Illinois Valley News, Cave Junction, Ore. Wednesday, May 17, 2017
Page A-5
Timber counties struggle to provide services as aid dries up
Gillian Flaccus
Associated Press
ROSEBURG, Ore. (AP) - So much
timber money once flowed into this rural
Oregon county that its leaders set up
committees to find ways to spend it.
Today, Douglas County’s library system
is on life support, and its sheriff’s department
is on track to lose funding.
Nearly 30 years after environmental
protections slashed logging in federal forests,
Oregon counties like this one that thrived on
timber revenues for decades are struggling to
provide basic services. These so-called timber
counties received hundreds of millions of
dollars during logging’s long heyday, and since
then the federal government has continued
to pour money in to make up for timber’s
downfall.
Now the money has dried up and people
are reluctant to tax themselves, leaving leaders
scrambling and public institutions in free fall.
Commissioners in Douglas County,
which once received $50 million in annual
profits from logging on federal lands, have
slashed health services, cut nearly 300 jobs and
started charging for landfill use and parking
at parks. The county’s main library will close
June 1 because voters rejected a tax, and voters
in nearby Josephine County must decide May
16 whether to restore limited tax dollars to
libraries and fund county response to 911 calls.
Democratic U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden
recently joined other Western lawmakers in a
last-ditch effort to restore federal assistance
- but local officials aren’t optimistic.
“Most of the citizens have become
accustomed to receiving that outside money,
and now that that money is gone, we have
to be self-sufficient - or at least more self-
sufficient,” Josephine County Sheriff Dave
Daniel said.
Yet anti-tax sentiment is strong here,
where President Donald Trump dominated in
November.
Voters in these counties have rejected
tax levies for public services nearly a dozen
times before, including for public safety and
libraries. Many residents feel county leaders
are quick to come to voters and must do more
to bring back timber dollars, said Jim Rafferty,
who opposes raising taxes in Josephine
County.
“I’m not saying that we’re opposed to
public safety. That’s not the message,” he said.
“The message is for the county commissioners
to roll up their sleeves and fund the sheriff
when they can, rather than give us this
rhetoric.”
The economic spiral playing out in
western Oregon is interwoven with themes
that have emerged across the American West:
Anger over federal land policy, debate about
the limits of environmental regulation and the
question of who has the right to benefit from
federal lands.
Communities across the American West
have long received revenues from logging on
federal land, but a quirk of history made the
timber wealth of more than a dozen counties in
Oregon even greater - and makes their current
plight unique.
These 18 timber counties stretch from
Portland to the California line. They contain
3,281 square miles (8,498 square kilometers)
of densely forested territory that is the central
character in a tale of rapid Western expansion
and century-old corruption.
The Oregon & California Railroad got the
lands in the 1860s for a rail line. The project
spurred growth in Oregon but also inspired
large-scale land fraud that led to the indictment
of a U.S. senator and two congressmen.
In the scandal’s wake, the federal
government in 1916 took back the land, but
locals argued that cheated them of a tax base
on land ripe for logging.
Federal legislation tailored to compensate
the counties created a cash cow: 75 percent of
the logging receipts from those lands go to the
counties, with no restrictions.
During the 1980s, the U.S. Bureau of
Land Management was selling 1 billion board
feet (2.4 million cubic meters) of timber a year,
producing so much money that some of the
counties did not assess property taxes. Most
also get 25 percent of timber receipts from
national forests within their borders under a
separate program.
But in the early 1990s, conservation
groups won lawsuits to protect spotted owl and
salmon habitat, and logging on federal land
dropped by 90 percent. Federal dollars to ease
the counties’ transition have been shrinking for
years and were not renewed this year.
That funding problem has been
compounded by a state law that removed
the harvest tax on cut timber and by a voter-
approved ballot measure in 1998 that changed
the valuation of private forest land.
The adjustment has been whiplash in
communities where unemployment rises to 8
and 9 percent.
Kate Lasky, executive director of
Josephine Community Libraries Inc., runs a
nonprofit foundation that has kept the libraries
open with donations and volunteers.
The May 16 ballot measure would add 39
cents per $1,000 in taxes for voters in a special
district of the precincts around the library’s
branches. A previous countywide levy failed.
“I have to focus on those people who
want to support their community,” Lasky said.
“We need to do that for generations, not just
for next year.”
A public safety levy on the same ballot
asks for 93 cents per $1,000. If that fails,
residents who call 911 won’t get any help
from sheriff’s deputies, said Daniel, the county
sheriff, who handed out 17 layoff warnings last
month.
The Oregon State Police, which has been
providing limited patrol coverage, says it can’t
help more if the measure fails.
“We’re just bracing ourselves for the
impact,” Daniel said.
In Douglas County, officials in the 1990s
realized there would be a drop-off in funding
and started building up reserves, but those
funds are almost gone.
“Literally, and I’m not kidding, we had
committees that just sat around and figured out
how to spend the money. That’s no joke. That
was their job,” Douglas County Commissioner
Gary Leif said of timber’s peak.
“What I fear - what I know - is going to
happen, is that we will have to go to the people
and say, ‘We’ve cut everything down to the
bones. There’s nowhere else to cut.
