Live Blog: The Skanner Foundation Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Breakfast

Businessmen come from Spain to build a plant here to manufacture a chemical reducing pollution from diesel fuel. From left, Portland Housing Authority Board Chair Lee Moore, Jorge Tarazona and Miguel Figuero of the Tarazona Corporation, Portland City Commissioner Nick Fish, and Wayne Branch Tarazona Vice President for Operations.

LIVE BLOG; The Skanner Foundation Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Breakfast. Presenting Ellyn Angelotti from The Poynter Institute; Scholarship awards and the annual Drum Major for Justice award.
7:30 am and the crew are all here. The Skanner staff, crew from the North Portland Multimedia Training Center and from Portland Community Media. The event will be broadcast live -- Jason is finding our which channel.
Lisa Loving here with her Barbie doll videocam. "I got it at Fred Monster's," she's telling the keynote speaker Ellyn Angelotti. Can't wait to hear Ellyn's speech. She spent time in South Africa where she says everyone has a cell phone and uses it all the time -- that's 100 percent penetration.
8:03 Gov. Kitzhaber will be here after all. Last minute information.
8:27 Bobbie Foster is asking people to take their seats. 
Dr. King was truly an American hero. Talks about the day of service. The value of service -- a beloved community. Also The Skanner's mission: Challenging people to shape a better future now. Debora Kimborough leading everyone in the African American national anthem Lift Ev'ry Voice.
Beautiful voice. 
Bishop Grace Osborne with the invocation: We know that with your strength we shall prevail against the snares.. continue the fight for the dream so that it is not lost. Help us to trust and not be afraid.. Be with us as we celebrate the life and the legacy of the one and only Dr. Martin Luther King. 

Breakfast is served. I love this event because everywhere you look you see people talking in small groups, catching up with friends they haven't seen for a while and an atmosphere of celebration. On the podium I see Sen. Wyden, Commissioner Smith, Sen. Merkeley; Bishop Grace Osborne;...
Bobbie Foster, emcee is asking everyone to take their seats for the Skanner's video, showing scholarship winners talking about what they are doing now and how their studies have progressed. On screen now,  Johnna,  political science graduate now working at OHSU.  Now Asmeret, talking about her career as a pharmacist, and her research with Pharmacy faculty into MRSA infections. Unique talking about how important it is to know you have a community behind you rooting for your success. Now Dr. Mike Axley, OHSU anesthesiologist, and former investigative reporter with The Skanner News, saying how much he loves his work.

9:05 am Applause for the video: Bobbie Foster, "We are very proud of our scholarship winners... and the scholarships have meant a lot to the award winners." Introducing the honored guests at the podium:
Chair of Portland Housing authority, Lee Moore, Sen. Merkely, President and CEO of Legacy Dr. George Brown; Sen. Wyden; County chair Jeff Cogen; Metro leader Tom Hughes; County Commissioner Loretta Smith gets a huge cheer, John Jackley of the PDC; Bishop Osborne.  "Also we are honored to have Gov. John Kitzhaber". Governor stands and gets applause.
The lovely Debora Kimborough singing.
Jerry Foster introduces the keynote speaker: All seperate parts work together. Jerry with his actors deep voice is a natural speaker. He talks about the diversity he sees in the audience and Dr. King's dream of us all being judged by the content of our characters not the color of our skin. Now introducing Ellyn Angelotti, her research into mobile storytelling; her work at the Poynter institute, her awards; her social media expertise and how these tools can change our technology. She's also a law student as well as a professor. "Most innovative multimedia storyteller award.

9:19 Ellyn Angelotti: Dr. King's legacy lives and thrives in the

digital space. These tools can help us overcome the obstacles we face. They can help us celebrate Dr. Kings legacy. Free and low cost technology can further his dream by helping people connect all across the world. Tools like twitter require nothing more than the ability to send an sms message. Twitter account Dr King @MLK25 challenges people to commit 25 acts of service.
Talks about the Iran revolution, impacted by twitter. Shows a word cloud of Dr King's Dream speech. Freedom and Justice are among the largest words. Dr King recognized that the First Amendment was the essence of democracy. Both Dr King and journalists have used the First Amendment to keep government accountable and to spread the values and ideas of justice and democracy.
Shows us the map graphic of Facebook users. Building relationships among us overcoming time and distance to spread messages to more people than ever before. Says 18-29 year olds cite the web as their main resource.
Challenges: access to technology is still cost prohibitive to many and learning the technology still can be a barrier. Also we can limit our networks, thus limiting diversity. Cites last year's speaker Robin Morris Collins, on environmental justice.

Talks about the new model for news -- interactive with audience. To give our communities accurate voices, we must build a diversity of sources. Need for diversity in newsrooms. As our media landscape continues to evolve and anyone can publish, it is important for journalism to partner with the community as storytellers. Once a story is published it often continues via comments and social media. So a journalist becomes more of a sense-maker as well as a storyteller.
Shows graph showing access to news sources based on income. Broadband still far more prevalent in higher income and white homes, same for all kinds of high speed internet; mobile is, and must be, a priority to develop for community engagement -- taking cues from the civil rights era in creating networks and connections in our communities.
Social media empowers us with tools that help us engage inside and beyond our community. Let us channel Dr King's methods and messages as we empower ourselves with these tools.

Applause
Speaker sits. Applause. Welcome to Mayor Adams.
Lady Kitty Griffin with a musical presentation. From California, Lady Kitty is here with her play 'Emerge' about women's struggles to live fulfilled lives. Talks about the struggles of students, mothers, mistresses, the seven very different women that are featured in her play,

Now Bobbie Foster, managing editor of The Skanner News, introduces the scholarship portion of the breakfast.

