WORD: 3d Bridge a Gigantic Boondoggle

Oregon State Highway 22 (Willamina-Salem Highway) intersects Oregon State Highway 223 in Polk Station. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

What's most interesting is that the most-reliably anti-tax groups in Oregon, the Chamber of Commerce and the Homebuilders -- two groups that fight ferociously against taxes usually -- got up and waved their hands about "future growth," and made empty claims about the need to build this monstrosity for the vague "future" needs.   Thus, they showed their true colors:  they aren't against making you pay higher taxes, just taxes that provide you with services.  If you have to pay higher taxes so they can make a lot of money, hey, they're all for that.

That tells you just about everything you need to know about this project:  It's nothing but a money grab by land speculators and developers who are salivating at the thought of sprawling all the way to Dallas and all the money they can make if they can buffalo the people of Salem into building them a bridge (and paying for it!) that will only hurt Salem and benefit them.

Not only do we not need this project, it's the epitome of making the problem worse at great expense.  Traffic counts over existing bridges are already declining and will continue to do so, and Salem's congestion problems are not a function of how many lanes go over the river but the idiocy of how we handle the traffic at each end.

Moreover, the Highway Lobby's refusal to apply least-cost planning methods to what little congestion we face in Salem for a couple of brief periods daily tells you everything you need to know -- this isn't a solution to a problem, this is a profitable project that they want to ram down our throats regardless of all other considerations.  If Salem had a serious congestion problem, it would be greatly reduced if not eliminated instantly just by staggering the start times for state government workers and offering good cross-river transit options.  A "fast-pass" electronic toll collection system on the existing bridges would not only provide all the money needed to address the problems with the existing on and off interchanges, it would also encourage carpooling and other reductions in cross-river trips.

Of course, these wouldn't put millions of dollars into the pockets of the land speculators and the concrete lobby businesses who care about nothing but taking your money and making it theirs.

Bridge project is a $687 million boondoggle

On Nov. 5, dozens of Salem residents filled the City Council chambers to say no to building a $687 million bridge and freeway from Highway 22 to Interstate 5.

Their testimony was eloquent and convincing about the fact that this project is destructive, too expensive, not needed and should be rejected by the council. They said we can relieve congestion by fixing the bottlenecks at both ends of the bridges and by improving transit, all at a much lower cost.

Alternative 4D, as the third bridge is called in the staff report, will not relieve congestion on the existing bridges and will destroy 160 residences and small businesses.

The only testimony in favor of the third bridge came from the homebuilders association and the Salem Area Chamber of Commerce, but when pressed by Councilor Chuck Bennett if they would be in favor of imposing tolls or raising taxes to fund the third bridge, they could not give him a straight answer.


The council will hold a work session on Nov. 28 and resume the public hearing on Dec. 10. I hope concerned citizens will mark their calendars and plan to be at the Salem City Council to continue to oppose this $687 million boondoggle.



Jim Scheppke
Salem

For Veteran's Day

Mark your Calendar: Squaredance at Marion-Polk Food Share

Stand Up for Sanity, tonight, 6:30, Salem City Hall

This is it -- public hearing on the biggest boondoggle ever proposed, a make-work corporate welfare, land speculator subsidy extravaganza, the "Salem River Crossing," with a Liar's budget of   $670 MILLION, even though the planning budget alone is already overrun by FOUR years and 350%, blowing $7.5 million on a planned $2 million.

Read this great op-ed post (buried by the S-J in the small readership Monday paper instead of putting it in Sunday's):  http://www.statesmanjournal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2012311050013

It's crucial that you vote, yes, but voting is not enough, it's just the bare minimum; a healthy democracy requires real citizen engagement, even though the powers that be would prefer that you stay home and watch the Ducks and other circuses.

This absurd boondoggle was the spark that got LOVESalem started.  The more we studied the absurd and intentionally deceptive and misleading output of the planning process, the more aware we became of the incredible void in Salem's information offerings, and we have aimed to help fill that void a bit, for going on five years now.  This unbelievably bad idea is only understandable as the last gasp of the auto dinosaur mindset, where the concrete lobby and the Polk County land speculators and developers make their final stand against the fiscal conservatism they like to profess (for others).

Although there is a strong chance that this project collapses on the immense weight of its own internal contradictions and the gossamer thinness of its financial funding likelihood, there are still good reasons not to take that for granted.  In other words, we still need you to come out tonight and help drive some nails into this monster's skull, because this is a zombie idea, and they never really die.  Even though the chance of this being built is low, the harm from the boondoggle is already being felt, and if it were actually launched, Salem would become yet another city destroyed in the name of auto sprawl.  The harm is too great to ignore this.  Come out tonight and demand that this process be stopped, and that the money being wasted on high priced planning consultants be used for our real needs.

Salem Beyond Coal Campaign - Get Active!

The global warming icon for the ubx. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Salem Beyond Coal Campaign is alive and well! 

Several Northwest cities are adopting anti-coal resolutions.
Please help us make it happen here.

