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Natural
Resistance: Damming Options 'The rule of intelligent
tinkering is not to lose any of the parts.'
Viewpoint:
Scrutinizing LMD Public needs accurate information.
Viewpoint:
Radical Retail We might have to buy something from time to
time.
Letters:
EW readers sound off.
Damming
Options
'The
rule of intelligent tinkering is not to lose any of the parts.'
I was standing on an ice-skinned ledge above a
cataract of boulders on
Icicle Creek, in the Cascades of western
Washington. Dick Rieman, retired United Airlines pilot, was showing
me the routes he thought a bull trout or steelhead might use to access
great rearing habitat above. He had come to this spot every week throughout
one year, to photograph it at different water flows. "Of course, I
only did that once a week," he said. "Who knows what routes might
have been obvious on the days I wasn't here? I figure when bull trout
and steelhead used to come this far and were blocked, they would wait
and wait. And then, one day, the water flow would be just right to
open up a route — maybe one right there — and they would
leap up above, to great habitat."
But Rieman can only guess, because bull trout and
steelhead have been blocked from using their skills here for 60 years.
Rieman is one of several folks who have devoted their past six years
scheming how to re-open, for the first time in 60 years, the upper
21 miles of Icicle Creek and its tributaries. Chinook and coho salmon,
steelhead and bull trout, sea lamprey, whitefish, bridge-lipped suckers,
and all those who would feed on them could return. It might be streamlined
wild bull trout and steelhead who could make it this high on Icicle
Creek and over this boulder barrier, on some propitious day. We know
they have spent thousands of years learning how to make use of just
such upper river moments.
In 1939, five fish-blocking dams were built downstream
from this boulder patch, in a wide spot on Icicle Creek, to service
the soon-to-open Leavenworth hatchery. The hatchery was being built
in a futile attempt to make up for the Grand Coulee Dam, which blocked
1,200 miles of the Columbia River. The uppermost of the five Icicle
Creek dams diverted water flowing downstream to the hatchery and the
lowest dam blocked fish swimming upstream. The middle three dams created
ponds intended to capture and hold trapped adults until their spawn
ripened and their eggs and milt were taken to the hatchery, where
the fertilized eggs were incubated, reared to smolt stage, and released.
Two ponds were never used and the lowest one was abandoned in 1979
in favor of a fish ladder, which routes all salmon directly into the
hatchery. But all five dams still stand, in concrete rigidity, denying
wild fish the ability to travel up and down the full length of Icicle
Creek, mate, reproduce and deliver ocean nutrients to the forests
and their bodies to a host of predators.
If Rieman and his intrepid friends succeed as planned,
the three holding-pond dams will be dismantled in 2003 and the upper
and lower two dams will be opened part of each year, allowing for
wild fish options once again.
As I stood above the wild, ever-changing complexity
of this upper Icicle Creek boulder run, it reminded me of the single
most important element of social and biological life that we can defend
and promote: the retention of multiple routes and options. Ecologically,
Aldo Leopold perhaps said it best, "The rule of intelligent tinkering
is not to lose any of the parts." Every piece represents options.
Socially, perhaps our National Environmental Policy Act requires the
best process: Consider all reasonable alternatives.
As we dam, log, mine, plow, straighten, level,
pave, bomb, poison, and overpopulate the world, we are dismantling
the library of environmental options each species and each habitat
represents. As we place the money economy, corporations, free trade,
and military might on thrones, we crush alternative routes to hearing
and caring for each other, functioning as communities, and making
public decisions.
We may, like the wild bull trout, have incredible
skills and strategies as individuals, but if the river of public democracy
in which we could bring forth these skills and strategies has been
dammed and diverted into the private domains of a global military-industrial-free
trade complex, we lose our ability to effectively use our skills.
We shouldn't be damming our options — neither
in our rivers, nor in our society. And we need to strategically dismantle
many of those that have been built. We'll have to think outside of
the holding ponds we've been put in.
Mary O'Brien has worked as a public interest scientist
for the past 20 years. She can be reached at mob@efn.org
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Scrutinizing
LMD
Public
needs accurate information.
Is land use controversial? Absolutely. People care
about land use issues. At stake are people's finances, homes and
environment. However, Norm Maxwell's Viewpoint in EW Nov. 7
contained inaccuracies. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion.
But, facts differ from opinions — facts can be proven.
