Are you tired of extremist politics? I sure am. We've become a bitterly divided country. That's bad enough at the national level, but when politics becomes the focus of a school board election, students are the ones who suffer from adults marching to the beat of their personal political drummer. Unfortunately, Oregon Right to Life and other groups on the far right side of the political spectrum have set out to control the Salem-Keizer school board. They're backing a slate of candidates in the May 2021 election who want to use the school board to push their extreme political agenda.…
(1) Below is a PDF file of the application submitted to Marion County by Lori Anderson in March 2020 for a primary farm dwelling on 80 acres north of Spring Lake Estates. Download Application (2) Below is a PDF file of the April 2020 Marion County decision on the application. It was denied because the applicant didn't prove that the required farm income came from the 80 acre property. Download AR20-009 Decision (3) Below is a PDF file of the March 2020 Marion County request for comments on the application. Download RFC-1 (4) Below is a a PDF file of the…
I'm already a big fan of the electric car VW revealed today at the Frankfurt auto show. Only problem, every report I've seen says that the ID3 won't be sold in the United States, because we Americans aren't big on smallish hatchbacks. (Since I drive a 2017 VW Golf GTI, and love my car, I'm an exception.) VW has done a great job with the design of the ID3. It honors the Golf heritage, while modernizing the look and feel of past VW vehicles. A Motor 1 story, "VW ID.3 Debuts As People's Electric Car With Up To 342-Mile Range,"…
Usually a question mark in a blog post title or newspaper headline means the answer is "No." But sometimes it is "Yes." That's why question marks are so marvelously mysterious! Check out today's post on my Salem Political Snark blog, "My (not so) secret plan to sway Salem's May election." No question mark there. Of course, if I wanted to fool the Chamber of Commerce and others who want to keep Salem's political system just the way it is -- benefitting the already Rich and Powerful -- naturally I'd point them in the wrong direction. Unless I didn't. Anyway, my…
One of Salem's biggest problems is that it is so close to Portland. My home town would seem a lot more with-it if Salem was plunked down in the middle of Oklahoma, say. Wow! Coffeehouses. Vegetarian food. Bicyclists. Environmental activism. Brewpubs. But since Portland is so much cooler than Salem in every way I can think of, Oregon's capital city to the south richly deserves its in-state nickname of So-Lame. Here's an example that caused Portland envy in me as I watched last night's KGW 11 o'clock news. (Salem doesn't have any television stations of its own, nor a "real" airport…
It was a strange Salem City Council meeting last night.
Several people told me, as I was leaving after testifying during the public comment period, that this was the first meeting they'd ever attended. They couldn't believe how disrespectful Mayor Anna Peterson was to citizens who came to speak their mind.
I told them, "I wasn't surprised, because I've seen the Mayor do her 'schoolmarm' act before. Sit down, shut up, stay in your seats. Just listen to what Teacher has to say. No backtalk!"
Repeatedly Mayor Peterson emphasized that she and other City officials are empowered to make decisions, and they are going to do just that.
Whether the decisions make any sense; reflect community values and desires; are based on solid facts; flow out of an open public involvement process… not important.
In the Brave New World of the Mayor, City Manager, and city councilors, Big Brother (oops, should say Big Sister) is in charge and Must Not Be Challenged.
To which I and others said last night (in so many words), screw that.
In my testimony about this I thanked the many people in the audience wearing red stickers saying "Hands Off the Library." It was obvious that the vociferous objections to moving the library to some other undisclosed location led to the Mayor and City Manager realizing this was a really poor idea.
The bad news, though, was that an almost equally poor idea has been resurrected: building a vastly over-priced police facility at the Civic Center (the current proposal is for a three story Police Palace next to and over Mirror Pond, with very expensive underground parking). Download Council: Salem library will not become police station
Also, if a new police facility isn't going to go into the library building, this opens the door to City officials bringing back an almost equally bad idea: building an over-priced three story police palace with expensive underground parking next to (and over) the Civic Center's Mirror Pond. A new police facility should be built out in the community at much lower cost.
By "lower cost," we're talking big bucks — in the neighborhood of $64 million, including bond financing costs (the City wants to spend about $128 million; Salem Community Vision considers the project can be done for aboout $64 million, half the price.)
So why aren't Mayor Peterson, City Manager Norris, and the eight city councilors eager to hear what citizens have to say about lower-cost alternatives to building a police facility at the Civic Center?
