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SATURDAY
FEBRUARY
14
•
2015
VIEW FROM UPRIVER
YESTERDAY’S NEWS
A valentine for the place we love
W ESLEY V OTH
For the Siuslaw News
E
verywhere here in the coast range
buds are swelling, and in many yards
pink camellias and some varieties of
plums flash their signature colors. Flowering
quince and crocuses are just beginning to
splash their particular pigments in our yard,
and daffodils will soon join in. In every near-
by bog and ditch, skunk cabbage boldly
unfurl their golden lantern envelopes, and
along the riparian roadsides Indian plum
secrets tiny blossom sprays the greening color
of dawn below their upright, praying-hands
leaves. These two harbingers of wild spring
are similarly endowed with designer fra-
grances suited to insects who are drawn to
exactly what our human olfactory senses tell
us to avoid.
As I write this, it is stormy and raining
hard, even though the weather forecast from
NOAA says clearing and temperature in the
60s for this day and all to follow for their
predictive window. The river has been
high and unfishable, not much work
getting done outside other than clean-
up, but we have been walking outdoors
a lot anyway. This is partly because we
have had visiting children, have been
taking care of one of their dogs, and
because we like to.
On one of the recent stormy days we
walked the Sweet Creek Falls trail, something
we especially enjoy when that narrow valley
roars with conjoined raindrop cataracts. On a
rock in the center of a particular noisy torrent
a dipper bird sat singing, its sweet tremolo
only just discernable above the white noise of
the white water.
If it is Valentine’s Day as you are reading
this, it is the day when the Siuslaw Watershed
Council is giving away native trees to be
planted along local waterways. From its
offices on the Mapleton school campus and
several other distribution points, such as in
Lorane near the southeastern headwaters and
Blachly near the headwaters of Lake Creek,
volunteers are helping with the distribution as
a hundred or so landowners pick up their
requested species. I hear there are more trees
this year than have been spoken for, with
even more becoming available soon.
Valentine’s Day also coincides with the
birthday of Oregon, which celebrates its
155th year of statehood. Why not take the
occasion to do something for this land we are
currently stewards of? Planting native trees is
one way, and if you own stream or lakeside
property here you can access those free trees
by calling the watershed office at 541-268-
3044, emailing nativeplants@siuslaw.org, or
finding more information through the link at
www.siuslaw.org.
If you can’t plant trees, you can probably
clean up a place here you particularly like or
frequent. Flood waters, stormy weather and
thoughtless people have distributed unsightly
and otherwise problematic trash almost
everywhere one looks. One suggestion for
someone living near where I do is just up
Thompson Creek Road. A little more than a
hundred yards up is a couch someone recent-
ly dumped. Who knows, maybe there are still
some coins left under the cushions. Across
the road a little further up and right in the
creek itself is a mattress, giving new meaning
to the term “streambed.” I used to remove
such items, but no longer have a pickup or
the physical capability, and so settle for trash
that can fit into bags. For all those who clean
up wild places and stream banks and road-
sides, for those who plant and help with the
trees, you are my — and Oregon’s — valen-
tine.
And Happy 155th Birthday, one and all.
LETTERS
Falling in love
Dear Florence,
With a nod to Neil Sedaka, “breakin’ up is
hard to do.” Allegedly, falling in love is the best
cure for a broken heart.
It was with heavy hearts in March 2013 that
Vito and I left our family, friends and home of
over 30 years in San Diego County bound for
your city limits. There were naysayers galore
who wondered what in the world we were think-
ing.
“You’re going to leave America’s Finest
City?” “Why abandon near daily sunshine?”
“Florence, Italy?”
We’d been tossing about a place to retire for
years. East Coast or West? North or South? In
June 2012 we were returning home after weeks
of exploring Alaska. As we drove down
Highway 101 on a crystal clear, sunny morning,
we were in awe of the mountains meeting the
shore, the forest with public parks and trails
galore and the spectacular coast between Yachats
and Heceta Head.
