They are coming for our water, and we are not prepared.
As I work with communities around the world, I see—everywhere, including here in Oregon—large corporations are grabbing water supplies for themselves. When they come for Lane County’s water, they are hard-driven by the prospect of using the water to make huge profits for shareholders and managers.
We pay the price, through degradation of our streams, our ecosystems, and our quality of life.
We currently do not have enough tools to stop them. Passage of Measure 20-373 will give us more tools. Tools that communities around the world are using to protect their water resources.
I will vote for Measure 20-373. I encourage you to do the same.
Ernie Niemi, Owner, Natural Resources Economics, Inc.
Dexter
(This information furnished by Ernie Niemi.)
McKenzie Watershed Protective Supports Measure 20-373
As a conservation organization in Oregon's McKenzie River watershed, we are very concerned about the condition of the environment in Lane County. The main issue here is there is no coordinated legislative protection of the forests, river riparian zones, and river water quality from industrial, agricultural, and residential pollution. "Who speaks for the rivers?" When it comes to identifying the causes of declining forests and watersheds, in seeking solutions it seems no one is in charge. There is no voice for the very things that provide the life we all so love, our mountains, our forests, our rivers, our clean water.
Our organization firmly believes that Measure 20-373, the Lane County Watershed Bill of Rights, will give legislative protection to our rivers, forests and watersheds. We urge passage of this measure.
Ask yourself this question: If this measure does not pass, "Who speaks for the rivers?"
Respectfully,
Robert Spencer
President
McKenzie Watershed Protective
(This information furnished by Robert Spencer, McKenzie Watershed Protective.)
Mountain Rose Herbs urges Lane County voters to vote YES on Measure 20-373, the Lane County Watersheds Bill of Rights.
Clean water is not optional. Our rivers, streams, wetlands, and aquifers are the lifeblood of Lane County-supplying drinking water, irrigating farms, sustaining salmon and wildlife, and supporting recreation and tourism. When pollution is treated as "legal," communities are left to pay the price, while the watershed bears the harm.
Measure 20-373 is a practical, locally rooted response. It recognizes basic rights of our watersheds to exist, flourish, and regenerate, and it affirms every resident's right to accessible, clean, and affordable domestic drinking water. It also gives community members standing to enforce those rights and requires government to adopt protective measures to prevent or remedy harm.
Mountain Rose Herbs is a thriving natural products business headquartered in Lane County. Our success depends on healthy ecosystems and trustworthy ingredients. We are highly regulated and conduct thorough pesticide residue testing; we have rejected shipments when chemical drift contaminated ingredients. Chemical spraying and other pollution threaten local crops and wild-harvested plants, forcing costly losses for growers, harvesters, and businesses like ours, and putting family-wage jobs at risk.
When waters are damaged, restoration costs land on taxpayers and communities. Measure 20-373 shifts responsibility back to those who pollute, and encourages prevention before contamination spreads downstream. It's the accountability our rivers and our children deserve.
We don't just talk about stewardship-we do the work. Since 2009, our employee-led Mountain Rose River Project has completed six to eight restoration projects each year, partnering with nonprofits and public agencies to restore riparian habitat, improve stream health, and protect fish and wildlife.
Measure 20-373 aligns Lane County law with our shared values: people, plants, and the planet before profits. Voting YES is an investment in clean water, resilient communities, and a thriving local economy for generations to come.
- Mountain Rose Herbs, Eugene, Oregon
(This information furnished by Shawn Donnille, Mountain Rose Herbs.)
The Climate Crisis Demands Bold Action – Vote YES on Measure 20-373
Our Oregon climate organization, 350Eugene.org engages and educates the public to address environmental devastation on our overheating planet. The name refers to the fact that 350 parts per million (ppm) is the safe upper limit of climate-warming carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere. Hovering now at 430 ppm, the earth has exceeded the limit of 1.5 degrees Centigrade set in the 2015 Paris Climate Talks, and will continue to overheat. Extreme negative ecological and economic trends are accelerating. We need bold policy changes to reverse the destruction.
Measure 20-373 is a step in the right direction. It will not solve climate change, nor will it stop all corporate harms in our community.
