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About The Siuslaw news. (Florence, Lane County, Or.) 1960-current | View Entire Issue (April 11, 2020)
4A | SATURDAY EDITION | APRIL 11, 2020 Siuslaw News P.O. Box 10 Florence, OR 97439 NED HICKSON , EDITOR | 541-902-3520 | NHICKSON @ THESIUSLAWNEWS . COM Opinion The First Amendment C ongress shall make no law respect- ing an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Govern- ment for a redress of grievances. “I never considered a difference of opinion in politics, in religion, in philosophy, as cause for withdrawing from a friend.” —Thomas Jefferson (1800) Hospital staff commitment remains unwavering (Editor’s Note: Viewpoint sub- missions on this and other topics are always welcome as part of our goal to encourage community discussion and exchange of perspectives.) no symptoms — a local resident or someone traveling through town — could still be contagious. Some will visit grocery stores, gas stations, food outlets. These num- bers will continue to change day to ver the last week there’s been day. Someone who tests negative last a lot of discussion in the com- week could be positive this week. munity about the track- Stay home, save lives. ing and reporting of lo- As frustrating as these cal COVID-19 positive guidelines are, they will give By William Foster, MD cases. us the best chance of slowing Chief of Staff and Emergency Dept. Medical Director the spread of this disease — Whether the Florence area has one case or 100 flattening the curve — and cases, the Medical Staff getting back to business as at PeaceHealth Peace Harbor Medi- We ask all local residents to keep usual. Keep yourself, your friends cal Center wants the public to know themselves, their loved ones and and your neighbors safe by staying that this does not influence our re- their communities healthy and safe home. sponse to this public health crisis. by staying home — especially if you This is your important role as we Our commitment to care for our are ill. navigate the pandemic locally, na- patients remains unwavering. Follow the guidelines from Lane tionally and worldwide. We also want to remind local County Public Health and the Cen- residents that COVID-19 is almost ters for Disease Control. Remember — On behalf of Peace Harbor certainly already circulating in our that someone with minimal or even Medical Staff Leadership O community. With a limited number of test kits, we can test only those patients who are most seriously ill. Across Lane County, for every patient who tests positive it’s estimated there are four more who have COVID-19 but ar- en’t sick enough to be tested. Guest Viewpoint LETTERS Dunes City Council act is one of stealth and deceit After the fact, Dunes City Council — via email — sent out a USDA notice to all citizens, which will be of some interest to those specifically involved. This is what governments do: Inform. How good it would have been if the Mayor had the courage and foresight to distribute his broad weapons protection proposal of declaring Dunes City a Second Amendment Preservation City to all Dunes City citizens as well. Giving it to the Council two weeks ago, where was the oppor- tunity to “show” it to constituents during a pandemic stay-at-home order? Being under the current closure restrictions makes it dif- ficult for citizens to participate in discussions, and one of this magnitude needed to have a more transparent public discussion pro- cess. The fact that it was passed during a “public” meeting under these circumstances speaks vol- umes about this Mayor and this Council. The expressed views of the NRA, and the majority of the Re- publican Party and a specific lob- bying group, have now been offi- cially adopted by everyone who lives here, endorsing assault-type weapons for the masses — and playing partisan politics. This is a sickening act of stealth and deceit, and one worthy of our federal government sewing even more division. Congrats. Putin loves it. —Mary Jo Leach Dunes City Support community by supporting LCC At the Primary Election on May 19, we can all weigh in to support a most important resource in our community: Lane Community College. Our support of the LCC Bond is part of helping our community economically recover from the ef- fects of Covid 19. Passing the LCC Bond will allow Lane County to continue training the health care workers we so des- perately need. Also, the Workforce Devel- opment Centers would be re-es- tablished to connect displaced workers with training, jobs and workforce services. Bond dollars would provide updated spaces for Career and Technical Education, including Advanced Technology and Cybersecurity — so necessary in our digital world. Students in Florence will benefit from the cybersecurity upgrades funded by the bond to provide more secure online education. All of our credit students take on- line classes, making it possible for them to live and work in Florence, while attending classes. The LCC Bond will also create a Mobile Manufacturing /Welding lab to expand training opportuni- ties for smaller communities like Florence. Bond money makes it possible for other resources to be used for students, keeping the tuition rate down. This benefits the many senior citizens (an average of 240 per term) that take our Continu- ing Education classes. Please support an incredible community resource by voting “Yes” for the LCC Bond. —Leonora Kent Florence COVID-19 shows us public health is a national security issue (Editor’s Note: Viewpoint sub- missions on this and other topics are always welcome as part of our goal to encourage community discussion and exchange of perspectives.) Second, Trump continues to ig- nore the experts and the facts. The overwhelming body of medical opinion is that testing kits, hospi- tal beds and protective masks are urgently needed but have not been provided, creating a potential na- tion-wide disaster. He never accepted the World Health Organization’s offer of test- ing kits, has failed to draw on all the U.S. military’s capacity, and has been granted but not yet fully used his power to compel emergency production of vital medical supplies. His speech to the nation March 11 and his subsequent comments came Under political