Hawthorne Auto

Get Cozy with Oregon HEAT

2012-02-26T16:48:00.007-08:00

Feeling good about your last oil change? Hawthorne Auto Clinic customers donated over 3000 gallons of used oil last year to provide funds for heating assistance to low income Oregonians, and most of them don't realize it! Oregon HEAT's Oil Recycling Program gets funds from donated oil drained from vehicles by shops and fleet garages and picked up for re-refining by a local company. Last year Oregon HEAT helped over 6000 household around the state keep warm when temperatures dropped.

Here's how it works: Oil and other petroleum - based fluids we drain from your vehicle, or oil you drain from your own vehicle and bring us to recycle, is transferred to our double-wall 300gal storage tank. Oregon Re-Refining Company (ORRCO) pumps out our full used oil storage tank every few weeks, and makes a donation to Oregon HEAT's Oil Recycling Program. The program provides payment for all types of heating fuels to clients in need.

Imagine what could happen if every car owner encouraged the shop changing their oil to donate used oil to Oregon HEAT, or switched to a facility supporting this program! Not only is the dirty oil getting rerefined to lube again, working toward energy independence in this era of rising crude oil prices, but more of our needy neighbors can keep their heat on.

- Liz Dally & Jim Houser

2011-12-07T13:59:00.000-08:00

December 1, 2011

Avakian Honors Outstanding Oregon Employers

BOLl chiefnames 2011 champions in civil rights and worliforce development

PORTLAND- Today, State Labor Commissioner Brad Avakian, head of the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries (BOLI), presented the 3^rd Annual BOLI Business Leadership Awards at BOLI's 27^th Annual Employment Law Conference at the Oregon Convention Center. This year, two Oregon employers were recognized for their significant contributions to our communities and their embodiment of BOLI's mission: to protect employment rights, advance employment opportunities, and protect access to housing and public accommodations free from discrimination. This year's honorees are:

Civil Rights Champion - Hawthorne Auto Clinic of Portland

Hawthorne Auto co-owners Jim Houser and Liz Dally were nominated for their efforts to foster a more livable community. Houser's work to increase small business employees' access to healthcare and to provide career paths in mechanical fields for diverse youth, and Dally's support for BradleyAngle House and leadership on workplace protections for victims of domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking-a civil right enforced by BOLI, coupled with their business commitment to the environment as a certified Eco-Logical Business, helped earn Hawthorne Auto this year's Civil Rights Champion award.

Workforce Development Champion - SE Works of Portland

For 14 years, SE Works has helped build positive connections between job seekers and employers. The extraordinary efforts of SE Works to assist job seekers, especially low-income, multi-barriered individuals, in seeking and applying for jobs have also translated to strong relationships with employer who will reach out to SE Works when they need reliable help. The range of services and programs offered by SE Works helped to set them apart as this year's Workforce Development Champion.

Avakian created the BOLI Business Leadership Awards in 2009 to recognize the good work that Oregon's employers do every day for the community, their workers, and the future of Oregon's economy.

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The mission of the Bureau of Labor and Industries is to protect employment rights, advance employment opportunities, and protect access to housing and public accommodations free from discrimination.

Here's our acceptance speech:

(Liz says employment discrimination has worked for her, because without it, she never would have gone into business)

We are honored but a little flabbergasted to be chosen for this award. I must confess that we have no hundred page corporate civil rights policy, no full time paid lobbyist for just causes, and no ambitious multifaceted retraining program for the disadvantaged.

After all, we are a 13 person small business and have no direct effect outside our shop except by using whatever influence we have, as gadfly to our industry and advocate for the community.

For the past 29 years a focus of our enterprise has been developing a workplace which functions for the benefit of our customers, our employees, and our neighborhood. Although occasionally we do show a profit, and fiscal stability is necessary, obsession with “the bottom line” for its own sake clearly causes real harm in our society.

To our colleagues who whine “But I’m just a small business person, I can’t afford to…(fill in the blank here: offer health insurance, make accommodation for the worker who is also a caregiver, or hire an apprentice)” we make this challenge: Get creative, think about what you can do, because together, all of us small business people will make a difference.

