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About Wallowa County chieftain. (Enterprise, Wallowa County, Or.) 1943-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 16, 2015)
A4 Opinion wallowa.com December 16, 2015 Wallowa County Chieftain PERS problem can’t get deeper East Oregonian O ne of the most pressing issues for the longterm health of this state is a signed contract to pay for the Oregon Public Employees Retirees System — better known as the four-letter word PERS. On Nov. 20, PERS actuaries forecast for the public their idea of how much more money will have to be funneled into the system in order for it to keep up its end of the deal. The actuaries predict a steady rise of 2 percent annual Voice of the Chieftain rate increases, at least for the next few bienniums. While that might sound pretty reasonable, it translates to cost increases of 20 to 30 percent for municipalities, school districts, emergency responders, prisons and more, all across the state. Those kinds of increases are not sustainable. And rural Oregon — where a larger percentage of the workforce is government employees — is especially vulnerable to runaway costs. First, a few facts. There are 200,000 public employees in Oregon, and 95 percent of them are tied into the PERS system. That system is also paying 130,000 retirees. (DFK\HDU3(56JHWVOHVV¿QDQFLDOO\VROYHQW The fund has $70 billion to invest, but returns from that investment bring in 70 cents for every $1 that is paid out. Losing 30 percent on every transaction puts PERS quickly into the red, and puts it deeper into that hole each and every year. Its unfunded liability is expected to soon reach $18 billion. That’s a black hole that reaches all the way to China — and to a depth that could cause the whole system to collapse. So what do we do about it? There are some facts both sides have to deal with. A contract is a contract. Deals were signed and — as we learned from the courts — past promises cannot be renegotiated. Cost of living increases can be renegotiated moving forward, but not looking back. That limits our options, but doesn’t keep us from designing a more sustainable system. Another consideration, especially in rural Oregon where government employees make up about a quarter of our workforce, is the fact that public sector employee EHQH¿WVYDVWO\RXWSDFHSULYDWHVHFWRURQHV That’s great for attracting good candidates for important, taxpayer-funded positions. But is such a wide gulf between private and public sector employees in the best interest of our country? We would argue it is not — and closing that gulf is imperative. It will take movement from both sides. Wage increases ZLOOVRRQFRPHWRWKLVFRXQWU\²HLWKHUDVLQÀH[LEOHODZ initiated in statehouses and Congress, or incrementally by employers themselves. As wages go up, competition to secure educated, reliable employees will increase. %HQH¿WVGXULQJZRUNLQJ\HDUVDQGIRUUHWLUHPHQWZLOO help reduce the need for a social safety net. It might even spur economic growth, meaning those PERS investments would bring in a larger dividend on every dollar. It’s a big problem with no easy solution, but action is QHHGHGEHIRUHWKHKROHEHFRPHVWRRELJWR¿OO EDITORIAL USPS No. 665-100 P.O. Box 338 • Enterprise, OR 97828 OI¿Fe 29 1: )irst 6t., Enterprise, Ore. PKone 27 • )Dx 2392 :DOOoZD &oXnt\¶s 1eZspDper 6inFe 88 Enterprise, Oregon M EMBER O REGON N EWSPAPER P UBLISHERS A SSOCIATION P UBLISHER E DITOR R EPORTER R EPORTER N EWSROOM ASSISTANT A D S ALES CONSULTANT G RAPHIC D ESIGNER O FFICE MANAGER Marissa Williams, marissa@bmeagle.com Scot Heisel, editor@wallowa.com Stephen Tool, stool@wallowa.com Kathleen Ellyn, kellyn@wallowa.com editor@wallowa.com Jennifer Powell, jpowell@wallowa.com Robby Day, rday@wallowa.com Cheryl Jenkins, cjenkins@wallowa.com P UBLISHED EVERY W EDNESDAY BY : EO Media Group 3HULRGLFDO3RVWDJH3DLGDW(QWHUSULVHDQGDGGLWLRQDOPDLOLQJRI¿FHV Subscription rates (includes online access) Wallowa County Out-of-County 1 Year $40.00 $57.00 6XEsFriptions PXst Ee pDiG prior to GeOiYer\ See the Wallowa County Chieftain on the Internet www.wallowa.com facebook.com/Wallowa | twitter.com/wcchieftain POSTMASTER — Send address changes to Wallowa County Chieftain P.O. Box 338 Enterprise, OR 97828 Contents copyright © 2015. All rights reserved. Reproduction without permission is prohibited. Volume 133 New food-safety rules need funding Now comes the hard part. The U.S. Food and Drug Administra- tion has for four years been