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About Eugene weekly. (Eugene, Oregon) 1993-current | View Entire Issue (June 9, 2016)
American women are really becoming confused about sex and gender. My wife is from Ukraine and thinks American women are strange. Most foreign women and men do as well. They ask, “Why do American women report rape many months or even many years after it happens and not immediately?” Foreign women say they should be required to report immediately, like within 48 hours, or forget it. American women will sit around thinking and thinking and creating more and more delusions in their heads and finally convince themselves they didn’t really have sex willingly — they were raped. Then you have a man whose life is destroyed and sitting in jail in major distress, not understanding why she is VIEWPOINT claiming rape. If a woman is raped against her will, she should immediately report this to the police by calling 911. We need a law that you must report within 48 hours. This nonsense of women reporting alleged rapes months later or five or 10 years later has to stop. If you have sex and decide after the fact maybe you shouldn’t have, it’s not rape. It’s simply a bad decision. We all make bad decisions, and then we learn from them. Keith Southworth Eugene EDITOR’S NOTE: The man who sexually assaulted Laura Hanson was found “responsible for sexual misconduct as defined in the Student Conduct Code” by the UO. OCEAN PLASTIC I’m a biology student at University of Oregon. I am writing this letter so that people pay attention to the damage of plastic pollution to sea animals. The negative effects are not limited to resource consumption. There’s a long coastline in Oregon, so plastic products easily get into the ocean. Plastics have found their way into all five of the world’s major ocean current systems and are one of the most common types of litter found in Portland’s rivers and on Oregon’s beaches. When dead birds’ bodies are opened, people find that they die because they cannot digest the plastic products they eat. Also, I saw some pictures of sea turtles who suffered a lot from plastic product. They were surrounded by plastic product when they were young, and after growing up, their bodies are shaped by these plastic products. Public awareness could be helpful, because it is needed for everyone to stop throwing plastic into the ocean. If only a group of people are aware of this, the problem cannot be solved. My point is that we should stop using plastic products unless they can be digested by animals in nature. Also, we can treat some birds to detect plastic products. Thank you for paying attention! Yuxuan Wei Eugene BY JOHN SUNDQUIST Dangers of Spray HONORING THE LEGACY OF JAN WRONCY WITH CHEMICAL FREE ROADSIDES C itizens of Lane County, take pride in your roadsides! Unique in the nation, the county hasn’t poisoned them since 2003, with unexpected benefits. Green, living roadsides and the well-crafted policies that achieve them are among the many gifts left by Jan Wroncy of Blachly, whose body returned to the soil April 16. Currently four out of five Lane County commissioners are directing staff to change county law and substitute any policy that will start spraying again. Meanwhile, on April 13, Douglas County commissioners bought $100,000 worth of chemicals on killer discount from the Oregon Department of Transportation, saying they couldn’t afford manual labor like Lane County, and that their pavements will crack as soon as any vegetation touches it. The head of Douglas County poisoning is also the county safety officer, who was videotaped spraying over and into the Umpqua River. The commissioners shown the videotape and damage said they didn’t see a problem. This same safety officer was witnessed spraying Forest Service land May 16, 2016, while a school tour was on the property. He was using a mix of Roundup, Opensight, Payload and Alligare. At the other end of the spectrum, Jan Wroncy was the mother bear, protecting children and all defenseless creatures in the biosphere from chemical trespass and involuntary exposure. Scientist, farmer, networker and legal tactician, she was fearless, brave, polite. Always composed, Jan presented her facts and evidence during many meetings, including with those responsible for poisoning her. I met Jan about 1984 when she was farming near Coburg. I was impressed immediately with her brilliance and ethics, and about 20 years ago she talked me into applying for membership joining her on Lane County’s Vegetation Management Advisory Committee. She represented citizens living with multiple-chemical sensitivity, what we today call toxicant induced loss of tolerance (TILT). Starting with roadsides, I discovered Jan was fighting for civil, constitutional and property rights in forestry and agriculture and all in public land management to boot. She was concerned with every toxicant upstream and upwind of everybody. I’m still astounded by the sheer number and complexity of issues Jan could master and move forward, all from her home in the Coast Range. She was always ready to help, for too many years providing the only information available to those injured by chemical drift and trespass. EW’s blessed Lane County Area Spray Schedule is one of the many strands Jan is weaving. When county staff applying chemicals made attending meetings and traveling on roads dangerous to her, Jan sued for accommodation under the Americans with Disabilities Act. Fighting for the rights of all citizens and against Lane county attorneys, Jan’s lawsuit reached the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. At the same time she found county and state herbicides repeatedly blocking all her roads to food, medicine and legal help. Another citizen suing the county for injury from roadside spray also found his roads blocked by spray in a manner that appeared both retaliatory and coordinated with county legal staff. A new Lane County Commission was elected in May 2003, and the new majority decided to minimize county liabilities. They unanimously passed Lane Code 15.500, the law to Use of Herbicides as a Last Resort Policy, in August. Public Works staff stopped spraying roads immediately, which continues until today. Sadly, some staff have been trying to get chemical treatments re-started ever since. Now four out of five commissioners support chemical use, and current Vegetation Management Task Force recommendations represent the most recent effort to get started. Alone in the nation, Lane County hasn’t used any herbicides along our roads since 2003, with many surprising benefits. Besides the outright reductions in poisoning program costs and legal fees: • The grassy borders along our roads absorb and clean the toxic runoff leaching from the asphalt surface and leaking from vehicles and their tires, preventing this pollution from entering our waterways. • The grass edges support the roadbed and eliminate most erosion into ditches and culverts, and reduce shoulder maintenance activities in most locations. • Invasive weed seeds are rejected by the established ground cover, leaving only a few corridors and isolated spots with problems. Tour neighboring counties’ roads or ODOT- maintained state and federal roads to see today what 1,500 miles of Lane roadsides used to be — dangerous, expensive, chemical-dependent and very, very ugly. But roadside poisoning is big business. In 2009 the Oregon Legislature approved most of Lane County for an ODOT no-spray pilot project. The appropriation passed through all final committees, but when ODOT got its copy, the line item was missing and the project had to be cancelled. ODOT has since made their requirements for an official no-spray right-of-way too onerous for any sane agreement. ODOT has its own agenda of fostering chemical dependence, as do the Oregon departments of agriculture and forestry. Along Lane roads today, the greatest threat to Lane citizens is from ODOT’s massive roadside poisoning along roads inside our communities and beside our rivers. Unquantifiable poison exposures and liabilities originate from illegal poisoning of county rights-of-way by adjacent landowners. Staff and commissioners are encouraging the illegal treatments by looking the other way. For monetary gain, or even aesthetics, some adjacent landowners poison county land with massive amounts of unknown chemicals with unknown re-entry times. In 2011, Jan achieved a longtime goal when county public service announcements explained the county didn’t spray its roadsides, and citizens should do likewise. A new commission was elected, ending those reminders. Treasure Jan’s roadsides and elect commissioners who will protect them. Demand an Integrated Vegetation Management Plan that builds on county success. Support and pass the petition by Freedom from Aerial Herbicides Alliance to outlaw poison drift in the county. Fiercely protect children and biodiversity, and do it politely. John Sundquist and his wife Marsha are retiring north of Coburg on a riverbottom farm they are converting to an educational venue on how nature works and how people can support nature. He started serving on Lane County’s Vegetation Management Advisory Committee in 1996 and twice served as committee chair. Sundquist currently serves on the board of Forestland Dwellers. eugeneweekly.com • June 9, 2016 7
