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About Appeal tribune. (Silverton, Or.) 1999-current | View Entire Issue (July 15, 2020)
SILVERTONAPPEAL.COM | WEDNESDAY, JULY 15, 2020 | 3B Lawmakers propose $500 for those still waiting for benefits Claire Withycombe Salem Statesman Journal USA TODAY NETWORK Like many other state lawmakers, Rep. Brad Witt, D-Clatskanie, has been fielding a flurry of calls from residents in his district who are desperate to get un- employment benefits. Some have been waiting weeks, even months, since getting laid off to see any money from the state. Last week, Witt heard from an unemployed constituent who had 13 dollars left in their bank ac- count. “The whole process over there is an abject failure and people are literally starving to death because of it,” Witt said. Lawmakers propose emergency relief On Thursday, House Speaker Tina Kotek, D-Portland, and Senate President Peter Courtney, D-Salem, proposed sending $500 each to the almost 70,000 Oregonians who have applied for bene- fits but haven’t gotten them. “People need help now,” Kotek said in a statement. “While the department works on processing all the claims, we can make sure desperate Oregonians get some direct cash assistance as soon as possible.” A committee that makes emergency budget allocations will take up the “mini-stimulus” measure, which would use $35 million in federal coronavirus relief funds, on Tuesday, July 14. The proposal would order the state’s administrative agency to come up with a “simple process” where people who have already applied for benefits could seek the relief. Earlier this week, the head of the agency said there’s no silver bullet that would quicken the pace of claims getting paid. “There really isn’t a magic legislative fix that would let us quickly go through the claims much more rapidly,” David Gerstenfeld, acting director of the state’s employment department, told reporters Wednesday. Other lawmakers have pointed out that the delays in benefits for those who have lost jobs have created other prob- lems requiring policy interventions. For example, people who aren’t get- ting any income either from a job or from the state are struggling to pay rent, which prompted lawmakers to ban land- lords from evicting people for another three months for nonpayment. “If it weren’t for the employment divi- sion fumbling so epically, we might not be here,” said Rep. Kim Wallan, R-Med- ford, during a floor debate on the mea- sure to extend eviction protections. “But we have so many tenants who are really desperate because they didn’t get the unemployment checks they were enti- tled to.” Some suggest systemic changes Last week, Kevin Mannix, a former state lawmaker — who earlier this year also supported an ill-fated quest to chal- lenge Gov. Kate Brown’s executive ac- tions to slow the spread of the coronavi- rus — suggested Brown create a loan program. Under his proposal, financial institu- tions could loan $2,500 to people who had applied for unemployment before July 1 and whose claims were still pend- ing. The state would back the loan. Mannix says he wants to push the agency to think creatively about how to solve the backlog. “The bureaucracy is so tightly strung that there’s no flexibility in understand- ing how to deal with an unusual situa- tion,” Mannix said. “Flexibility is the key here.” Lawmakers are constrained by strin- gent federal rules and a dwindling bud- get, said Rep. Paul Holvey, D-Eugene, who chairs a legislative committee on business and labor issues. Holvey, in a phone interview Tues- day, said lawmakers have indeed con- sidered ideas like loans. “A lot of people wanted the employ- ment department just to advance the money and then figure out if people were eligible afterwards,” Holvey said. But, he says, if the state pays people before they’re eligible, that could jeopar- dize needed funding that the federal government supplies. Even if the state used a separate, non- federal pot of money to pay people still waiting for unemployment checks, that money will have to come from some- where in the state’s already-dwindling budget, Holvey said. State revenues are expected to take a major blow due to the economic down- turn. “Should it come from schools?” Hol- vey said. “Should it come from public safety? Should it come from health care? ...That’s really the discussion. What pro- grams do you want to cut to do that? Be- cause the state doesn’t print money like the federal government.” Oregon is not the only state wrestling with the sudden onslaught of claims for unemployment benefits. Even those that had updated their technology wres- tled with the volume of applications, Gerstenfeld said. “The scope of the work and the changes to the system were just so mas- sive that even the best new systems really struggled to keep up,” Gerstenfeld said. Witt has called for a state probe into what specifically prevented the agency from paying Oregonians quickly. “We have to know in the Legislature precisely what the problem is in order to be able to hold someone accountable,” Witt said. Will federal changes trickle down? In light of those challenges across the country, some federal policymakers are rethinking the current system. Unemployment insurance was estab- lished in the throes of the Great Depres- sion, and requires each individual work- er to go through a