Sponsors of the scholarships present awards to each student. (Part of the next section was written earlier and the scholarships are out of order.)

John Jackley, director of communications and equity at Portland Development Commission presents a scholarship to Sheena Dass a student at the University of Oregon.

Dr. George Brown president and CEO of Legacy Health System presents a scholarship to Maya Allen, a senior at Grant High School heading to Howard University. He says he is a doctor today because he had a Martin Luther King fellowship. He points out the persistence of health inequalities. Remmbers civil rights era: "We did not have social media back then -- in fact if it were not for Dr. King we would not have a free society where we could use social media. talks about the violence that existed during civil rights era -- beatings and lack of justice. "

Lee Moore of the Housing Authority of Portland presents a scholarship to Veronica Medhanie, a student at De La Salle Catholic High, who is heading to the University of Portland. He talks about the need to support youth in education and a new youth initiative from the Housing Authority.

Steve Unger chair of Oregon State Lottery, talks about Dr. King's statement that the purpose of education is to create critical thinkers. He presents scholarships to:

Marneet Lewis, a student at Concordia University;

Allyson Knapper, a student at St. Mary's Academy, heading to Rice University in Houston, Texas; 
Natalia Payne, can't be here but is studying at Morehouse College and aiming to be a pediatric oncologist.;
Kaitlan Purkapile, a student at Portland Community College;
Janice Norris, a manager at Wells Fargo Bank presents the award for Grambling University student, Duver Retherford, to his mother, Maureen Retherford;

Multnomah County chair Jeff Cogen presents a scholarship to Vernasha Williams, attending Portland Community College;
Doug Tweedy, CEO of the Pacific Northwest Regional Council of Carpenters presents the scholarship to Ralph Nickerson, who is accepting for Darrell Keyes, a student at Hampton University.
Dr. Norwood Knight Richardson, a psychiatrist who is chief administrative officer of Oregon Health and Science University
presents a scholarship to Arya Morman, student at Oregon State University.
Pat Reiten, president of Pacific Power, presents the scholarship for Shikara Lowe, a student at Georgetown University, to her sister Nancy Olson.
Elizabeth McCabe, Chief of Mission Integration presents a scholarship to Shantel Monk, studying at Spelman College.
Steve Frisby, division president of Safeway, presents a scholarship for Carl Acker, studying at Louisiana State University, to his mother Teena Acker.
Molly Nichols, special projects manager at Turner Construction, presents a scholarship for Deanna Hartley a student at Georgetown University to her sister Jessica Hartley.
Applause for the scholarship winners: Drum Major for Justice Award presented by Lisa Loving, editor of The Skanner News. Video of a speech by Dr King He wanted it to be said of Martin Luther King  "that he tried to love somebody... tried to feed the hungry.. tried to love and help humanity"...
Lisa Loving: Our future depends on the education and self-worth of our youth. Continuing our theme of technology. Honoring a nonprofit that's been working for 20 years to improve our community. This group has set up free computer labs in cafes, community centers and more. Free computer classes, teaching youth video production center. The Drum Major for Justice Award goes to Sabin Community Development,  accepted by the wonderful Craig Fondren-- "one of the bulwarks of this community."
Now to wrap up with Bernie Foster, president and publisher.
10:12 am  Bernie Thanking everyone and appreciating the elected officials. Special thanks to all of the sponsors. You are the ones who make this happen and you can see the talent we produce. Praises Mike Axley -- he's giving back and that's what we're all about here.
Thanking the escorts, ushers, Denise Peterson, PCC and Dr. Algie Gatewood. Dr King said : If a man hasn't discovered something he is willing to die for he isn't fit to live.  Healthcare passed because of our senators standing up for what they believed.
"A lot of you came here wondering who Bernie Foster was going to take a swing at this morning  - I'm not going to disappoint you."
Shows slides showing web traffic at The Skanner. Shows four spikes bringing 900,000 visitors in one day. All the stories were about the same issue  "Unemployment".
Our readers care about jobs. we received more than 500 comments on these articles It's a bread and butter issue. It's jobs, jobs and more jobs. Introduces visitors from Spain from the $100 million company Tarazona who are looking at bringing their business to N. Portland. Jorge Tarazona and MiguelAlso introduces Wayne Branch, who helped make this happen.

10:22 Lisa Loving talks about The Skanner's web innovations. Talks about the previous year's developments including our new section YOUR BEAT Eyes on the Street. You can post your own news to that page.
Also talks about Bernie's initiative to provide free internet wifi access to four miles radius around Cascade campus.
Credits our YouTube channel: we are looking for more ways to partner with youth. If you create your own videos, we will put them on our channel and publicize them.
Bernie talks about being a cancer survivor and encourages us all to contribute to cancer research.
The county has a world class youth programs, but the disaster preparedness falls short. We need outreach to  all of our communities. Tells Commissioner Loretta Smith,  "Your campaign slogan was Real Solutions for Real People, so we're counting on you."
Tells County Chair Cogen: Jeff we're counting on you to be accountable and responsible on disaster preparedness. But that's just an editorial opinion.  Tells the audience 'Put your name in the drawing to win one of these four disaster preparedness bags donated by the City and the Red Cross.
Flowers at the tables are from Avalon Flowers downtown -- This is a minority small business, he says, so support her. If your birthday is close to Jan 18, Dr King's birthday -- you get to take home the centerpiece.
Bernie closing his speech, says 'Thank you'.
Lottery: If you have a stamp on your program you get  a free ticket.
Benediction: Bishop Grace Osborne with the benediction "May the words of my mouth and the sentiments of my heart be acceptable to the father."

See you next year.

Photos taken with webcam inside the Convention Center ballroom: Better photos from real photographers will be available soon. This blog was cleaned up after the event -- spelling errors, typos and some errors fixed.