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THE DAILY ASTORIAN • THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2019
OPINION
editor@dailyastorian.com
KARI BORGEN
Publisher
JIM VAN NOSTRAND
Editor
Founded in 1873
JEREMY FELDMAN
Circulation Manager
JOHN D. BRUIJN
Production Manager
CARL EARL
Systems Manager
OUR VIEW
Short Sand Beach at
Oswald West State
Park.
OREGON, OUR VALENTINE
We wish the state a happy 160th birthday, and a happy Valentine’s Day, too
t’s fi tting that Oregon’s birth-
day is on Valentine’s Day. It’s
the loveliest state we can imag-
ine, and we’re glad to call her ours.
From the expansive deserts to
the rugged coastline, from the
breathtaking Columbia River
Gorge to jaw-dropping Cra-
ter Lake, from the hidden gem of
the Eagle Cap Wilderness to the
eclectic neighborhoods of Port-
land, from Hell’s Canyon to Mount
Hood; every square mile of the
state is fi lled with unique beauty.
We don’t take that for granted.
There are entire countries that
would kill for this geographical
diversity. You could set out on a
fi eld trip every weekend to a dif-
ferent corner of the state and see
something new and interesting each
time.
Have you been to the caves in
the Siskiyou Mountains, with their
twisting marble hallways? Or the
lava fi elds of central Oregon, where
astronauts prepared for space travel
in the 1960s? How about the Pend-
leton Underground Tours, telling
the frank and wild history of that
western town, or the Astoria Col-
umn, towering above the mouth of
the mighty Columbia River?
I
E.J. Harris/East Oregonian
Tim Trainor/East Oregonian
Perfectly still Tombstone Lake refl ects the
granite cliff s that surround it in the Eagle
Cap Mountains.
East Oregonian
Lower Oneonta Falls at the end of
Oneonta Gorge.
It’s no wonder Oregon has
become one of the most popular
states for relocation. United Van
Lines, which runs an annual survey
on which states people are mov-
ing to and from, had Oregon as
the second most-popular destina-
tion in both 2017 and 2018 behind
Vermont.
Young and old alike come look-
ing for the high quality of life. It’s
something you can’t manufacture.
It goes way back, to the days of the
Oregon Trail, when people from
the east set their eyes and their
wagons on this place.
The urge to come here has
been called “Oregon Fever,” as
recounted by Stephen Dow Beck-
ham, a professor of history at
Lewis & Clark College in the Ore-
gon Blue Book.
“It caused dreams, persuaded
men and women to give up all that
was familiar, risk their lives and
fortunes, and set out for the far
shores of the Pacifi c. The overland
emigrations of the mid-nineteenth
century were one of the epochal
events of human history. Seldom
had so many people traveled so far
by land to seek a new beginning.”
Oregon bears a resemblance to
Eden, providing a cornucopia of
nature’s bounty.
Sand dunes north of Lake Abert, off
Highway 395.
We’re famous for our fi sh and
forests, pears and potatoes, wheat
and watermelon, hazelnuts and ber-
ries of all kinds.
A certain spirit has shaped the
state in the last century and a half,
as we’ve come to understand the
land we inhabit.
We’ve passed bills to protect our
beaches and keep them accessible
to the public, making our coast a
wonderful place to visit.
We’ve gone out of our way to
protect the environment (admit-
tedly, sometimes to a fault),
because we want to be able to hand
this state to the next generation the
way we found it.
So we wish Oregon a happy
160th birthday, and a happy Valen-
tine’s Day, too.
OTHER VIEWS
Selected editorials from
Oregon newspapers
The Bend Bulletin, on letting
locals make zoning changes
e’ll agree with House
Speaker Tina Kotek,
D-Portland, that Oregon
has a housing crisis and solving it is
going to take creative thinking.
That said, Kotek’s belief that
the Legislature is somehow better
equipped to solve the problem than
are local governments in Bend, Med-
ford or La Grande is wrong. She
ignores the role played by state land
use planning laws that strangle city
expansion and is the driving force
behind a measure that does away
with single-family zoning in much of
Oregon.
She’s going after local govern-
ments with House Bill 2001, a mea-
sure that orders cities to do away
with single-family zoning. Commu-
nities with more than 10,000 res-
idents would be required to allow
duplexes, triplexes and/or quadru-
plexes on all land currently zoned for
single-family housing.
But, as the House Committee on
Human Services and Housing heard
Monday from a member of the Sher-
wood City Council, the change could
W
have unintended, and ugly, conse-
quences. For one thing, it could make
it more diffi cult for school districts
to predict and accommodate growth
within the limits of their bonding
capacity.
Another unintended consequence
could be a shift from neighborhoods
that do not restrict property owners’
rights with formal covenants, condi-
tions and restrictions, to ones that do
as people who can, seek out neigh-
borhoods where multifamily housing
is prohibited.
The worst problem with Kotek’s
bill, however, is the way in which it
cuts local citizens and local govern-
ment out of decision-making about
their communities and the way they
grow. In Bend, duplexes and tri-
plexes are currently allowed in resi-
dential zones, and the city is working
to add fourplexes to the mix.
But Bend’s changes were made
locally, not forced by Salem. They
came about after local discussion and
local public hearings, as state land-
use law now requires. Because they
were a local creation, there’s been
considerable local buy-in.
None of that will occur with
Kotek’s bill. Instead, it effectively
prohibits locals from deciding what’s
best for their communities. It should
be defeated.
Albany Democrat-Herald,
on colleges wary of
governor’s budget plan
hen she released her pro-
posed state budget for the
two years beginning in
July, Gov. Kate Brown didn’t include
any additional money for higher edu-
cation — but she did express a hope
that legislators would be able to push
through a $1.9 billion tax increase,
and that some of the extra money
could be funneled to help hold tuition
increases to 5 percent or less.
It’s possible that part of Brown’s
strategy on this was to persuade edu-
cation offi cials to lobby legislators
to support the tax increase. The gov-
ernor has declined to offer specifi cs
about what sort of tax increase she’d
like to see, and has left that task to the
Legislature.
It’s fair to say that some education
offi cials have been, shall we say, cool
to Brown’s approach: For evidence,
look no further than Oregon State
University President Ed Ray’s state of
the university speech, delivered last
week in Portland.
“Under the governor’s budget,”
Ray told a crowd of 700 or so OSU
partisans, “universities would be
forced to shunt even more costs onto
the shoulders of students, and cut
W
staffi ng and programs even more. Or
both.”
A little later in his remarks in Port-
land, Ray added this: “I appreciate the
governor for seeking new funding, but
I must plan the university’s operations
on what I know, not what I hope leg-
islators and voters might approve at
some future date.”
And certainly, considering how tax
proposals have fared in the Legisla-
ture and among the state’s voters, it
doesn’t seem like a good bet to count
on that extra dough just yet, especially
since it’s not at all clear yet what
shape a tax increase could take.
To that end, Ray said last week
that work to identify potential cuts is
underway at OSU.
Although Brown’s proposed bud-
get is the fi rst step, the process
doesn’t really get going until legis-
lative committees release their fi rst
budget drafts. That will happen after
state economists release their lat-
est revenue estimates. (As an aside,
it’s worth noting again that legisla-
tors likely will have a record amount
of revenue at their disposal, but it
won’t be enough to cover increased
costs. Two big factors drive those
costs: the state’s public pension sys-
tem and the decision to expand Ore-
gon’s Medicaid health insurance
plan, also known as the Oregon
Health Plan.)