This morning I was looking up some music on Youtube for one of my other hobbies, and got an ad about “write Senator Wyden about O&C Lands” . It said “a balanced approach is best but no clearcutting.” It kind of creeps me out that that could have been targeted at me (or they have enough money to go after random people in Colorado), but I wonder who is doing this, and how much it costs to put it on Youtube?
I’d be interested if anyone else has seen this or other ads.. then perhaps we can check the organization’s 990 and figure it out next year.
If we’re watching the same ad on YouTube, the ad itself ends with “paid for by Coalition for Our O&C Lands” and a website:
http://oclands.org
The website has a “Who We Are” tab that lists several organizations and businesses.
Is this the Ad Sharon?
http://oclands.org/
If so, pretty easy to do a simple google search and find out more. Also, don’t most people who use the internet these days realize that many of the Ads are based on your previous web history and activity? As such, pretty easy to see why you’d see this Ad, Sharon, which has nothing to do with “going after random people in Colorado.” It’s the same reason why when I visit the website of, say, the Sheboygan Press or Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, I get web ads about Montana, Senator Tester, Rep Daines, Senator Baucus, etc.
I’ve made the same sort of request of you and others on this blog from time to time. Instead of posting something that comes across as a passive-aggressive allegation of sorts (ie “Wonder Who is Funding Ads on Youtube About O&C Lands?”) why not take 3 seconds to do a Google search and simply provide us with a little more basic information, which again is incredibly easy to locate, adds important context and most importantly quickly answers the question you are posing to all of us? Thanks.
P.S. For what it’s worth, I’d bet a beer that the O&C Lands ad was paid for with money that originally came from The Pew Charitable Trusts. Ironically, in Montana over 1/2 a million dollars in Pew money has been spent on Ads to promote legislation that has politicians simply mandating an dramatic increase in national forest logging on the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest and the Kootenia National Forest (ie Senator Tester’s “Forest Jobs and Recreation Act”). How this makes one ounce of sense from an environmentalists perspective is anyone’s guess. Bizarre, weird world we live in, eh?
Matt: I think many of these questions are intended to be rhetorical and make us think about things, not Google for data. If someone is interested, let them take the “3 seconds” to find out. I think the bigger question is who these groups are and what they’re trying to achieve, rather than just a list of names. And that can sometimes take quite a while to puzzle out.
Bob, if the information is readily available via a 3-second Google search I believe it is the responsibility of the author of the post to take that simple step, rather than simply post what amounts to some sort of passive-aggressive allegation wrapped in a cloak of mystery and potential wrong-doing.
As such, I’d suggest that the title of this post be changed to:
“Coalition for Our O&C Lands funds Ads on O&C lands”
Matthew, if I had Googled, I would have gotten that group, but I wasn’t sure that that group was responsible for the ads I saw (remember, this was a video clip before a Youtube.. no time to copy down names, just lots of pretty pictures and generic words). Are they the only ones with ads? I couldn’t tell from their page if they were responsible for Youtube ads. There wasn’t a search box I saw where I could have typed in “youtube.”
And I don’t click Oregon links very much.. so that is also interesting. Especially not from the email account through which I searched on Youtube (if those are separated).
I think it is funny now they talk about a balanced approach. As if they are such a nice group of people just wanting the best for everyone, and such nice pictures of clear cuts that no longer exists on public lands. Needless to say I think they are just scrambling to appear fair and balance when basically all management on our federal lands have been “their way” the last 13 years and has resulted in the bankruptcy, social and economic, of rural Oregon.
But under Defazio’s 0 n C proposal there would also be big clearcuts with lands managed under Oregon state forest practices regs, with minimal riparian buffers so depicting clearcuts is exactly how it might end up.
That said, I am not against clearcuts in some places for some age classes but I can;t see defazio’s proposal making any real dent in the county budget hole even after scalping off the trees.
It will be interesting to see what kind of proposal Wyden comes up with since Defazios thing looks impossible, A glance at the map shows a leopard skin patchwork of reserve and managed parcels, managed by different agencies. And the reality is that the volume of timber will still be too low to make much difference when the southern oregon voters refuse to pay enough taxes to cover basic services in places that already have some of the lowest tax rates in the nation.
And were is the income or jobs going to come from to pay for more taxes? Don’t you understand we don’t have the economy to pay more taxes or we would. Our extra low tax rates I think are done with the same math that shows how our watersheds are going to be destroy by Defazios plan.
