HinesSight

Salem City Council's irritating axing of Urban Tree Commission

How Salem's city officials treat trees tells us a lot about how they treat people.

That's the main message from last night's City Council meeting, where a popular, carefully thought-out proposal for an Urban Tree Commission ran into the chainsaw of Mayor Anna Peterson and six complicit councilors.

Councilor Tom Andersen was the only one to stand up both for Salem's trees and citizenry. He ended up on the short side of a 7-1 vote to reject an Urban Tree Commission.

Today's Statesman Journal story, "Salem City Council axes Urban Tree Commission," tells part of the irritating tale.

The Salem City Council on Monday voted not to establish an Urban Tree Commission, after a public hearing and first reading of an ordinance proposing changes to the city code dealing with removal of trees on city-owned property.

The proposed ordinance included provisions for streamlining and clarifying the appeal, notification and variance processes for tree removal.

The biggest proposed change, the creation of a seven-member Urban Tree Commission, received the most support in public comments submitted to city staff. And numerous residents spoke in favor of the establishment of the commission at the council meeting.

Salem Mayor Anna Peterson opposed the establishment of the commission and made a substitute motion to amend the proposed ordinance, removing the urban tree commission and replacing it with the Salem Parks and Recreation Advisory Board.

I was one of those who testified at last night's hearing.

I told Mayor Peterson and the seven city councilors that I'd read the staff report on this agenda item, along with all the emails and letters received from citizens regarding the proposed tree ordinance revisions -- a central part of which is the creation of an Urban Tree Commission that would handle appeals of street tree removals.

Thirteen individuals and organizations expressed support for an Urban Tree commission. This included six neighborhood associations in Salem, who obviously represent a lot of people. 

Only one organization was opposed to an Urban Tree Commission. This was the Salem Realtors Association, who said the commission "will only serve to delay development."

Well, I told the Mayor and City Council that this is why an Urban Tree Commission is needed. Beautiful, large, healthy street trees belonging to the public shouldn't be cut down for no good reason just because someone wants to build a parking lot or whatever. 

Tree removal decisions should be based on solid criteria and expert arborist advice.

At a previous council meeting, Kristin Ramstad, an Urban Forester with the State of Oregon who has 20 years of experience, testified that similar commissions in other Oregon cities provide expert advice on tree issues that often is superior to what city staff can offer -- since these volunteers frequently have more arborist knowledge.

But last night the Mayor and city councilors were told that no one, repeat, no one, on the Salem Parks and Recreation Advisory Board has any tree expertise. So it will require someone leaving the Advisory Board to allow the addition of a new member who has the sort of knowledge common on an Urban Tree Commission.

Thus there were no good reasons offered up at yesterday's City Council meeting for why the Urban Tree Commission proposal was being axed. Which is fitting, since City officials have a history of providing no good reasons for why large, healthy street trees are cut down.

This is so typical of how Mayor Peterson and her mostly right-wing city council allies operate these days. Public hearings are a sham. Public outreach is a sham. Public participation is a sham. Public testimony is a sham.

Peterson and Co. go through the motions of asking citizens what they think. In this case, a broad-based Tree Code Citizens Advisory Committee worked long and hard to come up with needed revisions to Salem's tree ordinance, Chapter 86.

Result: the committee recommended forming an Urban Tree Commission.

Then City staff held a bunch of outreach meetings with neighborhood associations and other groups where the proposed ordinance changes were explained. This included asking the public to submit comments on the revised tree ordinance.

Result: 13 individuals and organizations were in favor of an Urban Tree Commission, with only 1 organization opposed -- the Salem Realtors Association. 

Then the City held a public hearing last night on the proposed revisions to the tree ordinance. A handful of people testified, 5 or 6, I believe.

Result: I recall that every person supported an Urban Tree Commission.

So then we get to the vote by Mayor Peterson and the city councilors. The first thing Peterson does is put forth a substitute motion to ax the Urban Tree Commission and substitute the Parks and Recreation Advisory Board.

Where did that notion come from?

So far as I know, prior to the hearing nobody except Peterson was on record as being in favor of it, nobody. Everybody who had weighed in on this had said, "We want an Urban Tree Commission."

Yet when it comes time to vote, Peterson's motion wins 7-1. So much for democracy. So much for listening to the public. So much for respecting virtually unanimous citizen input.

The Salem Realtors Association and Mayor Peterson didn't want an Urban Tree Commission. A compliant city council, with the exception of Councilor Tom Andersen, gave special interests what they wanted -- an axing of the Urban Tree Commission.

Shameful? Yes. Typical for the Mayor and City Council? Yes. Healthy for the citizens of Salem and our tree friends? NO.

While the tree was alive, I made friends with a beautiful Japanese Zelkova on State Street before it was cut down in 2013 because of a backroom deal between Peter Fernandez, the City Public Works Director, and Ryan Allbritton, the US Bank president. 

(Photo below.)

The tree wouldn't be happy with what the City Council did last night. Neither am I.

Hopefully Salem citizens will remember the axing of the Urban Tree Commission when it comes time to vote in the next local election.

When city officials treat citizen input as badly as they've been treating trees, there is really good reason to say "goodbye" to them.

Yes, I'm cool. I got an iPhone 6s today.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Maybe you were the one I stood next to this afternoon at Bridgeport Village, buying some Peets coffee after picking up an iPhone 6s on the very first day they were available, overshadowing you with the coolness invisibly yet tangibly emanating from the boxed Apple device sitting in my backpack.

Couldn't help it.

As everyone knows -- except for those who shun all things Apple, and what can I say to them except, I'm so sorry for you -- owning an iPhone, MacBook Pro, iPad, or whatever else Apple makes adds immeasurably to a person's Coolness Factor.

If you don't believe this, you could have asked those standing in line with me outside the Bridgeport Village Apple Store. We all had reservations to pick up an iPhone 6s via the iPhone Upgrade Program.

The process went very smoothly, in no small part because there seemed to be more Apple employees hanging around (in the light gray shirts) than iPhone buyers when I arrived about 25 minutes before my 2:30 to 3:00 pm reservation time.

I had my iPhone 6s in hand by 2:42 pm, along with a nifty minimalist black Apple leather case. I had all the required info, such as my Verizon account password, so there weren't any glitches in my buying experience.

As is typical at an Apple Store, when I got to the front of the line a gray-shirted guy said, "Let's go in." Then  he found a space to stand next to a laptop display -- where we did the iPhone Upgrade Program thing with his magic handheld device.

The scene at the Apple Store wasn't super crazy, since I'm pretty sure that in Oregon all first day sales were happening through the Upgrade Program, which required an advance reservation. I snapped this photo as I was leaving the store, catching some male employees in a familiar pose -- staring at their Apple devices.

Naturally the two photos above were taken with my ancient iPhone 5. I didn't set up my new iPhone 6s until I got home and could transfer settings, apps, and such from an iTunes backup. That also went smoothly, so I've had a few hours this evening to play around with the 6s.

I can tell that I'm going to like it a lot.

The 6s is a big jump up from the 5 I've been using for quite a while. Even though it isn't hugely bigger, the larger real estate on the 6s already makes me feel like the 5 is just too small. 

Yet the 6s still fits nicely in the cushioned leather case that my iPhone 5 has been riding around in for several years. The 6s Plus feels way too large for me, so I've hit a size sweet spot with the 6s.

I haven't learned all of the new 6s tricks yet -- just enough of them to be impressed with the advances since the iPhone 5 came out. Unlocking the phone with my fingerprint is easier than swiping, for sure. And the 3D Touch feature is a sure winner. 

When my wife saw that a firm touch on the camera app icon brings up a mini-menu where you can easily select "Take Selfie," "Record video," "Record Slo-mo," or "Take Photo," she instantly wanted a 6s of her own -- because on the 5 it often is difficult in bright sunlight to tell whether you're got the camera set to take a video or photo.

The camera on the 6s is much improved from the iPhone 5 camera. I'd read articles saying that it was.

Swiveling from typing on my laptop at our kitchen counter and snapping a 6s photo without a flash of our dog lying on a newly cleaned carpet -- which is why there's no chairs at the dining table -- convinced me that the camera really does take much sharper and better exposed photos. 

So I'm a happy iPhone 6s first-day-buyer. I held off on the 5s and 6, but felt that the 6s was too good a phone to pass up. And now, with the iPhone Upgrade Program, I won't have to wait for a two-year Verizon contract to be fulfilled.

When the iPhone 7 arrives, I'll be an easy upgrade away. Oh, Apple, you bring so much wonderful Coolness into my life!

Pope Francis' remarks challenge Salem's leaders to do better

Being non-religious, I don't see Pope Francis as possessing any special divine inspiration. However, there's no doubt that the Pope is a wise, caring, compassionate person, with messages we here in Salem should take to heart.