Our Coastal Rainforest is a great natural treasure boasting secure and efficient sequestration of CO2, yet we’re racing to clearcut this global treasure at an alarming pace! Despite the devastating effects to humans, animals, plants and water, we spray poisons from helicopters as a ‘management’ process. We know this is harmful. Measure 20-373 addresses these harms.
Detractors, particularly those funded by the timber industry, say that this law may bring about lawsuits and litigation. That argument is their default response whenever new laws to increase corporate accountability are proposed.
The environmental challenges we face are unprecedented. Our window to act is closing. Nature is not a commodity to be monetized. Nature is alive and we must stop ravaging it by changing our actions to focus on protecting watersheds, supporting the natural world and the biodiversity that sustains life..
Please join us in Voting YES on Measure 20-373 350 Eugene
(This information furnished by Patricia S. Hine.)
YES ON MEASURE 20-373 — A PREVENTIVE PUBLIC HEALTH APPROACH
Access to clean, safe drinking water is a foundational public health requirement. Healthy watersheds support reliable water supplies, reduce exposure to contaminants, and contribute to the overall health of communities.
Industrial activities that affect watersheds—including chemical applications, runoff, and land disturbance—can introduce toxins into both surface and groundwater. Exposure to contaminants has been associated in scientific literature with increased risks of respiratory conditions (asthma), endocrine disruption(obesity, diabetes), neurological damage (Parkinsons, dementia, ALS), adverse reproductive outcomes(low sperm counts), and developmental impacts (brain damage, or birth defects). Protecting water sources is an important strategy for reducing preventable health risks to humans and wildlife.
Measure 20-373, the Lane County Watersheds Bill of Rights, is designed to strengthen protection of local watersheds and drinking water sources. The measure recognizes the importance of maintaining watershed integrity and affirms the right of residents to clean, safe drinking water. It also provides a mechanism for community members to act when water resources are at risk.
Preventive approaches to Public Health that reduce contamination at the source are more effective and less costly than responding after harm occurs. We support Measure 20-373 as a reasonable, well written precautionary measure to protect health of food animals, wildlife, and the public now and in the future.
VOTE YES ON MEASURE 20-373.
Protect Oregon Watersheds LLC, Board of Directors
(This information furnished by Debra Kauffman Fant, POW Board member, Treasurer, Protect Our Watersheds.)
As a professor at the University of Oregon I have spent the last 15 years studying rights of nature laws. As Executive Director of the Eco Jurisprudence Monitor, I have identified over 600 ecological laws around the world, including 163 U.S. ordinances like this one, the vast majority of which are approved. If adopted, Lane County would join dozens of other US communities in recognizing the rights of local ecosystems like watersheds.
Since this legal trend is new, it is often misunderstood and misconstrued, so I write to share information on what rights of nature is and is not.
First, the subject of rights is an ecosystem (e.g., watershed), which is like recognizing a human being as an individual rights holder even though our bodies biologically are nested systems. As systems, watersheds have the right to regenerate their natural cycles so that they can continue producing the conditions that sustain life for all of us. Rights of nature does not make it illegal to cut down an individual tree or blade of grass any more than human rights laws criminalize cutting a person’s hair or fingernails. Nor does it mean that we cannot use water, in the same way that human rights laws permit drawing limited amounts of people’s blood for medical purposes. Rather, rights of nature means that ecosystems cannot be so degraded, either through over consumption or pollution, that they are unable to regenerate their natural cycles and evolve naturally, causing them to collapse. In short, rights of nature laws require humans to live within the carrying capacity of ecosystems so that they can continue providing for our needs. This is why a growing number of courts worldwide recognize rights of nature laws as necessary to ensure human environmental rights, like the right to clean water and a healthy environment.
Dr. Craig Kauffman
Professor of Political Science,University of Oregon
(writing in his individual capacity, not representing the University of Oregon)
(This information furnished by Craig Kauffman.)
CENTER FOR RURAL LIVELIHOODS — VOTE YES ON MEASURE 20-373
Clean water and healthy forests are the foundation of rural livelihoods. Farmers, small businesses, families, and neighbors across Lane County all live downstream of industrial pollution and watershed degradation that gets worse with each generation.