The Archive Zone: by Hillary Mohr from the Illinois Valley News archives
STOP in the name of the
law! Calmly drop what you
are doing, take a seat, and get
ready for some lock and loaded
action in this week’s Police
Blotter Archive Zone. The Date:
May 29, 2002. Location: Cave
Junction and the Illinois Valley.
Thursday, May 16
*Deputies in rural Grants
Pass were told by a woman
in the 10000 block of Taklima
Road reported hearing five
gunshots.
*At the north end of CJ
a man with a chainsaw was
checked.
*In Selma a resident
claimed that he was being
followed by a man that he beat
up in another state last year.
He said that the man is a drug
that her son, in his tree house,
was questioned about the
accommodations by two scruffy
looking men with lots of
tattoos.
*A resident of Selma
reported verbal threats via
telephone by a prisoner in
county jail.
Friday, May 17
*At 12:05 a.m. a resident
JP Auto &
Metal Recycling
New Parts - Used Parts
-We Buy Scrap Metal-
Certified Scales
Vitamineral
Green
16 oz.
$
18
$
89
ea.
Reg. $23.59
Special Features
Smart Natural
Deli Special
No antibiotics or
hormones. An all
natural chicken.
2
Pulled pork with your
choice of side salad
or chips.
$ 29
4
lb.
ea.
6
$ 09
$ 49
Reg.
$2.69 ea.
ea.
Reg. $5.99 ea.
Gluten Free
Granola
Reed’s
Ginger Brew
3
$ 99
ea.
3
Reg.
$6.49
Asstd. Boulder Canyon
Asstd. Scents
Kettle
Cooked Chips
Earth Friendly
Laundry Soap
Grab-N-Go
Momma’s Munchies
Chocofit Almond &
Sea Salt Chocolate Bars
1
$ 59
3
$ 79
ea.
Reg. $1.99
ea.
Reg. $3.99
3 39
$ 29
1
$ 29
2
$ 29
4
ea.
Honeydew Melons .............
Reg. $1.49 lb.
Peaches ............................
Reg.
$5.79
Reg. $2.89 lb.
Strawberries......................
Reg. $4.79 ea.
lb.
lb.
ea.
Bulk
Reg.
$14.29
6
$ 79
7
$
15 59
Mt. Rainier Trail Mix ........
Great for hiking.
$ 79
lb.
Reg. $7.69 lb.
Deli
Your choice of
bread and cheese.
Reg. $4.79 ea.
Reg. $3.59 ea.
Asstd. 4 packs
Grill Menu
Kids’
Grilled Cheese
ea.
Pineapples ........................ $
Asstd. Udi’s
9
Shelton’s Chicken &
Turkey Franks ..................
Produce
Reg. $6.99 lb.
$ 99
ea.
4 79
$ 89
3
Asstd. 3 Twins
$
Ice Cream ..........................
lb.
Groceries
2
Reg. $6.39 pkg.
Try these grilled!
Reg. $3.09
pkg.
Frozen
Asparagus
$ 99
ea.
lb.
Reg. $8.19 lb.
Reg. $5.49 ea.
High Brew
Coffee Drinks
$ 29
ea.
No nitrates or nitrites.
Heat and eat.
Made with Smoked Chicken.
Asstd. Singles
ea.
7 79
$ 99
5
Niman Uncured
$
Ham Steak .......................
Aidell’s Habanero &
Green Chile Dogs ................
$ 99
Reg. $2.59 lb.
1
ea.
Meat
Whole Chickens Pulled Pork Sandwich
e very
Friday
and hear all of you
72 39
Reg. $85.09
K araoKe
C an ’ t wait to see
500 gr.
MCT Oil
S PORTSMAN TAVER N
CoCKtailS
that he lost the sale of two
properties because of tire tracks
from four-wheelers. They were
contacted and warned about
trespassing.
*Out Deer Creek Road,
according to a complainant at
11:06 p.m., approximately 30
underage persons were drinking
alcohol, staggering around and
throwing gasoline on a fire.
2 WEEK SPECIAL
Barlean’s
29910 Redwood Hwy
Cave Junction, OR
541-592-3691
Serving
dealer and a gang member.
*In Downtown CJ at 8:16
p.m. a man with a guitar was
warned about walking in traffic.
Saturday, May 18
*In CJ a report was
received from a person
who said that an ex-spouse
threatened to put a bullet in
someone’s head.
*A Selma resident said
Mt. Jefferson Trail Mix ........
Salad Case
Penne Antipasta
Penne pasta, mushrooms, mozzarella
cheese, red bellpepper, pepperoncini,
olives & snow peas.
Breakfast
Breakfast Burrito
Two eggs, your choice
of meat, cheese and
vegetables.
Reg.
$4.39
3
$ 99
ea.
4
$ 09
lb.
Reg. $4.59
lb.
Equal Exchange
Chocolate Bars .............
Reg. $8.79 lb.
lb.
Reg. $19.29 lb.
We support our local farms!
We Accept Oregon Trail Cards • Prices Effective Weds., 05/10/17 - Tues., 05/23/17 Ad Specials - Whil e Supplies Last.
1201 Redwood Ave. • 541-471-2700 • Open Mon. - Sat. 8 am - 8 pm • Sun. 10 am - 6 pm