Leaders Offer Oregon Loggers Encouraging Words

Newly elected officials, Speaker of the House, Rep. Bruce Hanna, R-Roseburg, and State Treasurer Ted Wheeler, D-Portland, had encouraging words for Oregon’s independent loggers at Associated Oregon Loggers 41^st Annual Meeting in Eugene over the weekend.

Treasurer Wheeler addressed more than 400 attendees on Friday, January 15.  Wheeler is part of the State Land Board along with the Secretary of State Kate Brown and Governor John Kitzhaber.  The SLB oversees Southern Oregon’s Elliott State Forest for the Common School Fund. 

Financially, the Elliott State Forest is the SLB’s poorest performing asset.  Previously, the Elliott used to be the quintessential model for sustained-yield forest management, while still being a popular destination for a wide array of forest recreation activities.  The timber produced on the Elliott commanded a high price from Oregon’s timber industry.  Since 1995, the Elliott has been managed under an ultra-conservative strategy that has reduced timber output by 60%.

Wheeler spoke forcefully about getting more money from the Elliott for financially strapped public schools.  State foresters have spent 10 years trying to negotiate a more productive management plan with federal fish & wildlife officials.   The Treasurer called on his negotiating experience outside the forestry world to claim, “Negotiating for 10 years isn’t a negotiation…it is a Stalemate!!!”

Wheeler wants to get more money from the Elliott “because I am the Treasurer…not the Parks Commissioner!!!”  The overflow audience interrupted Wheeler three times with spontaneous applause.  Wheeler finished his comments with “You’ve got a friend in the Treasurer!”  Time will tell if this was an early campaign speech.

Saturday, Republican House Speaker Bruce Hanna, pleased the loggers with the message that Oregon’s budget problem is really a “Jobs problem!!!”  Hanna wants to adopt the Main Street Plan, job-creating legislation that Republicans developed in the 2009 legislature but failed to gain any traction from Democrats.  The evenly divided House (30-30) and the narrowly split Senate (16-14) offers Hanna hope that the Main Street Plan or similar legislation can be enacted in 2011.

Speaker Hanna is encouraged by Governor John Kitzhaber’s inclusiveness toward Hanna and other Republicans with his transition teams and has sought their “input and ideas”.  The Governor “has done everything he said” that he said he would.

Despite the lumber market sinking to levels not seen since the Great Depression, the over 900 members of AOL should be encouraged by the optimism provided by Treasurer Wheeler and Speaker Hanna.

Plastic Bags: Useful for Carrying Things and… Collectors Items?

FRIDAY, JANUARY 14, 2011 AT 12:51PM | RALPH SAPERSTEIN

My how times have changed. After the Oregon legislature and the City of Portland both failed to ban plastic bags in 2010, a plastic bag ban proposal enjoys bipartisan support in the coming legislative session.

Senate Bill 536 was introduced during the legislative organizational days this month. Environmentalists are leading the charge to ban plastic bags, citing litter and other environmental impacts as a reason to get rid of them.

A nickel charge on paper bags helped gain the support of grocers, who want to recoup costs. The nickel charge also will encourage people to bring their own reusable bags, further reducing waste.

The proposed ban now carries the ever-present moniker “It’s About Jobs!” Sens. Jackie Dingfelder, D-Portland, and Mark Hass, D-Beaverton, say that a plastic bag ban is an Oregon job-enhancing scheme.

Oregon is home to pulp and paper mills that produce paper bags. According to the Senators, their proposed plastic bag ban will help support jobs producing paper bags without hurting jobs in the manufacture of plastic bags, since plastic bags are manufactured outside of Oregon. Paper bags will be required to be made with at least 40% recycled content.

"These plastic bags have taken their toll on Oregon's environment, but they've also taken their toll on Oregon's economy," Senator Hass said at a recent public hearing on the issue. "The number of Oregon jobs [making paper bags] has steadily eroded in large part because of the use of plastic, non-biodegradable bags."

Recyclers also support a plastic bag ban because if the bags are placed in curbside co-mingled recycling cans, they jam sorting machines and shut down recycling processes.

