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Letters to the Editor: November 25, 2022

County quagmire

At its Nov 10 meeting, the Yamhill County Board of Commissioners spent another 2½ hours trying to concoct a loophole to advance the Newberg Bypass project’s Wynooski interchange without risking revival of the Yamhelas Westsider Trail.

In January 2021, the commission, with newly elected Lindsay Berschauer leading the way, forbade staff from responding to a remand by the Land Use Board of Appeals to address some lingering land use questions regarding the Yamhelas Westsider Trail project.

LUBA had insisted on the novel idea that a transportation facility -- i.e., the trail -- had to be specifically permitted in county ordinances. By failing to appeal, the county not only loopholed the trail to a standstill, based on false premises, but also unwittingly blocked approvals for other proposed transportation facilities.

With the Newberg Bypass, the shoe is on the other foot.

The commissioners have discovered that their terrible decision on the trail is equally applicable to the bypass. So they are now scrambling to create yet another loophole, this one aimed at ensuring the bypass can move forward unrestrained without reawakening LUBA or the trail project from its live burial. They want to have their cake and eat it too.

Meanwhile, Yamhill County roads continue to be death traps for bicyclists and pedestrians. No exaggeration.

Thanks to Lindsay Berschauer, Mary Starrett and their political sponsors, Yamhill County lacks any bike-pedestrian lanes or grade-separated bicycle facilities.

They should try riding a bicycle on any five-mile stretch of a Yamhill County road. They would find it a harrowing experience — riding along narrow lanes with high-speed traffic, blind curves, nonexistent or steeply graveled shoulders and yawning ditches.

Would they be willing to send their children or grandchildren out to do the same? The question is, why don’t they care?

Craig Markham

Dundee


Caring about future

They showed up for work through the COVID-19 pandemic, political upheavals and now an active shooting at the McMinnville High School.

Why? Because they care about the future of the U.S.A. They are unselfishly educating all the children in their classrooms, treating all the children the same, hoping to build the future of freedom and opportunity in America.

Bravo and thank you.

William Cleek

McMinnville


Address sustainable building

I have read the pro and the con articles regarding the Gwendolyn Hotel.

The most striking thought I had focused on something neither party addressed: What is the developer proposing with respect to the most important issue of our time, namely climate change? What will the developer do to mitigate the effects of its project with respect to climate change, from demolition to construction to operation?

Surely there are methods and means developed by now that will help in this regard. Even if costly, they must be imposed on the developer as a condition of approval.

If mankind does not address this issue at every level, beginning now, we will guarantee the destruction of our planet during our childrens’ lifetimes. Not some future time, but the times that our currently living children will face and suffer.

Dennis Isenberg

McMinnville


Calling all drivers

When making a right turn, please be sure to look to your right, where you are headed, not just to your left for oncoming traffic.

I was struck on my bike last week in downtown McMinnville by a car making a right turn. And I have had numerous near-misses as a jogger and pedestrian with drivers not looking in their direction of travel.

I was fine, though my bike was totaled. But I know that I and others won’t always be so lucky.

If you hear a tennis ball hit your passenger side window, it’s probably me trying to get your attention.

Christine Bader

McMinnville


More Republican nonsense

Congratulations. We have a new majority in Congress.

And its very first moves, its very first announcements, are investigations into Hunter Biden and the Department of Justice. That and a goal of releasing all of the Jan. 6 insurrection criminals.

What happened to crime, inflation, immigration and gas prices?

That’s what the Republicans said they’d be focusing on. After all, that’s what they campaigned on.

Who cares about Hunter Biden?

What I care about, and most people care about, is being able to buy groceries, heat the house and put gas in the car – along with safer streets and more realistic immigration policy. But what I see for the next two years is more Republican nonsense.

You’d think they’d have learned something from their disappointment in the recent elections.

Paul “Paulie” Angerano

Carlton

Comments

Don Dix

Paul “Paulie” Angerano -- if congress is investigating an R, the Ds are in control -- and if it's a D under the microscope, the Rs are in charge. Both parties act as if they are 12 yr. olds, and only interested in revenge or payback. This is the reality of the 'do-nothing lawmakers' in DC today.