Center for Rural Livelihoods’ mission is to strengthen pathways to rural livelihoods while advancing social, economic, and ecological resilience. We seek local, democratic solutions to the challenges we face. We won’t have resilience, sustainability, or any livelihoods whatsoever if we don't ensure clean water for all.
Measure 20-373 aligns with this mission by giving our communities stronger tools to protect the places our water comes from.
Measure 20-373 (the Lane County Watersheds Bill of Rights) would:
There are many reasons to support this measure. One is that it directly targets harms tied to clearcut logging practices, including aerial spraying of pesticides. Aerial spraying degrades watershed health and threatens our drinking water sources. Clearcutting pushes us further towards catastrophic climate change and it further subjects our rural communities to the boom and bust extractive cycle that has polarized our communities.
For clean water, healthy forests, and resilient rural livelihoods—vote YES on Measure 20-373.
Josh Fattal, Executive Director, Center for Rural Livelihoods
(This information furnished by Josh Fattal, Center for Rural Livelihoods.)
YES ON MEASURE 20-373 – PROTECTING WATER AND THE RIGHTS OF THE NATURAL WORLD
As a tribal attorney who has spent many years working with Indigenous nations to defend land, water, and treaty-protected resources, I have seen firsthand how essential healthy ecosystems are to the well-being of communities. Water is not simply a commodity. It is the very foundation of life.
Across the country, many Indigenous nations recognize that rivers, forests, and watersheds must be protected as living systems. When legal systems treat nature only as property, pollution and ecological harm are too often considered acceptable so long as they remain within regulatory limits.
Measure 20-373, the Lane County Watersheds Bill of Rights, takes a bold and necessary step by legally recognizing what Indigenous peoples have always understood – that watersheds are living systems, not corporate property to be degraded. By recognizing the rights of watersheds to exist, flourish, and regenerate, the measure reflects a growing movement toward responsible stewardship of the natural systems that sustain human life.
We know that current environmental law is failing to protect our crucial ecosystems. We know that the climate crisis will further threaten living systems. This law, which recognizes that nature has rights and establishes a new baseline for protecting water, carries significance well beyond Lane County and deserves all of our support. While I do not live in Lane County, I strongly encourage its voters to support Measure 20-373.
VOTE YES ON MEASURE 20-373.
Frank Bibeau, Minnesota Chippewa, tribal rights attorney
(This information furnished by Frank Bibeau.)
The Coast Range Association urges Lane County voters to vote YES on Measure 20-373 to protect the watersheds that sustain our communities, forests, and local economy.
For decades, Coast Range Association has worked to improve forest policy across western Oregon, recognizing that the way forests are managed directly affects water quality, climate stability, wildlife habitat, and the well-being of people who live downstream. When forests are degraded, the impacts are felt far beyond the harvest site—through declining drinking water quality, damaged fish habitat, reduced recreation opportunities, and harm to the cultural and public health values that make this region home.
These environmental costs are often borne by local communities while profits from industrial forest practices flow elsewhere. Measure 20-373 helps correct this imbalance by giving communities stronger tools to prevent pollution and protect the watersheds that support farms, fisheries, recreation, and rural economies across Lane County.
Healthy forests and watersheds are also one of our strongest defenses against climate change. Intact forests store carbon, reduce flood and fire risks, and help ecosystems and communities adapt to a changing climate. Protecting watersheds today is an investment in long-term climate resilience and economic stability.
Measure 20-373 affirms that clean water and healthy ecosystems are fundamental to the future of Lane County. By voting YES, residents can help ensure that forests, rivers, and communities remain healthy and productive for generations to come.
Chuck Willer
Executive Director
Coast Range Association
(This information furnished by Chuck Willer, Coast Range Association.)
Florence Organizes, a community-led human dignity group dedicated to equal rights for all, including the right for all people to access clean water, strongly urges a YES vote on Measure 20-373, the Lane County Watershed Bill of Rights. Water is essential for life to thrive, and nothing can be more important than safeguarding our watersheds to ensure that it does.
Our intergenerational community is particularly at risk when areas impacted by clear-cut logging have been sprayed with aerial herbicide. At such a large scale, these practices do not simply harm our forests and wildlife, they pose a significant risk to the health of our retired veterans, service members, and families.
