Today is the anniversary of the holiday farm fire. I call it the Weyerhaeuser fire for where much of the burning was.
www.EWEB.wtf - EWEB completed their clearcut in August, cutting the largest Doug firs (including the 15 foot circumference champion tree) and Ponderosa pines. The largest Black Oaks were cut on August 2 when EWEB clearcut most of this public forest, rushing to destroy just as the state Land Use Board of Appeals (LUBA) issued a temporary stay of execution based on a challenge brought by former EWEB commissioner Sandra Bishop. LUBA lifted the stay on August 17, cutting resumed on the 18th and the champion big doug fir was cut down on the 19th.
Eugene environmental groups stayed silent. They did not dare challenge EWEB's mismanagement that let existing tanks degrade to the point they are unrepairable and are silent about real estate overdevelopment, including future expansions of Eugene to Veneta and Junction City which will need lots of water. They also ignore plans for massive widening of Beltline highway (12 - 14 lanes).
In a democracy the public comment period never ends. Silence is consent.
Today is the anniversary of the holiday farm fire. I call it the Weyerhaeuser fire for where much of the burning was.
Has EWEB ever expressed concern about conversion of forests into tree farms that are more flammable? I couldn’t find anything in your “source protection” materials.
Has EWEB ever objected to Weyerhaeuser spraying poison from helicopters in that watershed? Aerial spraying can drift for miles and land in the river or its tributaries. The fact that it is supposedly legal to dump this stuff by the ton into the air suggests environmental laws are mostly rhetoric and illusion.
In dust we trust
The increase payment to your clearcutting contractor includes money for extra rock for the construction / destruction zone
During tonight’s discussion EWEB promised to do something to address this, as if the utility’s leaders never heard of the idea of dust suppression before.
General Manager Lawton said there’s no need to cover the dump trucks. I know of another state where dump trucks were not required to be covered - until a State legislator had his car windshield cracked by a rock flying out of the dump truck and the law was changed shortly after that. I assume in Oregon a similar scenario will be needed.
This afternoon the temporary smog monitor in Fall Creek reached 1,471. One thousand, four hundred, seventy one.
Surely THAT should get someone’s attention as a reason to change behaviors. But it is “legal” to continue to pump dust into the air, to operate the Seneca incinerator, other toxic emission sources given permission to pollute by LRAPA.
If you really want to suppress dust, you could require covers for the dump trucks and use the waterline you added to the site to wet down dust from soil destruction. Since EWEB commissioners and senior staff don’t live immediately next to the pollution you can pretend that half measures and ersatz statements of sympathy are sufficient.
If EWEB can’t handle this relatively simple task, then don’t make claims of supposed ecological concerns. Just admit that it was necessary destruction for your goals and too bad for the natural world.
Your contracted report included in the April 6 announcement of your decision claimed that salamander habitat would supposedly be enhanced after construction, yet the closest thing to salamander habitat that was on site was the seasonal spring wetland that was roughly at the point between where the two tanks are planned. It had the largest ash tree on site and rushes, which are wetland species. The south slope of the site is hotter and does not have springs that salamanders need to survive summers. Even the spring that you destroyed was not summertime salamander habitat. This time of year they would have to be able to retreat down to Amazon Creek to wait for the rains to return.
Do you even fact check this stuff? It’s like claiming that leaving two snags on site will supposedly support wildlife habitats in the wake of your clearcutting. It fills a psychological need of reassurance but that’s not useful for wildlife, especially when existing snags were turned into wood chips.
I hope that all of the commissioners and senior staff saw the forest, before, during and after its destruction. I think it’s important for people to see - and smell - the consequences of their decisions.
Eugene was founded on clearcutting what was once one of the greatest forests on the planet, with more tons per hectare than almost anywhere else. So no one should be surprised to see that the City disrespects the natural world.
