KATHRYN B. BROWN
Owner
ANDREW CUTLER
Publisher/Editor
ERICK PETERSON
Hermiston Editor/Senior Reporter
SATURDAy, JULy 9, 2022
A4
Founded October 16, 1875
OUR VIEW
Survey
could be
beneficial
to city
T
he Pendleton City Council is on
the right path with its devotion
to fulfilling its goal to improve
communication with the community.
Last week, the city announced it has
launched the Pendleton Communications
Survey 2022 to help solicit feedback from
residents.
Any time elected and appointed offi-
cials can gather input from voters it is a
good step forward. In the digital world we
now live in people and cities can become
isolated inside self-made silos where
information is either stunted or slanted.
For government to work effectively
several goals must be met on a consis-
tent basis. For one, voters must always
keep a keen eye on the decisions made
by elected and appointed leaders. Our
government works for us. Which means
its decisions must be based on construc-
tive feedback from citizens.
There is no shortage of communication
in our world now. From social media plat-
forms to bloggers, the number of opinions
thrown across the public stage is monu-
mental. The trouble is, all of those voices
— those opinions — blend together and
become a single, long scream of white
noise.
Collecting feedback that is narrowly
focused and with an established goal is
crucial and the communications survey
does that. The key, though, will be the
kind of feedback the city receives. Long
narratives of political bombast are fine for
national television but hardly the ingredi-
ents to help a relatively small-town coun-
cil pave a way forward.
Pendleton residents essentially have a
terrific opportunity to give feedback to
their elected leaders. In an ideal world,
throngs of citizens would attend council
meetings and give feedback during the
public comment period at each session.
The reality, though, is we all live very
busy lives and attendance at most city
— or even county — public meetings is
never robust.
Yet now the city has created an avenue
for voters to use to get their input before
their elected leaders. Such input, if done
in a methodical and civil manner, can go
a long way toward helping the city in the
future. In the end, our goals should be
similar. A nice city that is safe and clean
that is welcoming to all.
The city is on the right track with this
survey, and we hope it proves to be a
successful model for the future.
EDITORIALS
Unsigned editorials are the opinion of the East
Oregonian editorial board. Other columns,
letters and cartoons on this page express the
opinions of the authors and not necessarily that
of the East Oregonian.
LETTERS
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. 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:
editor@eastoregonian.com,
or via mail to Andrew Cutler,
211 S.E. Byers Ave., Pendleton, OR 97801
Which Betsy Johnson would govern?
STEVE
FORRESTER
WRITER’S NOTEBOOK
etsy Johnson entered my office at
The Astorian in 2000 as a candi-
date for the state House of Repre-
sentatives. Decades prior, our family
histories intersected when my father
and Johnson’s mother were colleagues
on the Oregon State Board of Higher
Education. They had a simpatico rela-
tionship. So I was inclined to like this
legislative candidate. And I did.
Not being a pollster, I will leave it
to others to speculate on the viability
of Johnson’s strategy for winning the
three-way race she has with Democrat
Tina Kotek and Republican Christine
Drazan. What interests me much more
is what kind of governor she would be.
Oregon has not had a governor with
business ownership in their background
since Victor Atiyeh, our last Republican
governor, who led the state from 1979
to 1987. Atiyeh grasped the concept of
being the state’s CEO.
Our state government has grown
considerably since the 1980s, but some
of the same challenges beg for oversight.
With government’s growth, the state’s
dependence on computer systems and
software platforms has grown mark-
edly. And Oregon has lacked a governor
who grasped that particular challenge
and dealt with it.
Oregon’s state government’s
computer system disasters are no secret.
Refreshing my memory about those
B
malfunctions, I consulted a man with
some 30 years of watching the state-
house — Dick Hughes, our newspa-
per’s Salem columnist. “They’re awful,”
Hughes said.
On the one hand, computer systems
have become the nervous systems of
most businesses and governments. On
the other hand, no candidate for state
office will run on a platform of improv-
ing them. This is not sexy stuff.
Based on what Hughes tells me and
what I know of Johnson, she would have
the moxie to ask the tough questions of
systems and software providers who
are contracted to serve the divisions of
state government — which are equiv-
alent to large companies — in terms of
their payroll, budget and the size of the
customer base they serve.
Guns, however, are a sexy issue — a
highly visible flashpoint. When Johnson
told me, more than a decade ago, about
the machine gun that she purchased
at an auction, I was startled. In U.S.
Marine Corps infantry training, I had
fired the M60 machine gun. Why, I
wondered, would anyone not in uniform
want that killing machine?
When Johnson and I had this
conversation, a national community of
public health physicians was gathering
numbers on the scale of gun woundings,
deaths and suicides. They argued Amer-
ica should recognize this as a public
health issue. A calamity. An epidemic.
An example of this public health
perspective was “The Medical Costs of
Gunshot Injuries in the United States,”
published in the Journal of the Ameri-
can Medical Association. Its conclusions
were: “Gunshot injury costs represent a
substantial burden to the medical care
system. Nearly half this cost is borne by
the US taxpayers,” (Aug. 4, 1999).
David Hemenway, of the Harvard
School of Public Health, was a leading
explorer of the intersection of firearm
woundings and deaths and public health.
“Private Guns, Public Health” was his
2004 book. The virtue of Hemenway’s
work and other public health physicians
is that it moved the gun issue away from
politics and emotion into the world of
medicine, healing and prevention. In an
attempt to have a fruitful dialogue with
Johnson, I gave her one of Hemenway’s
papers. At that point, this very articulate
woman said nothing in response.
I was sorry to hear Johnson’s
response to the school shooting in
Uvalde, Texas, but it was the Betsy I
listened to some 20 years ago.
I know that her independent
campaign for governor demands she
cultivate a hard-line stance for the
single-issue voter — to cut into the
Republican electorate. That’s fine for
short-term thinking. But it is not lead-
ership for what has become a mortal
concern.
Put simply, Johnson is on the wrong
side of history. And if Oregon has
another Umpqua Community College
shooting (2015), Clackamas Town
Center incident (2012) or Thurston High
School shooting (Kip Kinkel, 1998),
most Oregonians will want much more
than a cliched response from their
governor.
———
Steve Forrester, the former editor and
publisher of The Astorian, is the president
and CEO of EO Media Group.
CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVES
U.S. PRESIDENT
Joe Biden
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW
Washington, DC 20500
Comments: 202-456-1111
GOVERNOR
Kate Brown
160 State Capitol
900 Court St.
Salem, OR 97301-4047
503-378-4582
U.S. SENATORS
Ron Wyden
221 Dirksen Senate Office Bldg.
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-5244
La Grande office: 541-962-7691
Jeff Merkley
313 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-3753
Pendleton office: 541-278-1129
REPRESENTATIVES
Bobby Levy, District 58
900 Court St. NE, H-376
Salem, OR 97301
503-986-1458
Rep.BobbyLevy@state.or.us
Greg Smith, District 57
900 Court St. NE, H-482
Salem, OR 97301
503-986-1457
Rep.GregSmith@state.or.us
U.S. REPRESENTATIVE
Cliff Bentz
2185 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
202-225-6730
Medford office: 541-776-4646
SENATOR
Bill Hansell, District 29
900 Court St. NE, S-415
Salem, OR 97301
503-986-1729
Sen.BillHansell@state.or.us