News Briefs

“I feel very strongly that if we don’t stop GMOs it will be the end of humanity,” says Lizzy Cwynar. She had never organized a protest before, but her concerns over genetically modified organisms (GMOs) led her to organize Eugene’s part of the worldwide March Against Monsanto. Eugene police estimate that about 2,500 people participated in the May 25 event. At least two million people are said to have participated in marches nationwide.

Oregonians would rather protect water, forests, fish and wildlife on their federal forestlands than cut them down for money for the timber economy and local governments. That’s the gist of a recent bipartisan statewide poll of likely voters in western Oregon by the Pew Charitable Trusts.

Eugene’s path toward a sustainable budget will probably be a bumpy road, filled with all the suspense and comedy of a summer blockbuster. Since the city service fee went down in flames on Election Day, Eugene’s budget process is going to get interesting. 

The somewhat elusive Springfield Ditch Projects gallery opened its latest exhibit May 18, and it runs through June 15. Ron Graff and Donald Morgan: New Work features the abstract expressionist paintings of Graff, a UO associate professor of painting, and 2-D and 3-D works of Morgan, a UO assistant art professor. Morgan’s graphic sculptures have had a playful (and sometimes dark) bent in the past, including a topographic wall hanging of Crater Lake’s Wizard Island, a pair of mirrored spider webs and a noose rack. For more information visit ditchprojects.com.

Move, grow or stagnate. That’s the choice the bustling Lane County Farmers Market has been looking at for years. Its members vetoed a big July 2013 move to the Fifth Street Public Market, but they approved a couple of smaller experiments. When the Thursday market opens June 6, it will move from Amazon Park to Fifth Street Public Market. The Farmers Market is also negotiating to close one block of 8th Avenue during the Saturday market.

Oregon’s Sen. Jeff Merkley has joined the march against Monsanto, in the U.S. Senate anyway. While Eugeneans plan their May 25 rally against chemical giant Monsanto here in Lane County, Merkley has taken a stand against loopholes and secret provisions aiding the biotech company in Congress. He has introduced an amendment to the Senate farm bill that would override a provision that has become known as the Monsanto Protection Act.

Oregon DEQ followed up on its Feb .19 warning letter to Georgia-Pacific Chemicals (EW 3/14, goo.gl/cFGEq) regarding discharge of phenols pollution to waters of the state with a civil penalty of $3,600 on May 13. DEQ sent Premier RV Resorts LLC a warning letter on April 24 for violating the biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) removal requirement in its Clean Water Act permit in March. The RV facility where this violation occurred is located east of I-5 near Exit 199.

As Eugene School District 4J works to meet a June deadline to comply with a corrective order regarding gifted education issued by the Oregon Department of Education, a second complaint has been filed against the district, according to the parent who filed the complaints and the education department.

East Lane Commissioner Faye Stewart may be facing a lot of opposition in the 2014 election and Kevin Matthews is the latest progressive to enter the fray. He joins former EWEB commissioner Joanne Ernst and Jose Ortal in indicating interest in Stewart’s largely rural commission seat.

EWEB meeting rooms that have been open to community and nonprofit groups for years may no longer be available starting next October if EWEB goes through with leasing out the second floor of its North Building. EWEB spokesman Lance Robertson did not disclose who would be leasing the offices but it is “highly possible” that meeting rooms at EWEB will be part of the lease agreement. Dozens of groups use the meeting rooms and those that have booked rooms through the year have been notified. 

Treehuggers having a square dance in a barn to raise money to save Oregon’s wildlands may have seemed more like a spoof than an actual event when it started, but Cascadia Wildlands’ annual hoedown has held up for the long haul — the conservation group’s 10th “Hoedown for Cascadia’s Ancient Forests” is on Saturday, May 18, at a Cottage Grove horse arena.

A bill that would ban roping horses by the neck and legs and tripping them for entertainment passed out of the Oregon Senate with a vote of 22-6 and has been the subject of several recent House Judiciary Committee hearings. Horse tripping in Oregon has been documented in Jordan Valley and Burns, according to testimony, and proponents of SB 835 say that being chased and tripped terrifies and injures the horses.