In a bipartisan vote, the Oregon Senate voted to join 15 other states today by passing legislation that outlines state practices for the growth and sale of industrial hemp. SB 676 authorizes the production, possession and commerce in industrial hemp commodities and products. “Senate Bill 676 will allow farmers to re-establish industrial hemp as an agricultural crop in Oregon,” said Senator Floyd Prozanski (D-Eugene), who carried the bill on the floor. “Industrial hemp is an innovative crop that is regaining its popularity across the globe. This legislation sets the course for growing and selling this high-demand crop in Oregon.” SB 676 identifies that industrial hemp is an agricultural product that is subject to regulation by the Department of Agriculture and requires that all growers and handlers have an industrial hemp license issued by the Department. Additionally, the Department will establish a field inspection program, a certifications process for hemp seed, and a civil penalty procedure for violations. “We heard a lot of positive testimony on this bill in committee,” said Senator Jackie Dingfelder (D-Portland), chair of the Senate Environment and Natural Resources Committee. “Senate Bill 676 clears the way for this product to be added to Oregon’s diverse portfolio of agricultural products.” The terms “hemp” and “industrial hemp” refer specifically to varieties of Cannabis sativa characterized by low levels of THC, marijuana’s primary psychoactive chemical. These strains are cultivated for industrial use only. Hemp fiber is amenable to use in a wide range of products including carpeting, home furnishings, construction materials, auto parts, textiles, and paper. Hemp seed, an oilseed, likewise has many uses, including industrial oils, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, and food. Industrial hemp was grown in the United States since colonial times but was banned in 1970 when it was redefined as marijuana. Currently, manufacturers and producers must import hemp into the country since they cannot buy domestic hemp from American farmers. SB 676 passed out of Full Ways and Means on a 19-3-0 vote and now goes to the House for consideration.

A dealer who was shut down last year after victims complained he sold their cars and pocketed the money sure has a lot of vehicles with 'for sale' signs and stickers on his property, so we went there to look into it. We saw several vehicles in Edmonds' driveway, some with 'for sale' signs and window stickers. And across the street at his father's home, we found more vehicles that appeared to be for sale. Edmonds told KATU he was not selling vehicles because Oregon's Department of Motor Vehicles had revoked his dealer's license. But after we received video showing a number of vehicles outside his home that appeared to be for sale, we paid a visit to try to figure out what was going on. Edmonds' father was not too happy to see us and charged us in the road with his front-end loader, telling us to "get out of here." He claims his son is not selling vehicles because that would be illegal.But the man who shot the video said Edmonds told him the vehicles did not belong to him - that he was selling them on consignment for others. State investigators have that video and said they are continuing to investigate Edmonds. According to DMV records, neither Edmonds or his father are licensed to sell vehicles in Oregon.is the former owner of Gresham's Auto Link. He was a consignment dealer who was raided by the state and closed down in October after at least 60 people filed complaints that he sold their vehicles and pocketed their money.

The president of a Portland-based optical network company said Thursday's equipment failure that shut down business and government telephone lines and slowed Internet activity to thousands in Southern Oregon was an "unimaginable event." Michael Weidman, president of Lightspeed Networks Inc., which operates LS Networks in parts of Oregon outside the Willamette Valley, said built-in safeguards couldn't keep lines open for many of the area's independent telecommunications, Internet and data transmission companies. Those companies' customers in turn lost their voice and data connections. "We have redundancy upon redundancy built in, but the whole shelf dropped and we were not able to restore the system remotely from Portland," Weidman said Friday. "The system is redundant and resilient with diverse routes in and out of Medford in the event of a fiber cut. But the unimaginable event occurred." About 200 circuits, each carrying between 1.5 megabits and 10 gigabits of information, failed when software running the system became corrupted, he said. A 10 gigabit circuit can handle thousands of online customers simultaneously. "The best way to understand the difference in the circuits, is to think of a garden hose next to a fire hose next to an oil pipeline," Weidman said. "There's a lot more flowing through the pipeline (with the larger circuits)." Exactly what caused the software to go bad is still being reviewed. "What would corrupt the software, we don't know," Weidman said. "We have our vendor looking at it at their lab." The outage began just before 1 p.m. Thursday. Telephone and Internet service began returning after Hunter Communications technicians working with LS Networks at the Medford Qwest central office restored connections around 4:30 p.m. It took at least another two hours for service to return to normal. The crash affected a variety of telephone, Internet and data providers. Medford-Ashland area businesses who subscribe to those providers were particularly hard hit. Service providers affected included Hunter Communications, Ashland Fiber Network, Charter Communications, Clearwire, Infostructure, Integra and Rio Communications. Although he could talk about the volume of loss, Weidman was unsure of the number of accounts affected, because many were clients of LS Networks' customers. A spokesman for Hunter Communications said the "worst-case scenario" event will spur the affected companies to develop back-up plans. "This occurrence will generate a series of meetings between all communications providers involved and new paths will be put into place to avoid the same issue in the future," Hunter Communications' Chris Cahill said.

The Chehalem Cultural Center has been a busy place of late and it's not even open yet. All the hubbub is coming from construction workers and their equipment as they dig, fill and build to transform the former elementary school into the town's premiere cultural venue. Construction, which started a few weeks ago, is underway for the next phase of the project. So far, it's on track and expected to remain so, said development director Mary Sommerset. Not only that, but she expects that the project will achieve an LEED Silver rating from the U.S. Green Building Council, a group that evaluates the sustainability of new or newly-remodeled buildings. When this phase is completed by January, the former Central School will sport a music recording studio; pottery, ceramic and fused glass studios; six art classrooms; meeting spaces; multiple-use art classes as well as a technology training room. It took five years of fund-raising and $2.6 million to get to the point where the school, property of the Chehalem Park and Recreation District since 1995, can be remodeled to attract a new kind of students and visitors. Fans of Tunes on Tuesday shouldn't fear disruption to the popular series of summer concerts as the Chamber of Commerce is in the midst of applying for a permit that would allow them to host vendors on School Street next to the concert venue. That construction has finally begun after years of demolition, planning and seismic upgrades in the 1990s, has been a big help for Sommerset and the fund-raising effort. "It helps the community to understand it's happening," she said, "we're actually going to have something wonderful here." She added that the city of Newberg had been helpful in moving the project forward because it waived fees to help reduce costs. "We look forward to having the classrooms available next year," Sommerset said.

