A4
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • THuRSDAY, MARcH 7, 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
GUEST COLUMN
Deepwater Horizon not worth remembering?
A
s if Deepwater Horizon never
happened.
Never mind 11 dead oil-rig
workers. Forget the 87 days that oil
spewed unabated from a ruptured well-
head 5,000 feet below the surface. For-
get the 22-mile plume of oil and chem-
ical dispersants, drifting like a toxic
cloud in the Gulf of Mexico, creating
incalculable damage to marine life and
coastal marshlands.
Well, not incalcula-
ble. Virginia Tech econo-
mists assessed the value
the public placed on the
various forms of marine
life wiped out by the
FRED
2010 disaster and came
GRIMM
up with $17.2 billion.
That’s aside from bil-
lions lost to the fishing
and tourism economies. Or the $61 bil-
lion BP paid in fines, cleanup costs and
reparations for business losses.
Never mind the health consequences,
including chronic respiratory difficul-
ties, suffered by cleanup workers and
residents in the coastal areas where that
strange red gook washed ashore. About
12 million pounds were removed from
beaches and tidal marshes along the
Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and
Florida coasts.
Yet, the Trump administration, as part
of its anti-regulatory frenzy, has decided
that the worst oil spill in the nation’s his-
tory was not worth remembering. The
Interior Department is discarding the
offshore drilling rig safety regulations
adopted after Deepwater Horizon to pre-
vent another such blowout. Meanwhile,
rather than wait for the cumbersome
process it takes to undo federal regula-
tions, Politico reported that Interior has
jumped ahead and issued an extraor-
dinary 1,679 exemptions to the safety
rules.
Most of the exemptions allowed off-
shore drilling companies to bypass regu-
lations that tighten the maintenance and
Tom Atkeson/Coast Guard
Fire boat crews battle the blazing remnants of the offshore oil rig Deepwater Horizon.
testing requirements for the so-called
“blowout preventers” that automatically
cap a wellhead in case of a rupture. Of
course, the blowout preventer on Deep-
water Horizon failed spectacularly.
It’s as if the disastrous aftermath
hardly matters as the Trump administra-
tion erases regulations that fossil-fuel
operations find burdensome. Oil drillers
want offshore drilling rules relaxed and
Trump’s appointees are there to serve.
Regulation rollbacks have become
the very essence of the Trump admin-
istration, almost by default after stum-
bling with other big initiatives, like the
construction of his fabled wall or the
nuclear disarmament of North Korea.
According to the New York Times, the
administration has targeted 78 environ-
mental rules created to protect drink-
ing water, control toxic industrial emis-
sions, limit greenhouse gases and protect
endangered species.
Trump’s fevered anti-environmental-
ists have attacked regulations govern-
ing the disposal of coal-ash waste. And
the arsenic, lead, mercury, selenium,
chromium and cadmium that steam
power plants spew into the atmosphere.
They’ve stopped enforcing the prohibi-
tion against using hydrofluorocarbons (a
particularly potent greenhouse gas) in air
conditioners and refrigerators. They’ve
undone rules that required states to mon-
itor tailpipe exhaust emissions and oil
refinery pollution.
Much of the environmental degra-
dation fomented by Trump anti-regu-
latory regime will be borne by Trump
country. For example, coastal Louisi-
ana, Mississippi, Alabama and the Flor-
ida Panhandle — the areas most at risk
for another Deepwater Horizon — are
home to some of Trump’s most fervent
supporters.
It’s not the residents of liberal Bro-
ward County, Florida, or Boston or New
York or Los Angeles who need to worry
about an unregulated coal-ash pond next
door or their children breathing polluted
air from a nearby chemical plant or strip
miners spoiling the water. It’s not our
workers who’ll be descending into coal
mines or boarding oil rigs where safety
precautions are no longer a priority for
federal inspectors.
Not that the regulation rollbacks
aren’t painful in South Florida, which
was ground zero in the shameless for-
profit college scandals that left thou-
sands of would-be students with sec-
ond-rate educations, deep in debt, facing
dismal employment prospects. Educa-
tion Secretary Betsy DeVos has undone
safeguards designed to protect students
from the misleading and unscrupulous
tactics employed by for-profits.
South Florida also has more than its
share of endangered species, another
genre that the Trump administration
considers subsidiary to the wants of cor-
porate America. And the Trump admin-
istration’s pretense that global warm-
ing and rising seas are liberal myths will
surely leave us treading water.
Of course, coastal communities in
Trump-loving South Carolina, Louisi-
ana, Texas and Alabama also face inun-
dation. But folks in those places sim-
ply pretend otherwise. And they shrug
off the Environmental Protection Agen-
cy’s findings that cessation of the pollu-
tion rules for power plants would lead
to 11,000 premature deaths, 4,700 heart
attacks, 2,800 new cases of chronic
bronchitis, and 130,000 asthma attacks
every year.
And if Trump’s supporters, between
coughing fits, can pretend that Deepwa-
ter Horizon never happened, then why
would they ever think to burden off-
shore drillers with inconvenient safety
regulations?