The distance from your destruction site at East 40th to the EWEB compound in the West Eugene Wetlands is about the thickness of the breathable part of the atmosphere. If one is in a plane at 35 thousand feet and there is a loss of pressure, you’d have about a minute of “useful consciousness” to put on an oxygen mask. With climate change, I think the time of useful consciousness expired when President Jimmy Carter’s relatively mild advice was mostly ignored by our society. Now, come the consequences of collective denial and bargaining, with acceptance mostly a distant illusion.
I found the documents EWEB released to me for my Public Records Request useful for understanding the topology of the water reservoir network. I was surprised that EWEB operates 23 tanks at various elevations, many more than I would have guessed. And with all those sites, somehow the utility couldn’t figure out a way to consolidate operations and not require destruction of our forest.
The photos of the cracked wall in Hawkins Hill tank suggests a lack of maintenance for decades, ignoring of seismic concerns for a third of a century (since the Cascadia Subduction Zone was discovered) and extreme risks for downhill neighbors if an earthquake broke Hawkins Hill and / or College hill water tanks.
During the response from the Commissioners, Matt McRae claimed that the danger of these reservoirs is why EWEB is acting “quickly” to replace them. However, the Cascadia Subduction Zone was discovered in the mid 1980s, so waiting four decades to repair, strengthen or replace these structures is not exactly a fast response. Plus, the seismic hazard to the water system is not only to the reservoirs, but also pumping stations, electric connections to them and of course, the numerous connectors in the piping network. It would not take many breaks in the distribution to make the system unusable.
Perhaps if EWEB had addressed severe seismic issues when they became known we would now be completing the second intake from the Willamette, which would be a real step toward resilience. Encouraging rainwater catchment, gray water use, more efficiency, serious conservation, xeriscape plantings and other approaches will also be needed as climate chaos continues to worsen.
We’ve known since the days of the Roman Empire that deforestation causes desertification, but there is almost no political courage in our community to point this out.
Something I did not get to say in the comment period:
Your report for today’s meeting suggests that testing every other week for toxic algae in the water supply would be sufficient for public health. I don’t know what the best interval would be but having seen algae in unexpected places my guess is this is not enough.
A decade ago I went backpacking upstream of Oakridge through officially designated wilderness. Toward the end of the trip we hiked through an area without water and ran out of drinking water. We were looking forward to walking by Erma Bell lakes to use a backpacking filter to refill our containers … but there was a sign at the lakes warning about algae and toxins that could not be easily filtered. That area does not have clearcuts or aerial sprays in its watershed yet was still dangerously polluted.
More recently I was at Cape Perpetua and walked along a creek that flowed out of designated wilderness, with the entire watershed in old growth rainforest. Despite that integrity the creek had lots of algae in it just before it flowed into the sea.
Toxic algae seems to be a greater problem than the pentachlorophenol problem upstream from the EWEB intake in Springfield.
The increasing problem of toxic algae suggests that the impacts of climate change are not a future problem.
I wish EWEB had conducted this board meeting by Zoom, which makes it easier to see what is happening. If citizens were able to speak via video, I would broadcast my three minutes from the big Doug fir that EWEB plans to cut.
Half a century ago, EWEB wanted to boil water with nuclear fission. Citizen protest forced the utility to back down and now EWEB’s official position is relief that a reactor was not built. (EWEB seems to be silent on the new nuclear threat of NuScale smaller nuclear reactors but that is a topic for a different day.)
EWEB is making a strategic mistake trying to bulldoze citizen concern about deforestation.
Your public relations approach risks a backlash just as serious programs to address real resilience are more urgent than ever.
At a minimum, EWEB needs to hold an in person public hearing before signing contracts.
The only urgency I can see to clearcut is to get ahead of growing public concern.
You are probably aware that hydroelectricity production on the WECC western power grid is starting to decline. Hoover dam has seen power production drop by a quarter due to drought. The BPA dams are not as far along in the disruption but also risk generation decline, with major implications for grid stability.
