The citizens’ Measure 3-568 will provide all our natural parks the same protections that Spring-brook has. It does so by clarifying specific parks by name and extending to these parks the same protections citizens created in Chapter X for Springbrook.
The citizens’ Measure 3-568 will provide all our natural parks the same protections that Spring-brook has. It does so by clarifying specific parks by name and extending to these parks the same protections citizens created in Chapter X for Springbrook.
The city has historically shown a preference for developed and landscaped parks incongruent with local flora. The city pushing a tennis center into Springbrook park prompted citizens creating Chapter X in the first place. We need Measure 3-568 with all the protections of Chapter X passed to the other natural parks to protect the intent of their inception.
The original Chapter X has always allowed long term planning as Springbrook Park is the only park with a master plan. Measure 3-568 and Chapter X both allow for unpaved ADA paths, fire abatement, removal of diseased and dead trees as well as invasive plants.
Measure 3-575 does not do this. Measure 3-575 is purposely vague and leaves decisions up to a rotating cast of city officials and employees. The people who wrote the measure will only be making decisions during their terms of office, or their current employment. In a few years new people with different ideas will make the decisions.
Intentions change, case in point: the buildings on First Street. The City had an idea that new construction in town should look like a village. Four years later a different group decided on a different look for the new City Hall. Drive by yourself, do they match?
Vote against allowing fickle and vague intentions in Measure 3-575, and vote YES on solidified protections and planning in Measure 3-568.
Jean Eves
Lake Oswego
With Jean Eves’ permission, we have reproduced her Reader Letter for your convenience and for those who don’t subscribe to the LO Review. Read her letter in the LO Review here: