North Douglas Herald
Business Matters
March 2024
Sponsored By Zolezzi Insurance Agency
All Oregon Businesses Must Offer Retirement Plans
OregonSaves Or Another Qualified Retirement Plan To Employees
Salem OR - Since July 31st of 2023 All busi-
nesses in Oregon with at least one employee
must offer a qualified retirement plan or other-
wise sign up for OregonSaves.
“Businesses across the state have now
been thrust into offering retirement and 401(k)
planning. Yet, most have no idea where to be-
gin, even if they are looking to get started with
the most basic of offerings, OregonSaves” said
the president of GNSA, Katharina Fink.
Back in March of 2023, businesses with at
least three employees became required to offer
a qualified retirement plan or otherwise sign up
for OregonSaves. Now all businesses with at
least one employee, as well as those utilizing a
Professional Employer Organization (PEO) or
Leasing Agency must offer a qualified retire-
ment plan or OregonSaves.
“The biggest issue we find is that all these
employers who are new to managing 401(k)
and retirement get started with OregonSaves,
and then most have trouble manually adminis-
tering their retirement plans as well as keeping
the information updated in both their payroll
and 401(k) systems, again manually.” Said
Fink.
To avoid manual 401(k) and retirement
plan administration, businesses have the option
of turning to an integrated retirement and 401(k)
plan, instead of OregonSaves, which eliminates
the need for things such as manual deduction
and contribution updates through a 360 integra-
tion with your payroll software.
With plans starting at just $120 per
month and $4 per employee, employers who
get started with 401(k) retirement planning
can satisfy their OregonSaves compliance
requirements without forcing themselves to use
OregonSaves.
Businesses in Oregon should compare
their Oregon Retirement Plan Mandate Options
before making a final decision or defaulting to
OregonSaves.
Business Oregon Awards Matching Grants
Awarded to 14 Oregon Businesses, 3 in Eugene
Business Oregon and the Oregon Innovation
Council (Oregon InC) are thrilled to announce
the recipients of the Small Business Innovation
Research (SBIR)/Small Business Technology
Transfer (STTR) Matching Grant awards. The
SBIR and STTR grant programs are federal
programs designed to stimulate technological
innovation and provide opportunities for small
businesses to conduct research and development
with commercialization potential. The programs
help small businesses explore their technological
potential and get their products closer to market.
However, because the SBIR/STTR funding
alone leaves gaps in critical areas for early stage
companies to scale their business, the Matching
Grant program is available to complement the
federal program and address these critical gaps.
Business Oregon’s Matching Grant program
can increase a business’s chances of success by
helping companies advance their technologies
and better positioning them for future fundraising
and growth after the federal grants are complete.
These funds can be applied to expenses that help
a company stay and grow in Oregon, such as
business plan development, facilities, testing
equipment, production equipment, intellectual
property protection, product marketing, business
consulting, and more.
Page 11
Grants awarded to 14 Oregon companies,
including 3 businesses in Lane county.
KeyBiome (Eugene) is developing a novel
microbiome-derived anti-inflammatory protein-
based therapeutic to treat IBD.
NemaMetrix (Eugene) is commercializing
FishCam Lite, an automated zebrafish drug
testing platform used in biomedical research.
Northwest Prevention Science (Eugene)
is developing digital health technology for
improving the mental health of children.
More information on Business Oregon’s
SBIR/STTR Matching Grant program can be
found at www.oregon.gov/biz.
Business Oregon, the state’s economic
development agency, invests in Oregon
businesses, communities, and people to
promote a globally competitive, diverse, and
inclusive economy. The agency’s services
span rural community development and
infrastructure financing; business retention,
expansion and recruitment; export promotion
and international trade; investments in industry
research and development and entrepreneurship;
small business assistance; and support for
arts and cultural organizations. Learn more at
biz.oregon.gov. Business Oregon 775 Summer
St NE, Suite 200, Salem, OR 97301
A Better Brand of Insurance Service
Embezzlement at Eugene Weekly newspaper
Forced to lay off entire staff and halt printing
Eugene OR — Last December the Eugene
Weekly newspaper had to lay off its entire staff
and halt print after 40 years because its funds
were embezzled by a former employee. This
was a devastating blow to a publication that
serves as an important source of information in
a community that, like many others nationwide,
is struggling with growing gaps in local news
coverage.
