Candidates target downtown
■ warn 3 uty council seat
hopefuls aim to improve the
downtown area, police
relations and ‘city mirth’
By Andrew Adams
Oregon Daily Emerald
A local activist campaigning for
“more mirth” in the city, a tavern
owner and a retired intensive care
nurse are the three very different
and unique candidates running
for the Ward 3 City Council seat.
Despite their differences, all
three candidates see changing the
downtown area and giving Univer
sity students a stronger voice in the
community as two of the most
pressing issues facing the ward.
Ward 3 encompasses the Uni
versity neighborhood and most of
the downtown area. University
graduate Bobby Lee currently rep
resents the area but is stepping
down from the seat when his term
expires in January 2001 to explore
other career opportunities.
A retired intensive care nurse,
Bonny Bettman, 47, believes she is
the most qualified candidate for
the council seat and decided to run
because she feels the other candi
dates lack experience. Prodding by
local and state politicians to enter
the election also convinced
Bettman to run in the race, she said.
Bettman said her 10 years of ex
perience gained while serving on
local committees, task forces and
neighborhood associations make
her the best candidate for the posi
tion.
“I know how the city works,
and I know many other elected of
ficials,’’she said.
Making the downtown area
more pedestrian accessible, pro
tectmg the environment and pro
moting sustainable development
are the key issues of Bettman’s plat
form. She said these issues are not
new to her as they have been the fo
cus of much of her prior civic work.
“My run for council is the cul
mination of 10 years of dealing
with these issues,” she said.
Tracy Olsen, the 30-year-old
owner of Doc’s Pad Sports Grill &
Lounge, is a Eugene native and a
University graduate with a bache
lors degree in management. He
said keeping the downtown area
economically active is his top pri
ority. To do so, Olsen would like
to increase the housing and busi
ness space in the area,.
“We can continue to push for
housing downtown and to push for
density and not sprawl,” he said.
As a downtown resident, Olsen
said he “walks through the heart of
the ward everyday” and is con
cerned about the young people
who hang out in the downtown
mall. If he were elected to City
Council, Olsen said he would open
youth centers offering productive
activities to these adolescents.
Olsen is not concerned by his
lack of government experience be
cause he sees himself as a student
eager to learn.
“As a student I really have been
diving down into it,” he said. “I’ve
really been able to bring myself up
to speed.”
Ron “Misha” Seymour, 49, who
is running to increase mirth in Eu
gene, said his friends convinced
him to run for City Council to per
haps bring a new voice to Eugene
government.
A former child psychology and
development teacher at Blackfeet
Community College in Browning,
Mont., Seymour said the preserva
BETTMAN
I. :§
SEYMOUR
OLSEN
tion of open
space and
better rela
tions be
tween police
and citizens
are the issues
most impor
tant to Ward
3 residents.
“1 feel that I
am one of the
few candi
dates address
ing the issue
that at times,
police are the
problem,”
Seymour
said. “Peo
ple’s rights are
being taken
away under
the guise of
the war on
drugs.”
The preser
vation of the
scenic corri
dor along the
banks of the
Willamette
river north of
the Universi
ty is also one
of Seymour’s
top priorities.
He said the city should buy land to
leave it open, not for development.
To increase city mirth, Seymour
suggested featuring street perform
ers in the downtown mall and
adding “benches around the city
for the worried to rest for awhile. ”
This is a part in a series of articles the
Emerald will publish profiling local and
state ballot measures and candidates
during the weeks leading up to the^May
16 Eugene primary elections.
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