Mar 17Liked by Richard Cheverton, Pamela Fitzsimmons
After I finished seeing red (or is it Reds?), I fired off the following letter to Comandante Rubio about the plan to enforce the ban on leaf blowers by fining those who hire noncompliant operators:
Dear Commissioner Rubio:
I am one of your constituents. I am a retired attorney and a Biden-voting centrist Democrat. I have lived in Portland almost continuously since 1978.
I understand you oversee the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability. For that reason, I am directing my complaint to you about a shocking consequence of Portland City Council's recent ban on the use of gasoline powered leaf blowers. OregonLive/The Oregonian recently reported:
Enforcement will focus on property owners who use leaf blowers or who hire contractors who use them. It will not be directed at landscape businesses or yard-care workers.
“The reason for this is to ensure that small businesses and landscape workers, especially those from marginalized communities, don’t bear the brunt of enforcement,” Sonrisa Cooper, the Sustainable Economy and Just Transition Analyst at the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability, told the City Council. “The onus is on the property owner to ensure that gas leaf blowers aren’t used on their property.” [1]
I could scarcely believe my eyes. I have good reasons for being a member of the Democratic Party and for voting for Joe Biden this year. However, this punitive and inefficient piece of bureaucratic class warfare against ordinary Portlanders finally made me understand why Republicans accuse Left-Coast politicians such as you of being socialists.
Now, it's doubtful Republicans really believe that you and other woke politicians are actually card-carrying members of a socialist organization. What they mean is that the people who run cities such as Portland deliberately go out of their way to favor the tiny percentage of the population who are members of "marginalized communities" at the expense of the vast majority of the voter/taxpayers who are not. Is there any other way to describe the round-about and grossly inefficient way the enforcement process was crafted? You and the others who put this scheme together really don't care if regular Portlanders have to shell out money because someone else failed to comply with the rules you established, do you? That's social justice for you.
In my opinion, Sonrisa Cooper and other city bureaucrats of her ilk are so out of touch with the taxpayers who pay her salary and so lost in social-justice land that she unwittingly made a damning admission that exposed the city's racial and class animus against the non-"marginalized" individuals who hire landscape services and yard workers.
Here is how a city government that was not suffering from terminal wokeness would have enforced a ban on gasoline leaf blowers: it would have taken action against those using the prohibited devices or their employer, if any. End of story. In fact, the "onus" of compliance with a ban on a device should be on the owner or user of that device, even if they are a home or business owner. It always has been that way. Sure, an enforcement officer can knock on the door of the person or business who hired noncompliant landscapers, but the purpose should be to ascertain the name and contact information of the company or self-employed individual who operated the prohibited machine.
What makes Portland's classist and inefficient enforcement scheme even more galling is that in the end it will be landscape businesses and yard care workers who bear the brunt of the ban. The first time a homeowner gets fined for hiring a noncompliant landscape business or yard care worker will also be the last time that homeowner hires them. Unless City Council pushes another rich-person tax to tide un- or underemployed yard care workers over until the taxpayers have subsidized their purchase of a compliant blower (in this city, who knows?), sooner or later members of those "marginalized communities" are going to feel some pain. You and Ms. Cooper may have tried to put the onus on the rich homeowners who hire yard care workers, but everyone will know that the real culprit was a City Council who has forgotten that it works for all Portlanders. What a joke!
Portland seems to take the award for producing nails that a writer/reporter/journalist like RC who's not afraid to tell the truth can swing a hammer easily and make a direct hit. Nice job hitting this gas blower BS one squarely, keep it up!
Mar 16Liked by Richard Cheverton, Pamela Fitzsimmons
Thanks, Richard! Someone who is better at math than me should study the impact on temperature of all the Oregon "climate" initiatives, including those by Portland, Bend, etc. The answer would surely be zero, or very very close to it. The fact is, nothing Oregon has done or could do makes a lick of difference to temperature, which is what we're supposed to be worried about. Meanwhile, we're taxing and regulating ourselves into the (not coincidentally) stone age in the name of "climate" action. It's the biggest scam in the history of our state.
We need to do something about these things being taught in our school! OMG. 😮..what does our future look like? Neutered children is what we are going to end up with!
Screwing the poor proles that spruce up the streets is a small price to pay to eliminate the noise and fumes of the dreaded leaf blowers Now the hoi polloi can relax to the dolcet cries of the roving psycotics while enjoying the wafting scent of toasting fentanyl
Mar 16Liked by Richard Cheverton, Pamela Fitzsimmons
Glad I live on the East side of Oregon. This stuff makes me want to ride a poopin bull down Broadway just to see the reactions. But I would probably be chased down by the city fathers/mothers (who knows what) for excessive CO2 emissions. I think instead I’ll just stay put and try to make Oregon normal again.
