NO CANOLA TO BE
PLANTED THIS FALL
Canola (aka rapeseed) opponents are celebrating the
announcement that canola will not be planted in the Willamette
Valley this year. The Oregon Court of Appeals has put a stay
on a temporary rule that would have allowed the controversial
crop to be planted in an expanded area this fall on about
480,000 acres in the valley.
Canola is grown as a food crop and for biofuels, but
vegetable and specialty seed producers say the plant acts like
a weed, cross-contaminates with vegetable seed crops like
turnips and rutabagas, and conventional canola seed is often
contaminated by genetically modified (GMO) canola. The
Willamette Valley has had a 3.7 million acre zone from
Portland to Springfield that protected Oregon’s $32 million a
year seed industry from canola contamination. The new rule
would have allowed canola at the edges of the zone.
Leah Rodgers, field director for Friends of Family Farmers,
which was part of the case along with the Center for Food
Safety, Frank Morton of Wild Garden Seed and others, said in
a Labor Day weekend announcement about the ruling that the
fight is not over. The Oregon Department of Agriculture has
filed for permanent rulemaking on canola. Unlike the
temporary rulemaking, the permanent rule does allow for
public input. Rodgers said that allowing canola in the valley
“would change the face of the Willamette Valley, the lives and
livelihoods of growers and the economic security of this
state.”
The Oregon Court of Appeals wrote that FFF and its fellow
petitioners demonstrated “the requisite prospect of irreparable
harm” in their petition for a stay on the rule. And the court said
happening people
KANNABOSM
SHOP BUSTED
Eugeneans who don’t want their tax dollars used to
investigate and raid medical marijuana facilitators have a lot
to complain about in the latest Oregon raid.
The Lane County Interagency Narcotics Team, with the
help of other agencies, raided Kannabosm Medicinal Cannabis
Resource Center, the Oregon Medical Marijuana Permit-only
club at 401 W 11th Ave., on Thursday, Aug. 30, and
confiscated all marijuana, computers, files and cash on the
premises. Kannabosm owner Curtis Shimmin and his nephew,
Austin Mullins, were pulled over earlier that day, arrested and
their vehicle impounded. Four other properties owned by or
otherwise associated with Shimmin in Eugene and Douglas
County were also raided.
A Lane County press release listed the confiscated
property as “several pounds of processed bulk marijuana,
numerous packages of marijuana and hashish packaged for
sale, numerous packages of food and beverage products
suspected of containing marijuana derivatives also packaged
for sale, 105 growing marijuana plants from three of the
locations weighing more than 400 pounds along with
additional evidence of distribution and money laundering.”
“There were three legal gardens that were completely,
totally legal, permits in place, plant numbers under the
BY PAUL NEEVEL
TOM TITUS
“I grew up outside,” says Tom Titus,
whose parents moved, when he was
3, to 25 acres on Cedar Flat, east of
Springfield. “I had the run of pastures
and hills. Our family vacations were
outdoor activities.” Titus graduated
from Western Oregon with a degree
in biology, then worked seasonally at
the Sunriver Nature Center where he
met his wife, Kim. They moved to
Kansas and had two kids, Alex and
Laurel, while he earned a Ph.D. in
evolutionary genetics. “I worked with
salamanders,” he notes, “one of my
favorite animals from Oregon.” After
two years as a researcher in St.
Louis, he landed a grant and brought
it to the UO in 1994. He was later
hired as a researcher at the UO’s
Institute of Neurology. “I work on fish
genetics now,” says Titus, who
traveled to the Antarctic in March to
study the icefish, “but I still teach a
summer class on the amphibians and
reptiles of Oregon.” A board member
of the Eugene Natural History
Society for 15 years and currently its
president, he will lead off the
society’s 2012-13 lecture season in
September. An avid writer, as well as
a gardener, bee keeper, clam digger
and mushroomer, Titus will launch
his first book, Blackberries in July: A
Forager’s Guide to Inner Peace,
rooted in his childhood memories,
with a reading at at 7 pm Nov. 15 at
Tsunami Books.
6 SEPTEMBER 6, 2012
it also took into account the “vehemently disputed”
environmental and economic impacts of allowing rapeseed in
valley put forth by Oregonians for Food and Shelter in an
amicus brief.
The court ruled that the canola opponents had a “very
substantial likelihood of prevailing on the merits” in the case,
and at one point it called the ODA’s statement on what would
happen if canola was not planted “inscrutable.”