After learning about Pope Francis' remarks at the White House yesterday, and at the joint meeting of Congress today, I got to thinking about how some policies of Salem's Mayor, City Council, and other leaders in this town stack up against papal views.

There's a lot to unpack and consider in what Pope Francis said. Here's three "one liners" that offer a beginning for Salemians to ponder.

Accepting the urgency, it seems clear to me also that climate change is a problem which can no longer be left to a future generation.

For sure.

Yet when I asked the Mayor, City Manager, and eight city councilors whether they agreed with the scientific consensus on climate change, only two councilors responded affirmatively.

Given that City officials, along with the Chamber of Commerce, are pressing hard to get an unneeded, unwanted, and unpaid-for billion dollar Third Bridge built -- which would substantially increase Salem's carbon footprint and promote harmful sprawl, it's clear that the Pope's urgent moral call for action on climate change isn't shared by Salem's right-wing Mayor and city council majority.

Pope Francis also said:

A political society endures when it seeks, as a vocation, to satisfy common needs by stimulating the growth of all its members, especially those in situations of greater vulnerability or risk. 

Salem's leaders really are falling short here.

For example, the Chamber of Commerce and Salem Hospital are putting big bucks behind an effort to defeat a much-needed November ballot measure that would improve this town's pitifully bad bus service. A small payroll tax would make possible evening and weekend service, something that disadvantaged people who don't have a car direly need.

Yet the Powers That Be in Salem are promoting a selfish "Who Cares?" philosophy that is at odds with the Pope's compassionate message. I've heard that Salem is the only state capital west of the Mississippi that has such a deficient weekday-only bus system. 

Our town's version of the 1% seem to want us to adopt a new city slogan: "Salem, Where We Don't Care."

Here's a third and final Pope Francis quote:

Politics is, instead, an expression of our compelling need to live as one, in order to build as one the greatest common good: that of a community which sacrifices particular interests in order to share, in justice and peace, its goods, its interests, its social life.

lt is well-known that special interests run Salem.

The communal general interest, the common good that Pope Francis speaks of, gets little attention from City of Salem leaders or the Chamber of Commerce. Making money is what they care about, not livability and quality of life for this town's people.

So many examples could be given.

Anyone who attends City Council meetings sees the disdain our Mayor and right-wing council majority have for public participation. The message citizens are given, both directly and indirectly, is "Shut up and let your elected officials make the decisions; we don't need no damn public input."

Salem's publicly owned trees are cut down for no good reason if a bank president wants this done. A historic building is destroyed against expert advice if Salem's largest employer demands this happen. Low cost sidewalks and bike lanes for the many remain unbuilt while multi-million dollar street projects that benefit a few suck up the transportation budget.

I'm pleased that Pope Francis has cast a light on how discredited "trickle down economics" and climate change denialism are a moral, as well as political, issue. Salem's leaders are acting immorally when they cater to special interests rather than the broad public interest. 

Fortunately, redemption always is possible, a core Christian message. I hope our right-wing Mayor and city council majority will recognize the moral failings of their ways.

If not, elections beckon. 

Marion County might ban marijuana businesses -- secretly

[September 26, 2015 update: Yes, the Marion County Board of Commissioners did prohibit marijuana businesses in the unincorporated parts of the county, aside from "grandfathering" in two currently licensed medical marijuana dispensaries. 

A vote in the November 2016 election will determine whether the prohibition on marijuana businesses continues. If it doesn't, the 3% tax on recreational marijuana sales passed in another ordinance will go into effect. 

Here's what the county Public Information Officer, Jolene Kelley, told me when I asked what happened at the September 23 meeting.

Attached are the two ordinances the commissioners approved on Wednesday. Ordinance 1358 "opts out" of the six different types of marijuana businesses described in HB 3400; however, grandfathers in current medical marijuana dispensaries in the unincorporated area of Marion County. The two existing dispensaries in Marion County may begin the early start recreational marijuana sales on October 1, 2015, as allowed under state regulations. The ordinance refers the issue to the voters for the November 2016 general election. 

 

The board also approved a second ordinance establishing a 3% tax on the sale of recreational marijuana that goes into effect based on the outcome of the November 2016 election. 

 

Please let me know if you have any additional questions.

Here's the files Kelley included with her message.
Download 09-23-2015 ORd. prohib marijuana bus in unincorp areas
Download 09-23-2015 Ord, three percent tax - marijuana ]

-------------------------------------

Wow, secrecy about banning marijuana sales and businesses is epidemic here in Marion County, Oregon.

Someone just told me about an agenda item on the Marion County Board of Commissioners' September 23 meeting, That's the day after tomorrow.  It says:

ACTION

BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
1. Consider adoption of an ordinance prohibiting marijuana businesses in the unincorporated areas of Marion County, by emergency procedure. – Scott Norris 

Norris is a Marion County Assistant Legal Counsel.

Here's the agenda, which hasn't yet appeared on the Marion County web site, even though the board meeting is the day after tomorrow.
Download 09-23-2015 Board Session Agenda (1)

It seems really suspicious that the County Commissioners would take steps to prohibit marijuana businesses in unincorporated Marion County on an emergency basis.

Don't they realize that Measure 91, which legalized recreational marijuana in Oregon, was approved by voters in November 2014? Almost a year ago! What's the emergency, dudes?

The person who emailed me the agenda thought county officials were trying to avoid the uproar that followed the City of Salem putting up an agenda item regarding a possible ban on early sales of recreational marijuana just two business days before the meeting.

(See my blog post, "Salem City Council might ban marijuana sales -- secretly.")

Now the Marion County Board of Commissioners is doing the same thing. This isn't the way government is supposed to work.

But it sure seems to be the way the Republican members of the Board are trying to sneak through a ban on marijuana businesses.

Update: after I sent in some testimony to the Board of Commissioners, urging them to take more time on deciding whether to prohibit marijuana businesses, I got this reply from the county public information officer. The agenda was indeed posted last week, but it wasn't easy to find.

Mr. Hines,

Thank you for contacting the Board of Commissioners Office. I have forwarded your email for inclusion as Public Comment for tomorrow's Board Session. 

 

The Board Session agenda and packets were added to the Marion County website on Friday, September 18. Here is a link to our board session web page: http://www.co.marion.or.us/BOC/WkCalAgen.htm. 

 

Please note that the county will launch a new website on Monday, September 28, and the direct page URL (as listed above) will not longer work. You will still be able to access board session information from www.co.marion.or.us then visit the Meetings and Events page. 

 

Thank you. 

Jolene Kelley

Marion County | Public Information Officer

Salem City Councilor Warren Bednarz caught in a lie

So what should I call a false statement by a public official, in this case Salem City Councilor Warren Bednarz?

"Misstatement"? "Falsehood"? "Untruth"? These are fine words, and sometimes they are the best to use. But in this case I feel justified in using "Lie" in the title of this blog post.

As you can read below, I got a report that Councilor Bednarz spent several minutes at a Salem neighborhood association meeting criticizing me and this blog -- claiming that I spread "half truths" on it.

That got me fired up.

I do my best to be accurate in what I write about. When someone points out a error in a blog post, I check that out. Repeatedly, I've invited the Mayor, city councilors, and other Salem officials to let me know when they think I'm wrong.

So far, they haven't done so. Not about any matters of fact, just of opinion.

Most recently, Councilors Brad Nanke and Jim Lewis silently admitted I was right and they were wrong, as I happily blogged about in "Salem City Councilors admit I was right and they were wrong. Sweet!"

Now I'm three for three, councilors-admitting-I'm-right-wise. 

Warren Bednarz ignored my two requests to, bluntly speaking, put up or shut up about this blog spreading half-truths. I said in my second email to Bednarz:

Councilor Bednarz, I wanted to be sure you got this message. If I don’t hear back from you by the end of the week I’ll assume that you aren’t able to tell me any supposed “half truths” that I’ve been sharing on my blog and Strange Up Salem page. 

Well, it's Monday. The week is over. My truth-telling blogger reputation remains intact. Councilor Bednarz, though, has been called out as a ________ (this time I'll let you insert your favorite synonym for liar).

Here are the messages that I sent to Bednarz via his official City of Salem email address.

First email to Bednarz, sent September 10, 2015

Councilor Bednarz, I’ve gotten a report on last night’s SCAN board meeting from someone who was there (not Tom Andersen). Reportedly you spent several minutes “dissing” me and my “little blog,” saying that I spread “half truths” on it.

Well, I invite you to reply to this message and tell me exactly what untruths I’ve been spreading. 

 

OK, not only invite — I challenge you to do this. I’m always concerned about accuracy in my blog posts. When someone points out an apparent error in something I’ve written, I’m eager to check it out and make corrections as necessary.

 

Recently I sent several messages to you and other City officials about the last council meeting. At that meeting I was accused of spreading misinformation. Yet so far no one from the City of Salem has been able to point out what, exactly, the misinformation consisted of.