Not far beyond the Sea Lion Caves an amaz-
ing panorama opened up: a surf-tossed beach
that stretched for miles, sand dunes, lakes and
ponds glistening in the sun surrounded by green,
everywhere green and air so clean it made you
aware that you were breathing. It was you,
Florence.
We were smitten. Our parting view driving
up the Siuslaw toward Eugene made our hearts
ache to leave you behind. So, we made the deci-
sion and began the process to move here as soon
as we got back to California.
Now, nearly two years later, I thought that
Valentine’s Day was the perfect time to let you
know how much we love you. We truly appreci-
ate all you have offered to make our lives here
just what we hoped it might be.
Your natural beauty is complimented by the
many wonderful people who live here and love
you as much or even more than we do. Your
weather is dynamic and exhilarating. Sure it
rains a lot, but I’m from Boston and her streets
are suffocating under six feet of snow right now.
I’m not sure we have a shovel for that in our
garage.
USPS# 497-660
Oh, and don’t let the mid-summer grumbling
you might hear about “all the traffic” bother you.
Trust me, that is not traffic.
Have a great Valentine’s Day, Florence.
Mary McCarthy
Florence
Health care ‘exchange’
On March 4, the Supreme Court will hear
King v. Burwell, considering whether the phrase
“an exchange established by a state” buried in
two technical sub clauses of the 2,000-page
Affordable Care Act effectively deny premium
subsidies to 7 million enrollees in the 34 states
that have a federal exchange.
“Exchanges” are websites where insurers
market and sell their qualifying benefit plans
directly to individuals otherwise unable to obtain
affordable care. All exchanges, state and federal,
have to comply with the Act’s minimum benefit
and exclusion-prohibition rules. The Act pre-
serves these safeguards for citizens of states
without state-established exchanges by requiring
the Department of Health and Human Services
to “establish and operate” exchanges in the states
opting to not do so.
In Oregon, Cover Oregon, the state-estab-
lished exchange, crashed. Consequently, Oregon
is transitioning to healthcare.gov, the federal
exchange. Potentially, this means that unless
Cover Oregon is revamped, tens of thousands of
eligible Oregonians could lose their subsidies if
the Supreme Court agrees that subsidies are not
available in federal exchanges.
Is it plausible that Congress intended to leave
the citizens unable to readily afford healthcare
living in states unwilling or unable to set up
exchanges without the premium subsidy that is
at the heart of the Act? As the government’s brief
says, “the court would have to accept that
Congress adopted that scheme not in a provision
giving states clear notice of the consequences of
their choice, but instead by hiding it in isolated
phrases.”
In determining what Congress intended,
courts have to look at “the language itself, the
specific context in which that language is used,
and the broader context of the statute as a
Mayor’s response
Wow! What an open-minded mayor: “What
you do in your spare time is up to you. I don’t
share your views on medical or recreational mar-
ijuana and I don’t intend to visit a medical mari-
juana facility,” said Joe Henry in response to a
suggestion that Florence City Council members
“visit a medical marijuana dispensary or at least
get footage of a video if it’s legally accessible,”
(“March Marks End of Marijuana Moratorium,”
Feb. 7, page A1).
I thought the role of elected officials was to
listen to all their constituents and make decisions
based on knowledge received first hand.
Guess not.
I was almost ready to say that thank goodness
I don’t live within the city limits any longer, but
I forgot that almost everything decided in
Florence directly affects all of us in the greater
Florence area as well.
My one personal knowledge of the efficacy of
medical marijuana is my son-in-law’s case of
shingles. It lets him get a night’s sleep pain-free
that could have otherwise been possible only
with prescribed pain medication or alcohol, both
of which would have left him with serious side
effects the following day.
Luckily, he lives in Flagstaff, Ariz., where
medical marijuana is prescribed and available
locally.
Annie Schmidt
Glenada
• On Feb. 19, 1473, Nicolaus Copernicus is
born in Torun, Poland, on the Vistula River.
Revered as the father of modern astronomy,
Copernicus was the first European scientist to
propose that Earth and other planets revolve
around the sun.
