PAGE A8, KEIZERTIMES, MAY 06, 2022
Everyone talks about weather
By GENE H. McINTYRE
PUBLIC SQUARE welcomes all points of view. Published submissions do not necessarily reflect the views of the Keizertimes
DAs support
Paige Clarkson
To the Editor:
We are four elected District Attorneys
from very distinct geographic locations
across Oregon who strongly believe Paige
Clarkson is the best candidate for Marion
County District Attorney, because she is a
champion for crime victims, holds violent
criminals accountable and is a statewide
criminal justice leader.
As colleagues of DA Clarkson, we
experience her leadership qualities first-
hand as she stands up for crime victims
time and time again, even if it upsets our
state’s most powerful elected officials.
And while she is unafraid to speak truth
to powerful people, she is also willing to
work with competing interests to make
the justice system more fair and efficient.
Paige has worked closely with the state-
wide criminal defense community and
other advocacy groups on issues like bail
reform and pretrial discovery, and devel-
oping reasonable reform that doesn’t put
community safety at stake.
If you haven’t met DA Clarkson, you
should also know that she is inspiring,
experienced and a person of integrity.
We urge the voters of Marion County to
re-elect District Attorney Paige Clarkson,
a vote for justice for crime victims and a
balanced approach to prosecution.
DA Jeff Auxier, Columbia County
DA Kelsie McDaniel, Union County
DA Aaron Felton, Polk County
DA John Wentworth, Clackamas
County
Put question of
public library out
to voters
To the Editor:
I am in support of libraries, but it has to
be done right. Keizer needs to stand on its
own, but most importantly it needs to be
done in a very sound fiscal way.
We do not need to do funding with a,
well—it may cost you more in a couple of
years when this stop gap funding is pro-
posed to cease. What then? If we want
to continue, does the price go up? Does
it double, triple or what? Let us learn
from some of the history of us not being
“equal partners." I will use the Willow
Lake Treatment Plant as an example and
the “sewer surcharge." It took us forever
to get that mess straightened out and the
charge to go away.
If it is put to the voters and they say
yes, then it can be a line item in the bud-
get for all to see and understand. There
are those of us in this community that
keep on top of things that are occurring
or being proposed that affect this com-
munity. Many of us also have very busy
lives and do not follow things that are
being done by our government or being
proposed to our city. The Keizer Library
is an example of what we can do. Can it be
better? Absolutely. We have come a long
way in this community since my family
moved here in the early 1960s. We have
done very well, in my opinion.
Now, let us get all the facts: what it
takes to make this happen in a responsible
Letters
way, how much staff does it take, how
many hours will it be open, in other words
we need to have a budget idea of what
this would cost us: salaries and benefits,
insurance, utilities, maintenance, equip-
ment needs, just for a few things. What
type of standard do we have to meet and
what will that cost be? Is it going to be a
city position to run this or are they (librar-
ians) answerable to a staff person or city
council as a whole?
The last couple of years have been
a challenge for all of us, our life has not
been normal. We are getting back to an
even keel, but this could stop all the prog-
ress we have made on getting back to nor-
mal. So, I am asking with all due respect
that you put this out for a vote. Let us
hear from as many of Keizer’s citizens as
possible,
Jacqueline Moir
Keizer
Ending suffering and
death from cancer
To the Editor:
Having lost both parents, two younger
sisters, several relatives, and many friends
to cancer, I have learned how important it
is to fight back—to hopefully end another
person from having to hear those dev-
astating words, ‘You have cancer.' Too
many fellow Oregonians often face such
a journey.
Earlier this year, President Biden
reignited his cancer moonshot to accel-
erate his commitment to end cancer. As
a long-time advocate with the American
Cancer Society Cancer Action Network,
I was excited to hear this. I also felt hope
to hear the emphasis on prevention and
early detection. Specifically, finding ways
to detect cancer earlier, especially for can-
cers with no available screening tools.
Currently in clinical trial status under
the FDA are several multi-cancer early
detection tests or MCEDs, new tech-
nology that with one blood test could
screen for dozens of cancers. Research is
still ongoing to determine the impact of
these tests, including a study at OHSU
in Portland. A single blood test may be
less invasive and more accessible than
existing early detection tests, expanding
screening opportunities to traditionally
underserved communities and helping to
reduce cancer disparities.
Ensuring individuals have access to
them will be critical. That’s why I’m calling
on Senator Merkley and Senator Wyden
to support legislation to create a path-
way for Medicare coverage for these tests
once approved by the FDA and proven to
have clinical benefit. All five of Oregon’s
Congressional House Representatives
have signed on to co-sponsor the Medicare
Multi-Cancer Early Deterction Screening
Coverage Act. It’s time to stand together
to end cancer as we know it.
Kathy Ottele
Salem
The weather may be the most-oft
discussed matter in humankind. In an
American era when the divisions that divide
us have become too vast in number to
keep up with and extreme in point of view,
weather remains a subject easy to bring up
and discuss.
