4A | WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 2019 | COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL
Cottage Grove Sentinel
116 N. Sixth St.
Cottage Grove, Ore. 97424
NED HICKSON , MANAGING EDITOR |
Opinion
541-902-3520 | NHICKSON @ CGSENTINEL . COM
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ongress shall make no law respect-
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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)
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Copyright 2019 © COTTAGE GROVE SENTINAL
Letters to the Editor Policy
The Sentinel welcomes letters to the editor 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 subject to
editing for length, grammar and clarity. Publication of any
letter is not guaranteed and depends on space available and the
volume of letters received.
Letters that are anonymous, libelous, argumentative,
sarcastic or contain accusations that are unsourced or without
documentation will not be published.
Letters containing poetry or from outside The Sentinel
readership area will only be published at the discretion of the
editor.
Political/Election Letters:
New publication day for Th e Sentinel
Over the course of the
past two years, we’ve seen
some changes here at The
Sentinel.
Those changes were
subtle at first and began
with re-organizing our in-
side pages to make finding
information easier by es-
tablishing consistent pages
for “Records,” “Commu-
nity News,” contributed
features, etc.
Then, this past April, we
changed the look of our
front page and introduced
a sidebar to the left of the
page to provide readers
with a quick glance of the
highlights in each edition.
Along the way, we also
updated our text fonts
to a cleaner, less stylized
version that is easier on
the eyes.
It also gave us more
creative control over the
look of feature photos
and layouts to make them
more dynamic.
All of these changes
were made with a single
purpose in mind: To im-
prove what we do as your
community newspaper.
nel’s Facebook page has
increased from less than
a few thousand a week to
nearly 3,000 visitors each
day.
Things like that let us
know we’re on the right
track.
Beginning Dec. 5, we’ll
be making another change
From the Managing Editor’s Desk
Ned Hickson
This has also included
having a stronger and
more consistent presence
online and through our
social media pages as a
way to get you the most
current information as
quickly as possible.
The response has been
tremendous, and we are
both encouraged and
appreciative of the positive
comments, constructive
feedback and hundreds of
“likes” we get each week.
Activity on The Senti-
that will help us provide
you with more timely
news and information in
print as well.
One of our biggest
challenges in clearing that
hurdle has been our print
deadlines, which have
meant getting our pages
to the press by 5 p.m. on
Mondays.
Because of this, any-
thing that happens Mon-
day or Tuesday evenings
— city council and school
board meetings, for exam-
ple — are too late to make
Wednesday’s print edition.
As a result, the paper
that comes out Wednesday
is already nearly two days
old — and whatever hap-
pened Monday or Tuesday
has to wait almost nine
days to see print.
That will all change
Dec. 5, when The Sentinel
will move its publication
day to Thursdays.
That one-day shift will
allow us to move our print
schedule to Wednesdays,
meaning those council
and board meetings that
happen Mondays and
Tuesdays?
You’ll be reading about
them that same week on
Thursdays.
They say most of us
don’t like change.
But in this instance, it’s
the kind of change I know
our readers will benefit
from as we continue our
pursuit to improve what
we do as your community
newspaper.
The Elliott has importance as research forest
(Editor’s Note: View-
point submissions on this
and other topics are always
welcome as part of our goal
to encourage community
discussion and exchange of
perspectives.)
I
n response to Dr. Zy-
bach’s Guest Viewpoint
(“Geisy Plan Is Alternative
To Current Elliott State
Forest Management,” Nov.
13), I agree with Dr. Zy-
bach on one point: The El-
liott State Forest has been
mismanaged.
For decades, large
swaths of steep slope
clear-cuts have eroded its
soils, polluted its streams
and creeks, jeopardized
the neighboring commu-
nities’ watersheds and
negatively impacted at-
risk and endangered spe-
cies. In the face of prior
flawed logging proposals
and legally questionable
land sales, the courts have
repeatedly decided to up-
hold environmental pro-
tections in the Elliott for
the endangered species
and rich riparian areas it
contains.
