7A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • MONDAY, MARCH 5, 2018
Science: ‘It’s intrinsically valuable for our volunteers’
Continued from Page 1A
“This work needs to be
done, but there’s just not
enough capacity,” he said. “If
we weren’t here? It wouldn’t
happen. This data wouldn’t be
taken.”
A growing trend
Citizen science is nothing
new. The Audubon Society’s
Christmas Day Bird Count has
existed for almost 120 years,
and for centuries natural obser-
vations have been recorded
in resources like farmers
almanacs.
Julia Parrish, a seabird
ecologist with the University
of Washington and founder
of the COASST survey, gives
presentations about citizen sci-
ence around the country and
has seen it spike in popularity,
particularly in the last decade.
Parrish started the group nearly
20 years ago while studying a
colony of common murres on
Tatoosh Island off the Wash-
ington coast.
She wanted to know if the
reproduction and die-off pat-
terns she was seeing were
applicable to the entire spe-
cies. But in order to know she
would need data collected on
more than one beach at a time.
“When you do that kind of
research, you get a lot of infor-
mation about one colony,”
Parrish said. “But it’s hard to
understand whether that one
place is indicative of the whole
range of the population, or if
we are just seeing something
that’s going on right there.”
When Parrish launched
a pilot citizen science proj-
ect near Ocean Shores, Wash-
ington, she never thought she
would get enough volunteers
willing to do the work. Now,
there are more than 1,000
active in the program.
“It’s hard to imagine
more than 50 people at one
time wanting to go sample
dead birds on a beach,” she
laughed. “But I was wrong,
Colin Murphey/The Daily Astorian
Eric Owen searches the
beach for dead birds near
Haystack Rock.
which is great.”
Part of the rise has to do
with technology, she said.
Apps that help identify spe-
cies and allow unprecedented
access to information have
driven interest up and removed
barriers that would have other-
wise made it harder to collect
data without formal training.
Another is the science commu-
nity slowly coming around to
accept citizen science.
“I think there’s a lot of ret-
icence in the science commu-
nity to use citizen science.
There’s some doubt the data
collected is of the precision or
accuracy that is needed to doc-
ument phenomena,” Parrish
said. “But as it grows, the more
standardized it becomes. What
we’re seeing right now is a lot
of discussion in citizen science
programs asking what they
need to do to get to that level.”
But a larger part, she said,
is a growing passion in locals
to study and protect their
own communities that other-
wise would not have regular
research conducted.
“Haystack Rock Awareness
Program is a fabulous example
of local people saying ‘Hey,
this is our place. We want to
collect the data, we want to
know what’s going on,’” Par-
rish said.
‘A marriage contract’
While a general decline
in federal funding for scien-
tific research could play a fac-
tor in the science commu-
nity’s acceptance of using
volunteer-collected data, Par-
rish said, regardless of fund-
ing, there are some projects
only citizen scientists can
accomplish.
An example was identify-
ing the correlation between
massive seabird die-offs and
“the Blob,” a large mass of
relatively warm water in the
Pacific Ocean that lasted
through 2015. Millions of
seabirds washed ashore from
Alaska to California in seven
mass extinction events since
2013 — a rate, Parrish said,
that is 100 to 1,000 times more
than normal, depending on the
species.
“Now that we know that,
we can dive into why the
warm water was affecting
them. What did it actually do
to these birds?” she said. “We
only know that because of
the work the volunteers are
doing, getting numbers on
the carcasses.”
Citizen scientists also were
the ones to alert researchers to
early warning data about inva-
sive species, like when Euro-
pean green crabs started show-
ing up on the West Coast in
2016. There have been mul-
tiple times Parrish has been
alerted to rare seabirds wash-
ing ashore that otherwise
would have gone unnoticed.
“We don’t do that with
mainstream science because
we don’t have the money, the
personnel to do it,” she said.
“To me it’s a contract, like a
marriage contract, between
mainstream scientists and
coastal citizenry to monitor
coastal health.”
Back in Cannon Beach,
Owen sees the benefit going
both ways with his volunteers.
“It’s intrinsically valuable
for our volunteers. What they
are doing, these issues, directly
affect them,” Owen said. “I
think they are realizing how
accessible it is.”
Session: Legislators tackled, health care, guns and net neutrality
Continued from Page 1A
“Really, the session worked
the way it should,” said House
Speaker Tina Kotek, D-Port-
land. “There were emerging
issues. We dealt with them, and
we did strategic investments for
communities that needed some
things. We balanced the budget.
We also were able to take on
some of the bigger issues fac-
ing the state.”
Republican leaders Rep.
Mike McLane of Powell Butte,
and Sen. Jackie Winters of
Salem said the short session
remains “broken.”