Getting to One Million Electric Vehicles

2011-11-08T12:39:00.000-08:00

"We can break our dependence on oil... and become the first country to have one million electric vehicles on the road by 2015. The future is ours to win."
- President Barack Obama, State of the Union address, January 2011

Getting to a million E.V.s (ElectricVehicles) quickly is both an important goal and a daunting challenge that has less to do with the ambition than with its achievement. A community can seemingly do all the right things to get prepared by enlisting vehicle and charging providers, aligning public policy, and identifying financial incentives and yet still miss the target. Why? Because the willingness and interest of the driving and buying public can be as important as the volatility of oil prices and the pace of battery advancements . The reality is,

EV adoption depends upon the vehicle buyers.

On November 2^nd and 3^rdJohn Mayer, Hawthorne Auto Clinic intern, and I attended EV Roadmap 4: Getting to a Million, the latest in a twice yearly series produced by Portland State University and Portland General Electric to advance transportation electrification. This fall’s EV Roadmap considered the challenge of reaching one million EVs on US roads by examining what motivates consumers to adopt them. Through a combination of activities – panel discussions, expert presentations, a live focus group, and breakout discussions – we considered our own commitment to EV adoption and explored the role we each might play through 2015.

The EV adoption issues we considered:

· Is the 2015 one million EV goal doable, and is the target number for Oregon, 30,000 EVs, realistic?

· What are consumers’ perceptions of the strengths and weaknesses of EVs, and how do we respond positively to their misconceptions and reservations?

· How do we understand the ways different types of drivers might be induced to consider an EV?

· What influence do fuel prices and various government incentives have on EV buying decisions?

· How are groups regionally and nationally addressing this challenge, and how can we work together to help each other?

We learned about Portland’s own Electric Avenue at Portland State University: http://pdx.edu/electricavenue/. Be sure to visit and see what’s charging.

The Oil Shockwave exercise conducted by a representative of Securing America’s Future Energy brought us back to Earth with the realization of the depth of our continuing dependence on oil. Get scared at: http://secureenergy.org/

We learned about electric vehicle initiatives taking place in other parts of the country, like New York City: http://www.nyc.gov/html/planyc2030/html/home/home.shtml

We examined ways to create our own EV social movement through projects like Plug In America’s: http://www.plug inamerica.org/

And we met the right people in the Portland Transportation Bureau and PGE to, hopefully, finally install a curbside charging station at Hawthorne Auto Clinic. I will follow up with further updates as our charging station project moves forward.

-Jim Houser

Prius Day at PCC

2011-06-20T19:02:00.000-07:00

The Portland area has a very active Meetup Group, http://www.meetup.com/PortlandHSD/ , for Toyota hybrid fans, organized and administered by the very capable Bill Merchant. On Saturday, June 18, 2011, the Portland HSD (Hybrid Synergy Drive) group met at Portland Community College (PCC), Sylvania Campus, in the automotive department.

For the past few years PCC/Automotive has been creating a gas/electric hybrid technician training program. PCC recently hosted several train-the-trainer, week-long classes devoted to hybrid HV battery maintenance and reconditioning and hybrid motor/generator diagnosis and trending. Their hybrid training initiative has been featured recently in local media.

http://www.portlandtribune.com/sustainable/story.php?story_id=128665449769081800

PCC hosted our HSD group to demonstrate the new test equipment they have acquired and to show off their staff-created cutaway Gen. II Prius designed for technician training. Over 20 Portland HSD members were in attendance. The presentation was led by Carl Thompson, retired PCC/ASEP automotive instructor and Kim Kittinger, PCC automotive instructor. Carl made the Power Point presentation and both instructors participated in pointing out the different hybrid HV batteries and other components on display.

Gary Gaunke, Portland HSD and OEVA (Oregon Electric Vehicle Association) member, also brought his new all-electric Nissan Leaf to display.

The Portland HSD Meetup Group meets the third Saturday of every month, usually at a local roadhouse, to socialize and discuss our experiences with our Toyota hybrid vehicles. New faces with an interest in hybrids are always welcome.

