A6 The BulleTin • Sunday, March 21, 2021
EDITORIALS & OPINIONS
AN INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPER
Heidi Wright
Gerry O’Brien
Richard Coe
Publisher
Editor
Editorial Page Editor
Bend may ease
rules for off-street
parking. Should it?
O
f all the treasured moments in your life, we’d guess that
time spent searching for parking spots is not up there.
The search is usually an inconve-
nience, not an emergency. What if,
though, the city of Bend changed
the rules? What if the city eased up
or eliminated any requirement for
buildings to have off-street parking?
A supermarket or an apartment
developer could decide, yes, they
want to provide parking. But maybe
other developers would decide
they could do so much more with
the land if they didn’t have to add a
bunch of parking. Parking in Bend
could become much more precious.
Cars, for better and for worse, could
make a lot less sense.
The idea of Bend reducing off-
street parking requirements is not
that far-fetched. It looks like the
Bend City Council will, at least, dis-
cuss it.
The battle lines, such as they are,
are being drawn. A group of in-
dividuals who have not identified
themselves have organized a website
at doesparkingmatter.com to influ-
ence the debate. The group clearly
supports continued off-street park-
ing requirements. It has a survey
on its website and plans to deliver
the results to councilors. Don’t ex-
pect councilors to interpret the sur-
vey results as precisely representing
Bend’s opinion on parking. They are
sharper than that.
Councilors also skirmished over
parking at their meeting Wednes-
day night. You probably know they
are trying very hard to find an op-
tion for purchasing property for
additional housing for the home-
less. The city may buy a hotel. It
needed Wednesday night to make
some code changes fast to clear the
way. The vote on the code changes
required a unanimous vote from
councilors if they were going to get
done in a hurry.
Councilor Melanie Kebler pro-
posed an amendment to the code
changes to essentially remove all
parking requirements for tempo-
rary housing. If Kebler’s amendment
passed, a homeless shelter could
elect to have much less parking or
even none and use that space for
something else.
Councilor Barb Campbell and
others pointed out parking require-
ments are an area of friction that
might lead to opposition to a home-
less shelter.
Mayor Sally Russell, a strong sup-
porter of adding more resources for
the homeless, didn’t say she would
vote against the code changes if
the amendment passed. But it was
clearly giving her pause. Kebler
withdrew her amendment and got
assurances that councilors would
take up the matter again.
So that’s not the end of it. Coun-
cilors will have a broader discus-
sion about parking requirements in
Bend in the months to come. There
certainly does seem support from
some members of the Council to
consider reducing or perhaps even
eliminating some off-street parking
requirements.
What do you want the council
to do? You can tell councilors
by emailing them at council@
bendoregon.gov or write us a letter
to the editor of up to 250 words and
send it to letters@bendbulletin.com.
Your tax dollars
at work at COIC
W
e doubt anyone is going to
give the Central Oregon
Intergovernmental Coun-
cil an award for it, but it does do
something interesting at many of its
meetings. It takes a moment to high-
light something it accomplished.
COIC is one of those government
agencies that can fly under the radar
of even certified government geeks.
It’s best known probably for being
the parent organization of Cascades
East Transit, the regional bus system.
It is also where elected leaders talk
about regional problems and solu-
tions. It offers opportunities for stu-
dents to get their GEDs. There’s a lot
more going on.
For instance, it had a brief report
in February about how through its
adult education and training, two
particular individuals were able to
get jobs. Another time, it highlighted
that through a grant provided
through COIC, the Ochoco Hu-
mane Society was able to reopen and
put one individual who had been
struggling into a position where they
could get a job, car and an apart-
ment. One final example: A patient
needed transport to a critical med-
ical appointment in Portland for a
transplant. COIC helped arrange
transportation and managed to con-
nect the patient with services so they
could get meals and stay in the Port-
land area for follow-up care.
Those are your tax dollars at
work, helping to make those things
happen.
Editorials reflect the views of The Bulletin’s editorial board, Publisher Heidi Wright, Editor
Gerry O’Brien and Editorial Page Editor Richard Coe. They are written by Richard Coe.
