WW welcomes letters to the editor via mail, e-mail or fax. Letters must be signed by the author and include the author's street address and phone number for verification. Preference will be given to letters of 250 words or less. DEEPER INTO THE WELL Thank you for reporting on the Mattel/Tyco groundwater contamination story ["The Poisoned Well," WW, Jan. 6, 1998]. As you reported, the contamination of the toy company's private well was discovered almost a year ago. Unfortunately, our major, statewide newspaper has refused to report on one of the worst public health disasters from well-water contamination in the nation's history. Without your report, the public would be uninformed about corporate practices that affect our health and the employee's sad plight would go undisclosed. Reporting of this nature serves us all. I would like to follow up on the story with a couple of key points. One is that, while Mattel is doing more than some other corporate polluters have done in the past to communicate with employees and pay for basic medical screenings, they would not have been so compliant if my organization had not forced them to through threat of legal action. What wasn't reported in your story is that Mattel is claiming that these extremely high levels of exposure to one of the nation's most toxic industrial chemicals is "not expected to affect their health." Every corporate communication has made the same claim. The employees know better and so do the state agencies, but the lie stands because, as you point out in your article, laws favor corporations, not citizens. Now, Mattel is suing former owner GAF to recover clean-up costs. Interestingly, in their suit they cite GAF for "failing to appropriately dispose of TCE" and further claim that the substances released "pose an imminent and substantial endangerment to human health and the environment." Citizens can't sue their employer for poisoning them, but corporations have a host of legal remedies to protect them from being held responsible. The other point I would like to make was touched upon in your article. As you reported, none of the state or federal agencies responsible for protecting the public health has been willing to enter this population into one of their long-term epidemiological studies. A study of this nature would go a long way toward answering questions about health impacts from industrial practices that poison our communities. It is the one thing that the employees are continuing to ask of the various bureaucracies and so far the agencies just keep passing the buck. The tragedy then continues because we will not be able to learn from our mistakes. And corporations will continue to dump toxins in our communities claiming that these chemicals are innocent until proven guilty. Jane Haley, President Oregon Center for Environmental Health AN IMMODEST PROPOSAL Why do the editors of WW continue to promote Steffen Silvis as the Grinch of Portland Theater? He quotes 11 semi-theatergoers, each with the most dismal attendance records, in an attempt to prove his point: that Portland has no theater scene ["In a League of Its Own," WW, Dec. 29, 1998]. By their own admission these 11 seldom attend live theater at all. Why would anyone think there is credibility to their opinions when they haven't done their homework? Maybe he should search out the audience that does attend regularly. They're there. Certainly not enough of them. However, that is less a comment on our theater scene and more on the proliferation of choices: TV, film, sporting events, the Internet and so on. WW seems to support Steffen's distaste for anything and everything on our stages, other than Imago of course. If I were Jerry and Carol (principal creators of Imago), I can't imagine I would be comfortable standing alone atop WW's list while everything below is characterized as some form of theatrical subversion. It might do WW and its readers a great service to have Steffen stand outside another theater to sample audience opinions, since for the last article Steffen was obviously standing in front of Imago's digs. The real problem is that Steffen has no credibility in Portland. Certainly not as a critic or as a playwright. So I suggest one of three proposals: Either WW should let Steffen go, send him to acquire some training as a critic (possibly from Bob Hicks since he is the best in Portland), or go one step further and put up the money to produce one of Steffen's own works. This last option has the most appeal. I promise you it would be the most attended production in Portland theater history. WW could even invite the same 11 audience members Steffen quoted in his article. And everyone would win. WW would even have something sensational to report, Steffen finally would get produced and at least 11 people would be rescued from vegetating in front of a television and reruns of Seinfeld. I bet Bob would even be happy to write the review. Shawn Rogers Actor and audience member Northeast Halsey Street TAKE THE RIGHT PATH For many of us here in Gearhart, Willamette Week's story of the swift rise and meteoric collapse of Andrew Wiederhorn's financial empire was a tale not entirely unexpected nor wholly unwelcome ["Ask Andrew Wiederhorn," Jan. 13, 1999]. Whatever his ephemeral skills as a fiscal manipulator, to Gearhartians he was young, dumb, and remarkably bereft of the qualities one expects of a human being. When he and wife Tiffany swaggered into town with their millions, they proceeded to break our hearts by destroying a community heritage that reaches back into the 19th century. Their fencing-off of the historic Little Beach path, their arrogant dispatch of the anguished residents who treasured this legacy, and, finally, their construction of an ugly and forbidding stone wall around their paranoiac compound sold short any hope of future sympathy should their schemes come to ashes. Now there is only the lonely fiddler to be paid. What went around has come around with the kind of poetic justice that time and tide know all too well. Perhaps the most daunting task presently facing Andrew Wiederhorn--one he might wish to move to the front of his agenda--is the rehabilitation of his bruised and buffeted soul. A good place to start would be to return our beloved path--an act that could begin to restore his humanity and, who knows, even change his luck! Wes Taft Gearhart - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Willamette Week | originally published January 27, 1999