Kate du Aime Rodewald and her husband, Bill Rodewald, were driving north on I-5 from Eugene in a borrowed Volkswagen van with their baby girls Dayiel, age 2, and 8-month old Mia, when smoke drifted across the highway. The family had recently moved to Oregon to be near Bill Rodewald’s mother in Falls City, a small town west of Salem. They had just made an offer on a house and planned to move to Eugene and attend the UO that fall. Their plans ended forever when the smoke of a field burn blew across the highway on the afternoon of Aug. 3, 1988. Blinded by the smoke and in the smoky darkness the Rodewald’s van was hit from behind by an 18-wheeler and shoved beneath the vehicle in front of them. The family was burned alive in the fire that swept over the accident. In all, seven people were killed and 38 were injured in the 23-vehicle disaster that made headlines across the country. The only member of the du Aime-Rodewald family to survive that day was Kate’s son Wills, who had stayed home with his grandmother. The fight over field burning began in the 1960s, but that young family’s tragic death in 1988 is probably the grimmest reminder of the dangers of field burning smoke. This summer marks the release in paperback of William Wharton’s novel Ever After: A Father’s True Story that chronicles the life and death of his daughter, Kate du Aime Rodewald, and her family in that field burning accident, and it also marks yet another attempt in the Oregon Legislature to put an end to the controversial practice. A bill to phase-down the practice introduced by Gov. Ted Kulongoski died in committee, but Senate Bill 528, written as a ban on burning, is struggling its way from committees to the Senate this week, and its advocates have long hoped it would mark a complete end to the fires in the grass seed fields of Oregon.It was an accident that brought field burning to Oregon in the first place; an unplanned fire in a grass seed field in the 1940s eliminated a fungus that kept seeds from germinating, leading agronomists, like John Hardison, stationed at OSU and known as “the father of field burning,” to recommend the practice as a way of controlling pests and weeds and to reduce straw. By the 1960s thousands of acres of fields were being burnt, to the point where it created a “pall of smoke that frequently hangs over the valley for days on end,” according to a 1964 article in The Register-Guard. A prescient August 1963 R-G story warns, “Fields next to highways should not be burned when wind can blow smoke across the highway and jeopardize traffic.” But such warnings were not enough to prevent the 1988 accident, or any of the other smoke-induced wrecks in Oregon. According to archived newspaper reports: In 1968 smoke from a burn caused an accident injuring three people, two of them critically. In 1972 a rear-end collision near Scio left a man with permanent neck and back injuries. In 1978 a 22-car accident happened 17 miles north of Eugene on I-5. That same year field burning smoke piled up 10 cars near Madras injuring 16 people. In 1980 “near-zero visibility” caused a four-car wreck near Albany, and in 1981 another accident near Albany also involved four cars. But these days it’s not traffic accidents that have field-burning opponents concerned — though the acres of fields that are burned have been reduced — it’s the affects of the smoke on the lungs of Oregonians. As Rep. Paul Holvey, who introduced this year’s bill to end field burning puts it, “We’ve lAlbert du Aime was known as a painter, long before he was known as a novelist. Under the pen name William Wharton, he published 10 books in English including Birdy, winner of the National Book Award, and A Midnight Clear. Both were made into films. Du Aime guarded his privacy, never going on a book tour until the publication of Franky Furbo, a book based on stories he had told his children, that came out shortly after the accident says his literary agent Rosalie Siegel. He toured because “he felt so strongly,” she says. “He fought; he dealt with his grief by speaking out against field burning” while on the tour. He came and spoke at the Eugene Public Library, a talk, he writes, that was well-attended. Of Ever After, the next book he wrote, “Has an autobiographical element to many of his books; this was his first non-fiction,” according to Siegel. Du Aime in his forward to the work calls it “biography-autobiography-fiction.” It begins in Kate Rodewald’s voice, telling the story of how she met her husband, called Bert in the story, married him and moved to Oregon. She interrupts the narrative with minute references to the fact she is a voice from beyond the grave. Describing her daughter, Dayiel, Kate’s character says, “She seems to love life so much she hates to close her eyes. It’s as if she knows.” Her narrative ends with the accident, surrounded by smoke and with the truck bearing down on them: “I look back for the babies and hear them cry. There’s nothing we can do.” The book, even when written in Kate’s voice, is raw with the author’s pain. The feeling intensifies when du Aime picks up the narrative, as “Will.” He chronicles the aftermath of the wreck and the journey he makes with Rosemary to Oregon to bury his daughter and her family. In the first of several scenes in which the family makes their spirits known from the “ever after” of the title, Kate, Bert and the children come to du Aime as he sleeps in Bert’s old bedroom in Falls City. Bert asks du Aime to get help from his brother Steve and go photograph their charred bodies, “It might help stop this damn field burning.” Steve Rodewald says his brother had always been environmentally motivated, protesting the Trojan nuclear plant and participating in other causes. Du Aime and Steve Rodewald did go photograph the bodies, a process grimly detailed in the book. The initial wreck horribly injured the family, but later autopsy reports show it was not the accident that killed them; they were burned alive. Later du Aime sent copies of those photos to Goldschmidt, accompanying one of his letters asking the governor to put an end to field burning. Ever After details the long and painful legal battle, as well as the correspondence with Goldschmidt that ensued after the accident. Rosemary du Aime says of that time and the deposition she gave, “we had to give evidence, it was horrible, I couldn’t stop crying.” “It was a strange form of justice,” said Matthew du Aime, “They had a judge who was quite positive to the seed industry.” “There was no sense,” he says, “of something wrong happened here.” The book details as well the du Aime family’s struggle to comprehend why Oregonians would continue to allow the practice of field burning, knowing its health dangers. Du Aime unsuccessfully sought a jury trial, because he writes, “We want to rub the filth and stubble and the ashes onto the faces of everyone who has anything to do with field burning, want them to experience in total, complete detail, the destruction of my family.” Though his letters back to du Aime express his sorrow and regret over the accident, Goldschmidt said through his press aide Gregg Kantor in an AP story, “any move to ban field burning ‘is really a decision to eliminate the (grass seed) industry.’” Kantor also said that Goldschmidt would not support a ban if it came up in the Legislature. After the I-5 accident, a brief moratorium was imposed on field burning in Oregon, but it was soon lifted. Efforts to ban field burning have been introduced again and again, and each time, bans have become phase-downs. In 1988, some 168,000 acres were burned. Since then phase-downs have kept the number to no more than 50,000. Steve Rodewald, a native Oregonian, and his mother Betty Rodewald, like the du Aimes, fought for several years after the accident to end field burning. The resulting bill that was introduced in 1991 called for the phase-down in field burning that would make its most drastic reduction in 1997. It was at that point, with field burning scaled back by almost 50,000 acres that the du Aimes and the Rodewalds took a step back from the fight to end the fires. “Quite literally,” says Rosemary du Aime, “we have heard nothing over the past 12 years.” She focuses on the positives, pointing out that du Aimes still have Wills, Kate du Aime Rodewald’s surviving son, who lives in California “We see each other as often as possible. That’s the goodness,” she says. Steve Rodewald has recently re-entered the fight to end field burning. Having grown up in rural Oregon, he says, “I never paid attention. It was just one of those things. It just seemed to be a part of Oregon. But after the accident, my attitude has changed. I started looking at the health impacts. It still hurts people, even though they have reduced it.” Last summer while driving back from his son’s soccer match in Cottage Grove to his home in Monmouth, Steve Rodewald says he suddenly encountered a field burn near the freeway, just north of Eugene. “In the field to the west,” he says, “I could actually see the flames; there was light smoke across the highway.” “It just did a lot of things in bringing back those memories of what my brother and his family went through,” he says. Attorneys Charlie Tebbutt and Dan Galpern from the Western Environmental Law Center, who have been working on the campaign to end field burning, eventually contacted Rodewald. “It should have been banned in 1988 after it killed the Rodewald-du Aime family,” says Galpern. “It should have been banned in 2007 when we presented a mountain of evidence to the EPA. It should be banned today, it’s well past the time to end this practice.” On June 16, a subcommittee of the Joint Ways and Means Committee voted to pass SB 528, the bill to end field burning, on to the full committee. But the bill did not make it though the committee intact. An amendment to the bill changed it from a full ban on the practice to a phase-down in 2009 and a ban in 2010 and if the bill goes through, there will be another exception to the ban. Rep. Holvey of Eugene, one of the backers of a full burn on the practice says the most recent exception was a result of “trying to secure the necessary votes,” to pass the bill, “and that is sometimes a moving target.” Sen. Floyd Prozanski, also of Eugene, calls the amendment “a significant compromise.” He clarifies that the exception only allows for the 15,000 acres of burning in parts of Marion and Linn counties, in the Silverton Hills area. The burning would be confined to “steep terrain and/or identified species.” The identified species he says are bent grass and fine fescue. The burning would not be allowed in the Lane, Benton or the rest of Linn county he says, calling it “very restrictive.” The bill could make it through the Joint Ways and Means committee soon, and then make its way to the Oregon Senate’s floor for a vote. If this ban goes through, will it be enough to protect the health and safety of Oregonians? Steve Rodewald says, “After the legislation that slowed it down, I thought it’s been resolved.” But he says, “I failed my brother and his family by not seeing this to its end.”earned so much more about the health impacts.” According to the EPA the fine particulate matter caused by field burning smoke can penetrate to the deepest parts of the lungs and is linked to “numerous health problems including asthma, bronchitis, acute and chronic respiratory symptoms such as shortness of breath and painful breathing, and premature deaths.” Two such premature deaths have happened in Idaho, a state where field burning is also hotly debated. Mary Bird, 68, died in 1986 of pulmonary emphysema aggravated by field burning, her husband, a doctor, said in an interview at the time with The Spokesman-Review, “She went through hell every smoky day.” Thirty-seven year old Sharon Vogel died of an asthma attack brought on by grass seed field burning smoke at her house in Sandpoint, Idaho. Her last words were “I don't want to die; I am going to die.” Kate du Aime Rodewald was only two months short of her 36th birthday when field-burning smoke cut her life short. Her brother, Matthew du Aime, flew to Oregon for the funeral of his sister, her husband and their baby girls. “At the time of the accident,” he says, “It wasn’t clear what had happened.” When it became evident the accident was caused by field burning smoke, “it seemed so strange to me,” he says in a faint accent that hints of his upbringing both in the U.S. and in Europe. As he was leaving Oregon for his return trip to France, he says he “borrowed a piece of paper at the luggage counter.” He wrote a letter that was published in The Oregonian and the R-G that asked grass seed farmers to give him an explanation for why they burned their fields or to convince him if “there are no viable alternatives.” He wrote, “I need a viable explanation for the death of these people I love so much.” Oregonians responded, deploring the practice, du Aime says in a phone interview this week from the family’s houseboat in France. But the only response he got from the grass seed industry was to “try to take my quite naïve letter and try to twist it” in a journal put out by the industry. “Suddenly,” he says, “I began seeing the kind of sinister side to the grass seed industry.” Despite attempts by the industry to spin the field burning debate as an attack on small farmers, du Aime says, he “became aware a couple of really big farms” controlled the industry. Despite the reputation Oregonians have for rugged individualism, “I realized that there are economic forces,in Oregon which are not obvious, but they control a lot of things.” The 2007 bill to ban grass seed field burning introduced by Rep. Holvey died in committee after a hearing with lobbying by major grass seed buyers Scotts Co. and J.R. Simplot. Du Aime had lived in Oregon before working in a logging camp in The Dalles and had been excited that his sister had moved to Oregon. He says Oregon has always had “positive connotations for me.” It wasn’t until after the accident that killed his sister that he saw his first field burn. “What I saw looked like a mushroom cloud from a atomic bomb,” he says. Du Aime’s way of dealing with his grief was “to initially get very aggressively involved and angry,” he says. He wrote letters and arranged a meeting with then Gov. Neil Goldschmidt. His father Albert du Aime wrote not only letters to Goldschmidt but also a book about what had happened to try to deal with the death of his first-born child, and as a scathing indictment of field burning. “We cried and cried until our teeth hurt,” says Albert du Aime’s wife, Rosemary, “then we said, ‘Is this doing any good? Let’s stop this.’” In one of his impassioned letters to Goldschmidt, du Aime wrote that he had begun writing the book titled Ever After about death of his daughter and her family: “I intend that the entire English speaking world should be aware of how easily they can be victimized by the forces of greed, power and ineptitude.” The book was published in 1995, but Albert du Aime died last October without seeing his vow to put a stop to field burning in Oregon come to fruition.Albert du Aime was known as a painter, long before he was known as a novelist. Under the pen name William Wharton, he published 10 books in English including Birdy, winner of the National Book Award, and A Midnight Clear. Both were made into films. Du Aime guarded his privacy, never going on a book tour until the publication of Franky Furbo, a book based on stories he had told his children, that came out shortly after the accident says his literary agent Rosalie Siegel. He toured because “he felt so strongly,” she says. “He fought; he dealt with his grief by speaking out against field burning” while on the tour. He came and spoke at the Eugene Public Library, a talk, he writes, that was well-attended. Of Ever After, the next book he wrote, “Has an autobiographical element to many of his books; this was his first non-fiction,” according to Siegel. Du Aime in his forward to the work calls it “biography-autobiography-fiction.” It begins in Kate Rodewald’s voice, telling the story of how she met her husband, called Bert in the story, married him and moved to Oregon. She interrupts the narrative with minute references to the fact she is a voice from beyond the grave. Describing her daughter, Dayiel, Kate’s character says, “She seems to love life so much she hates to close her eyes. It’s as if she knows.” Her narrative ends with the accident, surrounded by smoke and with the truck bearing down on them: “I look back for the babies and hear them cry. There’s nothing we can do.” The book, even when written in Kate’s voice, is raw with the author’s pain. The feeling intensifies when du Aime picks up the narrative, as “Will.” He chronicles the aftermath of the wreck and the journey he makes with Rosemary to Oregon to bury his daughter and her family. In the first of several scenes in which the family makes their spirits known from the “ever after” of the title, Kate, Bert and the children come to du Aime as he sleeps in Bert’s old bedroom in Falls City. Bert asks du Aime to get help from his brother Steve and go photograph their charred bodies, “It might help stop this damn field burning.” Steve Rodewald says his brother had always been environmentally motivated, protesting the Trojan nuclear plant and participating in other causes. Du Aime and Steve Rodewald did go photograph the bodies, a process grimly detailed in the book. The initial wreck horribly injured the family, but later autopsy reports show it was not the accident that killed them; they were burned alive. Later du Aime sent copies of those photos to Goldschmidt, accompanying one of his letters asking the governor to put an end to field burning. Ever After details the long and painful legal battle, as well as the correspondence with Goldschmidt that ensued after the accident. Rosemary du Aime says of that time and the deposition she gave, “we had to give evidence, it was horrible, I couldn’t stop crying.” “It was a strange form of justice,” said Matthew du Aime, “They had a judge who was quite positive to the seed industry.” “There was no sense,” he says, “of something wrong happened here.” The book details as well the du Aime family’s struggle to comprehend why Oregonians would continue to allow the practice of field burning, knowing its health dangers. Du Aime unsuccessfully sought a jury trial, because he writes, “We want to rub the filth and stubble and the ashes onto the faces of everyone who has anything to do with field burning, want them to experience in total, complete detail, the destruction of my family.” Though his letters back to du Aime express his sorrow and regret over the accident, Goldschmidt said through his press aide Gregg Kantor in an AP story, “any move to ban field burning ‘is really a decision to eliminate the (grass seed) industry.’” Kantor also said that Goldschmidt would not support a ban if it came up in the Legislature. After the I-5 accident, a brief moratorium was imposed on field burning in Oregon, but it was soon lifted. Efforts to ban field burning have been introduced again and again, and each time, bans have become phase-downs. In 1988, some 168,000 acres were burned. Since then phase-downs have kept the number to no more than 50,000. Steve Rodewald, a native Oregonian, and his mother Betty Rodewald, like the du Aimes, fought for several years after the accident to end field burning. The resulting bill that was introduced in 1991 called for the phase-down in field burning that would make its most drastic reduction in 1997. It was at that point, with field burning scaled back by almost 50,000 acres that the du Aimes and the Rodewalds took a step back from the fight to end the fires. “Quite literally,” says Rosemary du Aime, “we have heard nothing over the past 12 years.” She focuses on the positives, pointing out that du Aimes still have Wills, Kate du Aime Rodewald’s surviving son, who lives in California “We see each other as often as possible. That’s the goodness,” she says. Steve Rodewald has recently re-entered the fight to end field burning. Having grown up in rural Oregon, he says, “I never paid attention. It was just one of those things. It just seemed to be a part of Oregon. But after the accident, my attitude has changed. I started looking at the health impacts. It still hurts people, even though they have reduced it.” Last summer while driving back from his son’s soccer match in Cottage Grove to his home in Monmouth, Steve Rodewald says he suddenly encountered a field burn near the freeway, just north of Eugene. “In the field to the west,” he says, “I could actually see the flames; there was light smoke across the highway.” “It just did a lot of things in bringing back those memories of what my brother and his family went through,” he says. Attorneys Charlie Tebbutt and Dan Galpern from the Western Environmental Law Center, who have been working on the campaign to end field burning, eventually contacted Rodewald. “It should have been banned in 1988 after it killed the Rodewald-du Aime family,” says Galpern. “It should have been banned in 2007 when we presented a mountain of evidence to the EPA. It should be banned today, it’s well past the time to end this practice.” On June 16, a subcommittee of the Joint Ways and Means Committee voted to pass SB 528, the bill to end field burning, on to the full committee. But the bill did not make it though the committee intact. An amendment to the bill changed it from a full ban on the practice to a phase-down in 2009 and a ban in 2010 and if the bill goes through, there will be another exception to the ban. Rep. Holvey of Eugene, one of the backers of a full burn on the practice says the most recent exception was a result of “trying to secure the necessary votes,” to pass the bill, “and that is sometimes a moving target.” Sen. Floyd Prozanski, also of Eugene, calls the amendment “a significant compromise.” He clarifies that the exception only allows for the 15,000 acres of burning in parts of Marion and Linn counties, in the Silverton Hills area. The burning would be confined to “steep terrain and/or identified species.” The identified species he says are bent grass and fine fescue. The burning would not be allowed in the Lane, Benton or the rest of Linn county he says, calling it “very restrictive.” The bill could make it through the Joint Ways and Means committee soon, and then make its way to the Oregon Senate’s floor for a vote. If this ban goes through, will it be enough to protect the health and safety of Oregonians? Steve Rodewald says, “After the legislation that slowed it down, I thought it’s been resolved.” But he says, “I failed my brother and his family by not seeing this to its end.”

