letters
TO THE EDITOR
health care. He let me bring my dog to
the offi ce. Slant should give him a second
look. He’s an interesting guy, and let’s
be brutally honest here: Slant needs new
material. Usually Slant is boring as hell.
James Johnston
Corvallis
BASELESS COMPLAINT
It’s time for local voters to get through
the fog clouding the most contentious local
race in the upcoming May election. That’s the
contest between Lane County Commissioner
Pete Sorenson and his opponent, Andy Stahl.
Sorenson is still being hammered
for allegedly violating the Open Meetings
Law for meeting with other commissioners
privately to discuss political issues. There’s
little or no basis for that complaint. What
Sorenson (and others) did is common
practice among elected offi cials.
As a former newspaper journalist, I
covered politics for many year, from city
councils to Congress. I hardly ever met an
offi cial who didn’t meet with colleagues
to discuss and debate issues. That’s how
democracy works.
Sorenson has an outstanding record
as a public servant, covering many years
as an Oregon state senator and a county
commissioner. He also had experience as a
legislative assistant in Congress. It would be
hard to replace that level of accomplishment.
As a progressive legislator, he
has been a leader in protecting the
environment, supporting family wage jobs
and getting the most bang for the public
buck. His opponent in the May election,
Stahl, is reputable. But his experience in
the public arena is limited, and he has been
associated with known conservatives.
There’s only one choice that will
serve the public interest — Pete Sorenson.
Arnold Ismach
Eugene
living out
COVERED COAL
STAHL’S AWARDS
Let’s be accurate and realistic. The
statement in Camilla Mortensen’s News
Brief: “Coal, Coal, Go Away” (4/5) that “The
Port of Coos Bay’s coal export proposal ...
would require open-car coal trains” is fl at-out
false. The port wants to export coal and bring
badly needed jobs to the south coast. They
are not requiring open cars. Stopping
coal trains (interstate commerce) is quite
impossible on a local level. Requiring coal
train cars passing through our communities
to be covered or otherwise prevented from
spreading coal dust is doable.
Stefan Ostrach
Eugene
The Weekly’s gossip section, Slant
(4/5), made insinuations against Lane
commissioner candidate Andy Stahl due to
Stahl’s long-time friendship with a former
Eugenean, Randal O’Toole.
EW fails to mention that O’Toole is
the recipient of the Oregon Environmental
Council’s Neuberger Award for Service
to the Conservation Movement and the
Oregon Natural Resources Council’s (now
Oregon Wild) David Simon Award for
Vision.
What did O’Toole do to merit these
accolades? As an economist, he helped
expose environmentally destructive below-
cost timber sale programs on our national
forests. This logging not only damaged
our land and water quality, but as O’Toole
pointed out repeatedly and successfully,
the timber sold for less than the tax dollars
spent preparing and administering the
sales. O’Toole’s 1988 book, Reforming
the Forest Service, showed that most
national forest controversies result from a
skewed budget process that rewards Forest
Service managers for losing tax dollars on
environmentally destructive activities.
I can well understand why Stahl
was proud to have O’Toole serve as best
man at his wedding 30 years ago. Stahl
will make an excellent commissioner for
Lane County. He is willing to listen to and
learn from smart people on all sides of
challenging issues.
Anae Rosenberg
Eugene
EDITOR’S NOTE: Good point. The proposal doesn’t
require open cars, but containing coal dust on trains is very
expensive and rarely done. See www.coaltrainfacts.org
APPEASEMENT STRATEGY
South Eugene progressive and
independent voters should see through Andy
Stahl’s attempt to capitalize on what was
nothing less than a deliberate and concerted
effort by the right to silence a strong, honest,
effective leader and advocate, our South
Eugene Commissioner Pete Sorenson.
What’s disappointing is that Stahl’s
challenge is opportunistic. He promises to
get along with a system that just spent the
last year trying to destroy the career of the
man he wants to replace. Count me among
those who are tired of the rancor and
political bickering, but Stahl’s “get along”
appeasement strategy has little hope of
success. South Eugene voters interested
in sensible, fair, government, promoting
smart economic, social and environmental
policies should see through the “time for
a change” rhetoric and stand with their
tested and proven commissioner and return
Pete to offi ce.
Alan Leiman
Eugene
EDITOR’S NOTE: Those two awards were given to Stahl
more than 30 years ago, in 1978 and 1981.
CALI VS. OREGON
I don’t mean to pick on Ian Korn for
his letter (“California Bashin’,” 4/12), but I
always fi nd it to be ironic (and humorous)
when people come to Eugene and then
Pondering Freddie’s sad little Passover section
Y
ou’d think any big grocery store in a city the size
of Eugene, especially a store founded by a Jew
like Fred Meyer, would stock plenty of kosher-for-
Passover Passover food during Passover. You’d think.