Report on 2011 State of the Union Address

2011-02-10T19:43:00.000-08:00

On January 25 I had the honor of attending the 2011 State of the Union Address as a guest of President and First Lady Obama. The previous week I had taken a call from the White House at my business, Hawthorne Auto Clinic that I co-own with my wife Liz Dally, asking me to join the First Lady in her box overlooking the U. S. House of Representative’s chamber in the Capitol. Military heroes, victims of the attempted assassination tragedy in Tucson, representatives of business, education and our government were among the 20 invited guests. On the evening of the Address, guests and family members (my daughter, Helen Dally, was able to join me) arrived at the gates of the White House. After a brief transit through security we were assigned a staff member who led us to our reception in the first floor Entrance Hall where we were graciously welcomed by Ms. Obama.

At 8pm, while family members (accompanied by Bo, the Obama family dog) remained behind to watch the Address on TV from the Blue Room, the invited guests were escorted to waiting vans and were sped, with lights and sirens, to the Capitol. The First Lady’s joined us after arriving with the President. We watched from our box as members of Congress entered, followed by several members of the Supreme Court, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the President’s cabinet, and finally, the President.

The President’s speech did not disappoint. He laid out a plan for focused investments in education and infrastructure, emphasizing America’s competitive advantage in, among other areas, green technologies. He challenged Americans to put aside partisan differences and he directed our government to achieve savings by freezing most spending and improving efficiencies.

But it was President Obama’s emphasis on his health care reform accomplishment, The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) that most captured my attention. The reality is that most Americans under 65 rely on their employers for health care coverage and most Americans work for small businesses. Employee benefits, like health care, are important when competing for the best employees. Small businesses don’t have the clout to negotiate for lower health insurance premium prices the way large employers can. Over the last decade, health care costs have become a crushing weight for small businesses and many have dropped coverage all together. My company provides health care coverage for our 9 full-time employees and their families. Our premiums have doubled over the last 8 years to now equal $90,000, over 20% of payroll. The PPACA is already providing major health insurance premium relief to many of the 4 million eligible small businesses all across the country. According to our accountant we will be receiving a 2010 tax credit over $5,000 to help us pay our increased premiums. And there are even greater health care reforms slated to take effect in 2014.

As we returned to the White House following the Address I was struck by how truly unique our democracy is. Those of us joining Ms. Obama were not famous celebrities or major campaign contributors. In nearly every way we were a representative cross section of our citizenry. My fellow invitees and I participated in a Constitutionally mandated official duty of our President. The invitation to attend the State of the Union Address as a guest of our First Lady was a great honor.

Jim Houser
Hawthorne Auto Clinic, Inc.

My New Best Friend

2010-09-27T11:10:00.000-07:00

On September 22, 2010 I had the incredible good fortune to travel to Washington, DC to to join an informal backyard gathering with President Obama and over a dozen other participants from around the country who will benefit from the new health care protections that went into effect on September 23. We came to share our stories of how the ACA (Affordable Care Act) and its Patient’s Bill of Rights will improve our own and our families’ health as well as the financial well-being of our country’s small businesses. The President spent well over an hour listening to people tell their stories of how the health care reform provisions will improve their lives, sometimes dramatically. I met people who no longer face denial of coverage because they have a pre-existing medical condition or have exceeded their lifetime health insurance limit. In attendance were young people who will continue to be covered by their parent’s insurance policy until they turn 26 and people who will benefit from not having to pay co-pays or deductibles for recommended preventive care.

The significance of the new law for Hawthorne Auto Clinic is that we will be able to continue fully funding our employees’ and their families’ health care coverage. Our company is one of over 4 million small businesses now eligible for the new health care tax credits. Our health care costs for our employees and their families had reached 20% of payroll: an unsustainable burden. The effect of this tax credit for our company will be to return our health care expenses to 2008 levels – a major cost reduction. My visit with President Obama was truly remarkable and I was most impressed with how hard he and his administration have been working to address our health care crisis and make these health insurance reforms a reality.

During our visit the President remarked on the challenge of providing Americans with the information necessary to take advantage of the new health care law. In my research before making this trip I was surprised to learn how few Americans actually know what the ACA provides. Not surprisingly I also learned that the special interests who want to overturn this reform and return control of our health to the insurance companies have outspent, in radio, TV and print advertising, supporters of the Patient’s Bill of Rights by large margins. Though we may not be able to affect the spending ratio of the anti-health reform big insurance companies and their allies, I intend to do my part to help all Americans understand and take advantage of this new health care reform law.

