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Partial victory at LC Commissioners’ First Hearing

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By JOHN ROSS/for The Herald  —  Oakridge Strong: high, mighty, and aspiring—arrived abuzz like alerted bees boiling out of a disturbed hanging or underground nest—surged into Tuesday’s Lane County Commission hearing on the tired subject of the Old Hazeldel Quarry. Some came ready to sting repeatedly like angry yellow jackets to drive away any marauding creature, out to defile their most precious possessions: home sweet home, family and community.

Some were weary from the near decade long struggle to repel some stealthy invaders and usurpers. Could they be calculating predators, out to sully whole mountains along with scenic trails for walking, wandering or cycling? Might they pollute streams, abundant with preciously dwindling fish along with other luscious native habitats essential to bats, beavers, butterflies and scenery itself?

Or were they plagues of parasites seeking to leech the very bases of economic survival, one precious dram at a time, after some 50-70 years of blasting away the very ground they had chosen to stand on and to defend?

Several dozen local folks made time to drive to and from the downtown Lane County Courthouse and sit silenced on semi-soft chairs and endure wonkish presentations steeped in the uncommon language of law and administrative rules and regulations. Some, including staff and counselors, barely stifled outright yawns or far-off, glazed looks to maintain their full alert that drew them in buses, trucks and varied motor vehicles. The gravel pit miners and allies contended that the Old Hazeldel Quarry was essential for roads of blacktop, gravel or steel rail transit of people, goods or services and a viable economy of endless conspicuous consumption.

Tears were mostly suppressed, and fears masked given that “the fix” might be in. Somebody was on the take, they had read and heard. Otherwise, the resurrected project didn’t make sense. It was foolish, reckless, dangerous on the face of it.

And so they strode to the mic’d-up podium to look Commissioners squarely in their eyes and ask them to reconsider whether they truly were untainted by King Estates cash in any amount up to proclaimed $200,000 payouts.

It wouldn’t matter too much unless it tipped a commissioner’s hand in favor of a mountain-blasting gravel pit mine in plain sight and easy earshot of residents, businesses, and visitors as well as school-attending children in the valley and high plains.

The blast-mining prospectors project has kept citizens agitated over lives made riskier, and unhappier to the point of un-livability. Everything from property value collapses, soaring temperatures and life-threating and degrading wildfires would create suffering and destroy tourism. Those concerns, they said, amplify a host of other maladies affecting human and other living natives.

Eventually, the heartrending, deeply personal, three-minute stories of lives afflicted by the whim of one wealthy organic winemaker and his Stonebroke LLC cronies clearly softened most Commissioners’ rigid opening stances. They then allotted the “applicants” more time to maneuver and gyrate toward some bartered approval at some ill-defined future date, loosing unplanned, unimagined, or ignored consequences.

The partial victory at the end of the afternoon’s trials and tribulations evolved into an agreement to halve the King Estates representative’s request for 30 days to allow for more commenting, data gathering, engorgement and digestion that would otherwise have stretched far into next year. It established three designated periods:

  • The first, ending in 20 days on Nov. 4th, is for accepting new comments and evidence;
  • The second, also 20 days, ending Nov. 25th, allows responses to anything new;
  • A third and final seven days will admit Stonebroke LLC’s rebuttal by Dec. 2nd.

Beyond that, Commissioners would reassemble to reject or approve the quarry, possibly, and then create binding legal/administrative hybrid language to restrain the project from numerous possibilities for mischief and destruction that could far outweigh any benefits, even to King’s limited-liability corporation. Misfortunes mentioned included contamination of Oakridge city and resident wells, Salmon Creek waters and those downstream with all but certain lawsuit wars erupting—even between the city and the county and one of it’s cities, to sprawling into an undesirable, unglamorous future all around.

Who knows?

On the possibly brighter side, a new initiative offered by real-estate experienced Commissioner David Loveall envisions collaboration between the city and the county toward locating equally-mineable, rock-endowed property to swap with King et. al. Politicians and staff would also seek ways to fund a more fathomable, equally promising property with lesser risks to natural and human welfares, yet with essential natural services and resources.

Otherwise, should the quarry gain approval, whole rounds of hearings, comments and rebuttals would ensue to hammer out a viable, acceptable, enforceable set of codes and zoning laws and strategic plans. Those would require their own set of nesting public hearings which King Estates and associates are vocally opposed to. Enough, already, attorney and representative Bill Kloos grimaced Tuesday.

Of course, the Stonebroke folks could withdraw or accept some other alternative sites or outright buyout.

Commission Chair Laurie Trieger closed the hearing, noting admiration for the work of Lead Planner Taylor Carsley who also drew glowing praise even from the hired Quarry representative and supporter Mr. Kloos. Trieger also voiced praise and gratitude for both the on-line and attending citizens and experts who testified, pointedly including regional Oregon Department of Fish & Wildlife big game specialist, Joe Stack. Standing last, he asserted flatly that the quarry would forever impact both the quality and quantity of deer, elk and their habitats over both the short and long term. That issue spelled doom for the last round of Quarry application.

As testimony ended, sufficiently sobered and increasingly empathic, Commissioners—three at least—commented that they recognize they all lived downstream too.

“We hear you,” they said.

“We hear you.”

“We hear you.”

With the compromise extension, formally worded, and scheduled, the fifty or so Oakridge residents rose to gather their thoughts, emotions and possessions and exit, wondering aloud when, if, or ever, their long, stifling nightmare might finally fade to black.

John Ross is journalist with over 10 years experience writing and editing for daily and weekly newspapers and at wire service–United Press International International. He has an MS in Ecology, specializing in spider behavior and biological control and also ran a small baking business for 20 years in the San Francisco Bay area. John Ross photo
John Ross
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John Ross is journalist with over 10 years experience writing and editing for daily and weekly newspapers and at wire service--United Press International International. He has an MS in Ecology, specializing in spider behavior and biological control and also ran a small baking business for 20 years in the San Francisco Bay area.

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