writing the regulations that will put in force the Food Safety Modernization Act. The job involved many revisions in which industry members and university researchers politely tapped FDA authors on the shoulder and reminded them that they were providing solutions where no problems existed. For example, the use of spent grains from breweries to feed cattle has been a common practice for centuries, yet the FDA initially felt the urge to interject ex- pensive new requirements that made no sense and accomplished nothing. The regulation of irrigation water in the propagation of onions was another area in which the FDA was politely re- minded that no problems existed. Now the results of all that work will come to fruition and, presumably, make the food Americans eat safer. Nearly ev- ery week the news carries reports of an outbreak of E. coli or some other prob- lem at restaurants or processors. Though many are linked to food handling prob- lems, some can be traced back to the farms where the produce was grown. To improve food safety, Congress now has to provide the money for the FSMA. 7KH&RQJUHVVLRQDO%XGJHW2I¿FHLQL- tially estimated that implementing the FSMA would cost nearly $120 million a year. That is a bargain. If the rules are ef- fectively implemented, outbreaks can be avoided, the public will be protected This is good, but with a caveat. It is good because state departments of agriculture are intimately familiar with the practices farmers follow. Better than anyone else, they will understand how By Capital Press the regulations should be followed on the and growers will be minimally impacted farm. The caveat involves money. If Con- from recalls. But other aspects of the regulations gress does not adequately fund imple- are disconcerting. While the FDA has mentation of the new rules, all bets are aimed high in its attempts to assure food off. FDA has requested nearly $110 mil- safety, it appears the agency has a long OLRQ IRU WKH QH[W ¿VFDO \HDU WR GR WKDW way to go. At a recent meeting, even simple Now Congress must decide whether the questions from farmers appeared to food safety law it wrote will be an effec- tive tool for helping to assure food safety stump agency representatives. Mateusz Perkowski, a reporter for the or it will be a shell that sounds good but Capital Press, cited two questions that in reality does not live up to its promise. came up: The regulations cannot be implement- • If several farms draw their water ed in a piecemeal fashion. To do that from the same stream, one farmer asked, would give some sectors of agriculture can they collectively monitor bacteria an advantage over others because of the levels instead of each paying for separate differences in the costs of meeting the re- tests? quirements. • How can a grower establish a base- “We can’t expect it to happen as an line for bacteria levels in irrigation water, unfunded mandate,” Michael Taylor, asked another, if he leases different par- FDA deputy commissioner for foods and cels of land each year? veterinary medicine, told those at the re- Such questions will be referred to a cent meeting. Technical Assistance Network that will He is correct. Congress needs to make EH IRUPHG IURP WKH )'$ RI¿FLDOV ZKR sure its new law is adequately funded at wrote the regulations. the federal and state levels. )'$ RI¿FLDOV DOVR PHQWLRQHG WKDW Otherwise, FSMA will be just anoth- they would talk with food safety auditors er half-baked congressional initiative who already inspect farms and other op- that sounds good but doesn’t accomplish erations to coordinate efforts. much. They also said state departments of Much is at stake with the FSMA — agriculture will do the heavy lifting when the well-being of U.S. agriculture and the it comes to implementing the regulations. well-being of 319 million Americans. GUEST EDITORIAL Clarifying Food Bank Challenge article Thank you so much for the article about the Soroptimist/Rotary Food Bank Challenge. I just wanted to mention that the Soroptimist food bank challenge do- nation this year was collected entirely from members’ personal donations, not from Thrift Shop proceeds. Although we separately gave the food bank $4,000 from those proceeds, this was not part of the challenge. And this seems like a great opportu- nity to thank all the folks who shop and donate to the Thrift Shop. A reminder that the shop will be open through Tuesday, Dec. 15, and then will reopen Monday, Jan. 4. We are taking