NOT A NOTHINGBURGER
How disappointing the position you took on the three point shootout between Sabrina Ionescu and Steph Curry (Slant 2/22). Curry won with a score of 29, which would have won the regular three-point shootout as back-to-back champion Damian Lillard won with a total of 26. Ionescu matched the best number any NBA player not named Curry put up. How can you call that a nothingburger? Both players are classy human beings, they inspire boys, girls, men and women across all spectrums of society. To be honest I am not a huge fan of pro basketball, but I enjoyed the shoot-out immensely.
Will “Boomer” Mc Naught
Eugene
STRIP SEARCH QUESTIONS
I am a criminology major at Portland State University responding to the article about Lane County’s strip searching of juveniles. I found this article to be a concerning example of sexual misconduct by correctional officers that is a symptom of an institution allowing this misconduct to happen through discretion and unsatisfactory preventative measures.
I’m wondering how this issue could have gone on for so long undetected, even though the number of reported incidents has been “growing”?
Strip searching is illegal unless there’s reasonable suspicion. However, if we look at other crimes occurring in the criminal justice system, such as police brutality, reasonable suspicion is a loose guideline that involves a lot of discretion. Although the law is meant to rely on concrete facts, the issues taking place in the detention facility were based on finding banned items in detainees’ cells. Without scanners, which should absolutely be mandatory in carceral systems, there’s no way to prove contraband was being brought in under a detainee’s clothes.
The article mentions that workers are only now receiving training on the issue, and will then be able to make a decision. Why have they not been trained on this? How are metal detectors and other body scanners not utilized? It’s imperative that these are implemented and that the Lane County’s youth detention center is transparent with their strip search policies. This is an issue of sexual misconduct that is not just being perpetrated by the employees but by the institution itself.
Olivia Scott
Portland
EUGENE EMS HOSTAGE SITUATION
For well over a century, there has been the Lane County Fairgrounds, despite decades of changes. However, a change to a ballpark will forever cancel out what has been a staple in Eugene.
For a ball club to coerce voters into believing they would move to another city if they don’t get their way is nothing more than a hostage situation. To the north of Eugene, between Hwy 99 and River Road, lies land that currently is host to a state institution and a golf course that should be a site more than large enough to host a ball park the Ems envision. Given the fact that 13th and 18th avenues are quite close to downtown and very busy thoroughfares, which would cause a worse case scenario. Construction of the stadium would take about a year. Where would the July 2024 Lane County Fair be held during this time? What about the truck and heavy equipment traffic on 13th and 18th avenues?
Highway 99 N and River Road would present a much better traffic flow and noise situation than close neighborhoods surrounding a stadium. The city council may have given the go-ahead to place this before the voters for a bond measure, but is this really where a ball park should be?
Steve Coady
Eugene
PEACEHEALTH STRIKE
I worked at PeaceHealth Home Health and know firsthand the professional care and human caring hospice and home care nurses give. They don’t want to strike — not in their nature — but have no choice. According to EW’s Emerson Brady, hospital nurses got an 8 percent raise in 2023, but hospice and homecare nurses haven’t had a raise since 2022 and the PeaceHealth CEO got a $2 million raise in 2021.
This is the same corporation that closed Eugene’s only hospital with no plan or forethought for our future. I’m outraged that PeaceHealth executives can sit in Bellingham, Washington, far removed, with million dollar bonuses and any show of respect for Eugene and its needs.
Jay Moseley
Eugene
MEDIOCRITY
Thirty years since resigning from the Forest Service because of felonious leadership, I have struggled and failed to find one agency or political leader in Oregon to work with to protect Oregon’s quality of life.
After a decade of attempting to sway Sen. Jeff Merkley and Sen. Ron Wyden away from corporate timber interests, they are now sponsoring a $30 billion welfare logging bill as the timber industries touted “cure all” for wildfire which does nothing to protect communities nor lives.
Since 2018 I have requested ODOT implement simple low cost safety measures for Highway 58 like speed limits signs on dangerous curves and elimination of passing zones within “blind spots,” but ODOT refuses to address any of these hazards. However, ODOT has plans for a new passing lane just west of Oakridge at a cost of millions dollars.
Since 2018 citizens have requested a stricter air emission permit for Lane County’s largest polluter, International Paper, with emissions of up to several tons per day. In 2023 Lane Regional Air Protection Agency (LRAPA) granted a new permit to poison Springfield residents over the next decade without reducing emissions by a single pound.
The list of quality of life issues I have attempted to work with agencies and Oregon politicians is too extensive to describe here,. but entities include Oregon DEQ, U.S. Forest Service, Lane County Parks, city of Springfield and state Sen. Floyd Prozanski. All to no avail.
It appears Oregon’s political sycophants and bureaucratic class under 30 years of Democratic governors, legislators and Congressmen only serve the most powerful at taxpayers expense in the race towards mediocrity and extinction.
Shannon Wilson
Eugene
CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM
Please find Petition 9 (for Nov. 2024 Ballot) and help get signatures for the group Honest Elections Oregon. It includes contributions limits, certain prohibitions, requirements for transparency of donors, etc.
Looking at what we are facing with the timber industry, this is the only way to curb their influence on our laws and regulations and taxation. Look up the webpage for Sierra Pacific, and you will see why other mills are closing. They will not be able to compete with this giant who bought Seneca. Sierra Pacific (Archie Emmerson and family) own 2.33 million acres of land in California, Oregon and Washington. Emmerson’s “worth” is $5.3 billion. They are planning a huge mill expansion here in Eugene.
