After 16 months of careful construction and equipment installation, the Oregon Zoo's new Veterinary Medical Center will open its doors on Thursday, Jan. 19. The public can peek inside Jan. 20-22, when the zoo will offer behind-the-scenes tours.

On Dec. 8, 2011, Metro Council approved funding to construct an 18-hole disc golf course at Metro’s Blue Lake Regional Park. The course design will be the first gold-level disc golf course in the Portland metropolitan area.

Leftovers, schmeftovers! Throughout the four-day Thanksgiving weekend, Oregon Zoo animals will gobble their way through their very own Beast Feast, a cornucopia of enrichment activities and treats aimed at stimulating their minds and stomachs.

With the recent adoption of its first-ever green building policy, Metro has set new sustainability standards for all the agency’s facilities and developed properties, from regional parks, solid waste transfer stations and the Oregon Zoo to venues such as the Portland Expo Center and Oregon Convention Center.

The sashings were part of ceremonies across the state commemorating the 1912 law allowing Oregon women the right to vote. After five unsuccessful attempts, Oregon voters finally passed the law and became the seventh state granting women suffrage through a ballot initiative process.

One of my roles as a Metro Councilor is to serve as a liaison to the Intertwine Alliance. What is the Intertwine, anyway?

The Oregon Zoo’s Asian elephant Rose-Tu is pregnant, zoo officials announced today. The 17-year-old pachyderm, who gave birth to Samudra in 2008, is expected to deliver another member of the zoo’s celebrated elephant family in late 2012.

Today the Metro Council voted 6-0 to add 1985 acres to the region’s urban growth boundary for future housing and jobs. (Councilor Rex Burkholder was excused.) This represents less than a one-percent expansion of the region’s urban footprint to accommodate thousands of additional households and workers over the next 20 years.

Metro’s voter-approved Natural Areas Program started the fall with a flurry of land acquisitions, from the west side of the region to the east side. New natural areas build on Metro’s work in several areas that have been focal points of the 2006 natural areas bond measure.

Bright orange tags that declare “This item has been illegally dumped,” are appearing on discarded sofas, mattresses and other bulky items left on street corners as part of a new effort to stop illegal dumping, clean up neighborhoods and reduce costs to Metro’s solid waste rate payers.