Eugene weekly., July 14, 2011, Page 4, Image 4

letters
TO THE EDITOR
BUS PROGRAM CUT
I read with dismay that Oregon
lawmakers recently decided to stop
funding LTD’s Student Transit Bus
Program. Since 2005, this program has
encouraged middle and high school
students in the Eugene-Springfi eld area
to take advantage of mass transit by
providing them with free bus passes.
According to Lisa Van Winkle, director
of the program, student boardings on LTD
have increased 42 percent over the past
four years. With a cost of only $1.2 million
per year, this program would seem to be
a bargain compared to many other energy
conservation programs.
At a time when energy conservation
would seem at least as important as
development of alternative fuels, why
did the state legislature decide to
eliminate this highly successful program?
The funding for the Student Transit
Bus Program came from the Oregon
Department of Energy’s Business Energy
Tax Credit (BETC). For those of you who
have been paying attention to the Seneca
biomass debate, the BETC should ring a
bell. Seneca used these tax credits to cover
half of the $20 million cost of the biomass
facility. With additional federal stimulus
funds and a guarantee from EWEB to
purchase energy from the facility, Aaron
Jones and company will be doing quite
well for themselves. Our schoolchildren?
Not so much.
Michael L. Quillin
Eugene
CREATIVE SOLUTION?
The state recently informed LTD
they were cutting the $1.1 million grant
that funded the student transit pass
program. LTD’s comment was that they
have no hopes of fi nding a new funding
source. This is typical of their new think-
within-the-box attitude. “There’s nothing
right now to suggest that there’s new
funding available,” and “It’s just a tough
economic time,” an LTD spokesperson
said.
Before LTD became obsessed with
EmX they pioneered this program.
Creative thinking plus creative fi nancing
produced a successful program.
The ability of our children to
conveniently get to school is a vital part
of their getting an education. It appears
that a majority of the 7000 daily student
boardings were on regularly scheduled
bus routes, and that on very rare occasions,
busses were added to meet additional
anticipated capacity requirements.
I suggest LTD continue the program,
or a modifi ed version, using the existing
scheduled routes. Let’s see what happens.
We know there are empty seats on the
buses.
LTD’s mission is to enhance the
community with responsive progressive
transportation leadership.
Shame on you, LTD! You continue
to fi ght for the unsustainable, oversized,
unnecessary, overpriced EmX, but you
roll over for the students.
Robert Rubin
Waldport
4 JULY 14, 2011
EUGENE WEEKLY
Swing groups, and numerous others since
being acquired by the UO from District 4J.
The ROTC is a priority of the president
of the UO; it is a high priority according
to letters sent to club members! Meeting
the demand they have for space is more
important than allowing the community to
continue to use one of the few dance fl oors
available to community members.
Does the UO really need this space
each Monday night? Does the UO really
need to alienate current students, alumni
and community members in this way?
It seems to me the UO does very little
community service that is not money-
making. Come on Eugene, show some
outrage!
Join us on Facebook at Eugene Swing
Dance Club; write to the UO president
with us.
Linda Shaver
Springfi eld
AGAINST THE WALL
PERCEPTIVE REVIEW
I taught college and university drama
courses for more than 40 years and have
attended countless plays of all kinds from
grade school to Broadway productions.
I read local and national drama reviews
frequently. I found Rick Levin’s review
(6/16) of the Cottage Theatre’s production
of The Boys Next Door straightforward, clear,
perceptive, insightful and thought-provoking.
Reviews of local drama offerings
usually tend, understandably so, to be
overly generous and uncritical in their
assessments. Levin’s sharp-edged review
presents an important, challenging,
uncomfortable point for us to consider:
this culture’s invalid use of oversimplifi ed,
sentimentalized, stereotyped myths about
the developmentally impared or mentally
ill that present them as guides to wisdom
and salvation.
No doubt Levin had an attitude and
his knickers were in a bit of a twist,
having suffered through the rude,
disruptive brayings of the middle-aged
women sitting behind him. At any rate
thank you for printing this review. To me
it was drama reviewing at its best.
