RE: More on the Future of whatever work will be possible.

[Karen Watters Cole]

Greetings. I read this same article in The Oregonian today with an Associated Press byline. This may be the different approach required for some people to wake up and become aware of something that they have previously considered someone else’s problem.  Perhaps the war on terrorism and its concurrent fears about bioterriosm has opened a window of learning. Let’s hope so. Last night I attended a community hearing held by the regional government Metro seeking public feedback pertaining to the Urban Growth Boundary (UGB) that has managed to keep Portland livable and protect remaining adjacent farm land during its rapid growth.  Landowners were also asked to give details about their acreage, whether it had a stream on it, if that stream had water all year, what wildlife, was it farmland or forested, etc.  Forecasts are that the metro area will absorb 400,000 additions to the local population in the next 10 years and the state requires that there be a 20-year land capacity plan in place. Since my retired parents and I live literally “on the line” in an “outburb” of Portland, OR across the line from substantial nursery owners, I have a familiarity and interest in where this urban-rural conflict evolves.  Once again I was amazed to find these decent, hard-working but naïve country-living folk stunned to discover that they had not been aware that there is a process and they have not been participating in it. They don’t want their way of life changed by someone else, and yet they sat by passively for years. In this case, their elected representative was more preoccupied with prohibiting abortions and keeping gays in their closets rather than advocating land-use issues for the rambling community she served. Here sat mostly older landowners looking at the future differently than their children and grandchildren, hearing activist talk from a few and finding themselves applauding grass-roots inciters. Did they think that God was going to solve the problem for them? There is so much cynicism about big bad secular government in this crowd that people have not been involved in it and therefore let other people make decisions for them. My paternal grandfather, a mathematician, principal and school teacher who was as devoted to gardening as he was to academics (there is a connection, I’m convinced) terraced his suburban yards with roses, fruit and nut trees, vegetables, flowers and bee hives.  Not a blade of grass to mow or fertilize. A man ahead of his times, a product of the Great Depression and the very real salt-of-the earth Oklahoma red dirt.  We are products of our roots. What shall we pass on?  Karen Watters Cole If you are interested in what Metro does here in Portland, OR go to their website at http://www.metro-region.org/   -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Tom Walker Sent: Thursday, June 20, 2002 10:51 PM To: Ray Evans Harrell; futurework Subject: Re: More on the Future of whatever work will be possible.   World sickens as heat rises Infections in wildlife spread as pests thrive in climate change Tim Radford, science editor Friday June 21, 2002 The Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/globalwarming/story/0,7369,741074,00.html Going down Tuvalu, a nation of nine islands - specks in the South Pacific - is in danger of vanishing, a victim of global warming. As their homeland is battered by ferocious cyclones and slowly submerges under the encroaching sea, what will become of the islanders? Patrick Barkham Saturday February 16, 2002 The Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/globalwarming/story/0,7369,659779,00.html