About a week before Christmas, the Eugene
Weekly found inaccuracies in its bookkeeping,
editor Camilla Mortensen said. It was discov-
ered that a former employee who was “heavily
involved” with the paper’s finances had used its
bank account to pay themselves $90,000 since
at least 2022. The paper then became aware of
at least $100,000 in unpaid vendor bills, includ-
ing to the paper’s printer, stretching back several
months.
Additionally, multiple employees, including
Mortensen, realized that money from their pay-
checks that was supposed to be going into retire-
ment accounts were never deposited. When the
paper realized it couldn’t make the next payroll,
it was forced to lay off all of its 10 staff mem-
bers and stop its print edition. The alternative
weekly, founded in 1982, printed 30,000 copies
each week to distribute for free in Eugene, the
second-largest city in the state and home to the
University of Oregon.
“To lay off a whole family’s income three
days before Christmas is the absolute worst,”
Mortensen said, expressing her sense of devasta-
tion. “It was not on my radar that anything like
this could have happened or was happening.”
The suspected employee had worked for
the paper for about four years and has since been
fired. The Eugene police department’s financial
crimes unit is investigating, and the paper’s
owners have hired forensic accountants to piece
together what happened, she said.
Brent Walth, a journalism professor at the
University of Oregon, said he was concerned
about the loss of a paper that has had “an out-
sized impact in filling the widening gaps in news
coverage” in Eugene. He described the paper as
an independent watchdog and a compassionate
voice for the community, citing its obituaries
of homeless people as an example of how the
paper has helped put a human face on some of
the city’s biggest issues.
He also noted how the paper has made “an
enormous difference” for journalism students
seeking internships or launching their career. He
said there were feature and investigative stories
that “the community would not have had if not
for the weekly’s commitment to make sure that
journalism students have a place to publish in a
professional outlet.”
A tidal wave of closures of local news
outlets across the country in recent decades has
left many Americans without access to vital
information about their local governments and
communities and has contributed to increasing
polarization, said Tim Gleason, the former dean
of the University of Oregon’s journalism school.
“The loss of local news across the country
is profound,” he said. “Instead of having the
healthy kind of community connections that
local journalism helps create, we’re losing that
and becoming communities of strangers. And
the result of that is that we fall into these partisan
camps.”
An average of 2.5 newspapers closed per
week in the U.S. in 2023, according to research-
ers at Northwestern University. Over 200 coun-
ties have no local news outlet at all, they found,
and more than half of all U.S. counties have ei-
ther no local news source or only one remaining
outlet, typically a weekly newspaper.
Despite being officially unemployed, Eu-
gene Weekly staff continued to work without
pay to help update the website and figure out
next steps, said Todd Cooper, the paper’s art di-
rector. He described his colleagues as dedicated,
creative, hardworking people.
“This paper is definitely an integral part
of the community, and we really want to bring
it back and bounce back bigger and better if we
can,” he said.
The efforts of staff and supporters rang
true on February 8th when EW published a
print edition, albeit a diminished version but still
a Herculean feat given the odds against them.
Their journalistic fortitude is showing as the
weekly publication continues to put out a qual-
ity and concise product every week since. Still
waiting for an official accounting of the depth,
degree and identity of a perpetrator or any
clear assay of the events leading to the closure,
Law enforcement has only released minimal
information that cites a fraud investigation of a
“trusted” former employee. In the meantime,
Eugene Weekly is doing what it does best, as
best it can.