Why have a public hearing if you don’t want to hear the public?

Memo to Oregon legislators: if you invite the public to testify at a hearing, be willing to hear them. Especially if they've driven several hours to attend an 8:00 am session on SB 30, a bill that would protect the fragile Metolius River basin from two large destination resorts.

That's what happened last Thursday. The public got stiffed, while government officials and real estate developers got to talk…and talk…and talk some more.

I was there, one of the non-testifiers. Like several dozen other people who wanted a couple of minutes in front of the Education and General Government Committee, chaired by Sen. Vicki Walker, to voice their support of SB 30.

As the Bend Bulletin reported, the Committee hearing was horribly unbalanced:

The lion's share of the microphone time Thursday in front of the Senate Education and General Government Committee was devoted to critics of the Senate bill. These included Jefferson County and Madras officials - who said the legislation would trample on a legal land use process - and the developers of the two proposed resorts that could be in jeopardy.

Here's how the "public hearing" (what a joke of a name) went down. First, Sen. Ben Westlund and Sen. Betsy Johnson talked about why SB 30 was so important. Both were eloquent.

Westlund said, "The only question is, 'Do you want to protect this very special place?'" And, "This is Oregon, and if there is one place that defines us, it is the Metolius."

Johnson, whose family has had close ties with the river since 1904—and donated for public access the land around the head of the Metolius—started to cry as soon as she began speaking. She said she was thinking of her deceased mother and the profound connection they both had with the river.

"I plead guilty to an emotional response to the bill," Johnson said. Me too. I was almost in tears by the time she finished. My wife and I love the Metolius also, being part owners of a forest service cabin on the river.

That 10-minute or so part of the hearing was fine. But then began the parade of the "suits."

Staff from the state Water Resources Department talked at length about the hydrology of central Oregon. Rep. John Dallum talked at length about why he'd removed his name as a sponsor of SB 30. Jefferson County officials talked at length about how the proposed destination resorts would bring gobs of much-needed property tax revenue to their strapped budget.

The developers of the Colson and Dutch Pacific parcels talked at length about how utterly peachy-keen it would be to have 10,000 + acres devoted to homes, golf courses, and other destination resort amenities in or near the fragile Metolius basin, officially designated as a Wild and Scenic River.

Then a rancher talked at length about why SB 30 didn't make sense. All of the testimony so far had been invited. No one who had signed up to speak as a member of the public had gotten to say a single word, even though those in favor of SB 30 had (correctly) sent out notices urging people to come and testify, since this was a public hearing on the bill.

Except, oops, Chairwoman Walker looks at the clock on the wall and says, "We have to leave for a floor session at 10:15. We won't be able to hear those of you who signed up to testify, aside from one group."

So at 10:07, two hours and seven minutes into the two hour and fifteen minute hearing (about twenty minutes of which was devoted to an unrelated bill), three guys from Friends of the Metolius and Central Oregon Landwatch rush to sit down at the microphone table. The first two quickly say that they're yielding their time to the third, Gregory McClaren, who gets a whole five minutes to express support for SB 30 and opposition to the destination resorts.

And that's it. Walker had said that it was committee policy to let people who'd driven over 100 miles testify first. However, that seemed to only apply to opponents of SB 30. A man sitting across the aisle from me raised his hand and said, "I've come over 100 miles. Will I get a chance to say anything?"

No, Walker told him, you won't. But she said there would be another hearing on the bill, so everybody who drove several hours or more to have a couple of minutes in front of the committee microphone could do it again another time.

I was frosted. And I only came from south Salem, twenty-five minutes away. The day before, Laurel and I had spent seven hours in a Marion County Board of Commissioners appeal hearing on a Measure 37 subdivision that we and our neighbors are fighting.

The four days previous we'd spent countless additional hours preparing for the hearing. There were lots of other things I would have preferred to do than sit in a legislative hearing room for another two hours, waiting to testify in favor of SB 30, only to find out that the Education and General Government Committee clearly never intended to allow the public to have the opportunity to do that.

Sen. Walker is a sharp legislator. I liked her style, and I like her politics, by and large. But I sure didn't like how she allocated almost all of the hearing time to opponents of SB 30. Per usual in hearings of this sort, those who got by far the most microphone access were being paid to attend the session (public officials and destination resort consultants).

The members of the public who took a day off (or at least, a morning) at their own expense to testify in support of SB 30 were ignored, aside from the one representative of Central Oregon Landwatch. That's a crappy way to run a public hearing.

Legislators, how would you feel if you got an invitation to a dinner party, drove several hours to get there, and then were told by the hostess, "Oh, I'm sorry. We don't have enough room at the table and have decided that it's more important to let other people eat. Come back next week."

That's exactly what happened at the state capitol on Thursday. Sen. Walker and her committee treated the invited public shabbily.

Why have a public hearing if you don't intend to hear the public? I'm going to send a link to this blog post to every member of the committee. I've asked a good question. I'll share any answers I receive in the "comments" section.

[SB 30 is much-needed. Click on this Save the Metolius web page and use the email links to express your support for the legislation.]

