NEWS BRIEFS
get to the side with the traps.
Harwood says the nutria, an invasive
species from South America originally
brought to the Pacific Northwest for their
fur, can reproduce three to four times a
year, with four or five babies in a litter. He
says though river otters will prey on them,
the rodents lack many predators to control
their populations, and they harm native
plant life.
He says there are probably a dozen of
the lethal traps set along the waterline of
the Leaburg Canal near the pond, and the
traps will be moved at the end of January.
Methods to protect the area from burrow-
ing such as lining the banks with an imper-
meable material have been suggested.
“They may cause damage but are still liv-
ing beings,” Breitenstein says. “It looks
like a nutria war zone out there.”
The traps are conibear traps, set under
the waterline. The traps are capable of
crushing a dog’s head or killing it, and
have been known to kill or maim dogs in
Oregon and other states. For how to release
a dog from a conibear trap, go to http://
wkly.ws/6f
— Camilla Mortensen
PET ADOPTION
AT GATEWAY
A new pet adoption center will have a
grand opening from 11 am to 5 pm
Saturday, Jan. 23, at the Gateway Mall.
Save the Pets is a local volunteer-run non-
profit group that will have its Adoption
Center open seven days a week. It is
located between Ashley Furniture and the
mall’s Center Court. This is the same orga-
nization that holds weekend adoption
events at Petsmart.
Founder and president of Save the Pets
is Lori Smith, “It has been our dream since
we founded Save the Pets to have a perma-
nent location to showcase animals in need
of homes,” she says. “We look forward to
uniting families with the wonderful ani-
mals that have been neglected or rescued
in our community.” See can be reached at
savethepetseugene@gmail.com
Gateway Mall General Manager Ron
Glover said the new pet center comple-
ments the mall, and he praised the “kind,
professional personnel” associated with
Save the Pets. “Pets need the same impor-
tant elements in life such as love, care, a
kind gentle hand and strength of faith by
depending on others.”
The center also plans to educate valley
residents about the importance of spaying
and neutering, and plans to be a source of
information about low-cost programs in
the area.
Valerie Brooks is serving as volunteer
director of the center and as a board mem-
ber.
A drawing will be held at 4 pm Saturday
for a pair of round-trip airline tickets to
Las Vegas. To qualify for the drawing,
Save the Pets requests a donation of pet
supplies, such as unopened pet food, gen-
tly used bedding, scratching posts, crates
and toys. More information about supply
needs can be found on the “Wish List” sec-
tion of the website, www.savethepets.net
ANARCHIST
INFORMATION
Radical reading is coming to Eugene.
Bad Egg Books, a radical infoshop, is get-
ting ready to open on the corner of 13th
and Oak. Despite Eugene’s reputation as
an activist and anarchist Mecca, the area
hasn’t really had anything approaching an
infoshop since Icky’s Teahouse closed in
1997. Organizers are accepting donations
from 1 to 4 pm Sunday, Jan. 24.
An infoshop is basically a gathering
place for activists and pro-
vides reading materials and
resources for the community.
Volunteer run and usually
managed by a collective, in
the U.S. they grew out of the
peace and justice centers that
sprang up during the Vietnam
era.
Bad Egg Books will share
the building with the
Hummingbird Gallery and is
located adjacent to the newly
opened Cornbread Café, vegan
soul food foodcart.
Organizers are asking for
donations of bookshelves, a
couch or comfy chair, lamps,
computer, a moneybox or till,
a computer, DVDs and CDs,
and most importantly books
and zines.
The Bad Egg Books col-
lective says, “Currently our
walls and floors are bare, but
with the coming together of
the community we will have a wonderful
radical infoshop/lending library to help get
radical ideas and information out to hun-
gry minds.”
If you have a donation or want informa-
tion about volunteering at the infoshop,
email badeggbooks@gmail.com or drop by
the informal donation party on Sunday at
112 E. 13th. An opening date for the infos-
hop is still in the works. Please contact the
collective in advance if you have a larger
item like a couch to donate to ensure there
is space for it. — Camilla Mortensen
MORE EVENTS
FOR HAITI
Among the many local organizations
and businesses raising money for Haiti
relief is this weekend’s Good Earth Home,
Garden & Living Show at the Fairgrounds
starting Friday evening, Jan. 22 and run-
ning through Sunday. Show management
has committed to matching up to $10,000
in donations to the Oregon-based Medical
Teams International.
The nonprofit was founded in 1979 as
NW Medical Teams and has served more
than 4.5 million people in 53 nations. The
group collected and distributed $126 mil-
lion in supplies last year. They also serve
the Pacific Northwest with 11 mobile den-
tal clinics.
