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• Eugene’s mayor says Whoville is here to stay through the holidays — or, at least, the city has no plans to disperse the homeless camps before the City Council reconvenes Jan. 13. But the council’s refusal to officially approve four emergency rest stops before its monthlong vacation irked protesters, who say they’ve been harassed by police at the sites and want the council’s protection through the break. Continue reading
• Eugene is a like a big family where the parents squabble but mostly get along, some of the kids are bright-eyed A students, some are rebellious, some are going through hard times and are homeless but will be OK in time. Benevolent in-laws are around to provide guiding hands, and there’s a crazy uncle running around without pants, scaring the kids and alarming the neighbors. The wild kids, crazy uncles and people temporarily without homes hanging out downtown are getting a lot of media attention lately. Continue reading
• We keep saying this and it’s worth repeating. Civic Stadium and the 10 acres it sits on are important to the character of this community. In the depth of the Great Depression, citizens of Eugene voted to help build the stadium, along with the support of the Chamber of Commerce, the WPA, the wood products industry and others. Continue reading
• The fate of Civic Stadium has stirred a plethora of news stories, letters and op-eds and we keep looking for perspectives that get little attention. Jim Watson of Friends of Civic Stadium sent a letter to the mayor and Eugene City Council this week talking about the environmental impact of trashing a huge wooden stadium that’s still in good condition and replacing it with new concrete, steel and pavement. Continue reading
• Want to help with the calamity in the Philippines? Climate activist and author Bill McKibben of 350.org recommends non-governmental organizations that do direct relief in the Philippines. He lists them and provides links at wkly.ws/1mf. Super Typhoon Haiyan, the most intense storm on record to hit land, has drawn more attention than usual to issues of climate change, in part due to the timing of the Warsaw Climate Change Conference. Continue reading
• Welcome to our annual Best of Eugene issue, sometimes affectionately called the “Beast of Eugene” since it is our biggest honking issue of the year and demands brain-numbing weeks of labor by our writers and photogs, and thousands of ballots submitted by our readers. This is our fattest Beast issue ever at 76 pages with near-record ad revenue, so we have to thank our loyal advertisers as well. They recognize that EW print ads provide the most bang for the buck. You simply have to be in EW to build a crowd for your business or event. Continue reading
• What do Eugeneans want to see happen at Civic Stadium? The public, as documented in a recent Lindholm Company phone survey, appears to favor selling it to the city and preserving the historic stadium as a soccer field and public park. The survey found that 60 percent of respondents supported selling Civic to the city and 28 percent opposed. We wager that more people will come around, especially as the prospect of swapping an important historic recreational site for a big-box store right in the middle of town looks worse and worse. Continue reading
• Wolves have endured a rocky reintroduction to Oregon, but with new legislation enacted this summer, wolves stand a better chance of surviving when they will disperse elsewhere into Oregon. OR-7, the famous Oregon wolf affectionately known as Journey for his 1,000-mile trek from the Wallowa Mountains to Northern California, was the first to do this, and more wolves could follow his example, eventually settling in the Crater Lake area or even the Willamette Valley. Continue reading
• The Eugene Budget Committee began a series of public outreach meetings this week, and we weren’t satisfied with the overly broad and simplistic exercise the city provided the audience. Most attendees wanted better information, clearer details and a more creative discussion. A city staffer says the city planned to repeat the exercise at the rest of its public outreach meetings, but changes are possible. Following the exercise, the audience moved to a more in-depth discussion. Continue reading
• Eugene’s Finance Investigative Team (FIT) is a new addition to the city budget process, adding a group of invited community members to join some Budget Committee members to talk about how to balance the FY 2015 budget. The meetings are supposedly open to the public, but they have been held in a third-floor room of the Eugene Public Library that does not have public access, and no public notice was given. Is this a violation of Oregon’s Open Meetings Law? Continue reading