Drop the f from fear. Fear promotes unnecessary vibrations in the body (ear). When you are vibrating and trying to feel/hear vibrations of sound, that is too much vibration to deal with. The ear operates best when it is unfettered.

Note: This is a weekly column by long time Corvallis resident and jazz drummer Dave Storrs

Supporters of online charter schools flooded the Capitol on Monday in an effort to beat back a bill they say would shut down Oregon’s largest existing online charter school and make the development of similar programs impossible. Ann-Marie Gurney was among dozens of parents who testified against Senate Bill 767 during a four-hour hearing June 15 before the House Revenue Committee. The committee approved the bill, sending it to the House for a floor vote expected later this week. Gurney told WW that Oregon Connections Academy, the Scio-based online charter school that educated her son in second grade this year, is doing an excellent job. But Gurney, who runs a home-based business in Northeast Portland, says she’s come to realize her son and other ORCA students are pawns in a much larger game over charter schools, which can employ non-union teachers and use fewer teachers than conventional public schools. “This isn’t about education at all,” Gurney says. “It’s about politics.” Now, online charter school supporters have used Oregon’s Public Records Law to show just how much politics are involved. They obtained emails between a lobbyist for the state’s 47,000-member teachers union and an Oregon Department of Education staff attorney. Those emails, they say, show that the lawyer for the ostensibly neutral state agency tinkered with SB 767 to serve the union’s interests and contradicted written instructions from Oregon State Board of Education chairman Duncan Wyse. In an April 2 email to ODE lawyer Cindy Hunt, Oregon Education Association lobbyist Laurie Wimmer asked Hunt to “fix” the language of SB 767. The bill would sharply limit online charter schools’ enrollment of students from different school districts and eliminate the Oregon State Board of Education’s ability to waive residency requirements. “The bill’s effective date needs to be written two ways: one, to nullify a waiver if granted before this [SB 767] passes, and two, to make it applicable on upon renewal,” Wimmer wrote. Hunt told WW she then shaped the final version of the bill per Wimmer’s request. The tiny mid-Willamette Valley school district of Scio has long sought a waiver from the State Board\of the requirement that 50 percent of an online charter school’s students live within its district. ORCA serves more than 2,500 students, few of whom live in Scio. Without such a waiver, supporters say the school would fail. Interest groups and lawmakers often circulate draft language to relevant state agencies and other parties for review of technical errors. But ORCA supporters say Hunt’s role went beyond merely reviewing the bill to outright advocacy for the OEA, a stalwart supporter of most Democratic lawmakers. The charter’s backers also point to an April 16 letter that Wyse wrote to legislative leaders, saying, “The board unanimously requests that the Legislature not adopt legislation that would either remove the board’s authority to grant waivers or effectively close existing online charter schools.” But that is exactly what the bill Hunt shaped for Wimmer and the OEA does. The Senate sent the bill to the House after passing it June 10, just following federal Education Secretary Arne Duncan warned that states unfriendly to charter schools might get less stimulus money. OEA spokeswoman Becca Uherbelau says the union has three concerns about online charter schools: that the public money flowing into them is not used transparently, that the quality of online education is uncertain, and that online education isn’t equally available to all students. Morgan Allen, ODE’s lobbyist, says Hunt did nothing wrong either by “fixing” the teachers union’s bill or helping craft legislation contrary to the board’s wishes. “Hunt has acted very appropriately,” Allen says. “ODE is neutral on [SB 767] and on the charter schools issue. She merely provided technical assistance.” Others are not so understanding. Greg Chaimov, who in his former job of legislative counsel was in charge of drafting legislation, says Hunt’s actions raise serious questions. “If I were the State Board, I would be extremely troubled by staff [Hunt] providing advice the State Board did not want pursued,” Chaimov says. “To have a staff member doing something adverse to the board’s interest would be troubling.” (ODE and elected State Superintendent of Public Instruction Susan Castillo operate independently of the board but provide it with staffing and other support.) Wyse acknowledges that Hunt’s advice to Wimmer contradicted his board’s wishes but says he’s not bothered. “The bill does take away our authority,” he says, “but I don’t think she was doing it to help OEA. She would offer assistance to anyone who asked.” State Sen. Vicki Walker (D-Eugene)—who along with Sen. Sen. Joanne Verger (D-Coos Bay) Rick Metsger (D-Welches) were the only Democrats to vote against SB 767 last week—says Wyse is being too kind. “I think there’s a clear conflict here,” Walker says. “The board took a position and Cindy should have played straight with that position and she didn’t.” Hunt says she has done nothing wrong. “If ORCA had come to me seeking advice, I would have helped them,” she says. “We are a neutral party.”

Last Tuesday, June 2, the president directed the chairmen of two Senate committees he has charged with crafting health care reform to focus their efforts on a plan that includes a national “public health insurance option operating alongside private plans.” “This will give [Americans] a better range of choices, make the health care market more competitive, and keep insurance companies honest,” Obama wrote in a letter to Senator Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts (chairman of the Senate committee on health, education, labor, and pensions) and Senator Max Baucus of Montana (chairman of the Senate finance committee). Meanwhile Senator Wyden, who also sits on Senator Baucus’ finance committee, seems to disagree with President Obama on the national public health insurance option, which Wyden’s 2006 bipartisan health care reform bill excludes. Wyden’s bill, the Healthy Americans Act, was co-sponsored by Republican Utah Senator Robert Bennett, and will serve alongside the president’s letter as a basis for the finance committee’s discussions on health care reform. Senator Bennett is on record saying he will oppose any health reform with a national public insurance option and Wyden’s office has cited bipartisanship as a reason not to support the public insurance option. Nevertheless, Wyden’s reluctance to support an idea now explicitly favored by the president has some influential Democrats concerned. “Bipartisanship is great thing,” said former chairman of the Democratic National Committee Howard Dean last Friday, June 5, at a health care town hall at Portland Community College on N Killingsworth, organized by Oregon Congressman Earl Blumenauer. “But I do not think bipartisanship is the end. I think it’s the means, and if we have to sacrifice a great health care bill to get bipartisanship then it’s time to throw bipartisanship over the side.” Dean even called on Wyden by name when asked what the audience could do to make a national public health insurance option a reality. “Ron Wyden,” he said. “We don’t know where he’s gonna be on this yet. And you can push him very hard on this and you should. The clear, focused message is that there must be a public insurance option… that this is the price of public support.” Unlike Dean, Wyden’s fellow Oregon Democratic Senator and congressmen have so far been noticeably silent when it comes to criticizing Wyden’s plan in public, despite their support of a national public health insurance option. “Senator [Jeff] Merkley supports a national public option that would be open to all Americans,” says Merkley’s spokeswoman, Julie Edwards, when asked what her boss thinks of Wyden’s plan. “I’ll leave it at that.”  

How to Win the Online Mcgraw Hill Business Strategy Game
A History of the Canadian Dominion, William McGillivray and the Canadian Clique
History of Russians in the Pacific Northwest
The Basics of Making Cheese
Lyman Beecher and the Second Great Awakening
Bus Schedules
The Tulsa Race Riots
An Inquisition Torture Session
History of Mathematics in India
Corvallis dogs and Jack London's Call of the Wild
Corvallis Serial Killers
Thomas Egarton Hogg and Corvallis
The Modoc Indian War in Oregon
The fur trade in the Northwest
Imprisonment of OSU students 1942
The History of Astoria and Washington Irving's Trip to Oregon

According to reports being posted on independent blogs and media in Oregon by "A motley crew of queers, anti-fascists, and anarchists", an anti-gay organizer for the Nazi National Socialist Movement was assaulted while waiting for a bus of cohorts who never appeared: "We found 41 year old "Spanish Blue Blood," a self proclaimed "stormtrooper" of the National Socialist Movement and senior moderator of the NSM's official party forum, sitting on a bus bench waiting for a crew that never showed. And beat his ass. The second he saw us he split for the street
but didn't get far til we caught up with him and gave him what he deserved. "Spanish Blue Blood," who lives in the Colonie area of Albany, had been trying for weeks to draw up enough people to stage a counter protest of Albany's Capital Pride march but apparently he couldn't even get a single person out. He recently celebrated his 41st birthday on June 9th so we delivered some belated gifts-in the form of tightly
balled fists. The gang beat him until the cops showed and we made our way back into the park with no arrests."