 

So I’m assuming that the “half truths” you mentioned to the SCAN audience didn’t have to do with the early sales of marijuana issue. What, then, are you talking about? Tell me, specifically. Then I can check out what you claim are half truths or untruths. Like I said, I’ll be pleased to make corrections on my blog if I’ve been wrong about something factual.

 

I can’t resist commenting on your “little blog” reference. 

 

I started my HinesSight blog in 2003. (I also have a Church of the Churchless blog, which dates from 2004.) Since, HinesSight has had 3,618,000 page views; I’ve written 2,695 posts; there have been 10,287 comments on those posts.  Currently HinesSight gets about 1,200 page views a day.

 

Thus I have a lot of experience on my HinesSight blog alone in responding to commenters. My Churchless blog has had even more comments, over 30,000. I mention this to show that my personal blog isn’t all that little. Also, to show that I have engaged in a lot of back and forth with blog visitors. 

 

I can only recall a handful of times when genuine significant factual errors have been pointed out to me. 

 

Before I retired, my professional background was in health services research, planning, and policy analysis. I was an Executive Service manager with Oregon’s State Health Planning and Development Agency, which involved conducting special studies for the Governor’s Office and state legislators. 

 

This is past history, of course. 

 

I mention it, along with my blogging experience, just to show that I have a strong background in collecting and analyzing information in an accurate, defensible manner. I’ve also written three books, each of which involved much pre-publishing fact-checking, editing, and reviewing by outside readers. I completed the course requirements for a Ph.D. in Systems Science way back when. So your comments at the SCAN meeting were, frankly, fighting words to me.

 

I look forward to you being able to back them up. Or, not. The “half truth” ball is in your court. Serve me some specific accusations about what I’ve gotten wrong on my blog regarding City of Salem affairs.

 

     — Brian

 --------------------------
Second email to Bednarz, sent September 14, 2015

Councilor Bednarz, I wanted to be sure you got this message. If I don’t hear back from you by the end of the week I’ll assume that you aren’t able to tell me any supposed “half truths” that I’ve been sharing on my blog and Strange Up Salem page. 

Since you made this accusation in a public/official setting, naturally I’ll feel duty-bound to publicly let people in Salem know that you couldn’t back up your "half truths" statement after I asked you to do so. Or, maybe you can. If so, I look forward to hearing from you, since I’m always open to being corrected if I truly do get something wrong.

 

     — Brian

Republicans, including Fiorina, lie in their presidential debate

Though I'm a proud progressive, I readily admit that Democrats, and liberals in general, shade the truth at times. 

But Republicans, and conservatives in general -- they often engage in total eclipsing of the truth, blanking out virtually every semblance of factual reality. 

The New York Times editorial board tells it like it is in "Crazy Talk at the Republican Debate." 

Eleven presidential candidates had three prime-time hours on the national stage on Wednesday to tell the American people why they should lead the country.

Nobody forced them to be there. They were there freely, armed with the best arguments they and their policy advisers had come up with, to make their cases as seasoned politicians, business leaders and medical professionals — the Republican Party’s “A-Team,” as one of them, Mike Huckabee, said at the outset.

And that, America, is frightening. Peel back the boasting and insults, the lies and exaggerations common to any presidential campaign. What remains is a collection of assertions so untrue, so bizarre, that they form a vision as surreal as the Ronald Reagan jet looming behind the candidates’ lecterns.

These guys and gal seeking to be the Republican presidential nominee aren't stupid. They wouldn't have been standing on the stage if they were.

So it can't be lack of intelligence that leads them to tell lies. It must either be a lack of moral character or a reckless disregard for truth-telling -- assuming there is a distinction between these personal qualities. 

Case in point: Carly Florina claiming that...

One of the Planned Parenthood videos shows "a fully formed fetus on the table, its heart beating, its legs kicking, while someone says, 'We have to keep it alive to harvest its brain.' "

The respected fact-checking organization PolitiFact gave this claim a Mostly False. That's generous. Actually, there isn't a speck of truth in what Fiorina said. Journalists who have watched every second of the  Planned Parenthood videos have reported that what Fiorina says she saw, doesn't exist. 

A Los Angeles Times post, "It's time for Carly Fiorina to apologize to Planned Parenthood," says:

Fiorina's history shows that one of her character flaws is an inability to admit when she's wrong and accept blame; in her telling, the responsibility for her abject failure as head of Hewlett-Packard belongs to everyone except herself. (For a dissection of her missteps at HP, written at the time, see this brilliant 2005 piece by Fortune's nonpareil Carol J. Loomis.) 

The irony is that as the only woman in the Republican field, Fiorina has a golden opportunity to stand up for the reproductive and healthcare rights that her rivals are trampling over at every turn. Instead, she's setting a new standard for exploiting innuendo and lies to take those rights away. She now faces a test of character: Will she set the record straight?

Absolutely. This is indeed a test of character.

Why should anyone vote for a presidential candidate, or any other person running for elected office, who refuses to admit that they were wrong about something they said?

Truth-telling is vitally important for public officials. Sure, politics frequently involves "spin-doctoring." However, there is a big difference between putting a certain spin on facts, and ignoring facts altogether.

That's what Florina did in her Mostly False (or Totally False) attack on Planned Parenthood -- ignore facts altogether.

Even if Fiorina wrongly believed that what she said at the debate was true, now that her error has been pointed out to her, an apology is indeed in order. If Fiorina persists in holding onto her lie, this will tell us a lot about her character and fitness to be president. 

Or, lack thereof.

Apple Upgrade Program credit check -- what credit agency is used?

Frustrating. 

That's my reaction after spending time today trying to learn what credit agency will be used to check my Credit Score when I go into the Bridgeport Village Apple Store on September 25 to, hopefully, pick up my new iPhone 6S bought under the iPhone Upgrade Program. Which says I'll need to bring...

Your personal information and credit card.

You will be asked to provide your Social Security number and date of birth for a credit check. You will also need a valid U.S. personal credit card. Debit cards and prepaid cards are not accepted.

Several times this week I've contacted Apple and Citizens One, the bank Apple is using, to find out what credit agency -- Experian, Equifax, TransUnion -- is being used for the credit check.   

Before, when a car dealer or whoever has needed to check our credit, they've been able to tell me what agency they use, so I don't have to pay $10 to three different credit agencies to temporarily release the freezes on all of them.

Apple, though, couldn't tell me this when I phoned them this morning. I was told they don't know what credit agency will be used a week from now when iPhone Upgrade Program sales start.

Well, if they don't figure this out soon, a lot of people are going to walk in to Apple Stores who have credit freezes.

If they don't bring their "unfreeze" passwords with them, the credit check won't be possible. When I called Citizens One, they were even more clueless -- couldn't reach anyone who knew anything about this.

I've Googled this question and haven't found anyone who knows what credit agency will be used by Apple come September 25. If I learn the answer before then, I'll update this post. 

Tips for "vaping" marijuana if you want to go first class

Oregon, where I live, has legalized recreational marijuana, along with medical marijuana. Early sales through medical marijuana dispensaries start October 1, 2015 -- just two weeks away.

Since many people are going to either be buying pot for the first time, or getting back into imbibing marijuana after a long absence, I wanted to share my preferred approach to "smoking" marijuana.

I realize this sort of openness will sound weird to people used to Demon Weed being, well, demonized.

But on July 1 of this year marijuana became legal to use, possess, and grow in Oregon. Before too long more states will do the same, as Colorado, Washington, Alaska, and Oregon already have. In five to ten years, I suspect pot will be legal almost everywhere in the United States.

Just as there are many styles of drinking alcohol, so are there many ways of ingesting marijuana. It all depends. On lots of things. Too many to mention. 

What follows are my tips for people who, like me, want an easy, safe, efficient, classy way of imbibing pot via a vaporizer, which is the preferred way to go in my educated opinion.

Read "7 Reasons to Vaporize Weed Rather Than Smoking It, You Modern Woman You." (applies to men also, of course)

There are many types of vaporizers. If you want to go first class, the Pax 2 is an amazing product. Yes, it is spendy, $280 list price, but free shipping!

The Pax 2 strikes me as being the iPhone of vaporizers.

Great design. Simple to use. Long battery life. Elegant. This vaporizer simply works. Positive reviews are here and here. A You Tube review is here. And below.

 

You just remove a magnetic lid on the bottom of the Pax 2 and fill it with ground marijuana flower/bud.

Aside from plants and seeds, this is all that can be bought in Oregon during the early sales period at medical marijuana dispensaries-- before "regular" sales begin in late 2016 with the licensing of recreational marijuana stores.

Meaning, you can't buy extracts, edibles, or such during the early sales period. Just dried marijuana. No problem, not if you have a good vaporizer and a good grinder.

I recommend the Santa Cruz Shredder. 

There are much cheaper shredders (which grind "herbs" into small pieces for more effective vaporizing), but if you're going to go first class with the Pax 2, you might as well have a top-of-the-line shredder/grinder.

