Help Yourself to a Slice of Special Election
Palm Card Pie!

Ballots are arriving for the May 20 Special Election, and our Special Palm Card of Special Endorsements for the Special Election is available here! Click and read, then use the Palm Card to help you fill out your ballot and get it into the mailbox or drop it off in the white ballot box at the Community Center at 700 E. Gibbs Ave. in Cottage Grove.

We Are Not Fooled:

"Parents’ Rights in Education” Means
Ban Everything They Don’t Like

The veiled language surrounding the seemingly benign notion of “parents’ rights” might make it seem reasonable. After all, shouldn’t parents have rights when it comes to their child’s education?

It turns out parents do have rights, but according to the non-profit group Parents' Rights in Education, they just don’t have the right rights. Parents’ Rights thinks they alone know the right rights. They want to be the deciders of those rights, starting with telling you what your child can or can’t read and telling everyone what can or can’t be taught in school. 

To get us all where they want us to be, Parents’ Rights in Education must lure us into the draconian world of banning. To get started though, first, they want us all to accept their pretzel logic and believe that banning books is not actually banning them, then advocate for banning books along with pretty much everything in schools.

Vaccine and mask mandates? Ban them! School based health clinics? Ban those too! But what about “School Climate Surveys”? Banned! Social Emotional Learning? Again, banned!

Now they’re on a roll. What about anything anti-capitalist? Banned! Marxist? Banned! Or this head scratcher: anti-race theology? We don’t even know what that is. No matter, ban that too!

When we take a step back, it’s easy to see that what the parents’ rights folks are really doing is corrupting the widely practiced and supported notion of parent involvement in education by morphing it into this thing they call “parents’ rights.” But we are not fooled.

Here in the real world, parent involvement is already well underway. It includes parent-teacher conferences, PTAs and other parent-teacher groups, teacher and staff appreciation efforts, school fund raising and myriad other ways parents are invited to become involved with their child’s education. Schools welcome parent involvement because there is a demonstrated connection between parent involvement and student success. 

That said, parent involvement leaves the substance of classroom teaching to the professionals. Teachers are trained and have the experience to make sound decisions on behalf of their students. If there is an issue, parents can simply talk to the teacher, principal or appropriate school staff member to find out what is happening and work together to find out what the school and parent can do to support the student. There’s no need to order the solution for one or even a few students to be applied to every student in the district.

Even as things are, you are free to restrict your own students’ reading material if you want, and you already have the choice to opt them out of Sex Ed if you think that’s bad for them.

If there is still something that you don’t like about what’s happening with your student at school, find a solution that works for them, and stop presuming that your solution is best for everyone. Leave the rest of us alone and let our family values guide us when our students encounter new ideas. If we need help with that, we’ll turn to our educators and work with them to come to a solution that works for our student and not insist that solution be applied to every student everywhere. 

So, Parents’ Rights in Education, please go home and stop trying to boss us all around. Stop distributing your fliers at non-partisan Candidate Forums as you did in Cottage Grove last week.  Stop telling us what to do.

Rage Call of the Week

Trump’s dream is that he can simply wave his magic marker and make things go away lickety-split. His latest ploy is an Executive Order that attempts to defund 1000 NPR stations and 335 PBS stations. 

Good heavens, man, what are you doing? Attempting to cut a billion dollars from the Center for Public Broadcasting because you don’t like their programming? Well, we will be having none of it, so we’ll be using 5Calls.org https://5calls.org/issue/npr-pbs-trump-cuts/ to let our senators and representative know just that. Harumph!
 

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NOW ON TO THIS WEEK'S ACTION ALERT!

WHAT'S HAPPENING:

Wednesday, May 7, 5:30 pm

Cottage Grove FRIENDS OF DEMOCRACY Group 

Rural Organizing Project, 632 E. Main, CG

Saturday, May 10, 1:00 pm

DOOR KNOCKING for Support Our Schools Coalition of candidates for South Lane School District board!  Help stop book bans and LGBTQ discrimination! 

Info here  Sign up here  DONATE HERE

Tuesday, May 13, 5:00  pm

HISTORY PUB: The History of Bohemia Mining Days

Axe and Fiddle

Saturday, May 17, 10:00 am

Cottage Grove Historical Society: THE BOOKMINE'S 50th ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION

Cottage Grove Community Center

Friday, May 28, 6:00 - 8:00 pm

ARTWALK in Historic Downtown Cottage Grove 

Main Street from River Road to the train tracks, CG

...IN THE NATION

OPB: Corporation for Public Broadcasting sues Trump in fight for control

Chop Wood, Carry Water: Extra! Extra! 5/4!