pressure to do something about the economic fall- out from COVID-19, besides trying to talk up the Dow Jones, the White House first decided to attend to the needs of the largest corporations If one event shows both the Pres- and many of Trump’s allies. Tax ident’s flawed character and in- breaks for the airline, cruise ship, eptitude, it would be his handling fracking and other major industries, of the coronavirus pandemic. It is and a reduction in the payroll tax all about him, claiming superior that would have taken money away knowledge of the medical issues from Social Security and Medicare. while constantly downplaying the Following his March 11 speech, extent and seriousness of the virus, he tweeted: “Please remember. . . ignoring early warning signs, and The restriction [on European travel] withholding vital information from stops people not goods.” the scientific community as well as Same goes for closing the Cana- the public. dian border: It only affects “Maybe I have a natu- people, not trade, Trump re- ral ability,” he said during minded us. By Mel Gurtov a tour of the CDC. “I Congress and state govern- Prof. Emeritus of Political Science, PSU understand that whole ments must step up to fill in and Deadwood resident world” of medicine and the leadership gaps when it should have been a doc- comes to meeting the needs tor. When that claim falls apart, belatedly and, for all the hype about of the unemployed, the quarantined, Donald Trump casts a wide net hundreds of billions of dollars being the homeless, the small business of blame for the rapid spread of thrown at the pandemic, the admin- owners and others whom the coro- COVID-19 — Obama, the Dem- istration still falls short of adopting navirus has put in dire straits. ocrats, the WHO, the Chinese — the kind of comprehensive, strategic In response to COVID-19, we rather than focus on his responsibil- approach we are seeing in South should see public health as part of ities as a leader. Korea, Singapore and (eventually) our national security. Cuts in fund- His efforts to calm the public China. ing for medical research must be re- might, under any other leader, be Trump only now realizes, several stored; testing, ventilators and other reassuring. But they fall short in two weeks after saying that COVID-19 equipment should be prepositioned major respects. presents “very, very low risk” to for this and the next pandemic; an First, they are inconsistent and Americans and is “more like some expert disease crisis group should contradictory, sometimes suggest- ordinary flu,” that you can’t talk be permanently in place; decisions ing urgency and other times resur- your way out of this crisis. To pro- should be made on the basis of the recting the false optimism — “It will claim that he aims at “total victory” best science; and the health of all go away,” “stay calm” — that proved is empty political rhetoric when the citizens must be considered funda- so terribly wrong when the virus figures on infections and deaths mental to our economic and social first hit the U.S. have already surpassed Italy. well-being. Guest Viewpoint USPS# 497-660 Copyright 2020 © Siuslaw News Siuslaw News Published every Wednesday and Saturday at 148 Maple St. in Florence, Lane County, Oregon. A member of the National Newspaper Association and Oregon Newspaper Publishers Association. Periodicals postage paid at Florence, Ore. Postmaster, send address changes to: Siuslaw News, P.O. Box 10, Florence, OR 97439; phone 541-997-3441; fax 541-997-7979. All press releases may be sent to PressReleases@TheSiuslawNews.com. Jenna Bartlett Ned Hickson Susan Gutierrez Cathy Dietz Ron Annis Publisher, ext. 318 Editor, ext. 313 Multimedia Sales Director, ext. 326 Office Supervisor, ext. 312 Production Supervisor DEADLINES: Wednesday Issue—General news, Monday noon; Budgets, four days prior to publication; Regular classified ads, Monday 1 p.m.; Display ads, Monday noon; Dis- play classified ads, Friday 5 p.m. Saturday Issue—General news, Thursday noon; Budgets, two days prior to pub- lication; Regular classified ads, Thursday 1 p.m.; Display ads, Thursday noon; Display classified ads, Wednesday 5 p.m. Soundings, Tuesday 5 p.m. NEWSPAPER SUBSCRIPTION RATES: In Lane County — 1-year subscription, $79; 6-month in-county, $56; 10-week subscription, $25; Out of Lane County — 1-year subscription, $102; 6-month out- of-county, $69; 10-week subscription, $35; Out of State — 1-year subscription, $134; E-Edition Online Only (Anywhere) — 1-year subscription, $65. Mail subscription includes E-Edition. Website and E-Edition: TheSiuslawNews.com Letters to the Editor policy The Siuslaw News welcomes letters to the edi- tor as part of a community discussion of issues on the local, state and national level. Emailed letters are preferred. Handwritten or typed letters must be signed. All letters need to include full name, address and phone number; only name and city will be printed. Letters should be limited to about 300 words. Letters are sub- ject to editing for length, grammar and clarity. Publication of any letter is not guaranteed and depends on space available and the volume of let- ters received. Letters that are anonymous, libelous, argumen- tative, sarcastic or contain accusations that are unsourced or documented will not be published. Letters containing poetry or from outside the Siuslaw News readership area will only be pub- lished at the discretion of the editor. 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Donald Trump 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 Oregon Gov. Kate Brown 160 State Capitol 900 Court St. Salem, Ore. 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 U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley 313 Hart Senate Office Bldg Washington, DC 20510 202-224-3753 FAX: 202-228-3997 541-465-6750 www.merkley.senate.gov U.S. Rep. Peter DeFazio (4th Dist.) 2134 Rayburn HOB Washington, DC 20515 202-225-6416 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 FAX: 503-986-1080 Email: Sen.ArnieRoblan@ oregonlegislature.gov State Rep. Caddy McKeown (Dist. 9) 900 Court St. NE Salem, OR 97301 503-986-1409 Email: rep.caddymckeown @oregonlegislature.gov 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
