Letters to the Editor: Aug. 29, 2025

Open letter

Dear Chief Godfrey:

Having served as an elected board member and vice president with the La Pine Rural Fire Protection District, I understand your financial issues with providing under-reimbursed EMS inside your McMinnville Fire District tax and service area and unreimbursed EMS outside. Those issues include:

- Out of-district emergency medical service.

This accounts for 20% or 1,797 of your service calls. So who authorized spending MFD property tax dollars to provide free EMS outside the district? Why are you providing free EMS at all? Please share a copy of the ordinance authorizing such service.

- Non-reimbursement for EMS supplies.

If you are billing for supplies, why are you not collecting on the bills? Why are you letting Carlton, Lafayette, Dayton and Amity out of paying for supplies? How much money is owed by others for 2024 and 2025?

- Ambulance transport to Portland-area hospitals.

Why are you not charging the $2,500 EMS call fee to the hospital receiving the patient? By only charging mileage, you are providing nearly free transport service. Who authorized use of MFD medics for non-emergency taxi service? Please provide a copy.

- Inadequate federal funding.

La Pine tried going to our U.S. senators to get it classified separately, rather than lumped in with Bend, but with no luck. Medicare and Medicaid are not going to increase rates. In fact, we will be lucky if the administration doesn’t cut current rates.

- The Ground Emergency Medical Transport system’s Fee for Service program.

La Pine used a consultant to facilitate billing the state for reimbursement for uncompensated costs under GEMT, and it has been very successful.

- Additional property tax support.

With the city aiming to keep $1.50 of the $2 per thousand it had been allocating to fire protection, and MFD charging a new $2 per thousand, there’s no chance voters will approve more taxes to the district — especially when it’s providing free service outside its boundaries.

I’m looking forward to your response.

Jerry Hubbard

McMinnville

Make the investment

The McMinnville culture, parks and recreation bond is a vital investment in our community. I’m an active user of these facilities and I see the need for new and renovated buildings.

I swim two to three times a week at the Aquatic Center. From October through June, I have to weave around garbage cans catching water from the leaking roof.

If using a stroller, I can’t take my grandson to Tiny Tots in the Community Center basement, because the elevator is broken. As a regular library user, I see firsthand the need for renovations that would expand programming and community access.

I appreciate the hard work of the Mac PAC in right-sizing the original proposal. Yes, the revised plan will raise property taxes, but the long-term benefits far outweigh the costs.

The house where I currently live would be perfect for a young family to purchase.

Would the cost of the increased property taxes, should the bond pass, keep them from considering it?

It could. But without modern facilities, many of our residents will continue traveling to other towns to find what we lack, or look to move their families to places where they can get access to the amenities they want.

A stronger culture, parks and recreation system would make McMinnville more attractive to new families, current residents and even businesses that want to invest here. Over time, that will increase property values and make McMinnville a better place to live for generations.

Please join me in supporting the culture, parks and recreation bond — and if you are able, donating to the PAC promoting it. It is an investment our community desperately needs.

Susan Chambers

McMinnville

America is lost

I’m not concerned about high taxes, potholes or masked men arresting either legal or illegal immigrants. I don’t care whether Biden, Trump or Harris is the president.

What I care about is the rotten core that has formed deep in the soul of America. It has metastasized over many years.

We have become a feckless, and self-absorbed people. We are naive and gullible. We yearn to be led and directed by others. We obediently embrace narrative over truth.

For 25 years, America has been on a rampage, sewing chaos across the globe. We are the authors of so many illegal wars, indiscriminate civilian murders and regime change operations that you can’t keep count.

The culmination of all this madness is Gaza.

Don’t condemn Netanyahu and his butchers until you first look in the mirror. America overwhelmingly supports his depravity, and until we pull the plug on money and military transfers to the state of Israel, nothing will change, either there or here in the USA.

The chickens have come home to roost. Until we as a nation stand up and say, “Enough is enough,” our demise is imminent.

Larry Treadwell

Sheridan

Hard to understand

We seem to be having extra warm weather this summer.

I know that it’s weather, not climate. But don’t you think climate change is playing a role?

Researchers have documented fossil fuel industry knowledge of a link between CO2 emissions and climate change dating back to 1954, when I had started high school. That’s five years before physicist Edward Teller warned the American Petroleum Institute of the danger emissions posed.

CO2 acts as a blanket around the earth. The oil and gas industry has been misleading the public about the danger for 70 years, but some people raised concerns early on.

In the early ’70s, President Nixon asked engineer Fred Morse to assess the feasibility of putting solar panels on the White House. In 1979, President Carter had 52 panels placed to assist with water heating, saying, “In the year 2000, this solar water heater behind me, which is being dedicated today, will still be here supplying cheap, efficient energy.”

But in 1986, President Reagan had the panels removed.

Last year’s AP-NORC poll showed 78% of Americans believed in climate change, but only 54% believed it was primarily human-driven. So what do the other 24% think is causing it?

The poll showed 64% support for solar and 60% for wind, but President Trump just canceled a $4 billion wind project off the coast of Rhode Island, despite the fact it was 80% complete. Unfortunately, science and facts don’t seem to matter anymore.

As a society, I think we are placing our heads further and further into the sand. Frankly, I don’t understand why the Democrats are not making this more of an issue.

Les Howsden

Amity

Not the answer

Earlier this summer, I wrote about the president creating a national police force out of ICE, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. Now he appears to be making his federalized force dream a reality with the National Guard.

This past Monday, he signed an executive order establishing a specialized unit within the District of Columbia National Guard “dedicated to ensuring public safety and order,” as well as “a standing National Guard quick-reaction force ... resourced, trained and available for rapid nationwide deployment.”

Though the National Guard primarily responds to local emergencies, or supports regular U.S. troops overseas, the president is deploying it to D.C. and other cities to fight “crime.”

Guard members are trained for a variety of military roles, but are not trained as police officers.

To be certified as a police officer in Oregon, new hires must complete a 16-week Basic Academy training program. In Portland, this is followed by a 10-week Advanced Academy and 18 months of field training, none of which are available to the National Guard.

The rate for serious crimes is high in D.C., but has been dropping precipitously.

Mayor Muriel Bowser asked the president to send funds to hire, equip and train 500 more police officers, but that wouldn’t be showy enough. Instead, he sent untrained National Guard personnel to patrol mostly lower-crime areas frequented by tourists.

Nationally, about 80% of National Guard members are part-time, typically reporting for duty one weekend a month in addition to participating in an annual two-week training session. They have families and employers who notice their absence when they are deployed.

If crime is the issue, the president should focus on the cities with the highest rates, not D.C., Chicago, New York or Portland, none of which is even in the top 25 in the FBI’s 2024 statistics.

Susan Watkins

McMinnville