Oregon should not allow mink farms
BY SCOTT BECKSTEAD
I
n their March 16 column (“Should
Oregon have tighter regulations
for raising mink?”), the editors of
The Bulletin raised the issue of the
public health threat posed by mink,
and more specifically, mink raised for
their pelts on factory farms. Animal
Wellness Action is supporting SB 832,
a bill sponsored by state Sen. Floyd
Prozanski that aims to close down
the small number of industrial mink
farms in Oregon and help the farm-
ers transition to other commodities
or lines of work. The legislation will
be heard by the Senate Committee on
Natural Resources and Wildfire Re-
covery on April 5.
It’s true that animal welfare advo-
cates have long sought to end com-
merce in fur. As the grandson of an
Idaho mink farmer who spent much
of my childhood and youth on mink
farms, I can attest to the inhumane
conditions on those operations and
the undeniable misery endured by the
animals.
But the legislative and regulatory
efforts to regulate mink in Oregon
have more to do with protecting hu-
man health than ending inhumane
mink farms. Mink are uniquely sus-
ceptible to the coronavirus, which
they easily catch from infected farm
workers. In Denmark, the world’s
leading producer of mink pelts, sci-
entists discovered the virus uses the
mink to mutate into a pathogen that
is transmissible back to people, and
in a form that could be resistant to
vaccines. That’s why Denmark culled
GUEST COLUMN
all 17 million of the
mink raised on over
1,100 mink farms
and provided farm-
ers with a generous
relief package. Other
European nations,
Beckstead
responding to out-
breaks of their own,
have similarly moved to shutter their
mink farms.
While other countries have moved
swiftly to eliminate the threat posed
by mink farms, authorities in the
U.S. and the states where outbreaks
have occurred, including Oregon,
have largely shrugged off the threat
and taken a “wait and see” approach.
Their ho-hum attitude was matched
by an alarming lack of transparency;
after the coronavirus outbreak on
an Oregon mink farm, state agen-
cies refused to disclose to the public
many important details, including the
location of the farm where the out-
break occurred. In Oregon as in other
mink-producing states, agencies ap-
pear more concerned about protect-
ing the viability of their mink indus-
tries than in informing and protecting
the public at large.
The Oregon outbreak was anoma-
lous in a couple respects. First, while
mink in other countries and states
quickly succumbed to COVID-19, the
Oregon mink got sick, but then recov-
ered. Officials also noted that captive
mink that escaped from the farm and
were later trapped tested positive for
the virus. Farmed mink that escape (a
frequent occurrence on factory mink
farms) pose a major threat to our na-
tive wildlife, including wild mink and
other mustelid species, such as fishers,
martens, and badgers. Should those
creatures catch the virus, they could
potentially transmit the disease to a
trapper or other human who comes in
contact with them.
It would be one thing if mink were
being raised to supply a much-needed
product for consumers in the U.S. But
they’re not. Americans have largely
sworn off fur as a luxury fashion item,
so the pelts being raised on Oregon
mink farms are destined for China,
where a small segment of the popula-
tion still wears fur. Why should Ore-
gonians be expected to tolerate a grave
public health threat for the sake of a
product destined for the very country
where COVID-19 started?
The global pandemics that have re-
sulted in millions of human deaths
started as a direct result of our un-
healthy relationship with wildlife,
especially wildlife raised on factory
farms. Scientists are warning that if
we don’t move to eliminate this threat,
COVID-19 might look like a compara-
tively benign precursor to a far deadlier
pandemic. Thankfully, some Oregon
lawmakers are heeding that warning
and moving decisively to mitigate the
threat for the people of our state.
e e
Scott Beckstead is director of campaigns
for Animal Wellness Action. There is
more information about the group at
animalwellnessaction.org.
Letters policy
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How to submit
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be limited to one issue, contain no more
than 250 words and include the writer’s
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letin. Writers are limited to one letter or
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Your submissions should be between
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Please address your submission to either
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mail, fax or email it to The Bulletin. Email
submissions are preferred.
