I have now been at the location of Landfill Park 15 times more than anyone in Yamhill Couty Parks Planning Department

I see there is a new article in the News Register- (Wine Country!) about the proposed new park on next to the old unlined dump full of undoubtedly toxic waste and one time proposed superfund site.
That is interesting to me as I just planted for the farmer that rents the ground. I have now officially been there a few more times than the illustrious Ken Huffer and the rest of the parks department. Except for the jail crew that does the grounds keeping. Well, probably also more than that crew as well...
I found a nice quote at the end of the article which I think pretty well sums up not only the attitude of the clever folks that run "Wine Country USA" but also illustrates what is a major irritation about parks in general.
"Huffer responded by saying the Yamhill River is already open to the public along its entire length under the Public Trust Doctrine. "The development of this park is not intended to allow or open unwanted access to private properties, so Yamhill County Parks and Recreation has worked hard to create a park design to keep park users on-site and limit accidental trespass," he said."

I respond:
1. The problem with rivers in Oregon is not so much the people going up and down them-I understand, it is for the public good... It is when they get out of the river and start wandering around on private property and stealing stuff and doing vandalism or being victims of something-like their own stupidity. Or start telling you how you are miss-managing your own land.
This they do on a regular basis...
This is why people oppose parks, rails to trails, bike paths, and anything else open to the public that is going into your backyard or down the street where you live.

2. Yamhill Wine County Parks and Rec- nor any other local or state agency is actually capable of creating, "a park design to keep park users on-site and limit accidental trespass."

As for the continuing comments about Linn and Benton Counties having more parks than Yamhill I say, good for them. How about building a park at the farm end of Yamhill County, like say on the border between Lincoln and Yamhill out there towards Rose Lodge. Then everyone could drive by the Casino and could get lost on Federal Forest Land instead of our corn field...

And Furthermore... Enough of this "Wine Country," BS. All it brings in is arseholes in short pants, people from Portland, and bicycles. The whole Wine Country tourist traps BS was started by a couple winery owners and people desperate for income after the timber industry was shut down a few years back-by the same sort of people who now patronize our local wineries.
Just what Yamhill County needed, to replace good paying industrial jobs with minimum wage tourist industry jobs!
I remember setting in a Newport City Council meeting years ago and hearing the retiring mayor of Newport talking about the jobs tourism was bringing to Newport. He laughed about it and said that while they had to support tourism now that fishing and logging had been killed off everyone knew what tourists did for the city of Newport, "They come here, take a shit, and leave," he said. Of course this was said in private session so it couldn't be reported...
But, it is oh so true...
We all just pretend it ain't so... And we have purple grapes on the police cars (funny, police cars advertising drinking and driving) and pretentious eateries, and farmers wearing short pants and Keens.
Do you realize you can do a bicycle tour of wineries? Oh yeah, and who exactly is the designated driver!!!!
I leave you with photos of Landfill Park, in the rain... It is so beautiful-wish I had a sip of wine!

More about parks in Yamhill County

Here is a link to a list of Yamhill County parks. 
The county has a number of undeveloped parks. I would personally like to seem basic facilities at a couple of them. They look like they would be neat to visit.
The first on one the list is Dayton Landing. I didn't know it was a park. That sounds like a nice place for a picnic. But, who knew it was there?
Powerhouse Park and Juliette Park both look interesting. Plus, they have history with the McMinnville hydroelectric project back when people tried to be self-sufficient. I think I will visit these parks.
So, why not do some simple upgrades to these unimproved parks and see what happens?
I'm sure that if this was suggested the arguments against it would include, vandalism, lack of security, lack of parking, expense of maintaining the park, lack of money in the budget. Neighborhood objections. Pretty much all the reasons we don't want a 90 acre park with over night camping located on our road.
I wonder if developing an interesting feature at each of the undeveloped parks and making a few simple trails would draw in a few visitors who would take more pride in the park or if it would just make it easier for people to go off the road in drink at night. Which seems to be the primary use of parks in Yamhill County at the present time.

In a little side note about the public interest in parks. If you do a search for Yamhill County park you will find posts by The Lazy Farmer.  I've been watching my stats much closer since I posted those blog entries.  Very few of my hits come from those posts. I suspect that there are not a lot of people searching online for info and Yamhill County parks. I don't know what that means statistically but I kind of suspect that people just don't care. If no one is searching online for parks than Ken Huffer is most likely not telling the truth when he states that Landfill Park is needed because people call him all the time looking for hiking trails in Yamhill County.

Yamhill County wants to build a park because they want to build legacy, bad smells and grumpy neighbors be damned!

The Head of the Yamhill County Parks Department wants to go places in life. He needs to justify his job and he needs to build a resume.
He says Yamhill County needs more trails and campsites and there are 90 acres that Yamhill County owns which are just sitting there doing nothing. Well, much of it is being leased for farming, but that is not a huge income.
The vehement opposition of residents surrounding the proposed park means very little to the Parks department or the parks board. The issue of a huge landfill across the river, which smells very bad in the summer, is not an issue either.
What matters is following through with their proposal and essentially, winning their argument.
It is fascinating to watch the process in action. The issues that we argue about are essentially meaningless. Traffic and crime are items on a graph or report to those who do government planning. They are issues to be addressed by regulations and conditional uses restrictions by the Yamhill County Planning Commission.
No one in Yamhill Government will discuss the old landfill as the landfill has already been closed and has regulated through DEQ and I suspect that as long as their approved long range plan is followed, liability is limited.
They will not acknowledge the stink of the Waste Management site across the river. They claim that it will have no impact.
This denial will work as there is no accountability. Ken Huffer, Head of the Parks department, will be long gone to bigger and better things before anyone in government discovers that the sort of people who want to camp and walk nature trails are also the sort of people who object to a mountain of garbage.
Ken will have his legacy park on his resume, the Parks Board will have done their civic duty by building a park over the objections of a bunch of "selfish farmers," and the local meth heads and kids will have a place to party that is closer than Deer Creek park.
So really, it is a win-win situation for everyone but the neighbors.
And that is the definition of "for the public good..."

