Letters to the Editor: June 3, 2016

‘Dumped’ headline fits

I saw in the News-Register that a few people did not like the words used pertaining to County Commissioner Allen Springer being “dumped.”

Frankly, the headline was clever and real because Springer supported the Riverbend Landfill.

A certain amount of people mourn the heavy load of rot that the earth must hold, never mind the air that people and creatures must breathe.

I enjoyed the article about the proposed Recology tranfser station in McMinnville by the publisher of the paper. He knows, as he has been witnessing all the pit falls of the dump such as Riverbend.

First of all, Riverbend should have been closed years ago. One day the earth will speak and the gigantic man-made monstrosity will crack wide open. But right now, we see there is a first payment coming of what the believers of the dump made happen.

It is the Recology site in McMinnville that is like a snake circling around itself. This process is a continuing tragedy.

The circle contains the reminder of the odor from the trash at both ends of town. The value of the wonderful town of Mac will not go down because the people will just tolerate the smell.

The battle against Riverbend can further be understood loud and clear because Ed Gormley, the former mayor, was for the landfill at Riverbend and now cries about what is going to happen — lots of traffic and lots of trash on the road and, of course, the odor as Recology is roosting at Gormley’s front door of business.

Helen Bitar

Sheridan

Where’s dump outrage?

Jeb Bladine reminds McMinnville in his May 26 column to look carefully at Recology’s recently approved transfer station at its recycling facility in McMinnville’s industrial zone.

It goes without saying that the transfer station needs to be designed to exacting standards so that neighbors are not subjected to odor, trash and vermin.

Would that Bladine had expressed the same concerns about Waste Management’s Riverbend dump for lo these many years, a dump on the best farmland in the county, in a severe seismic hazard zone, often surrounded by flood water, with documented leachate leaks, flying vermin and wind-blown trash contaminating neighbors’ fields.

When the county went out of its way to rezone the dump as farmland so it could expand onto more farmland, did anyone at the News-Register get his knickers in a twist about that bit of legislative legerdemain? And when expansion plans were approved, again and again and again, was there editorial concern about the neighbors?

Even after the paper published an in-depth article about the dump’s documented leachate leaks, there was no editorial comment urging commissioners to take a long hard look at a problem that DEQ ignores.

Waste Management’s Forest Grove Transfer Station is about as close to homes as the News-Register is from the dance studio across Third Street. I drove by that transfer station for years without knowing what it was. I continue to drive by it almost every week and have never smelled it. The same could not be said about Riverbend Landfill.

Recology proposes building a state-of-the-art recycling and waste reduction facility in a fully-enclosed building in an industrial zone. Waste Management is building a permanent mountain with 20,000,000 tons of leaking garbage of unknown origin on prime farmland. Which facility should the News Register be concerned about?

Ilsa Perse

Carlton

Move past racial lines

I applaud the McMinnville School District officials for supporting the demonstrations for equality, and just as importantly, the students who were brave enough to organize and speak their minds.

It’s time for all citizens to look past the color of one’s skin and remember that color is a descriptor, like the color of eyes or hair. It does not imply worth, or whether or not a person is prone to be good or bad. It’s just a color. I’ve tasted multiple colors of apples, and I liked them all.

Linda Schwichtenberg

McMinnville

No Trash Mountain

All those who want “Trash Mountain” in McMinnville, raise your hands!

Don’t you people who are mad at the News-Register for the May 20 headline “Voters dump Springer, Olson emerges victor” realize that this is why we lost the primary?

Nobody in his or her right mind should think that Trash Mountain will be a good thing for our city. We love our town and feel sorry for the evicted people at Mulkey RV Park. We want to keep our town clean and have fresh air. Trash Mountain will never become a tourist attraction.

Truman and Sherry Drew

McMinnville