How is that so? Well, it would seem to
be easy to pin down and verify. Who can
take issue with whether it is raining or not
and determine it’s a clear day when the
whole sky is blue. Yet and halt! We all of
us actually do have differing views on the
same weather phenomenon, taking sides on
whether the weather is too hot, too warm, too
cool, too cold, etcetera. That way we stay “in
shape” for the controversies to soon follow
thereafter.
April, this year, was like old times for me.
Having been born and raised in Astoria, I
recall Aprils in the years of my childhood as
just as rainy as the one we tried to enjoy here,
now a last month memory. Having been
home- school- principal’s office- bound for
months, the Astorian youth could never plan
on playing softball, baseball, track and field
outside (there was no soccer in Astoria in
those days), until sometime in June, unless
you wanted to try to run with two inches of
mud attached to each high-top Keds.
Spring 2022 has been more interest-
ing to me than many others experienced
County deputy DAs:
Vote for Paige Clarkson
To the Editor:
We are a group of current, retired and
former Marion County deputy district
attorneys and law clerks and we very much
encourage you to reelect Paige Clarkson as
your District Attorney. We have worked with
Paige and we hold her in the highest regard.
Paige has dedicated her entire career to
public safety, victims and this office. She
began as a law clerk in 1998 and then an
attorney immediately upon graduating
from law school in 1999. She has served
as a Deputy District Attorney, Trial Team
Leader and now as your elected District
Attorney. Paige has prosecuted and gone to
trial on every kind of criminal case imagin-
able—from shoplifting to murder. Over her
lengthy career she has trained a multitude of
attorneys to do the same.
This work is challenging in the best of
times. Even more so over the last few years.
Paige has led us with unmatched integrity,
compassion and dedication every step of
the way. The mantra of this office is and has
been: "Do the right thing, for the right rea-
son, every single day."
The office has several specialty court
programs (mental health, veterans, drug)
that have assisted us in achieving that goal.
Little else is more gratifying to Paige and her
deputies than seeing defendants who want
and are amenable to treatment, get the help
they need to change their lives and the com-
munity for the better. If you examine the list
of people who endorse Paige for reelection,
you will find graduates of these programs.
Guest
COLUMN
since I moved to Salem for a job in 1972.
Concentrating on April and these first two
days of May, I cannot recall going from win-
ter to spring, to winter to spring (and repeat
switch multiple times) more often than this
year. Specific related actions: I’m not much
of a wardrobe fanatic, if one at all, but I can’t
recall putting my woolies away and taking
my cotton shorts and shirts out more often to
repeat the same than over the last five weeks.
The neighbors and I, while we sel-
dom have anything resembling a heated
exchange, agree whenever we see one
another nowadays exchange a weather-re-
lated grimace or a big smile in contrast to
what’s usually of late the latest political cam-
paign event or commercial. Well, we know
for sure the primary will be over soon and
thereby entertainment on TV will get back
to normal—until the onslaught starts again
way too far ahead of the November general
election. We could (but unfortunately won’t)
copy the United Kingdom and other dem-
ocratic republics whose periods preceding
political elections wisely endure by law for
only one month of weeks, not 24.
(Gene H. McIntyre lives in Keizer.)
While rehabilitation is always the goal of
prosecution, there comes a point when, due
to the nature of the act or the defendant’s
criminal history, the only way to protect the
public is to seek harsher sentences. In these
cases, Paige has instilled in us a solemn ded-
ication and commitment to seek justice and
protect victims and the public. Because of
her leadership, we do not take this responsi-
bility lightly.
The ethical duty of every prosecutor is
to “Do Justice.” Nobody has worked harder
and with more dedication toward that goal
than Paige Clarkson. She is the only quali-
fied candidate in this race. Marion County
Deputy District Attorneys stay in this chal-
lenging work for all of these reasons, and
because of who Paige is and what she stands
for. We will continue to do so when she is
reelected. Please join us voting for her on
May 17.
Current: Matt Kemmy, Katie Suver,
Brendan Murphy, David Wilson, Shannon
Sullivan, Evelyn Centeno, Nicole Theobald,
Braden Wolf, Katie Semple, Drew Taylor,
Justin Barbot-Wheaton, Allie Knodell,
Kyana Hughes, Christine Herrman,
Melodie Dickey, Meghan Kamps, Natalie
Barringer, Robin Klein, David Sorensen,
Dan Olsen, Conner Egan, Concetta
Schwesinger, Tim O’Donnell
Former: Drew Anderson, John Knodell,
Sean Kallery, Mahalee Evans, Rachel Klein,
Kurt Miller, Toby Tingleaf, Melissa Alison,
Ashlee Cadotte, Erin Greenawald, Doug
Prince, Bryan Orrio, Patrick Lowney, Nick
Triplett, Alicia Wilson, Amberlynn Howell
Retired: Jean Kunkle, Joe Hollander, John
Turner, Henry Loebe
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