The public requires accurate information about Lane
County's Land Management Division (LMD). There are important changes
in the works for the division. In September a new task force was convened
to scrutinize LMD's programs and recommend changes to the Board of
Commissioners. This is represented by a wide range of stakeholders
including LandWatch, Board of Realtors, Lane County Planning Commission,
1000 Friends of Oregon, citizens, Eugene Home Builders Association,
Public Works, commissioners and county administrator, and Lane County
Human Resources. It is important that we collaborate to make land
use process work for everyone.
To set the record straight:
Item #1: The performance audit findings are part
of the reasons Lane County is clamoring for more bonds and levies
to be funded by increased property taxes. Fact: There are no property
taxes funding LMD activities. The division was reorganized as a fee-based
division a decade ago. LMD permit processing is supported by application
fees and Title III federal reimbursement. Performance audit findings
have nothing to do with the ballot measures. The six ballot measures
were for capital projects to support public safety emergency communications,
jail improvements, courthouse plaza improvements, parks improvements,
public health building, and planetarium. None of these items contained
funding for Land Management.
Item #2: Viewpoint implied that LMD does not put
out sound legal land use decisions conforming with Oregon land use
laws. Fact: By definition, land use decisions are decisions where
discretion is exercised. Findings of fact and conclusions of law are
provided in support of each land use decision and notice is given
to surrounding property owners.
Item #3. LMD land use decisions cost taxpayer dollars
defending developers' highly questionable development plans. Facts:
LMD has been a fee-based division for approximately 10 years. Permit
processing is supported by application fees and Title III federal
reimbursement. There are no property taxes funding LMD activities.
Development plans are proposed to the LMD. However, many plans are
rejected by LMD and those that are approved are usually changed extensively
from the original proposal to address code requirements and other
legal issues.
Item #4: LMD does not provide notice to affected citizens.
The facts: A land use decision is not final until it has been noticed
to affected parties. Who is affected is determined by the process
within which the decision is made. If the process is quasi-judicial,
the notice is required to be mailed to all surrounding property owners
within 750 feet of a resource land designation (agricultural or forest
land) or 500 feet of a developed or committed land use designation
(residential, commercial, industrial). If the process involves a public
hearing, there is a requirement that notice be mailed to all parties
of record. A 12-day appeal period begins upon the notice being mailed.
If there are no timely appeals filed, the decision becomes final.
Item #5: It costs up front $3,000 (just to start)
for a dissatisfied citizen to try to challenge a questionable action.
Fact: For the first evidentiary hearing of an appeal it costs $310.
Appeals on the record are $1,810.
Item #6: The hearings official is a county employee.
Fact: The hearings official is provided through a contract for services
with the Lane Council of Governments. Application fees pay for this.
The hearings official is not a county employee.
Item #7: The county staff lawyer is funded by the
taxpayers.Fact: County counsel for LMD is paid by fee revenue that
is collected from application fees, not taxes.
Items #8-9: The 2001 audit was a performance audit
and that it cost $90,000. Facts: In 2001, an external audit was done
on the surveyors program and an internal audit was done on reporting
on cash handling procedures. The internal audit carried forward progress
on the 1993 internal audit, which was a permit processing performance
audit. The surveyors program audit cost $77,230, a portion of which
was charged to that program. No costs were incurred by the planning
or building programs.
Item #10: The 2001 audit recommended LMD needed to
establish a coherent land use policy. Fact: It was a 1993 permit processing
audit recommendation that the county commissioners should establish
a comprehensive land use and development policy framework for Lane
County.
Land use decisions by nature are high-charged issues.
People's livelihoods, finances and homes are on the line. Let's commit
to an accurate public discussion.
Anna Morrison is a county commissioner representing
western Lane County. She can be reached at Anna.Morrison@co.lane.or.us
or 682-4203
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Radical
Retail
We
might have to buy something from time to time.
I'm a bundle of contradictions, and right now my
most vexing dilemma is how to celebrate the warm season of Solstice,
the birth of that bearded guy and the generosity of that other one,
and the nine-day fest of the friends with the great potato pancakes.
It is a huge strain to maintain a radical perspective in the face
of participating in the retail blowout that will keep me fed while
the light does its returning.
I wear my pirated Buy Nothing Day T-shirt on the biggest
retail day of the year and it doesn't hurt my sales, which are good.
We get shoppers at Holiday Market on the day after the National Day
of Gluttony, but they don't fight over bins of sale items and they
don't rack up credit card debt for more electronics for their tuned-out
kids. Our tuned-out kids are at the malls themselves, or at home with
their games, and we are trying to not look desperate and wondering
how much we care about our pure ideals.