a vacation! Happy Holidays to all. Ann Browder PresiGent, 6oroptiPist ,nternDtionDO oI :DOOoZD &oXnt\ Measure ¿lling our prisons I am writing to ask if anyone in Wal- lowa County knows what Measure 11 is? Do you know how it works and what it was meant for? Measure 11 was meant for repeat and violent offenders. After 21 years it has morphed into a pipeline to prison. First- time offenders with no criminal back- ground or history of violence are given the same sentence as violent and repeat offenders. Oregon has 14,694 inmates — 6,164 in under Measure 11 — and almost a third of the prison population (4,314) DUH¿UVWWLPHRIIHQGHUVZLWKQRFULPLQDO LETTERS to the EDITOR background. The state spends $137 mil- lion per year for them. Oregon, second in the country to spend more on prisons then education. That is why I am throwing my hat in the ring for the state Senate seat in District 29. I know that Sen. Hansell is a good man, decent, but he is sitting on the fence about this. It must be reformed, NOT repealed. We need more money for education, more money for more police in our towns and cities. No, I do not want vio- lent and repeat offenders released. There are other ways. My small town of Mil- ton-Freewater has a terrible gang prob- lem. We need help with that. Barbara Dickerson 0iOton)reeZDter Saving the wolves for ...? I have read so many articles in the local newspapers and I am disgusted by the lack of common sense on the part of environmentalists and animal rights groups. They are predominantly urban residents who fantasize about something they know so little about. Yet they are dictating what the laws should and will be. I believe our government leaders should have stopped this nonsense be- fore it happened. Some claim they want to work with the stockgrowers. That is hard to fathom when they have little perception of the livestock business. Their ideas of pro- tecting livestock from predators -- espe- cially wolves -- are just plain silly. , JUHZ XS RQ D VKHHS RXW¿W DQG ODW- er I was a range rider for several cattle RXW¿WV7KHUHDOZD\VLVVRPHORVVIURP predators on livestock as well as all wildlife. This loss will be much worse with increasing the wolf population by laws preventing containment of their numbers. The idea that the wolves will “selectively kill” is absolutely false. The fact is that wolves take what they can. This is a loss to the stockgrowers, sportsmen and businesses that depend on the livestock and wildlife. The (Sept. 15 letter) submitted to The Chieftain by Scott Beckstead, Or- egon director of The Humane Society of the United States, is an example of the common sense of these people. He writes: “California is privileged to host a new wolf pack. Wolves have been in- strumental in restoring biological diver- sity in the Northern Rocky Mountains, including increasing the number of song birds, pronghorns, lynxes and other spe- cies, while simultaneously improving the ecology of vital riparian systems.” As cattlemen, sheep producers and hunters roam the ranges, they will be able to listen to the birds and appreciate the tall, green grass where the carrion has decomposed. And maybe when they check the spots of green grass they will be able to salvage an eartag or cowbell -- if the grass ain’t too tall. Bart Harris :DOOoZD Where to write Washington, D.C. The White House, 1600 Pennsyl- vania Ave. N.W., Washington, D.C. 20500; Phone-comments: 202-456- 1111; Switchboard: 202-456-1414. U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, D — 516 +DUW 6HQDWH 2I¿FH %XLOGLQJ :DVK- ington D.C. 20510. Phone: 202-224- 5244. E-mail: wayne_kinney@wyden. senate.gov Web site: http://wyden. senate.gov Fax: 202-228-2717. U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley, D — 313 +DUW 6HQDWH 2I¿FH %XLOGLQJ :DVK- ington D.C. 20510. Phone: 202-224- 3753. E-mail: senator@merkley.sen- ate.gov. Fax: 202-228-3997. 2UHJRQRI¿FHVLQFOXGH2QH:RUOG Trade Center, 121 S.W. Salmon St., Suite 1250, Portland, OR 97204; and 310 S.E. Second St., Suite 105, Pend- leton, OR 97801. Phone: 503-326- 3386; 541-278-1129. Fax: 503-326- 2990. U.S. Rep. Greg Walden, R — (Sec- ond District) 1404 Longworth Build- ing, Washington D.C. 20515. Phone: 202-225-6730. No direct e-mail be- cause of spam. Web site: www.walden. house.gov Fax: 202-225-5774. Med- IRUG RI¿FH 1RUWK &HQWUDO 6XLWH 112, Medford, OR 97501. Phone: 541- 776-4646. Fax: 541-779-0204. Pending Bills: For information on bills in Congress, Phone: 202-225- 1772.