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. THE OTHER HALF OF THE STORY Thank you for your recent cover story on Portland's water supply ["Wet Dreams," WW, March 3, 1999]. You recognized Jerry Yudelson's conservation pricing proposal as an effective means of addressing water shortages. Unfortunately, you failed to mention the other half of Yudelson's proposal: competitive contracting for water-supply services. According to Yudelson's report, even with these rate changes there will still be a need for investments in both water conservation technology and new supply in order to meet increasing regional water demands due to population growth. He recommends that Portland open the city's water supply system to competitive bidding. Billing, line maintenance, water treatment and numerous other services can be provided effectively and at a lower cost when contracted out. When Indianapolis contracted out its water operations, the costs of sewer service were reduced by 20 percent ($23 million in the first two years) and effluent violations fell by 50 percent--in a city that had been considered a model for efficient wastewater treatment plant operations. Through managed competition, the provision of water services and the necessary infrastructure and conservation investments can be achieved more economically, meaning that rate increases for high-consumption customers could be somewhat offset. For the full text of Yudelson's proposal, go to the Cascade Policy Institute Web site at www.CascadePolicy.org, or call (503) 242-0900. Angela Eckhardt Cascade Policy Institute WATCHING THE WATER WASTRELS Thanks for calling attention to Jerry Yudelson's water conservation pricing plan in "Wet Dreams" [WW, March 3, 1999]. It is good to know there is someone addressing the "hidden" issue of water use in the Portland area and that they have the ear of policy makers. Portlanders uncharacteristically take their water for granted, and as the need for more has grown, it is garnering needed attention, i.e. the Willamette River and its watershed. The valuation of water in the past has had little to do with its intrinsic worth. When pricing is set, it is based solely on delivery and administration, not with the actual product itself. Indeed, it does cost the city more to send Wacker Siltronic its $739,000 water bill because maintenance is more than meter reading and bill collecting. It is also establishing and sustaining these high flows. The intake valves are the midpoint in this equation. Tom McCue should pick that "low-hanging fruit" to conserve the 20 percent of water use before paying more for the same in future. Yudelson's plan will make this kind of conservation profitable instead of prohibitive. All big businesses are not big water users and not all big water users are big businesses, but those that are both should not be less responsible than residential customers are for the environment in the Bull Run watershed. After all, its water quality is one of the conditions that created the "Silicon Forest." A plan to establish conservational practices toward water use in Portland is something that can be embraced, especially when the alternative is $135 million and the increased damage and degradation of our primary water source. It is time to stop pleasuring ourselves so readily and allow "wet dreams" of a sustainable, healthy Willamette River and Bull Run reservoir to return to Portland. Edward Hughes Southwest Barbur Boulevard OPB CRUELTY? On page 35 of the March 10 issue of Willamette Week, Oregon Public Broadcasting placed a clever ad for OPB Radio, picturing an addled older woman, with this headline and copy: "Joyce will never listen to OPB Radio. Then again, Joyce has a head of lettuce she swears is Steve McQueen." As a copywriter, may I suggest that OPB continue this campaign with ads that convey the same message as this one? "Joyce will never listen to OPB Radio. Then again, Joyce has clinical depression and is thinking about killing herself." "Joyce will never listen to OPB Radio. Then again, Joyce is trapped in a heroin addiction." "Joyce will never listen to OPB Radio. Then again, Joyce's Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder makes her life a fearful hell." I have met many people who suffer from schizophrenia, a disease OPB portrays quite comically in its ad. The disease of schizophrenia is a relentless, hideous nightmare, and the lives schizophrenics lead are an endless struggle to escape that nightmare. The stigma society attaches to their disease, and to all mental illnesses, is one more source of pain and shame, one that prevents many mentally ill people from ever seeking help. In its ad, OPB has done a fine job of contributing to that stigma and humiliation. I do not want to suggest that Willamette Week in any way censor your advertisers. But to OPB, I ask that they pull this ad. It is cruel. Bill Weinstein Creative Director USWeb/CKS YOU BET THEY'RE ROGUES Thank you for the nice piece in Rogue of the Week [March 10, 1999] about George Vaughan and Bill Swindells (publishers of the Clackamas Review and Oregon City News). However, I would like to correct one inaccurate characterization. Referring to Vaughan and Swindells as newspapermen is like calling Custer an Indian fighter. They wanted to be one. They looked like one. They had everything they needed to be one. But they couldn't quite figure it out. That's the problem. That's why they had no qualms about cutting the editorial staff in half, producing one paper instead of two, increasing the advertising ratio to more than 70 percent and then publishing statements to their 5,500 recent subscribers telling them the changes would allow them to get more community information into the papers. As to Vaughan's claim that readers who subscribed in October to two separate newspapers are now happy: Maybe