Based on what was said at last night's city council meeting, City officials consider they were elected to make decisions without considering the desires and values of the people they represent. Thus they aren't concerned that no public hearings about the best location for a new police facility have been held.
Well, I am. And I will continue to be.
Every time I heard the Mayor or a city councilor talk about themselves being the decision-makers, this strengthened my resolve to work to restore transparency, openness, and a genuine respect for public involvement back into City Hall.
These guys and gals are acting like they're the CEO and board of a private corporation, accountable to no one. Problem is, they're playing this private enterprise fantasy game with public funds — taxpayer dollars.
More: those dollars don't exist yet. Approval for a $128 million bond measure, or whatever the final cost is, would have to be approved by Salem voters. What are the chances of a bond measure passing when citizens have had essentially zero input into the project they're expected to pay for?
Just about zero.
Top-down authoritarian management such as that practiced these days at City Hall has gone out of fashion even in the corporate world. It is hugely more out of place in city government where officials ostensibly are servants of the people.
Here's a video of last night's City Council meeting. I start to do my public comment thing at the 32:35 mark and depart the podium at 41:45.
Lastly, as a continuation to this post I'll copy in an email I sent to City officials after I got home from the meeting. I was bothered by repeated unsubstantiated comments that "bloggers," almost certainly referring to me, had been promulgating false information about the planned police facility, and how the Civic Center was selected as the site for it.
All of my posts on this subject are listed and clickable on the Salem Community Vision "Other Voices" page. City staff and elected officials know where to find my blog, believe me. None have pointed out any factual errors in what I've been writing about.
In my email message I sent to City officials last night, at one point I had a "put up or shut up" in it.
I decided to take that out in a gesture of good will. But I said the same thing in other ways. If you read on, you'll see that I've researched how the siting decision was made, concluding that City staff chose the Civic Center location without any public hearings or other community input.
Salemians, it's worth your time -- really. To spend 24 minutes listening to my interview with Ken Adam's on our community radio station, KMUZ. I talked about my report, "Outrage," an expose of the completely unnecessary killing of five beautiful healthy trees in downtown Salem next to the U.S. Bank building. Listen here. Ken asked some excellent questions, and made some great observations of his own about how the Salem City Council and other aspects of city government work. Or rather, don't work. As they should. The podcast was just put up on the KMUZ web site. A few minutes…
It's been about a year since U.S. Bank and the City of Salem cut down five, large, healthy beautiful trees in the downtown historic district for no good reason. Today the Statesman Journal ran a story about a less outrageous, yet still disturbing tree tale: "Salem residents mourn trimmed trees." Download Salem residents mourn trimmed trees (Caution: this excerpt from the story begins with an offensive word, Salemites. The official term for residents of Salem is Salemian. I know this, because I have issued that Official Proclamation from the height of my Strange Up Salem perch. Statesman Journal, Obey! ) Salemites are…
Bottom line: one day into the Portland Oregonian's venture into being an online newspaper for subscribers on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday, I hate it. The online reading experience sucks. But maybe, just maybe, it could suck less. Here's my reasons for saying this. (1) A digital facsimile of the Oregonian is stupid. The Oregonian's quasi-erotically-named URL for its online version is www.mydigitalo.com. Clicking on that leads to a digital.olivesoftware.com site. So the Oregonian has signed up for an off the shelf Olive Software digital newspaper. It should have been left on the shelf. There's a wonderfully simple and effective way to…
I don't know who made "Dream of the Suburbs," a terrific Portlandia-inspired satire that flings right-on barbs at Vancouver, Washington -- Portland's yawn-inspiring neighbor city across the Columbia. Whoever they are, two thumbs-up to them. You nailed Vancouver! [Update: through brilliant detective work I clicked on the name of the person who uploaded the video and discovered it's... Brighton West. Follow on Twitter here.] Not that I've ever experienced Vancouver close up and personal myself. I've never felt a need to go there. I've got plenty of blah and boring right here in Salem. Along with an Old Navy store.…
Since I'm eligible for social security benefits, I've got retired-time now to solve the world's problems. After pondering where to start over several Grande Christmas Blend coffees at Starbucks, here's my choice: Shortening winter to one month. I picked this problem rather than nuclear disarmament, famine, environmental degradation, or Middle East peace for a couple of reasons. One, winter is my least favorite season, so I'm personally motivated to shorten it as much as possible. Two, with sufficient caffeine in my system to stimulate my steadily aging brain, it didn't take me long to figure out a way to make…