Dear Savage

I'm going to say up front that I know I am a complete and total A..hole.

I have been with my current boyfriend for about three years and we are living together. About a year ago, our relationship started to go bad when I found out I was pregnant and ended up having an abortion. Every time I look at him, all I see is this baby I didn't have and I feel horrible to the point where now I don't like him to even touch me anymore. I don't want to hurt him. I just don't see how I can carry on in this relationship anymore.

Compounding all of that, an old flame from Europe is back in my life, and I am still in love with him and I know he still loves me. This guy was my knight in shining armor in college but he had to return to the UK, so we couldn't really have anything. But now the possibility is there because our lives are at a stage where we could move and make it work. I have no idea how to deal with any of this. The old flame looks better and better all the time and I am doing so badly here, but I don't want to hurt anyone. I don't see any route at this point that won't end with at least one person in tears. Please help!

-Definitely Out Of My Depth

Presumably there was a good reason why you decided against having a child with the boyfriend. Perhaps you told yourselves that it wasn't the right time, DOOMD, but it seems more than likely you realized, consciously or subconsciously, that he wasn't the right person: He wasn't the man with whom you wanted to have children. Or perhaps the boyfriend was so strongly opposed to becoming a father that you decided to have an abortion—an abortion you instantly regretted and resent him for.

Either way, DOOMD, I don't see how your current relationship survives.

And we haven't even addressed the existence of the Euro. You still have strong feelings for your old college flame—clearly—and if you stay with the boyfriend for the rest of your life just to spare his feelings, DOOMD, your resentments will metastasize.

Again, I don't see how this relationship survives.

But none of that answers your question, does it? You've asked me to identify a way out—a route out—that spares everyone's feelings. Sorry, DOOMD, but I can't help you. If you pass on the Euro because you can't stand the thought of hurting the boyfriend, you'll be miserable. And if you stay with the boyfriend, you're only postponing his misery. Your resentments will grow and spread, like so many tumors, until they ultimately kill this relationship. If the Euro has moved on by that point, then all three of you will wind up miserable and alone.

- Dan Savage

Hi Kids!

Friday, June 26th we are bringing in LOCAL COLOR, with Armin Mueller-Stahl and Ray Liotta.

We will be holding over IN PURSUIT OF PANAMA, awarded Best Documentary at the 2009 da Vinci Film Festival, and featuring Corvallis natives Garrett Martin and Ryan Shaw. Also held over: EASY VIRTUE, with Jessica Biel, Colin Firth, and Kristin Scott Thomas. SUGAR, with Algenis Perez Soto, will play Friday, Saturday, and Sunday only.

Check the schedule at darksidecinema.com for show times.

MONDAYS you can save $1.25 off your movie ticket if you are a member of the Corvallis-Benton Chamber Coalition.

TUESDAYS you can save $1 off your movie ticket by bringing in a canned food donation for Linn-Benton Food Share.

Coming soon:
FOOD, INC, TYSON, and MOON ... and lots more great film. Check out everything that's Coming Soon.
Playing Friday, June 26th thru Thursday, July 2nd (click a link to jump to the section).
LOCAL COLOR
EASY VIRTUE
IN PURSUIT OF PANAMA
SUGAR
OTHER STUFF
LOCAL COLOR --R
Review by Paul Turner

LOCAL COLOR is a loving look back at the pivotal summer in the life of writer-director George Gallo, a fine arts painter in real life.

Stop me if you've heard this before...Troubled teen pesters reclusive master to teach him the classical art form because school ain't doing it for him. Teen shows master his work. Master grunts at the work. Teen persists. And so on.

Sound like FINDING FORRESTER, with Sean Connery?

In LOCAL COLOR we have Armin Mueller-Stahl. For those of you not familiar with this actor, he usually plays the old German/Russian with an edge who takes over the screen when he walks into the frame. He graces LOCAL COLOR with that same presence. The guy is pushing somewhere around 80 years old and has worked his whole life, so it is very likely you've seen him in something--and noticed him.

Meanwhile.

In 1974, in the suburb of Port Chester, New York, the teenage aspiring artist John Talia, Jr. (Trevor Morgan) finds out that his favorite Russian painter Nicoli Seroff (Armin Mueller-Stahl) lives nearby. Driven by the adolescent notion that a renowned painting master would have anything to do with him, John pops over to Seroff's place to makes friends, and finds a bitter, alcoholic former painter.

When Nicoli travels to the Pennsylvania countryside for the summer, he invites John to go with him. John thinks he's going to learn how to paint. Nicoli needs a handyman. John's homophobic dad (Ray Liotta) smirks, "So, 'teaching someone to paint' is what they're calling it these days." I hope you're sitting down: John defies his dad and goes anyway.

Once in the countryside, we see the art of painting come alive as we are shown the hues and tones of the surroundings, and a glimpse into the methods that make a great work. Other sides of Nicoli's personality come to bear--primarily his sense of humor. It provides a nice contrast to the drunken rages. In an unexpected appearance, Ron Perlman (HELLBOY) is the pretentious art dealer adding to the dramatic landscape. He's not playing HELLBOY, and he is perfect in this part.

Carla (Samantha Mathis), the expected hottie neighbor, creates a focus for the kid's summer crush. Thankfully, this is handled masterfully and with sensitivity. The Carla character could have been a throwaway but Mathis added welcome depth, preventing the most significant female role in the movie from being nothing more than a place to hang a plot point. She synchronizes the recent loss of her son with Nicoli's loss of his wife to form a two-person community of grieving. Nicoli's drunken rages flow from the depths of his grief, which does nothing to relieve the tension in the master/student dynamic. However, this information gives us a deeper look and perhaps some understanding into how all these people fit together.

The most distracting thing in LOCAL COLOR is the language. Okay, we know the old Russian is pissed off--fine. But his adjectives and adverbs shouldn't be limited to one word.

LOCAL COLOR is not a perfect movie. But it has an old story most people don't mind hearing, accented with a love of its topic: painting. It is this love that threads the characters and story together into a very enjoyable summer in the Pennsylvania countryside. Those who know painting will find depth and poignancy in the way the subject is treated. Those outside of that world will be brought into it with awe and appreciation. And although we can see the story's end from a mile off, our affection for these characters allows us to grant Mr. Gallo some forgiveness.
EASY VIRTUE --PG-13

EASY VIRTUE poster Adapted from a Noel Coward play, EASY VIRTUE is essentially a tale of Old World manners vs. New World freedom.

The year is 1929, and John Whitaker (Ben Barnes) has just married a feisty American race car driver named Larita (Jessica Biel). John is the eldest of the Whitakers--a prim English family--and when he returns home with Larita on his arm, his mother (Kristin Scott Thomas) is none too pleased. John's choice of a loud, brash American has raised everyone's eyebrows, including his sisters, Hilda (Kimberly Nixon) and Marion (Katherine Parkinson). The only person who seems to approve of Larita is Mr. Whitaker--John's weary, put-upon father (Colin Firth). Try as she might, Larita has a hard time impressing the icy, unforgiving Mrs. Whitaker, and indeed, the entire Whitaker clan proves to be a rather eccentric, unhappy bunch.

John had promised Larita a short visit, but due to pressure from his mother, they stay longer than planned. Time drags on, and the friction between Mrs. Whitaker and Larita only gets worse. When Hilda digs up something scandalous from Larita's past, tensions bubble to a boiling point, and Larita is forced to face some rather hard truths about herself and her new husband.