The Amazon reviews of the Santa Cruz Shredder are 5-star.

OK, you've got your vaporizer, and you've got your shredder. Now you just need to get some quality marijuana. With legal pot, this is akin to saying to a would-be wine drinker, "You just need to get some quality wine."

Opinions will vary all over the place, from "two buck chuck" to $100 bottles. Understanding the basic differences between strains is a good foundation for making your buying choices.

Check out "Sativa vs. Indica, vs. Hybrid: What's the Difference Between Cannabis Types?" The Leafly site, where this article is, also has informative reviews of specific strains of marijuana. 

Lastly, I've almost finished reading a great book, "Stoned: A Doctor's Case for Medical Marijuana." It has a lot of good information about the benefits and risks of marijuana, along with the pros and cons of imbibing it in various ways. 

The author is big on vaporizing, as am I.

Now, enjoy!

Salem City Councilors admit I was right and they were wrong. Sweet!

Ah, it feels so good to have called out Salem City Councilors Brad Nanke and Jim Lewis about their erroneous assertion at a recent council meeting that I got things wrong about early sales of recreational marijuana in this town.

I was confident that I was right, and told them so in my testimony at the August 31 meeting.

You can see me speaking truth to power in a video Salem Community Vision made of my remarks at the contentious meeting, where citizens were disrespected, big time. 

But I didn't want to leave it there.

It deeply irked me that Nanke and Lewis were so dismissive of the Constitution-given right of citizens in our representative democracy to tell elected officials how they feel about a proposal -- in this case, whether the early sale of recreational marijuana through medical marijuana dispensaries that can begin on October 1 under state law should be prohibited by the City of Salem.

I came home from the August 31 City Council meeting all fired up to cast another Truth Bomb. Truth is too important to be trashed by a couple of city councilors.

I'd told them why they wrong to speak the way they did at the meeting. But I wanted this confirmed beyond a shadow of a doubt. Hey, I always leave open the possibility that I could be wrong. So I wanted to be sure that I wasn't. 

That made me dash off a blog post, "The Salem City Council accuses me of misinformation -- I call them out on this." Excerpt:

It irritates me when City of Salem staff accuse me of firing people up with misinformation. Whenever this happens, I ask them "So, show me what I got wrong." So far they haven't been able to do this. I'm pretty damn confident they won't be able to do it this time.

Tonight, Councilor Brad Nanke went on a mini-rant about how I'd gotten things all wrong, because it was so obvious in the marijuana staff report that the City Council was planning to approve early sales. This isn't true.

I confirmed that I was right through three emails that I sent to the Mayor, city councilors, and top City staff.

Last night, at another council meeting where the early sales issue was on the agenda, I enjoyed spending my three minutes of testifying time telling city officials that, yes indeed, I was right and Councilors Nanke and Lewis were wrong.

You can read what I said below. 

When it came time to vote on an ordinance allowing early sales of recreational marijuana, there were six in favor and three opposed. Mayor Anna Peterson plus Councilors Daniel Benjamin and Brad Nanke were opposed. 

Yes, Nanke.

The same Brad Nanke who, just two weeks before, had castigated me for publicizing through social media the fact that the City Council was considering a ban on early marijuana sales. He and Lewis strongly implied, if not outright said, that my blog posts and Strange Up Salem postings were much ado about nothing, since there was no doubt that early sales would be approved.

Well, the first vote on this issue two weeks ago was 8-1. Last night the vote in favor was 6-3, with Nanke and Benjamin changing to the "no" side. There will be a second reading of the ordinance to allow early sales on September 28.

Hopefully support for this won't further slip.

Regardless, I was pleased to tell the Mayor and City Council that I and others were entirely justified in alerting the citizenry to the upcoming vote on whether early sales should be prohibited, especially since the City of Salem didn't do anything to let people know about it except through a brief obscure mention on the meeting agenda that takes work to find on the City's web site.

Geez, City officials didn't even let the Salem Cannabis Industry Association, which represents the medical marijuana dispensaries where early sales would take place, know about the agenda item. (I confirmed this by asking the association president.)

Here's the Truth Bomb that I exploded last night at the council meeting.

Hello, my name is Brian Hines, 10371 Lake Drive, Salem.

I was disturbed when I left the first council meeting two weeks ago dealing with the subject of early marijuana sales. 

After testifying about this, outside the council chambers I talked with some young people who also were concerned about the agenda item — which included this question from City staff:

Should City Council prohibit “early sales” of recreational marijuana from Salem area medical marijuana facilities that may begin October 1, 2015?

It bothered me to hear these young people say things such as “I can’t believe how disrespectfully you and others were treated by the council” and “This is the first council meeting I’ve been to, but I’m not ever coming to another one.”

I told them they shouldn’t judge all of City government by how a few councilors acted at the meeting. I also said it was great that they came out to exercise their democratic right to express their views on a subject they felt strongly about. 

To confirm that I and others were indeed entirely justified in urging people to weigh in on the question of whether early sales should be prohibited, I sent three detailed email messages to the Mayor, city councilors, and top city staff.

I asked city officials four questions, sharing evidence and arguments supporting what I said in my previous testimony. I asked these officials to let me know if anyone disagreed with my interpretations and conclusions. Nobody did. 

This is like saying to a group, “Does anybody disagree with what I’ve said?” Here silence is wordless speech that says “No, you’re correct.” 

Which I’m pleased to know. Not just because I enjoy being proven right — also because the facts I’m about to share will reassure anyone who came away from the last council meeting wondering if they were justified in speaking their mind about an agenda item.

Contrary to what Councilors Nanke and Lewis strongly implied, if not outright claimed, these are the undisputed facts. 

The council was indeed asked to decide whether early sales of recreational marijuana should be prohibited. This is what the staff report said, as did my blog and stories in the Statesman Journal and KGW TV. 

Citizens were indeed entirely justified in contacting councilors and coming to testify about whether they felt early sales should be prohibited. 

Importantly, no one knew ahead of time whether the council would vote to prohibit early sales. I explicitly asked City Manager Duncan this question:

Do you or any other city officials (elected or appointed) know the outcome of council votes with certainty prior to the vote occurring in public at a council meeting?

Duncan replied: 

“I do know that every effort is made to comply with Oregon’s public meeting laws and no final decisions are made prior to the public meeting.”

So while some city councilors gave the impression at the previous meeting that citizen participation in the question of prohibiting early sales was much ado about nothing, this is completely wrong.

Like I said then, This is the way things should be. Citizens speaking their minds to city officials about undecided issues they care about. Keep it up, people of Salem. 

Proposed changes to the city tree ordinance will prevent more beautiful healthy street trees from being cut down for no good reason like the US Bank trees were. Follow my blog, hinesblog.com, and Strange Up Salem Facebook page to learn how to weigh in on this before the next council meeting. 

Here's the great video Salem Community Vision made of clips from the August 31 meeting. Watching it will help you understand why I and many others were so upset by the way citizens were treated at the meeting.

 

How did I know how many marijuana stores are in Colorado?

It was my favorite moment of yesterday's Salem City Club lunch event, "Marijuana: It's Legal, Now What?" And not just because I was the centerpiece of it.

The moment pointed to something profound -- yet not easily understood -- about how memory, intuition, and that well-worn adage Trust Yourself tie together. 

Salem Police Chief Jerry Moore was one of the speakers, along with Margo Lucas, owner of West Salem Cannabis, a medical marijuana dispensary that after October 1 will be selling recreational (a.k.a. "adult") marijuana.

Moore said he had done some Googling about Colorado's experience with legalized recreational marijuana. After discussing some facts about this and that, he had an audience participation quiz. 

I can't remember the exact numbers, but he said something like this:

In Colorado there are 300 McDonald stores and 400 Starbucks stores. Does anyone know how many marijuana stores there are in the state?

Immediately "800" flashed silently in my mind.

This wasn't a fact that I thought I knew, like the speed of light or when World War II ended. But along with that "800" I also had an intuition that sometime, somewhere, somehow I'd read a story about how many marijuana stores there were in Colorado.

This, along with a feeling of rightness about the "800," caused me to yell out that number after a few seconds, having noted that silence was the response of everybody else in the audience (maybe 75 people or so).

Chief Moore looked down at his notes. Paused briefly. Then said, as best I recall:

Well, Brian is on top of these sorts of things. The actual number is 827.

Or maybe it was 833, which some Googling of my own just now turned up. Anyway it was in the low 800s.

My snap reaction was to say loudly enough for everyone to hear, "I'm kind of ashamed that I know this." Moore replied with a smile and "We'll have to talk about this later." 

Afterwards, of course, I came up with some wittier rejoinders that, sadly, didn't pop into my mind at the salient moment. Such as...

This shows that pot use is good for the memory.
My drug cartel requires me to know facts like that.

