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About Eugene weekly. (Eugene, Oregon) 1993-current | View Entire Issue (July 28, 2016)
BY CAMILLA MORTENSEN • The nonprofit Community Veterinary Center on Hwy 99 in Eugene provides low-cost veterinary services for 1,500 animals each year whose families are low-income. The clinic, which opened in 2012, mainly focuses on animals in Lane County. CVC has a special capital campaign to raise money to add a sterile surgery because currently clients needing such surgery are sent to private veterinarians, and CVC must then raise additional money to help its clients with that. CVC has raised $10,000 of a $62,000 goal — $33,000 for the building addition, $12,000 for surgical equipment and $17,000 to upgrade its film x-ray to digital. To donate, go to communityvet.org or send a check to Community Veterinary Center, 470 Highway 99, Eugene 97402. • There will be a “Good Bye July” benefit for White Bird Clinic and CAHOOTS 6 to 10 pm Saturday, July 30, at Kesey Square. Organizers say, “Celebrate our unique community space and one of Eugene’s most important community resources.” The event features music by Steel Wool, Gumbo Groove and Mhofela with Musekiwa Chingdoza, plus busking at 5 pm by Cardboard Carnival for early arrivals. Voodoo Doughnut is making a White Bird Doughnut and the CAHOOTS van will be on site. The event is FREE but donations are accepted. • Eugene Sunday Streets, which the city says promotes “healthy, active living by opening the city’s largest public space — its streets — for people to walk, bike and roll to discover active transportation in a safe, car- free environment” is noon to 4 pm, Sunday, July 31 in downtown Eugene. The route runs down Broadway from Monroe Park to Kesey Square and the Park Blocks. The free gathering will feature a Beautiful Bikes pageant and more. Go to eugenesundaystreets.org for more information. • Corvallis is in the direct path of next year’s total solar eclipse, which will take place around 10 am Aug. 21, 2017. Eugene will experience a partial but not full eclipse, according to Oregon State University. There will be town hall 6 to 8 pm August 3 to educate the community on the MegaMovie project documenting the eclipse in the International Living-Learning Center, Room 155, 1701 S.W. Western Blvd., at OSU. A team from the Space Sciences Laboratory at the University of California-Berkeley is hosting the “Eclipse Across America Awareness Tour” to bring together civil leaders, business owners, scientists and other community members to take photos during the eclipse and submit them to stitch them together into the MegaMovie, which is sponsored by Google’s new Making & Science initiative. LANE COUNTY AREA SPRAY SCHEDULE Oregon Department of Transportation is spraying roadsides. Call 503-986-3010 to talk with a vegetation management coordinator or call 1-888-996-8080 for recent herbicide application information. Hwys. I-5, 36, 105 and 126 were recently sprayed. Weyerhaeuser Company, 541-744-4600, plans to ground spray 440.1 acres in nine areas north of Lorane and southeast of Lorane with imazapyr, triclopyr, Foam Buster, Crosshair, Hi-Light Blue, Insist 90, Liberate and/or MSO Concentrate to kill competing vegetation. See ODF notification 2016-781-09129 and call the Veneta office of ODF at 541-935-2283 with questions. Compiled by Gary Hale, Forestland Dwellers: 541-342- 8332, forestlanddwellers.org 8 July 28, 2016 • eugeneweekly.com CONTROVERSY OVER ALLEGED RACISM CANCELS FESTIVAL OF EUGENE “P eople are comfortable with racism here,” Jamie Clark tells EW. Clark moved to Eugene from Texas in part to escape racism and now finds herself in the middle of a firestorm after a rac- ist Facebook comment attributed to Festival of Eugene organizer Krysta Albert made the rounds on social me- dia. The Festival of Eugene, which came into being after longtime staple the Eugene Celebration was canceled by Kesey Enterpris- es in 2014, is now also canceled in the wake of social media re- action. This is something that Clark points out was not of her do- ing, but she says she is being blamed for it. “It’s hard to go in and to be the person who closed down the Eugene festival,” she says. The incident kicked off when Clark, who is of mixed race, including black, commented on a July 20 Facebook post by her friend Nancy Berge. Both Clark and Berge work with autistic individuals, Clark says. In response to a meme Berge posted calling for girls to do things like, “Stop saying ‘Sorry,’ and start saying ‘Don’t in- terrupt