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Wednesday, April 27, 2016 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon
LETTERS
Continued from page 10
District submitted to voters, the current measure
is bloated with nonessential items. It’s especially
insensitive and inappropriate considering the current
state of the economy.
The new bond would also pay for the repair or
replacement of the High School’s defective roof,
which has failed after only 12 years. Rather than sue
the company that designed and built the faulty roof
to force them to fix their shoddy work, the Sisters
School District is asking taxpayers to shoulder the
burden.
The Sisters School District needs to recognize
that most people’s budgets are smaller — some
completely broken — since the 2008 financial crisis.
The school board needs to stop its endless requests
for funding discretionary spending, delete the non-
essentials from their bond measure and focus on the
items for which there is a true need.
Send a message: We won’t support the Sisters
School District’s undisciplined shopping sprees.
Vote “No” on Measure 9-108.
Michael Cooper
• • •
To the Editor:
I support school needs, but this bond worries me
both because of the range of issues, and the fuzzy
math used to sell it.
First the fuzzy math. Part of the bond will pay off
a prior bond and we are told that will save $260,000
per year for new teachers. Maybe. But the new bond
borrows the same amount to pay off the old which
means the interest on the old just becomes part of
the new. I suppose what they really mean is they get
$260,000 and we taxpayers get stuck with the inter-
est for the old bond we did not vote for along with
the new bond. Slick.
The bond has four elements, but none are very
clear. The first, repairs to the high school are prob-
ably necessary. The second, security upgrades is
too vague for $3 million and given where we live,
questionable. I suspect this will end being a slush
fund. The third is repair and upgrade of the sports
fields. This is not only too expensive, but the funds
needed to keep these facilities up in the future will
end up coming out of the school operating budget,
again cutting funds for teachers. The final issue is
the ever-present comment that if the bond passes
they will create an oversight board who will care-
fully supervise the projects. Always said, never
really done.
This bond should be scrapped. Why must these
bonds always be so large and full of different issues.
The last one was the same. Come back with a bond
only for facilities repair. Do a good job on that,
then come back for the next project. Prove to us the
money will be used carefully and we will support
the effort.
Howard Jameson
• • •
To the Editor:
Re: Trees on Highway 20 are in trouble,” (The
Nugget, April 20, page 1).
What a terrible story to break in the same week
as Earth Day! And with so many unanswered
questions.
Who is the unnamed manufacturer? Internet
research reveals DuPont. When and for how
long was the herbicide Perspective applied in the
Highway 20 corridor? The warning that it would
damage ponderosas came out in 2012. Are we just
now seeing damage from before that? How long
does it take to damage ponderosas? How much
more damage can we expect to see? Where else has
Perspective been used in ponderosa country? Who
decides to use these herbicides and how are those
decisions made?
According to the website PAN (Pesticide Action
Network), DuPont has done this before with
Imprelis, a supposedly tree-safe herbicide that killed
roadside Norway spruces and white pines in nine
Midwestern states (who have filed class action law-
suits). Imprelis was pulled from the market in 2011,
but others in the same chemical family, including
Perspective, remained.
What are the testing protocols that DuPont uses,
and how is it that they are so flawed?
Those dying and damaged trees along the other-
wise beautiful western approach to Sisters will be a
sad and terrible reminder of flaws in “the system”
for a long time.
Joellyn Loehr
• • •
To the Editor:
Deschutes County has taken months to put
together a 14-page shapshot report of overnight
housing for the four Goal 5 destination resorts. Let’s
not give them the impossible and publicly sub-
sidized task of trying to track the 1,800+ medical
marijuana growers now in Deschutes county that
want to convert to recreational growers to increase
the size of their grows.
Today Oregonians can each grow four plants
legally and can now get ample marijuana medi-
cine thru the Oregon Health Authority. We don’t
need large grows scattered across the community or
grandfathered in homes across our county or in cit-
ies under OLCC rules growing more pot for recre-
ation. Medical growers already can sell surplus for
recreation.
Bigger grows pose life, health and safety issues
for all.
If you think you’re immune or your kids are safe
taking their learner’s permit or that the rural com-
munity won’t be a target for heist, or you can’t fig-
ure from where that skunk smell is emanating, get
educated.
Testify on May 2 before the Board of County
Commissioners — Barnes Hearing Room, 10 a.m.
or 1 p.m.
Is it that hard to figure the right way to develop
our community? Resort hotels are a bust and
large marijuana growers is outright dangerous for
Deschutes. Is this the tourism you want?
We don’t need another boom/bust hype to risk
our rural livability.
OLCC requires fingerprinting to grow pot, so
this heavy industry should be behind industrial
razor wire the required security cameras inside
industrial parks, not open to our scenic views,
exposed to our raptors, invading with permanent
skunk odor, glowing at night or tantalizing our
youth.
Set the keel with our politicians. Land use moves
slowly and the Board needs to continue the opt out.
Nunzie Gould