What's interesting to me is how this was a good example of knowing something without knowing that you know it. If I'd been asked on a quiz show, "How many marijuana stores are there in Colorado?", I would have struggled to come up with an answer.

Now, Moore's mention of the number of McDonalds and Starbucks stores offered me a bit of a clue, since my rational conscious mind was pretty sure that the number of cannabis outlets was going to be higher. Otherwise, the audience participation question wouldn't have had as much impact.

Still, I was impressed that my subconscious mind knew the correct answer, within about 5%, and delivered it up to my conscious self in what seemed to be a fraction of a second. 

Of course, I could have been wrong. That feeling, 800 is the right number, might have been way off. Yet I trusted it enough to yell out "800." 

If I hadn't done that, if I'd sat silent in my chair, then heard Chief Moore say "The number is 827," I would have been mad at myself for not trusting my intuition. Even, I'm pretty sure, if I'd been way wrong.

By and large, I'm a believer in the wisdom of the subconscious mind.

It's best to check out what pops into conscious awareness when this is possible, or if the stakes are high (like whether a stock should be bought, or a lengthy trip taken).

However, in everyday situations like the one I was in, why not trust a feeling of this is right?

My KMUZ interview about early sales of marijuana and Salem city council dysfunction

I always enjoy talking with Ken Adams, host of the Willamette Wake-Up show on Salem's KMUZ community radio.

Here's a link to a podcast of our recent interview/conversation about prohibiting or allowing early sales of marijuana in Salem, which was on the agenda of the August 31 city council meeting.

http://kmuz.org/willamette-wakeup-09072015-brian-hines-interview/

Ken has a knack for saying things that usually blend perfectly with the remarks I was contemplating for my next side of the conversation.

Here's a photo of Ken and Salem Weekly publisher A.P. Walther. I ran into them, figuratively, at last month's Salem Sunday Streets event.

I just plugged the podcast on my Strange Up Salem Facebook page. Here's how I tried to get people to listen to it.

Here's a podcast of my Labor Day interview with Ken Adams on KMUZ radio where we talked about the Salem City Council's contentious meeting where the issue of prohibiting or allowing early sales of marijuana attracted a lot of citizen interest.

Ken and I also discussed how our conservative Mayor and council majority view citizen participation in general. (Spoiler alert: Not positively.)

Since the podcast is 42 minutes long, here's some suggestions to make it seem more enjoyable:

1. Get stoned or drunk while you listen to it. (Highly advised if you are the Mayor or part of the city council right-wing majority.)

2. Look upon it as a really cool music video. Just without music and video.

3. Imagine that you are forced to choose between listening to the podcast and sitting through the most boring school class you can remember. Say, "I'll take the podcast!"

Photos of 2015 Salem Sunday Streets event

Here's photos of, and commentary on, the third Salem Sunday Streets event that was held August 28.

I'm a big fan of Salem Sunday Streets, where some downtown roadways are closed to traffic and opened for the sole use of cyclists, walkers, and other human-powered ways of getting around.

I'm also a big fan of Portland Sunday Parkways, as I wrote about in "What Salem Sunday Streets can learn from Portland Sunday Parkways." 

Over time I hope and expect that our local open streets event will become more like how Portland does things. This isn't really a criticism of Salem Sunday Streets, since the organizers are doing the best they can with what they have to work with in this town.

I got to downtown Salem around 2 pm, halfway through the noon to 4 pm event. Right away I enjoyed being able to walk down the middle of streets that normally are owned by cars and trucks.  Salem feels much more pleasant without noisy vehicles speeding around.

Street Art! Nice.

I'm pretty sure this message refers to Howard Street being part of the first Bicycle Boulevards (a.k.a. Neighborhood Greenways) project in Salem that has been approved for a planning grant. 

I encountered Angela Obery and her children at the Street Art area. Angela is one of the prime movers behind the push for Bicycle Boulevards in Salem. Salem Bike Boulevard Advocates organized a group ride to the Sunday Streets event and she was pleased that over 30 people took part in it.

When I got to the "main stage" on the state capitol steps, a Beatles tribute band was playing music that sounded a lot like the Fab Four. The crowd, though, was a lot thinner than the real Beatles played to. 

This was a pleasingly quirky booth. I was tempted to see what sort of poem I'd get for the requested donation, but decided to pull out my camera rather than my wallet.

A food truck! Yes!

But why do I only see food trucks at events like this one? After the city council allowed food trucks to cluster in pods, I thought we'd see them in the downtown area. I hardly ever eat at a Salem food truck because I rarely encounter them. Hopefully this will change.

An overall feeling I had about the 2015 Salem Sunday Streets event was... Come on Salem! Get out and take part in this! More people, more people!

The Just Walk Salem folks were out and about doing what they do best... walking. 

I ran into two fellow progressive citizen activists, KMUZ's Willamette Wake Up host Ken Adams (in blue) and Salem Weekly publisher A.P. Walther (on his paper delivery cargo bike).

If a giant sink hole had opened up and swallowed the three of us at this moment, the Mayor, her right-wing city council majority, and Chamber of Commerce PAC would have been so happy. After briefly shedding some politically correct tears, of course.


At the bus/transit mall people were able to try out new activities -- like longboarding. This woman, clad in sandals, did a good job balancing after getting some tips (and temporary hand-holding) from the guy on the left.


Yes, a fun time was had by all who attended the 2015 Salem Sunday Streets event.

We just need to find ways to get more people in this town to realize that they should pedal, walk, or skate themselves to the next Salem Sunday Streets. If they try it, they'll like it. 

City of Salem kills another beautiful ancient White Oak

A friend sent me photos of a very old (maybe 500 years?) White Oak that the City of Salem cut down recently. It was near the intersection of Fir and Bush streets.

Since the City has a habit of removing street trees for no good reason -- see here and here -- I'm determined to find out if this was another case of "get out the chainsaws first, ask arborist questions later."

What I was told is that several weeks ago a woman who lived near the tree asked that some limbs be trimmed because she was worried about branches falling on children walking to school. 

Jan Staszewski, the City's Urban Forester (who isn't a certified arborist), reportedly came out, inspected the tree, and told the woman "I’m sentencing this tree to death."

It bothered her to have him talk that way.

But maybe Staszewski just has a poor sense of humor -- failing to realize how much most people in Salem love their trees and don't want them to be cut down unnecessarily.

The woman said the White Oak had a full healthy canopy before it was killed, so far as she could tell. She is really sad about the death sentence proclaimed by the City of Salem's Urban Forester.

So am I.

Jan Staszewski needs to answer some highly pertinent questions when he gets back to work next week. 

The death sentence document pinned to the tree says "root rot." It took all week to cut the tree down. Ancient White Oaks don't submit to chain saws without a fight.

Someone else who heard about the tree's demise shared a poem (of sorts). It mentions Peter Fernandez, the City's Public Works Director, who is Jan Staszewski's boss.

He's the guy who made the backroom deal with a U.S. Bank president that led to five large, beautiful, healthy trees being cut down unnecessarily in downtown Salem back in 2013, overruling advice from expert arborists and the City's own Shade Tree Advisory Committee.

This is the poem.

500 years it lived here.
Before the wagon trains.
Before the settlers.
Before the City of Salem.
But then Peter Fernandez arrived.
“I’m sentencing this tree to death” said the Public Works “forester.”

The woman who called Jan to ask that the tree's limbs be trimmed feels bad now that the tree has been cut down. She shouldn't. 

If the White Oak was killed for no good reason, the bad is on Staszewski and Fernandez. They'd better have some damn good evidence that the White Oak was in imminent danger of collapsing and there was no way of saving it.

I'll be blunt.

I don't trust Staszewski and Fernandez. They've shown that they are quick to get out the chain saws, and slow to consult certified arborists who know a lot more about trees than they do. 

I'll be asking Staszewski and Fernandez some pertinent questions.

Foremost among them will be, "Please send me a copy of a report on the tree's condition by an independent certified arborist, which I assume you got, since the City of Salem's Urban Forester isn't as qualified to assess the health of this White Oak as a certified arborist is."

If they didn't get a second opinion on the White Oak, and it was cut down solely on the basis of Staszewski's personal opinion that it had root rot, citizens should complain, big time. 

I'll keep an open mind on this until I get a reply from Staszewski and Fernandez. There could have been a good reason to remove the tree.

Like I said, though, their past tree-killing actions support healthy skepticism about whether this White Oak really needed to be cut down.

Let's remember what respected arborist Elwood Newhouse told me after I asked him to take a look at the High Street trees after they were ordered to be removed by the City of Salem.

"It's all bullshit."

Meaning, the trees were healthy and didn't need to be cut down, though they needed some care and attention. I'll report on whether Staszewski and Fernandez have solid independent arborist evidence that this White Oak was terminally diseased and couldn't be saved.

If such evidence doesn't exist, then once again citizens can say, "It's all bullshit."  