A public hearing on the permanent canola rule has been
scheduled for 9 am Friday, Sept. 28, at Cascade Hall at the
Oregon State Fairgrounds, 2330 17th St. NE, in Salem. For
more information on the canola control area issue and the
proposed permanent rule, go to wkly.ws/1c4
— Camilla Mortensen
EUGENE WEEKLY
allowable,” Shimmin says. “None of the gardens belong to
me. I allowed three people to grow their medicine on my
properties. Those gardens were cut down. All the patients’
medicine at all the locations was seized.”
As EW went to press, Shimmin says neither he nor Mullins
have been formally charged, but Shimmin says that he was
arrested for possession, delivery, manufacturing, tampering
with evidence and money laundering. Sgt. Carrie Carver of
the Lane County Sheriff’s Office says the lack of charges
could be due to a number of factors, including a lack of
evidence, not enough prosecutors to continue the case or
investigators waiting to gather more information before filing.
Patients who used Kannabosm to acquire marijuana will
now do so on the street, Shimmin says, and instead of
smoking locally grown marijuana, they’re more likely to
smoke weed that cartels will profit from. “It’s going to impact
my patients incredibly. There will be several hundred. We’ve
had close to 2,000 patients come through the club since
opening [in 2011],” he says. “It will force most of them back
to the street to operate on the black market for their medicine.
They have no other choice. That’s why we opened this facility,
so people could have safe access to medicine.”
Shimmin says he’s taken pains to ensure that Kannabosm
is compliant with Oregon’s medical marijuana statutes. “I
consult and have on retainer attorneys that have gone through
my model and have told me that it’s completely, 100 percent
legal” according to Oregon law, he says. The actions of the
narcotics team “are completely against the voters.”
The OMMP law states that growers can be reimbursed for
the cost of growing marijuana, but they may not profit from it.
In addition to the cost of executing the five raids, Shimmin
says officers were posted outside of the locations from the
time he was arrested until the nighttime busts, and he says
there was also a prior investigation. “It has to be tens of
thousands of dollars,” he says of the total cost. “Obviously the
investigation took a substantial amount of man-hours, time,
energy, taxpayers’ money.”
Shimmin and other Kannabosm volunteers are starting a
letter-writing campaign directed at local officials in an effort
to reacquire the confiscated marijuana. Learn more at http://
wkly.ws/1cm — Shannon Finnell
ACTIVIST ALERT
• Western Environmental Law Center’s Eugene headquarters
is planning a fundraising “Garden Workshop for Every Type of
Gardener” from 10 am to 1 pm Saturday, Sept. 8, at Northwest
Garden Nursery. Cost is $50 and includes lunch. To register or for
directions, visit westernlaw.org or email marlette@westernlaw.
org or call 359-3240.
• The Lane County Chapter of the ACLU of Oregon is holding
a series of “Civil Conversations” from 5:30 to 7 pm on the
second Tuesday of the month at Café Yumm, 730 E. Broadway.
The next is Sept. 11 on the PATRIOT Act and the National Defense
Authorization Act with Gregory J. Hazarabedian, Executive
Director, Public Defender Services of Lane County, Inc. See www.
aclu-or.org
• The 11th anniversary event of the Interfaith Prayer Services
will be at 7 pm Tuesday, Sept. 11, at First Christian Church, 1150
Oak St. in Eugene. Speakers will include Mayor Kitty Piercy, the
Rev. Dan Bryant, Rabbi Yitzhak Husbands-Hankin and
presentations from many of the world’s faith traditions. See www.
interfaithprayer.org for more information.
• A community presentation by Jan Spencer and Ravi Logan
on “Creating A Safer, More Secure and Greener Neighborhood”
will be at 7 pm Wednesday, Sept. 12, at First United Methodist
Church in Eugene, 1376 Alder St. The presentation is a “unique
fusion of urban land use, global trends, economics, permaculture,
human potential, social activation and concern for the natural
environment,” says Spencer. See www.suburbanpermaculture.
org
• The Latin America Solidarity Committee will host a
benefit concert from 6:30 to 9:30 pm Friday, Sept. 14, at New Day
Bakery, 449 Blair Blvd. Cost is $3 to $10 sliding scale. Call 485-
8633 for more information.
• Eugene City Councilor Betty Taylor’s re-election campaign
is building up for the last two months and those wishing to
donate, volunteer or take a lawn sign can email her at
bettyltaylor@gmail.com
CORRECTIONS/CLARIFICATIONS
In our cover story on “Problem Solving Stoves” last week we
wrote about Institutional Stove Solutions and called it “ISS” on
subsequent references and photo credits. We have since heard
the nonprofit does not use that acronym, but instead prefers
“InStove.”
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