FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2019
Baker City, Oregon
4A
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EDITORIAL
Dealing
with deer
Deer returned to Baker City Hall Tuesday after a
hiatus of somewhat more than a year.
Not literally — there were no bucks bumping into
councilors’ microphones or anything like that.
But the topic of deer that live exclusively, or almost
so, within the city limits did come before our elected
offi cials for the fi rst time since the Council, in late
June of 2018, passed an ordinance banning residents
from intentionally feeding deer.
(You’re still on the right side of the ordinance if
your tastes in landscaping happen to overlap with
those of the deer; intention is the key.)
Robin Laakso told councilors that she wants to
build a fence taller than the 6 feet the city generally
allows, her goal being to keep deer from marauding
her organic vegetable garden.
Councilors didn’t take any action Tuesday. But
Councilor Lynette Perry said she expects other
residents will have questions similar to Laakso’s, and
Perry suggested councilors have a further discussion
on the matter.
That’s a good idea.
Justin Primus, assistant district wildlife biologist
at the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife’s
Baker City offi ce, said the urban deer population
isn’t likely to shrink soon, even with the anti-feeding
ordinance in place. Even without having food set out
for them on purpose, the animals have ample food
sources. And besides cars, they face few threats.
On the positive side, Primus said that although
deer can clear a 6-foot fence, that’s high enough to
potentially deter some of the animals and convince
them to seek easier pickings elsewhere.
Based on the comments from residents last year,
there doesn’t seem to be widespread support for the
city to take the more aggressive action, as allowed
under a 2017 law, of asking ODFW to kill deer within
the city. But it’s reasonable for councilors to discuss
fence heights and other issues related to deer and
their effects.
— Jayson Jacoby, Baker City Herald editor
Your views
We must never forget 9-11-01
Driving down Second Street on Wednesday, Patriot Day, I
encountered the beautiful American fl ag display in front of
the fi re station. Turning onto Main Street, all I could think
was, “Where are the fl ags?” Later in the morning my hus-
band and I drove to La Grande, and saw fl ags fl ying all down
the main thoroughfare. Listening to radio and TV remem-
brances of 9-11-01 reaffi rmed my conviction that the tragedy
of that day as well as many heroic actions of our citizens
must continue to be commemorated, so that our children and
grandchildren realize that freedom must not be taken for
granted. Patriot Day is another occasion for that immortal
phrase: Lest we forget.
Julie Jeffs
Baker City
Wishing people had more respect for fl ag
I was honored to be at the Baker City Fire Department for
their ceremony honoring September 11. However, I was very
dismayed at the number of people, fi re and police personnel,
media and civilians that were not respectful by either being
quiet and removing their hats, or put their hands over their
hearts when the large fl ag was being raised on the fi re truck.
I was raised and taught that WHENEVER the American
fl ag was raised, you stood up, were quiet and respectful when
the fl ag was presented. No, it was not part of the ceremony,
but it still went up! People acted like, so what?
During the ceremony, many people were talking. Only
when they asked for a moment of silence, were they. When
they raised and lowered the fl ag on the fl agpole, yes, the
women and men in uniform were at attention, but others
were talking. I was in a position to see that I and one other
person, stood and put our hands over our hearts.
Maybe next year or the next time they do this, the fi re
department should ask the military to join them and show
them how it’s done!
I wonder how many there, were there just to say they
went.
Respectfully,
Cindy Abbey
Veteran
Baker City
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Mail: To the Editor, Baker City Herald,
P.O. Box 807, Baker City, OR 97814
Email: news@bakercityherald.com
Hurricane highlights the limitations of science
Weather forecasters can spy on
storms from space, and they have
some of the cleverest computer
models at their disposal, but the
atmosphere still throws them an
occasional curveball.
Or curving hurricane, to be more
precise.
The saga of Hurricane Dorian ex-
emplifi es the fi ckle nature of, well,
nature even in our era of weather
satellites and Doppler radar.
It also highlights the immense
complexity of trying to fi gure out
how multiple discrete factors
spread over thousands of miles —
air and water temperatures, jet
stream wind speeds, air pressure
— will combine to determine where
a hurricane will hit and how strong
it will be.
(And who knows, perhaps the
fl utter of a single butterfl y’s wings
will infl uence the course of events
as well.)
I have immense respect for the
science of meteorology.
Indeed I’d rather be a forecaster
than almost any other profession,
except I can’t do the math.
(Frankly I can’t do much of
any math. But the equations that
meteorology mandates will forever
remain so far beyond my intellec-
tual reach that they might as well
be fi ctitious. I am in fact incapable
even of describing them coherently.)
In common with fi eld goal kickers
and pest control experts, weather
forecasters tend to get more atten-
tion when they screw up than when
they succeed.
This is unfortunate.
Meteorologists are in fact quite
reliable, it seems to me, in answer-
ing the questions most of us have.