Jerome Garger
Yachats
MR. CITY ATTORNEY
Behave does not mean get out of town,
Mr. City Attorney!
There are times in heart and mind
when something desperately needs to be
said, yet we realize that only we know
what that is, how to say it, or if we should,
knowing if we don’t, nobody else will.
The result is that others will continue
to suffer needlessly, because no one
challenges the devil’s advocate, or his
absurd, false accusations, whose use of
Prohibited Camping Ordinance 4.815
violates the equal protection clause of the
constitutions of the state of Oregon and
the U.S.
When few legal options exist, campers
are forced to choose the lesser evil as
willful violators, and they are damned
well justifi ed in defending their freedom
of travel, personal privacy and right to
sleep! Choice of evils was already used to
defend a camper in court; the city did in
fact dismiss charges and set a precedent
against itself.
Attorney Glenn Klein: Citizens of
Eugene — those stripped of citizenship
rights, who are at risk of being stripped
of all personal belongings — deserve
to know in exact detail how they are
expected to behave.
Before your homies make fools of
themselves and hurt more innocent
homeless homies as willful violators
having no compelling state interest, the
unconstitutional portions of the ordinance
should be severed — not standing in court
— because to the best of my knowledge,
the amendment was illegally inserted in
violation of law, which requires a 10-day
public comment period that the citizens
of Eugene were denied. Now who is the
willful violator?
Danielle R. Smith
Eugene
SWING IS OUT
The Eugene Swing Club hosts a weekly
dance each Monday night that provides
great times, clean fun, effective exercise,
educational challenges that are available
to all ages, affordability, and availability
to mass transit in a drug-free and safe
environment on campus! What is not to
applaud? Yet the UO is eliminating this
and all other community use of Agate
Hall!
The Swing Dance Club has been
using Agate Hall for 15 years. We pay
rent annually and have an attendance of
approximately 50 to 75 people weekly,
bringing people from all over Lane
County, Corvallis and Portland to dance
West Coast Swing! We teach beginning
dance to intermediate level. Each year our
members travel the competition circuit
in the U.S. to compete and bring home
championships. They bring honor to our
local dance community and to the UO, as
most learned while being students.
The UO has arbitrarily decided that
they do not want to rent out Agate Hall to
any community groups with the exception
of ROTC, the Law School and the School
of Journalism. Agate Hall has been used
by the Native Plant Society, the Russian
Theater group, Lindy Hop and East Coast
John Davis (Viewpoint, 7/7) writes
well of the relationship between the public
and private sectors. I have spent the last
four years on the board of commissioners
of a local utility district, most recently
as vice chair. There’s nothing like such
service to give one an appreciation for all
our public employees do.
We take for granted that when we
turn on our faucets clean water will fl ow
and when we fl ip a switch the lights will
go on. But I believe few understand or
fully appreciate the work and dedication
of those who make these conveniences
possible. Our district’s public employees
have made us feel very privileged to have
them as part of our team.
That’s why it has been so gut-
wrenching trying to deal with fi nancial
realities, which Davis partly nailed down:
“Union membership has steadily declined
in the private sector, along with private
sector wages, benefi ts and security.” I
will add to that the disastrous free trade
agreements, gross malfeasance by the
fi nancial sector and those charged with
its oversight, crushing regulations, a
totally irresponsible, inept and bought-
off Congress and other factors that have
body slammed the U.S. private sector,
especially the working class.
All of these factors have cost millions
of private sector jobs — jobs that aren’t
coming back anytime soon if at all. The
result is that the ability of the private sector
to fund the public sector has deteriorated
badly and is likely to continue on a
downward spiral.
The Left wants to “tax the rich” (more)
to fi x this problem, but with tax code
loopholes big enough to sail a supertanker
through, how effective would that be?
I wish we could continue giving
COLAs, full or nearly full medical
coverage, sick leaves and other benefi ts
that are increasingly rare in the private
sector. But we’re up against a wall, as
are the boards of most small utilities.
Unfortunately, I don’t see a light at the end
of this tunnel.
Jerry Ritter
Springfi eld
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