The home show is free, but Medical
Teams will be collecting cash and check
donations in the lobby, and by credit card
at its booth in the North Hall, according to
Helen Berg, founder of Berg Productions
which produces local home and garden
slant
• Do you know where your ballot is?
Maybe buried somewhere in a kitchen
pile, along with all that confounded
election propaganda? This is important,
people. Uncover that big white enve-
lope and take five minutes to vote.
Deadline to drop off ballots at a county
elections box is 8 pm Tuesday, Jan. 26.
We strongly endorse “yes” votes on
both Ballot Measures 66 & 67.
How do you plow through all the
contradictory arguments? One way to
evaluate the measures is to see who
and what’s behind the campaigns. The
pro-66 & 67 side represents long-term
economic stability through supporting
education, social services and public
safety. The anti-66 & 67 side represents
maintaining unfair tax advantages for
big corporations and wealthy individu-
als. Back in the 1970s, corporations
paid about 18.5 percent of all state
income taxes; but that’s dropped over
the years to about 6.3 percent, thanks
to Republican-dominated legislatures.
Businesses once paid 50 percent of all
property taxes, and now pay 40 per-
cent, thanks to Measure 50. These new
measures shift a little of the burden
back.
Ironically, the Eugene Area
Chamber of Commerce is dead-set
against these measures, despite the
fact that thousands of small businesses
and nonprofits in this valley and state
will benefit from the funding and jobs
saved by Measures 66 & 67. Small busi-
ness, not big business, is the founda-
tion of our state economy. And Eugene
is unique as a center for government
and nonprofits. Try to imagine what our
local economy would be like without
the living wage payrolls of federal agen-
cies, the UO, LCC and other state and
local governments. Those tens of thou-
sands of employees pay for housing,
buy garden tools and tires, eat at local
restaurants, drink local beer, fill psychi-
atrists’ couches, volunteer, donate to
charities and pay taxes. An estimated
one-third of our local economy is direct-
ly linked to the public and nonprofit
sectors.
Maintaining a strong infrastructure
of education, public safety, health care
and services for seniors and the dis-
abled is vital to our ability to attract
and keep beneficial enterprises and
nonprofits in our evolving economy.
Few people want to live and work in a
state suffering from oversized class-
rooms, high crime rates and a shredded
social services safety net. That’s the
direction we are going if these mea-
WWW.EUGENEWEEKLY.COM • BLOGS.EUGENEWEEKLY.COM
sures fail, forcing an estimated $700
million in budget cuts.
The bottom line: What kind of state
do you want to live in? Take that ballot,
lick it and stick it.
• Martin Luther King Jr. Day once
again brought excellent observances in
our local communities and at school
assemblies. Kudos to all those who see
this holiday as a day of action for peace
and justice, and not just a day to sleep
in or watch reruns of The Biggest Loser.
Lots of folks were out canvassing
Monday for Measures 66 & 67.
We’re always amazed at how King’s
words still resonate. Many of the issues
of his turbulent times remain unre-
solved at their core. This MLK Day saw
the first playing of a lost recording of a
speech King made in January 1960 at
Bethel College in Newton, Kan. A brittle
old reel-to-reel recording was recently
found and carefully restored.
In his speech, MLK talked about
the need to be “maladjusted” to our
society. We tend to use maladjusted as
a negative term, but King turned it
around, saying “I never intend to adjust
myself to the evils of segregation and
discrimination. I never intend to become
adjusted to religious bigotry.”
We can all stand to be maladjusted
to today’s bigotry and hate, lack of
police accountability, discrimination
based on race and gender, our unfair
tax system that favors the privileged,
inequities within our university, high
student-to-teacher ratios in our public
schools, secrecy in government,
destruction of our environment, obses-
sion with war, lack of access to afford-
able health care and persecution of
those who are poor, homeless or men-
tally ill. It’s a long list, but not unlike the
list the “maladjusted” King carried in
his mind and in his heart.
• Something to be proud of in these
trying times is our response to the
unthinkable catastrophe of Haiti’s
earthquake. Despite our economic woes
and polarized politics, we still know
how to come together as a nation, as a
community, as businesses and as indi-
viduals when something terrible hap-
pens to our fellow human beings. There
is hope for the two-legged creatures on
this planet after all.
SLANT includes short opinion pieces, observations and
rumor-chasing notes compiled by the EW staff. Heard
any good rumors lately? Contact Ted Taylor at
484-0519, editor@eugeneweekly.com
EUGENE WEEKLY JANUARY 21, 2010 11