BigfootLives

Uni-party. 90%, maybe 95% of politicians in DC are on the same team and team is for themselves. There is a famous quote by George Carlin about DC - "Its a big club, and you ain't in it".

But it is ironic that the things you are expecting the R's to fix, or work on, inflation, gas prices, heating costs, were in a large part due to policies of Joe Biden, the person you likely voted for. His attack on the US energy industry starting on day one of his administration has led to where we are today. it's not by accident, it's a plan. They have called it a great opportunity for transition to a green economy, one where you will own nothing and like it. John Kerry, Biden's Climate envoy, whatever the hell that means, is crafting policy to eliminate gas and diesel cars by 2035. Buy some extra sweaters while they are still available.

As for investigating Hunter Biden, very unlikely anything will come from it, especially if Kevin McCarthy is Speaker of the House, he is the poster child for go along to get along. Although CBS recently reveled in shock that "A CBS investigation authenticates the content of Hunter Biden’s laptop" after automatically 'debunking' it prior to the 2020 election. Set aside the perversion and drug problems, Hunter has been Joe and the entire Biden family's agent for pay for play access to Joe for the entire time he was VP. The proof is there that Joe Biden is corrupt, the so called US intelligence buried the information, and the media is complicit. His entire laptop (one of reported many, one of which reportedly taken by Russian drug dealers - source - Hunter himself) is online and not hard to find with Google.

its your vote, its your money, and its your country too, for God sake wake up.

Don Dix

Pay attention to what BigfootLives has pointed out -- the Ds have held congress for 4 yrs. And 2 yrs. ago, when they obtained the White House and senate, everything was on the table (or off). Today's economy, inflation, immigration issues, etc. are the result of policy -- and the credit or blame rests with those in charge. It's that simple.

tagup

Interesting that the global issue of inflation and the corresponding impact on world economic activity is the result of policy of the US.
As for immigration, I seem to recall those issues going back decades. So maybe it’s not that simple.

Don Dix

As of July 2022, nearly 5M illegals have entered the US since the Ds took control -- that blows away any 18 month period since records have been kept -- that total speaks rather loudly to a failed administration border policy, wouldn't you say?

tagup

Ronald Regan gave 3 million illegal immigrants amnesty in 1987! 35 years ago! He promised tighter border security and strict penalties for employers that hired undocumented workers. Nothing has changed except the rhetoric since then.
Blaming one party is inaccurate as both parties are to blame for the failure to develop serious immigration policy that works for both immigrants and businesses needing workers.

tagup

May I add, that a wall will not solve the problem as a large percentage of illegal immigrants are in the country with expired visas.

Shorty

Classy is when you have a lot to say but you choose to remain silent in front of fools

RobsNewsRegister

Reagan's amnesty was for people that had built up over a long period of time. We've never seen the numbers streaming across at the rate we are seeing right now, and it is about to get worse after title 42 expires. Who knows who all is getting through when the numbers of monthly 'gotta aways' alone is over 60,000. My concern right now is the possibility of terror cells slipping getting in. I guess one day we will know.

https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128303672
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/cbp-reports-all-time-record-230000-migrant-encounters-us-border-october
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/southern-border-sector-sees-massive-spike-illegal-migrant-crossings-title-42s-end-approaches

tagup

As with the 9/11 attackers, any serious terror organizations can get tourist visas. They don’t need to cross rivers & desert to sneak across the border.

RobsNewsRegister

Prior to 9/11 I would agree, but we have rather sophisticated tracking networks for legal entry now. The concern with 'got aways' and the unknown number never encountered so not listed as a 'got away' is that we have no idea who they are; the other difference right now is the unprecedented variety of nations from which this human wave originates making that job even harder. See story below. This uncontrolled mess at the southern border also hides unprecedented fentanyl trafficking killing at least 150 per day. That's another subject though.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/09/world/americas/migrants-darien-gap.html

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