NEWS BRIEFS
to Rosenblum’s campaign. Wolfe says his group reached out
across demographics to publicize differences in Rosenblum
and Holton on weed, and young voters and parents concerned
about their kids losing scholarship opportunities due to
possession convictions were among the most responsive.
A source familiar with the Holton campaign told EW that
polling showed that any differences between the candidates’
positions on marijuana weren’t stark enough to sway voters
one way or the other, but the source said that they did have
the potential to generate out-of-state campaign donations for
Rosenblum.
After the widespread publicity on the AG race and
marijuana, Rosenblum’s campaign contributions also
included $80,000 from Drug Policy Action and $70,000 from
businessman and medical marijuana activist John Sperling.
Meanwhile, the initiative process is under way for the
November ballot, and two petition drives say that they’ve
gathered more signatures than are required. Wolfe is a chief
sponsor of Initiative 24, which would give Oregon adults the
state constitutional right to possess marijuana.
Wolfe says that Oregonians smoke weed at a rate 40
percent higher than the national average. “We can’t keep
criminalizing such a huge percentage of our population when
there are more important ways to spend our limited
resources,” he says.
Initiative 9 would allow the commercial cultivation and
sale of marijuana.
Despite having to fight the secretary of state on a
proposed $65,000 fine for allegedly paying petitioners per
signature (Wolfe says he is innocent), Wolfe thinks his
initiative has a good chance of passing in November. “We’re
not going to run a campaign that glorifies the marijuana
lifestyle — that’s not what we’re about,” Wolfe says. “It’s a
matter of social justice. We want to end prohibition because
it’s a failed policy that costs us too much in every possible
way.”
— Shannon Finnell
EW obtained an email Richardson sent out to county
employees on May 11, in which she writes “if you email or
call me or stop me in the hall and tell me that I’m doing a
lousy job, shouldn’t have been hired, made a bad mistake, or
are going in the wrong direction on something” then she
would stop and listen to the complaints though “it will hurt.”
— Camilla Mortensen
BIG YEAR FOR
POT POLITICS
Pot smoked other issues as the hot topic in the May 15
Oregon attorney general primary race, in a sign that Oregon
voters don’t see enforcement of marijuana prohibition as a
law enforcement priority. It’s continuing as an issue thanks to
petition drives asking voters to put legalizing pot on Oregon’s
November ballot.
No Republicans ran in the primary, so Democrats Ellen
Rosenblum and Dwight Holton faced off in a showdown that
will likely decide the November AG race. Rosenblum won
with 64 percent of the votes after enforcement of pot
prohibition made the Oregon AG race a topic in publications
across the country like the Chicago Tribune and The
Huffington Post.
On her website, Rosenblum wrote that she’d make
marijuana enforcement a low priority as attorney general,
while Holton said at a March 20 Eugene City Club debate
that Oregon’s medical marijuana law, as run, is a “ train
wreck” because “it’s putting marijuana in the hands of
people, in the hands of kids, who are not using it for pain
management purposes.” Holton also said, before and during
the campaign, that he supports the medical marijuana law
and those who are in compliance.
“In Oregon, this issue is more important than people
realize,” says Robert Wolfe of Citizens for Sensible Law
Enforcement, which donated $53,000 in in-kind contributions
Keep it local…
Grow it yourself
Fresh Organic Vegetable Starts
INDIGENOUS PEOPLE
& CLIMATE CHANGE
An Athabascan woman holds up a blood-red salmon in
a village on the Alaska Peninsula. With a gentle tug, she
slides the fish’s skin off like sludge. The salmon, a major
part of the village’s diet, had been overcome by
Ichthyophonus hoferi, the microscopic parasite that is
proliferating in Alaska’s warming rivers and tributaries.
“It felt like paste,” says Larry Merculieff, deputy
director of the Alaska Native Science Commission and a
keynote speaker at this week’s “Indigenous People,
Climate Change, and Environmental Knowledge”
conference at the UO. “I’ve never seen it before.”
UO history professor Mark Carey, the co-organizer of
the conference, sought out keynote speakers like
Merculieff, an Aleut member, and Daniel Wildcat, a Yuchi
member and professor of American Indian Studies at
Haskell Indian Nations University, because he continues to
see a lack of understanding in the general public about the
impacts of climate change on indigenous peoples.
“Native peoples are disproportionately affected by
climate change,” says Carey, who teaches the new UO
Honors College course Climate and Culture in the
Americas.
Carey hopes that the conference will expose the
community and university to different perspectives on
climate change because, in spite of the innovative methods
many indigenous groups are using to adapt, there is little
information transfer to scientific communities. “In my
own interaction with scientists, there is a lot of resistance
to incorporate indigenous knowledge.”
That’s where Merculieff comes in. “What’s missing is
the spiritual component,” he says. Merculieff has been
denoted as the messenger for the elders, or wisdom
keepers; he grew up with on Alaska’s Saint Paul Island, a
OR 58 Salt Creek Tunnel and
Half Viaduct Project, Milepost 56
Spring to mid-October 2012 and 2013
Project Location
C Complete day/night highway closure:
Available weekly at both Down To Earth locations
8 p.m. Monday, June 4 through
6 a.m. Friday, June 8, 2012
//(<
+$<+ 2 8 5 5 * 6 $ 7 1 9 , $
&
)$ 5 0
O Other travel impacts:
1 8 5 6 ( 5<
3URYLGLQJ\RXUJDUGHQZLWKDKHDOWK\VWDUWIRURYHU\HDUV
OR 58 Suggested Alternate Routes
• Closed completely at night Monday - Thursday,
from 8 p.m. - 6 a.m.
• Open to a single lane of travel Monday - Thursday,
from 6 a.m. - 8 p.m.
• Open weekends to a single lane of travel from
Friday 6 a.m. until Monday 8 p.m.
• Travel is restricted to a single lane with pilot cars
Expect 20 minute delays.
• No complete daytime closures in July or August.
• Oakridge will always be open for business from
the west.
• Crescent Lake and Willamette Pass will always be
open for business from the east.
K Know Before You Go
T To learn more about the construction project
a and schedule, visit the project website at
w
www.58tunnel.com
F For the latest road conditions,
v visit www.TripCheck.com or call 511
+20(*$5'(1
WK 2OLYH6WUHHW
8 MAY 24, 2012
0RQ6DW
6XQ
EUGENE WEEKLY
*,)7
WK :LOODPHWWH
Construction Starts May 18
WWW.EUGENEWEEKLY.COM