Jessie Burke calls cops on Free Store
Old Town Community chair then claims she did it for PBOT
Jessie Burke stumbled over the videographer’s question.
Jessie Burke and Jonathan Cohen are Old Town’s power couple. They own real estate, operate businesses and lead the political affairs of their community.
Burke chairs the Old Town Community Association and Cohen is its treasurer, but their reach goes well beyond their corner of the city. Burke locked horns with Gov. Tina Kotek in 2023 over her appointment and dismissal from a task force to turn Portland’s downtown around.
But the dominant duo melded into the background last month after calling the police on a free food and clothing giveaway on Northwest Second Avenue early last month. When they call the police, they get action. About a dozen officers lined the street, prepared for whatever disruption the Portland Free Store Project and its homeless beneficiaries might bring.
Look for the complete story here tomorrow.
Jessie Burk is a true hero and a person to be embraced by anyone who really cares about their fellow human beings. Her life story is a testament to how dedication, education, and hard work can make a good life possible regardless of where a person starts.
She is an eloquent advocate for all the business owners whose lives have been negatively affected by the City’s neglect in helping the homeless get into permanent housing, and the complete inability of anyone who works for the City to stop the crime wave in Old Town that has been fueled by the use and sale of drugs in the area.She will meet with anyone interested in helping Old Town get back on its feet, and she always gives her full attention to whoever wants to praise, or complain about the situation and the remedies that they would like to see. This includes the homeless, many of whom she knows personally on a first name basis.
Anarchists, and their Antifa cousins, are destroyers, not healers, and the terrorist tactics displayed a few days ago against a Jewish owner of an Old Town hotel were a blatant race crime. The Portland I grew up in would not have allowed this to happen without bringing the perpetrators to justice. How have we fallen so far?
Allan, Your partial story is inflammatory and leads a reader to draw incorrect conclusions. Burke’s business was already targeted for vandalism and people were violently attacked. You seem to be fanning the flames of this vitriol.
Please read this:
https://thej.ca/2025/03/30/society-hotels-vandalized-in-apparent-antisemitic-attacks/