Immediate actions (full details below);

• Letter-to-Editor party Tuesday night, 10/30, 7 PM at the Clockworks Cafe
  
• Dept of State Lands Visibility Event: Tuesday, 11/13, 11 AM
  
• Bus to Vancouver WA (for Bellingham Hearing): Wednesday, 12/12, 1 PM
  
• Salem Beyond Coal Campaign meeting, Thursday, 11/1, 7 PM at Oregon Peaceworks

Hi all,

Thanks so much for coming out to our Salem Beyond Coal Exports Team meeting last Thursday!   We got a chance to meet and hear from Laura Stevens, Assistant Field Organizer with the Sierra Club up in Portland.

She briefed us on two very critical events. So please mark your calendar and tell your friends/family:

1. Department of State Lands Visibility Event: Tuesday November 13th at 11 AM.  We will gather in front of the Department of State Lands (775 Summer St. NE) to welcome their new director into office and call on her to deny a permit for the first coal export terminal in Oregon at the Port of Morrow.  We've lined up several speakers and now we've got to mobilize turn out.  We have a goal of 50 attendees and 5 media hits from the press.
   
2. Trip to Vancouver, WA to Oppose Coal Terminal in Bellingham: Weds, December 12th, 1 PM.    We will gather at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Salem (5090 Center St. NE) to hop on a bus to Vancouver, Washington for the first public hearing on a coal export terminal, the Bellingham Terminal.  We've got space for 50 people and it's up to us to fill them and show a strong opposition to coal trains from our town.

There are two other events this week you should put on your calendar and attend:

1. Come to our Letters to the Editor (LTE) party tomorrow night, Tuesday, 10/30, 7 PM at the Clockworks Cafe. Jim Scheppke will lead us in writing letters both to our local paper and our city councilors on this critical issue.
   
2. The next Salem Beyond Coal meeting is Thursday, 11/1 at 7 PM at Oregon Peaceworks.      We'll be hearing from Chris Ortolano, Founder and Co-Chair of the Milwaukie Coal Task Force, our team's equivalent in Milwaukie. The Milwaukie City Council unanimously passed a resolution opposing coal exports on Tuesday, October 16th.

Finally, I'd like to end with a shout out to Evan White for his work in a fantastic presentation to the City Council last week and diligent follow up this week building those relationships.

Thank you all for your hard work and support,

Lucy
--
Lucy Sedgwick
Field Organizer
Sierra Club
c) 973-738-0738
e) lucy@greencorps.org

Be there Nov 4 for citizen activism at its best

Citizens doing the job that the elected officials have shamelessly and shockingly shirked for sure:

Say NO to the $687 Million 3^rd Bridge

On Monday, November 5^th the Salem City Council will hold a public hearing on a recommendation to build a new bridge and freeway connecting Highway 22 and I-5. The plan would destroy residences and businesses on both sides of the river and would do little to relieve rush hour congestion on the existing bridges. And to make it worse, Salem residents would bear most of the costs, with increased property or gas taxes — maybe even tolls on the existing bridges.

To learn how you can oppose the 3^rd bridge, please plan to attend:

NO 3^rd Bridge Briefing

Sunday, November 4^th, 3 pm

Salem Public Library, Anderson Room

For more information visit our Facebook page: NO 3^rd Bridge

JimScheppke, Campaign Coordinator

503-269-1559

no3rdbridge@comcast.net

NO Third Bridge Briefing Will Inform Salem Residents

 in Advance of City Council Hearing

Salem, Oregon – Concerned Salem residents will get the opportunity to hear from experts about the proposal to build a new $687 million freeway spanning the Willamette River and connecting Highway 22 to I-5.

The NO 3rd Bridge Briefing will take place on Sunday, November 4^th at 3 p.m. in the Anderson A meeting room at the Salem Public Library.

The featured speaker will be Scott Bassett, a transportation policy analyst for fifteen years, who has been following the planning process for the 3^rd Bridge. Bassett will describe in detail the 3^rd Bridge plans that will be considered by the Salem City Council at a public hearing on November 5^th at 6:30 p.m. He will also show how the need for a new bridge is now highly questionable in light of declining traffic on the existing bridges, and he will present his ideas on how to relieve congestion at peak hours without spending many hundreds of millions on a new bridge.

Also speaking at the briefing will be a member of the project Task Force who is not in favor of building a 3^rd bridge. Doug Parrow, who represented the Bicycle Transportation Alliance on the Task Force, will give an insider’s perspective on the project, and explain why he believes better infrastructure for bike transportation is one answer to relieving traffic congestion.

Bob Krebs, a member of the project Oversight Team for the Salem-Keizer Transit District Board, will share how planning for the 3^rd bridge will proceed from here. The District has not taken a position on the 3^rd bridge. Krebs will also share his ideas about how better mass transit between West Salem and downtown might be a viable solution to relieve peak hour traffic congestion.

Following the presentation there will be time for audience members to have their questions about the 3^rd Bridge answered by the expert panel. Panel members will also explain how citizens can participate most effectively at the Salem City Council public hearing on November 5.

