Emphasize that the State's excellent land-use laws will protect the environment, Lively told the group that has led assaults on those laws that have greatly reduced their effectiveness. Scaling the heights of chutzpah, Lively noted further that Oregon's superb land-use laws "ensure ongoing public involvement."

Lack of public involvement was exactly what outraged people when the project was announced. Since then, the Eugene Weekly, with the aid of the Freedom of Information Act, has documented how Lively and public officials at every level of government fast-tracked the deal and deliberately did not inform the public.

Emphasize the "low value" of the D.A.G. Trust wetlands, Lively continues. These wetlands lie in the area the County's booklet, West Eugene Wetland Self-Guided Tour, calls "the soul of the West Eugene Wetlands," and 135 plant species found on the plot rank the area as one of the best wetlands in the region -- and that was an incomplete survey.

Besides, we can create even better wetlands, Lively asserts, because Eugene's mitigation experiment in wetlands mitigation is a "national model." This 'model' is only two years old, has lost 20% of the wetland species planted and is being overgrown with non-native grasses and blackberries. The site 'mitigated' by SpectraPhysics for five years as part of its negotiations is a failure. SpectraPhysics' responsibility has ended, and the City/taxpayers are stuck with trying to revive those wetlands.