Amelia Templeton

Salem Health in Oregon is a major hospital, but the omicron onslaught has strained the staff like never before. Still, they show up. For the patients, and for each other. And some see signs of hope.

Salem Hospital in Oregon has been crowded for weeks. Patients are doubled up in rooms. Nurses experience panic over the workload and sadness over the unvaccinated. Then they get back to work.

Oregonians voted to become the first state to decriminalize the personal possession of illegal drugs, including cocaine, heroin, oxycodone and methamphetamine. The measures passed by a wide margin.

Oregon's governor put a one-week pause on reopening due to a growth in COVID-19 cases. Arizona's governor, despite a big spike of cases in his state, is defying requests to slow reopening.

As rents rise, Portland is making it easier for homeowners to build small houses in their backyards and enable people who would be priced out to stay.

Some in the community of Burns, Ore., welcome the attention on long-running conflict between ranchers and the federal government. Others question the out-of-town militants' tactics and goals.

Researchers at Crater Lake National Park in Oregon have been documenting the park's soundscape. But human-caused noises, like airplanes, are making it harder to hear.

For the first time in more than a century, Umatilla tribe members from northeast Oregon go on a hunt for bison. It's part of an effort to revive traditions that were once the heart of the tribe's religion and economy.

Although the city is slowly growing more diverse, it still remains one of the most homogeneous big cities in the U.S. Many of the residents are young, white professionals, most of whom are not from there. What has helped keep Portland majority white? Its whiteness.