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About Eugene weekly. (Eugene, Oregon) 1993-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 18, 2003)
CORPORATE SHILLS TARGET SCHOOL MONEY global warming, for example. Wentz says she’s concerned that corpo- rate or other moneyed interests in Oregon or nationally could similarly be using CSE as a cover. US West has already used CSE to lobby for higher phone bills, she notes. The tax increase CSE is now opposing would raise $800 million to keep schools open with a three-year graduated income tax surcharge. The average Oregonian would pay only about $38 a year, but wealthier individuals and corporations could pay far more. “They’re complete hired guns,” Wentz says of CSE. The real question is who hired them, she says. “Just who are these people and what are their interests in Oregon?” — Alan Pittman If somebody comes up to you with a clipboard asking you to sign on to their grassroots anti-tax referendum, you better think twice, says Patty Wentz of the Voter Education Project. “People assume when they see some- body holding a clipboard that it’s a grass- roots group,” Wentz says. But she says big corporations and other shady donors are behind the effort to repeal the Legislature’s recently passed tax increase. “They’re to- tally fake. They’re not really a grassroots group.” The three chief petitioners for the “Taxpayer Defense Fund” PAC formed to gather signatures to defeat the revenue measure are staff with the Washington, LCC BOARD MEMBER D.C.-based Citizens for a Sound Economy BACKS MANNIX PLANS (CSE) lobbying firm. Two of the three have offices in D.C., not Oregon, accord- Oregon Republican leader Kevin ing to a filing with the state. Mannix is pushing for a referen- CSE, which calls itself a grassroots dum on the Legislature’s think tank and refuses to name three-year tax hike and donors, has served as a front he’s getting support group for corporations’ secret big from an unlikely source, spending on lobbying efforts, ac- a member of the Board cording to Public Citizen and of Education at LCC. other critics. A recent article in Jay Bozievich of the the Washington Post based on board voiced his support leaked documents, reveals millions for Mannix’s efforts at a of dollars in donations CSE received board meeting last week, and Bozievich from Phillip Morris, US West, General when asked about it after the Electric, Microsoft, Exxon and other big meeting, said, “Increased taxes hurt the corporate donors while pursuing lobbying state’s economic recovery and with it the efforts in those corporations’ interests. college’s ability to count on stable funding. Phillip Morris got CSE lobbying against As business in Oregon gets stronger, the cigarette taxes, Microsoft got lobbying for college’s funding becomes more stable.” cuts in anti-trust enforcement and Exxon Bozievich, an EWEB engineer and got lobbying against efforts to reduce Libertarian recently elected to the board, BY PAUL NEEVEL Maggie Matoba On a hot August afternoon, master gardener Maggie Matoba shares a patch of shade with Roberta Phillips, Helen Burns and Evelyn Higgins, Willamette Oaks Retirement Center residents who raise veggies and flowers in the therapeutic garden Matoba maintains as part of her Healing Harvest program. “Maggie came last spring— she’s been such a blessing,” says Higgins. “She put in new soil and a watering system.” Matoba witnessed the healing potential of gardening when her father came to stay following a stroke. “Gardening added 15 years to his life,” she says. “He enjoyed it so much, his whole aura changed.” Matoba took the master gardener course in 2000 and currently commutes to Portland to study horticul- tural therapy — she’ll be certified in October. She started her first therapeutic gar- den, for girls at Looking Glass treatment center, in May of 2002. “It’s a population I wanted to work with — at-risk youth,” she says. “They learn about soil, biology, ecology. At the same time we address behavioral issues.” Healing Harvest, newly granted non-profit status, also includes gardens at Sheldon Oaks, Womenspace, and River Kourt Apartments. says during these tough economic times, “we should be looking for ways to stimu- late the economy, not depress it. HB 2152 will be a disaster for Oregon’s economy and, as LCC’s enrollment tracks with the economy, a disaster for LCC.” Mary Spilde, president of LCC, did not comment on Bozievich’s position, but she said last week that if Mannix’s efforts to stop the tax hike are successful, the college will lose about $1.3 million and commu- nity colleges statewide will lose about $9.9 million. Even with the tax hike, LCC is looking at cutting programs and raising tu- ition over the next few years. Several board members declined to comment on Bozievich’s position, how- ever none of them could recall a situation in the past where a board member publicly opposed a measure that would increase funding for the college. EW endorsed Nadia Sindi for the posi- tion in the May 2003 election, but The Register-Guard endorsed Bozievich, say- ing he has “a broader grasp of the intrica- cies of the college’s operations and bud- getary challenges.” Bozievich’s views on taxes are not new. In his unsuccessful campaign for the state Legislature in 2002 he promised to “vote with the Democrats to block the Republican social agenda, but vote with the Republicans to block any Democratic attempts to increase taxes or spending.” He was supported in that race by County Commissioner Anna Morrison and Rep. Pat Farr. Bozievich says his opposition to HB 2152 “is the only stance that is in the real interest of the college and the state.” — Ted Taylor DEVELOPERS PUSH FEES ONTO HOMEOWNERS Your sewer bill could go up to fund de- veloper profits after the Lane County Home Builders Association (HBA) de- railed a fee increase for developers. The local sewer system and sewage plant is funded by a mix of sewer fees and system development charges (SDCs) on developers to account for the cost of serv- ing new growth. To better account for the cost of growth, sewer managers this sum- mer proposed that home builders pay a $837 SDC per new home to hook up. The HBA threatened to take legal action and the sewer managers this month backed down, agreeing to suspend $300 of the fee for a year, pending a consultant and citizen committee study. Susan Smith, manager of the Metropolitan Wastewater Management Commission (MWMC), says the HBA at- tack on the SDCs became very personal. “There’s a lot of material that attacks me personally and our staff.” But she said HBA lobbyist Roxie Cuellar recently pub- licly apologized for the attacks at a MWMC meeting. Smith says if the sewage system can’t collect enough SDCs from developers to pay for needed capacity projects, the dif- ference may have to come from homeown- ers’ sewage bills. “It is a zero-sum game,” she says. “We have to build the capacity projects that are needed” to comply with environmental regulations. “The [home- owner] fees could go up.” At stake is big money. By heading off the developer fee increase this year, home- owners may have to make up about $200,000 in lost SDC revenue down the line. If the developers don’t pay their share in later years, homeowners could be out millions of dollars in higher sewer rates. The Eugene City Council will discuss approval of the MWMC’s proposal to sus- pend the SDC increase on Sept. 22, with a council vote scheduled for Sept. 24. Smith says the current fee system that HBA opposes was established by a diverse citizen committee in 1997 that looked at the “complex” balance between home- owner fees and developer charges. “For the last six years, we’ve had a methodology that seemed to work,” Smith says. The MWMC is now asking for volun- teers to serve on the new citizen study committee formed in response to the HBA threats. Applications are available at the MWMC office at Springfield City Hall. — AP POSNER SPEAKS ON HUMAN RIGHTS POST-9/11 John Posner says our founding fathers (continued on page 11) SEPTEMBER 18, 2003 9
