The Misogyny of it All
I was disgusted to learn of the waste of a quarter-million dollars in taxpayer money incurred by Lane County “leaders,” namely commissioners David Loveall and Pat Farr, in settling a 2024 lawsuit related to their misogyny toward a female county counsel.
However, the news report fell far short of describing the full cost. A public records request reveals that the county spent an additional $149,000 for outside attorneys’ fees in investigating the suit and crafting the settlement. And how did those attorneys investigate? They had to depose employees in the investigation. Hundreds of hours were diverted off the critical county staff priorities of public safety, health and human services, public works, elections and land use planning.
Note also that the same Lane County “leaders” (Farr and Loveall, with Ryan Ceniga’s aid) then — apparently finding nothing problematic with misogyny and the waste of county staff time and taxpayer money — elected Commissioner Loveall chair of the board for 2025.
Reading reports published by OregonLive, Lookout Local and The Register-Guard, and watching recorded sessions of public county board meetings, clearly the settled claim represents only the tip of a toxic iceberg of rude, unprofessional behaviors by these county elected officials. It is sad to imagine how toxic the workplace has become for female staff at Lane County due to the misogyny of some of our elected leaders. And the direct cost to taxpayers is clearly approaching $500,000 at this point, much more than what has been previously reported. The public has a right to know.
Dawn Lesley
Eugene
It Could Have Been Stopped
“Unstoppable Juggernaut” (EW, 9/11) suggests the city could not have prevented construction of Amazon’s new mega warehouse on farmland next to Eugene airport.
Actually, the city took action to facilitate this. The city rezoned this farmland to pave it over.
When Jim Torrey, a Republican, was mayor, there was interest at the council to follow the lead of Hood River and dozens of other U.S. cities that wrote laws restricting super sized big box businesses. In 2002, the Oregon Supreme Court ratified Hood River’s law. Unfortunately, none of the three Democratic mayors — Kitty Piercy, Lucy Vinis and now Kaarin Knudsen — who followed Torrey were interested. Maybe if Eugene still had a Republican mayor liberals might have paid attention.
Three years ago, the city and county enacted “urban reserves” to pave more farmland all the way to Junction City and toward Veneta — with minimal public notice or objection.
“Sustain-a-bull” rhetoric lulls the public to sleep, pretending we’re addressing ecological crises when we’re not. Gentrification downtown doesn’t stop the paving of farmland. The approval of massive widening of the Beltline Highway was ignored by local climate groups. Nice values statements didn’t stop the city from installing Flock surveillance cameras.
Mark Robinowitz
Eugene
A Plaque for Frog
After losing his court case in a Lane County district courtroom to the city of Eugene for selling his joke books on the corner of 13th Avenue and Kincaid Street without a license, Frog (David Miller) was fined $500.
Because Frog sold the “Worlds Funniest Joke Books,” his merchandise did not conform to the city ordinance, which only allowed for balloons, food, beverages and flowers.
Rebecca Davis, Frog’s attorney working on a pro-bono basis, appealed the case to the Oregon Court of Appeals in Salem.
The chief judge in that trial wrote that the Eugene ordinance violated Article 1, Section 8, of the Oregon State Constitution.
Eugene appealed that decision to the Oregon State Supreme Court. After four years of citations, appeals and litigation, the case was finally decided — the Supreme Court upheld the appellate court’s decision.
Frog became a local legend.
Frog passed away on Nov. 2, 2024, the last day of the year for Eugene’s outdoor Saturday Market. I don’t normally go to funerals — too depressing. But Frog’s funeral ended in tears of laughter.
At the funeral, I was informed of a group putting together a plaque commemorating Frog’s life. A photograph of the plaque was sent to me yesterday. It is the hope of the plaque’s makers that it can be placed somewhere near the corner of 13th and Kincaid streets. I support putting the plaque there, too. Maybe it could go on one of the building’s support columns in front of the University of Oregon book store.
Joe Blakely
Eugene
Count Me In
As a former tenant of one of David Loveall’s buildings in Springfield, I have experienced many interactions with him over the five years we were associated (EW Slant, 9/18).
In my experience, Loveall is the type of individual that would use his position of power in insulting and intimidating ways. As an elected county commissioner, Loveall’s reported behavior toward staff and others are unacceptable. Name calling and religious invocations have no place in politics. To whoever decides to run against Loveall in the upcoming 2026 election, I would love to work on your campaign!
Marilou Heriot
Eugene
ONLINE EXTRA LETTERS
Bypassing the Voters
Florence has discovered how to bypass the voters to increase property taxes setting a dangerous precedence. Registered voters, in response to abusive property-related taxation, limited what our bureaucracies could take from us to pay for their operations. Yes, some are valid expenses. But the voters noted there were too many extravagances. It takes a vote to approve a five-year levy to increase the property tax taken by a district. Western Lane Ambulance District convinced voters to approve an additional $90 per average residential property.
Now comes Florence deciding its “sewer and water” bill is really a “services” bill open to expansive opportunities. It already added the property taxes called “storm water” and “street maintenance” that are part of the Florence official property tax. Whether justified or not, the council has decided to expand property tax taking by adding a police tax on the monthly city service bill.
At $15 per property starting January 2026, it comes out to $180 annual property tax, while remember WLAD went to great effort just to get $90. And this property tax expansion by Florence was a mere vote by the council, which is currently doing dog-and-pony presentations around town.
The city even informed Florence residents of their intention to increase annually the storm water, street maintenance and police fee/tax while open to adding more. Florence is no longer limited by Proposition 5, 50 nor anything as they can add at will any new property taxes as new service fees.
Keith Stanton
Florence
Go Brown and Black
I was thinking that maybe we should all wear dark-colored wigs, spray tan or black on our skins and confront the fascist, racist, Gestapo wannabes when they descend on our peaceful city streets inflicting pain and fear on the innocents. Imagine a thousand people pretending to be black or brown in an effort to protect our beloved brothers and sisters of a different stripe from the invasion of the “whites only” house.
Let them arrest us all and show just how stupid this makes them look. Let them sort out who is who, who is too dark skinned to be allowed freedom. I’d throw an egg sandwich in the face of a National Guard troop who is holding an automatic weapon, you know, the kind of weapon that the numbskulls of today are OK about us owning legally, so they can be used to kill children in schools.