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Bend, OR 97708
Fax:
541-385-5804
Don’t go wobbly, Mr. President — beat the pandemic
W
BY DAVID VON DREHLE
The Washington Post
hat was true on the day
President Joe Biden was
inaugurated remains true
some 60 days later: The potential suc-
cess of his presidency hinges on one
thing and one thing only. The oppo-
sition, many in his own party and the
media’s fleeting attention span all seek
to pull Biden in a dozen different di-
rections. Don’t go wobbly, Mr. Presi-
dent. Beat the pandemic.
We’ve reached a critical point in
the yearlong war that has shaken the
world. The end is in sight. But a lot
can go wrong between sighting the
end of a war and reaching it. The end
of World War II was in sight by 1943,
when the Soviets broke the siege of
Stalingrad, the Allies entered Eu-
rope and the Japanese withdrew from
Guadalcanal. The actual end was two
years and two atomic bombs away.
In the war against the coronavi-
rus pandemic, we can see how it will
eventually end. Pharmaceutical facto-
ries are producing effective vaccines
by the millions of doses. As those
doses go into arms, the spread of the
disease will slow. Fewer mutations will
produce fewer variants. Meanwhile,
progress on therapies to treat severe
COVID-19 will continue. When the
spread is essentially halted and deaths
are few, the world can declare victory.
But we’re not there yet. A new poll
has found that 30% of health care
workers don’t plan to be vaccinated
or are unsure. Another survey found
that more than 40% of Republicans
have no intention of meeting the nee-
dle. The scientific triumph of vaccine
development and the logistical feat of
delivering the first 100 million injec-
tions may be squandered unless we
speed toward universal compliance.
That won’t be achieved without
relentless focus from the top. With
vaccine stockpiles growing, Biden
should examine every possible lever
to increase vaccination rates and pull
on those levers that pass legal mus-
ter. There must be a price attached to
vaccine avoidance. If children can be
required to be vaccinated for other
diseases before going to school —
and they are, with a few exceptions
— then coronavirus vaccines can be
a precondition for attending sporting
events and concerts, for returning to
college classrooms and for working
in offices, factories, warehouses and
restaurants. It should be unthinkable
(barring some special circumstance,
like a severe allergy) for an unvacci-
nated person to work in health care.
If Biden loses focus now, tilting to-
ward a dozen political windmills, only
to have a new variant of the corona-
virus wallop a half-vaccinated nation
next winter, his presidency will be
neutered. Republicans will gallop to
victory in 2022.
On the other hand, if Biden keeps
his eye on the ball — even at the ex-
pense, temporarily, of voting rights, the
fate of the filibuster, infrastructure, tax
hikes, immigration reform, the bor-
der, China, Russian espionage, and so
on — the rewards will be enormous.
Freed by mass vaccination to gather
again without fear, the public will be
elated. The economy will boom. Biden
will bank mad stacks of political cap-
ital. Then, if he wishes, the president
can take a progressive agenda to the
voters in 2022 and let them have their
say. First, clear the air of COVID-19
and, then, have an election about what
comes next. This is the playbook Dem-
ocrats will follow if they want to trans-
form America, because no transforma-
tion rammed through a 50-50 Senate is
likely to endure.
It is the playbook written by the
most transformative Democratic presi-
dent of all, Franklin Roosevelt. Inaugu-
rated in 1933 as the Great Depression
was raging, Roosevelt understood that
voters had one thing on their minds:
the economic crisis. He plunged in sin-
gle-mindedly, enforcing extraordinary
measures, including the forced closure
of the nation’s banks long enough to re-
store the health of the financial system.
The public rewarded the president in
the subsequent midterm elections by
strengthening his hand in Congress.
Only then did Roosevelt expand his
agenda, turning to transformative leg-
islation such as the Social Security Act
of 1935.
Biden’s presidency is on the line.
Will he be goaded by his party’s left
wing, hectored by the opposition and
distracted by the Twittering press? Or
will he win like FDR?
e e
David Von Drehle writes a twice-weekly column
for The Washington Post.