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About Eugene weekly. (Eugene, Oregon) 1993-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 28, 2004)
TO THE EDITOR EDITOR’S NOTE: We are giving priority this issue to letters regarding state and local candidates and issues since they have gotten less attention than the presidential race. See our website this week for more letters. FICECK QUALIFIED Qualifications. Perhaps voters should think more about them. They didn’t in 2000, and almost elected George Bush. The conse- quences have not been happy ones. I live in House District 14; the current rep- resentative for my district is Pat Farr. But Pat is leaving, and reminding us of his short House tenure by running his wife, Debi, in his place. She has never held an elective office. She did work for her husband for two years as a staff person. But that qualifies as nepotism, which has little or no relevance as a qualifi- cation. Other than chief of staff for her husband, I find Debi Farr’s qualifications (debifarr.com) to be more relevant for a Toys ‘R Us position than one that will undoubtedly deal with seri- ous budgetary matters and other contentious legislation in the next few years. Debi says she attended UO, but does not mention graduating. She also states that she has fund-raised for “playground equipment” and was “co-chair of the all-night graduation party for Willamette High School,” worked with the Girl Scouts and the Oregon Junior Miss Pageant, and sang with a music team at the Eugene Mission and in nursing care facil- ities. Farr’s opponent is Bev Ficek. From her website (electbev.com) I see she has run for elective office at least twice, and won — once for a seat on the City Council, and once for mayor. She was also on the city Budget Committee. She was also a board member with Habitat for Humanity, Lane ESD, the Lane Council of Governments, president of the PTA and the Sacred Heart Foundation Board. She holds a BS degree from UO in geography. I am concerned about Oregon’s funding of public schools. In that respect, I find no men- tion of school funding by Debi Farr, but I do find endorsements for Ficek’s candidacy by both the Oregon and Eugene Education Associations. And she has other notable endorsements. I hope voters can navigate to these two candidates’ websites and examine qualifica- tions while dismissing presumptions. We need all we can of the former, and no more of the latter. Tom Erwin Eugene DON’T BE FOOLED Despite it’s deceptive ballot title, Measure 37 presents a clear choice: To keep a land use planning program that for more than 30 years has protected Oregon’s farms, forests and neighborhoods. Or to turn them over to what former Gov. Tom McCall called the “grasp- ing wastrels of the land.” Measure 37 proposes “just compensa- tion” if a property’s market value is reduced by land use regulations. But its real purpose is to extort local and state governments into waiving land use protections by promoting a feeding frenzy of selfish, irresponsible and bogus claims. Supporters spout the “do what I want with my own property” mantra as if it were a divine right, forgetting that our rights — our original deeds — to land in the West were granted by governments the measure vilifies. Property rights without responsibilities — without regulations that protect the common good — are a self-serving recipe for chaos. Who really stands to benefit from passage of this measure to destroy Oregon’s land use planning program? Follow the money: 72 percent of its funding has come from big tim- ber and the real estate industry. Travel to California or the East Coast and experience for yourself the consequences of growth without restrictions. See why so many have fled to Oregon from these areas to enjoy the fruits of 30 years of foresight. While promis- ing to allow you and your neighbors to “do what you want on your own property,” Measure 37 will pick your pocket and offer you fool’s gold in return. Don’t be fooled. Vote No on Measure 37. Robert Emmons Fall Creek DISSING KEANE It’s one thing for our friends at EW to take a shallow and somewhat paranoid approach to the presidential election and not even men- tion Green Party candidate David Cobb in BY JERRY DIETHELM Distorted Picture Measure 20-88 ‘vision’ is far from 20-20. N ot so fast. There are still some serious questions to be answered about the downtown “Civic Center Vision” and the proposed new police station on 8th Avenue across from City Hall. Questions such as, “Whose vision is this?” And is this a popular, widely shared vision, or is it something that’s been cooked up by our outgoing mayor and city staff and pressed too quickly through a lame duck City Council? And why didn’t this proposal ever pass through our Planning Commission where it could get some needed public air and where it could build the wider pub- lic understanding and support a project of this scope demands? Come to think of it, the proposed Triad hospital project on the EWEB site never passed through the Planning Commission either. These two projects and the development of 8th Avenue as a “Great Street” connecting the Park Blocks to the new courthouse and the river are projects that will have a long-term impact on our downtown and our riverfront. They need to be brought to our attention, not quietly managed and slipped behind our backs. They deserve to be done well, even if it takes more time and care. They need to build community in more ways than one. Now we’re being told that the police station will be built on 8th Avenue whether we pass Measure 20-88 or not. So what would a no vote on Measure 20-88 really signify — that we think the police should put their house in order before we build a new house for the police? That we think the matter of the city-owned site and its relationship to the fate of City Hall is too far from settled? (What if we decide, for example, to move City Hall to the EWEB headquarters building when it becomes clear that the required Triad subsidy is just too large to swallow or to hide?) Would it mean that we don’t approve of the merging of police and social servic- es that the bond issue would provide? Or if that’s such an important idea, that it shouldn’t be tacked on to the building project as a sweetener and ought to be 4 OCTOBER 28, 2004 made integral from the start? Would it mean that we wonder if the $29 million might be better spent to jump start Chief Lehner’s plan for community policing and pay for some of the startup costs in the neighborhoods that will be neces- sary to make it work? Would it mean that we are excit- ed about the possibility of remodeling of the Park Blocks but don’t think the necessary public planning has been done or that a satisfactory agreement for city-county cost sharing has been reached? Would it mean that we approve of the “Great Street” preparation of 8th Avenue and look forward to its conversion to two-way traffic, the wider public sidewalks, lights and trees that will set the public framework for the kind of mixed use development that we know is required to bring a city street to life and make it safe, but just don’t think it’s a good home for the police? D oes anyone realize or remember (or care) that at least five of the 10 teams of planners, architects, landscape architects and city officials who partici- pated in the mayor’s all day Civic Center Vision design charette recom- mended against siting the police building and its connected one-full-block of park- ing garage on the city-owned site? Team after team asserted that it would put a “big dead thunk” of no street life after 5 pm for two full blocks on 8th Avenue — just what a “Great Street” doesn’t want or need — and proposed a location that had better access and was more suitable for the mass car storage that most peo- ple don’t realize is part and parcel of a modern police station. With so many of the town’s planners and designers raising the alarm, wouldn’t it be wise to take another look before plunging stubbornly ahead? Measure 20-88 is and open and far from shut case. Jerry Diethelm is a member, along with Charles O. Porter and Jerry Rust, of the Executive Board of the Emerald Waterways Citizens Committee, Inc. He is also professor of landscape architecture at the UO.