[Update: Someone asked an arborist who I trust to take a look at the White Oak. I was sent a copy of this person's report. Here's pertinent excerpts. This is good news. This time, it appears that the City made the right decision about whether a street tree should be removed.

It is my opinion that the decision to remove this tree was correct... I have determined that the tree had been severely cut a number of times continually spreading decay throughout the tree evidenced by different areas showing varying degrees of decay.

I did not see the top of the tree prior to removal but I would venture to say that this evidence is similar to large trees being cut by the power company for line clearance or untrained workers making large and multiple improper cuts over time.

Some injury may have affected the roots initiating decay from the bottom up but with the wood being piled up over the root area on the street side, I could not inspect for that.]

DirecTV, rot in hell for not carrying Pac 12 Networks

I don't think I'm overreacting by telling DirecTV staff to rot in hell for -- after THREE FREAKING YEARS -- being unable to reach an agreement with the Pac 12 Networks to carry their sports events.

Like the opening Oregon State and Oregon football games that I'll be unable to see today and tomorrow, just like I have for the past THREE FREAKING YEARS. (See here and here.)

Today I emailed DIrecTV again through their online help center. I told them not to send me their deeply irritating canned response about why they don't carry the Pac 12 Networks.

I"ve seen it so many times, I want to barf when I get another one. But naturally the idiots sent me the same damn message. They must have a robot responding to complaints.

Probably the same robot that keeps saying "No, No, NO" when the Pac 12 Networks tries to negotiate with them. Bastards.

Michael Rose is missed at the City of Salem

While I was checking our VISA statement against our credit card receipts this evening, a task that doesn't consume all of my cognitive assets, I was idly thinking about what I'd like to say to the Salem Mayor and City Council the next time I testify at a council meeting.

(Yeah, I know, I'm weird.)

Wanting to throw in some positive observations and advice about the City's often-shaky P.R. and communications efforts, I was mentally rehearsing some lines regarding how postings on the City of Salem Facebook page have improved. 

But then another thought came to mind: No, wait. They were much better for a while, but now they've gone back to blah.

I notice stuff like this, writing style and such, because that's been a prime focus of my life since I was a kid -- writing. 

I'm not sure when the City of Salem Facebook page came into existence. I believe it wasn't long ago. For a while I didn't give it much attention, figuring it would just be filled with boring stuff written to put City officials in as positive a light as possible.

However, as time went on I found myself complimenting the Facebook posts to my fellow local liberal political activists, who usually don't have much good to say about what our right-wing Mayor and city council majority are up to.

"The posts are well-written, balanced, and informative," I'd say to them. "Something has changed with City of Salem communications. I can actually read a post about something controversial, such as planning for the new police facility, and not feel like I was reading a City of Salem spin-doctored press release."

I felt that Michael Rose was largely, if not entirely, responsible for the improvements.

I knew that he'd gone to work for the City of Salem after being let go by the Statesman Journal newspaper as part of their New Journalism Strategy: "fire experienced competent reporters who make a decent salary and hire inexperienced people who will write for cheap."

(See my "Layoffs at Statesman Journal tied to worrisome Gannett 'newsroom of the future'")

So I paused my bill-paying duties to see if I could learn whether Rose was still with the City of Salem. Some brief Googling led me to his Linked In profile. Where I read:

Experience

Public Relations Coordinator
City of Salem, Oregon

December 2014 – August 2015 (9 months) Salem, Ore.

Provided accurate communications to the media and public under the direction of the Salem City Manager and Salem City Council. Wrote press releases and social media postings, using a style that was engaging and concise. Translated bureaucratic city staff reports into plain language. Posted information on the city's Twitter and Facebook accounts, as well as on the FlashAlert website. Served as the city’s media liaison and helped reporters connect with sources and verify information. Advised city staff on preparing for media interviews. Provided a veteran journalist’s perspective to support the city’s goals of increasing transparency and fostering citizen participation. Assisted media and the public at Salem City Council meetings.

That confirmed my suspicions. Michael Rose had been posting on the City's Facebook page until, recently, he stopped working for the City of Salem. I don't know why he left. 

I just know that since he's been gone, the Facebook postings have gone way downhill. As has the City's communication activities in general.

For example, last Friday a City of Salem FAQ document was put out after I and others began publicizing a Monday city council meeting agenda item involving a possible ban on early sales of recreational marijuana that otherwise was to start on October 1.

If the document was intended to inform and educate the public about why the City Council was considering a controversial ban on early sales, it didn't succeed.

A FAQ question asked, "Will Council be voting to ban the early sale of recreational marijuana?" The answer said, "No. However, Council will be asked whether they want to ban the early sale of recreational marijuana by medical marijuana dispensaries which could otherwise begin October 1, 2015. If so, action would be taken at the next Council meeting."

That struck me as absurd. The only way early sales can happen is through medical marijuana dispensaries. So the answer was pure P.R., not factual. It should have started out, "Yes, because Council will be asked..."

I'm pretty sure Michael Rose wasn't employed any longer by the City of Salem when the FAQ document was released. An experienced reporter and writer would have realized that honesty and accuracy are key to communicating with the public. 

In fact, the whole early sales agenda item drama was a public relations fiasco for the City. There's no way a possible ban on early sales of recreational marijuana should have been sprung upon the public on a Friday with no advance notice, with the City Council vote on whether early sales should be banned or allowed coming up on Monday.

(In my testimony at Monday's council meeting I said the City was the Amazon Prime of marijuana policymaking; a possible ban on early sales is announced on Friday and a vote happens the next business day.)

So I'm already missing Michael Rose. As he says in his Linked In profile, he "provided a veteran journalist’s perspective to support the city’s goals of increasing transparency and fostering citizen participation." 

The City of Salem needs someone like him, badly.

That person should do what Rose did: serve as a conduit for accurate, balanced information about what is going on at City Hall, presenting both sides of policy issues when appropriate, rather than simply serving as a P.R. flack for City officials.

Basic facts about Oregon's early sales of recreational marijuana

Today I got an email message from a friend who'd been contacted by someone who thought I had my facts wrong about early sales of recreational marijuana in Salem, and Oregon as a whole.


That "someone" (I don't know who it was) wrote to my friend:

I think he got the dates wrong for the early sales of pot.  Legal sales from rec dispensaries can begin on Jan 4 2016 if i am not mistaken... meaning that early sales (from medical dispensaries) would go from Oct 1 to Jan 4.  Brian would have you believe from his blog, that the City Council's action would ban recreational pot from Oct 1 2015 to December 31 2016, if I read his blog right. He claimed that by neglecting to put the year on the agenda item that they were trying to ban rec pot sales to the end of 2016.

This is wrong, largely. I responded with the correct facts.

Glad to reply to the person who has questions.  

Early recreational sales from medical marijuana dispensaries run from October 1, 2015 to December 31, 2016. Senate Bill 460 says this at the end of the short bill. It sunsets on December 31, 2016. See:

https://olis.leg.state.or.us/liz/2015R1/Downloads/MeasureDocument/SB460

 

Recreational sales through the “late” licensing program aren’t expected to begin until the end of 2016. So it isn’t true that “late” sales begin on January 4, 2016. It will be much later. The OLCC chairman, Bob Partridge, explained this in a Q and A interview with the Oregonian recently. 

http://www.oregonlive.com/marijuana/index.ssf/2015/08/post_3.html

Under the early sales law, anyone 21 and older may purchase marijuana from a dispensary starting Oct. 1. Meanwhile, the liquor control commission isn't expected to launch regulated recreational sales until late next year. How do early sales impact the liquor control commission's work?

Patridge: We are going to get a lot of questions related to, 'What does this really mean?' and 'What is going on?' But the OLCC is not the enforcement arm for that particular piece. 

Does it complicate next year's rollout of recreational sales under the OLCC?

Patridge: I think it could get awkward toward the end of 2016 because we will be putting up stores at the end of 2016. There could be some overlap and some market confusion.

So, as Partridge says, the early sales through medical marijuana dispensaries can continue through the end of 2016. At some point near the end of 2016, likely there will be recreational stores also, so there could be some overlap between recreational sales at "medical" and "recreational" stores. Of course, likely many medical marijuana dispensaries will apply for a recreational license.

 

The main thing, again, is that recreational stores won’t open until the end of 2016.

 

Early sales at medical marijuana dispensaries are intended to bridge the gap between October 1, 2015 and the end of 2016 — helping to cut down on black market sales between now and then, and bringing in tax revenue. (There is a tax holiday for recreational buyers at dispensaries until January 1, 2016; then taxes will be levied.)

 

Regarding the City of Salem getting the date wrong in their staff report about marijuana, the importance of this is that since “late" recreational sales won’t begin until the end of 2016, a ban on “early” sales in Salem would have meant that citizens 21 and older wouldn’t have had any way to buy recreational marijuana in Salem until late 2016 — not January 4, 2016, as erroneously mentioned by some.