For fans of period films, EASY VIRTUE is a visual treat, set on a sprawling country estate and with gorgeous and impeccable costumes. Director Stephan Elliot (THE ADVENTURES OF PRISCILLA, QUEEN OF THE DESERT) tries to inject a bit of modern zing by filling scenes with contemporary renditions of Cole Porter songs, while Biel and Scott Thomas breathe some life into their lightweight characters. Though the source play, with its airy plot, isn't one of Coward's most popular works, fans of Colin Firth's work in costume comedies and dramas will be delighted with the actor's performance here.
Held over!! IN PURSUIT OF PANAMA
Review by Ben Shepard

IN PURSUIT OF PANAMA poster In Pursuit of Panama seems to be surprising to everyone who sees it--one of those rare films where the viewer becomes a participant, and each participant's story fuses individually with the story on screen. It is an intricately metaphorical documentary, executed with a literary finesse rarely seen in first-time filmmakers. A film you must listen to closely. It is surely a real-life adventure through seven countries, but at its heart it's a film about the paths we take in that distinctive transition from youth to adulthood--a thoughtful look at the inhibitions that trap us and the freedoms we may attain, at the possibilities of our dreams, and the real, tangible practicalities of them.

A documentary with the pace and feel of a movie, it's one of the few documentaries that I wanted to watch again as soon as it was over. And one of the few documentaries that may change the course of my own life--by the credits I was taking stock; and before the last credit rolled, I was dead set on bringing to life my own Panama adventure.

IN PURSUIT OF PANAMA won Best Documentary at the 2009 da Vinci Film Festival.
SUGAR --R
Review by Roger Ebert

Poster: SUGAR SUGAR approaches with tender care the story of a kid from the Dominican Republic who has a strong pitching arm and a good heart. Miguel Santos, known as "Sugar" because of his sweet personality, is recruited from the fields of dreams in his homeland by Major League baseball, and assigned to an Iowa farm club that is very, very far from home.

I thought I could guess the story. But I couldn't. There isn't a single scene in this film where it really matters which side wins a game, and it doesn't end with a no-hitter. It looks with care at Sugar, and there are a thousand Sugars for every Sammy Sosa. Probably more. Baseball players have become an important export for the Dominican Republic, and poor families like Miguel's dream of the day when sons will be sending home paychecks. A minor league salary represents wealth.

The film is knowledgeable about how the system works. American teams maintain elaborate Dominican training facilities, send talent scouts to local leagues and keep recruits under close watch: Room and board is provided, there are security guards to enforce discipline, the kids get a few days off once in a while. This is heaven for them. For years, their dreams have been filled with visions of big-time baseball.

SUGAR isn't filled with melodramatic developments and a hard landing on U.S. soil. Baseball seems, in fact, a friendly if realistic destination, an income where there was none before. If very few players ever make it into a Major League starting lineup, well, they know that going in. What's special about the film--and this is a very special film--is how closely it observes the emotional uncertainties of a stranger in a strange land, not speaking the language, not knowing the customs, beset with homesickness and the dread of disappointing his family.

Algenis Perez Soto, a young baseball player in his acting debut, embodies Sugar with a natural sincerity. The movie regards him with sympathy. Sugar isn't "torn with conflict," as movie ads like to say, but weighed with worry. He finds himself boarding in the friendly Iowa farm home of Helen and Earl Higgins (Ann Whitney and Richard Bull), who have taken in a generation of new players for the local farm club. They know their baseball. ("You've been dropping your arm," Helen tells him, and Sugar doesn't disagree.)

There is also the presence of their granddaughter Anne (Ellary Porterfield), who sends out mixed messages; she's obviously attracted to him and invites him to meet her friends, evangelicals who would like to get him on board. On the team, he bonds with Jorge (Rayniel Rufino), a more seasoned player from the Dominican Republic, and Brad Johnson (Andre Holland), who is the same color but from a different world; if baseball doesn't pan out, he'll go back for an advanced degree from Stanford.

For Sugar, who mumbles he's had "a little" high school, everything depends on baseball panning out. On their regular phone calls, his mother fears she can sense something troubling in his voice. He finds the farm system is supportive, and he gets help from coaches who care, but there is always another player waiting behind him in line.

Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, who wrote and directed SUGAR, are serious filmmakers who have no desire to make a "sports movie." They've obviously done their research on the Major League farm system and the men who pass through it; at some level, this entire tryout process is for the benefit of a fan in the grandstands with a wise-ass opinion about the "new kid." Remembering a day when Sammy Sosa was booed at Wrigley Field, I see it now in a wholly new light.

The true subject of SUGAR is the immigrant experience in America. Boden and Fleck are interested in newcomers to this country, doing what they can to make a living and succeed. Whether this happens for Sugar, or how it might happen, you will see for yourself. The filmmakers are too observant to settle for a quick, conventional payoff. For them this film is a chapter in the more interesting story of the lifetime Sugar has ahead of him. Algenis Perez Soto plays the character so openly, so naturally, that an interesting thing happens: Baseball is only the backdrop, not the subject. This is a wonderful film.
OTHER STUFF: NOPE.

Okay, I lied about writing an essay this week. However, I did write a powerful review of LOCAL COLOR. Almost as good. If you buy my books, you will always have a plentiful supply of my wit and banality at your fingertips.

As always, thanks for your continued support!

Paul Turner
Dodging the Butterfly Nets

Darkside Cinema
215 SW 4th
Corvallis, OR 97333
darksidecinema.com
541·752·4161

Week of June 16th, 2009

BLOCK 15 RESTAURANT AND BREWERY
300 W JEFFERSON AVE (758-2077)
www.block15.com
Every Monday: Acoustic Folk Jam, FREE
All local Musicians and those passing through are invited to jam at Block 15 every Monday at 7pm. The Monday jam session has developed due to local musicians wanting a pulic venue to gather and make music. Those attending should expect any kind of acoustic music. Bluegrass, folk, pop, blues, country, swing, whatever moves you. Vocal songs and instrumentals. Any kind of acoustic instrument should work. Music that does not require electricity or batteries. For more info, contact Sam Holmes at sameldon@gmail.com
Friday, June 19th, 9:00 pm
“American Nobody”
In 2007, American Nobody’s music joined the ranks of Sufjan Stephens, Xavier Rudd, and Jack Johnson in being featured on the PBS television series “Road Trip Nation.” American Nobody has mastered the art of looping as one of Portland, Oregon’s emerging singer/songwriter acts. His flashy guitar chops and robust voice deliver catchy hooks and melodies that fuse the influences of Jeff Buckley and Ed Vedder with the legendary looping of Keller Williams and Tim Reynolds. Weaving tight layers of voice, guitar, bass tones, and percussion, he has redefined the modern concept of singer and songwriter.

BOMBS AWAY CAFE
2527 NW MONROE AVE (757-7221)
www.bombsawaycafe.com
Wednesday, June 17th, 10:00, $3
Dossier
Indie Rock
Thursday, June 18th, FREE, 7:30
Curtis Monette
Inspired by the looping concoctions of such acts as Victor Wooten, Tim Reynolds, and Keller Williams…Curtis Monette takes every gig as an opportunity to experiment, freak out, and bedazzle listeners, as he loops guitars, percussion, and vocals live to create a playful blend of reggae, funk, and bluegrass that can only be described as, ‘curtronica.’ At one moment he may play the role of a singer/songwriter and then next he is blazing through a shredding solo over a trance groove.
Friday, June 19th, 10:00, $5
Taarka
Emerging from a long tradition of gypsy circus troubadours come the solar- powered travelers: carriers of a new musical light; Taarka. This merry band is the culmination of the new millennial, sonic adventures of David Tiller (mandolin, tenor guitar, vocals), Enion Pelta-Tiller (five string violin, vocals), Daniel Plane (cello, vocals), Troy Robey (bass, vocals), and Dale Largent (percussion) - a virtuosic cadre of performers who have roamed the freeways and backroads of the new and old acoustic caravan trail in search of a revolutionary ancient sound for modern times.
Saturday, June 20th, 10:00 pm, $5
The Bush Pilots
The Bush Pilots are a bluegrass-style trio that plays their original songs and add a variety of interpretations of other tunes. Their unique style is difficult to place into a single category. Call it what you will, newgrass, jazzgrass, or bluegrass with a twist—no matter what you call it, Bush Pilots music will put a smile on your face and have you tapping your foot in no time!