Your spokesperson Joe Harwood claims more tanks would ensure water distribution after a large earthquake. In reality, that disruption would have multiple failure points, not only from faulty tanks. It is probably not possible to strengthen every connection point in the water and sewage systems, so mitigation would be needed to ensure minimal water requirements and to avoid disease outbreaks. Rainwater catchment, graywater utilization, humanure, serious water conservation and other approaches are needed for every home to prepare for the disruptions beginning to unfold.
More tanks also could not protect Eugene’s water supply if the sole source from the McKenzie is disrupted.
One factor in our expanding drought is deforestation on an industrial scale. We’ve known that degrading forests causes desertification for millennia. A good resource on that is John Perlin’s book A Forest Journey, he spoke at U. of Nike about a decade ago. But one need not read academic discussions - stand under old trees on a hot day and then stand in a field or parking lot.
Currently there is a water tank at 52nd and Willamette. Across 52nd, to the south, is a City owned field that could be adapted to extra water storage. Perhaps a bureaucratic land swap between the City and our utility would be needed to facilitate this (and the EWEB forest could then become a City park).
The EWEB forest is likely the last unprotected high quality natural area left in the City. It not only has the largest unprotected trees, but it is rare interior forest habitat.
Hot air about climate concerns only means something when accompanied by behavior changes. Edward Abbey said “sentiment without action is the ruin of the soul.”
This forest is already serving an important water storage function. Large trees hold moisture and have critical cooling functions.
It is also shocking that EWEB claims they are somehow protecting oak savannah when some of the largest oaks on the property are marked for cutting.
I urge board member Matt McRae to invite co-plaintiffs from his childrens’ climate lawsuit to visit the EWEB forest, including the 15 foot circumference Doug fir, and solicit their opinions about clearcutting and climate chaos.
It would also be useful for him to discuss his understanding of limits to growth, oil and gas depletion, and the fact that electricity generation has had two peaks in the past decade and a half. The first peak was in 2007, at the time of conventional energy peak (globally). Just before the pandemic was the second peak for US gigawatt hour production and that was fueled by fracking for shale gas. Fracking postponed rationing. This doesn’t only impact energy flow, but since concentrated energy makes everything else possible, it needs to be considered in your long term planning.
I bought my first solar panel in 1990. It is a great technology but it is not possible to replace our “current” consumption with solar. The first lesson for using solar is to reduce use, not only through efficiency but changing the way we live. It also takes mineral ores and fossil fuels to make solar electric panels, computer chips and other required systems. The Earth is abundant and finite, yet our economy pretends it is constantly getting bigger. Now we are all beginning to experience to consequences of out of control overdevelopment.
In 1947 Albert Einstein said the splitting of the atom changed everything except our mode of thinking. Now, we are past the limits to exponential growth but most pretend this is not happening. This collective denial has a liberal variant and a conservative variant, but admitting limits does not fit anywhere on a political spectrum. I hope future generations are able to understand why we ignored the warnings and they will still have some ability to adapt.
MEMO
To: Save Eweb Forest
From: A volunteer
Date: 7 July 2021
Re: Remarks made by EWEB Commissioners and GM in reaction to public testimony in opposition to 40th & Patterson water storage tank project
at 6 July 2021 EWEB Board meeting
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQvhT4PWOUU
Disclaimer:
The following verbatim transcript is from video recording accessed on the Eugene Water & Electric Board website (or YouTube). This transcript has not been edited and may contain unintentional errors.
Verbatim transcript
Present
Commissioners
• John Barofsky
• Matt McRae
• John Brown
• Mindy Schlossberg
• Sonya Carlson (at home, joining remotely)
Staff
• Frank Lawson, EWEB General Manager
• Rodney Price, Assistant GM (electrical engineer)
[ED NOTE: 4 commissioners & two staff were present at the EWEB headquarters building (ROC) in West Eugene.]
48:00 – Recording marker
Mindy Schlossberg, EWEB Commissioner – Well, it doesn’t sound like any of the other folks are there. So, the public testimony period for this meeting is now closed.
At this time Commissioners are given the opportunity to comment if they chose.