that's because those readers trusted their community newspapers, which informed them changes made two months later were improvements but conveniently left out the part about converting to a single "shopper news" that 37,000 of their neighbors now receive for free via junk-mail postage. Perhaps more subscribers didn't ask for their money back because they didn't realize they were entitled. That's the way a good con is supposed to work. A final note. Vaughan's claim that most current subscribers live outside the free-delivery zone is amusing at best. The CR/OCN mailed out 30,000 free copies for a year. Most of the readers who subscribed in October, after being told free circulation would cease, came from that pool. The papers were absolutely the only promotional vehicle for the subscription push. Now Vaughan and Swindells mail out 42,000 issues, and apparently many of those 5,500 subscribers manage to fall outside the free-delivery zones. Vaughan's only contribution to editorial content while I was editor was an op-ed piece about Bill Clinton's unworthiness. Vaughan reminded the president and our readers what his father had told him: "One lie wipes out a million truths." Vaughan better get busy tellin' as much truth as possible if he wants to even the score. Pat Malach Astoria HEROIN HYPOCRISY I am responding to the short piece entitled "Last Writes" by Bill Donahue [WW, March 10, 1999]. Putting down one physically addictive drug--heroin--while chatting innocently about another--(During Brennan's "clean times) "We'd throw 'em back...essentially Irish...Guinness-inspired"--is a bunch of hypocritical shit. Pure, legal heroin wouldn't cause any of the myriad of health and social problems that alcohol does or inspire the arrogant stupidity and bad breath of a drunk. If alcohol were illegal, as it once was, you'd have alcoholics robbing people for liquor, gangs being formed and killing people to supply it, people going blind and dying from poorly made alcohol--parallel effects to the criminalization of heroin. If Michael Brennan had had legal access to pure heroin, he could have written, lived, worked and supported his habit on a few pennies a day, then kicked it if he wanted to. I met a junkie in New Mexico a few years back who'd been shooting up since the late '60s, and the scars and sores on his arms were enough to turn anyone's stomach. But he was an intelligent and well-spoken writer, and I was always glad to sit down and talk and hear his views on things. I can't say the same about anyone who's just downed a few pints. Christopher Dreger Southeast 9th Avenue SELLOUT Where is your integrity? After reading "Operator Please!" [500 Words, WW, March 17, 1999] about US West's neglect of rural Oregon and the subsequent outrageous profits bilked at their expense, I turn the page to be faced with a full-page advertisement for, guess who, US West! Two pages down from that ad is yet another full-page US West ad. Both advertisements promise even faster telephone and Internet service, presumably offered at the expense of the eastern part of the state. Many readers appreciate that Willamette Week has proved very outspoken regarding US West's underhanded and exploitative business practices. But when your paper accepts money and advertising from a giant corporation that it and many readers regard as corrupt, how seriously do you expect your tirades to be taken? Is it really necessary to trade your paper's integrity for a few advertising dollars? It seems that, just like the Oregon Legislature, you offer up a token resistance to US West when you've been in their pocket all along. David Williams Southwest Park Avenue REPUBLICAN FAMILY VALUES Hats off to Willamette Week again for your choice of Rogue of the Week (March 17, 1999). I was appalled at the heartless and unconscionable comments made by public-appointed Sens. Eileen Qutub and Veral Tarno. We have the chance to do something right here by building the women's prison and intake center in Wilsonville and not separating these families. Children don't care what mistakes their parents have made as long as they are loved. The largest percentage of inmates come from the Portland area. For the most part, these are not people incarcerated for crimes against their children, and we have no reason to believe separating them from their children could ever be for the benefit of the children. Inmates have the right to raise their children, no matter what mistakes they have made in the past. There is no doubt that visitation for inmates (both men and women) with family and friends encourages positive rehabilitation. When inmates are also parents, the contact with their children could very well be the key that keeps the child from making similar mistakes. A large portion of the men's prison population is in the Portland/Salem area. But that is also changing. The newly expanded men's prison in Ontario has dramatically changed visitation for inmates recently located there (against their own will). Proposals of video visits from the Salem area to these distant prisons disregard the need for physical contact and personal sharing. Doing the same thing to Oregon's women inmate population would be cruel for them and their children. Some of these inmates, being barely adults themselves, also need contact with their own parents, who in most cases are raising the grandchildren. This is all sad but true--and must be dealt with humanely. Many of our younger inmate population, imprisoned under Measure 11, will one day return to your world, Sens. Qutub and Tarno. Steps toward humane treatment, expansion of inmate education and rehabilitation programs, and extension of visitation days and times are important when realizing this. Juliet Silva Clackamas - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Willamette Week | originally published March 24, 1999