Fred Grimm is a columnist for the
Sun Sentinel newspaper in Fort Lauder-
dale, Florida.
LETTERS
A great season
ongrats to our Astoria High School
girls basketball team. They had a
great season.
I have been around basketball for
more than 50 years as a player, coach
and father, and I have to say I truly
enjoyed watching our girls play this year.
The best game I saw was when we beat
Seaside on the buzzer.
Many of these girls are coming back
next season. I can not wait to see them
play again.
MANNY SUAREZ
Astoria
C
Solar panels
he March 1 story, “Astoria Co-op
pursues rooftop solar array” (The
Daily Astorian), states that this will be
the first solar installation in our region.
This is not correct.
My business, Center Diamond in Can-
non Beach, added solar panels in Octo-
ber 2018. I believe we were the first
commercial installation of solar panels
on the North Coast.
I love what the co-op is doing,
though.
JULIE WALKER
Cannon Beach
T
Gift of gratitude
’m grateful for the donation, it’s rare
to hear about the good:
I’m new to the Chinook, Washing-
ton, area (October 2018). One day a per-
son was telling me about a woman who
passed away, but ultimately donated her
money to Pacific County residents. The
search for ways to fulfill the intent of
Verna Oller’s gift to expand access to
swimming education for Pacific County
started in 2015. Agreement with city of
Astoria was reached in 2016. The pro-
gram is very successful.
A couple of months ago I entered the
Astoria Aquatic Center, showed my iden-
tification and utility bill, and have been
using the center free and clear. The staff
is very helpful, professional and friendly.
I am hoping that anybody else who is
using the Verna Oller Aquatic Trust is
grateful like me. Without this trust I
probably could not afford the member-
ship; therefore, limit my opportunities
for a more quality fitness program.
With this extreme gratitude, I want
to thank the Verna Oller Aquatic Trust,
and specifically Verna Oller’s vision. So,
with all the toxic issues we have going
I
on in our society, it is so refreshing to
hear about, and take part in, a benefit the
trust offers. Thank you for allowing me
to take part in a quality fitness program.
The greatest gift is the gift of giving, the
second greatest gift is the gift of receiv-
ing. This has been a great gift for me, the
gift I can give is this gift of gratitude.
STEVEN MCCONNELL
Chinook, Washington
Don’t support gillnetting
s a Northwest fisherman for the last
30 years, I take exception to The
Daily Astorian’s support of Columbia
River gillnetting. I have friends who are,
or have been gillnetters, so believe me,
I’ve heard their side.
The fish in the main channel are all
Endangered Species Act (ESA) listed.
I’ve seen the result of mesh size selec-
tivity, and it isn’t all that selective. The
Columbia is the only river still allowing
these nets, with good reason. As sports-
men, we’re told that the Columbia River
endorsement would go toward remov-
ing the nets, and now their use is being
expanded for 2019.
It just doesn’t add up. Neither does
the newspaper’s backing of commer-
cial Columbia River netting. The money
A
brought into the local economy by sports
fishing dwarfs that generated by com-
mercial salmon fisheries. I’m very disap-
pointed by The Daily Astorian’s stance
on this issue.
VINCE ARCHIBALD
Vancouver, Washington
We are but keepers
h, how I love Astoria. I love to go
down to the Riverwalk, strolling
along the banks to smell the estuary, to
hear the waves as they lap the shores, to
see the gulls, egrets and the cormorants.
I love to go to the river to count the
ships in anchorage. I get excited every
time I see a vessel coming upriver or
downriver under the bridge. The sight of
the river pilot boat pulling up next to a
passing vessel gives me goose bumps.
I love that we celebrate being a Coast
Guard City. I love to hear visitors go
“oh, look at that,” pointing to a spectac-
ular view that has captured their atten-
tion. I love riding the trolley and listen-
ing to the conductors boast about our
rich history, and pointing out all the river
activity.
This natural wonder running its course
along our city boundary was named
Columbia in 1792 by Capt. Robert Gray,
O
but it has existed for eons of time with
native peoples living along its banks.
The ancient Chinook people called
it “wimahl,” which translates to simply
mean “big river.” They revered it, and
had great wisdom, understanding it to be
a precious gift, and taking responsibility
to preserve it for those who came after.
To paraphrase an oft-quoted thought:
We do not inherit the beauty and the vis-
tas of “the big river” Columbia from our
ancestors; we are but keepers, and we
borrow it from our children, and future
generations, forever and ever.
LARRY ALLEN
Astoria
Smart Meter concerns
bout Pacific Power’s installation
of digital meters (“Clatsop County
commissioners concerned about opt-out
fees for smart meters,” The Daily Asto-
rian, Feb. 28):
It should be understood that no single,
individual Wi-Fi device is the problem.
It is the cumulative effect of all radio fre-
quencies that creates the concerns for
health and welfare. Penalizing those who
share those concerns is unjust.
DONNA LEE ROLLINS
Astoria
A