To learn the facts about how the ACA will enable all to take control of their health care needs, access the new law’s details at http://www.whitehouse.gov/ . For a non-partisan evaluation of the ACA, the respected Kaiser Family Foundation Web site has excellent information at http://healthreform.kff.org/. To learn how the ACA can help America’s 4 million small businesses provide health insurance coverage for their employees, check http://mainstreetalliance.org/wordpress/ .

Jim Houser, co-owner Hawthorne Auto Clinic, Inc.

OIL MOLECULES DON'T WEAR OUT

2010-06-11T18:55:00.000-07:00

Re-refined oil? Does that mean you drain the oil from someone else's car and put it in mine? Sounds sketchy! Well, yes and no.... Last month we completed the switch from using virgin oil in the most commonly specified grades, 5w-20, 5w-30, and 10w-30, to using re-refined oil in our oil changes at Hawthorne Auto Clinic. So we better have a good explanation.

The process of creating base stocks for re-refined oil begins with the collection of used oil drained from customer vehicles at our shop and and many others. This oil, contaminated with moisture, engine wear products, and chemical byproducts of combustion, is transported to the refinery. In a process similar to that of refining crude oil, but using 85% less energy, it is converted into re-refined base oil, and combined with an additive package similar to that used for virgin oil.

First stop is the dehydration unit, where water,

gasoline, and other light-boiling components are "flashed out" of the feedstock. Next, vacuum distillation strips away diesel fuels and gas oils which can be used in asphalt roofing and refinery fuel. Dirt, polymers, heavy metals and other contaminants are removed from the resulting base lube stock by the thin-film evaporator. Hydrofinishing uses hydrogen to remove sulfur and chlorine compounds, purifying the base stock. Finally, an additive package is blended in to produce oil that meets or exceeds auto manufacturers' warranty requirements and the American Petroleum Institute's motor oil specifications.

Because a part of our mission at Hawthorne Auto Clinic is to help our customers get the

maximum lifespan from their vehicles, it's important to us that re-refined oil meets the latest API SM and ILSAC GF-4 specifications. Most governmental agencies as well as corporations like UPS and Frito-Lay use it in fleets (the US Postal Service has used it for over 10 years), Mercedes Benz uses it as factory fill in new cars, and it even sees use on the NASCAR circuit. We have been using it in our own vehicles and by customer request for a number of years and have never seen any engine problems related to its use. That said, some manufacturers do require full synthetic or other specialty oils to meed warranty requirements for several models, and we always confirm we are recommending oil specified by the manufacturer when we are changing a customer's oil.

Environmental degradation associated with the production and use of petroleum is much in the news lately, and obviously the solution must be multifaceted. In addition, it's estimated that more than 350 million gallons of used motor oil is disposed of improperly each year, mostly a gallon at a time by do-it-yourselfers, and is thought to cause more than 40% of the total oil pollution of our waterways. Before the re-refining process became common, much oil from shops was either burned on-site for heat or collected to burn as fuel elsewhere, adding heavy metal emissions and greenhouse gases to our atmosphere. Help close the loop - use re-refined oil in your vehicle.

(Information in this post came from Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, State of California Dept. of General Services, Undercar Magazine, and Vehicle MD Magazine)

Who Will Fix Your Car?

2010-05-03T19:50:00.000-07:00

Who will fix your car five or ten years from now? Maybe you’ve noticed your mechanic’s hair turning grey, or perhaps disappearing entirely. Perhaps you’ve observed that your neighborhood high school no longer offers auto shop, that fewer young people are spending time in the driveway or family garage working on their “ride”.

These days community colleges provide the primary training ground for auto repair technicians. Students often enter several years after leaving high school, having realized that minimum wage work doesn’t provide much satisfaction or future, but without the support needed to successfully complete the two-year automotive technology program. Instructors tell stories of students living in their cars, subsisting on a diet of ramen, dropping out because a spouse lost a job.

For over twenty years the Association of Women in Automotive has raised money for scholarships for students in the automotive program at Portland Community College. You can help us by attending our plant sale this Saturday, May 8, in the parking lot at Hawthorne Auto Clinic, 4307 SE Hawthorne Blvd. from 8:30AM to 3:00PM. We are offering colorful annuals, vegetable starts, perennial divisions from members’ gardens, some natives, and even a smattering of rummage!