This measure would give additional protections to the land itself, allowing any resident of Lane County to enforce or defend provisions of the ordinance in any appropriate court. When courts find the rights of the land have been violated, the party at fault will be responsible for its restoration. This is an important step toward protecting our ecosystem, and normalizing the rights of nature, because as we know our watersheds won’t hire lawyers on their own.
Our members support Measure 20-373 for a future where all communities in Lane County have the ability to end the threat of pollutants to watersheds. Local residents deserve to have a stronger voice in deciding how to protect their drinking water, as well as our lakes, rivers and estuaries. We must ensure a safer environment for all.
Florence Organizes
(This information furnished by Justin Lloyd Ludwig, Florence Organizes.)
ARGUMENT IN FAVOR OF MEASURE 20-373
The Graduate Teaching Fellows Federation, Local 3544, representing over 1,400 graduate employees at the University of Oregon, and the American Federation of Teachers Oregon urge a YES vote on Measure 20-373.
Clean water is not a luxury. It is a basic necessity for every Lane County resident, and the people who live and work here deserve meaningful legal protections for the watersheds that supply it.
Eugene’s drinking water comes from the McKenzie River. The Long Tom, Middle Fork Willamette, Coast Fork Willamette, and Siuslaw watersheds serve communities across the county. These water systems face threats from industrial practices, including aerial herbicide spraying on clear-cut timber lands, which deposits chemicals into the soil and waterways that feed our taps. Current regulations permit these practices and offer inadequate safeguards for the communities downstream.
Measure 20-373 would change that. The Watersheds Bill of Rights would recognize the right of Lane County’s watersheds to exist, flourish, regenerate, and naturally evolve free from contamination. It would affirm every resident’s right to clean and affordable water. And it would give community members legal standing to hold polluters accountable when those rights are violated.
As labor organizations, we understand that the wellbeing of working people extends beyond wages and benefits. Our members are Lane County residents. They drink this water, raise families here, and depend on healthy ecosystems. Graduate employees already face significant financial pressures; they should not also bear the costs of preventable environmental contamination. The same corporate interests that resist fair labor standards often resist environmental accountability. Standing up for clean water is consistent with standing up for working people.
UO students and graduate employees are volunteering with the Protect Lane County Watersheds campaign because they recognize what is at stake. We encourage all Lane County voters to join them.
Vote YES on Measure 20-373.
(This information furnished by Graduate Teaching Fellows Federation, GTFF Local 3544, AFT/AFL-CIO, and the American Federation of Teachers Oregon)
(This information furnished by Carver Goldstein, Graduate Teaching Fellows Federation, Local 3544.)
We are Lane County permaculture practitioners—people who work with soil, water, plants, and community resilience every day. Permaculture is about designing for long-term health: clean water, living soils, thriving forests, and communities that can feed themselves and adapt. Many of us also teach and demonstrate regenerative practices, helping neighbors build practical, place-based solutions. We practice regeneration at the home, neighborhood, and watershed scale—because resilient communities start where we live.
Measure 20-373 aligns with these values by protecting the natural systems we all depend on.
Measure 20-373 helps Lane County by:
In our work, we see a simple truth: when water is polluted and forests are degraded, everything downstream suffers—farms, gardens, wildlife habitat, fisheries, and public health. Lane County’s headwaters are not just “resources”; they are living systems that make life and local economies possible. Practices tied to industrial extraction—especially clearcut logging and aerial pesticide spraying—undermine watershed function, soil health, biodiversity, and community safety.
Permaculture teaches that prevention is cheaper and wiser than cleanup. Measure 20-373 is a commonsense, rights-based tool to stop harm before it happens and to shift policy toward stewardship, restoration, and responsibility. Permaculture starts with care for Earth and care for people—Measure 20-373 puts those principles into law.
Vote YES on Measure 20-373.
Signed:
Michele Renee, Dharmalaya
Robert Bolman
Jan Spencer
Donald Cross
Berthus Rekker
Genevieve Mason
Sara Christine Levine
Sunniva Jelsing
Glen H. Spain, J.D.
