7A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • THURSDAY, AUGUST 18, 2016
Timber: ‘It’s a complicated issue involving federal agencies’
Continued from Page 1A
waterways and federally pro-
tected species, he said.
Determining how much
timber could have been gen-
erated from each parcel would
devolve into 183 mini-trials,
he said.
“How can we decide if rev-
enue has been maximized on
a particular parcel unless you
consider all of those issues?”
Kaplan said.
Linn County is also an
inadequate representative of
the other counties for multiple
reasons, he said.
The litigation costs are cur-
rently being paid for by timber
groups and lumber companies
— Oregon Forest & Industries
Council, Sustainable Forests
Fund, Stimson Lumber and
Hampton Tree Farms.
Linn County is simply
lending its name to a lawsuit
that actually represents private
interests, according to Ore-
gon’s attorneys.
“It’s not a public interest
case. It’s a case to beneit one
particular group,” said Kaplan.
Unlike the counties, which
appreciate tourism and other
beneits from uses besides log-
ging, the timber interests fund-
ing the lawsuit primarily want
to change the state’s “greatest
permanent value” rules for for-
est management to emphasize
harvesting, he said.
Much of the alleged dam-
ages are for lost future timber
revenues, which may force the
state to change its logging pol-
icies, he said.
“That would directly chal-
lenge the interests of the other
counties,” Kaplan said.
Chris McCracken
attorney for Linn County
Lack of ‘commonality’
The case also doesn’t qual-
ify as a class action because
of the lack of “commonality”
among the counties, which
donated land to Oregon during
different times and under spe-
ciic terms, he said.
The presence of threatened
and endangered species, which
constrain logging, varies widely
by county and affects the dam-
ages calculation, he said.
“It’s a complicated issue
involving federal agencies,”
Kaplan said.
Lead: Most of the districts have either
completed or are in the process of testing
Continued from Page 1A
supplying bottled water, miti-
gation and testing individuals
who might have been exposed
to high levels of lead, accord-
ing to the Oregon School
Boards Association.
Portland Public Schools
estimates that taking those
steps will cost that district an
estimated $7 million, said Joe
Crelier, the district’s director
of risk management.
The cost of just testing
lead in water for drinking and
food preparation is estimated
to cost $10,000 for a small
district and about $1 million
for a large district, according
to district representatives who
attended a July meeting on the
proposed rules.
Legislative leadership has
asked the Emergency Board to
allocate money in September
to pay for costs of testing but
not mitigation, Nazarov of the
Department of Education said.
The Legislative Fiscal Ofice
is working on a proposal to
present to the Emergency
Board in September, accord-
ing to school advocates. Leg-
islative Fiscal Oficer Ken
Rocco was not immediately
available Wednesday to pro-
vide that number.
Governor’s directive
Gov. Brown in April
directed the Department of
Education and Oregon Health
Authority to review exist-
ing requirements for environ-
mental testing and address
the problem of lead in drink-
ing water. During the review,
health and education oficials
learned that neither the educa-
tion department nor the health
authority had rules to require
schools test for lead.
The health authority has
the power to require test-
ing of public water systems,
but schools are excluded
from the agency’s jurisdic-
tion. The proposed rule would
require school districts, char-
ter schools and education ser-
vices districts to conduct lead
and radon testing and to sub-
mit an environmental moni-
toring plan to the Department
of Education for keeping
water, air and physical spaces
safe for students and staff.
The
health
author-
ity already had authority to
treats them according to
regional forest plans, he said.
Deciding the counties’ con-
tractual rights collectively is
more eficient than trying sep-
arate cases with potentially
conlicting verdicts, he said.
McCracken also disputed
that the lawsuit’s funding
mechanism should disqualify
it as a class action.
‘... This lawsuit is not
seeking to change the
management of the forests.’
require schools to test for
radon, but the new rule will
provide comprehensive guid-
ance to schools on all of the
testing required. Schools will
be required to report their
test results to the education
department and to the com-
munity annually.
The
agencies
asked
schools to test for lead during
the summer. Most of the dis-
tricts have either completed or
are in the process of testing,
Nazarov said. The agencies
recommended that schools
identify sources of lead, stop
access, communicate results
to staff, students, parents and
the community and mitigate
and repair the problem.
A survey of 104 schools ear-
lier this month by the School
Boards Association found
that 88 percent of respondents
were in the process of testing
drinking water for lead. Most
of the other 12 percent had
either already tested water or
had a plan in place to do so
after classes resume in the fall.
The Capital Bureau is a
collaboration between EO
Media Group and Pamplin
Media Group.
FAMILY OWNED & OPERATED
Chris McCracken, an attor-
ney for Linn County, rejected
the argument that there’s a lack
of commonality among the
counties.
They all face the same
issues, such as whether the
state has violated its contract
to maximize timber revenues,
he said.
“We have common ques-
tions in droves,” McCracken
said.
The Oregon Department of
Forestry does not manage each
parcel individually but instead
‘No disabling conlicts’
The Davis Wright Tremaine
law irm would be entitled to
15 percent of any inancial
award in the case.
Contingency fees aren’t
unusual in class action law-
suits, particularly since the
counties are strapped for
cash and could not afford
such litigation on their own,
McCracken said.
“There are no disabling con-
OREGON CAPITAL
INSIDER
licts between Linn County and
the class members,” he said.
It’s irrelevant whether
some counties prefer the for-
ests to be managed for ecolog-
ical or recreational beneits,
McCracken said.
The lawsuit’s outcome
won’t affect these priorities,
he said.
“All that is sought here
is money damages,” he said.
“This lawsuit is not seeking to
change the management of the
forests.”
Linn County Circuit Court
Judge Daniel Murphy said he
would issue a ruling by Sept.
19 on the class certiication
issue as well as the state’s
motions to dismiss.
The Capital Bureau is a
collaboration between EO
Media Group and Pamplin
Media Group.
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