...IN THE STATE  

OCC: Oregon to offer rebate on electric vehicles again

...IN THE COUNTY 

KLCC: Lane County Sheriff leaves midway through term for PeaceHealth job

EW: Polluter's Dwindling Assets Scrutinized

GOVHUB WEBSITE  

Choose a city or county meeting to easily stream webcasts!

Lane County Commissioners BOARD MEETING

Tuesday, May 6, 9:00 am: AGENDA

Harris Hall, Eugene or Live webcast

Lane Community College BOARD WORK SESSION

Wednesday, May 7, 6:00 pm: AGENDA

Lane Community College, Eugene

Lane County: Upcoming Committee Meetings and Events

Here you can see just how many Committees, Councils, Boards, Teams and Commissions there are in Lane County.  Check out the calendar to see when they meet and plan ahead! 

...IN THE GROVE

Cottage Grove CITY COUNCIL MEETING

Monday, May 12, 7:00 pm: AGENDA

City Hall, CG

South Lane SCHOOL DISTRICT BOARD MEETING

Monday, May 5, 5:30 pm:  AGENDA

455 Adams Ave, Cottage Grove

Explore the SLSD home page here.  

WEEKLY and Bi-WEEKLY EVENTS

Cottage Grove Community Garden: Wednesdays, 11:00 am - 3:00 pm, 1140 Birch

Bi-Weekly Garden Club: every other Monday, 5:30 - 7:00 pm, Coast Fork Brewing

MONTHLY EVENTS

Wisdom Seekers Club: 1st Thursdays, 7:00 pm, Community Center

History Pub: 2nd Tuesdays, 5:00 pm, Axe and Fiddle

Poetry Night: 3rd Tuesdays, 7:30 pm, Cottage Events Venue

Science On Tap: 4th Tuesdays, 5:00 pm, Axe and Fiddle 

Art Walk: Last Fridays, 6:00 pm, Downtown year-round

CULTURE IN THE GROVE ~ It's not all politics!

Cottage Grove Museum 147 N. H St.

On Exhibit now: Old School Cool: Cottage Grove High School Schoolmates

Cottage Grove Genealogical Society Community Center

An amazing library and access to Ancestry and Newspapers.com

Cottage Grove Historical Society 308 S. 10th

The Marcia E. Allen Historical Research Library, 1:00 - 4:00 pm, Fridays/Saturdays

Cottage Grove Senior Center Cottage Grove Community Center

Mondays -Thursdays, 10:30 am - 4:00 pm

Cottage Theatre 700 Village Dr. 

Nevermore starts June 6

History Pub Axe and Fiddle

2nd Tuesdays, 5:00pm. Also see History Pub on Youtube!

Opal Center 513 E. Main

All the Arts, right in downtown Cottage Grove

Poetry Night Cottage Events Venue, 2915 Row River Rd. 

Third Tuesdays, 7:30 pm

South Lane Ballet Academy 308 S 10th

Dance instruction including ballet, jazz, modern, hip hop, tap.

Storybook Theatre

Skills, confidence and creativity for youth interested in all aspects of theater

Wisdom Seekers Club Community Center

Real life discussions about philosophy, science and more. First Thursdays, 7:00 pm, 

Garden Club Coast Fork Brewing 

Meets every other Monday, 5:30 - 7:00 pm

The Cottage Grove Library Website

Keep informed about events at the Library, new books, apps, homebound services and more.  Check it out here. And you can subscribe for regular updates.

The Cottage Grove Police Department Facebook page

Includes a weekly summary of police activity along with an expanded account of selected calls. Check it out here.

Cottage Grove's YOUTUBE Channel!  

Watch previous City Council and other meetings 

Cottage Grove: Meetings, Minutes, Agendas, Past, Present and Future

Find them all here.

Grove Construction 

Read about all the construction projects in the city's newsletter, Construction Corner.  

Around the Grove News:  April 24 - May 4

Chamber of Commerce 

The Grove's business is our business, so check their calendar.

THINK and LAUGH

Political Cartoons by Dave Davis

Political Essays by Tom Coffin

WHO ELSE NEEDS TO KNOW?

Do you know someone who should be reading the Alert?  Please pass this on or let us know. We'll add them to our mailing list.  Let's get the word out!

REMEMBER!

YOU CAN ALWAYS DONATE TO THE BLACKBERRY PIE SOCIETY!

https://secure.actblue.com/donate/blackberry

____________

The Blackberry Pie Society is dedicated to promoting good politics and great people in

East Lane County and beyond and having fun while doing it!

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Our mailing address is:

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