Opponents, including the plastics manufacturing industry, point out that there are programs in place to recycle plastic bags, along with some private funding for public education on the proper recycling of plastic bags. An educated public would recycle bags and therefore do away with the environmental hazard of litter and landfills.

All Fred Meyer stores offer plastic bag recycling and sell reusable bags. According to their website, the reusable bag program has kept 18 tons of plastic from the waste stream. Still, in an effort to prepare for the likely ban, Fred Meyer has stopped using plastic bags in ten of its stores.

If enacted, Oregon likely will be the first state to ban plastic bags.

Big Day in Oregon...

No, not the National Championship, the Oregon Capitol will be the site of the inauguration of Governor John Kitzhaber, Version 3.0, and the beginning of the 2011 legislative session.  This will be the third inauguration for Kitzhaber, an Oregon first.  Since Oregon's new Governor is comfortable at most times in his blue jeans and cowboy boots will Kitzhaber completely suspend formality and become "Trey"?

Opening Day is often viewed as the best day of the legislative session: lot's of Pomp and Circumstance, home grown musical entertainment and "Let's just get along" speeches. Unfortunately, Monday may be the Highlight of the session.  Pundits and reporters expect the 2011 session to be tumultuous.  As with everything else, security will be tighter for Monday's events.

The weekend shooting of a member of Congress, a Judge, a 9 year old born on 9-11 and 15 others in Arizona has cast a pall over everything political.  It's a good thing that Governor Kitzhaber did not plan an Inaugural Ball for Monday night.  With the UO Ducks playing for the Collegiate National Championship, the billion dollar revenue shortfall Oregon faces and the Arizona shooting,  no Ball is a good thing.

Oregon's Board of Forestry will hold private interviews with six finalists for the new State Forester.  Forums with Department of Forestry employees and Forestry Stakeholders will be scheduled for the two or three candidates approved by the BOF Monday.

More twists and turns in CylviaGate and other AG activities

Probably more than you want to know...

Kroger Rejects Kulongoski’s Request for Outside Counsel in Investigation 

What happened at the Energy Department?

Former AG and Duck President Frohnmayer Threatens Lawsuit

Kulongoski and Kroger at odds on Energy probe; Kitzhaber says he will handle it

Kulongoski "Man's" Up

Justice, Oregon Style

“Did they forget about the Great Recession?” From OCPP

Liberal think tank Oregon Center for Public Policy has an unsettling spin on Oregon’s budget problems and Measure 66, the personal income tax increase passed by voters last year.   In opinion pieces and in fundraising letters, OCPP Executive Director Chuck Sheketoff has been saying that the recession is the cause of our current budget crisis, something Republican legislators refuse to acknowledge.

In a Salem Statesman Journal article on the nearly 30% shortfall in revenue from the tax increase, Sheketoff said that tax collections were off “because the recession was deeper than thought in 2009.  But the measure is doing what we thought it would do.”

I guess “we thought” shows that the left-leaning group helped craft the tax increase for high-income earners and small businesses.  Does the “recession was deeper than thought in 2009” mean that OCPP wouldn’t have supported the tax increase if they new the economy was in such bad shape?

Likely not since Sheketoff also notes the tax increase “is doing what we thought it would do,” albeit at a 30% reduction.

Labor's Coming Class War (from the Wall Street Journal)

Private-sector union workers begin to notice that their job prospects are at risk from public-employee union contracts.

• By WILLIAM MCGURN

Jeffrey Brown of PBS's "NewsHour" recently summed up the year's economic performance by invoking the most overworked chestnut of modern American punditry: "the disconnect . . . between Main Street and Wall Street."

The notion that Wall Street and Main Street are fundamentally at odds with one another remains a popular orthodoxy. So much so that we may be missing the first stirrings of a true American class war: between workers in government unions and their union counterparts in the private sector.

In theory, of course, organized labor is all about fraternal solidarity. For many years, it is true, private-sector unions supported collective-bargaining rights and better benefits for government workers, while public-employee unions supported the private-sector unions in their opposition to legislation such as the North American Free Trade Agreement in the 1990s.