[ED NOTE: Sounds like she is READING a written statement.]
I don’t know if anyone wants to raise their hand or I can just go around and call on people [nervous laugh].
Um, John Brown, I’ll start with you.
John Brown, EWEB Commissioner – For those of you who are still with us who testified this evening – thank you. I, um, understand the the challenges of what you are facing and things, but we rely on engineers and, and input. There’s a lot of technical issues that go into siting a reservoir. That’s why EWEB bought this over sixty, seventy five years ago, knowing it had the right elevation. It had the lines there to get the water to it and get it distributed properly. Ah, I wish we had an alternative but I’m pretty sure we don’t.
The thing is that ah, you know, people talk about one tank, they are okay with that, but you know, that’s basalt and we have to blast to even place the first tank. And we can’t build a tank and not blast for the second one. And to blast for the second one we have to remove the trees where the second tank would go.
So, even if we built just one tank, we would still have to cut all the trees and blast. Because we can’t build a tank and blast next to it, because I’m sure that there would be a public outcry if we start settin’ off dynamite right next to an extra seven hundred million gallon tank – that we compromise the integrity of that tank.
Um, we’ve looked at this long and hard and ah, we’ve done the best we can. We are under a time mandate by the Oregon Health Department to decommission College Hill and we can’t ah, and we can’t decommission it until we have something to replace it. And so, we are in a little bit of a quandary here, and time is of issue, and ah, um, I understand your concerns but we also understand our concerns and that’s that we have to provide safe reliable drinking water to over 200,000 people and um, this is a tough decision but, ah, um, I’m going to move forward.
50:12
Mindy Schlossberg, EWEB Commissioner – All right. Does anyone want to jump in next?
50:15
John Barofsky, EWEB Commissioner – Oh sure, I will. Thank you. Thank you everybody for taking the time to testify. I wish it was in person [looking away from the camera].
I think we are getting close to that. Hopefully in the next month or two we will be able to have people, and face-to-face, um, Mark Robinowitz, just so you know, when your email did come through, so we will be able to look at that and get your testimony from that. Anybody else who felt that they were rushed or didn’t get all their points across please feel free to email us.
As Commissioner Brown said, this is a complicated issue. It’s one that we’ve, ah, struggled with. We have – I personally myself have walked the property and gone up to community meetings at the property – face-to-face meetings that were, ah, facilitated by EWEB staff with the neighborhood.
You know, public outreach is a difficult thing and it’s even more difficult during COVID.
[ED NOTE: He is constantly turning his head to his left, not looking at the camera when he speaks.]
I believe our staff did their best job to try to get the message out to people.
If you feel that you didn’t get the message, I apologize for that, but like I said there was a robust effort to get this information out there. Um, and we do our best to reach everybody and you just can’t until , until somebody knocks on your door and says, they’re puttin’ up a tank at the end of the street. Did you know about it?
Well, I hope that you would.
It’s been a tough decision for me to make. You know I’m new on the board as of January, so some of the background material on this, I had to get brought up to speed on.
But I feel comfortable moving forward with this decision. Um, there are going to be trees that are going to be cut. There’s going to be oak habitat that’s going to be maintained and enhanced.
Any time we have a project of this size, anywhere in the community, there’s going to be impacts. So, to say, just move it to College Hill – then the people who are at College Hill are going to come and testify in front of us.
I understand that, because I wouldn’t want to have this right next to my house.
Um, but we move through it for the betterment of the community. Um, ah far as, you know, being able to vote on this [shaking his head side to side] you know, we are elected officials. If you think we have done the wrong thing – we’ll hear about it at the ballot next time. And I’m prepared to live with that decision going forward, and I will defend it and if enough people feel I made the wrong decision and want to run against me, I’m more than willing to do that.
[ED NOTE: EWEB Commissioners are elected for 4-year terms.]
But again, I hear you guys. We do need to move forward and I feel comfortable with [mumbled, indistinct… can’t understand the words (Turning his head sharply to his left)]
Thank you.
