MAY 14, 2021, KEIZERTIMES, PAGE A15
A muted response to a shot
Editorial
The Keizer City Council voted unani-
mously to release the investigative report
on the former city manager’s discharge of
gun in his office in early March. This after
the city denied requests for access to the
full report from the Keizertimes.
The report has since been posted on
the city’s website as well as in the media.
Upon reading, it is not difficult to under-
stand why the city didn’t want to release
it. The city’s initial denial for the report’s
release was based on personal privacy and
due process issues. Some city officials are
shown in less than flattering light.
What is striking is that the reaction
from those in city hall at the time was
so muted. A gun shot in an office in this
time in our country should unnerve any-
one. Shannon Johnson, the city attorney
—whose office is near the city manag-
er’s office—heard the shot. According to
the report he went to the city manager’s
office, who told him, “It’s okay, it’s okay.”
In the report Johnson told the investiga-
tor, “…I just left. I didn’t ask any questions,
I just left.”
A number of people heard the bang—
though not all thought it was a gunshot.
According to the city manager’s state-
ment, he went to staff in the area around
his office and apologized for the dis-
charge of the gun.
A gunshot in any public building
is unnerving, especially in light of the
large number of recent mass shooting
incidents across the United States. The
public should question why the Keizer
Police Department was not immediately
informed of the gun discharge. Police
Chief John Teague told the investigator
he was unaware of the gun discharge until
asked for a response from the Keizertimes.
In a subsequent investigation the
Oregon State Patrol concluded that the
city manager’s discharge of his personal
gun was not a crime. That may be, but the
city has workplace violence policies pro-
hitbing anyone other than police offices
from carrying firearms in the building
without permission. There is no evidence
any such permission was given to the city
manager.
Reaction from the public included sur-
prise and shock. There were calls for for-
giveness. Would the reaction be different
if it was, for example, a teacher, who had
brought a firearm into school and it acci-
dentally discharged? We think not.
We hope this was an isolated inci-
dent. It was unfortunate and it cost the
city manager his job after a celebrated
two-decade career with the City of Keizer.
He has since been hired to work in com-
munity development for Marion County.
The incident of March 4 demonstrates
how easily a firearm can be brought into a
public building. We have not reached the
point where metal detectors are needed
and hopefully never will. We must rely
on those entering our governmental and
education buildings to adhere to the laws
and statutes designed to keep people safe.
A gun was fired in Keizer City Hall.The
reaction was lackluster. The city council
and city officials should be more forth-
coming in explaining why.
—LAZ
Get off the internet
To the Editor:
The best way to prevent hacks and/
or ransom ware attacks is to get your
system(s) off of the internet. You don’t
have to be completely free of the internet
but for sure; utilities, governments, hos-
pitals, schools, etc. should isolate their
critical data bases and operations from
the internet.
The internet is convenient for many
uses but critical operations and data
base management should not be con-
nected to the internet. If you are not on
the internet, your system can’t be held
for ransom or damaged by malicious
hacks. Convenience has to be balanced
with security and privacy needs and con-
venience should not be the first choice.
Jim Parr
Keizer
The cost of
climate change
To the Editor:
Rep. Bill Post again shows his inabil-
ity to understand that climate change is
already costing Keizer taxpayers money.
In the May 7 Keizertimes article (Post’s
bill for police dog rescue, veteran’s bene-
fits taking shape), Post says of the 2020
Republican walkout of the legislature’s
cap-and-trade regulations “We walked out
because cap and trade would have funda-
mentally changed the economy of Oregon
forever….”
As if last summer’s wildfires, augmented
Letters
by climate change, had no effect on
Oregon’s economy. Clearly that’s false. As
if more warming, drought and wildfires are
not in our future. As if Keizer taxpayers are
not already paying part of Miami’s sea level
rise protection costs, or, soon, Key West,
and others on the east coast. As if we’re
not already paying higher food prices for
the scientifically documented agricultural
losses due to climate change.
I’ve found this in my own correspon-
dence with Post—he fails to understand
that climate change itself has costs—appar-
ently he can only see the costs of its mitiga-
tion. We need smarter, wiser more engaged
representation in our state legislation.