Debra Y. Bolman
William F. Klaverkamp
Ronald Logan
Monika Kiraly
Lois Schlyer
Terry Jones
Vasily Gouliouk, Oregon Permaculture Works
(This information furnished by Michele Renee.)
Clean Water, Healthy Watersheds, Safer Communities
We are Michelle Holman, Eron King, and Kunu Bearchum: the chief petitioners of Measure 20-373, the Lane County Watersheds Bill of Rights. We brought this measure forward because we love this place, and because as parents, grandparents, and community members we feel a deep obligation to protect the water, forests, and healthy environment that our children—and all of us—depend on.
In recent years, we have seen friends, neighbors, and loved ones harmed by toxic chemicals sprayed in forested areas. Some of those affected are members of our own families. No one should have to worry that the air they breathe, the streams they fish, or the water they drink could be contaminated by industrial chemicals released into the places we all share.
Measure 20-373 is a commonsense step toward prevention and accountability. It recognizes the rights of our watersheds to exist, flourish, and be protected, and it strengthens the ability of Lane County communities to act before pollution and damage become irreversible.
We owe it to ourselves, to our community, and to future generations to be better stewards of the natural world. A YES vote on Measure 20-373 is a vote for cleaner water, healthier watersheds, and a safer future for Lane County.
Vote YES on Measure 20-373.
By Michelle Holman, Eron King, and Kunu Bearchum, Chief Petitioners
(This information furnished by Michelle Holman.)
I am writing to urge a YES vote on Measure 20-373. I’m a retired professor of political science and international studies at Portland State University. My research on environmental protection at home and abroad convinces me that this bill, by giving community members standing to defend their right to clean air, water, and land, is in line with trends worldwide. There is growing international and local recognition of the rights of nature. Over forty countries, many US communities, and US tribal nations recognize those rights. Lane County should join them.
Changing the legal status of ecosystems from property to nature rights acknowledges our interconnectedness. We, the people, thereby become guardians rather than mere users, with the power to defend nature in court when it is abused. At a time when environmental protection regulations are being systematically dismantled at the federal level, public officials in our counties and states need to stand up for nature lest we lose it all to profiteers.
Where I live, in Deadwood, forests are subject to aerial pesticide spraying with little protection for the surrounding population due to weak regulations. The health risks to people and watersheds from toxic runoff have been amply demonstrated. If rights of nature are recognized, timber companies could be held accountable and prevention of harm would be enhanced.
Thank you for voting YES on Measure 20-373.
Dr. Mel Gurtov, Professor of Political Science, Portland State University (retired)
(This information furnished by Dr. Mel Gurtov.)
As Interfaith Earthkeepers, a coalition of Lane County residents from diverse faith communities, we urge a YES vote on Measure 20-373. We speak as people formed by our faith traditions, not as official representatives of any denomination or congregation. This measure reflects the intersection of sound science, democratic authority, careful legal reasoning, and moral responsibility.
Measure 20-373 would recognize the rights of Lane County’s watersheds to exist, flourish, and regenerate. The scientific foundation is strong. Healthy watersheds filter drinking water, recharge aquifers, reduce wildfire risk, store carbon, and sustain fisheries and biodiversity. When ecosystems are degraded, communities bear the costs through polluted water, increased disaster impacts, and public health consequences. Protecting ecological integrity is practical, evidence-based policy grounded in decades of environmental and climate research.
The Rights of Nature framework is an emerging area of law and scholarship. Communities in the United States and globally have adopted similar measures to strengthen local authority to protect public health and safety. This approach addresses gaps in environmental law that often permit harm within regulatory limits. Measure 20-373 affirms residents’ democratic right to safeguard the ecosystems upon which we depend.
Our faith traditions call us to this responsibility. In Christian teaching, we are called to be stewards, recognizing Earth as a gift entrusted to our care. Jewish tradition teaches reverence for creation through the call not to destroy or waste what is sacred and good. Buddhist wisdom teaches deep interdependence with all living beings. Islamic tradition names humanity as accountable for creation’s well-being. Sikh and Hindu traditions call for living in harmony with the sacred order woven through nature. Indigenous wisdom teaches that land and water are living relatives, deserving respect and reciprocity.
