Letters to the editor: April 1, 2022

Headed for extinction

I hold no degrees in traffic engineering, but I do hold a brain capable of common sense. Thus, I must respectfully disagree with Mark Davis regarding his analysis of a McMinnville Bypass rezoning and development proposal.

Times change, and like it or not, McMinnville is dying as an impressive local economic influence. The only hope for McMinnville now, to remain even slightly economically relevant, is to embrace the future.

The vast majority of local residents do not wish to patronize overpriced local retailers. They will travel to save significant dollars.

So why not embrace the future and try to incorporate it into your existing community, rather than becoming a dinosaur destined for extinction?

Oh, wait. I guess the latest election results explain that. It’s simple ignorance.

Good luck, Mac. You’re well on your way to following the examples of the downtown districts of Portland, Eugene and Seattle.

Dale Lux

Willamina

Fear of future

I say no to rezoning along McMinnville’s bypass, just like I say no to the electrification of homes in McMinnville.

Just think of the catastrophe that would ensure if we allowed that. Duh, it would obviously be followed by retail development.

Just imagine if our friendly kerosene delivery man lost his job.

There could even be more far-reaching effects. What would happen to our daily deliveries of ice for our ice boxes?

As has been proven by Dr. Fauci, science is real. Food stored without benefit of ice can become poisonous.

I urge everyone within the realm of my words to rise up now and vote Democratic in the next election.

Stultus Jones

McMinnville

Reason to celebrate

Two years ago, Lindsay Berschauer received 52.25% of the votes to win a four-year term in Yamhill County Commissioner Position 2. The voter turnout was 46.25% of 70,943 registered voters.

She got 1,382 more votes than her opponents. That was considered a victory and a reason to celebrate.

In a recent update of the recall vote, Commissioner was up 1,561 votes. That would have to be considered a better victory and more reason to celebrate.

Save Yamhill County was trying to overturn an election that its candidate had lost. Its leaders wasted our money.

Don Cummings

McMinnville

Just say no

Wasn’t it just a year or two ago that we were all being encouraged to vote for McMinnville as the nicest little town in America? Small, attractive and friendly, with lots of locally owned shops and so forth?

And wasn’t it a couple decades before we built a “bypass” to do just that — bypass the busy commercial portion of McMinnville to make travel to the bigger, busier cities easier, faster and more direct? If I recall, the bypass wasn’t supposed to have commercial businesses that might slow down that commute.

The Newberg-Dundee Bypass was built for the same reason as McMinnville’s Highway 18 Bypass, and has proven itself. The next extension is underway to make it even faster and more direct.

But now our city planners are bowing to out-of-town and out-of-state developers who want to make big bucks by covering our beautiful farmland with huge buildings and parking lots.

The developers say they’ve already bought the land, so it’s too late. Well, oops. Hopefully that’s their mistake and thus their loss.

I hope our local planners seriously review their thinking. I hope they don’t sacrifice our “nicest little town” — we came in 2nd nationally, didn’t we? — to developers who don’t mind destroying our locally owned businesses or our beautiful farm land.

Eleanor Fuhrer

McMinnville

Doesn’t bode well

It appears Ms. Berschauer has prevailed in another low-turnout election.

In a state where it is so easy to vote, turnout is pathetically low. And that does not bode well for democracy.

Every election is important. Every election has consequences.

Across the country, there are many efforts under way to restrict or deny voting, so you’d better start using your vote while you still can. As the adage goes, use it or lose it.

Alisa Owen

McMinnville

Universal language

I am just back from the Second Winds Community Band concert, “Pictures At An Exhibition,” and am still in a state of peaceful exhilaration.

What a great hour and a half of massage for the hearing, memory and spirit. The art of Joyce Messina on the overhead, bathed by coordinating music expressively played, was such an uplift.

According to Director Mark Williams, this entire program had been fixed by date and preparation for performance a couple of years ago, down to programs being printed, when COVID shut down gatherings in public places. Because no rehearsals could be held, performances were placed on hold.

Now that precautions have been eased, Director Williams and Associate Director Brian Parker decided to revive the program for performance this afternoon. Given the faithful and talented members, it went off as smoothly as if the pause button had just been pushed last month.

My heartfelt thanks to the directors and musicians for their dedication, and the artist for use of her pictures. I choked up a few times when thinking about those musicians in Ukraine, who are practicing the adage that music is a universal language.

One plays a violin concerto from an underground bunker. Another sits on a chair amidst the rubble of a bombed out parking lot, playing Bach to no immediate audience.

Would that peace could become a universal language of action.

Peggy Lutz

McMinnville

Urgent solutions

After serious consideration of all of the candidates running for our new 6th  Congressional District, I was pleased to find one, in particular, who aligned with my values.

Matt West decided to run after noting the many tragedies our part of Oregon was facing — forest fires, a heat dome, water issues and our growing homeless crisis, just to name a few. As a scientist and engineer at Intel, he realized that he could bring urgent and significant solutions to Congress.

One need only visit his website at www.mattwestforcongress.com/en/home to learn just how diverse his knowledge and understanding are of the many challenges we face day-to-day.

They range from all who struggle to get adequate health care and necessary prescriptions to the mismanagement of tax dollars paid into Social Security and Medicare; from the billionaires and corporations who choose not to pay their fair share of taxes to members of the workforce struggling to make ends meet for themselves and their families.

Matt knows the changes that need to be made, and he has some concrete and innovative ways to address them. He believes in a grassroots campaign and will not be beholden to corporations or political action committees.

Matt understands the opportunities to decentralize finance. But he believes wholeheartedly in the importance of regulation.

If we don’t address our climate emergency now, with solutions like those Matt is proposing, we will continue to face further disasters. Isn’t it time we sent a scientist and engineer to Washington, D.C.?

Matt West is nothing like the other candidates. He surely deserves the attention of voters in Congressional District 6.

Liz Marlia-Stein

McMinnville