ACTIVIST
LERT
• Sen. Jeff Merkley will be the speaker at a special
free meeting of the City Club of Eugene at noon Friday,
Aug. 9, at the UO Law School, Room 110 on campus. The
event is co-sponsored by the Wayne Morse Center,
Oregon College Democrats and the League of Women
Voters. The deadline for ordering lunch has passed.
Metered parking is available on Agate Street and 15th
Avenue. See cityclubofeugene.org.
POLLUTION UPDATE
Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ)
sent a warning letter to Jeanne M. Burris of Springfield
on July 29 for illegally operating a waste tire storage site
at property owned by Burris at 29882 Kelso St. in
Eugene. DEQ’s warning letter indicates that while more
than 17 tons of tires from the site have already been
disposed of at Delta Sand and Gravel, additional tires
remain on the property and also that improper storage
and accumulation of tires can be a fire hazard and
attract mosquitoes, rats and mice. Comments to DEQ
regarding the erosion and sediment control plan for
Serenity Lane’s Coburg Campus are due by 5 pm Aug.
16. Visit goo.gl/Yp4iAK for information on how to make
arrangements to view the plan and comment.
Doug Quirke/Oregon Clean Water Action Project
LANE COUNTY AREA
SPRAY SCHEDULE
Weyerhaeuser Co., 744-4600, plans to backpack
spray 247 acres near Fish Creek in the Coast Range with
Polaris AC, Polaris SP, Forestry Garlon XRT, Accord XRT II,
Rodeo and/or Accord Concentrate with additives MSO
and/or nonionic surfactant. See ODF, 935-2283,
notification 2013-781-00649 for more information.
Weyerhaeuser, 744-4600, plans to backpack spray
161 acres near the Long Tom River in the Coast Range
with Polaris AC, Polaris SP, Forestry Garlon XRT, Accord
XRT II, Rodeo, Accord Concentrate and/or Sulfomet Extra
with additives MSO and/or nonionic surfactant. See ODF
(541) 935-2283 notification 2013-781-00652 for more
information.
Compiled by Jan Wroncy, Forestland Dwellers: 342-8332, www.for-
estlanddwellers.org
LANE COUNTY RESIDENTS
PARTICIPATING IN SNAP
1 5
IN
80,657
LANE COUNTY
RESIDENTS
NEWS
Under the House version of the bill, federal laws and
protections under the Northwest Forest Plan would not be
used; instead the lands would be logged under the Oregon
Forest Practices Act (OFPA) that allows for pesticide use
and has no stream buffers for nonfi sh-bearing streams
— which still produce drinking water. Protection for fi sh-
bearing streams would be cut in half.
Clean drinking water is a logging issue in Oregon,
The protection for streams has actually increased since
where so many of our watersheds are on forest lands. In
an earlier draft of the bill. DeFazio said in a July 30 press
the furor over the DeFazio forest bill — or more properly
release that in response to comments and recommenda-
the O&C Trust, Conservation and Jobs Act — river advo-
tions from Gov. Kitzhaber’s task force, “several changes
cates say that the need to protect water for fi sh, wildlife and
have been made to better protect Oregonians’ drinking
humans gets lost as people argue over county payments,
water and fi sh-bearing streams.”
timber jobs and board feet.
But clean water advocates say that’s not enough.
John Kober of the Pacifi c Rivers Council says, “We
David Moryc of American Rivers says that Eugene and
haven’t seen a real brass tacks look into what does this
Springfi eld residents are among
mean for water, clean drinking
the “1.8 million people who de-
water in particular, if our lands
rive their drinking water from
are harvested at the level at
O&C lands.” He says that 81
which [Congressman Peter] De-
drinking water providers get
Fazio is proposing.”
their water from these forests.
