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MONDAY 12-06-21 PODCASTS   6AM   –   7AM   –   8AM

TUESDAY 12-07-21 PODCASTS   6AM   –   7AM   –   8AM

WEDNESDAY 12-8-21 PODCASTS   6AM   –   7AM   –   8AM

THURSDAY 12-09-21 PODCASTS   6AM   –   7AM   –   8AM

FRIDAY 12-10-21 PODCASTS   6AM    –  7AM   –   8AM

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 Friday 12-10-21 Bill Meyer Show Guest Information

 6:35 Rick Manning, President of Americans for Limited Government, www.DailyTorch.com and www.GetLiberty.org

 7:10 Greg Roberts, www.RogueWeather.com and today’s Outdoor Report

 7:35 State Representative Duane Stark from Grants Pass talks of bills coming next session that wish to crack down on homeschoolers.

8:10 “Mr. X” with more on how to properly comment on the OHA’s desired permanent mask mandate rule. Deadline is Tuesday, 5pm. Here is the notice originally sent out by OHA so you can see what they’ve said, and then there is our example of one way to respond. First, the original OHA notice.

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Date: November 24, 2021

To: Interested Parties

From: Zintars Beldavs, Section Manager

Acute & Communicable Disease Prevention Section

Subject: Extension of Comment Period for OAR 333-019-0010 and 333-019-1005 –

“School and childcare exclusion, public health, safety requirements for childcare providers, youth programs “

 

The Oregon Health Authority, Public Health Division is extending the public comment period for the proposed rules noted below. The public comment period will close at 5:00 p.m. on December 14, 2021 in order to allow additional time for input from the public.

The Oregon Health Authority (OHA), Public Health Division, is proposing to permanently amend and adopt Oregon Administrative Rules in chapter 333, division 19 pertaining to school and childcare exclusion, and public health and safety requirements for childcare providers and youth programs related to COVID-19.

The two rules proposed for adoption and amendment concern:

  • Exclusion of susceptible staff, children and students from schools and children’s facilities, if they are exposed through close contact to an individual with COVID-19.

 Public health and safety requirements for childcare providers and youth programs.

Temporary rules were adopted effective June 29, 2021 (Temporary Administrative Order PH 27-2021) and this proposed rulemaking seeks to make those changes permanent.

You are being invited to review and comment on the proposed rules.

The comment period for this rulemaking has been extended until 5:00 p.m. on December 14, 2021.

You may file written comments by sending them to the Public Health Division Rules Coordinator at the following address:

OHA, Public Health Division

Administrative Rules Coordinator

800 NE Oregon Street, Suite 930

E-mail comments to: publichealth.rules@dhsoha.state.or.us or you may also send comments by fax to: (971) 673-1299.  Final rules will be filed after consideration of all comments.

PLEASE NOTE that we are not taking comments on school vaccine or mask requirements at this time. The hearing and comment period for those rules will be announced at a later date.

For more details, please see the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, including the Statement of Need and Fiscal Impact and the full text of the proposed rules at the following website: www.healthoregon.org/diseasereporting .

If you have any questions or would prefer to be sent a hard copy of the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, please send an email to publichealth.rules@dhsoha.state.or.us

_____________________________________

 Okay, that’s what OHA sent out. Here’s some suggested verbiage:

 

RE: extension of comment period for proposed rules-OAR 333-019-0010 and 333-019-1005 to December 14, 2021

OHA – Is there Justification for a permanent rule, based on data analysis of hospitalizations, deaths, and recovery rate of school aged children 0-19 from Jan. 21, 2020- November 28, 2021?

