The LA Times published an interesting article about the state of Oregon’s public schools and the news is not good. Budget shortfalls for education are rampant across the nation but Oregon seems especially hard hit. School districts where there is no reserve fund and personnel have already been cut to the bone leave school administrators nowhere to turn except shorter school years.

Oregon school calendars are three weeks shorter than the national average already and some of our local districts are looking at shortening our already short terms. Some of the problem may lie with Oregon’s low corporate tax rate one of the lowest in the nation and the legislature is talking about raising the minimum corporate tax.
Another possible solution for struggling school budgets is to convert their utility expense, what they pay for electricity, to capital improvements. Spending exactly the same amount of money already spent as an expense and investing in local power production can generate revenue.

This is the concept Rogue River Wind, Ltd will be pushing to Congress in the ensuing weeks to support an appropriations request to fund a 5MW distributed energy smart/micro-grid. This project will supply all electrical needs to the participating school districts and still generate an additional $2M in annual revenue for the schools by selling excess power to the neighborhood.

RRW is working with Dr Gerry Sheblé of Portland State University and through him with Pacific Northwest National Laboratory to ensure the technical details are worked out to install this highly efficient and profitable smart/micro-grid. PNNL with Sheblé will be developing the software that will manage the power plant and grid.
Carefully investing our tax dollars has never been more crucial than it is now. For this reason I am inclined to question the apparent intent of the County to invest a minimum of $450,000 to upgrade a serviceable rural country road to industrial status in order to ‘grant’ a conditional use permit to ORC for mining.

In October, 2007, the County Planning Commission granted a conditional use permit to ORC subject to various conditions including Condition 13. Condition 13, on the surface sounds good for the taxpayer in that it holds ORC accountable for any damage done to the roads by excessive travel from heavily laden tracks.

Unfortunately, Condition 13 also binds the County to paying to improve the condition of the road to support their proportional share of the wear and tear upon the 4.7 miles of road at W Beaver Hill. In theory establishing proportional share and the precedents presumably set by Federal Supreme Court case Nollan vs. California Coastal Commission and an Oregon case, Dolan vs. City of Tigard protect property owners from paying more than a proportional cost.

The ORC situation may fully apply here but I wonder if the intent of the above precedents is interpreted correctly. In the matter of ORC the upgrade of W Beaver Hill Road to an industrial standard road benefit only ORC and are not necessary for the historical use of the roadway. When mining operations cease the improvements are not likely to be necessary for further industry. Investing half a million dollars or twice that if a 2” overlay is adopted to support possible future mining operations without any guaranteed revenue may not pay the returns taxpayers deserve.