DeFazio and Reps. Greg
Those providers face deal-
Walden and Kurt Schrader’s bill,
ing with water that would be
which would split Oregon’s 2.4
more turbid (full of sediments),
million acres of federal O&C
D AV I D M O RYC , A M E R I C A N R I V E R S
warmer and possibly full of
forests into a conservation trust
pesticides, he says.
and a timber trust, has generated
DEQ maps showing sensi-
controversy since its inception.
tive lands also show some of the logging would be on
Logging the O&C lands has historically been a source of
steep slopes, Moryc says, and landslides on those slopes
county funding, but the lands are also the source of drink-
would affect water quality and increase costs for down-
ing water and a haven for wildlife. The bill passed out of
stream users.
the House Natural Resources Committee July 31. It is part
Add turbidity from road building and the fact the pri-
of a larger piece of forest legislation offered by Resources
vate lands logging “has virtually no protections for clean
Chairman Doc Hastings, but is under a separate title.
water,” and Kober says the O&C bill would add to the
Chandra LeGue of Oregon Wild calls the Hastings bill
harm done to Oregon water, rather than benefi t it the way
“the worst environmental bill we’ve seen in a generation.”
federal forests should.
She adds, “Peter didn’t like the Hastings bill, but that didn’t
Sen. Ron Wyden is expected to introduce a Senate
stop him from voting for it.”
version of the bill “at the end of the summer,” his spokes-
LeGue shares Kober’s concerns about the lack of pro-
person Tom Towslee says, which according to Towslee is
tection for streams under the proposal, which calls for us-
around Sept. 21. He says, “Of course people are always
ing weaker state rather than federal environmental laws on
concerned about clean water and fi sh buffer zones,” and
the federal lands. “It’s still public land but federal laws not
adds that the bill is still in process. — Camilla Mortensen
applying just seems wrong,” she says.
DEFAZIO BILL BAD
FOR CLEAN WATER?
‘1.8 million people
derive their drinking
water from O&C lands.’
2,881 26,607
LANE COUNTY WOMEN
OVER THE AGE OF 65
LANE COUNTY FEMALE
HEAD OF HOUSEHOLDS
15,888 7,845
LANE COUNTY
SCHOOL AGE CHILDREN
LANE COUNTY
CHILDREN UNDER 5
STATEWIDE RESIDENTS PARTICIPATING IN SNAP BY COUNTY
Data Source: Oregon Department of Human Services/Integrated Client Services. Compiled by Joe Kosewic
8
A ugust 8, 2013 • eugeneweekly.com
THOUSANDS ON
FOOD STAMPS
FACE CUTBACKS
More than 20 percent of Lane County
residents are on food stamps — that’s
80,657 people in a county with a population
of about 350,000 who need federal assis-
tance to eat and to feed their children. Local
mapper and retired government employee
Joe Kosewic has been mapping food stamps
and other social issues to graphically draw
attention to the challenges faced by the poor
and the homeless.
Federal funding for food stamps, aka
SNAP (the Supplemental Nutrition As-
sistance Program), is reportedly facing a
proposed $40 billion cut by Republicans in
September. The Center on Budget and Pol-
icy Priorities (CBPP) says this means four
million people would be cut from SNAP.
The think tank calls this proposal “stun-
ningly harsh.” Lane County has almost
16,000 school-age children participating in
SNAP and 2,800 elderly women, according
to Kosewic’s maps. His data comes from
the Oregon Department of Human Services.
The SNAP program was already inad-
equate before cuts were proposed. Kosewic
says that the USDA’s current “thrifty” food
plan doesn’t take into account the gender
inequality when it comes to pay that women
continue to face in their retirement years,
since Social Security is based on earnings
and the less earnings you have, the fewer
benefi ts you receive.
Even without the proposed $40 billion
slashing by Republicans, SNAP has been up
against cuts. In July, the House split SNAP
from the rest of the Farm Bill where it has
historically been legislated, creating an im-
passe with the Senate version of the bill. And
CBPP says the 2009 American Recovery
and Reinvestment Act’s temporary boost to
SNAP benefi ts is scheduled to end on Nov.
1, resulting in a benefi t cut for every SNAP
household. CBPP says this means SNAP
benefi ts will average less than $1.40 per per-
son per meal in 2014. According to Forbes,
food stamp use is at a record high, and one
in seven Americans is getting a little over
$133 a month to help pay for groceries.
Kosewic hopes seeing the numbers
and facts on maps will give people a bet-
ter understanding of how widespread the
need for food assistance that even work-
ing people have — while more than 80,000
people in Lane County are on food stamps,
Kosewic’s information from the Oregon
Department of Employment says only
about 45,000 people are on unemployment.
— Camilla Mortensen