October 2, 2015
CapitalPress.com
13
Ag economist: Keep eye on global slowdown
By CAROL RYAN DUMAS
Capital Press
By JADE MCDOWELL
EO Media Group
Residents in eastern Or-
egon and Washington have
discussed breaking away
from their more liberal
neighbors to form a new
state for years, but a new
twist has been added to the
conversation: Why form
a new state when the rural
counties could just join Ida-
ho instead?
Ken Parsons, a 72-year-
old farmer from La Grande,
said the idea was floated
offhand by someone else in
a letter to the editor in the
La Grande Observer. After
thinking about it for a cou-
ple of months and discuss-
ing it with friends, Parsons
said he has decided to try to
get input from residents of
neighboring counties, in-
cluding Umatilla and Mor-
row County.
“It’s an intriguing idea,”
he said.
As Parsons sees it, ru-
ral Oregon and Washington
residents who are tired of
being outvoted by the pop-
ulation centers in Portland
and Seattle would be better
understood by politicians
from the more rural, con-
servative Idaho. Legislators
born and raised in the most
urban parts of their state
“don’t have any idea,” he
said, of how environmental
lobbyists often hurt farmers,
hunters and others in more
rural parts of the state.
“The environmental regu-
lations that come out of Sa-
lem make it almost impossi-
ble to do my work,” he said.
Jeffrey Dense, a political
science professor at Eastern
Oregon University, called
the logistics of trying to
create a new, larger Idaho
“largely insurmountable.”
“Given the inability of
Puerto Rico and Washing-
ton, D.C., to effectuate this
type of large scale change,
disgruntled citizens would
be better off to get involved
with politics instead of com-
plaining about the state of
affairs,” he said in an email.
A state boundary hasn’t
been redrawn in the United
States since West Virginia
was carved out of Virginia
in 1863. The idea of seced-
ing from one state to the
other is hardly new, howev-
er, and various efforts have
landed on ballots and on the
floor of state legislatures
across the country.
Occasionally, those ef-
forts have even come close
to fruition. In 2002 the U.S.
House of Representatives
voted unanimously to al-
low state legislators to ad-
just the Nevada-Utah state
boundary. The move would
have been a minor one, but
it would have allowed the
economically
struggling
city of Wendover, Utah, to
join the casino-rich city of
West Wendover, Nevada,
and get rid of what residents
called an invisible “Berlin
Wall” in the community
creating poor infrastructure
and schools on one side of
the state line and abundant
services on the other. The
bill ended up dying in the
Senate, however, after Ne-
vada Senator Harry Reid
opposed it.
According to 2014 data
from the U.S. Census Bu-
reau, Idaho currently has
1,634,464 residents. That
would increase to 3,680,297
people if all 17 Oregon
counties east of Hood River
County and the 20 Washing-
ton counties east of King
County jumped ship.
Oregon,
meanwhile,
would go from 3,970,239
residents to 3,471,709 and
Washington would drop
from 7,061,530 residents to
5,514,227.
How that would affect
each state’s representation
in Washington, D.C., would
depend on how other states’
populations changed at the
same time.
The 435 seats in the
House of Representatives
are apportioned every 10
years based on population
counts in the latest census.
If other states’ populations
stayed roughly proportion-
ate to their current levels,
Washington would likely
lose two of its 10 seats, add-
ing them to Idaho’s current
two seats, while it would be
a close call on whether Or-
egon would hang on to its
five representatives or lose
one to another state.
The number of Elector-
al College votes a state re-
ceives is equal to the num-
ber of U.S. senators and
representatives the state
has, which would give Ida-
ho more sway in presiden-
tial elections too.
Rep. Greg Smith, R-Hep-
pner, said during his fresh-
man year in the Oregon
Legislature in 2001 he tried
to introduce the idea of cre-
ating a state of Eastern Ore-
New Idaho: Re-drawing the map
A La Grande, Ore. farmer is seeking comment on the idea of eastern portions of Washington and
Oregon joining Idaho. The new, supersized Idaho would see a 125 percent population increase.
Proposed state of Idaho
Area in detail
Spokane
Seattle
Olympia
WASHINGTON
Canby Herald
Jade McDowell
and Alan Nenaga/
EO Media Group
La Grande
Salem
IDAHO
Bend
Burns
Boise
Idaho Falls
OREGON
Pocatello
Twin Falls
Medford
‘Given the inability of Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C., to effectuate
this type of large scale change, disgruntled citizens would be better off to
get involved with politics instead of complaining about the state of affairs.’
Jeffrey Dense, a political science professor at Eastern Oregon University
that getting rural Oregon
and Washington counties to
join Idaho is a long shot.
“If it came to fruition it
would probably not be in
my lifetime,” he said.
To start the discussion
he emailed every state leg-
islator in all three states,
contacted newspapers in the
area and started a forum on
Yahoo Groups titled “Ore-
gon and Washington Joining
Idaho” to discuss logistics
like what would happen
with assets like state prisons
and universities in counties
that voted to join Idaho.
“I figured there are a
whole lot of people smarter
than me who could figure
all that out,” he said.
Parsons realizes that
government officials in Boi-
se may not want to take on
more rural counties, even
if they also got population
centers like Spokane, the
Tri-Cities and Bend. The
U.S. Congress would have
to approve.
Still, he said if Eastern
Oregon did secede to Ida-
ho, local residents wouldn’t
have to worry so much
about Portland residents
pushing laws such as a $15
an hour minimum wage on
rural areas.
“If they want to buy a
$20 Big Mac that’s fine with
me,” he said.
CANBY, Ore. — A cou-
gar has been killing live-
stock and worrying families
near this north Willamette
Valley town.