After I finished seeing red (or is it Reds?), I fired off the following letter to Comandante Rubio about the plan to enforce the ban on leaf blowers by fining those who hire noncompliant operators:
Dear Commissioner Rubio:
I am one of your constituents. I am a retired attorney and a Biden-voting centrist Democrat. I have lived in Portland almost continuously since 1978.
I understand you oversee the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability. For that reason, I am directing my complaint to you about a shocking consequence of Portland City Council's recent ban on the use of gasoline powered leaf blowers. OregonLive/The Oregonian recently reported:
Enforcement will focus on property owners who use leaf blowers or who hire contractors who use them. It will not be directed at landscape businesses or yard-care workers.
“The reason for this is to ensure that small businesses and landscape workers, especially those from marginalized communities, don’t bear the brunt of enforcement,” Sonrisa Cooper, the Sustainable Economy and Just Transition Analyst at the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability, told the City Council. “The onus is on the property owner to ensure that gas leaf blowers aren’t used on their property.” [1]
I could scarcely believe my eyes. I have good reasons for being a member of the Democratic Party and for voting for Joe Biden this year. However, this punitive and inefficient piece of bureaucratic class warfare against ordinary Portlanders finally made me understand why Republicans accuse Left-Coast politicians such as you of being socialists.
Now, it's doubtful Republicans really believe that you and other woke politicians are actually card-carrying members of a socialist organization. What they mean is that the people who run cities such as Portland deliberately go out of their way to favor the tiny percentage of the population who are members of "marginalized communities" at the expense of the vast majority of the voter/taxpayers who are not. Is there any other way to describe the round-about and grossly inefficient way the enforcement process was crafted? You and the others who put this scheme together really don't care if regular Portlanders have to shell out money because someone else failed to comply with the rules you established, do you? That's social justice for you.
In my opinion, Sonrisa Cooper and other city bureaucrats of her ilk are so out of touch with the taxpayers who pay her salary and so lost in social-justice land that she unwittingly made a damning admission that exposed the city's racial and class animus against the non-"marginalized" individuals who hire landscape services and yard workers.
Here is how a city government that was not suffering from terminal wokeness would have enforced a ban on gasoline leaf blowers: it would have taken action against those using the prohibited devices or their employer, if any. End of story. In fact, the "onus" of compliance with a ban on a device should be on the owner or user of that device, even if they are a home or business owner. It always has been that way. Sure, an enforcement officer can knock on the door of the person or business who hired noncompliant landscapers, but the purpose should be to ascertain the name and contact information of the company or self-employed individual who operated the prohibited machine.
What makes Portland's classist and inefficient enforcement scheme even more galling is that in the end it will be landscape businesses and yard care workers who bear the brunt of the ban. The first time a homeowner gets fined for hiring a noncompliant landscape business or yard care worker will also be the last time that homeowner hires them. Unless City Council pushes another rich-person tax to tide un- or underemployed yard care workers over until the taxpayers have subsidized their purchase of a compliant blower (in this city, who knows?), sooner or later members of those "marginalized communities" are going to feel some pain. You and Ms. Cooper may have tried to put the onus on the rich homeowners who hire yard care workers, but everyone will know that the real culprit was a City Council who has forgotten that it works for all Portlanders. What a joke!
Sincerely,
Portland seems to take the award for producing nails that a writer/reporter/journalist like RC who's not afraid to tell the truth can swing a hammer easily and make a direct hit. Nice job hitting this gas blower BS one squarely, keep it up!
Richard, you are still “the best”! Keep up the amazing work 😊👍🏻
Thanks, Richard! Someone who is better at math than me should study the impact on temperature of all the Oregon "climate" initiatives, including those by Portland, Bend, etc. The answer would surely be zero, or very very close to it. The fact is, nothing Oregon has done or could do makes a lick of difference to temperature, which is what we're supposed to be worried about. Meanwhile, we're taxing and regulating ourselves into the (not coincidentally) stone age in the name of "climate" action. It's the biggest scam in the history of our state.
We need to do something about these things being taught in our school! OMG. 😮..what does our future look like? Neutered children is what we are going to end up with!
Ultra dumb politics, Thy Name is Carmen Rubio!! 🤣
Screwing the poor proles that spruce up the streets is a small price to pay to eliminate the noise and fumes of the dreaded leaf blowers Now the hoi polloi can relax to the dolcet cries of the roving psycotics while enjoying the wafting scent of toasting fentanyl
Glad I live on the East side of Oregon. This stuff makes me want to ride a poopin bull down Broadway just to see the reactions. But I would probably be chased down by the city fathers/mothers (who knows what) for excessive CO2 emissions. I think instead I’ll just stay put and try to make Oregon normal again.