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In Afghanistan • 2,355 U.S. troops killed (2,355 last month) • 20,071 U.S. troops wounded in action (20,071) • 1,599 U.S. contractors killed (1,592) • 16,179 civilians killed (updates NA) • $707.3 billion cost of war ($704.7 billion) • $282.9 million cost to Eugene taxpayers ($281.9 million) Against ISIS • $5.1 billion cost of military action ($4.7 billion) • $2 million cost to Eugene taxpayers ($1.9 million) Continue reading
This just in from EWEB: Continue reading
Are you a rock-stacker? Or are you a rock-stack knocker? The opinion piece, "Stop the Rock-Stacking" on the High Country News website is getting a lot of opinions. Some people get really worked up on the subject of what I like to call "hippie cairns." Continue reading
• 350 Eugene’s summer gathering will be from 7 to 8:45 pm Thursday, July 16, at First United Methodist Church, 1376 Olive St. “Hang out with fellow climate activists and jump into action-planning leading up to U.N. Climate Talks in Paris, and on to big actions next spring,” organizers say. Email 350eug@riseup.net to get on the email list or call 343-5091. Continue reading
What’s going on with Barnhart Associates Real Estate? We hear the Barnhart office building at 186 E. 14th Ave. has been sold to Environmental Law Alliance Worldwide (ELAW) and will be vacated soon, but the office phone goes unanswered and email queries are not being returned. The agency still has listings and is still advertising. Owners are Jim and Nancy Barnhart and David Holland, who became a full partner in 2004. The historic building, called the Soults-Westfall Duplex, is an elaborate bungalow dating to around 1915. Continue reading
The daughter of artistically inclined parents, a woodworker and a flower farmer, Leda Hermecz grew up in tiny Silverhill, Alabama, located between Robertsdale, an agricultural town, and Fairhope, an artists’ colony on the shore of Mobile Bay. She left Robertsdale High School after two years in favor of home schooling. Continue reading
The Fourth of July weekend’s shake and bake of high temperatures and a small earthquake may have caused some short-term fear and consternation, but both events are linked to longer-term causes. On July 2, temperatures at the Eugene airport were a record setting 101 degrees, and temperatures hovered in the 90s through much of the holiday weekend. Then, many of those who managed to sleep late despite the heat were woken at 8:42 am July 4 by a 4.2 magnitude earthquake centered 9 miles east-northeast of Springfield. Continue reading
The loss of Civic Stadium to a fast-burning fire June 29 is tragic to those who tried to save it and to those who have rich memories of the historic stadium. But, as Eugene Springfield Fire Operations Deputy Chief Joe Zaludek pointed out at a recent press conference, no one was injured in the fire or fighting it, which he called “amazing” for an incident of this magnitude. Continue reading
Oregon’s seven public universities enter a new era this July: No more Oregon University System, no more Board of Higher Education and no more OUS chancellor. Instead Oregon state universities will be run by their own independent governing boards, as pioneered by the University of Oregon, Portland State and Oregon State University. Senate Bill 80, passed by both houses (not yet signed by governor as of this writing) will legally abolish the OUS. Continue reading
The Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) fined Arclin U.S.A. $5,200 last month for illegally discharging pollution to waters of the state early last year from its formaldehyde and formaldehyde-based resin manufacturing facility near 28th and Main in Springfield. Arclin’s discharges were low-pH and high in biochemical oxygen demand, with BOD levels as high as 203 percent of the limit in Arclin’s Clean Water Act permit. Continue reading