Protecting our watersheds is both a moral calling and a practical necessity. We stand united in support of Measure 20-373 and urge a YES vote.
Rev. Mark A. Lindberg, Interfaith Earthkeepers and Carl Bybee, Interfaith Earthkeepers, Buddhist Coalition for Democracy
Interfaith Earthkeepers
(This information furnished by Mark A. Lindberg, interfaith Earthkeepers.)
Argument in Favor of voting YES on Ballot Measure 20-373
The time is now!
My son Jason grew up loving clean water. He boated the McKenzie River innumerable times. He got his first kayak at age 14 and soon began competing in river rodeos often taking 1st place.
He boated rivers from Alaska to the southern reaches of Argentina always seeking out rivers where water was wild and free.
He taught kayaking to hundreds of people and for many years he guided groups on wilderness trips down the beautiful Rogue River in southern Oregon. He also loved Lane County Rivers including the McKenzie, the Willamette and the Siuslaw.
The natural world was sacred to him and it is to me as well.
No one advocates for toxic water but some do pretend that corporate harm is necessary and therefore acceptable for one reason or another. These folks try to instill fear in the voters that this law is going to harm them in some way.
The truth is that defeating this measure is only “necessary” in order to protect corporate profits. Trying to convince you that scary bad things await you if you vote for protecting the watersheds are just the typical tactics meant to frighten you to vote against your own interests.
The health issues tied to continuing to poison our water and soil with carcinogens, neurotoxins, immune system disruptors and all the rest are the real monsters lurking in our futures if we don’t change our priorities.
It’s time corporations stop making excuses for why they need to contaminate our environment.
According to The American Cancer Association over 613,000 people in the United States died of cancer in the year 2023. My son Jason was one of those. We, his immediate family members, urge you to please vote YES on Measure 20-373.
Bernadette Bourassa, Zeph Van Allen
(This information furnished by Bernadette Bourassa.)
YES ON MEASURE 20-373 — RESPONSIBLE LEADERSHIP FOR OUR SHARED FUTURE
Those of us who have served in public office or civic leadership understand a core responsibility of governance: protecting essential public resources for current residents and future generations. Clean water is among the most fundamental of those responsibilities.
Measure 20-373, the Lane County Watersheds Bill of Rights, is designed to safeguard the long-term health of local watersheds and ensure reliable access to clean, safe drinking water. It reflects a growing recognition that existing regulatory frameworks too often respond to harm only after it has occurred, leaving communities to bear the costs of contamination, cleanup, and lost trust.
Activities that degrade watersheds—such as industrial pollution, chemical drift, and unchecked land disturbance—pose real risks to public health, local economies, and public infrastructure. Preventing harm at the source is both fiscally responsible and consistent with sound public policy.
Measure 20-373 affirms the importance of stewardship, accountability, and transparency in decisions that affect shared natural resources. It empowers communities to act when watersheds are threatened and encourages government to prioritize long-term public interest over short-term gain.
As civic leaders committed to the well-being of Lane County, we urge voters to support Measure 20-373.
VOTE YES ON MEASURE 20-373.
Jerry Rust, Vice-Chair, Lane Community College Board; Lane County Commissioner, 1977-1997
Pete Sorenson, Lane County Commissioner, 1997-2021; Oregon State Senator, 1993-1997
Kitty Piercy, Mayor of Eugene, 2005-2017
Austin Fölnagy, Chair, Lane Community College Board
Dana Merryday, Cottage Grove City Councilor
Jim Settelmeyer, Cottage Grove City Councilor
(This information furnished by Jerry Rust.)
YES ON MEASURE 20-373 — PROTECT HEALTH BY PROTECTING WATER
As health professionals, we know that clean water is fundamental to human health. Safe drinking water, healthy rivers, and intact watersheds are essential for supporting healthy development, preventing disease, and protecting the well-being of our communities.
Many of the same industrial activities that degrade watersheds—such as chemical pesticide spraying, toxic runoff, and pollution from land disturbance—are linked to serious health risks. Exposure to these substances has been associated with cancers, respiratory illness, neurological degeneration, endocrine disruption, reproductive complications, and developmental disorders in children. These risks extend not only to humans, but also to animals and ecosystems that sustain our food systems and local economies.