Obviously one of our country's biggest problems is
our overuse of the world's resources and our arrogant attitude about
our right to do it. If they hate us it is not because we are beautiful.
As people who care about how we live, we find it impossible to extract
ourselves from the experience of living in the nation that promotes
the most violence, the greatest soulless consumption, and some of
the scariest flawed reasoning of any people on Earth. We can look
at our soft underbelly, but it is stretched tight and we don't want
to deny ourselves that extra piece of pumpkin pie. It won't help to
suffer.
I can bring my sandwich from home but if I don't buy
coffee from David and cheesecake from Colleen they won't be buying
candles from Phil and bowls from Susan or Frank. What goes around
won't come around to me, and I'll have to stop painting the silk scarves
from China and printing the shirts sewn in Honduras. Some of my retail
income needs to buy the goods of my fellow iconoclast artists, or
they'll have to get real jobs and stop pushing the limits of their
imaginations for my benefit. If I don't make the No War T-shirts that
I sit nervously trying to sell, the Market kids won't have a way to
march through the fashion show and express their deep concern about
the shape of their futures.
We're all horrified by the war machine and
the uncertainty of our lives on the material comfort level and the
deeper levels, too. Last winter several of my fellow artists died,
quickly and with no safety nets. Someone will always be next. Reality
is harsh. Christmas warms us and joins us and helps us treasure what
is so primal and life-affirming. We don't want to destroy the safe
place we've carved out to huddle together, against the freight-train
winds that drive in from the ocean, or the waves of fear and pain
that wash in from the far reaches of the globe. We need each other
to be producers and musicians and farmers and workers and yes, consumers,
so that we can all look around at the faces of our circles and be
grateful. We need to feel alive amid the slimy leaves and forgotten
tomatoes of the gardens we nurtured.
Eugene needs the Holiday Market, and some of us need
the batteries, perfumes and the silk suits from the other malls. We
all need to learn tolerance and to walk in beauty and to be in alignment
with our deep beliefs. We have to reach out to those who are different
and we have to feel good about what makes us unique.
We might have to buy something from time to time.
It could be from our neighbor, or someone far around the world who
needs to eat as well. It feels good to push up against right action
as close as we can, but we need to learn forgiveness, too.
My teacher friend says she likes to imagine George
the Unelected on the blue rug where the preschoolers go to sort out
their moral dilemmas. Use your words, George. Stop and think. It's
good to cry, and then you go comfort the ones you hurt. Share.
I'll get the coffee and the cheesecake. I'm not giving
up culture jamming, and I'm not going to stop asking myself hard questions.
But you might see me singing the lovely carols about the baby Jesus.
It's the harmonies that compel me.
Diane McWhorter is a Eugene writer and artist, who
can be found at the Holiday Market, space #202. She likes to sing the
second soprano part.
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TIME
FOR COMMENT
I just received a postcard from PeaceHealth
stating, "It's time for public comment on the proposed PeaceHealth
RiverBend campus," yet none of the options to check and return allow
dissent. How typical that they tell the public what they think
is best for us, rather than holding themselves accountable to their
mission statement pledging cooperative collaboration to promote the
health of the community. How sad that they did not ask for
public comment before they decided to abandon the downtown
Willamette Clinic site and become the largest incentive to sprawl
in the history of Eugene-Springfield.
I'm so tired of the lies claiming that the Eugene
City Council chased them out of town. It was PeaceHealth who abruptly
canceled plans to stay on the Hilyard campus, loaned Arlie the money
to buy the RiverBend property, and refused to work with the Council
to look at alternative centralized sites to the politically unfeasible
demolition of six to eight residential blocks. The Council's continued
efforts to find a new hospital site compatible with Eugene's citizen-approved
planning goals show where the good faith was in those negotiations.
So, as the postcard urges, please provide public comment,
but consider urging Springfield to keep their hospital, and send ours
back, for the health of both communities:
- Attend and testify at the Springfield Planning
Commission hearing: 7 pm, Tuesday, Dec. 3, in the City Council Chambers.
- Attend and testify at the Springfield City Council
hearing: 7 pm, Tuesday, Jan. 21, same location.
- Contact Springfield city officials: Fax 726-2363;
cmo@ci.springfield.or.us
Richard B. Coolman, MD
Eugene
NOT
THIS DUCK
So the listeners of the "Michael Medved
Show" and the "Savage Nation" (Michael Savage) are worried their voices
might no longer be heard? Too bad. Now you know a little of what it
is like to be a minority in this country, or a woman, or gay.
