By Daniel Simmons-Ritchie, The World The World | Posted: Thursday, August 18, 2011 11:00 am | (4) Comments
Coos and other South Coast counties could make-up for millions in lost federal money under a plan unveiled by U.S. Rep. Peter DeFazio on Wednesday.
The 4th District Democrat fielded questions in North Bend's City Hall on the county's most pressing problems as part of a tour of the South Coast during Congress' summer recess.
DeFazio tackled one of Coos County's gravest fiscal threats head-on -- the end of millions O&C funds from the government this year.
The O&C payments have compensated the counties for decades for large tracts of land that were taken by the government in the early 1900s.
DeFazio told The World in a sit-down interview, and later to the crowd of a 100 in North Bend, that he hoped to have legislation by the end of the year that would transfer the O & C land to trusts that would manage it for conservation and timber revenue.
One of the trusts would manage the lands to protect the forests, pleasing environmental groups. The other trust would lease the land to a private investor in exchange for a large upfront payment.
That payment would be invested and the annual interest would go to Oregon counties -- paying the same to the counties as the government previously funded.
DeFazio would ask Congress for one more year of O & C funding while the trusts are set up and Congress would be paid back from part of the investor's upfront payment.
He said there were challenges to the plan -- 'it's never been done before so it's not going to be easy" -- but it could mean stable income for Coos and other counties.
Speaking with The World and in the North Bend meeting, DeFazio also weighed in on other issues facing the South Coast and the U.S.
• DeFazio touted infrastructure development as his prime progress on curbing the region's high unemployment and economic stagnation. He was met with claps and cheers when he reminded the crowd in North Bend City Hall that the railway between Eugene and the North Spit would be reopened this year. He also said a new instrument landing system was on its way for Southwest Oregon Regional Airport and he was working to get funding for Oregon International Port of Coos Bay dredging.
• DeFazio said the idea of removing dams in the Columbia River basin was 'an incredibly stupid idea being pushed by a few people." DeFazio was responding to questions posed by The World about U.S. District Court Judge James Redden's ruling that the government needed a new plan to protect salmon around federal dams. He said some calls to remove dams would cause 10 years of harm to the fish because of disruption to rivers. It also would be impossible to replace the 210 megawatts of energy with another sustainable source, like wind, that quickly. 'Do you want natural gas or nuclear?"
• While DeFazio lashed out at George W. Bush over tax cuts and two wars that inflated the federal deficit, he also criticized Obama for extending those cuts and signing a law for a Social Security tax holiday. He said America's economic predicament was partly a result of the erroneous belief that continuously cutting taxes created jobs. While that may have made sense in the early 1900s when America manufactured things, he said, consumers now spent that money on Chinese-made goods. He reminded attendees that he voted against the new deficit-ceiling bill because its unspecified spending cuts didn't address the country's long-term need for new revenue.
• DeFazio disagreed with the war in Libya and said those, and America's military presence around the world, needed to be reigned in because it was financially unsustainable. He said the U.S. could spend a hundred years trying to rebuild Afghanistan and discover the country still devolves into tribal conflicts. He agreed with a person who criticized America's need for tens of thousands of troops in Germany. 'A presence to defend who? The French?" he said to laughs.
• Responding to attendees frustration over a lack of integrity among the country's leaders, DeFazio offered his own frustration with the limitless amount of private, and often unaccountable, money being spent on elections. He agreed with a cap on election spending as one measure of much-needed congressional reform.
Reporter Daniel Simmons-Ritchie can be reached at 541-269-1222, ext. 249, or at dritchie@theworldlink.com