Gambling has become part of the Oregon landscape, culture and economy. Oregon has more forms of legalized gambling and offers easier access to gambling than most other states. This week has been proclaimed Oregon Problem Gambling Awareness Week, and our state joins a national campaign to promote the benefits of problem gambling prevention and treatment.

Problem gambling remains a hidden issue that can have devastating effects on individuals, families and the community. Some people become addicted to gambling in much the same way a person can become addicted to drugs or alcohol.

It isn’t about environmentalists. It is about ecology but only as it serves economics. Both terms have the same root, the Greek word oikos, which means home. Before we can manage our home (economics) we need to understand it (ecology).

Forest stands cascade off of Mount Emily, fingering down through shaded draws and eventually merging to form the forests that cover the benches above the Grande Ronde Valley. Those benches were originally covered with old-growth Ponderosa pine. The Union County Museum hosts photos that show log decks in Imbler from the turn of the last century. Those decks are filled with giant Ponderosa logs that were most likely taken from the immediate vicinity of Mount Emily.

Dear Neighbors of Union County,

I encourage the taxpaying citizens of Union County to continue to question your Union County commissioners about the benefits of the proposed wind farm(s).  Maybe they’ll be wonderful, with all the benefits promised. And maybe they won’t.

Take it from us in your sister county of Wallowa: two of your commissioners have been very effective in decisions ruining our rural beauty. The hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of parked rail cars we look at 24/7 from Joseph to Minam are a manifestation of a failed business plan. While the original mutual county effort to save the rails was noble and with hope, the continuation of this plan beyond anything but paying down the debt we took on in 1999 is akin to keeping clipper ships alive in the face of steam.

In 2009, the U.S. Department of Treasury awarded $546 million to Iberdrola from the stimulus program. Per the CEO of Iberdrola, the offshore parent company of Horizon and the developer of Antelope Ridge, they expect to receive another $470 million in 2010.

Horizon’s Elkhorn Wind Farm in 2007 and 2008 received $11 million each year in tax credits from the state of Oregon. In addition, Union County gave Horizon a property tax deduction of $331,680 each year for 2008 and 2009 which will continue for the next 10 years. The federal government also allowed in 2008 and 2009, a Production Tax Credit of $5,518,500 each year wherein it will continue for 10 years which will amount to $55,188,000. If you add up these numbers, it amounts to in excess of $81 million over 10 years, which are political giveaways at taxpayers’ expense. Just imagine what kind of jobs that could be created with this kind of money being addressed to private sector and infrastructure.

Citizens of Union County have a proposal for a wind energy generation facility to be constructed on the southern end of the valley, in close proximity to Hot Lake and the city of Union. Preliminary documents portray a project we feel is fiscally wasteful, aesthetically grotesque and environmentally damaging, and as a result we feel a need to highlight some issues.

Local budgets are lean yet our county commissioners are willing to forgive millions of dollars in revenue by allowing development under a Strategic Investment Program. Federal stimulus money, a large percentage that will be going out of country, is mainly responsible for the project development. Once constructed state tax dollars will be subsidizing the project at an approximate rate of $23.34/MWH.

As longtime residents of La Grande and the Grande Ronde Valley, we are disheartened to see the City of La Grande considering cuts to essential services and facilities that enhance the quality of life when an option with less overall impact still remains.

It is easy to target fire, safety and emergency services as well as the library and pool because they are the services most visible and utilized by community members and those which evoke an emotional response from people. The dissolution of the city’s Urban Renewal District is one option that has not been “put on the table” by the La Grande City Council.

Fire, police and ambulance services should not be cut except under the most dire circumstances, as these essential services are a core part of the community infrastructure.

A travesty of justice was handed the Elgin Museum and Historical Society at the Elgin City Council meeting Jan. 12.

After 10 years of operating in the former police department in the Elgin Opera House building, the city council voted to vacate the museum from these premises for expansion of the current opera house lessee’s theater business. In October, the city council voted to remove the museum from the upstairs former library of the opera house, which it had occupied for the past seven years.

Museum board members approached the city council on Aug. 13, 2002, asking permission to expand the museum to the second floor of the opera house (the former library). Following is a quote from the city council minutes: “The consensus of the council was in favor of this request.”

Letters and Comments for January 22, 2010