“Oregonians sent us here
to adjust budgets, make minor
policy tweaks, and respond
to emergencies. Instead, the
majority party introduced sig-
nificant partisan policy changes
that were impossible to prop-
erly vet in such a short amount
of time,” they said in a joint
statement. “While thankfully
many of these bills failed to
make it to the governor’s desk,
it’s hard to escape the reality
that the short session is increas-
ingly becoming more about
political posturing than good
policy making.”
Health care
Lawmakers passed two
bills aimed at understanding
the high price of prescrip-
tion drugs and shining light
on coordinated care organiza-
tions, which provide govern-
ment-subsidized health care
to low-income Oregonians
through the state’s version of
Medicaid.
House Bill 4005 requires
pharmaceutical manufacturers
to disclose reasons for increases
in the price of prescrip-
tion drugs when the increase
exceeds 10 percent.
House Bill 4018 makes pub-
lic the meetings of the state’s 15
CCOs and requires the organi-
zations to give at least three
months’ notice before end-
ing a contract with the state,
an effort to stabilize the health
care system.
Guns
A bill to strip gun rights
from convicted stalkers and
intimate partners convicted of
abuse passed both chambers.
Known as closure of the “boy-
friend loophole,” the fix was a
priority of Gov. Kate Brown for
this session.
Housing
Lawmakers boosted reve-
nue to fund affordable housing
by raising the real estate doc-
ument recording fee from $20
to $60. The fee is the state’s
only source of revenue dedi-
cated to paying for affordable
housing.
The increase is projected
to generate an additional $60
million every two years
Business taxes
Lawmakers eliminated a
federal deduction for busi-
nesses on state tax returns.
While the state’s income
tax code is largely tied to fed-
eral code, business owners with
“pass-through” income on their
personal income taxes will not
be allowed to deduct up to 20
percent of their income in 2018.
It was unclear Saturday
whether the governor plans
on vetoing the bill. She raised
some concerns during session
over the impact it would have
on the state’s small businesses.
The bill was intended to
stem state revenue losses from
federal tax reform late last year.
The change is expected to result
in $244 million in tax dollars in
the existing two-year budget
than if the state had allowed the
deduction.
Net neutrality
State lawmakers have no
authority to regulate internet
companies. However, they can
pass laws to use the state’s buy-
ing power to encourage certain
business practices.
In this case, they required
that internet providers that con-
tract with government entities
in the state abide by the prin-
ciples of net neutrality. That
means contractors may not
block, slow down or charge
more for certain content.
Climate change
An ambitious proposal to
enact a cap-and-invest pro-
gram this year moved through
the session without legislative
action.
The program would have
charged companies for emitting
carbon dioxide into the atmo-
sphere and invested the pro-
ceeds into projects designed to
offset global warming.
Kotek and Courtney said
they want to pass the legisla-
tion next year during the Leg-
islature’s longer session. They
also announced the creation of
a new Joint Legislative Com-
mittee on Carbon Reduction.
Lawmakers also added $1.4
million to the state budget as
part of the budget reconciliation
bill to create a carbon policy
office in the state Department
of Administrative Services.
Health care
Portland Rep. Mitch Green-
lick’s third try to refer a con-
stitutional amendment to vot-
ers to make access to affordable
and effective health care a fun-
damental right was blocked in
the Senate. Opponents were
concerned about potential cost
and litigation that could result
from
the
constitutional
provision.
The Capital Bureau is a col-
laboration between EO Media
Group and Pamplin Media
Group.
.
.
.
s
n
e
p
p
a
h
Life
!
e
r
e
h
e
r
’
e
w
y
That’s wh
Keith Klatt, MD
Sally Baker, PA-C
Mark Tabor, PA-C
Our friendly and dedicated Physicians and
Physician Assistants are available for all of
your routine healthcare needs, not just for
emergency situations!
If you’re suffering from a headache,
toothache, earache, backache, any illness
or injury, are in need of a refi ll of your
prescription medications, or even a sports
physical or DOT physical, our dedicated staff is
here to assist you!
We are open 7 days a week. We are located in
the Park Medical Building East in Suite 111. We
accept most insurances, offer a cash discount
and also accept the Oregon Health Plan, WA
Medicaid and Medicare.
Kenyon Solecki, PA-C
2120 Exchange Street
Suite 111
Astoria, Oregon
Express Healthcare for Busy Lifestyles
www.urgentcarenwastoria.com
We observe the following holidays & are closed on
July 4th, Thanksgiving, Christmas & New Year’s Day.
New Hours:
Mon-Fri 7 AM -7 PM
Sat-Sun 9 AM -7 PM
503-325-0333