February 26th, 2010
Yesterday the Metro council approved a package of 28,000 acres of future urban growth boundary expansion areas and 272,000 acres of “rural reserves“ that will be off limits to urban growth boundary expansion for the next fifty years. What does it all mean?
I am honored that OLCV has identified me as the one candidate who will best protect the land, water and air quality of our region.
My key environmental goals include:
As we embark on a new year, many of us are assessing the past and planning for the future. I myself have been thinking about what 2010 will bring for perhaps the most significant project planned for our region: the Columbia River Crossing (CRC).
In 2009, the CRC moved closer than ever to becoming reality. But after years of negotiations and compromises, the project has taken a form that would be ecologically and fiscally catastrophic for the region.
A recent edition of Willamette Week (Wed., Oct 28) named Metro the “Rogue of the Week” for its completely inconsistent actions on global warming. On the one hand, Metro proclaims the importance of reducing greenhouse gases in its policy statements, while on the other hand it releases a draft regional transportation plan that will increase transportation greenhouse gases by 50 percent over current levels
What’s going on here?
Nearly 200 supporters joined me for my campaign kickoff Wednesday evening at Holocene. Leslie Carlson and Eric Lemelson did a great job warming up the crowd, who then responded enthusiastically to my call for new leadership at Metro to:
Larry Duyck, one of my strongest supporters, isn’t here tonight. Larry’s a farmer from the Verboort area of Washington County, and I worked with him on the Measure 49 campaign. He had an unavoidable conflict tonight—it’s moose hunting season up in Canada. But I want to acknowledge him and his support, because he has a very simple and understandable reason for endorsing me, and you can help him with it. Larry’s farm is outside Metro. And he says I’m the candidate most likely to keep his farm out of Metro.