CALAPOOPIA BREWING CO.
140 HILL ST. ALBANY, OR
www.calapooiabrewing.com
Thursday June 18th, 7:30 pm
Swing Habit
Albanian Jazz Trio
Friday, June 19th, 8:00 pm
Jake Duncan
“I have something to say. something to convey, something to express. I love music, and creating music playing didjeridu is something I am incredibly passionate about in all senses of the word. Music, instruments, in their raw natural sound and form is something I am deeply inspired by. The works of Rodrigo Y Gabriela, classical composers, ondrej smeykal and talented musicians big and small alike drive me down my path to create and invoke feeling through music so beautiful and terrible it could save you from any depth, or kill with a glance. I am 18 years old, and have been playing didjeridu since I was 11. ” From Jake’s Myspace Page
Saturday, June 20th, 8:00 pm
Robert Richter
Portland native Robert Richter began teaching himself guitar at the age of 12 when he purchased a Sears “Silvertone” guitar from a neighbor for $5 and the promise to mow his lawn for a month. (He still has the guitar) Over the years Richter has become known as a versatile guitarist and songwriter known for his ability to perform a variety of styles from acoustic to electric to blues to folk. His skilled and emotional slide guitar playing often works his audiences into frenzy.
With a strong powerful voice, Richter is electrifying with his energy, enthusiasm, sense of humor and most of all his innate ability to “connect with people.” His original songs range from the uptempo rock-a-billy blues style originated at the legendary Sun Records Studio in Memphis to Dylan influenced songs about life and love.
Richter’s live show often includes talented violinist Jessica Hitchborn. Hitchborn, the winner of back to back Oregon State Fiddling titles adds her unique sound and energy to the music often bringing audiences to their feet in appreciation.
Sunday, June 21st, 4 pm
Blues Jam

CLOUD 9 & THE DOWNWARD DOG
126 & 130 SW 1ST St. (541-753-9900)
www.dinecloud9.com & www.drinkthedog.com
At Cloud 9
Thursday, June 18th, 9 pm
Improv Comedy Theater
Not the typical fodder of Corvallis week night entertainment… shakes
up audiences with improv absurdity… as …actors take turns
performing whatever silliness comes into their heads based on audience
suggestions.
Friday, June 19th, 10 pm
International Funkatronic Voodoo presents:
Astro Tek Electric Boogaloo
w/ Dj’s C4 Logic & T-Rex
6 turntables, 2 far out Dj’s

CROWBAR
214 SW 2ND ST. (753-7373)
Behind the Downtown American Dream Pizza
www.adpizza.com
Thursday, June 18th, 6 pm
Paul Lemoine
Acoustic Hits
Saturday, June 20th, 6 pm
Mark Cleaver
Acoustic Rockin’

FIREWORKS BAR AND GRILL
On Hwy 99th in South Corvallis (541-754-6958)
www.FireWorksVenue.com
Thursday, June 18, 8pm
Sam Marshall Trio, Acoustic Blues Roots
- The Sam Marshall Trio formed in the spring of 2008. With Bennett Kling on bass and Collin Andresen on drums (both having played with The Jazz Underground Big Band and The Jayne Simpson Group), the trio achieves a progressive roots sound that is highly groove and improvisationally oriented. The trio has brought their unique sound to venues throughout the Northwest sharing bills with roots music staples such as Tony Furtado and the Joe McMurrian Quartet. “Marshall is a gifted blues guitarist whose style reflects a firm foundation in the Blues, while moving with a Jazzy, almost-improvisational progression.” - What’s Up Magazine
Friday, June 19, 8pm
Al Rivers, Blues Guitar and Vocals
- “Aw yeah, this is blues the way we like it. Rain fall. Tree shakin’. Likin’ yo’ peaches. Truck broke. Good gal gone. Al Rivers walks the same old rode, but utterly without pretension or artifice. He has a great, scraping voice and a nimble, dirty way with the guitar.” - Victory Music Review, Tacoma, WA 2006.
Saturday, June 20, 8pm
The Skunky Bunch, Funky Rhythm & Blues
- The Skunky Bunch is a fun lovin’ high energy funk band, based in Oregon’s mid-Willamette Valley. The six-piece band performs covers of artists such as George Clinton, Buddy Guy, and Busta Rhymes and brings many funky originals. The group, comprised of music majors and recent graduates are all multi-instrumentalists; performances feature a tight always danceable rhythm section, funky horns, and soulful vocals combined with anything from talk box, to nose flute and didgeridoo creating an unforgettable sound.
Summer Solstice, Sunday, June 21, 1-9pm
Southtown Street Party & HOUR Exchange Marketplace Bazaar
1pm - Muti Marimba, Zimbabwean Music & Percussion
3pm - Elles & Adam, Soulful Americana
4pm - Tony Noble, Delta Blues Slide Guitar
5pm - Jake Duncan, Home Grown Didjeridu
6pm - Mill About Smartly, Irish Tunes & Sea Shanties
7pm - The People’s Front, Reggae Funk Fusion
The first Southtown Street Party of the season is co-sponsored with the Corvallis HOUR Exchange Annual Summer Gathering and features a Marketplace Bazaar. FireWorks will offer food and drink specials all day. For more info visit www.SouthtownSounds.com
Monday, June 22, 8pm
Southtown Open Mic Talent Search with CASH PRIZE for Top 3 Acts!
- FireWorks hosts this weekly showcase of local talent - who knows what performance surprises the evening will hold? The show starts with a non-competitive Open Mic warmup round, then performers have a chance to compete in the Talent Search for the cash! (All competing performers are asked to contribute $5 for the cash prize purse.) For more info call (541)754-6958.

PEACOCK BAR AND GRILL
125 SW 2ND ST (754-8522)
www.myspace.com/peacockbargrill
Karaoke on the Top on Sundays, Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays.
DJ on the Top on Thursdays, Fridays, and some Saturdays.

CLUB PLATINUM
126 SW 4TH ST. (738-6996)
www.platinumvenue.com
Wednesday, June 17th - No cover and tons of hot Country hits. Don’t miss the new Wild West Wednesdays. No Cover. $1 beers all night, every night!
Thursday, June 18th - Ladies Night Thursdays with DJ Hes starting at 9PM!
Video Dj!! Beer Pong from 9PM-11PM! Join DJ Hes every Thursday Night. Ladies no Cover until 11PM! The best old and new school hip-hop on the 1’s & 2’s. Be here for the party every Thursday!! $1 beers all night, every night!
Saturday, June 20th - Rockstar Saturdays; 9pm; Come party to the best hits of the 80s & 90’s at Club Platinum every Saturday! $1 beers all night, every night!!

WINESTYLES
2333 NW Kings Blvd. (738-9463)
www.winestyles.net/corvallis
Friday, June 19th, 7:00 pm
Pete Kozak & Michael Fridley
Eclectic Folk
Pete & Michael will be playing great eclectic folk music at WineStyles this evening. Guitar, banjo, great vocals and more!
Friday, June 26th, 7 pm
Adam Scramstad
Adam is an Acoustic/Electric Finger-style & Blues Musician, born and raised in Oregon. Performing regularly throughout the Pacific Northwest, Scramstad’s reputation as a professional Blues Guitarist & Vocalist is rapidly becoming widespread.
Although he maintains a focus on Solo Acoustic Delta Slide & Country Blues (both vocal and instrumental), Adam also performs with Blues Guitar Legend Terry Robb (Adam’s Producer & Mentor)– as an Acoustic Duo as well as slinging electric guitar in the acclaimed Terry Robb Band.
 

Most of you must have heard of Global Warming which has resulted in dramatic climate changes happening in every corner of the world. Our life on Earth is being threatened more than ever by the ever increasing number of such “natural” disasters. Some may argue that they are natural disasters which human can’t control, but recent research and data have proven that most of them are human made. Below are some supporting data from reliable sources:
In 2006, the United Nations reported that livestock production is the greatest contributor to global warming:
“When emissions from land use and land use change are included, the livestock sector accounts for 9 percent of CO2 deriving from human-related activities, but produces a much larger share of even more harmful greenhouse gases. It generates 65 per cent of human-related nitrous oxide, which has 296 times the Global Warming Potential (GWP) of CO2. Most of this comes from manure. And it accounts for respectively 37 per cent of all human-induced methane (23 times as warming as CO2), which is largely produced by the digestive system of ruminants, and 64 per cent of ammonia, which contributes significantly to acid rain.”