JAYSON
JACOBY
We just want to know whether
it’s likely to be rainy or fair over the
next few days, balmy or frigid, and
generally forecasts fall within spit-
ting distance of reality.
I’d wager that most people who
habitually belittle forecasters’
skills, if they ever tracked in detail
the difference between what was
predicted and what happened,
would be surprised at how minor
the difference actually was.
(And those who endured a
downpour without an umbrella will
continue to disparage the supposed
experts who let them down.)
I’m not writing a dissertation
or anything but I’m confi dent in
asserting, based on my rather ob-
sessive interest in the subject, that
major forecast blunders — utterly
failing to identify an approaching
snowstorm, for instance, or calling
for a high temperature of 75 when
it only gets to 55 — are exceedingly
rare.
But the accuracy of a forecast, as
I suspect even most nonscientists
understand, usually diminishes in
proportion to how far in advance it’s
made.
And the uncertainty is greater
still when it comes to a particularly
complex phenomenon — the track
of a hurricane being a proximate
example.
Meteorologists most generally
concede this is so. But it seems
to me that journalists sometimes
fail to understand this crucial
fact, which leads to reporting that,
though not grossly irresponsible,
underestimates the range of pos-
sible outcomes that, from a forecast-
er’s viewpoint, are basically equally
plausible.
Which of course is another way
of saying that sometimes even the
degree-laden experts don’t really
know what’s going to happen, an
admission that doesn’t often get
into the newspapers.
I perused news stories from a
variety of sources, dating back
to the last week of August when
Dorian was beginning to brew in
the Atlantic.
Even then, when the hurri-
cane was hundreds of miles from
America’s East Coast, forecasters,
though they emphasized the con-
siderable danger the storm posed
for Florida, were also acknowledg-
ing the evidence — primarily from
certain of the computer models that
are integral to weather forecast-
ing — that hinted Dorian might
veer away before pummeling the
Sunshine State.
Floridians certainly were justifi ed
in feeling frightened. Dorian was an
unusually powerful storm when it
struck the Bahamas. And for many
people the memories of Hurricane
Irma in 2017 and Matthew in 2016,
both of which caused damage in
Florida, were no doubt vivid.
What struck me, at least based
on my admittedly limited sample
size, is that references which tilted
toward predicting disaster were in
many cases paraphrases from jour-
nalists rather than direct quotes
from meteorologists.
By contrast, the scientists, when
actually quoted at length, frequent-
ly noted that Dorian, though a scary
storm, was not quite an inevitable
disaster for the U.S.
An Aug. 29 story from The As-
sociated Press, for instance, pointed
out that “some of the more reliable
computer models predicted a late
turn northward that would have
Dorian hug the coast, the National
Hurricane Center said.
(Which is pretty much what hap-
pened.)
The story quoted Jeff Masters,
meteorology director for Weather
Underground, who said “There is
hope.”
Yet the next paragraph describes
this as a “faint hope,” without
saying whether Masters added
the critical qualifying adjective, or
indeed whether he believed it was
appropriate.
Later, after describing the clash
between low and high pressure
that ended up stalling Dorian
over the Bahamas and, eventually,
keeping it off the Florida coast, the
story concludes, again without any
quotes from an expert, that “which-
ever one of those forces wins — the
blocking high or the pulling low —
Florida is likely to lose.”
A story published Aug. 31 in
the New York Times gave readers
a much more thorough sense —
which is to say, a more accurate
picture — of the uncertainties.
The Times did so by eschewing
the predictive paraphrasing that I
think muddied the message in the
AP story, and potentially misled
readers about what the experts
truly believed about Dorian.
Of course the Times reporters
had the advantage of, well, time —
their story ran two days later than
the AP’s, and the Times’ sources
had the benefi t of computer models
that strengthened the case for
predicting that Dorian would strike
Florida at worst a glancing blow.
But I also appreciate that the
Times story included quotes from
scientists that, to me, underscore
why phrases from the AP article
such as “faint hope” and “Florida is
likely to lose” were inappropriate.
Mike Brennan, who leads the
Hurricane Specialist Unit at the
National Hurricane Center in
Miami, told the Times, in response
to a question about whether
forecasters can responsibly give
precise answers to questions about
a hurricane’s track or severity, that
“The limitations of the science run
up against the demands of society.”
The Times story also quoted
Lauren Rautenkranz, a meteo-
rologist at First Coast News in
Jacksonville, Florida, who ad-
dressed the limitations of com-
puter models.
“It’s just, we don’t want people
to latch onto one specifi c computer
model and think that’s a forecast,”
Rautenkranz said. “It’s guidance.”
I welcome the humility.
I understand people want
confi dent proclamations, devoid of
ambivalence — particularly when a
hurricane is involved, quite possibly
a matter of life and death.
But when such certainty isn’t
warranted, to imply otherwise,
when the more measured opinions
of experts are readily available, is
unfortunate.
Jayson Jacoby is editor
of the Baker City Herald.