Posted: Friday, October 12, 2007 12:00 am
We hereby deliver: ROSES to the merchants and citizens of Philomath. At last, the $11 million Philomath couplet project is finished. It was a project 50 years in the planning and 10 months in the making. The last five months were a traffic-delayed, obstacle-course-like, blocked-access-ridden nightmare for many, especially 27 merchants in downtown Philomath.
To help them adjust to normalcy now that the couplet is finished, we hope Corvallis residents join our neighbors to the south today in a rare support of SPAM. No, we're not talking about the spiced canned ham or the unwanted e-mail but the "Support Philomath Area Merchants."
Six Philomath churches banded together to spread the word about SPAM, hoping to rally local shopper power to Philomath for a much-needed businesses boost.
As we reported, the plan is to bring shoppers back to the downtown business center by offering more than $800 worth of gift certificates to customers who make purchases during the first full weekend since the Highway 20/34 couplet opened.
Sounds like a good deal to us.
• RASPBERRIES to a break in the circle of trust and support that makes treatment and recovery possible for many cancer patients.
We were saddened to learn this week that a Corvallis woman was charged last month with first-degree theft, a Class C felony, for allegedly stealing at least $750 in funds that were donated to help pay the medical bills of 8-year-old Cricket Beebe. Her brain cancer was diagnosed in February.
Christina Lee Simpson, 40, has been charged her stealing money from a bank account set up for Cricket. Simpson's court appearance is set for Oct. 18.
It isn't as though we're talking about a lot of money. So far, fundraisers at a pizza parlor and school brought in about $1,500, but police did not release the exact amount missing. To be a felony, the amount must be at least $750, however.
We will continue to report on this sad development, but it has not derailed fundraising efforts. The donation jars for Cricket located around town go directly to the family for Cricket.
• ROSES to Kirk Swaney, who is to electric car racing what New Zealander Bill Monro was to motorcycle racing.
If you haven't seen Monro, as portrayed by Anthony Hopkins in the 2005 movie "The World's Fastest Indian," you've missed a filmed example of one man's intelligence and ingenuity triumphing against the odds.
If you have seen it, you can appreciate that Swaney did exactly the same thing. Except instead of his much-modified, lovingly maintained 1920 American Indian motorcycle, Swaney built an electric race car - a really fast, sleek, hot-looking race car called "The Falcon."
Like Monro, Swaney tested his vehicle on the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah, and like him, he set a world speed record. Swaney's Falcon reached 89.4 miles per hour for the fastest Electrathon America racing vehicle. Aside from being impressive, it advances the feasibility of electric transport.
Because Swaney is much younger than Munro, we anticipate that he will return many times to the salt flats and improve on his time. In the meantime, Swaney, a technical supervisor at Hewlett-Packard Co., works with students at Corvallis High School, including two who helped him design the Falcon.
That story sure sounds like another feel-good movie.
• ROSES-BERRIES to recycling developments - and a lack of developments. We'll explain our split decision:
The roses go to Allied Waste of Corvallis, for making it easier for residents of Philomath to recycle highly reuasble commodities such as plastic water bottles and cardboard by introducing rollaway multi-recyclable bins. We trust this will make recycling and collection easier, perhaps encouraging more people to recycle.
The raspberries are for the ongoing confusion and many barriers to recycling other reusables.
For instance, well-intentioned recyclers who leave the metal caps on glass tea bottles doom those items to the landfill. Same story if you leave the plastic bottle tops on water and juice bottles.
Want to recycle Styrofoam, which often can be melted and remolded? You have to take it to the First Alternative Co-Op.
Want to recycle pizza boxes? You can't, even if you carefully peel away all of the food content from the cardboard. (Hey, pizza box makers; how about a removable sleeve that leaves the cardboard box cheese-and-topping free?)
The public enthusiasm for recycling is evident, in that both demand and participation has increased. But the plastics and glass recycling industries - while to be heartily commended for establishing recycling protocol - still have long way to go in providing facilities that can process all glass and plastic to expand collection of recyclables, make it easier for consumers and more valuable and accessible to manufacturers.
ROSE (roz) n. One of the most beautiful of all flowers, a symbol of fragrance and loveliness. Often given as a sign of appreciation.
RASPBERRY (raz'ber'e) n. A sharp, scornful comment, criticism or rebuke; a derisive, splatting noise, often called the Bronx cheer.