"Take your hat off, boy!" You hear the stories of how the City of Portland makes even the smallest of businesses [like ours] pay for improvements to its beautification. When we picked up our plans over two and a half years ago and paid COP for the final permits to finish Shift Drinks' build-out, it was a shock to see handwritten in red ink on the blueprints that we had to add two new trees [a zinger of an unexpected expense $7,200.00]. We didn't have the funds, but to contest the impromptu mandate would have meant waiting even longer to start building [and time is money]. So, we scrambled and raised the cash. This used to be a painful memory, BUT watching tree No. 1, which is right in front of our east windows, grow instep with our business is strangely comforting.