David Appell
Keizer
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Democrats are thwarting recovery
By MARC A. THIESSEN
President Joe Biden insists that last
week's disastrous jobs report has nothing
to do with Democrats’ extension of federal
unemployment benefits. “I know there’s
been a lot of discussion . . . that people are
being paid to stay home, rather than go to
work,” he said Monday. “Well, we don’t see
much evidence of that.”
Look harder, Mr. President. The evidence
is there for all to see.
The April jobs report fell short of expec-
tations by more than 700,000 jobs. Normally,
that would be a sign that employers are
reluctant to hire. But that is not the case
today. Job openings are at a record high.
Employers are creating millions of jobs; they
just can’t find workers to fill them.
How can that be? With coronavirus
restrictions being lifted across the country,
and vaccines available to anyone who wants
them, Americans are venturing out, trav-
eling, going to restaurants and living their
lives again. Millions of Americans who were
forced out of their jobs during the pandemic
should be eager to return to work.
So why aren’t they? One reason is that by
extending the federal unemployment sup-
plement to September, Biden created a dis-
incentive for millions of Americans to return
to work. Even though Congress reduced
the federal supplement from $600 to $300
a week, a recent paper estimates that 48%
of workers still make more from unemploy-
ment benefits than they would from working.
This is especially true for those at the
lower end of the income scale, such as
restaurant workers. In an interview with a
restaurant industry journal, Carl Howard,
chief executive of the Fazoli’s restaurant
chain, does the math. “In Ohio you can make
$452 a week in unemployment,” he says.
“The federal government is going to top that
with $300. That’s $752 [a week]. If I pay $15
an hour, that’s $600.” In other words, even if
he matches what Democrats say should be
the federal minimum wage, he can’t compete
with the unemployment office.
But that’s not all. While workers would
have to pay taxes on that $600 in earned
income, thanks to Biden they can get some
of that $752 tax-free -- because the president’s
covid-19 relief legislation included a $10,200
tax exemption for individuals on unemploy-
ment, and $20,400 for married joint filers.
Why would someone work long hours to
earn $600 a week when they make more and
pay less in taxes by doing nothing?
Is enhanced unemployment the only
reason Americans are not filling the record
number of job openings? Of course not.
Another problem is Biden’s failure to push
back on his allies, the teachers unions, and
get U.S. schools reopened. According to
the American Enterprise Institute’s “Return
2 Learn” tracker, less than half of all pub-
lic schools are currently open for full-time
in-person learning—and the numbers are
even lower in school districts with high
minority populations and high proportions
of single mothers.
This is not only harming millions of
other
VOICES
American children; it also is preventing
millions of American moms from rejoining
the workforce. According to a Pew analysis,
mothers of small children lost work at three
times the rate of fathers during the pandemic
-- and job losses were even higher for single
mothers of young children. If Biden wants
to help these families, he should demand
that the teachers unions agree to reopen our
nation’s public schools -- not next fall, but for
summer learning, so that kids can make up
lost ground and mothers can return to work.
As the Biden administration flails,
Republican governors across the country
are showing the way forward. In January,
Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds signed a law that
requires every public and accredited private
school in her state to offer in-person learn-
ing, five days a week. Governors in Arizona,
Texas, Florida, West Virginia, South Carolina
and other states also have directed schools
to reopen. As a result, across the country,
59% of schools are fully reopened in districts
that Donald Trump won compared with just
32% in districts won by Biden.
Similarly, Republican governors in South
Carolina, Arkansas and Montana have
announced that they are turning down the
federal unemployment subsidies in their
states starting at the end of June. In Montana,
Gov. Greg Gianforte is going a step further
by offering a one-time $1,200 “return to
work” bonus to anyone who returns to work
and completes at least four full weeks of
paid employment. My American Enterprise
Institute colleague Michael R. Strain sug-
gests we should do the same on the federal
level.
Early in the pandemic, when millions
of businesses were ordered to close by the
government, it made sense to give unem-
ployed Americans additional help to make it
through the lockdowns. But that is no longer
the case. America is back open for business
-- or at least it would be if the Democrats’ pol-
icies weren’t holding it back.
(Washington Post Syndicate)
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