(It is pretty funny that Yamhill County may one day be known for Landfill Park, the park that stinks. But, I suppose that will be called a positive as in some sort of green recycling project and everyone but the people who smell it will think it is all a great idea...)

Yamhill County Wants to Build A Park Next to a very Smelly Dump

This is a bit of a rant about a park and a dump and how the idea of building an amazing park with nature trails and clever interpretive kiosks and possible camping completely overshadows the basic fact that the location stinks. I mean that literally.

It will be kind of funny as the people who want to get in touch with nature are the very same people who will be totally offended by the sight and smell of a huge mound of garbage and so I really kind of hate to object. I think huge government failures are pretty amusing, in a bitter ironic way.
Anyway...
The point of this post is that I went to a Yamhill Planning commission meeting last night. It was an amazing example of democracy in action.

It was amazing and depressing all at the same time.

The Yamhill County Parks Commission (or what ever it is called) wants to put in a park.
I really hate to be against parks. In fact if it were 30 years ago and I had not seen the de-evolution of local culture or I had not had to put up with the litter and crime associated with parks near places I farm, (Deer Creek Park, The park on Mill Creek next to Harmony Road and Hwy 18, the unofficial and illegal park at the former Green Bridge, old park at the dump known as Monroe Landing,) I would be in favor of the park. It is kind of a neat design.
However... (Rant follows-there are no pictures-just another one of my painfully long monologues)

Some years ago the country purchased property for a buffer zone around the old landfill on our side of the river. This was due to several lawsuits and problems with the old landfill and the neighbors.

But the memory of a bureaucracy is not much longer than the retirement age of the involved  minor officials and so all the controversy surrounding those events of 30 years ago has been forgotten.

So when the new Parks Commission figured out these 90 some acres that were being leased to a neighboring farmer they only saw space for the future crown jewel of the Yamhill County Parks department.

They have an official planner and there are people with degrees in such things and there are local people that are on the Parks Commission and they all need to feel useful and important.

They mostly talk to each other and go to seminars and tell each other how smart they are and how important their jobs are and how the peasants need parks and how parks will bring jobs and sustainability and whatever current buzzwords they have just learned in whatever wonderful self congratulating seminars they have just attended.

It would appear that no one really thought about what would really happen if you situated a park next to a smelly landfill. No one actually visited the proposed site often enough to smell the landfill. No one actually talked to any of the residents before picking a site.

The one commission member who testified told us with a straight face that Sheriff’s Department response time, the smell of the landfill, what was buried in the landfill, and why a buffer zone was purchased, was not really what the Parks Commission took into account when the site was chosen.

In fact, we should accept all inconveniences for the “public good” and that no one really liked having a park on their road and all crime and traffic problems were offset by the good experiences had by people from outside our community who would enjoy the park.

It was obvious that they did not see a connection between crime and traffic problems and a neighborhood reluctance to see a park built.

Instead all the protests from neighbors were categorized as a “Not in my Backyard” response and fall under the age old category of “you can’t make an omelet without breaking a few eggs,” concept of government steamrolling the individual.

That is the sort of bureaucratic thought that causes me to say, “screw the public good, build it next to your house you arrogant SOB…" but I didn't...

But all talk of traffic problems, security issues, and "Not in my Back Yard" issues aside, the self important maroons on the Yamhill County Parks Commission are proposing the building of a park with nature trails next to a giant stinking pile of garbage. A pile of garbage that catches on fire from time to time. A pile of garbage that emits random explosions from time to time.

A nature park, that when the future plans for camping spaces are phased in, will provide campers with the roar of giant bulldozers and incessant beeping of backup alarms. (Well, not during the weekends. Of course the 200 cars a day going past my house on Sunday-the one day a week I take off work, is for the greater good and I should just smile and say “thank you may I have another.”)

Where is the sense of perspective?

I really couldn’t read the opinions of the Planning Commission members. They seemed a bit amazed at the strength of the opposition. One would hope that they would be more in tune with rural fears and values.

I personally feel somewhat uncomfortable with opposing this park. It sounds like a good idea in many ways. However, I had to remind myself of a couple truths I’ve found over the years. 1. It will not work out like they say 2. It will be much bigger than they claim. 3. It will be painful in the long run.

Of course the bottom line is, Yamhill county has 90 acres just sitting there. They have to do something with it.  The head of the parks department wants to make a park to build his resume.

All this talk of the public good is just a rationalization to give the him and the parks commission self worth and job satisfaction.

I don’t want a park on my road because I don’t want a lot of environmentalist city folk driving past my place, imagining that I am spraying toxic chemicals, blocking me driving my wide farm equipment down the highway on the weekend, and annoying me in my yards as my house is 20 feet from the road.

Then when they discover the park stinks and quit going, the drinkers and drug users will move in cause they don’t care that it stinks and we will have to lock everything up.

The parks department and the parks commission will take absolutely no responsibility after the fact. Their goal is to build a “legacy” park.

That is the bottom line…