I am an employee of KUGN. I am also a student at the
UO. I strongly disagree with the current programming on the station
and support the ASUO coalition on diversity in their opposition to
KUGN as "the Voice of the Ducks."
I simply wanted to clear up a statement attributed
to President Dave Frohnmayer in the Nov. 16th edition of The Register-Guard.
The article reads, "But he noted that the station airs disclaimers...."
I've worked here four years. We have never aired a disclaimer. Not
once. This may seem minor, but the whole issue actually turns on this.
If Frohnmayer believes the station already airs disclaimers, he may
not see any need to support the ASUO's stand.
That these shows are offensive is not in question.
Similar statements to those quoted by opponents are made every hour,
every day that these shows air. They are not only racist. They are
misogynistic and homophobic, and if you are not gay, a minority, or
a woman, don't worry, you haven't been left out. Simply attending
the University of Oregon makes you subject to their diatribes. I've
heard both hosts equate a university degree with brainwashing, and
Savage repeatedly calls students and faculty perverts and sexual deviants.
I am a Duck, but that is not my voice. That is not
my home.
Timothy Sutton
Eugene
STRATEGY
FLAWED
Thank you for running Marshall Kirkpatrick's
column (11/21) on water privatization. This is extremely important
information, and the sooner we act to prevent the privatization of
our water the better chance we will have of success.
While I am grateful for Kirkpatrick's research and
for his foresight in publishing it, I disagree with his strategy for
action. He states that it is useless to write to our senators, and
implies that we will need violence to attain our goal. This is a view
held by many of the anarchists who write letters to EW. The
writers of these letters generally believe that it is useless to vote.
They could learn something about strategy from my self-defense class.
In that class we learn how to fight, but we also learn that it is
better to avoid a fight. It is best to stay out of dangerous situations.
If we can't do that, it is best to embarrass or scare off the attacker.
If we can't deter the attacker, it is best to run or get help. If
all other strategies fail, we disable the attacker quickly and get
away.
We might have avoided this situation. If every disaffected
leftist, anarchists included, had voted in the last election, we might
now have a Senate that wouldn't even consider privatizing our water.
Since that didn't happen, the next step would be to convince, cajole
or embarrass the Senate into doing the right thing. If that fails,
let's discuss direct action tactics.
Carol Feinberg-McBrian
Eugene
PAY
OK
Pete Sorensen (EW 11/21) stated that
paying petitioners by the signature was a "loophole" in the initiative
process that provided a "perverse incentive."
Payment by the amount of work accomplished is no loophole.
In fact, it provides people with a very healthy, positive incentive
to work as hard as they can to maximize their success.
I know. In the 1980s, I helped earn my way through
college as a paid petitioner. I quickly learned what worked and what
didn't. I always had several clipboards circulating in public places
with high foot traffic. That increased my signature rate. I tried
to be friendly and courteous at all times. That improved my signature
rate, too.
I appreciated the opportunity to contribute to several
progressive campaigns in California, including measures to pass a
bottle bill, conserve water, limit the use of cancer-causing pesticides,
save the Headwaters forest, protect mountain lions and promote public
rail transit.
I also appreciated the opportunity to get paid by
how hard I worked, not merely by the number of hours I put in.
If we really wish to reform the initiative process
in Oregon, then we need to take a close look at what happens after
a measure qualifies for the ballot, not what happens during the largely
mundane process of gathering signatures. Today's elections are too
often dominated by big money and the outcomes determined by aggressive
campaigns of misinformation. That's the place to focus attention if
we wish to create genuine reform.
Bob Dale
Eugene
PECULIAR
PARANOIA
When Sally Sheklow wrote (11/21), "I am
thankful for so much today. Like both my nostrils breathing after
the nasty cold that hit everyone around here but nobody is saying
could be the work of biological warfare."
What? Maybe because it never occurred to anyone else
that it was biological warfare. Since when is a routine outbreak of
flu biological warfare? If everyone in the city, county, state, nation
or even continent got the same symptoms within say, four days or so,
and it was the middle of August, I might be more inclined to believe
claims of biological warfare. I am admittedly no expert on such things,
but the cold I had this week seems no more peculiar to me than any
other in the past.
Natalie Androsoff
Eugene
GUN
RUNNERS
It just got a lot easier for our government
to spy on the average citizen, but not a lot easier to track suspected
terrorists. Why? Because Attorney General John Ashcroft refuses to
allow the FBI to use the National Instant Check System (NICS) to determine
if terrorists are purchasing guns in the U.S. Ashcroft is obviously
willing to trammel the rights of everybody but gun purchasers. Why?