The statistical record doesn’t constitute conditions that would require making a permanent statewide rule, and that local control over adequate health responses would be best suited. Here’s the OHA and CDC stats:

According to OHA from Jan 21, 2020 to November 28, 2021

Total Cases Oregon Age 0 to 19 – 70,461 Cases (18.9% of Cases in Oregon)

Total Hospitalizations Age 0 to 19 – 606 Hospitalizations (0.86% of School Age Cases have needed hospitalization)

Total Deaths Age 0 to 19 Age – 5 Deaths (0.007% of School Age Cases have resulted in death)

Total Recoveries Age 0 to 19 Age – 99.993% of Cases have Recovered

https://www.oregon.gov/oha/covid19/Documents/DataReports/Weekly-Data-COVID-19-Report-2021-12-01-FINAL.pdf

According to CDC from Jan 21, 2020 to November 28, 2021

Total (Oregon) MIS-C Age 0 to 19 – 25 to 49 (Max 0.07% of Cases have been MIS-C) Multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children…” condition that appears to be linked to covid 19

https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#mis-national-surveillance

For Reference Statistical Significance typically doesn’t come into effect until a percentage reaches 3 to 5%

https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/career-development/how-to-calculate-statistical-significance

 

FOR RECOMMENDATION FOR THE RULE TO BE PUT IN PLACE:

  1. Bullet point recommendations: The two rules proposed for adoption and amendment concern:

Page 2 of the proposed rule should read: (italicized wording replaced with bold print)

  • Potential exclusion of infected staff, children and students from schools and children facilities, if they are exposed through close contact to an individual with (COVID-19) with provable SARS-COV-2 infection.
  • Public health and safety requirements guidance for childcare providers and youth programs.

Additionally, there is potential misuse of the intended rule that would prevent equity and inclusion and would be potentially discriminatory. An equitable solution and mechanism should be in place for children who are NOT vaccinated and are at no risk, to return to school ASAP.

____________________________________________

  

8:35 Open for Business with Brad Bennington from the Builders Association of Southern Oregon

www.Buildso.com  541-773-2872  Brad and I discuss the state unemployment situation, are contractors finding people to hire? An update on the Talent/Phoenix state of rebuild.

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MUST READ ARTICLE – More about the fraud of this war on Covid-19 Early Treatment. This is on the RESCUE substack – The Despicable Defamation of a Lifesaving Doctor.

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Thursday 12-09-21 Bill Meyer Show Guest Information

 6:35  Armin Brott, aka Mr. Dad, is a spokesman for the Men’s Health Network. He is author of The New Father: A Dad’s Guide to The Toddler Years, a nationally published columnist on manhood and fatherhood, and Host of ‘Positive Parenting,’ a weekly talk show.

“I think one of the biggest risks to civilization is the low birthrate and the rapidly declining birthrate,” Musk explained on Monday evening, as recorded by the New York Post.

“And yet, so many people, including smart people, think that there are too many people in the world and think that the population is growing out of control,” Musk continued. “It’s completely the opposite. Please look at the numbers — if people don’t have more children, civilization is going to crumble, mark my words.”

Following COVID-19 and subsequent lockdown measures, American birth rates have plummeted to their lowest levels in nearly a century.

ARMIN’S BOOK: The New Father: A Dad’s Guide to The Toddler Years

BIO: Hailed by Time Magazine as “the superdad’s superdad,” Armin Brott is a pioneer in the field of fatherhood and has been building better fathers for more than a decade. As the author of eight bestselling books on fatherhood, he’s helped millions of men around the world become the fathers they want to be—and that their children need them to be.

FIND HIS WEBSITE HERE:

FIND HIM ON FACEBOOK HERE:

FIND HIM ON TWITTER HERE:

 

7:35 Dr. Marilyn Singleton is a board-certified anesthesiologist and Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) Board member. She graduated from Stanford and earned her MD at UCSF Medical School.  Dr. Singleton completed two years of Surgery residency at UCSF, then her Anesthesia residency at Harvard’s Beth Israel Hospital. While still working in the operating room, she attended UC Berkeley Law School, focusing on constitutional law and administrative law.  She interned at the National Health Law Project and practiced insurance and health law.  She teaches classes in the recognition of elder abuse and constitutional law for non-lawyers.

A Constitutional Cure for Covid-19

Covid, Covid, Covid. Variant, variant, variant. Trust me, I’m the government’s highest paid employee, and “I represent science.” Show your papers, wear a mask, take a shot or lose your job. And the beat goes on for an infection where 99.95 percent of infected persons under age 70 years recover. It’s becoming clear that Covid-19 is not merely a disease but an excuse to concentrate power in the government.