53:12
Mindy Schlossberg, EWEB Commissioner – Thank you. Sonya.
53:18
Sonya Carlson, EWEB Commissioner –
[ED NOTE: She is NOT present with the other 4 Commissioners. It appears she is at home.]
Thank you everybody for coming out tonight. I really appreciate all of the feedback and, you know, even though it’s hard to hear, um, as I think your intention is, um, it’s, it’s valuable information, ah, for us.
What I’m taking away primarily is that you felt like the public process has not been what you would like it to be. I understand that, that tre.., you don’t want the trees cut down. I don’t want the trees cut down. I don’t think any of us want the trees cut down.
But I do believe that EWEB staff, in combination with a number of environmental groups and owners and such, and the survey to the neighbors, throughout, over the last year and a half they’ve done the best job they can to minimize the amount of trees and to maximize the, the oak, um, saving the oak that has the highest environmental, um, impact. And that is really what I’ve appreciated in the process from EWEB.
[ED NOTE: There has been no mention of ‘environmental groups’ that I recall, unless she is referring to Friends of Trees (?) who planted 14 oak seedlings on south side of property?]
Now, on the public process side, I, I encourage anybody who hasn’t gone to the EWEB website to check out the, there’s a list on here that says, “Previous updates and announcements” about the College Hill site.
[ED NOTE: This is the ‘E. 40 th site.’]
And I looked on there, and there’s at least 9 different emails that have gone out to neighbors. So somehow that isn’t working.
I mean, for me, I try to find solutions. How can we do this better? I’m not willing to go back on the decision we made right now, but I do feel like – there was a robust process throughout. There was emails that were put out. There was at least two public meetings that were held on site, at the College Hill site.
[ED NOTE: This is the ‘E. 40 th site.’ This is not College Hill site…]
We have testimony 9 different EWEB board meetings where we have had public testimony just like this.
So, for me, I continue to wonder, you know, what else do people want?
I know that staff has gone and reached out to the neighbors. We’ve reached out to the neighbors. I don’t know how to reach out to people any more.
I wish that, you know, we could have had some of these conversations before. I know that thee COVID has really challenged, um, you know, some of the work here. So it’s not in-person, but that doesn’t mean that this isn’t – this is still valuable (gesticulating with left hand in front of her).
This is still a valuable information sharing platform for us. And in some respects people may be able to attend more because they can come and visit.
Now, on the other side of it, I, I didn’t personally think we were going to have two tanks until I found out that we were going to have to blast the trees anyway and it was going to cost us more than a million more dollars to do it later. And, that it was going to impact the neighbors even more because they were going to have to have – what – more than, it was like a thousand more truck loads of dirt that were going to be hauled back in and hauled back out to ready the site. It just didn’t make sense to me.
So, when the second tank proposal was presented, and those were the additional impacts, it wasn’t just the tree removal. You know, I wanted to, to reduce the timing for the trees as well.
When we found out that they were going to have to be removed anyway, it felt like a done deal to me. Honestly. I mean, we already had to remove them.
And, I appreciate – last point – and I appreciate everybody’s feedback about having to, or looking for other options. I can guarantee, other options were evaluated.
Um, you know they have to have it at a certain height level. It has to have a certain capacity. It’s not an easy thing to find in that region.
So, again, I really appreciate everybody coming out, um, we have asked many of these questions. We’re all volunteers, you know, we don’t get – this is something we do because we care about Eugene. We care about making the right decisions. It’s something that keeps us up at night.
[ED NOTE: EWEB Commissioner is an unpaid elected position.]
And I hope that you respect that we have looked out as well for these absolute questions.
So, thank you. I appreciate it all. I’ll be quiet now.
57:45
57:50
Matt McRae, EWEB Commissioner – Thank you Sonya. I’ll take just a quit minute. Just want to say thank you to folks who took time out of your evenings tonight to share your thoughts and opinions with us. I also want to say thanks to John and John and Sonya for covering a lot of territory, and addressing a lot of the issues that, um, I think were raised tonight.