All proceeds go to assist automotive students. You can help a young person preparing for a career that pays a living wage, offers healthcare and other benefits, and performs a useful function in the community – keeping your vehicle in safe operating condition.

Liz Dally

President, Hawthorne Auto Clinic, Inc.

2010-01-26T11:16:00.000-08:00

Today's Oregonian, 1/26/2010, published a commentary I submitted (http://www.oregonlive.com/opinion/index.ssf/2010/01/health_care_reform_changing_th.html) . Since there were some errors in their editing I thought I would post my original submission.

"As the final details are being negotiated on the health care reform legislation, I can’t help but think back to a year ago when I began to speak out on this issue. As a small business owner, getting involved in advocating for health care reform was an easy choice for me. Sure, I was inspired by the historic election of President Obama last year and excited by his early commitment to make health care reform a priority. But that wasn’t the clincher.

Just before the President was sworn in, I got a notice that our insurance rates were going up 13%. Well, it’s that time of year again and last week I got this year’s bad news: another 11% hike. You do the math and it’s scary: our staff’s health care costs now exceed $90,000 a year, an increase of 100 percent over the last eight years. It’s that kind of math that produced another auto mechanic for health care reform: yours truly.

My wife and I have operated our auto repair business for 27 years. We’ve always offered health insurance for our employees, not just because it’s the right thing to do, but also because it makes good business sense.

Cars are very complex and, in our industry, servicing them properly requires high-level employees. We need well-trained technicians who pay close attention to detail. Our workers are very skilled and very committed. We have people on our team who’ve worked here twenty years; our longest-serving employee just retired after 26 years. I don’t want my customers to even think about going anywhere else but our shop… and I really don’t want my technicians to think of going anywhere else either.

We offer full health care coverage for all our regular employees and their families, but the premiums far outstrip any reasonable cost for what we receive. With that 100 percent increase over the last eight years, rising health insurance costs hinder our ability to provide well-deserved raises and other needed benefits. While good health care coverage helps us keep good employees, the increased cost of health insurance premiums is unsustainable.

The game of health care is rigged against small businesses in two key ways that need to be fixed.

First, as a small business that pays for good coverage for our employees, the expense puts us at a competitive disadvantage to other similar businesses that shirk that responsibility. We need reform to level the playing field for business owners like me by calling on all employers to step up, to be responsible employers and do their part. The final bill must ensure a system of shared responsibility so that small businesses—the engine of our economy—can compete and thrive.

Second, small businesses have no bargaining power in the current structure of state-based small group health insurance markets. The insurance companies have us over a barrel. That’s why we need a national health insurance exchange where businesses and individuals can shop for coverage that meets our needs. A national exchange will give us real options: a wide array of competing providers offering different plans with varying benefit levels and prices. No more discrimination based on pre-existing conditions. Plans will have to be certified and meet a basic standard of benefits. The exchange will give us the benefit of real choices with the bargaining power that only large employers enjoy now.

The bill Congress is poised to pass is historic. Sure, we could find a hundred and one things in it to complain about, but what we have is an inspiring start, the beginning of a process to fix our broken health care system. We should not allow a minority of politicians who are dead-set against meaningful reform to derail this hard-won legislation. For me as a small business owner, this long-overdue health care reform can’t come soon enough."

Health Care Horror Stories

2009-10-05T20:32:00.000-07:00

On Saturday, September 19^th, we had the honor of hosting Senator Jeff Merkley at our shop for a roundtable discussion on the failing state of our current health care system. In attendance were two Oregonians who described to the Senator how the current health care system has abandoned them. One young woman, with a tumor growing at the base of her brain, has no coverage for her needed surgery. She has exhausted the limits of her insurance coverage even before all of the medical tests have been completed. Another woman, whose insurance company dropped the professional association group plan she was covered by, denied her coverage on an individual plan because of a pre-existing condition, high cholesterol. I had the opportunity to explain how the health insurance premiums we pay for our employees and their families have doubled in the last few years to now exceed 18% of payroll. These skyrocketing insurance premium costs are unsustainable for a small business such as ours.

Senator Merkley explained how the health care reform proposal adopted by the Senate HELP Committee that he serves on will end limits to insurance coverage, end denial of coverage for pre-existing conditions, and provide an Exchange and a Public Insurance Plan that will help control costs for small businesses.