Stefani Carlson, whose
husband, Paul, owns and
operates 4:8 Financial, an
investment services firm in
Canby, said they lost two
alpacas and three lambs last
week. Another neighbor lost
three sheep around the same
time, and another nearby
family lost two llamas and
a pygmy goat, Carlson said.
“Everyone knows it’s
funky out there, a weird
feeling out there,” Carlson
said. “Even cattle are act-
ing funny out here. (One of
our neighbors), Nancy Ben-
nett, said one of her llamas
jumped over one of their
fences and hurt its leg badly
trying to protect (their live-
stock from) something out
there.”
Bennett said her llama
has been on “super-high
alert” ever since Sept. 9,
when the cougar first killed
her livestock.
USDA Wildlife Services
sent out a trapper who set
bait near the dead animal
carcasses to try and catch the
cougar, but the effort has not
been successful.
USDA officials were not
immediately available for
comment.
BUYING 6” and UP
Alder and Maple
Saw Logs, Standing Timber
www.cascadehardwood.com
Have you seen
these invasive plants?
Italian and slenderflower thistles
are aggressive, tap-rooted annuals
capable of forming dense stands that
outcompete desirable forage plants.
Learn more at www.nwcb.wa.gov
Flowers are pink, in
terminal clusters and
covered with cobwebby
hairs. Italian thistle
flowerheads are in
clusters of 1-5, while
slenderflower has
clusters of 5-15.
Oregonian research
Pendleton
Portland
gon, but couldn’t even get a
hearing on it.
“I know there’s a real
frustration with the ur-
ban-rural divide,” he said.
However, he also said
that although Eastern Ore-
gon provides the state with
food and fiber, the west
side of the state provides a
tax base that supports state
services. The transportation
package, for example, that
both sides of the aisle would
like to see come to fruition
would likely result in East-
ern Oregon infrastructure
benefiting from tax money
generated by Portland resi-
dents.
Parsons said he knows
Cougar kills
livestock
in north
Willamette
Valley town
By DANIEL PEARSON
Yakima
Eugene
market is bouncing all over,
the government is devaluing
currency and the country has
serious natural resource issues,
he said.
“We’ve got to keep our eye
on China because political un-
rest and just economic unrest in
that region can spread through
that whole Asian region, and
the second-largest economy in
the world does matter, particu-
larly (to) agriculture and rural
America,” he said.
Looking at other factors in
the region, Japan has a debt is-
sue and South Korea is “very,
very” sluggish. There’s also a
demographic wedge in both
Japan and China of one child
to every two parents and four
grandparents, a demographic
that is more conservative in
investments and spending and
creates defl ation and sluggish-
ness, he said.
Both thistle
species have
spiny-lobed
leaves and spiny-
winged stems.
The underside of
the leaves and
stems are
covered with
cobwebby hair.
ROP-40-5-4/#24
The state of
New Idaho
he said.
“Interconnected global risk
… is a house-of-cards risk. It’s
one I think we really have to
watch for because again, like
a house of cards, you pull one
and it can kind of go through-
out the world,” he said.
China’s economy is also
slowing down, with exports
off by more than 10 percent.
The country had phenomenal
growth oriented on building
infrastructure, which kept
manufacturing jobs in China
and abroad going. But recent
articles suggest some of Chi-
na’s cities are now like Detroit
and Cleveland in the sense that
manufacturing there is no lon-
ger needed. Many of the resi-
dents there who had good-pay-
ing jobs are being displaced,
he said.
China has lowered inter-
est rates fi ve times, the stock
Canada thistle stems are
Why are slenderflower
not spiny, flower heads
(Carduus tenuiflorus) &
Italian (C.pycnocephalus) are not tightly clustered
and roots are
thistles noxious weeds?
rhizomatous.
• Both thistles displace
desirable forage species,
What can you do?
impacting livestock and
• Learn to correctly identify
wildlife grazing.
these Class A noxious
weeds.
Where do you find these
• Please note that
thistles?
eradication of these plants
• Italian and slenderflower
is required in Washington
thistles can be found in
State to prevent them
pastures, rangelands,
from gaining a foothold.
right-of-ways and waste
• Report any sightings to
areas.
your county noxious weed
• Italian and slenderflower
control board or to
thistle can be confused
noxiousweeds@agr.wa.gov
with Canada thistle, a
Class C weed. However,
Italian thistle
tends to grow
taller than
slenderflower
thistle, though
both can reach
6 feet tall.
40-2/#13
Capital Press File
Economist Dave Kohl is seen speaking in this fi le photo.
Countries some see as hav-
ing few ties to U.S. agriculture
are in fact critical to the indus-
try due to interconnected econ-
omies, an ag economist says.
There’s plenty going on
around the world — from de-
fl ation and infl ation to reces-
sion and political unrest — to
keep on the radar back on the
farm, said Dave Kohl, profes-
sor emeritus of ag and applied
economics at Virginia Tech
and a long-time partner in the
Northwest Farm Credit Ser-
vices development program.
A rundown on economies
around the globe and their im-
plication for U.S. agriculture
was one area of focus in Kohl’s
recent ag outlook webinar.
Starting with the EU, Kohl
said Europe is critical to the
health of the U.S. economy.
First of all, social and regula-
tory trends usually start in Eu-
rope and gravitate to the U.S.,
he said, but there is also a Eu-
rope-China connection, with
Europe being China’s biggest
customer.
Europe’s central bank is
providing stimulus and may
extend it because France’s
economy is “very, very slug-
gish” with signs of contrac-
tion, Germany’s economy is
extremely export-driven and
Greece is in a debt crisis, he
said.
While Greece’s economy
is smaller than Alabama’s, its
connection with other econo-
mies makes it worth watching.
Many French and German
banks have loans to the Greek
government, and many U.S.
lending institutions have loans
to French and German banks,