EDITORIAL
Do-it-yourself budget
just a political sham
Somebody down at City Hall has lost it.
Gov. Barbara Roberts started off this new round of
participatory democracy with her "Conversations with
Oregon" speeches. But somebody deep down in the
dark recesses of the Eugene City Hall has come up with
a doozy:
Instead of spending long, arduous hours on a budg
et. how about letting the people decide what to do with
their own money?
Before you could say "recall election." the City
Council sent off 66.000 do-it-yourself budgets for all
the households in Eugene. The idea is for citizens to
drop their crossword puzzles and rush to the mailbox
to retrieve this 12-page extravaganza, then sit patiently
for hours deciding whether to raise |H>lic:e officers' sal
aries or create a Eugene slush fund
Some say the budget looks like an income tax form
— just the type of thing local residents want to see
Anybody who has ever spent the entire spring trying to
figure out a 1040 form is really going to want to buckle
down and fill out this budg
et Yeah, right.
Now that's a great idea.
Give unprepared,
unexperienced citizens the
right to shape the economic
future of the city — pretty
much the same thing
thathappens every year in
the City Council.
The price tag for this lit
tie excursion? Try S12.WX)
For a city running an esti
mated S# million in the red
for 1994. wantonly spending
these kind of bucks on a
"get-the-people-involved"
sham is just about as bad as
wasting Sit 1.(XXI to remove a
statue.
Now that’s a
great Idea. Glee
unprepared,
unexperienced
citizens the right
to shape the
economic future
of the dty —
pretty much the
same thing that
happens every
year In the City
Council.
n city icauers are realty cooking to trim uiineeueu
costs from the budget, scrapping this kind of thing is a
good place to start.
It's true Eugene citizens do need to get more in
volved in city jKilitics. but force feeding democracy to
unwilling participants is an entirely different issue. If
residents want to know about the budget, they can go
to council meetings or get copies of the proposed
plans. Citizens could even run for office.
Any one of these alternatives would be desirable to
the $12.h(X) boondoggle currently floating around the
local postal system. Shelling out bucks to find out how
to save money is the very essence1 of a "mixed mes
sage.''
Here's a compromise: Eugene residents promise to
get more involved in the political process, while the
city government resolves never to spend hard earned
tax dollars on pet projects ugain
Everyone agreed?
1 Kn!\
2X21
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LETTERS
Three pointer
! think it is Ms lex Brand svho
hits overstepped his itounduries
and not tin' I.Mti Board of Di
ns tors
Ms fust point is ! do not son
where tin- total rtx miters need
,ms mort- puiiltt spin i' to ad
vertisv their six alion 1 here art'
si'siTal buildings in and around
tlir fclugone Springfield area
svhcre any student can go in
uiut talk ssitii thmn If thoy
arc interested
Moriiovur, tluiM' buildings
arc not open to me to go in and
rri nut lor much of anything
Win do tiles have to tic in the
:.M! sv lien tin's already have
buildings allotted to them, all
at taxpay l'|s expense '
Ms second point is tin1 mill
tars recruiters weren't lieing pe
nali/ed (prohibited from the
l-.MI ) tieiause ol ssll.it tilev re
saving No one ss as restricting
them trum saving anything
What tiles svere penali/eti for
ssas their stance against indi
vlduul riglits It seems to me
that if Brand svere to pas alien
lion to tiie reality of the situa
lion, tie sv i hi hi see tile issue
svas the military s rules against
homosexuals entering tile
armed services and not the mil
itary's freedom of Spi'll h
Ms final point is d Brand is
simply going to summarily
overrule the l-.MI: board, then
svhv allosv tin1 board to exist'
In effei t. Branil lias said the
hoard may decide whatever
tin s svant as long as it coin
iides ssitii ins view Brand lias
removed their effectiveness by
Ins veto
I hope that tin' IsMt! board
overrides the veto
S< ott Shea
Student
Hoop it up
III tiie Nos 1II edition of the
/'.'rriera/i/. Student Sen Brian
Hoop offered the student Ixids
an old recurring theme ol Wil
lie Horton-based politics While
Hoop rightly lights against rai
ism. lie has no qualms about
reaching into the bottom of the
barrel to sling paranoid racial
remarks at myself Hoop also
attempts to use the Issue of r.u
ism to condone the actions of
Jo Sonja Watson, our ASIJO
\ Ice president
Well Hoop. I don't take kind
ly to your rat ml attai k I find it
very interesting that you would
tr\ to drag me into this event I
didn't Initiate this petition to
retail Watson The College Ke
publicans initiated this petition
to retail Watson I'm not .1 Ke
publican, and I've never attend
ml a College Republican meet
ing I'm not the issue here I
didn’t shoplift or fall to appear
In < our! No one forced Watson
to shoplift or avoid the court
site did this all on tier own
The Important issue is Wat
son was indicted, tried and
convicted of two misdemeanor
counts m a state court Because
of these convictions !>v an mi
partial court Watson's ethics,
piKir |udgment and willingness
to 1 over up the allair are the
real issues those of urn reading
tills letter need to consider
when you dec ide whether or
not to sign the petition The is
sue ol 1 person's color, sev and
politic s are irrelevant here
Mic had Colson
Politic al Sc lenc e
Zombies
Let me get tills straight The
military discriminates, so the
coalition of opposed students is
going to stop this discrimina
tion hy ku king tin- military out
Perhaps it's only called dis
crimination if it's against the
majority.
Bo Adun in the press confer
ence said, to say that
(Brand) is opposed to disc rimi
nation. and then, when others
take the initiative- to veto tiieir
efforts, is no less an ac t of
hvpocnsi and moral coward
ice- "
Does this mean that Brand
would not he a hypoc rite if he
opposed discrimination and
then agreed to boot an organi
zation off campus just because
of how the\ think7 Does this
mean that only the moral or po
litically correct can Is- discrimi
noted against7
Kvery human bring disc rimi
nates to some degree, though
this doesn't necessarily make
discrimination right Unless wi>
all turn into zombies who can't
think for ourselves, then I think
it's here to stay
The essence ol our lives as
humans revolves around the
need to think freely We should
not be fort ini to think in any
particular wav
lust as the ku Klux Klan dis
criminates, it is against the law
for them, or anyone, to kill
someone liecause of how they
feel about them, but no one can
make a lavs .is to llovv people
think
Ur (anno! ban the military
and promote free thinking at
the same time.
Allen James
Student
Buy it
Regarding Ryan Blaeketler's
letter of Nov r> Black letter,
since you're an Knglish major
I'm surprised you wore never
taught that satire (even sar
casm) to be truly effective
should be used with a light
touch It should lie a stiletto,
not a club
You're bunting mosquitoes
with a howitzer Furthermore,
what prompts you to heap so
much scorn on such a piteous
caricature7 While there are
many laughable and absurd as
pects to the l*C deliate (presum
ably the intended target of your
vitriolic outpouring look it
up, OK), 1 think you protest too
much
Why are you so threatened
Blackletter? Oh. and while 1
hope this doesn't offend your
deep-seated convictions con
cerning your true Wittiness, go
buy a sense of humor
David Dodds
History