Comments

[Jack Bog]

It sounds a lot like when the Hanford bomb factory folks held "public hearings" in Portland in the '80s and '90s. A good half the time at the beginning of each session was taken up by paid government contractors and "private citizen" shills who came down from Tri-Cities to speak in favor of whatever lie the feds were selling that particular time around.

[Rain]

Money means everything in our culture and our government is run with that as its priority. With thinking like this, we'd never have had places like the Grand Canyon or Yellowstone set aside (the current ruling group still would like to undo such).

[Brian & Sen. Vicki Walker]

I've heard from Sen. Walker, chair of the Education and General Government Committee. I appreciate her taking time at 3:00 in the morning to reply to me, and have included her email verbatim below.

However, I still think she's off base. The meeting wasn't fair.

A public hearing on an emotional issue that sparked a lot of interest among the citizenry isn't the time or place for lengthy invited testimony aimed at educating legislators about a bill.

Do that in a work session. Don't do it during the time allotted for public testimony. I'm not disputing that Walker asked some good questions. The problem is, virtually all of the people who were questioned were opponents of SB 30.

Here's Sen. Walker's message:
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"Mr. Hines: You can post away as you wish. I run a very fair hearing and will not apologize for the way I run my committee. Without a crystal ball, there is no way to anticipate how many members of the public will show up for any public hearing. Our committee is scheduled for two hours. We went over 15 minutes as it was. There was another bill on the same day to accommodate an out-of-town witness that took 20 minutes. None of the committee members, except for maybe Sen. Westlund, had heard anything about this issue before it came on for hearing last week. And I would dispute the Bend Bulletin's accounting of the air time. If you wish to look at the committee log, please feel free to contact the committee administrator. Additionally, some people were confused when they signed up to tesify. While they may have been against the development, they signed up against the bill, which would have been contrary to their position. Their own confusion made it very difficult to know who was there to testify on which side of the issue.

It would have been irresponsible of me as the chair to not allow my committee to hear some background to the underlying dispute before we moved forward with additional testimony. The Water Resources Department came in at the last minute as a request of the bill proponents to provide further background as to how these resort destinations would impact the acquifer and underground springs for which the Metolius is well known.

I indicated I would be co-chairing a work group with the parties to try to come to some compromise, at which time the bill will come back for further hearing. That work group is scheduled for early this week. Maybe you think a compromise is unnecessary or unwise, but I can tell you the sense I have from my colleagues is the bill was going nowhere in its current draft; even the proponents of the bill were indicating they would be open to some "light footprint" development [emphasis mine]. The issue of local control versus state control is always controversial, particularly when cash-strapped counties are looking for a way to fund services. There are strong advocates on both sides of that issue.

I also indicated that anyone could submit written testimony who did not have a chance to testify. I took my file home this weekend (I got home from the capitol at 9:30 p.m. Friday night) and reviewed all that has been submitted so far, in addition to a DVD the Friends of the Metolius provided to the committee. You don't need to speak orally to have your voice heard. In fact, some of the most profound statements can be found on the Friends of the Metolius DVD with writings back to 1913. I would have loved to have had some of those stories been recorded as oral histories.

If you just want to complain about how the hearing was conducted, I don't find that very productive. Your blog tells me nothing about your position on the bill or what the Metolius means to you, other than a passing reference that you and your wife love the place. It is unfortunate you were so busy being "frosted" that you didn't seem to hear the questions I asked nor the responses they gave. Don't you find it rather interesting the county didn't send anyone with much background on the issue, nor did they have a credible response when I asked about the "affordable housing" piece of their zoning ordinance? You might wish to listen to the hearing again with an ear tuned to a different strategy.

It is now nearly 3:30 a.m. I have had less than 12 hours of my weekend for myself and my family, and need to be at the capitol at 9 a.m. I'm going to bed. Please feel free to provide written testimony to the committee, and to watch the committee postings for the next hearing date.

Sen. Vicki Walker"

[Brian & Central Oregon Landwatch]

I got an email from Paul, a Central Oregon Landwatch representative (see below). I agree with everything he says. You can't speak "truth to power" if you aren't given a chance to speak.

In Sen. Walker's email (see preceding comment), she says that supporters of SB 30 at the public hearing who weren't allowed to testify were invited to submit written testimony.

Well, they could have done that from home, by mail or email, without having to drive several hours to Salem and spend the night at a motel in order to be at a 8:00 am hearing.

Here's Paul's message:
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Thanks Brian. I'm glad you did this. Those with power--govt. officials and billionaire (literally)/millionaire developers got to testify---the people didn't. And I believe all but one of those who testified were getting paid--on salary or paid by developers. Those who were there on their own dime, who had to drive over the Pass the night before, rent a motel room, and take off work weren't allowed to testify.

