WHY is Oregon engaging in such vile, restrictive, anti-property rights and probably illegal behavior?
I have my own ideas, but I leave it to you to follow the dots to determine what the ultimate goal of the state is concerning land use. When Oregon created the Department of Land Conservation and Development (DLCD), the state took control over every scrap of land not under federal control, reaching into every city, neighborhood, side street and residential lot.
The story below ought to anger every Oregonian. Whether you believe in the state’s stated mission of wildfire prevention (read the regulations imposed on high-risk properties), everyone should be outraged over the Oregon Department of Forestry’s lack of transparency and Oregon State University’s failure to correct the data and analysis used to create their high-risk map.
Excerpts from the article exposing the fraud are shown below, but the entire article should be read by every Oregonian.
Lake Oswegans should know that our city has designated Wildland-Urban Interface areas that may be impacted by the new Wildfire Prevention codes. All Oregonians should check their city or county Natural Hazard Maps,
INTERVIEW: Oregon’s Failed Wildfire Hazard Map Reveals a Wider Scandal
We generally assume (correctly) that whatever comes out of the state is reliably nutty and leftist, and can be ignored in favor of poring over the news from swing states. A massive bureaucracy, far-left judges, and machine politicians thrive in that lack of scrutiny, creating a dominant power structure that crushes opposition.
That ecosystem has created a lack of transparency and a culture of unresponsiveness. It is in that culture that the Oregon Wildfire Hazard Map was born.
The rest of America needs to take a lesson from this sordid affair, because these types of things happen a lot more often than most realize. One data scientist tried to analyze the product commissioned by the state legislature and got completely shut out when he attempted to make inquiries into the process. Along the way, he revealed the state of Oregon as guilty of either deliberate manipulation or gross incompetence. This project threatened the property values, insurability, and habitability of thousands of homes across the state.
This whole thing goes back to the 2021 session of the Oregon Legislature. That year, they passed Senate Bill 762, which then-Gov. Kate Brown (D-Portland) signed into law. ODF states the purpose of the wildfire hazard map on its website:
The wildfire hazard map's purposes are to:
- Educate Oregon residents and property owners about the level of hazard where they live.
- Assist in prioritizing fire adaptation and mitigation resources for the most vulnerable locations.
- Identify where defensible space standards and home hardening codes will apply.
One computer scientist in southern Oregon was personally affected by the fire hazard maps, with his home placed in the high-risk zone. What Kauwe discovered left him furious. "What I found is straight up corruption or negligence," he said in an interview with Restoration News. "Either way, not a good look." He was alarmed not only with the errors he found in the state's computer modeling, but also with their response.
Kauwe has assembled all of his information into a professional format, similar to the reports he produces at his day job. He published all of it at a website that any homeowner can use as a reference.
To drive the point home, he went so far as to learn how to use Geographic Information System (GIS) software to produce his own maps, similar to the process used by the state.
OTHER LINKS
Oregon Department of Forestry
Letter to high-risk property owners
DOF Wildfire Website
Dept. of Forestry Laws (See 476.301, 392)
(Draft) Defensible Space Codes for Landowners
