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About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (March 31, 2016)
Page 4A OPINION East Oregonian Thursday, March 31, 2016 Founded October 16, 1875 KATHRYN B. BROWN DANIEL WATTENBURGER Publisher Managing Editor JENNINE PERKINSON TIM TRAINOR Advertising Director Opinion Page Editor OUR VIEW Capitol construction The Oregon State Capitol is getting a $50 million upgrade, which will increase security at the Depression-era building but not protect it in the case of a severe earthquake. It’s a scaled-back version of a $337 million overhaul of the building that lawmakers were unable to push forward in the last full legislative session. That version would have included VHLVPLFUHWUR¿WWLQJ to ensure the building would not crumble in all but the most powerful earthquake. As Hillary Borrud reported from our Capital Bureau, Governor Kate Brown signed legislation Tuesday that will pay for $30 million of the project by issuing bonds. Where the other $20 million will come from is not yet known. Part of the upgrades are necessary and overdue. The Oregon State Police RI¿FHLVWXFNHGDZD\LQWKHEXLOGLQJ¶V basement — in case of emergency that’s a bad place to have the good guys. Moving them up to the ground ÀRRULVQHFHVVDU\IRUWKHVDIHW\RI legislators and the public, who are often walking the halls of the capitol. The rest of the $50 million will be used to build two additional wheelchair accessible entrances, replace leaky skylights, remodel and PRYHVRPHVWDWHRI¿FHVDQGEXLOG vaults for electrical and mechanical equipment. Senate President Peter Courtney, D-Salem, said the capitol was a dangerous place for women, especially after-hours, because it allowed for easy access through locked doors. He wouldn’t elaborate, for security reasons. But he did elaborate on why WKHXSJUDGHZRXOGEHQH¿W2UHJRQ schoolchildren. Courtney said he was concerned about the safety of young Oregonians, especially the bus loads of children who visit the capitol. “This building is in deplorable conditions,” said Courtney at a March 3 press conference. “It’s a safety threat. It’s a health threat. And we’re not stepping up.” Yet since 2007, after completing a seismic needs assessment, the state has known there are hundreds of Oregon schools — mostly on the west side of the state — that are in deplorable conditions when it comes to their ability to withstand a serious earthquake. These are places where our students spend many hours most days of the year, as opposed to a place where most will visit once or twice in their lives. Clearly, upgrading hundreds of schools is a more expensive and more complex issue. The state has estimated the cost at more than $500 million. But if Courtney believes it really is a safety threat and a health threat, legislators are not stepping up to discuss and solve that issue. Perhaps it is just human nature. Schools are places legislators may visit just once or twice in their lives, instead of a place where they spend many hours many days of the year. Legislators will fix the capitol building for $50 million, but $500 million in school upgrades remain unfunded. Unsigned editorials are the opinion of the East Oregonian editorial board of Publisher Kathryn Brown, Managing Editor Daniel Wattenburger, and Opinion Page Editor Tim Trainor. Other columns, letters and cartoons on this page express the opinions of the authors and not necessarily that of the East Oregonian. YOUR VIEWS Finicum shooting deserves Milton-Freewater schools thorough investigation need local support I had to stop taking my narcotic drugs (they’re doctor prescribed following hip replacement surgery on March 14) to make sure I was reading what I was reading when I was reading Carlin Sacco’s letter to the editor in the March 25 edition of the East Oregonian. Ms. Sacco and I have locked horns on these pages before, but never to this extent. The last time she and I crossed swords I intimated that she was speaking authentic frontier gibberish. This time I’m not sure her letter rises to that level of comprehension. It’s too bad. If Ms. Sacco would take the aluminum foil off her head long enough so that it’s no longer blocking her ears, she would become aware that there is really something troubling in the death of LaVoy Finicum. While far from the peaceful protester painted by Ms. Sacco, Fincicum did not deserve to JHWJXQQHGGRZQE\RI¿FHUVIURPWKH Oregon State Police. I don’t know whether the shooting ZDVMXVWL¿HGRUQRWEXWLWGHVHUYHVD thorough, objective investigation. Finicum was shot in the back. That raises a strong presumption in my mind WKDWWKHSROLFHPDQZKR¿UHGWKHIDWDO shot did so improperly. What the right has been ignoring for a long time is that even “thugs” like Finicum deserve the protection of the police. Bad behavior does not justify the police resorting to deadly physical force. Too often in the past months and years, that is exactly what has happened in case after case. Last fall we were visiting our kids in Washington, D.C. They took us to a little restaurant that specialized in Middle Eastern food. We were surprised to see signs on the wall that this restaurant ZDVDQRQSUR¿WGHYRWLQJLWVSUR¿WVWR building schools in the Middle East. We asked the waiter some questions about this and soon the owner was at our table. He told us how he went about helping people build schools. “First an advocate of the community, usually in this country, contacts me,” KHVDLG³0\¿UVWUHTXHVWLV\RXPXVW get commitments to fund one third of the cost. If they return with the commitments then I board a plane and travel to that community. I gather the leaders that want the school and tell them they must commit to one third of the cost. Then I leave for six months and when I return if they have the commitments then I commit the fund for the remainder and we start planning a school.” Here in Milton-Freewater the poverty rate, in the 2010 census was one of the highest in Oregon for city’s with more than 5,000 residents. There are good reasons not to pass a bond; people struggle to make ends meet. Yet even people in an impoverished village in a third world country are expected to “have skin in the