It’s time for the political histrionics to stop. Multiple studies have shown that the consequences far outweigh any potential (and illusory) benefits of masks, lockdowns, and school closures. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director admitted that the current Covid-19 mRNA vaccines, while helpful in reducing deaths and hospitalizations, do not stop transmission of the virus. “Breakthrough” cases in vaccinated persons are on the rise. Moreover, the current vaccines likely are not effective for the new, likely less lethal Omicron variant. Public health experts opine that the SARS-CoV-2 virus (that causes Covid-19) and its multiple variants are becoming endemic. That means SARS-CoV-2 and its infinite number of variants will not be eliminated, but become a manageable part of the human-viral ecosystem.

Sadly, our government is not responding in accordance with the scientific facts. Instead, federal and some local governments are mandating more vaccines, culminating in proof of vaccination to engage in society and continue living as a normal human being. This is not science. This is nascent totalitarianism.

Two lines from the 1990 Cold War era spy film, The Hunt for Red October foreshadowed our government’s warp speed trajectory to authoritarianism. “Privacy is not of major concern in the Soviet Union, comrade. It’s often contrary to the collective good.” And a White House official casually boasted, “I’m a politician that means I’m a cheat and a liar.”

It didn’t take long for President Biden to tell the big lie. As president-elect, Mr. Biden said there would be no vaccine mandates. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (the third in line for the presidency) brilliantly illustrated the intersection of lying and privacy. As late as August 2021, Speaker Pelosi said, “We cannot require someone to be vaccinated. That’s just not what we can do. It is a matter of privacy to know who is or who isn’t.”

Without skipping a beat, the executive branch issued three separate vaccine mandates: all federal contractors (including remote workers), an Occupational Health & Safety Administration (OSHA) requirement for businesses with more than 100 employees, and a Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) requirement for employees, volunteers and third-party contractors of health care providers certified by CMS.

The judicial branch is fighting back against the President’s attempt to jettison the Constitution’s separation of powers clauses, a large chunk of the Bill of Rights, and Supreme Court precedents on bodily autonomy with these mandates. On November 9th, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals put the OSHA mandate on hold. The Court reasoned that the mandate “threatens to substantially burden the liberty interests of reluctant individual recipients put to a choice between their job(s) and their jab(s).” And “the loss of constitutional freedoms ‘for even minimal periods of time … unquestionably constitutes irreparable injury.”

Citing the lack of congressional authorization and harm to access to medical care, on November 29th a Missouri federal district court placed a temporary halt on the CMS health care workers “boundary-pushing” mandate. The government planned to enforce the mandate by imposing monetary penalties, denial of payment and termination from the Medicare and Medicaid program. The ruling covers providers in Kansas, Alaska, Arkansas, Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming.

On November 30th, a Louisiana federal district court blocked the CMS mandate issuing a nationwide injunction in a lawsuit brought by 14 states (Arizona, Alabama, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Utah and West Virginia). “If the executive branch is allowed to usurp the power of the legislative branch to make laws, two of the three powers conferred by our Constitution would be in the same hands. … [C]ivil liberties face grave risks when governments proclaim indefinite states of emergency.”

That same day, a Kentucky federal district court issued a hold on the federal government contractors mandate, citing lack of authority of the executive branch—“even for a good cause”. The court reasoned that if a procurement statute could be used to mandate vaccination, it “could be used to enact virtually any measure at the president’s whim under the guise of economy and efficiency.” The ruling covers Kentucky, Ohio and Tennessee.

The mainstream media finally reported on the toxicity and poor results of Dr. Fauci’s “standard of care” treatment, remdesivir. This prompted families to use the courts rather than watch their relatives needlessly die. Victories for patients are growing. A Chicago area judge recently ordered a hospital to “step aside” and allow a physician to administer ivermectin in an effort to save a dying patient. It worked.

People are tired of lies. When Google employees are signing a “manifesto” to fight the mandates, you know the seeds of revolt have sprouted.

 

8:10 Oregon Republican Party Treasurer and State Senator Dennis Linthicum talks with me about the battle for liberty, and what it will take to “Steel the Spine” of the elected GOP legislature leaders.