There is surely a connection with the fact that we have no campaign finance laws in Oregon, and the ways in which large wealthy corporations can do business in Oregon.
Sue Craig
Eugene
UNHOUSED TRASH COMPLAINT
It’s too bad some people, especially families with kids, are homeless through no fault of their own. Why do most people seem “uncaring” or just plain “disgusted” with the homeless? It wouldn’t have anything to do with what looks like a trash dump where they are or where they’ve been, would it? (Sarcasm.)
Regardless, if you’re down and out or not, whatever happened to the little thing we all call personal responsibility?
Greg Anson Sr.
Eugene
PRO-JOE
I’m responding to Stephen Slater’s letter in this week’s issue (2/22).
By no means am I happy with everything President Joe Biden has done so far during his term. This is particularly true in how I feel towards the Biden administration’s actions during the tragic events that have unfolded in the conflict with Hamas.
However, in my opinion there is not one president in recent history that wouldn’t have acted in a similar fashion.
I would like to challenge anyone who diminishes how overall effective Biden has been to take a look at the full legislative accomplishments that Biden had helped push through so far during his term.
This coming election is no normal election, and these are not normal times. We are way past voting your conscience at this point in our history. For anyone to conflate Biden and Donald Trump is beyond dangerous rhetoric in its implications.
If Trump attains re-election, the world wide psychological trauma will dwarf what happened in 2016, and the overall consequences will be beyond most people’s imagining. There is not one of us that can afford to be complicit in allowing this to happen.
The bottom line is this: Until we change the current capitalistic economic system, it won’t matter a whit who is president. Not voting again for a knowledgeable, accomplished and competent president and instead for Sen. Jeff Merkley, or anyone else, will not accomplish anything until we change the system itself .
Neil S. Burton
Eugene
ONLINE LETTERS
ACTIONS OF STUDENTS FOR JUSTICE IN PALESTINE
The Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) at the University of Oregon held another demonstration Feb. 21. This time it was a so-called “die in” by lying on the floor of the student center and blocking the access of others. In their march through downtown on Jan. 20, SJP failed to obtain the assistance and permission of the Eugene Police Department, risking traffic and pedestrian accidents, and went on to occupy the student center, creating a threat to all who were there.
In the uproar created by SJP and others in the calls for a permanent ceasefire and the high number of casualties in Gaza, it is easy to forget the horrendous slaughter of 1,200 Israelis on Oct. 7, 2023, and the high risk of future harm to Israel if Hamas survives.
Without considering the total situation in Gaza, SJP misleads others and increases the risk of anti-Semitism on campus and in the community. The fact is Gaza is the most densely populated enclave in the world. And Hamas has embedded its military within its civilian infrastructure. A similar situation existed in Fallujah during the Iraq War in 2004 where 10,000 civilians were lost. In Gaza there is the added difficulty of the extensive tunnel network where Hamas fighters hide.
Any official recognition and funding the SJP receives as a university student organization should be rescinded, and SJP should be held accountable for their unlawful use of university property.
Michael E. Sturman
Eugene
UKRAINE CONCERNS
I recently tried to email this letter to all six Oregon U.S. representatives, but only the transmission to Rep. Val Hoyle, of our district here, made it through. So, this is an open letter:
Dear Representative,
I write to you in support of the $95 billion aid package that includes $60 billion for Ukraine, and to ask your position.
I live in Eugene. I’m a recent retiree who has made five humanitarian aid/volunteer trips to Ukraine since the war started. The first trip involved 12-hour days with World Central Kitchen. We fed many thousands of the millions of Ukrainians who were driven from their homes. Since then, I’ve brought medical aid and water filters to Ukraine and volunteered for an international NGO that delivers the aid all over Ukraine, including to the eastern and southern fronts. Ukrainians did absolutely nothing to deserve being ejected, bombed, injured and killed.
All the medical material I bring to Ukraine is American-made: 3M V.A.C. negative pressure bandages (for blast and gunshot wounds); special Sawyer water filters; and CAT-7 (Combat Action Tourniquets) made by North American Rescue. Only these products are sure to work. For example, one can buy foreign-made tourniquets online for $6, but they break and are worse than no tourniquets at all.
Now I’m hoping that our political system and our House of Representatives will not break under the pressure of improper influence, just like a cheap tourniquet. My and your children’s and grandchildren’s futures are counting on it. Every day of delay has meant more Ukrainians have been dying. We need to stop the bleeding now.
Thank you for considering my question and the above-stated views.
Bill Sharp
Writer City
HOMETOWN CRISIS
The New York Times covered the “crisis” in Eugene with 3,000 homeless people, 2,000 sleeping on the streets every night. The mayor and Eugene City Council say they don’t have enough money to create more shelters. However, the next big ticket item is to build a ballpark for the Ems at the fairgrounds.
Where is that money coming from? Oh, yes, let’s put up a bond issue and rip off the homeowners with higher property tax. If PK Park is not adequate enough for the 4,000 fans, why not have the San Francisco Giants step up and subsidize a park that will be used for five months each year. And how many of the homeowners that are going to pay for the new park will attend?
Maybe we should think about a recall of the mayor and the City Council who are totally out of step with the needs of Eugene! These people ignore the problems of Eugene and choose their pet projects!
And, how about all the potholes in the streets that are now worse since the storm in Eugene. When do they plan on those repairs? Obviously, not a pet project!