Measure 20-373, the Lane County Watersheds Bill of Rights, takes a preventative public-health approach. By empowering communities to act before contamination becomes widespread, the measure helps reduce preventable harm and long-term health costs.
Jenny Bohrman, DO
Lauren Fuller, MD
Jim Harrison, MD (retired)
Paul Steier, D.O, FASAM, FAOAAM
David Tvedt, RN (retired)
Katie Geiser, LMT (retired)
Barbara Davis, RN (retired)
Mary Lou Robicheaux, RN
Lily Pearl Johnson, RN (retired)
Cindy Forslev, RN (retired)
Corrine Weber, MSN, RN
Dee Tvedt, RN (retired)
Joy Thomson, RN (retired)
(This information furnished by Jenny Bohrman.)
Judith K. Berg
Statement in Support of Measure 20 -373 – Watershed Bill of Rights
I urge you to vote in favor of Measure 20-373, the Lane County Watershed Bill of Rights.
I am Judith K. Berg, Wildlife Researcher Emeritus. During my career, I conducted 38 years of wildlife research, the last ten of those years in watersheds. Six years were conducted studying River Otters on a 40-mile stretch of forested and riparian watershed. Ecosystem engineer Beavers became an important component of that research, contributing, as they do, to the health of the otters’ habitat. In fact, many fish, mammal, and other faunal species form the biodiversity of wildlife in this watershed ecosystem. The last four years were spent conducting a mammal survey in Willow Creek Preserve, a segment of the West Eugene Wetlands. Wetland habitats and other species essential to the health of that ecosystem became an important part of that survey.
The Long Tom, Willamette, and Siuslaw river basins all originate – or are completely contained – in Lane County watersheds. They are a most important component of their overall ecosystems. The health of the biodiversity of species that rely on them for survival is dependent on cool, clean flow of life-sustaining waters emanating from them. The layered complexity of the web of life in these watersheds is very intricate. My own observations of wildlife on the rivers I studied reinforce this fact. Healthy waters are essential to the existence of all life on earth, including our own. The wildlife I studied and the watersheds they call home have no less than an equal right as us to exist.
Please vote to ensure protection of these vital watersheds, which, in turn, are a leading factor in the existence of life on Earth. Their right to exist is intrinsic to the lives that depend on them.
(This information furnished by Judith K Berg.)
ESSN Supports Measure 20-373 – Vote YES on the Watersheds Bill of Rights
The Eugene Springfield Solidarity Network has stood with working families since 1989. We know that unchecked corporate power harms our communities. That's why we support Measure 20-373.
What it does:
Why working families need it:
Why ESSN endorses it:
Clean water isn't a luxury. It's a foundation of healthy communities, healthy workers, and healthy families.
Vote YES on Measure 20-373.
Eugene Springfield Solidarity Network
(This information furnished by Lonnie Douglas, Eugene Springfield Solidarity Network.)
Lane County is uniquely blessed with a complex web of aquifers, streams, and rivers. This abundance is a shared gift that demands a shared responsibility.
Jewish and Christian scriptures are filled with the life-giving imagery of water, reminding us that it is the source of all life and a reflection of the Divine. We are called not to dominate the earth, but to be its faithful stewards.
We believe we must acknowledge the important role we all play in keeping our waters clean and demand real accountability for those who pollute this shared resource. Currently, our legal system treats our beautiful Lane County watersheds as mere property. We support the recognition of legal rights for our watersheds—ensuring they have the right to flow, flourish, and be free from contamination. Water is not merely a “resource” to be consumed.
This ballot measure challenges us to acknowledge the important role we all play in protecting our precious watersheds and demands accountability for those who pollute this shared resource. We support Measure 20-373.
Bruce Kelsh, Chair of Earth and Social Justice Committee, First Presbyterian Church, Cottage Grove
(This information furnished by Bruce Kelsh, First Presbyterian Church.)
Community Safety Over Corporate Privilege
We represent a growing community rights movement in Oregon and nationwide. We believe decisions that shape our health, safety, and future must be made by the people who live here—not dictated by corporate interests protected by laws that too often elevate profit over community well-being.