• On Feb. 22, 1819, Spanish minister Do
Luis de Onis and U.S. Secretary of State John
Quincy Adams sign the Florida Purchase
Treaty, in which Spain agrees to cede the
remainder of its old province of Florida to the
United States. The Treaty put Florida into U.S.
hands at no cost beyond the U.S. assumption of
$5 million in claims by U.S. citizens against
Spain.
• On Feb. 21, 1926, glamorous Swedish
actress Greta Garbo makes her U.S. screen
debut in “The Torrent.” Unlike many of her
contemporaries, the Nordic beauty successfully
made the transition to sound after becoming a
star during the silent film era.
• On Feb. 18, 1964, the United States cuts off
military assistance to Britain, France and
Yugoslavia in retaliation for their continuing
trade with communist Cuba. The action was
chiefly symbolic, but represented the continued
U.S. effort to destabilize the Cuban regime of
Fidel Castro.
• On Feb. 20, 1974, Reg Murphy, an editor of
The Atlanta Constitution, is kidnapped.
Kidnapper William Williams drove Murphy
around the city, stopping to phone in ransom
demands to the newspaper. Managing editor G.
James Minter delivered the money to Williams,
and Murphy was released. After being caught,
Williams was sentenced to 40 years for kidnap-
ping and extortion.
• On Feb. 16, 1984, Bill Johnson becomes
the first American man to win an Olympic gold
medal in downhill skiing, a sport long dominat-
ed by European athletes. Johnson quickly
became a national hero, though his fame was
short-lived and he never again competed in the
Olympics.
• On Feb. 17, 1996, in the final game of a six-
game match, world chess champion Garry
Kasparov triumphs over Deep Blue, IBM’s
chess-playing computer, and wins the match, 4-
2. However, Deep Blue would go on to defeat
Kasparov in a rematch the following year.
© 2015 King Features Synd., Inc.
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Postmaster, send address changes to: The Siuslaw News, P.O. Box 10, Florence, OR 97439. Phone (541) 997-3441 (See
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whole.” If the Supreme Court applies this basic
rule of statutory interpretation, King v. Burwell
ain’t brain surgery. Which makes one wonder
what objectives the requisite four justices voting
to hear this case might have had in mind.
Possible objectives notwithstanding, there’s a
simple legislative way to protect the 7 million
enrollees who would be denied their premium
subsidies: Amend those two sub clauses. Except,
maybe not so simple. On Feb. 3, the House of
Representatives voted to repeal Obamacare for
the 56th time and with it, “health care that is
accessible and affordable for all.”
Arnold Buchman
Florence
MOMENTS IN TIME
The History Channel
Pres. Barack Obama
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW
Washington, D.C. 20500
Comments: 202-456-1111
Switchboard: 202-456-1414
FAX: 202-456-2461
TTY/TDD Comments: 202-456-6213
www.whitehouse.gov
Gov. John Kitzhaber
160 State Capitol
900 Court St.
Salem, OR 97301-4047
Governor’s Citizens’ Rep.
Message Line 503-378-4582
www.oregon.gov/gov
U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden
221 Dirksen Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-5244
541-431-0229
www.wyden.senate.gov
FAX: 503-986-1080
Email:
Sen.ArnieRoblan@state.or.us
U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley
313 Hart Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-3753/FAX: 202-228-3997
541-465-6750
State Rep. Caddy McKeown
(Dist. 9)
900 Court St. NE
Salem, OR 97301
503-986-1409
Email:
rep.caddymckeown@state.or.us
U.S. Rep. Peter DeFazio (4th Dist.)
2134 Rayburn HOB
Washington, DC 20515
202-225-6416/ 800-944-9603
541-269-2609/ 541-465-6732
www.defazio.house.gov
State Sen. Arnie Roblan (Dist. 5)
900 Court St. NE - S-417
Salem, OR 97301
503-986-1705
West Lane County Commissioner
Jay Bozievich
125 E. Eighth St.
Eugene, OR 97401
541-682-4203
FAX: 541-682-4616
Email:
Jay.Bozievich@co.lane.or.us