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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (May 21, 1985)
Oregon daily emerald Tuesday, May 21, 1985 Eugene, Oregon Volume 86, Number 158 Protests begin anew in Cathedral Forest SWEET HOME (AP) — Protests against logging old-growth timber in the Willamette National Forest resum ed Monday, with eight people cited for trespassing and one camping out high in a Douglas fir tree. Doug Norlen, director of the University’s Survival Center, said the protest was part of a continuing effort by the Cathedral Forest Action Group and Earth First! to stop logging in the Cathedral Forest 40 miles east of Sweet Home. “These are citizens who have been actively trying to protect their na tional forest for over 15 years and all traditional methods of negotiations have failed," said Norlen, who spoke for the protesters in a telephone inter view from Eugene. “They are trying to convince the Forest Service to use their discretion to protect the last re maining vestiges of wild forest that we have." Norlen said the forest is the biggest remaining low-elevation stand of old growth Douglas fir in Oregon and was the site of 35 arrests in protests last year. The forest covers about 80,000 acres along the Middle Santiam River. Congress did not include it in forests designated as wilderness areas last year but did declare a nearby area as wilderness, said Jim Christensen, head of law enforcement for the Willamette National Forest. Authorities expected the protest after the Cathedral Forest Action Group promised “direct action” following a weekend camp out to celebrate its first birthday. Christensen said. Early in the morning, the protesters went to the Pyramid Creek timber sale, which is being logged by Willamette Industries, and occupied the logging site, Norlen said. “This morning when a timber falling crew from the outfit logging that area went up there, there was a group of people camped around a tree and one person was up in the tree,” Christensen said. The person, calling himself Doug Fir. had climbed 60 feet into the tree with food, water and a hammock, prepared to stay for five days, Norlen said. The area had been closed to the public due to ongoing logging opera tions so the eight protesters on the ground were cited on a federal trespassing charge and told to leave, Christensen said. Six of them refused to leave and were arrested with the help of Linn County sheriff’s deputies and charged with criminal trespass, he said, add ing that they were later released at Sweet Home. Names of the protesters were not immediately available, deputies said. There are no plans to try to remove the protester in the tree, who hung out a large white banner with the words Earth First! on it, Christensen said. Negotiations continue over athletic budget By Mary Lichtenwalner Of the Emerald After failing to override the ASUO’s veto of the athletic department budget Monday night, the Incidental Fee Com mittee asked Assistant Athletic Director Chris Voelz to do more “homework” on the budget. The committee held a motion from last week to override the veto of the 1985-86 allocated budget of $773,009, giving the ASUO Executive time to negotiate fur ther. IFC Chair Bob Mead said the com mittee may take action on the veto today. If the IFC does not override the veto this week, the budget will probably end up on University President Paul Olum’s desk. Voelz and ASUO President Julie Davis met last week and negotiated several budget options. They presented the op tions to the IFC on Monday, and the committee informally accepted an alter native — a combination of the options. Voelz will submit detailed figures of the alternative option at today’s IFC meeting. Mead proposed the alternative option of about $640,000 in direct subsidy. Op tion 1, the budget level allocated by the IFC, constitutes $653,009 in direct sub sidy. At that level, “We’re not getting what we wanted, we’re getting what we need,” Voelz said. “We’d like to go with that.” The alternative, however, “would not increase the incidental fee students pay,” Mead said. The IFC was attracted to the alternative because it does not in dude a rise in student ticket prices, although it does mean students would give up the “OO” seating section in McArthur Court, Mead said. Davis said that although raising ticket prices and giving up student seating were two of the difficulties she had with the athletic department budget contract, “the lesser of the two evils was to give up the ‘OO’ seating.” The committee rejected an option con sisting of $623,225 in direct subsidies, primarily because it would raise student ticket prices $1 for football and men’s basketball and would raise the all-sport season pass from $54 to $74. Voelz told the committee that she and the athletic department are “not thrill ed” with that option, but that it gave the department a chance to “recoup some money.” “We’d rather have students at the games. In an average year or a poor year, (with that option) we’d be in bad shape,” she said. Davis said that she felt other Pacific 10 Conference schools run on bigger budgets than they need. “It comes down to, what can students afford?” she said. Davis agreed with the committee that further negotiation is necessary. “It’s clear to me that what the Executive wants is not going to fly,” she said. But IFC member Lloyd Atheam said that negotiations should be completed by now. “We’ve spent a month arriving at this plan, and I’m not going to spend another week going over this,” he said. “I’m going to feel comfortable that we found a viable alternative.” Riverfront plan questioned in public hearing By Cynthia Whitfield Of the Kmeraid Eugene residents packed City Mall on Monday night to attend a Planning Commission public hearing on the recently released Riverfront Research Park draft plan. Most of the speakers said they thought “more questions should be answered" before the city adopts the plan. The area studied in the draft plan is University-owned land located along the Willamette River, north of campus. The park is expected to house new research and industrial development. Although the possibility of classified defense research be ing conducted in the park has sparked some controversy, University administrators say they do not intend to extend the University’s ban on classified research to the park. Such a ban would have to be included in ground lease rules developed by the University. Campus Planning Committee member Charles Wright told the hearing that people have to make sure they get what they want. “The ground rules have to be tight,” he said. He said the committee is still unsure about the size of the riverfront “setback” (the distance between the river and development), about open space ratios, what to count as open space, and noxious and toxic waste. “We’re also concerned about the issue of classified research. But a fair number of people are not aware we've been working on these things,” Wright said. Diane Bishop of the bicycle committee spoke in support of the Riverfront Park draft plan. “We appreciate the work the study put into it and that it took our concerns into considera tion, and would like to endorse that part of the study draft," she said. But real estate agent Don Nor ris said the plan was too “grand” for Eugene. “I’m in favor of economic development — it’s my bread and butter. But if it takes taxpayer’s money — and it will — we’d better find out if it’s feasible,” he said. John Moseley, who will replace Dick Hersh as Universi ty vice president for research, was appointed to the seven member Riverfront Park board of directors, a non-profit cor poration. The board will hire a master developer for the research park and enforce University ground lease policy. Unless “all the substantive Photo by Brian Erb The fragile ecology of the riverfront and the heavy recreational use of the area have been cited in criticism of the proposed location for the Riverfront Research Park, just north of campus. questions are answered and the project wins community sup port, the park would not be built,” said Moseley. ‘‘Because of the radical changes needed (to develop at the proposed site) there should be a minimal searching for alter native sites. The Riverfront is a special, fragile area. Develop ment there flies in the face of the North Campus Plan which calls for playing fields,” said A1 Urquhart, University geography professor. Urquhart suggested that the east campus area be explored as an alternative site. “There is fire and police protection there already; you can walk to it from campus; there are sewers and electricity there and supportive housing already. In most respects, the east campus area is more compatible with the stated objectives of the project,” Ur quhart said.