rigorous vetting proc- ess before they see a dime of govern- ment aid. Democrats in the U.S. House and Senate have introduced proposals that would essentially pay businesses to keep workers on payroll instead of laying them off and forcing them to go through the unemployment insurance system. As broader fixes await debate, state lawmakers have been chipping in with elbow grease. Every day, Witt and his staff make calls: to food banks, to shelters, to com- munity activists, trying to get the resi- dents of his district help with housing and food. “This whole thing is being held to- gether right now by paper clips, rubber bands and bubble gum,” Witt said. “And that’s not a way for tens of thousands of Oregonians to have to meet their daily existence.” Claire Withycombe is a reporter at the Statesman Journal. Contact her at cwithycombe@statesmanjournal.com, 503-910-3821 or follow on Twitter @kcwithycombe. Mount Washington is seen on the trail to Blue Lake. PHOTOS BY BOBBIE SNEAD/ SPECIAL TO THE STATESMAN JOURNAL Blue Lake Continued from Page 1B produce warped boards, this unusual growth pattern is actually a means of survival for trees. Spiraling provides great flexibility in high winds that can quickly snap trunks with straight verti- cal growth. If a portion of a tree’s roots become injured, the branches directly above the damage continue to receive water thanks to the growth pattern of porous vascular tissue curling up the trunk. Water from the healthy roots rises in slow internal swirls to reach the branches all around the tree. Growing like a corkscrew enabled this venerable tree to survive for at least two centuries before the B and B Fire fi- nally took its life. The snag stands defi- antly; eventually it will fall and its crum- bling wood will enrich the soil for the next succession of trees. Huffing and puffing, we reach the cal- dera’s rim and look down 300 feet to the sapphire surface of Blue Lake. The cra- ter holding the lake formed when hot A meadow behind the caldera that holds Blue Lake. magma met underground water and erupted in a violent explosion of steam and fragmented rock. Radiocarbon dat- ing indicates the eruption occurred only 1,300 years ago, just yesterday in geo- logic terms. Fed by submerged springs, the lake is over 300 feet deep. We walk the faint rim trail. On our left, the slope falls steeply to the water; on our right, the hillside drops to an em- erald meadow. It is as though we are hik- ing along a jewelry setting that holds two giant gemstones in place. After lunch on the rim, our little group descends the cinder slope for the return hike. We pause to explore the meadow. Scorched snags around it ac- centuate its green lushness. Three huge cottonwood skeletons, joined at the base, tower over the meadow’s south side. Their thick bark protected them from burning, but the fire’s intense heat desiccated them like kiln-dried lumber. The smooth wood is cement-hard; the bare trunks throw long shadows. Their branches still reach for the sun just as they did the day the fire swept over the meadow and its encircling forest. But no Public Notices PUBLIC POLICY NOTICES Public Notices are published by the Statesman Journal and available online at w w w .S ta te s m a n J o u r n a l.c o m . The Statesman Journal lobby is open Monday - Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. You can reach them by phone at 503-399-6789. In order to receive a quote for a public notice you must e-mail your copy to SJLegals@StatesmanJournal.com , and our Legal Clerk will return a proposal with cost, publication date(s), and a preview of the ad. LEGAL/PUBLIC NOTICE DEADLINES All Legals Deadline @ 1:00 p.m. on all days listed below: ***All Deadlines are subject to change when there is a Holiday. The Silverton Appeal Tribune is a one day a week (Wednesday) only publication • Wednesday publication deadlines the Wednesday prior LEGAL/PUBLIC NOTICE RATES Silverton Appeal Tribune: • Wednesdays only - $12.15/per inch/per time • Online Fee - $21.00 per time • Affidavit Fee - $10.00 per Affidavit requested leaves absorb the sun’s energy and no living roots take up moisture. These trees harbor no life, or so it seems at first. Slowly circling the trio, we discover a scrawny shoot of new growth emerging from the base of the middle tree. A few tentative leaves flut- ter in the wind. These three sisters pro- tected a flicker of life deep within and, seventeen years after the fire, life re- sumes. Resilience; survival. Bobbie Snead is a local naturalist and nature educator. She can be reached at naturalist.column@gmail.com . public notices/legals email: sjlegals@statesmanjournal.com or call: 503.399.6789 PUBLIC NOTICE Notice of Permit Amendment T 13373 T-13373 filed by Shawn and Kimberly Schurter, 10520 Sunnyview Road NE, Salem, OR 97317, propose an additional point of appropriation un- der Permit G-18197. The permit allows the use of 0.54 cubic foot per second from three wells in Sec. 19, T7S, R1W, WM for irrigation in Sects. 19, 20 and 30, T7S, R1W, WM. The applicant proposes an additional point of appropriation in Sec. 19, T7S, R1W, WM. The Water Resources Department has concluded that the proposed permit amendment appears to be consistent with the requirements of ORS 537.211. Silverton Appeal July 15 & 22, 2020 BE SEEN with color! 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