Channels 2, 6 and 8, covered the roundtable. You can catch a Channel 6 video clip here:

http://www.koinlocal6.com/content/mediacenter/default.aspx?videoId=12263@koin.dayport.com&navCatId=156

Our Jim Speaks At Health Care Reform Rally

2009-09-01T19:10:00.000-07:00

At Hawthorne Auto Clinic we've always been committed to providing full health care coverage to our co-workers and their families. However the cost of health care premiums has risen to an unsustainable level. Something must be done to control the cost of health care. On Saturday, August 29th, a major health care reform rally, attended by over 800 people, was held in downtown Portland at Terry Shrunk Plaza. Our own Jim Houser was asked to address the group on behalf of Oregon small businesses. Following is the text of his remarks.

When my wife, Liz Dally, and I opened Hawthorne Auto Clinic 26 years ago we made the commitment to offer those who worked with us a good benefits package, including comprehensive health care.

Health care is a major issue for small businesses like ours, and especially for those of us in the auto repair business. We're in a high-skill field where being able to offer good benefits to keep good people is very important. Plus, we're an aging profession. These factors make health care critically important.

We offer full health care coverage for all our regular employees and their families, but the premiums far outstrip any reasonable cost for what we receive. Our staff's health care premiums now exceed 18% of payroll. A 100% increase over the last 8 years. Good health care coverage helps us keep good employees but the increased cost of health insurance premiums is unsustainable.

When President Obama announced he was going to make health care reform an early focus of his administration I was suddenly hopeful. When I was contacted by the Oregon Small Business Council I saw the opportunity to become involved. And when the U.S. House Tri-Committee proposed their comprehensive health care reform bill that included a strong public health insurance option, I was committed.

The Oregon Small Business Council, with over 400 members statewide, is an affiliate of the national Main Street Alliance with over 9000 members in 20 states. Earlier this summer the Main Street Alliance provided the opportunity for 3 members of the OSBC to join 60 other business people from around the country to travel to Washington, DC for 2 days of meetings with each of our states Congressional delegations to lobby for meaningful health care reform.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank Senator Merkley and Representatives Wu, Schrader and De Fazio for making themselves and their staff available to listen to our concerns and answer our questions. I was especially proud that our own Representative Earl Blumenauer agreed to host our Main Street Alliance town hall meeting attended by all 60 plus delegates.

So this is what I have learned from my trip to DC and from the last several months of my involvement in this health care reform campaign:

Our health care system is badly broken and without meaningful reform more people will lose health care coverage and our country’s economic situation will worsen.

Small businesses are the economic engine of this country and they, and their employees, will bear the brunt of any failure to pass real health care reform.

Small businesses will gain economically from the changes proposed by the HR3200.

Most small businesses owners are willing to support a health care reform package that offers affordable costs, guaranteed coverage, a shared commitment, and real choices.

The only effective way to provide real choice and control ever-increasing insurance premium costs is with the competition that can only be provided by a strong public health insurance option. Despite all the confusion sown during the Congressional recess, over 70% of Americans still support the Public Health Insurance Option.

One final observation. There are some in Congress who argue that increased government regulation of the for-profits insurance companies with their policies of exclusion and rescission, will be sufficient to control bad practices. They say the additional competition provided by the public option isn’t necessary. But this is what I know. In most of this country, and in most of Oregon, health insurance is provided by a monopoly, by cartels. I ask you to consider our own for-profits electric power monopoly PGE, which is regulated by the Oregon PUC. Last year PGE’s CEO, Peggy Fowler, received a whopping $4.3 million dollars in compensation. Across the Columbia River in Vancouver electric power is provided by the publicly owned Clark PUD. Clark PUD’s highest paid executive, Wayne Nelson, made do with $220,000 dollars in compensation last year. Government regulation of a monopoly is never going to provide the same level of cost control that competition from a strong public option will provide.

In closing, I thank you, and those who work with me at our shop thank you, for such a large and committed voice for real health care reform, including a strong public health insurance option.

First blog!

2009-07-24T10:44:00.000-07:00

Hello and welcome to Hawthorne Auto Clinic's blog!

While we are getting things set up over here, you should check out our twitter at www.twitter.com/hawthorneauto and join our Facebook buisness and fan pages.