OREGONIAN SHAMED
FOR MISSING SCANDAL
Neil Goldschmidt isn’t the only one scan-
dalized by reports that the former governor of
Oregon sexually abused a 14-year-old girl 30
years ago. The Oregonian, the state’s largest
and most powerful newspaper, is taking heat
for missing and then spinning the story,
which first broke in the alternative
paper Willamette Week.
• Some of the criticism is
coming from inside the
paper. Willamette Week
published an internal
memo describing a
meeting of editors and
reporters
at
The
Oregonian concerning
the paper’s catch-up cov-
erage. Columnist “Steve
Duin felt strongly that our
coverage today was too rev-
erential. We are dealing with a
child molester,” according to the
memo. Duin “suggested that readers
might think we’d learned nothing from
Packwood and that we are hands off people in
power.” In 1992 The Oregonian failed to pur-
sue allegations of sexual harassment against
then Sen. Bob Packwood, and that story
broke instead in The Washington Post — to
The Oregonian’s continuing shame.
• The Post reported May 12 that The
Oregonian “has been dogged by questions —
from inside and outside the newsroom —
about why it was scooped and then seemed to
allow its catch-up coverage to be spun by
Goldschmidt.” The Post noted that
Goldschmidt went to The Oregonian with an
exclusive confession only after investigative
reporters at Willamette Week unearthed his
sordid past. “The confession that
Goldschmidt gave exclusively to The
Oregonian appeared to pay some coverage
dividends, at least for one day’s news cycle.
On that first day, the paper published his ver-
sion of the duration of the relationship. The
benign language he used to characterize his
encounters with the girl — ‘affair’ — ap-
peared in the banner front-page headline. An
editorial was sympathetic” and described
Goldschmidt as a “tack-sharp, charismatic
leader” and the scandal as “an incalculable
loss” for the state, the Post reported.
The Post reported on complaints from
readers. “Goldschmidt dropped an interview
in The Oregonian’s lap so it would not be
completely skunked on this huge story,” Lars
Larsen, a conservative talk show host on
KXL-AM Portland, told the Post. “In
exchange, the paper gave him
the most favorable treat-
ment I can imagine to a
confessed
rapist.
People are calling in
to complain that it
was absolutely scur-
rilous of the paper to
characterize this as
an affair.”
• The Daily
Astorian chimed in
May 20 with an editor-
ial, “It’s Bob Packwood
all over again.” The paper
accused The Oregonian of
“dishonesty” and for making a
“fateful bargain with Goldschmidt in order to
foster the illusion that they were breaking the
story that he had committed statutory rape
while mayor of Portland. In doing so, they
printed his version wholesale, which short-
ened the period of sexual relations by two
years.”
The Astorian wrote that the newspaper’s
failure in the Packwood and Goldschmidt
stories “reveals a corporate culture whose
comfort with lassitude may also be observed
every day of the week as well as in major in-
cidents.” The Oregonian’s inertia “leads in-
evitably to a culture of underachievement
and a lack of intellectual rigor.” The Astorian
blames the paper’s owners for a lack of a
“sense of moral obligation” and “demand for
excellence” that has lead to the “intellectual
corruption” at The Oregonian.
— Alan Pittman
EUGENE SUBSIDIZES
NEW FEDERAL BUILDING
While the federal government is blowing
billions of dollars in Iraq and slashing taxes
for the wealthy, the city of Eugene is spend-
ing millions on subsidizing a lavish new fed-
BY PAUL NEEVEL
DIANE BENNER
Soon after she and her family moved to
their west Springfield neighborhood 12 years
ago, Diane Benner took a job delivering the
Register-Guard’s weekly ad circular. “I knocked
on doors and said, ‘I’m your paper person,’”
she says. “I like to know everybody. I’m a listen-
er, too.”
Years later, when elderly neighbors were
threatened with eviction by the city after a fire
damaged their home, Benner brought in a TV
crew and the harrassment ended. When unruly
kids roamed unsupervised at all hours, she
went door-to-door to get adults to take respon-
sibility.
