• Oregon Country Fair is this week — not to be confused with the Lane County Fair, which is July 23 to 27 and features everybody’s fav Shrek band, Smashmouth. Time is drawing nigh for those of you who want to submit art and photography — we’re big fans of the new “activism” photo category! Find out more at AttheFair.com. Full disclosure: EW intern and Lane Community College Torch Editor Kat Tabor is coordinating the photos!
• Wish us luck! Fresh off the excitement of six first place wins in the medium newsroom category in the regional Society of Professional Journalists contest (we are not medium, we are small, and we still beat the likes of Investigate West and Willamette Week), we are up for a top award from the Oregon Newspaper Publishers Association July 18 and three top finishes at the national Association of Alternative Newsmedia (now known as AAN) publishers conference July 12. Also, AAN will posthumously present longtime Eugene Weekly owner Anita Johnson with a lifetime achievement award for her dedication to local journalism.
• In local and national news, The New York Times has an obituary this week for longtime Eugenean Frank Stahl who died in April at age 95. The NYT writes, Stahl was “a molecular biologist who helped create a methodology to confirm how DNA replicates that was so elegant, it has been remembered for more than five decades as ‘the most beautiful experiment in biology.’” The paper also notes the University of Oregon did not announce the emeritus professor’s death.
• This week in what you might be missing in local news (but we are news nerds and read it for you): The Daily Emerald followed up its investigation into Juan-Carlos Molleda of the School of Journalism and Communication and his travel spending with the announcement July 8 that Molleda is stepping down from his position as dean. He will go on research leave in the fall and winter and return to a faculty position. KLCC, via its news partner OPB, has an extensive look into the history of the Oregon Country Fair. And everybody is reporting on J.H. Baxter’s being deemed a Superfund site and the layoffs at the Oregon Department of Transportation.
• Planning ahead for some fun? The Eugene BRiGHT Parade is slotted for Sept. 27 and registration is still open at EugeneBrightParade.com. The city of Eugene is looking for artists to decorate downtown for Halloween: “Imagine a superbly frightful haunted house that was disassembled room-by-room and redistributed around Downtown Eugene,” organizers say in a press release. There’s an info session at Whirled Pies on July 31 and submissions are due in August; more at Eugene-or.gov/5287/Halloween-Downtown-Call-to-Artists. Finally, LEGO lovers rejoice — a LEGO fan event is slated for the Lane Events Center Nov. 1 and 2. Learn more about the Brick Convention at BrickConvention.com/eugene.
• City Club of Eugene this week is discussing “Lane County’s Deflection Program: What is it, and is it working?” Speakers include District Attorney Chris Parosa, Deflection Program Coordinator Clint Riley and Navigation Team Supervisor Art Zamudio. City Club meets noon Fridays at the WOW Hall, 291 West 8th Avenue.
• We’re planning a special issue geared toward the over-60 set. Since calling it the “old people’s issue” is going to piss someone off (even though living to be old is an achievement), we need a name for it. Our publisher, Jody Rolnick, favors “Silverado.” Ideas? Send them to Editor@EugeneWeekly.com. And as long as we are crowdsourcing — it’s almost pet photo contest time! Categories? Cutest pet? Best dressed? And, survey says, it’s almost time for Best of Eugene voting. What categories should we be sure to have? Send all your observations to Editor@EugeneWeekly.com.