FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2017
4 — THE BAKER COUNTY PRESS
Opinion
— Guest Opinion —
— Letters to the Editor —
Collaboratives exclude public
To the Editor:
Forest Service “Collaboratives” do not
want to grant Eastern Oregon residents a
vote at the table.
They want people to “participate” but
not to ask for a vote in the process, that’s
why now, finally, when residents of Grant
County ask for voting status, the Blue
Mountains Forest Partners come out with
defamatory statements of residents being
“untrustworthy,” hoping to marginalize
those trying to participate in a meaningful
manner.
My mom had to sit through a shaming
by the Blue Mountains Forest Partners be-
cause she was “untrustworthy”, because I
question the collaboratives, and how they
use economic hardship to justify restrict-
ing motorized access to the mountains of
Eastern Oregon. Using “vegetative treat-
ments” to “restore” the forest, while re-
stricting motorized access when they help
the Forest Service “develop projects.”
The collaboratives are supposed to be civil
and open to diverse public input, but, if
that input does not align with the collabor-
atives stated goals, they become personal,
nasty, and petty.
The question is, can we get logs to
the mills without “rewilding” Eastern
Oregon? We did it for decades, and grew
some of the healthiest wildlife populations
around. Unfortunately, the environmental
community turned that on its head with
their litigation strategy, and they now get
to drive their message thru these collab-
oratives, while excluding public input thru
voting membership.
To paraphrase a collaborative board
member “my grandmother always told
me, you are the company you keep”. The
other lesson most of us learned from our
grandparents was “the only thing you have
is your word”, unfortunately, collabora-
tives members never learned that lesson,
because every time they give you “their
word”, they back track from it.
Eastern Oregonians should not be
shamed upon requesting voting member
status to “diverse and inclusive” groups,
but unfortunately, that’s how Eastern
Oregon Collaboratives operate.
John George
Bates
Taxpayer-funded abortion law
needs repealed
To the Editor:
In mid-August, Oregon Governor Kate
Brown signed into law HB 3391, The
Reproductive Health Equity Act. This law
requires private health insurers to offer
free abortions without deductible or co-
pay—abortions with no restrictions from
conception until birth.
Oregon is the only state in the United
States with no abortion restrictions. Abor-
tions can be done at Oregon taxpayers
expense any time before birth, for any
reason, for citizen or non-citizen. Yes,
we Oregonians are now forced to pay the
entire cost of all abortions in the state. Or-
egon taxpayers already pay for an average
of 10 abortions per day through the Or-
egon Health Plan (OHP) at a typical cost
of about $450 each. HB 3391 gives $10.2
million to expand the Oregon Health
Authority in order to provide “services,
drugs, devices, products and procedures”
for undocumented residents, $500,000
of which would specifically be used for
abortions.
Of course, the biggest losers in this sce-
nario are the human beings living in their
mothers’ wombs. They have no say in
the matter of their lives being eliminated
through the brutal act of abortion.
It is essential that those of us who hold
human life to be sacred and/or are con-
cerned about fiscal responsibility to speak
out and act on this matter. A citizens’ ini-
tiative, Stop Taxpayer Funding for Abor-
tion Act, is in place to block the stream of
taxpayer dollars now funding abortions
through OHP. This initiative will also
reverse the expansion of taxpayer-funded
abortion mandated by HB 3391.
Time is short. A total of 117,000 valid
signatures are needed by September 30 to
qualify this measure for the next statewide
ballot. Petitions are available from Oregon
Life United (https://www.oregonlifeunit-
ed.org/). We urge all Oregon citizens who
want fiscal responsibility and/or want to
Letter to the Editor Policy: The Baker County
Press reserves the right not to publish letters con-
taining factual falsehoods or incoherent narrative.
Letters promoting or detracting from specific for-
profit businesses will not be published. Word limit is
375 words per letter. Letters are limited to one every
other week per author. Letters should be submitted
to Editor@TheBakerCountyPress.com.
Advertising and Opinion Page Disclaimer:
Opinions submitted as Guest Opinions or Letters
protect human life to obtain and sign a
petition—or better yet obtain and circulate
petitions to assure that this initiative is
successful.
John and Susie Busch
Baker City
I liked anti-Trump economy
book
To the Editor:
How does our economy work?
According to Canadian activist Naomi
Klein, we have a corrosive values system
that places profit above the well-being of
people and the planet. It is a system based
on limitless taking and extracting.
It takes from workers, asking more and
more from them, even as employers offer
less and less security and lower wages in
return.
Schools, parks, transit, and other
services have had resources clawed back
from them over many decades.
Our system takes endlessly from the
earth’s natural bounty, without protecting
cycles of regeneration, while paying little
attention to where we are offloading pollu-
tion, whether it be into water systems that
sustain life or the atmosphere that keeps
our climate system in balance.
Our economy is addicted to short-term
profits, treating people and the earth either
like resources to be mined to their limits
or as garbage to be disposed of far out of
sight, whether deep in the ocean or deep
in a prison cell.
The economic system described above
is not mine, but slightly paraphrased from
that presented by Klein in her new book
“No is NOT Enough: Resisting Trump’s
shock politics and winning the world we
need.”
The system we need, says Klein, needs
to shift “from a system based on end-
less taking—from the earth and from one
another—to a culture based on caretak-
ing, the principle that when we take, we
also take care and give back. A system in
which everyone is valued, and we don’t
treat people or the natural world as if they
were disposable.”
I highly recommend reading Klein’s
“No is NOT Enough.”
Gary Dielman
Baker City
Please sign anti-gun grab
petition
To the Editor:
Okay folks, game on.
As you know, the Governor has signed
the Boquist/Burdick gun confiscation bill.
