... Of environmental concern
By Catherine Siegner
The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory
Commission (NRC) will hold a
conference July 24 and 25 in Port
land to discuss whether hearings
should be held on restarting the
Trojan Nuclear Power Plant.
The NRC recently turned down
a petition submitted by the plant’s
owners asking that Trojan be al
lowed to restart while modifica
tions to the control building are
being made. It was found earlier
this year that the control building
walls do not meet federal specifi
cations for withstanding earth
quakes.
If the NRC decides to hold hear
ings on the matter, restarting the
plant could be postponed until
next year while at least eight indi
viduals and two organizations that
have requested to intervene pres
ent testimony on the modifica
tions.
The conference will be held in
room 223 of the Federal Building,
1220 S.W. 3rd Ave., Portland.
A total eclipse of the sun will
occur in the early morning hours
on February 26, 1979 over the
Northwestern United States.
The University's Outdoor Pro
gram plans to coordinate efforts
with other outdoor groups to find
locations which will offer the best
opportunity to view this unusual
event.
Ideal locations would be high in
the mountains where the sun
shines most of the time such as
the Eagle Cap Wilderness in
Oregon; the Mt. Adams Wilder
ness in Washington; the Idaho
Primitive Area, and the Bob
Marshal Wilderness Area in Mon
tana.
If you have a site in mind or
would like to be notified of efforts
to see the eclipse, write to Gary
Grimm, University Outdoor Pro
gram, EMU Room 23, University of
Oregon, Eugene 97403.
All plans and contact persons
for the event will be published in
the University’s Cooperative Wil
derness Adventures brochure to
be sent out December T, 1978.
Workers at Portland General
Electric Co.’s coal plant site near
Boardman staged a sympathy
walkout July 12, after a Spokane
man working at the site was
crushed by boxes he was loading
onto a truck.
The man, Loyal Vick, was taken
to a Pendleton hospital but died en
route. Workers maintained that
telephones should be provided
Drug patrols cut,
sheriff unhappy
By KEVIN HARDEN
Of the Emerald
Lane county drug users may be relieved, but Sheriff David Burks
isn’t smiling. Budget cuts that have taken nearly $200,000 from the
county's Public Safety Department have taken a large bite out of the
county's narcotics and drug enforcement team.
Burks, speaking at the Republican Roundtable Luncheon Friday,
said the loss of $175,000 from the Sheriff’s Department budget alone
has left five people without jobs. Two of those belonged to the nar
cotics team which enforces county drug laws.
The cuts were the result of programs added to the county budget by
the Lane County Commissioners several weeks ago. The programs
weren’t part of the original county budget, and money had to be approp
riated from existing programs, Burks said.
Burks protested the appropriations during a news conference after
the commissioners intituted the new programs, but to no avail.
“I did go to the people because I was concerned about what was
happening to our budget,’’ Burks said. “The people had a right to know
what to expect from the sheriff’s department if the cuts went into effect.”
The Department of Public Safety, which runs on an annual budget
of about $6 million, usually gives $200,000 back to the commissioners
each year. Most of its operating funds come from outside the county,
Burks said.
Federal funding for the county Traffic team, the Interagency Rape
team and the burglary team will end at the end of this year. After that, the
programs will be taken over by the county. Which may not happen if the
commissioners take any more money from the sheriff’s department,
Burke said.
Burks said the budget cuts forced him to set up 13 priorities for the
sheriff's department. At the top of the list is the new jail, scheduled to
open next March.
With the addition of the new jail, built with county tax bonds, the
department would be able to house almost 250 prisoners in both the old
and the new facilities. The old jail, on 5th Street downtown, houses 188
prisoners, nearly 40 more than its capacity, Burks pointed out.
"Frankly, there are a lot of people sleeping on the floor over there
right now."
But, even with increased jail space, Burks says, he and the
county's narcotics team won't be able to fill the cells with area drug law
violators. The loss of two narcotics agents and a lab scientist have put a
damper on drug law enforcement, he observed.
“We aren’t out to get everyone who smokes marijuana," Burks
explained. “That’s not what we are going to do. Now we re going to go
after the big-time dealers who are selling the drugs in the county."
on the site, and an ambulance
helicopter should be at hand in
case of accidents.
Union representatives met with
PGE officials Friday and were
promised the safety improve
ments.
Half of the 150 to 200 workers
returned to their jobs Friday, while
the rest were standing around or
had left the site.
The U.S. Department of
Energy (DOE) has chosen the
Wheelabrator CleanFuel Corpo
ration of Washington, D.C., for
negotiation of a contract to oper
ate the DOE’s Biomass Liquefac
tion Facility in Albany.
The Facility, built in 1976 at a
cost of $3.8 million, is a testing
station for perfecting a process of
converting wood chips to oil.
Wood chips are ground to a
coarse powder and blended with a
coal tar distillate to produce a thick
paste. Gasses are added and the
paste is cooked at high tempera
ture until it is converted to oil by a
chemical reaction.
The two year contract will run
through June 30, 1980.
The State Board of Forestry’s
three regional committees, which
advise on forest practice rules, will
meet this month to consider pro
posals by the Oregon Environmen
tal Council and Gov. Straub to
tighten controls on the use of her
bicides in Oregon's forests.
The Northwest Regional Forest
Practices Committee will meet in
Salem on July 26 at the State
Forester’s Conference Room,
2600 State St., beginning at 10
a.m.
The meetings, open to the pub
lic, are being held to determine if
the committees v/ish to make any
recommendations to the State
Board of Forestry at the formal
public hearings on the herbicide
proposals scheduled for August 3
and 4 in Salem.
The formal public hearings in
August will also be held in the
State Forester's Conference
Room,-beginning at 9 a.m. each
day.
The Crabshell Alliance, an
anti-nuclear group based in
Washington State, has filed a
class-action suit against the
Washington Public Power Supply
System (WPPSS) in an effort to
halt construction of five nuclear
power plants in the state.
The Alliance charged that the
plants planned by WPPSS de
grade the environment, cause
birth defects, and lower property
values.
In another action filed against
WPPSS in Grays Harbor County
Superior Court, the Alliance is
seeking $1.5 million for “illegal ac
tions" taken against demon
strators during a June 25 occupa
tion of the S.atsop nuclear plant
construction site.
Crabshell charges that “legal
demonstrators were damaged by
the malicious and arbitrary instiga
tion of arrest and prosecution” by
WPPSS on June 25.
THE TILL IS LOCKED
BUT—
WE’RE OPEN!
THURS NITE FROM 6-9
Find out, is depth of field an agricultural term? Gerlachs
will have a team of photographic specialists on hand to
answer your questions on cameras, technique and theory;
IF you want to buy anything, come back another day, be
cause we promise not to sell anything tonight!
THURS, JULY 20, IS
QUESTION &
ANSWER NITE
Where we sell photography, not just cameras.
erlach*:
849 E. 13th
Camera Centers