The Mercury provides news and fun every single day—but your help is essential. If you believe Portland benefits from smart, local journalism and arts coverage, please consider making a small monthly contribution, because without you, there is no us. Thanks for your support!

Good afternoon, Portland! Monday with a little sunshine? Not so terrible! Now... THE NEWS.  

IN LOCAL NEWS:

• The Oregon Department of Justice and a group of law firms in the state announced Monday that they are launching a hotline that will provide free advice for people seeking access to abortion care—a potentially critical step in shoring up the state's reproductive care infrastructure as nearby states criminalize abortion. The hotline number is 503-431-6460. 

• You're not going to believe this, but... housing prices in the Portland area are falling? At least that's what happened in December, with the median home price falling by .7 percent compared to December of last year. Lest you think that's good news and you're finally going to be able to purchase your leafy estate in the West Hills, the Oregonian quotes economist Jerry Johnson who says "Affordability is much worse," and "You can’t afford as much home, or maybe you can’t afford a home at all." 🙁

• It's been an awfully sad few days for Trail Blazers broadcasting. The team's legendary play-by-play man Bill Schonley died at 93 on Saturday; two days before that, John Curry, the one of the club's longtime television cameramen, also died.  

The Goonies house in Astoria is off the market. The new owner is Behman Zakeri, a resident of Overland Park, Kansas who loves the film and tells OPB that he's committed to preserving the house and making fellow fans feel welcome there. Mazel tov to Mr Zakeri.

IN NATIONAL NEWS:

Another person injured in the mass shooting at a ballroom in Monterey Park, California, has died, bringing the total number of people killed in the shooting on Saturday night up to 11. Law enforcement officials still have not announced a suspected motive for the attack, which was perpetrated just hours after the city concluded its Lunar New Year festival.  

• Investigators in Brazil have identified Rubens Villar Coelho, nickname Colômbia, as the man who allegedly ordered the murders of British journalist Dom Phillips and renowned Indigenous activist Bruno Pereira in the Amazon last June. The murders were viewed as emblematic both of the dangers facing Indigenous environmental activists as well as the destructiveness of the Jair Bolsonaro era for the Amazon. 

• Speaking of dangers facing environmental activists—police say that they shot and killed 26-year-old activist Manuel Esteban Paez Terán outside of Atlanta, Georgia out of self-defense, but have not produced any evidence to back that up. Terán, known as Tortuguita, was protesting the construction of a massive police training facility in a forested area near the city. 

• Sen. Kyrsten Sinema's path to re-election as one of the most loathsome members of the U.S. Senate just got significantly harder with the announcement that Rep. Rueben Gallego is running for Sinema's seat as a Democrat—leaving Sinema, who just left the Democratic Party to become an Independent, facing the prospect of a three-person race without the support of a major party or more time to devote to her Facebook Marketplace habit

• Finally... welcome back to the work week.