On the sixth night of Passover, I fi gured I’d pick
up one more box of matzo just to make sure we had
enough to last until the end of the eight-day holiday
during which observant Jews eat matzo instead of
bread. Matzo symbolizes Jews’ exodus from slavery
in Egypt when we were in too big a hurry to let our
dough rise so we bolted to freedom with unleavened
bread. A quick grocery stop for a box of matzo
shouldn’t end up symbolizing my people’s 40 years
of wandering in the desert.
I wandered. First, past two huge displays of
close-out Easter candy, 50 percent off! What a deal
for fans of chocolate bunnies and peeps.
I wandered up to a young man in a Fred Meyer
apron. “Where can I fi nd the Passover foods?” He
seemed stunned, like he knew he should know but
just couldn’t recall.
“Like matzo? Gefi lte fi sh?” I must’ve been
speaking a foreign language. “Maybe aisle 10?”
APRIL 12, 2012
BEYOND POINTLESS
In regards to “Leaf-Blowers Suck,”
yes, leaf blowers really suck! Especially
when dealing with wet debris, which seems
beyond pointless. This hatred also includes
getting struck on a few occasions by fl ying
debris from this machine while riding my
bike down the Amazon path. All the while
the operator seems to be indifferent about
it. Every sunny day is ruined by their noise
pollution.
Jennifer Kellin
Eugene
BY SALLY SHEKLOW
Culture Shock
6
complain that the place is “growing” or
“changing.” I mean … hello. And the Cali
versus Oregon issue: From an historic
perspective California and Oregon have
always been on different ideological paths.
For instance, we had Tom McCall as
governor when Cali had Ronald Reagan —
both were Republicans but McCall created
the nation’s fi rst bottle deposit bill, created
urban growth boundaries to protect farm
land, cleaned up the Willamette (which was
pretty much an open sewer for industrial
waste before he was governor) and he made
the ocean beaches and beach access a public
right. While Reagan was sending the storm
troopers into UC-Berkley, McCall hosted a
Woodstock-style rock concert.
In California many beaches are still
posted “No Trespassing.” I’ve even had
dogs sent after me while trying to enjoy
a beach in Cali. And count the number
of orchards that have been replaced by
“Junk in the Box’s” between Palo Alto
and Sunnyvale. But getting back to the
development issue: I think what Ian is
reminding us of, is that we need to get back
to our Oregonian ideological roots, (ideals)
that may have been diluted by the infl ux of
Californians into Oregon. Just saying.
Mark Barbour
Eugene
EUGENE WEEKLY
Ah, the “Ethnic” section. Tortillas,
soy sauce, falafel mix. No Matzo.
I wandered into a check-out line,
“Passover food?”
The busy cashier nodded toward
the other end of the store, “Try ‘Natural
Choices.’” She continued ringing up
bacon and Wonderbread. “Natural
Choices” had lots of granola and whole
grain bread, all chametz, forbidden on
Passover.
I wandered past a couple of guys taking
inventory. “Is there a manager around?”
“She’s over in Customer Service.”
I hoped my ascension to the Customer Service
desk would end my wandering.
“I think we had a rack of Passover stuff at the
end of the Pet Care section,” the manager said. Her
co-worker added “And it’s all half off!”
Half off on Easter candy a few days after Easter
I understand. But Passover food half off during
Passover seemed a bad business idea. At this point
I’d have happily paid double for a box of matzo.
At long last, past rows of pet food,
nestled near the dog toys and kitty
litter, stood a narrow rack that housed
Fred Meyer’s sad little Passover
“section.” The top shelves held
nine pink waxed paper-wrapped
packs of matzo — fi ve boxes in
each. Anyone who could use that
much matzo this late in Passover
is either feeding the Lost Tribes
of Israel or will soon be found in
the laxative aisle.
Just the Matzo super-packs
— no individual boxes — and a few
yartzeit candles and other random
Jewish provisions with no particular
association to Passover, plus some
miscellaneous non-Jewish items that other
shoppers had decided not to buy and left on the
conveniently empty Passover display shelves.
Now, I can see having a hard time fi nding matzo
in rural Oregon. Our rural Jews are probably used
to traveling to a bigger town for holiday supplies.
But in Eugene? Really? Am I THAT far out of the
mainstream here?
It’s not like I was trying to buy a rainbow fl ag.
Award-winning writer Sally Sheklow has been sharing her pain in EW
since 1999.
WWW.EUGENEWEEKLY.COM