There are unquestionably tradeoffs and impact from this project. And as Sonya suggested, I think taking a look at the project [mumbled, indistinct… can’t understand words]
…. to see the real effort that has been done to try to minimize impacts and really weigh the tradeoffs and provide the best project we can given the needs of our water system.
Um, I have a lot of trust in our staff team [indistinct, mumbling, can’t understand word] …done a tremendous amount to do just that. They have managed to find a spot on this sight where the impact is minimized to just two and a half of the 10 acres of this property.
And they are protecting really valuable oak habitat that is exceedingly rare. [note: EWEB is going to cut "valuable oak habitat" including most of the largest oaks on the site]
So, um, there’s definitely thought about the ecological impacts on the site.
Lastly, we have all asked staff to identify and take steps to reduce the very real impacts to neighbors, in terms of noise and dust and, and truck traffic. Um, and we’re aware that it’s gonna be hard to be in that neighborhood and have that construction going on, but. um, we are asking staff to do to try to minimize those impacts.
Thanks again for the input and, um, and ah back to you Mindy.
Mindy Schlossberg, EWEB Commissioner – Um, I just want to echo what my fellow commissioners have said and thank everybody for testifying tonight [ indistinct, can’t understand words]
You know some people feel very passionately about [indistinct . can’t understand word] including us.
Um, I want to thank the staff for the great care that they’ve taken in coming up with this plan. I know that, um, in additional to their expertise, they are also members of our community and they do care about this site. Um, the site was chosen seventy years ago strategically for EWEB and one of the reasons that there is a beautiful forest is that we haven’t needed to use it – that site for this. But we do live in an urban area and there is, there are tradeoffs for major infrastructure projects.
So I’m confident in the plan that we have put forth. I feel that there are some strong, um, plans in there to mitigate as much of the, um, ah, noise, [indistinct, can’t understand word] and ecological damage that will happen. And I support moving forward with it.
1:00:46
Mindy Schlossberg, EWEB Commissioner – All right. That was a very long public input section. Um, do you want to say anything Frank?
Frank Lawson, EWEB General Manager – Thanks President Schlossberg, um, for the record, people listening in audio, this is Frank Lawson, the ah, General Manager of EWEB.
I think there are a number of tradeoffs. The Board spoke about that. I did want to mention to those who talked about College Hill specifically, and other sites, um. This is part of an overall plan that we have that addresses water quality and water reliability over a number of years. We will ultimately in the next 8 years or so have two 7 and a half million gallon tanks at E. 40th, two 7 and a half million gallon tanks at Hawkins and also at College Hill.
Those are matched in elevation, specifically six hundred and seven feet above sea level. Those sites were chosen many years ago for that reason.
We are also balancing the system for resiliency as well as water quality. And having two seven and a half million gallons while, it seems like a lot. Those are actually smaller than some of our existing reservoirs now, so that we have more flexibility for O & M and other maintenance costs going forward.
And so, this is part of a larger plan, ah, and I almost guarantee that if we did one tank now, waited a few years and then did the second tank, people would be asking – why didn’t you just do this all at once – and the reason for that was the two thousand one hundred, uh, savings of truckloads and the carbon associated with those, and the carbon associated with those is also part of this.
And I do have a great deal of trust in staff, that they have made this recommendation in, in, thoroughness and in logic and we appreciate your support in that.
And we also appreciate the ah, public process and the fact that people are willing to speak up, ah, even if they disagree with, with us. And so, we appreciate that as well.
But thanks for the opportunity to contribute [looking toward the 4 EWEB Commissioners who are in the large room with him at the ROC EWEB Headquarters in west Eugene.]
1:02:59
Mindy Schlossberg, EWEB Commissioner – All right. Thank you. Ah, now we are going to shift gears a little bit, to Agenda Item 4. We are moving into Board action items and approval of Consent Calendar A.
1:03:12
END of Commissioners and General Manager comments following Public Comment.
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