Raised near Harrisburg, Benner bussed to
school at Cal Young and Sheldon. She has
three grown children from an early marriage and three school-age kids living at
home, along with her husband of 25 years, Jay Benner, and an adopted grandson.
She works as a custodian at Bethel’s Home Source School.
Early this year, Benner called police to report odors coming from a nearby
house in her neighborhood.
“Diane busted a meth house,” says Head Start family advocate Chava Kronen.
“She put herself at risk to make her street safer.”
8 JUNE 3, 2004
eral courthouse.
The city spent $4.1 million buying the
Chiquita cannery site for the courthouse and
another $2.2 million buying and relocating
the adjacent AutoCraft body shop for a total
cost of $6.3 million.
But the federal government paid the city
only $3.9 million for the courthouse site.
That leaves the city $2.4 million in the hole.
The city hopes it can sell a couple acres of
land the courthouse didn’t want at the site for
another $1.6 million. But even that optimistic
scenario leaves the city about a million bucks
in the hole.
The city is adding to that federal reverse
subsidy by spending another million on roads
leading to the courthouse. That’s a total sub-
sidy of land and roads of at least $2 million.
If the federal government refuses to pay
for a new riverfront highway to serve the
courthouse, the city of Eugene has agreed to
pick up the $7 million tab. That would push
the total city hand-out to the feds to about $10
million for the feds silvery new courthouse.
With calls for more money
for living wages for the poorest
city workers, buying parkland to
protect endangered natural
areas, more police officers, a
new indoor swimming pool,
continuing library and school
funding, a new city hall, etc., the
city is always scratching for
cash to meet community needs.
But that hasn’t stopped city offi-
cials from spending millions
subsidizing the new courthouse,
freeing up federal money for
more war and wealthy tax
breaks. — AP
FUNDRAISER SET FOR
BIRTHING CHOICES
Every month, the Oregon Midwifery
Council (OMC) pays a lobbyist in Salem to
help the organization fight for women’s
birthing choices. To continue that work, the
Southern Willamette Valley branch of OMC
will hold a fundraiser at 1 pm Sunday, June 6
at Secret House Vineyard in Veneta. The
event will include music, organic food
booths, wine tasting, activities for kids, and a
silent auction including contributions from
Sunshine Kesey, as well as lots of local art
and glass work.
OMC aims to safeguard the independent
practice of midwifery through community
education and political action; to increase the
availability of midwifery care to more moth-
ers and babies; to provide continuing educa-
tion for midwives; and to protect the rights of
parents to choose where and with whom to
give birth.
Direct entry midwife and OMC member
Elise Hansen says, “Hospitalized childbirth
has become so medicalized, you would think
women could hardly give birth without ma-
chines. Fact is, planned homebirth, with ade-
quate prenatal care, is as safe, if not safer,
than hospitalized birth.”
By employing a lobbyist in Salem,
Hansen says OMC can continue to “keep
birth natural and to keep the doors open for
women’s birthing choices.” — Bobbie Willis
HEMPFEST SETS DATES
FOLLOWING COUNTRY FAIR
This year’s Emerald Empire HempFest is
scheduled to happen over
two days, July 17-18, the
weekend following the
Oregon Country Fair. Last
year’s event was held at
Alton Baker Park, but this
year the event is planned
for the park under the
Washington-Jefferson
Street Bridge.
Organizer Dan Koozer
says the one-day educa-
tional and entertainment
event last year was “so suc-
cessful; we decided to ex-
tend the event to two days. The Emerald
Empire HempFest we have envisioned for
this year promises to be a blast for all ages.
We plan to have three stages, a food court, art
booths, non-profit booths as well as great
musical bands.”
Several guest speakers (to be announced)
will give presentations throughout the day
about “the hope Cannabis Hemp provides
and the ways it is becoming legal.”
The event is free to the public, but will in-
clude a food drive for FOOD For Lane
County. Prizes will be given for 2, 5 and 10
can donations.
For information on performing and vend-