The Judicial Candidates for the 99%: Baldwin and Egan

And the Albany Democrat-Herald has the word on Judge Jim Egan:

Editorial: Jim Egan for appeals court

April 27, 2012 9:00 am  

     To serve on the Oregon Court of Appeals, it helps to be a smart lawyer. But you don’t have to be a Portland lawyer. Which is why Linn County Circuit Judge Jim Egan would be a great addition to the court.

 

     The Democrat-Herald has had the chance to talk with all three candidates for Position 6 on the Court of Appeals: Egan, who of course has been a known quantity around the mid-valley for years, as well as Tim Volpert, partner in a big Portland law firm, and Allen J. Arlow, an administrative law judge for the Oregon Public Utility Commission. . . .

       What sets Egan apart is his background. Unlike Arlow and to some extent Volpert, he’s not been working much of his life in corporate or government law. Instead he has represented ordinary Oregonians with problems as a trial lawyer.

     Egan also served in the Marine Corps, then in the Marine Corps Reserve. As an officer with the Army Reserve, he again served his country in Kuwait a few years ago.

     He’s familiar with the nitty-gritty problems of Oregon not just from his law practice but also from first-hand experience on the Linn County Planning Commission and the board of the Tangent Rural Fire Department.

     Since 2010 he’s handled cases as a Linn County circuit judge. He demonstrated that he wastes no time by quickly issuing a lengthy written opinion in a recent case involving public records and the responsibilities of city councils.

     In a statewide preference poll of lawyers, Volpert came in first with 688 votes. But Egan, even though he’s not from Portland where most of the lawyers are, still got 569 votes. That speaks well of the respect he has earned among people in his profession.

     Egan for Position 6 on the Court of Appeals.

Bogus Right-Wing Memes: "Get Government Out of the Way"

This is a good video on the whole, although it totally overlooks an even more fundamental contribution of government to businesses, the intellectual property system that is written into our Constitution and helped make the US different from other countries from Day 1.

The patent and copyright protections that US businesses demand be enforced vigorously are a gigantic support for business and innovation.

The video also overlooks the role of the bankruptcy system; without a bankruptcy code to backstop the financial system, you'd see a whole lot less borrowing and lending.  Without bankruptcy codes, lending is mainly done through small networks and clans, and defaults lead to devastation, with favored creditors doing OK and others being wiped out, which leads to a vicious cycle of distrust, which undermines the whole economy.

If you think business and the economy would prosper if government just "got out of the way" then you don't understand business or the economy.

LOVESalem Election Endorsements

Ballot Measures: The table above is pretty much right on -- except that it's a firm, big NO & NO on 82 and 83, and it's a regretful NO on 80, a very poorly drafted measure that would do more to discredit a saner approach to marijuana than anything else.  Measures 79 and 84 are particularly horrible, and deserve to be defeated something like 80% to 20% if not worse.

Just how bad is Measure 84?  That's kind of a hard question to answer, since it contains a sneaker provision that nobody's even talking about -- essentially the repeal of ALL capital gains taxes in Oregon, since the measure includes a provision that there are NO TAXES at all for inter-family property transfers.  So someone who inherits 100 shares of MicroSoft or Apple that were purchased back in the 80s, what they will do is "sell" them to a family member before selling them out into the market, and presto! Not only has any estate taxes been eliminated, but also all the capital gains taxes.  In fact, Measure 84 is So bad that Kevin Mannix and the cronies tried to resort to lying about AARP's position on it.  

REMEMBER:  Oregon already has a $15 million property tax exemption for family farms.  There are ZERO family farmers who have any problem paying the estate tax.  The whole family farm thing during discussions of the estate tax is just a bunch of rich folks trying to hide behind a popular myth.

Contested judicial races:  Judge Richard Baldwin (Supreme Court) and Judge Jim Egan (Court of Appeals) are both clearly the right picks by a long shot.

Both Baldwin and Egan are sitting trial judges, and both deserve to go upwards.

In each race, they are the only candidates in their races with meaningful judicial experience.

It appears that Baldwin is a D, while Egan is an R; however, in these nonpartisan races, what counts is that both are committed doing the job with integrity, and both have splendid recommendations from not just clients but also from people they've ruled against.

Both are opposed by the usual cadre of corporate interests who want to be able to sue you at the drop of a hat, but never face justice themselves.

Related articles

• Under threat, Kevin Mannix removes AARP article from Measure 84 website
• Vote 'no' on Measure 84 to end the estate tax: Editorial endorsement
• Measure 84 could cost state more than first thought, report says
• The enormous tax break for the rich hidden in Measure 84

Jump on this! Free Home Energy Audit for You, $50 to an Important Cause, Your cost: $0.00

Loft insulation (Photo credit: Southend-on-Sea in Transition)

Autumn has finally arrived - it's a great time to think about your home's energy efficiency.

In partnership with Neil Kelly Company and Clean Energy Works Oregon, I'm excited to share an exclusive offer for [Oregon League of Conservation Voters] supporters that will save you money and support OLCV's work. Read on!

Thank you,

Doug Moore
Executive Director, OLCV

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We look forward to seeing you at OLCV's 16th Annual Celebration for the Environment next year, and thank you for your commitment to furthering the work of OLCV.

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Neil Kelly Company

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