 

I’ve been following this issue more closely than most people have. It’s sort of confusing, but not that confusing. There’s no reason City of Salem staff couldn’t have gotten their facts right in the staff report, so I appropriately criticized them about that.

 

Feel free to share this message with anyone else who has similar questions. 

 

    — Brian

Since the City of Salem staff report erroneously said on the first page that the early sales program ends on December 31, 2015 rather than the date it actually ends, December 31, 2016, I can see why some people would think that "late" recreational sales in Salem could begin in January 2016.

But this isn't true.

It's unfortunate that the error was in the staff report. I pointed it out to the City Attorney and other city officials last Friday morning, as soon as I noticed it. As I said in my testimony at Monday's city council meeting, I sort of expected a "thank you" from City staff. But so far, that hasn't happened.

This is a big shortcoming of the top officials who run the City of Salem these days. Everybody makes mistakes. I sure do. Frequently.

What's important is that when a mistake/error is pointed out to us, we take a close look at what the other person is saying and consider whether we could be wrong. I've found that City of Salem officials are extremely reluctant to admit when they are wrong.

Are Salem City Council votes predetermined prior to meetings?

It's an open question, the title of this blog post. But this is something people have been talking about for a long time here in Salem, Oregon, because it sure seems like important policy decisions often are voted on with very little discussion or debate between councilors at City Council meetings.

Today I emailed the message below to Kacey Duncan, the Acting City Manager, and other city officials. After last Monday's city council meeting, I figured it was time to ask some pertinent questions that revolve around whether the City of Salem is complying with Oregon's public meeting law.

The way I argue it in my message, there are only two basic possibilities.

Either (1) Votes on issues such as whether to allow or ban early sales of recreational marijuana aren't predetermined in advance of City Council meetings, in which case citizens have good reason to weigh in via emails, letters, phone calls, and public testimony about upcoming votes, or (2) Votes are predetermined and City officials are violating the public meeting law.

As I say in the message, if (1) is true then Councilors Brad Nanke and Jim Lewis owe me an apology when they said at last Monday's meeting that I spread "misinformation" and "paranoia" by altering people to the possibility of the council imposing a ban on early sales.

Actually, as I said in the public comment period, this is democracy in action -- citizens expressing their opinions to elected officials about an issue that means a lot to them. I woke up today feeling that I couldn't let Nanke and Lewis get away with their anti-public participation remarks.

Here's what I sent to City officials. I'll let you know what sort of response I get.

Mr. Duncan, as Acting City Manager I’ve got some questions for you about issues I raised during my testimony at the August 31 City Council meeting, and raised again in the email I sent to you and other City officials after the meeting. 

That email was mostly directed to Councilor Nanke, but I’ve gotten a brief non-responsive reply from him saying, "In the future I would suggest you contact city staff for clarification on any staff report.” So that’s basically what I’m doing here, even though my questions involve more than Mr. Atchison’s staff report about marijuana laws/policies.

 

I’ll try to be as clear as possible, framing my concerns and questions in a step by step process. I’ll boldface the questions to make them stand out more. 

 

(1) I’m still confused about Councilor Nanke’s contention at the meeting that the staff report, and also the Statesman Journal story on this subject, indicated that early sales of recreational marijuana through medical marijuana dispensaries was going to be approved by the Council on August 31, so there was no need for me (and others) to fire people up with requests to contact Council members and/or testify in person in favor of allowing early sales.

 

I’ve re-read the staff report and Statesman Journal story several times. Both say, in various ways, that a ban on early sales, and also “late” sales, will be considered by the Council at the August 31 meeting, as will other marijuana-related questions raised by Mr. Atchison. Yet Councilor Nanke accused me of spreading misinformation by communicating this fact to concerned citizens.

 

So, what are the portions of the staff report and Statesman Journal story which support an assertion that the question of banning early sales of recreational marijuana had been settled by the Council — in favor of early sales? 

 

This isn’t the meaning I get from the staff report. Rather, it says that staff will move ahead with ordinance changes to allow early sales unless the Council decides to institute a ban on such. The report doesn’t contain a staff recommendation on the marijuana-related policy questions. Instead, it says: “Staff recommendations are dependent on Council policy choices on the issues identified above.”

 

(2) Thus this raises the question of whether the Council had already made those policy choices at the time of the August 31 staff report, which was released to the public, along with the meeting agenda, on Friday, August 28. I’m not aware that the Council had previously discussed these choices, notably including whether early sales of recreational marijuana should be allowed, or banned.

 

So, prior to August 28, did the City Council hold an official work session or meeting where a vote was taken on allowing early sales? If this happened, please send me the minutes of the meeting. 

 

I’m pretty sure, but not 100% sure, that this didn’t happen. After all, if the Council already had given direction to City staff on the question of whether to allow early sales, why would the City Attorney ask for such guidance on this policy choice in the staff report? (This is a rhetorical question; no need to answer it.)

 

(3) Assuming that the question of allowing early sales was still officially unsettled prior to the August 31 Council meeting, I remain perplexed by Councilor Nanke’s strong assertion that all the people, including me, who asked the Council to permit early sales were operating under some sort of false assumptions or misinformation. 

 

Nanke emphatically implied at the meeting, if not outright asserted, that it should have been obvious that the Council was going to approve early sales, so there was no need for the public to weigh in on this via emails, phone calls, and testimony during the meeting’s opening public comment period.

 

So, how was this obvious? How would citizens know that the Council was going to approve the early sale of marijuana when this was raised as an open question in the staff report? More broadly, how would a member of the City Council, such as Brad Nanke, know in advance of the August 31 meeting that this was going to happen?

 

(4) This brings me to the question of “secret deliberations” and “pre-council meetings” that some citizen activists in Salem believe are happening. Understand, I’m not saying they are. I just want to bring this out in the open, as this question has been raised, and denied, by Councilor Bednarz and others during council meetings. 

 

I will accept that denial unless evidence arises that secret deliberations indeed are occurring.

 

However, I hope you understand how Councilor Nanke’s comments at the August 31 council meeting fuel the fire of suspicion that votes are hard-wired, so to speak, prior to a council meeting. Otherwise, some would say, how could Nanke argue that there was no need for citizens to urge councilors to allow early sales of marijuana since, according to him, there was no possibility that a ban would be passed by the City Council?

 

So, as Acting City Manager, do you or any other city officials (elected or appointed) know the outcome of council votes with certainty prior to the vote occurring in public at a council meeting? This may sound like a rhetorical question with an answer of “no,” but I’d like to have an answer to it given the longstanding suspicions that votes are predetermined prior to council meetings. 

 

(5) I believe I’m done with my questions. Time for comments and clarifications. You and other City officials are smart enough to see what I’m getting at. 

 

Either the policy question of allowing early sales of recreational marijuana was settled by the City Council prior to the August 31 meeting, or it wasn’t. Meaning, either a ban on early sales had been ruled out in advance of the meeting, or a ban was still possible if a majority of councilors was to vote for it.

 

I and others have been castigated by Councilor Nanke (along with his wife, on a recent KYKN program) for alerting citizens to the fact that a ban on early sales was being considered by the council, and would be voted on at the August 31 council meeting. 

 

Supposedly, Nanke and others said, we citizen activists should have known that a ban was impossible; it wasn’t going to happen; the Council wasn’t going to approve one. My question is: how were we supposed to know this?

 

My understanding of Oregon’s public meeting law is that it requires not only that votes on policy questions such as whether to allow early sales of recreational marijuana are to occur in public, the deliberations leading up to those votes also are to be made in public. 

 

Otherwise, what is the purpose of citizens contacting public officials, such as city councilors, urging that a certain policy position be adopted? What is the purpose of having public hearings, or public comment periods, if a city council already has decided in advance of a meeting what the outcome of a vote would be? This makes a mockery of public participation.

 

Yet this is what Councilor Nanke seems to have asserted at the August 31 council meeting. He said that it was wrong of me to urge citizens to weigh in on the question of a ban on early sales because, apparently, the vote on this question had been settled prior to the meeting.

 

My questions above are intended to get at the truth of Nanke’s remarks. 

 

Maybe the Salem City Council does meet secretly prior to meetings and predetermine what the vote will be on certain policy questions. In this case, you are in violation of the state’s public meeting law. 

 

If that isn’t the case, then Councilor Nanke owes me and other citizen activists an apology, because the question of whether the council would institute a ban on early marijuana sales was unsettled prior to the meeting. Thus it was entirely appropriate for me and others to alert people to the possibility that a ban on early sales could be approved by the council.

 

Understand: I realize that we all make guesses/predictions about how elected officials will vote. This happens with Congress all the time. Today the big news is that Obama has a veto-proof Iran deal, even though a vote in Congress won’t happen for weeks.

 

The issue is about transparency and citizen participation in public policy-making, the goal of Oregon’s public meetings law. 