game” up to one third the cost. This is the way things are done now; there is no better deal down the road. If people in a third world village can make a new school and a new hope, so can we. Vote yes on the school bond. Patrick J. Delaney Hermiston John D. Mitchell Milton-Freewater OTHER VIEWS College admissions shocker! PALO ALTO, California — several essays, one haiku and one Cementing its standing as the original recipe using organic kale. most selective institution of higher “Compositions of 750 or even 500 education in the country, Stanford words give some students syllable University announced this week that IDWLJXH´VDLGDVFKRRORI¿FLDO³ZKLOH it had once again received a record- others exhibit their greatest creativity setting number of applications and around roughage. We want to meet that its acceptance rate — which had them on their turf, especially if it’s dropped to a previously uncharted low leafy and a rich source of vitamin B6.” Frank of 5 percent last year — plummeted all Current high school seniors who Bruni the way to its inevitable conclusion of had set their sights on Stanford Comment 0 percent. responded to its announcement with With no one admitted to the class of astonishment and fury. 2020, Stanford is assured that no other school “This is the worst thing that has happened can match its desirability in the near future. to anyone, ever,” said Alissa Parker, 18, a “We had exceptional senior at Sidwell Friends applicants, yes, but in Washington, D.C. not a single student She added that whether we couldn’t live she accepts an offer of without,” said a Stanford admission from MIT or administrator who one from Duke, she’ll requested anonymity. “In defer enrollment and the stack of applications take a gap year to regain that I reviewed, I didn’t KHUFRQ¿GHQFH see any gold medalists Taylor Abramovich, from the last Olympics a 15-year-old senior — Summer or Winter at the Horace Mann Games — and while School in New York there was a 17-year-old City, blamed his parents who’d performed for his dashed Stanford surgery, it wasn’t open- dream. When he was a heart or a transplant or toddler, they hired the anything like that. She’ll thrive at Yale.” lawyer David Boies and successfully sued News of Stanford’s unprecedented Horace Mann to let Taylor begin kindergarten selectiveness sent shock waves through far ahead of schedule. the Ivy League, along with Amherst, “If I’d been held back a year, I would have Northwestern and at least a dozen other been applying to the Stanford class of 2021, elite schools where, as a consequence, when the school might start accepting students there could be substantial turnover among again,” Taylor fumed. He said that his one underperforming deans of admission. consolation for not getting in was knowing Administrators at several of these that none of his peers did, either. LQVWLWXWLRQVPRUWL¿HGE\DFFHSWDQFHUDWHV $W¿UVWEOXVK6WDQIRUG¶VGHFLVLRQZRXOG still north of 6 percent, chided themselves for seem to jeopardize its fundraising. The LQVXI¿FLHQWLQWHUQDWLRQDORXWUHDFK&DUQHJLH thousands of rejected applicants included 0HOORQYRZHGWKDWRYHUWKHQH[W¿YH\HDUV hundreds of children of alumni who’d donated it would quadruple the number of applicants lavishly over the years, their expectations from Greenland. The University of Chicago REYLRXVLQWKHIDFWWKDWWKH\DI¿[HGWKHLU announced plans to host a college fair in Ulan $50,000 checks to photographs of Emma Bator. playing an obscure woodwind in an Umbrian 2I¿FLDOVDWWKH8QLYHUVLW\RI3HQQV\OYDQLD chamber orchestra or Scott donning the meanwhile, realized that sweatshirts, T-shirts traditional dress of an indigenous people and glossy print and web catalogs weren’t for whom he tailored a special social-media doing nearly enough to advertise its charms, network while on spring break. and that the university wasn’t fully leveraging But over recent years, Stanford the mystique of its world-renowned business administrators noticed that as the school school. So early next fall, every high school rejected more and more comers, it received senior in America who scored in the top 4 bigger and bigger donations, its endowment percent nationally on the SAT will receive, rising in tandem with its exclusivity, its luster in the mail, a complimentary spray bottle of a magnet for Silicon Valley lucre. Wharton: The Fragrance, which has a top note In fact just 12 hours after the university’s of sandalwood and a bottom note of crisp, rejection of all comers, an alumnus stepped freshly minted $100 bills. IRUZDUGZLWKD¿QDQFLDOJLIWSURGLJLRXV Seniors who scored in the top 2 percent enough for Stanford to begin construction on will get the scented shower gel and reed its long-planned Center for Social Justice, a diffuser set as well. ¿UVWHYHUFROODERUDWLRQRI5HQ]R3LDQRDQG On campuses from coast to coast, there was Santiago Calatrava, who also designed the soul searching about ways in which colleges pedestrian bridge that will connect it to the might be unintentionally deterring prospective student napping meadows. applicants. Ŷ Were the applications themselves too Frank Bruni, an Op-Ed columnist for The laborious? Brown may give next year’s New York Times since June 2011, joined the aspirants the option of submitting, in lieu of newspaper in 1995. As the school rejected more and more comers, it received bigger and bigger donations, its endowment rising in tandem with its exclusivity. LETTERS POLICY The East Oregonian welcomes original letters of 400 words or less on public issues and public policies for publication in the newspaper and on our website. The newspaper reserves the right to withhold letters that address concerns about individual services and products or letters that infringe on the rights of private citizens. Submitted letters must be signed by the author and include the city of residence and a daytime phone number. The phone number will not be published. Unsigned letters will not be published. Send letters to Man- aging Editor Daniel Wattenburger, 211 S.E. Byers Ave. Pendleton, OR 97801 or email editor@eastoregonian.com. Be heard! Comment online at eastoregonian.com, or visit our Facebook or Twitter pages.