What you might not know is how few of
our friends in law enforcement are even
aware of it.
When the courts begin ordering the sei-
zure of guns from people who have com-
mitted no crime, things are going to get
real ugly in Oregon. So it’s time to go to
work.
Rest assured, as the effort begins to re-
peal this vicious attack on our rights, New
York billionaires will be pumping a fortune
into our state to continue the lies that the
supporters of this bill told to pass it. This
will NOT be an easy fight but you can do
something about it. And you can start now.
Please visit http://www.repeal719.com/
right now to download petitions to refer
this bill to the voters. Please share this link
with everyone you know who believes
in liberty and due process, especially
our friends in the rural parts of the state.
Then... start gathering signatures. As many
as you can.
The Repeal 719 website had both single
signer sheets and 10 signature sheets if you
are willing to gather other signatures. And
why wouldn’t you be? These are your guns.
The website has everything you need to
get going on this, including info on how to
gather signatures and the reasons this bill
is so dangerous.
Bring them to your gun club and share
them with your friends. We have, and the
response has been great.
This is the first part of the fight,a part you
can play a major role in. After the referral
is on the ballot, we will face a very expen-
sive battle in a campaign against anti-gun
billionaires but now we need signatures.
Please do your part.
Kevin Starrett
Oregon Firearms Federation
Salem, Oregon
to the Editor express the opinions of their authors,
and have not been authored by and are not neces-
sarily the opinions of The Baker County Press, any of
our staff, management, independent contractors or
affiliates. Advertisements placed by political groups,
candidates, businesses, etc., are printed as a paid
service, which does not constitute an endorsement
of or fulfillment obligation by this newspaper for the
products or services advertised.
“Repeal 719”
Ballot
Referendum
Initiative
By Rep. Bill Post
I know that many in Oregon are very
u pset that SB 719 passed. Therefore a
group of us are working to repeal it via the
ballot. We need your help. Why are we
doing this?
SB 719 calls for the forced confisca-
tion of property by the police with no due
process, no accusation of a crime let alone
conviction of a crime.
It allows people with no mental health
credentials to make assessments of other’s
states of mind and it allows people with
no mental health credentials (judges) to
punish people they have never met or
spoken to.
Furthermore it actually forbids judges
from considering assessments of the
respondents mental health by people who
actually DO have mental health creden-
tials.
The law allows a judge to confiscate
every firearm in a household because one
person there has ever has a DUI convic-
tion.
The law provides no help whatsoever for
a person who has been accused of being
suicidal. In fact, an amendment that would
have called for some minimal intervention
was not even considered.
The law provides NO protection for
people who are living in the household of
a person who has been accused of being a
danger to others.
The law provides no guidance for the
police who are tasked with confiscating
the firearms of the person who has not
been accused of or tried for a crime.
The law allows 24 hours for the respon-
dent to turn over firearms even though in
many cases that is not possible. That 24
hour window is clearly a time of extreme
danger in the event the respondent actu-
ally IS a danger to self or others.
The law defines no provisions for deter-
mining how many firearms the respondent
has, or how to assure they have all been
seized and lastly and probably most im-
portantly to me:
Governor Kate Brown stalled signing
this bill into law which greatly limited the
amount of days to gather signatures, thus
depriving Oregonians of their constitu-
tional rights.
So, what do you do and how can you
help?
Below are the links for the two sided
petition sheets. They need to be printed
back to back. So, first download each
(they are pdf files) then print the first
sheet, turn the paper over and print the
“cover sheet” on back. Once you have
filled a sheet out (read the instructions
carefully on the cover sheet and down
below on this page) send them in to the
addresses listed.
Here are the two sheets to download to
go gather signatures: http://www.billpost.
Submitted Photo
Rep. Bill Post out of Keizer rep-
resents Oregon’s House District
25. He is also host to the Bill Post
Radio Show.
com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/2018-
302-RP-10-line-08222017.pdf.
Mail completed sheets to:
Bill Post, 5135 Lacey St N, Keizer, OR
97303; Mike Nearman, 2570 Greenwood
Rd S, Independence, Oregon 97351; or
Teri Grier, 94342 Sether Street Ln, North
Bend, Oregon 97459.
Instructions for Circulators
Only active Oregon voters may sign a
petition. Ask each signer if they are an ac-
tive registered voter in Oregon.
A single circulator must personally wit-
ness all signatures collected on any one
signature sheet. After witnessing each
signature on a sheet, use a pen to sign and
date the circulator certification.
Initial any changes you make to the date
you signed the certification. A complete
list of allowable circulator certification
corrections is provided in the Circula-
tor Training Manual available at www.
oregonvotes.gov.
It is against the law for circulators to:
Circulate a petition containing a false
signature.
Make false statements to any person
who signs the petition or requests infor-
mation about it.
Attempt to obtain the signature of a
person who is not qualified to sign the
petition.
Offer money or anything of value to
another person to sign or not sign the
petition.
Sell or offer to sell signature sheets.
Write, alter, correct, clarify or obscure any
information about the signers unless the
signer is disabled and requests assistance
or the signer initials after the changes are
made.
Accept compensation to circulate a
petition that is based on the number of
signatures obtained.
Warning Violations of the circulator
requirements may result in conviction of a
felony with a fine of up to $125,000 and/
or prison for up to 5 years.
Instructions for Signers
Only active Oregon voters may sign a
petition. Use a pen to sign your name, as
you did when you registered to vote.
Provide the date you signed the petition,
your printed name and residence address.
Only you may complete this optional
information.
Initial any changes the circulator makes
to your printed name, residence address or
date you signed the petition.
Go to www.billpost.us for more.
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