 

What if the outcry last weekend had been on the other side of the early sales issue? What if the council had heard from hundreds of people opposed to early sales, and dozens of them came to testify about this during the public comment period at the August 31 meeting? What if some people brought amazingly persuasive arguments in favor of an early sales ban before the council?

 

Councilor Nanke’s remarks, which went unchallenged by anyone else on the council, strongly implied (and again, seem to have outright asserted) that there was zero possibility of the council voting to approve a ban.

 

And again I ask: how did Nanke know this? How would a member of the public know this? If this is true, and the outcome of a vote on early sales was predetermined one way or another, how is the council complying with Oregon’s public meeting law?

 

Feel free to contact me by email or phone if you have any questions, Mr. Duncan. I’m eager to get the City of Salem’s replies to my questions. 

 

Sincerely, 

 

Brian Hines

 

---------------------------------

 

Update: Here's the response I got back from Kacey Duncan. Not very satisfying as regards answering my specific questions, but at least he got back to me. My reading of his response is that it confirms my positions as described in this blog post.

 

Good Afternoon Mr. Hines,

 

The purpose of the staff report was to inform the Council of recent legislative changes pertaining to recreational marijuana and taxation and seek policy direction on whether to initiate potential code amendments or other available actions.  The final page of the staff report spoke to actions staff would take--unless directed otherwise--based on our interpretation of marijuana and taxation policy guidance provided at previous meetings of the Council.  I do know that every effort is made comply with Oregon's public meeting laws and no final decisions are made prior to the public meeting.

 

Thank you for the opportunity to respond.

 

Kacey Duncan

Interim City Manager

City of Salem, Oregon

"Trust us" says Salem's right-wing City Council. "Why?" ask citizens.

As the saying goes, there can be a universe in a grain of sand. Likewise, those attending last night's Salem City Council meeting got insights into how things at City Hall are generally going.

In short: not well. Not for those of us concerned about government transparency, trust, and citizen participation.

The three go together. Transparency. Trust. Citizen participation.

For example, when people feel like the Mayor, city councilors, and other officials are being open and honest with them, trust is fostered. When people trust that what they say will be listened to, and can make a difference, they're more likely to participate by emailing ideas to the City of Salem and testify at public hearings. 

Yesterday it was encouraging to see quite a few people show up at the City Council meeting who hadn't been part of such goings-on before.

The Topic of the Night -- whether early sales of recreational marijuana should begin October 1 at Salem's medical marijuana dispensaries -- brought out a different crowd than the usual suspects of gray-haired activist baby boomers.

Like me. 

What was discouraging to me was how many comments of this sort I heard and read online after the meeting. 

Man, those guys sure disrespected the public. I can't believe how rude the Mayor and councilors were. Now that I've seen how the city council operates, I'm never going to another meeting.

Something needs to change at City Hall.

I'm hopeful that the new City Manager, Steve Powers, will bring a new approach to how city officials relate to the citizenry. But we're still going to have the same Mayor and city councilors, so they need to get with the program and change their attitudes toward transparency, trust, and citizen participation.

Right now there's a lot of denial going on in the council chambers, mostly (if not entirely), among our right-wing Mayor and council majority. They look upon criticism as an attack, questioning as a threat, open discussion as an annoyance.

Yet I and others who testified last night were viewed as the troublemakers. Or at least, as the people who needed to understand the good intentions of City officials, rather than the other way around.

I've encountered this quite a few times before from Mayor Anna Peterson and her Chamber of Commerce backed-and-financed conservative council majority. When I hear them whine about citizens not understanding the marvelousness of what they're trying to do, I'm reminded of a song by The Animals from my teen years.

When things go wrong I seem to be bad
But I'm just a soul whose intentions are good
Oh Lord, please don't let me be misunderstood

Well, everybody is misunderstood some of the time. Human communication is a tough thing to do rightly. But if you're always feeling misunderstood, you should look more at yourself, and less at other people. 

Last night Councilor Brad Nanke got all incensed at how the many people who emailed the City Council, asking that early sales of recreational marijuana be approved, didn't understand that the council already was planning to do this.

Except, he never explained how anybody could have known this, a fact I made clear in my own testimony. (See "The Salem City Council accuses me of misinformation -- I call them out on this." And here's a video of me correcting Nanke's false statements.) 

Nanke and Councilor Jim Lewis just kept saying, in different ways, trust us; we'll do the right thing; there's no need for citizens to weigh in on what we're doing. Which is very bizarre, striking as it does at the heart of what drives Oregon's public meeting laws.

Nanke, Lewis, and Peterson don't seem to realize how nonsensical their trust us attitude is. The Mayor has even said that City staff don't make mistakes, so there's no need for citizens to oversee their actions. After watching a council work session about an Urban Tree Commission, I wrote:

She said that because the City Council hires the “right” City Manager, who chooses the “right” directors, who hire the “correct” people to work under them, “right” decisions are going to be made.

This also was the underlying vibe at last night's council meeting.

The band of conservative councilors acted as if all the people who sent emails urging that early sales of recreational marijuana be approved, and those who testified to that effect at the meeting, should have sat on their hands, or smoked some weed, and allowed the City Council to do its thing without interference, because Big Council always knows best.

Like I said, bizarre. Also, illogical.

Nanke strongly implied, and almost said outright, that it should have been known (somehow or other) that the City Council was going to approve the early sale of recreational pot. But this runs afoul of Oregon's open meeting law, which requires that deliberations by a governmental body be made out in the open, not behind closed doors.

I urged citizens to email the council about this issue and to testify at yesterday's meeting during the public comment period. After all, the City Council isn't supposed to have already decided how to vote on an issue before it hears from citizens and goes through a process of open discussion before the vote.

So Nanke's and Lewis' trust us pleas made no sense. Democracy is founded on an assumption that reasoned arguments and solid evidence presented transparently in an open public process are supposed to guide policy decisions.

See an essay of mine on my other blog, "Naturalism needs to rule public policy debates." The arguments I made for excluding religious dogma from the public policy arena hold equally for excluding private "backroom" reasons for doing this rather than that.

For instance, I said:

A group is playing poker. A hand has been dealt. The cards have been played. Everything is on the table for examination. A player with four aces prepares to pull in the chips she has won. Until she hears…

“Stop. I won this hand. I’ve got a straight flush, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 of clubs.”
“No, you don’t. We can all see your cards. You’ve got nothing.”
“Ah, those aren’t my real cards. My real cards are invisible. Only I can see them — give me the chips I’ve won.”

Who would do that?

The game has been played fairly. The only cards that count are the physical ones handed out by the dealer. There are rules for deciding which combinations of cards win out over other combinations. If someone brings in supernatural invisible cards, this makes playing a fair game of poker impossible.

Leave out the word "supernatural," and this metaphor applies almost perfectly to last night's city council meeting. 

Nanke and Lewis wanted citizens to trust in the Invisible "cards" only they could see that, supposedly, meant that the early sale of marijuana policy the council would approve could be trusted to be a "winning hand."

To which I and others appropriately said, no way. The Mayor and city councilors need to put their cards openly out on the discussion table -- reasoned arguments and solid evidence -- just like interested citizens do.

Only then can the policymaking process work as it should, with transparency, trust, and citizen participation.

But these things are in short supply at the Salem City Hall these days. People with much longer memories of how City officials used to do things tell me that Mayor Peterson and her right-wing council majority are the most dismissive of public input of any City Hall administration in many, many years.

I've testified at quite a few City Council meetings. The prevailing mood when I've done this is akin to how my wife, a retired psychotherapist, tells me domestic abusers (almost always men) treat their women. 

"Honey, I'm hitting you for your own good. You just don't understand how much I love you. You deserve what you're getting. Just trust that everything will work out fine if you obey me and do as you're told."

This, of course, is a bunch of denial-crap. As is the oft-heard complaint of the Mayor and her city council majority: you citizens don't understand that you should trust us, even though we're treating you badly.

Well, I for one am not going to put up with this.

And It was pleasing to see so many other people with the same attitude in the council chambers last night. I'll trust City of Salem officials when they prove that they're worthy of being trusted.

A litany of prior missteps during the past couple of years I've been involved with local politics shows that there is a long ways to go before Salem citizens can feel that the folks at City Hall truly care about transparency, trust, and public participation.

See, for example:

Outrage: the true story of Salem's U.S. Bank tree killings
Pringle Square developer poised to take some of Riverfront Park
Salem Public Library might be converted to a police facility
Salemians were excluded from police facility planning
City of Salem took over Salem Downtown Partnership for lousy reasons
Salem's Third Bridge planning reaches new level of absurdity
Salem City Council gets it wrong on Howard Hall
Salem's downtown parking dysfunction continues

And the topic of the day:
Salem City Council might ban marijuana sales -- secretly

So, yeah, folks in Salem have a lot of really good reasons not to trust Mayor Peterson and her council majority. It's possible for them to earn back that trust, but we'll need to see actions rather than words.

Actions founded on...

Trust. Transparency. Public participation.