There is also a research article in Animal Science Journal, 2007: It reported that producing 1kg beef leads to the emission of greenhouse gases with a warming potential, equivalent to 36.4 kg of CO2; releases fertilizing compounds equivalent to 340 g. of sulphur dioxide and 59 g. of phosphate; and consumes 169 mega-joules of energy. 1 kg of beef is responsible for the equivalent of the amount of CO2 emitted by the average European car every 250 km, and burns enough energy to light a 100-watt bulb for 20 days. Over two-thirds of the energy consumed goes towards producing and transporting animals feed".

We, as humans, have done enough damage to our Earth that we are reaping the consequences due to our ignorance. But we can minimize consequences by eating less or no meat which will gradually shrink the meat production to help with our environment greatly, and mostly importantly, our compassionate way of life will bring the best to ourselves and to our Earth’s survivability.
Best wishes for your health,
Best wishes for our Earth’s health too,


Goodbye for now until next time…

Friends and family of Melissa Stephens, the 55-year-old alternative school director who was arrested June 10 on allegations of raping a 10-year-old boy five years ago, are distraught over the charges, saying they don’t believe the respected community member could ever commit such acts. Stephens’ sister, Deborah Alysoun of Marylhurst, said the family has received “frightening” phone calls and e-mails from people angry about the news, some who have proclaimed her guilty even before a trial. “It is very scary and it has made my family very fearful,” she said. Police arrested Stephens at her work, the youth-oriented Willow Cottage Arts and Academic Program in Tualatin (18815 S.W. Boones Ferry Road), after an investigation started on June 8 that gave detectives probable cause to take Stephens into custody. She was charged with allegedly engaging in multiple sex acts, including intercourse, with the child for about a year. Charges include first-degree rape, sodomy and sex abuse. She is out on bail and is scheduled to be arraigned June 23 at 8:30 a.m. in Washington County Circuit Court. Stephens has stepped down as administrative director of the Willowbrook Center for Development of Human Potential, which conducts the Willowbrook Summer Arts Program at Tualatin’s Brown’s Ferry Park. The six-week camp caters to as many as 400 children every summer, ages 3 to 18. The camp will begin as scheduled on June 29, according to Board of Directors Chair Peter Thacker, but without participation of Stephens. Willow Cottage, which Stephens founded in 1993, does not run in the summer. “While there has been a great deal of media coverage regarding Melissa Stephens, another long term Willowbrook employee, we want to assure you that ENSURING YOUR CHILD’S SAFETY has always been, and is, our top priority,” said an e-mail sent to parents by the Willowbrook board of directors. Thacker, who is a parent with kids in the program, said Willowbrook does background screening of all its employees, including Stephens. “The camp really has been an incredibly safe haven,” he said. But now that these charges have been filed he worries it could hurt the innocent nature of the camp. “It makes us look very deeply at ourselves as people and as a camp.” While many have come forward to say they don’t believe Stephens could have committed the crime, some parents who have children in the Willowbrook summer camp say they won’t be so quick to jump to her defense until more is known. One parent, Pam Crow, is also a therapist that deals with sexual abuse cases in private practice and at CARES Northwest, a child abuse evaluation program. She has two children who have been in the camp for seven years and was worried, like other parents she said she has spoken to, about her children’s safety. But she feels the camp is being open and honest about the arrest and is reassured that her teenagers will be safe this year when they take part in the camp. “I was concerned of course about whether or not she had been around my kids at the camp,” she said. “My understanding is that she wasn’t.” Crow can’t speak to the specifics of these allegations, but in general she said people should be wary about proclaiming an alleged abusers innocence solely because they believe they are a good person. “You can’t tell if someone has this problem by virtue of the fact that they are a nice person,” she said. “In my experience usually it doesn’t get as far as this has gotten unless there is some reason for concern.” Although, she added, “I certainly think it’s premature for people to jump on a bandwagon in any direction.”

By now many of you may have heard what happened after Blowpony Saturday night. Unfortunately, I am one of the people who was physically assualted and then received negligent treatment from the Portland police afterward. Right now, I'm planning on going to the Sexual Minorities Roundtable meeting on July 14th to talk about my experience. Below is a copy of the statement that I plan on reading there. If anyone would like to come, would love the support. thanks.
It is with a heavy heart and a bruised face that I write this letter but I think it's important that my experience be known.
In the early morning hours of Sunday June 14th, I was the victim of a hate crime on the corner of NW 6th and Couch. This happened outside of Casey's, a gay bar where I am a dj and it was 2:30 in the morning, after the bar had closed.
When I came outside to make my way home, I saw that a friend of mine was talking with the Portland Police. She had been punched in the face by a man who had been spouting homophobic remarks at her and another friend of mine. Her nose was broken and the police had arrived to investigate this crime. While I was watching this interaction, a group of men approached the scene also shouting homophobic remarks. I walked up to them to ask them to leave the area and the next thing I remember, I was on the ground with my mouth bleeding. I didn't really know or understand what had happened. I had been punched in the mouth and knocked out.
The Portland Police department, who was on the scene, was completely negligent to my situation. They talked to the guy who said I had started it, yet there wasn't a scratch on him and I was the one on the ground bleeding. As I was sitting on the ground, the police officers refused to let a friend of mine bring me ice for my face, threatening to arrest him if he attempted to approach me. Three police officers were standing over me, firing questions at me in a harsh, aggressive manner. Having been the victim of hate crimes in the past and feeling extremely confused, hurt, and threatened, I went into shock and was unable to answer their questions. They responded to this by rolling their eyes at each other and laughing, implying that my response to this trauma was ridiculous. Even though two of my friends who witnessed the incident were able to tell the police what happened, they refused to do anything about it because I was unable to talk. Not once did they offer to provide medical attention to me or my injuries. They ended up leaving me there with a friend and the guy who did this was still in the area. When my friend asked if we could get a ride home, they responded with "We're not a taxi service" as they walked away from us. Luckily we were able to get back into the bar and wait for a cab.

The lack of compassion and negligent response from the Portland Police Department is not isolated to my situation. In fact, earlier in the evening, people on the balcony above the bar had thrown several objects onto patrons of the bar who were outside smoking. These items included glass bottles, cups of urine, and many homophobic and hateful and violent remarks. The police had come to the bar due to capacity concerns and refused to acknowledge the dangerous situation that was happening outside of the bar. They actually demanded that we refuse re-entry to the bar, keeping the bar patrons outside and in the line of danger.
On Sunday afternoon, the same day, a friend of mine, a transgender woman, was assaulted on Portland public transportation. Her assailant made homophobic and transphobic remarks and physically pushed her. The police came and found the man who did this but when she asked to file a report, they essentially refused to let her, claiming that it wasn't necessary because the man was intoxicated.
The man who broke my friend's nose was quickly arrested, handcuffed, and placed in the police car while the police were asking my friend questions about what happened. The man that punched me was talked to while leaning against his car and let go shortly after. The man who punched my friend was black and the man who punched me was white. I also find this extremely problematic. While I'm grateful that the man who punched my friend was apprehended, I don't feel like the two assailants were treated in the same manner and it's hard for me to believe that race had nothing to do with it.
Again, I don't feel like these are isolated incidents but that there is a larger problem at hand here. At minimum, this is a training issue. This is something that needs to be addressed immediately and seriously by not only the police department but by the entire community. It's time that the Portland police stop allowing hate crimes to happen. It's time that the Portland police show some compassion and understanding to all of Portland's residents. If the Portland police are unable or unwilling to do this, it's time we as community members hold them accountable and let them know that their negligence will not be tolerated.
Jose

On another note we all need to unify and stand up for each of our community family members, less then two months earlier I was attacked and punched in the face just outside the door of our club by a male who was harassing queer men & women who were outside for fresh air and to have a smoke, this male was from the top floor apt where many cups of urine, beer and glass bottles were thrown down upon people standing outside this past Saturday, he was arrested and I'm still waiting for my day in court?
I think it's very important we don't give up ground and that we all stand together on this and all other attacks, we need to hold a discussion and I plan personally holding a demo on the corner where Jose, Heather, and Kayenne were attacked anyone care to join me?

XO
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