LET TERS
state/national government needs to heed the
organic intent of apportionment: taxation =
representation + public service.
Lane County is part of the congressional
district that receives taxes from around
700,000 people. This money needs to be
used to upgrade and extend existing rails
tracking across the county to provide
county-to-county mass transportation.
Public agencies, such as LTD,
competing for federal subsidies will result
in local over-development, or more than
likely, a squandering away of subsidy
payments within multiple layers of
government.
Jon Meadow
Eugene
VOTERS BEWARE
American voting in the presidential
election need to know who Mitt Romney
is and what his “business success” is
really all about. A brief historical view
of Romney’s business dealings with Bain
Capital expose a highly predatory and
corrupt model of business.
Basically it is the leveraged buyout
tactic wherein large amounts of money are
borrowed to buy controlling interest in a
fi rm, after which the fi rm becomes liable for
the loans used for its takeover. This would
then drive the companies into bankruptcy
destroying thousands of jobs and pensions
while Bain and Romney made off with
hundreds of millions of dollars.
Here’s a partial list as compiled in the
recent expose in Rolling Stone magazine,
“Greed and Debt: The True Story of Mitt
Romney and Bain Capital.”
• Ampad — Bain borrowed $60 million
to purchase the company after only
investing $5 million of its own money. The
company went bankrupt throwing hundreds
out of work. Bain and Romney made $100
million on a $5 million investment.
• KB Toys — Bain borrowed $300
million gaining control of the company
[and] driving the company into bankruptcy.
Jobless employees got no severance pay.
Bain made off with $120 million.
• Stage Stores — same model as above.
Bain got “a $175 million return on its initial
investment of $10 million.” Employees
and fi rm left in ruins.
So voters beware. This is Romney’s
predatory economic model and it would
surely leave this country’s 99 percent in
economic ruins.
Gerry Rempel
National Delegate to DNC
Eugene
LETTERS POLICY: We welcome letters on all topics and
will print as many as space allows, with priority given
to timely local issues. Please limit length to 200 words,
keep submissions to once a month, and include your
address and phone number for our fi les. Email to letters@
eugeneweekly.com or fax to 484-4044, or mail to 1251
Lincoln, Eugene 97401.
MIC CHECK!
BY JERRY BRULE
Some people need help recovering
Once again we are seeing more than a thousand homes lost to a hurricane
in Louisiana. This time around, some wise investments in infrastructure saved
New Orleans, but what happens to those outside the new levee systems who
have lost their homes? Americans are remarkably generous to these storm
victims, but many are less generous to the victims of the economic storm.
In Eugene alone more than 2,000 people have lost their homes because of
the economic collapse. Is there a plan to save them? When Occupy Eugene
(OE) started, its participants exposed the plight of the homeless. When OE
offered safe refuge, it placed people from all walks of life in close proximity
to the hundreds of homeless helped, and we learned that most of the homeless
are articulate, decent human beings. They are the same as us, and they deserve
the right to sleep in safety.
Opportunity Village is the fi rst installment of a plan put together by many
of the most experienced and knowledgeable homeless advocates in the city,
including many from OE. The fi rst stage would help the most vulnerable: the
families with children who should be in stable neighborhoods near the schools
they attend. The Opportunity Village study group determined that the ideal
site would be near the urban center, near bike and bus transportation, would
have access to utilities and would be a safe and secure location positioned
near supportive neighbors. The City Council is going to look at various
potential sites and will meet again this fall to discuss the best location. If this
pilot is successful we should set up additional villages in other locations and
in vacant buildings to provide the opportunity for hundreds of others to get
back on their feet again. This is a wise investment in our community’s future.
The victims of both the hurricanes and the economic storm will need help
to get going again. Don’t we have the same moral obligation to invest a small
amount to provide a safe and sanitary place for the homeless to sleep? If done
correctly, the right plan will improve the city and also save money.
Los Angeles County has about 51,000 homeless on any given night. The
county invested in a pilot project called Project 50 that provides permanent
housing for 50 of the most vulnerable to help them break their cycle of
dependence and reenter society. This investment resulted in a savings for
the county of $120,000 a year. Project 50 supporters are advocates of the
so-called housing-fi rst approach, who say a permanent roof provides the
stability chronically homeless people need to get their lives back on track. It
helps to have an address to look for a job.
In August, about 200 people met at the Unitarian Universalist Church to
learn about Opportunity Village Eugene and to listen to Mark Lakeman give
a presentation about Dignity Village,
ge, which provides shelter for about 150 in
Portland. The villagers there created
ed their own cute structures from recycled
or donated materials. It only costs the residents about $3 a night per person
and they provide those funds, so it t doesn’t cost the city anything but the use
of the land. Lakeman believes that
at being a member of a village is critical
to being able to transition to a more
ore stable situation. Villagers need to have
an attractive location with a gathering
ring place where neighbors will
feel comfortable coming to visit, so they can get to know the
real people rather than fear the stereotype.
reotype.
New Orleans learned from the experience
xperience of Hurricane
Katrina and made the investments
nts that protected the
residents from this latest storm. . Eugene can learn
from the experience of Los Angeles
es and Portland, and
invest in helping victims of the economic storm to
regain their footing. If your home had washed away
or been destroyed in a forest fi re e then would it be
any worse than losing your home e because you became
ill? What help would you need to get started again? At a
time when we are releasing violent
nt criminals from jail
because of budget problems, can we afford to be
spending hundreds of thousands of dollars
having the police rousting the homeless?
meless? Or
should we invest in making the city
ity more
livable for all?
Jerry Brule has lived in many Western states and has
experience in teaching, engineering, welding and con-
ene Oc-
struction. He is retired and writing for the Eugene
cupier and other publications.
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