It is difficult to buy more than one handgun at a
time. But how many of us know it is not difficult, nor illegal, for
anybody to walk into a gun shop and purchase not one but 900 AK 47
"knock-offs"? It happens all the time. And why do we not know about
such purchases? Because the dealer who sells those 900 AK 47 "knock-offs"
is not required by anybody — most of all by our own government
— to report that sale. All the dealer must do is run the name
through NICS. If the name passes (the system is not difficult to circumvent),
then the gun dealer has done his job, and nobody ever knows that 900
long guns are now on their way to Columbia, Chechnya, Afghanistan
or wherever. What kind of shell game are we playing here?
The NRA is not interested in protecting the Second
Amendment. The NRA is the lobby for the U.S. arms industry, and their
profits in guns and bombs make what pharmaceutical companies take
home look like chump change. Not allowing the use of NICS is a guise
to keep the truth about the multi-trillion dollar American arms industry
from becoming common knowledge. It is the U.S government in collusion
with our arms industry that is the true "axis of evil" in this world.
Helen Burnham
Eugene
ACT
NOW
Progressive candidates can and do win. In
the recent congressional elections, only eight incumbents lost their
jobs. Half of those were losses (due to redistricting) to other incumbents.
Only one Democrat who voted against the Iraq war was voted out, He
lost to a Republican incumbent who spent over $3 million, almost twice
as much as the Democrat. No other progressive representatives were
voted out.
The world is in peril from the aggressive programs
of Cheney Co, and the democrats want to talk about whether to give
Bush absolute power or just near absolute power. And that's just the
point. One party represents "let's give absolute power to the wealthy
elites," and the other party represents "let's give near absolute
power to the wealthy elites."
Furthermore, it's accepted as fact that third party
candidates can't win. Does it really surprise anyone that a large
majority of people don't vote?
The only thing that can effectively change what our
government does is to effectively change our government. The way to
do that is to provide real choices that will make people want to get
out and vote. Now is the time to start laying the groundwork for that
to happen. I invite groups and individuals to contact me at tomr@epud.net
to discuss what actions might be taken now.
Thomas Rose
Cottage Grove
EARLIER
JAZZ
So I finally made it out on Thursday night
to listen to jazz at one of the local hot spots. I was determined
to go out and listen, even though the show started after 9 pm and
I had to work the next morning. I love jazz and I had a great time,
despite having a less than stellar Friday morning due to lack of sleep
(and a slight hangover). I'm hoping I'll get to do it again sometime
soon, but I have to admit that I'm disappointed so many of the clubs
in the area choose to have live music later in the evenings. At age
30, I'm not exactly getting old, but it's hard to stay out late and
live on a few hours of sleep like I did back in college.
If any of the restaurateurs and barkeeps out there
are reading, please consider having your music start a little earlier
— at least on weeknights. I'm sure there are plenty of music
lovers out there who would appreciate and patronize.
Gina Mack
Eugene
BRAVE
ACT
I would like to thank the Eugene City Council
for passing a resolution opposing the unconstitutional provisions
of the USA PATRIOT Act. The Registar-Guard news article said
the councilors acted under duress because the crowd was threatening
them. Ridiculous! A third of the crowd left early, at the end of the
public hearing, an hour before the council even took up the issue.
What moved the Council was the very eloquent testimony
of a number of first and second generation immigrants stating that
they have been afraid since the USA PATRIOT ACT went into effect
because they have been targeted for surveillance and have been threatened;
sometimes their homes and cars have been searched for no reason except
their ancestry.
The council acted to protect members of our community.
That was its primary motive. The councilors were very clear in stating
that they were not impressed by emotional outbursts from the crowd
in attendance.
I would particularly like to thank Gary Papé
for working out the "friendly amendments" that clarified the wording
so that all members of the council felt that they could vote "yes."
Also for helping to clarify that a primary reason for voting yes was
to provide support and reassurance to members of the Eugene community
who are afraid. He changed the minds of at least two councilors (Nathanson
and Meisner), who initially opposed the resolution.
Ann Tattersall
Eugene
LETTERS POLICY: We welcome letters on all topics and
will print as many as space allows. Please limit length to 250 words,
keep submissions to once a month, and include your address and phone
number. E-mail to editor@eugeneweekly.com,
fax to 484-4044, or mail to 1251 Lincoln, Eugene 97401.
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