Suddenly, it's a different world. In this recession, for example, construction workers are suffering from unemployment levels roughly double the national rate, according to a recent analysis of federal jobs data by the Associated General Contractors of America. They are relearning, the hard way, that without a growing economy, all the labor-friendly laws and regulations in the world won't keep them working.

What's more, "blue-collar union workers are beginning to appreciate that the generous pensions and health benefits going to their counterparts in state and local government are coming out of their pockets," says Steven Malanga, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. "Not only that, they are beginning to understand the dysfunctional relationship between collective bargaining for government employees and their own job prospects."

The signs of this new awakening are gathering. In New Jersey, Gov. Chris Christie rightly becomes a YouTube sensation for taking on his state's obstinate public-sector unions. The more interesting story, however, may be the president of the New Jersey Senate, Steve Sweeney—who also happens to be an organizer for the International Association of Ironworkers.

In the days of Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine, Mr. Sweeney angered state-employee unions by opposing their push to balance the budget with an increase in the sales tax. In the Christie days, he continues to anger them by pushing for reform of state-employee pay and benefits. Another way of putting it is that Mr. Sweeney knows that 40% of his fellow iron workers in New Jersey are out of work—and that unless his high-tax state gets its fiscal house in order, the only work they'll find will be in Texas.

Over in New York, meanwhile, newly inaugurated Gov. Andrew Cuomo faces a similar battle. Mr. Cuomo campaigned on a cap on property taxes and a freeze on state salaries, both anathema to the powerful state-employee unions. As the New York Times reported last month, however, in this showdown Mr. Cuomo may have found a surprising ally in the 100,000- member Building and Construction Trades Council of Greater New York. Maybe not so surprising: The Times says unemployment for these workers is running at 20%.

Elsewhere, in 2005 Republican Govs. Mitch Daniels and Matt Blunt used executive orders to end collective bargaining with state employees in Indiana and Missouri, respectively. Now the incoming Republican governors of Ohio and Wisconsin—John Kasich and Scott Walker—are targeting collective bargaining for government workers in their states.

In some ways, this new appreciation for the private sector is simply back to the future. FDR, for example, warned in 1937 that collective bargaining "cannot be transplanted into the public service." In the old days, unions understood economic growth. Mr. Malanga points to AFL-CIO President George Meany's strong support for the JFK tax cuts as an example.

These days the two types of worker inhabit two very different worlds. In the private sector, union workers increasingly pay for more of their own health care, and they have defined contribution pension plans such as 401(k)s. In this they have something fundamental in common even with the fat cats on Wall Street: Both need their companies to succeed.

By contrast, government unions use their political clout to elect those who set their pay: the politicians. In exchange, these unions are rewarded with contracts whose pension and health-care provisions now threaten many municipalities and states with bankruptcy. In response to the crisis, government unions demand more and higher taxes. Which of course makes people who have money less inclined to look to those states to make the investments that create jobs for, say, iron workers, electricians and construction workers.

Some of these folks are beginning to notice.

Write to MainStreet@wsj.com

It is hard to believe...

Oregon has more than it's proportionate share of "dirty" political stories.  The first workday of 2011 brings us some good ones:

A former legislative candidate/mixed martial arts fighter/real estate agent, Chael Sonnen, pleads guilty to money laundering.

Longtime Oregonian Columnist Steve Duin  notes that "while reading yet another story in which Ted Kulongoski, transitioning from eight years of semi-retirement into a brief flurry of self-promotion, blubbered about his legacy as governor." Steve Duin: Ted Kulongoski campaigns for Ted Kulongoski to the bitter end


New Governor John Kitzhaber's girl friend continues to be a news and blog person of interest as current Governor Ted Kulongoski calls for further investigation into the Oregon Department of Energy contracts for "Green" projects and possible direction to the contract award winners to subcontract with Kitzhaber girlfriend Clyvia Hayes.  Cylviagate


Willamette Week, always first with a scandal, takes Attorney General John Kroger to task for failing to find criminal violations by the Department of Energy. Read the Letter: Oregon Energy Department/Cylvia Hayes Investigation Gets Messy


Let's not forget the Attorney General's Office as he tries to carve out a public persona by releasing 2.7 Press Releases per week for 2010.
Final tally for Kroger 2010 press releases: 142