me,’” Clark wrote, “Thank you for represen[ting] ALL women and not just the females that present right and play well at respectability politics.” Clark says her comment wasn’t related to race but that Albert took it that way on the thread. A discussion ensued and according to a screenshot captured by others on the thread, Al- bert wrote, “U r exactly why we call u people niggers.” Clark says she didn’t know Al- bert or know she was the Festival of Eugene organizer. Albert blocked her on Facebook before Clark could report the hate speech. Clark, who re- sponded to the remark with the meme “Stay black and remain proud,” was not the one who took a picture of the exchange. By the next day the screen cap- ture was making the rounds on social media, and Festival sponsors were calling for a response or posting on the Festival Facebook page that they were withdrawing their sponsorship. Clark says “White voices were am- plified” and people called for reso- lution for the sponsors, who were embarrassed at being associated with racism, rather than calling out the racism itself. Media outlets contacted Albert for comment, but not Clark, the tar- get of the racist remark. In an email to EW about the incident, Albert writes of the rac- ist post, “Suffice to say these allegations are untrue.” Albert adds, “The Festival of Eugene, ran by a dedicated team of volunteers, does not in the past, present nor future dis- criminate against anyone for any reason; neither race, color, creed, national origin, religious, sexual preference or orientation or political. Nor has it participated in racism, bigotry or any other type of discrimination or hate. The Festival is about celebrat- ing diversity, social tolerance and inclusion of all. For those who have participated in this event in years past know this to be true.” Albert says in the email that recent posts are “under review” by Facebook. In other posts she has written her account was hacked, the screen capture was Photoshopped or that someone else used her account. Many of those on social media said they were aware of past racist remarks or pointed to her support of presidential candidate Donald Trump as an example of racist tendencies. Back in De- cember, after Natriana Shorter, who is African-American, won the crown for Miss Oregon, Albert commented on a KEZI news story that, “I know this is going to sound racist and it’s not my intention. But I can’t help but think it’s awfully strange that a woman of color would represent [the] state of Oregon. The state that has one of the smallest amount of minorities of any race compared to other states. And yes, she is very beautiful.” Kelly Asay, the publisher of the website Eugene Daily News, posted in Albert’s defense, calling her “a friend to Eugene” and that she would never condone or engage in “this type of hateful behavior.” Clark says, “Nobody uses the n- word in public as a first-time racist.” By July 22, the Festival of Eugene — JAMIE CLARK was canceled. Its Facebook presence and website were soon deleted. An email from the Festival of Eugene account reads, “Racism cannot be tolerated. The 2016 Festival of Eu- gene is canceled. Our sincere apolo- gies for those hurt and affected.” Clark says that email “wasn’t a direct apology,” nor was it an ac- knowledgment, calling it “PR spin.” She says the comment smacks of put- ting public relations concerns before “your good karma and your soul” in the face of a serious human rights er- ror. Clark says she sees people in Or- egon who are comfortable express- ing racism and people around them who don’t call them on it. She says she sees people openly expressing af- filiation with the National Alliance, a white separatist organization, and a man who drives around Eugene and Springfield with “diversity is white genocide” on his truck. When asked what white allies could do to prevent or respond to rac- ist situations, Clark says to call out friends on things, not let micro-ag- gressions slide and not wait for rac- ism to directly affect you before you stand up. “Be vocal on the little things that are not little things.” According to a 2015 Fortune magazine article, black women are the fastest growing group of entrepreneurs and Clark, who is a health care administrator, says that’s something this area doesn’t want to miss out on, culturally and financially. As EW goes to press, KVAL news is reporting Albert’s ac- count was “compromised,” but Facebook has not responded to a request for comment. ‘Nobody uses the n-word in public as a first-time racist.’