[proud lefty]

Brian, I drove from Portland to attend the hearing as well. I work evenings, so getting up at 5:30 am after working until 10:00 pm the night before was difficult. I agree that it was difficult to not be able to testify; I don't have any dog in the fight except my love for a beautiful river that I love to fish and spend time camping near. However, I agree with much of what Vickie Walker stated in her posting; she did ask tough questions of all who did testify and her anger at Jefferson County was clear. It would have been nice to split the time equally between pro and con SB30 from the beginning, I don't know how time allocation is typically done in hearings like this. I submitted my testimony to the committee, I hope Ms. Walker has read it, and I feel proud of the turnout and the fact I made the effort to be there. It is very early in the process, it was an eye-opener to see and hear from the developers. I am highly concerned that Ms. Walker has never been to the Metolius. She needs to spend time there getting a sense of how spiritual the river is. I spend at least 20 weekends a year there with my wife, we don't own property there, I don't believe anyone should, it should be a sacred place for all to enjoy and none to own.
Ervin Siverson

[Brian]

Ervin, I share your admiration for the Metolius. But I still don't admire the way the hearing was handled.

My wife and I testify frequently before the legislature. In our experience, almost always invited testimony is separated from public testimony--especially on hot button issues where a lot of people want to speak.

It was absurd to have staff from the Water Resources Dept., who work right in Salem, talk on and on about the hydrology of central Oregon, while people who took a full day in order to testify sat in their seats.

The committee could have educated itself on its own time. The committee could have heard from the developers of the destination resorts at another time.

This wasn't a subdivision hearing, where a body was going to decide on a land use application. Like Sen. Westlund said, "this is about place, not hydrology" (or anything else).

I'm glad you weren't as offended as I was by the "stiffing" of public testimony. However, when you speak of the allocation between pro and con testimony, actually this didn't happen at all.

As I noted in the post, all of the "cons" were invited to speak. They got the lion's share of the time. The only "pros" for SB 30 were Westlund and Johnson.

I doubt there was a single person in the room, other than Jefferson County officials and the developers, who was in favor of the resorts.

Yet the committee will never know that, having decided to shut the public out of the testifying--other than the one Central Oregon Landwatch guy.

[bev]

Brian - An Oregon friend sent me the URL for this post, so I dropped by to read it. I live in Canada, and have been to similar types of hearings (municipal, provincial, etc...) where I and others have signed up to speak and then been sandbagged and given 1 minute or less to speak after those from corporations, etc.. have had 20 minutes or more to prattle on, give powerpoint presentations, etc... It's insulting to the public to be treated in this way. The only way around this that I and others up here have found to deal with this kind of situation is to find a large public venue and hold our own "hearings". We did that for an issue up in our own area and filled the place with about 300 people -- far more than the so-called "public hearings" did. We did a lot of publicity ahead of the event -- so much so, that the "corporate heads" called and asked if they could reserve some time to speak, so we allowed that, but ran a timer clock allowing them a top limit of 10 minutes each to speak -- the same limit we gave to everyone else. They came in their suits with their briefcases, slide projectors, etc.. and attempted to hijack the meeting, but we just cut each of them off at the end of their 10 minutes. Things were run fairly, and they just tried to break the rules. We didn't allow that. There was absolutely no doubt by the end of the meeting what the general concensus of the "true public" was regarding the issue. I've seen this type of meeting held over a couple of issues and it really helped a lot in allowing the public to have a chance to be represented. In our case, most of the politicians made a point of "being there" at our meetings as they knew how it would look if they didn't bother to show -- which was good as they were basically "forced" to have to hear the truth from their constituents. Anyhow, good luck with things out there. I do hope that you get a better chance to make your point of view known on this issue.

[Stacey Dycus, Senator Ben Westlund]

Another public hearing has been scheduled for 6:00-8:00pm on April 26.
From Chair Walker:
Please note that I have today scheduled SB 30 for a public hearing and work session on the evening of April 26 from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. to accommodate folks who will be traveling from the east side of the mountains. If we have reached a compromise on this bill, then I will allow the first 20 minutes of the hearing to be dedicated to a discussion of the compromise, and the balance of the hearing devoted to public testimony followed by the work session. If we have not reached resolution, then public testimony will be taken in the following order: people who signed up but were not afforded an opportunity to testify at the previous hearing; any new testimony from members of the public; followed by testimony from the proponents and opponents only if time remains. We will then go into work session where no further public testimony will be taken.

[Metolius Friend]

I live in Portland, but share the love, devotion and protection for the Metolius River and surrounding area! I'm hoping everyone can spread the word about the upcoming April 26th hearing in Salem @ 600pm. Please ban together and offer rides/carpools to folks who are unable to make the trip over the pass themselves. Urge people to write personal expressions of what the river and area means to them and why. Submit their testimony on their behalf. Offer support and help make this process "user friendly" to those who might be overwhelmed or confused about how they might be able to help. Thank you!

[Metolius Friend]

For more information on Senate Bill 30 and how you can help, please visit:

www.noresorts.blogspot.com
www.metoliusfriends.org

[Marita Dietz]

Dear Ervin,
It appears that Ms. Walker did take your blog to heart. It sounds as though she intends to run a fair forum. Your very interesting and witty blog may make a difference in the fight to save the Metolius. Keep up the activism. We need people like you.