Here in western Oregon we don't have afflictions that curse other parts of the country: hurricanes, tornadoes, long bouts of hot humid weather, deep snow, scorching temperatures.But this time of year the karmic weather account balances out somewhat, because one thing the Willamette Valley does have is leaves.Billions, trillions, gadzillions of leaves! Most of which seemingly end up in our yard. For the next month or so the adage what does not kill you will make you stronger courses through my brain frequently, offering me some degree of comfort that all the work I put into leaf maintenance will translate…
I don't believe in destiny. But as I was eating a marvelously tasty Southwest Tofu Wrap at Bend's Cafe Yumm in the charming Old Mill District, I gazed at the central Oregon sky from our outside table and thought, "We could easily end up living here someday."So call this a premonition. Or better, a desire.After I shared this notion with Laurel, who was totally receptive to it, we talked about some of the pros and cons of moving from the Willamette Valley (rural south Salem) to the Bend area.First con that came to mind: winter. We come to central Oregon…
It'd been four years since we last visited the beautiful Head of Jack Creek (near Camp Sherman in central Oregon). We shouldn't have waited so long. After contemplating the spring-fed waters for a few minutes, Laurel said, "I wish I could bottle a vision of this place and drink it whenever I feel bad." So true. Looking at the photos I took that day, to choose my favorites, was almost as moving as being there. Nature...the natural healer of so much that ails us. Being spring-fed, the almost constant water flow allows for wonderful low-level growth. Vegetation growing in shallow…
Every blogger has to decide how to handle comments on his or her posts. In my case, I've opted for as much openness as possible. But now that I've gotten a rash of crazed commenters on my other blog, I'm having to rethink my approach.Given that the blog is called Church of the Churchless, it isn't surprising that I attract quite a few religious true believers who are out to challenge my skepticism. That's fine with me. I enjoy debating metaphysics and philosophy with fundamentalists, in large part because it is so easy to undercut their arguments. (One of their favorites:…
President Obama has started saying "health insurance reform" instead of "health care reform." Smart move. My post title is slightly inaccurate. A few people in the United States like health insurance companies. Namely, people who are employed by them. As for the rest of us, when's the last (or first) time you had a wonderful customer service experience interacting with a provider of health insurance? They seem to have replaced lawyers as the most maligned profession in America.Yesterday I went into my doctor's office to get copies from the "chart," now electronic, of my last two physical exams. As related…
Salem (Oregon), as I frequently point out, doesn't have a lot going on compared to its much cooler city cousins an I-5 hour drive north and south -- Portland and Eugene. But we do have the Salem Art Fair, a first class event, that's beautifully nestled in the towering trees of Bush Park. In the northwest is there a nicer setting for an art fair? Can't believe there is. This is how the fair looks walking up to it from High Street. And this is a view from the line exiting the vastly popular stand that sells "Moo" shakes of…
A friend recently got back from a trip to Munich, Germany, where she attended a week-long conference. When I asked what struck her about Munich, compared to this country, she said: "You don't see any homeless people there." But here in Oregon, as elsewhere in the United States -- supposedly the Greatest Country on Earth (according to Fox News) -- homelessness is painfully obvious. As hugely talented Oregonian cartoonist Jack Ohman showed in the Sunday paper today. (click to enlarge...and maybe weep)We need to stop this "greatest country" crap. Fortunately, Obama is restoring some much needed reality to our sense…
Today some friends and I were talking about how Fox News was in the business of making news, not reporting it -- when it came to promoting the ridiculous pseudo-tax protests called "tea parties."I say pseudo, because the sparsely attended tea parties clearly were much more Obama-bashing events than anti-tax efforts. After all, Obama has reduced taxes for 95% of working Americans, not raised them.Here's proof.As Media Matters has extensively documented, Fox "News," the most popular cable news network in America, aggressively pushed these tea parties on air and on line for weeks on end. It billed them as "FNC…
Pat Buchanan says America "is being systematically de-Christianized and secularized," while pornography is promoted.And the problem with this is...? Sure sounds to me like this country is on the right track. My fellow citizens are steadily coming to the same conclusion also.
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