The Elliott is comprised
of 93,000 acres of irre-
placeable coastal rainfor-
est. Within its borders, the
Elliott encompasses more
than 41,000 acres of native
mature and old-growth
forest, providing critical
habitat to endangered and
threatened species as well
dren of Oregon with a
decent education for the
sake of the future of our
state. However, we must
also be able to provide a
future for our children to
Guest Viewpoint
By Cristina Hubbard
Executive Director of Forest Web,
a grassroots environmental nonprofi t based in
Cottage Grove
as healthy streams and riv-
ers that provide drinking
water to the communi-
ties within its watersheds,
and spawning grounds for
Coho and Chinook Salm-
on in the Coast Range.
Fisheries experts have
determined 25 percent of
Oregon’s wild Coho salm-
on are produced in its wa-
ters.
Despite the fires that
devastated the Elliott 170
years ago, this native forest
has thrived. Fire is a natu-
ral part of the life cycle of
any forest. Today, the El-
liott contains a rich diver-
sity that includes Doug-
las fir, western hemlock,
western red cedar, bigleaf
maple and red alder.
With regard to the
Common School Fund, it
is vital that the state find
ways to provide the chil-
utilize that education.
In the face of climate
change, the Elliott has
greater value as a research
forest than as a source of
commercial timber. And,
it has even more value
to the environment as a
standing contiguous for-
est, sequestering carbon.
Forest Web puts great
effort into making gov-
ernment agencies and
elected officials aware of
public opinion regarding
environmental concerns
such as clear-cutting in
state forests and the cu-
mulative impact on our
climate caused by logging
our planet’s richest carbon
sinks.
Ecotrust’s 2011 Car-
bon Analysis of Proposed
Forest Management Re-
gimes on the Elliott State
Forest states, “If no har-
vests were to occur in the
Elliott Forest, the total
amount of carbon stored
would be approximately
46.6 million metric tons of
carbon dioxide equivalent
by 2050, approximately
68.5 percent of the annual
emissions of greenhouse
gas for the entire state in
2007...”
The report also states:
“…The significant im-
pacts of climate change
on our forests and their
continued management
requires that we evaluate
the potential of our forests
to store more carbon and
include this in the poten-
tial outcomes of the state’s
management plans...”
It is time to stop selling
off our planet’s future. We
must eliminate the anti-
quated concept that the
value of a forest is mea-
sured only in board feet.
We must find other ways
to fund our schools.
And, we must not sell
our public lands to pri-
vate interests. It is time
to look past expediency
and economics. It is time
to look forward instead of
repeating the mistakes of
the past. It is time to truly
turn our forests over to the
future of our children.
Election-related letters must address pertinent or timely
issues of interest to our readers at-large.
Letters must: 1) Not be a part of letter-writing campaigns
on behalf of (or by) candidates; 2) Ensure any information
about a candidate is accurate, fair and not from second-hand
knowledge or hearsay; and 3) explain the reasons to support
candidates based on personal experience and perspective
rather than partisanship and campaign-style rhetoric.
Candidates themselves may not use the letters to the editor
column to outline their views and platforms or to ask for votes;
this constitutes paid political advertising.
As with all letters and advertising content, the newspaper,
at the sole discretion of the publisher, general manager and
editor, reserves the right to reject any letter that doesn’t follow
the above criteria.
Send letters to:
nhickson@cgsentinel.com
HOW TO CONTACT YOUR REPS
Oregon state
representatives
Oregon federal
representatives
• Sen. Floyd Prozanski
• Rep. Peter DeFazio
District 4 State Senator
PO Box 11511
Eugene, Ore. 97440
Phone: 541-342-2447
Email : sen.fl oydprozanski@
state.or.us
(House of Representatives)
405 East 8th Ave.
#2030
Eugene, Ore. 97401
Email: defazio.house.gov/
contact/email-peter
Phone: 541-465-6732
• Rep. Cedric Hayden
Republican District 7 State
Representative
900 Court St. NE
Salem, Ore. 97301
Phone: 503-986-1407
Website: www.leg.state.or.
us/hayden
Email: rep.cedrichayden@
state.or.us
• Sen. Ron Wyden
405 East 8th Ave., Suite
2020
Eugene, Ore. 97401
Email: wyden.senate.gov
Phone: (541) 431-0229
• Sen. Jeff Merkley
Email: merkley.senate.gov
Phone: 541-465-6750
S entinel
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