Measure 20-373, the Lane County Watersheds Bill of Rights, is a clear step toward restoring local self-government and accountability. It recognizes legal rights for watersheds and ecosystems to exist and flourish, and it affirms people’s right to clean, safe water.
For too long, extractive industries have been allowed to privatize the gains while the public is left to shoulder the costs—economic hardships, polluted water, degraded forests, health risks, and long-term damage. Community rights are about a basic principle: residents have the right to say “no” to harmful corporate activities, and say “yes” to a healthy future.
A YES vote on Measure 20-373 is a vote to put community and watershed rights ahead of corporate privilege—and to help ensure those who profit from risky activities can’t offload the harms onto our families, our neighbors, and future generations.
Vote YES on Measure 20-373.
Signed:
Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund (CELDF)
Community Rights Lane County
Oregon Community Rights Network
Lincoln County Community Rights
Community Rights Douglas County
(This information furnished by Katie Geiser, Community Rights Lane County.)
YES ON MEASURE 20-373 — PROTECTING WATER FOR FARMS AND FOOD
As farmers and growers, we depend on clean water and healthy soils to do our work. Our livelihoods—and our ability to provide safe, nutritious food—are directly tied to the health of the land and watersheds around us.
Pollution in rivers, streams, and groundwater harms crops, livestock, and farm families. Chemical drift, pesticide runoff, and contamination from industrial activities can damage fields, reduce yields, threaten organic certification, and impose costs that small and mid-sized farms cannot absorb. Once water is contaminated, the impacts can last for years.
Measure 20-373, the Lane County Watersheds Bill of Rights, takes a commonsense, preventative approach to protecting water. It recognizes the importance of healthy watersheds and affirms every resident’s right to clean, safe drinking water. By giving communities tools to act before contamination becomes widespread, the measure helps protect farms, rural economies, and local food systems.
Good farming depends on good stewardship. Protecting water is not just an environmental issue—it’s an agricultural one. For the future of farming, rural communities, and the land that sustains us, we urge Lane County voters to support Measure 20-373.
VOTE YES ON MEASURE 20-373.
Wintergreen Farm
Horton Road Organics
Wild Child Farm
Branch Road Farm
Goat Nettle Farm
Folly Farmstead
(This information furnished by Shannon Shipp-Overbaugh, Winter Green Farm.)
YES ON MEASURE 20-373 — PROTECT OUR WATERS, PROTECT OUR FUTURE
Water is sacred. For Indigenous peoples and all who depend on this land, water is life—fueling ecosystems, nourishing communities, and sustaining every living being. Across Indigenous cultures, we carry teachings of responsibility to land and water, and we know that the health of our waters determines the health of our people and our future.
Measure 20-373, the Lane County Watersheds Bill of Rights, offers a bold and necessary step toward protecting our most precious resource. This measure would recognize the inherent rights of rivers, streams, wetlands, aquifers, and other watershed systems to exist, flourish, regenerate, and naturally evolve. It would also affirm every resident’s right to clean, safe drinking water—and give communities the legal authority to defend these rights.
For too long, legal systems have treated the natural world as mere property or a “resource” to be exploited for profit. We have seen the consequences: industrial clear-cutting, the aerial spraying of poisons, and the commodification of the very water that sustains all life. Too often, this destruction is considered “legal.” But legal does not mean right.
Measure 20-373 establishes a new foundation—one that places ecological integrity at the center of decision-making and strengthens accountability before harm becomes irreversible and the costs are passed to future generations.
We are at a crossroads. We can continue systems that permit destruction, or we can choose a future where our grandchildren can drink from their streams and know that we acted with courage and responsibility.
For our waters.
For our communities.
For our shared future.
WE URGE LANE COUNTY VOTERS TO VOTE YES ON MEASURE 20-373.
Signed:
Winona LaDuke, Anishinaabe, environmental/climate justice leader, economist, author
Julian Brave Noisecat, Canim Lake Band Tsq'secen of the Secwepemc Nation, filmmaker, author
Kunu Bearchum, Northern Cheyenne, Ho-Chunk, filmmaker, musician
(This information furnished by Winona LaDuke.)