Actually I think both Defazios plan and any Wyden plan are flawed. We need to realize we can harvest timber of all age classes, and anywhere, responsibly. And sure don’t like the idea of the Forest Service managing more of the land, might as well just light it on fire and leave.
Don’t forget this astroturf campaign by the timber industry: http://www.healthyforests.org/ Politics happen Sharon. No need to get creeped out.
Tree, my problem was on my browser I could only see “Wh” underneath the “get updates” once I figured out that might be “who we are”. I could click on it. Maybe it’s “politics” but not in a very open and transparent way.
The Coalition for Our O&C Lands founding members include:
American Rivers (national group)
Backcountry Hunters & Anglers (somehow related to TRCP.. national)
Dean Finnerty Guides and Outfitters (business in Oregon)
Ed Hepp Design (clothing designer?)
Fish the Swing Guide Service (business in Oregon)
KS Wild (local environmental group)
Northwest Sportsfishing Industry Association (business association)
Oregon Tree Care (arborist business in Portland?)
Pacific Rivers Council (environmental group- rivers-Portland)
Rebright Industries (manufacturers, Portland)
The Pew Charitable Trusts (national group)
Trillium Pacific Millwork (wood products, Wilsonville)
Wild Salmon Center (international salmon group)
What’s interesting to me about Trillium is that they use FSC wood, so conceivably to them wood can be sustainably produced. So are all these groups really concerned about clearcutting? Wouldn’t it be BMP’s, riparian, etc. that matter most to fish people? And it seems from what I’ve read that salmon have many serious issues besides vegetation practices in a part of Oregon (I’ll post on this when the paper I’m reading gets to press).
My personal experience with Pew and TRCP working on Colorado Roadless was that they tend to be ideological and not so much practical (or even understanding or interested in the details). Just being real here. So it could be that it’s really about ideology and not so much actual forest practices on the O&C lands.
for healthy forests it’s
which seem to include a bunch of elected officials …
Don Dashiell, Stevens County Commissioner
Jay Bozievich, Lane County Commissioner
Fred Warner, Baker County Commissioner
Tony Hyde, Columbia County Commissioner
Bob Main, Coos County Commissioner
Melissa Cribbins, Coos County Commissioner
Mike McCabe, Crook County Commissioner
Alan Unger, Deschutes County Commissioner
Doug Robertson, Douglas County Commissioner
Joe Laurance, Douglas County Commissioner
Doug Breidenthal, Jackson County Commissioner
Simon Hare, Josephine County Commissioner
James Bellet, Klamath County Commissioner
Dan Shoun, Lake County Commissioner
Faye Stewart, Lane County Commissioner
Patt Farr, Lane County Commissioner
Sid Leiken, Lane County Commissioner
Craig Pope, Polk County Commissioner
Tim Josi, Tillamook County Commissioner
Mark Davidson, Union County Commissioner
Steve McClure, Union County Commissioner
Mike Hayward, Wallowa County Commissioner
Paul Castilleja, Wallowa County Commissioner
Susan Roberts, Wallowa County Commissioner
David Brock Smith, Curry County Commissioner
David Itzen, Curry County Commissioner
Chris Brong, Skamania County Commissioner
Evelyn Badger-Nores, Douglas CARES Executive Director
Diane Dealey Neill, California Forestry Challenge Executive Director
Steve Grasty, Harney County Judge
Thomas Turner, Lane County Sheriff
John Hanlin, Douglas County Sheriff
Steve Rogers, Wallowa County Sheriff
Boyd Rasmussen, Union County Sheriff
Mike Blankenship, Ferry County Commissioner
Shelley Burgess, Elgin School Board member
JB Brock, Union County Emergency Management
Sue Kupillas, Communities for Healthy Forests
Salem Area Chamber of Commerce
Oregon Farm Bureau
A full-page ad appeared in The Oregonian today — see http://wp.me/aGtVn-3SR.
Title: “Defend Clean Drinking Water, Older Forests and Fish and Wildlife on Oregon’s O&C Lands.” Main message is to do that defending by “protecting [the O&C lands] from increased clearcut logging.”
Signed by 19 enviro groups, including some of the big national ones, Center for Biological DIversity, Earthjustice, and Sierra Club.