 

8:35 Open for Business with Steve Johnson from Quik Fix Jewelry Repair in the Rogue Valley Mall. https://quikfixrvm.com/

Call 541-690-1388

A little more about Steve – He became a Designated Master Jeweler in 1975 after 3 years of study with a European trained Master.

 He has worked with insurance companies to re-create heirloom pieces that have gone missing. At QuikFix we have added a great  selection of watch bands and the very affordable and rugged Mason brand of watches.

Our design center has become invaluable. Having the ability to see illustrations and selections of styles larger than life on a flat screen takes all the guess  work out of the creation of that one of a kind special creation.  If they mention the show we have some surprises for them including an exclusive sneak peek at the  new Oregon inspired gift creation? You will be one of the few to see Liana’s carving of the original model and to be able to pre-order your own customized version.

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Wednesday 12-08-21 Bill Meyer Show Guest Information

6:35 “Wheels Up Wednesday” with Eric Peters, automotive journalist with www.EpAutos.com

The 2022 Leaf Review – https://www.ericpetersautos.com/2021/12/06/2022-nissan-leaf/

 Something “Creepy” in a new Mercedes Eric drove – https://www.ericpetersautos.com/2021/12/05/something-creepy-this-way-comes/

 “Shocking” news – https://www.ericpetersautos.com/2021/12/07/you-might-be-shocked-and-soon-will-be/

7:10 Kenny Xu is author of the new book, An Inconvenient Minority: The Attack on Asian American Excellence and the Fight for Meritocracy. He is the President of Color Us United,which advocates for a color blind society.

 8:10 Kevin Starrett with Oregon Firearms Federation talks with me about the upcoming session, the protection of gun rights, where are the GOP spines in standing up for the 2ndA?

 8:35 Open for Business with Randall from Advanced Air – www.MyAdvancedAir.com

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Tuesday 12-07-21 Bill Meyer Show Guest Information

6:35 Mr. X discusses how best to craft a comment on OHA mask rule changes and other issues. Comments Close 12/14/21 – suggests we hold off until further research later this week. Here’s the info on the changes. 

Changes to Oregon Health Authority Rules – this is the address folks can email comments on the rules  publichealth.rules@dhsoha.state.or.us

Date: November 24, 2021

To: Interested Parties

From: Zintars Beldavs, Section Manager

Acute & Communicable Disease Prevention Section

Subject: Extension of Comment Period for OAR 333-019-0010 and 333-019-1005 –

“School and childcare exclusion, public health, safety requirements for childcare providers, youth programs “

The Oregon Health Authority, Public Health Division is extending the public comment period for the proposed rules noted below. The public comment period will close at 5:00 p.m. on December 14, 2021 in order to allow additional time for input from the public.

The Oregon Health Authority (OHA), Public Health Division, is proposing to permanently amend and adopt Oregon Administrative Rules in chapter 333, division 19 pertaining to school and childcare exclusion, and public health and safety requirements for childcare providers and youth programs related to COVID-19.

The two rules proposed for adoption and amendment concern:

  • Exclusion of susceptible staff, children and students from schools and children’s facilities, if they are exposed through close contact to an individual with COVID-19.
  •  
  • Public health and safety requirements for childcare providers and youth programs.

Temporary rules were adopted effective June 29, 2021 (Temporary Administrative Order PH 27-2021) and this proposed rulemaking seeks to make those changes permanent.

You are being invited to review and comment on the proposed rules.

The comment period for this rulemaking has been extended until 5:00 p.m. on December 14, 2021.

You may file written comments by sending them to the Public Health Division Rules Coordinator at the following address:

OHA, Public Health Division

Administrative Rules Coordinator

800 NE Oregon Street, Suite 930

E-mail comments to: publichealth.rules@state.or.us or you may also send comments

by fax to: (971) 673-1299.

Final rules will be filed after consideration of all comments.

 

PLEASE NOTE that we are not taking comments on school vaccine or mask requirements at this time. The hearing and comment period for those rules will be announced at a later date.

For more details, please see the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, including the Statement of Need and Fiscal Impact and the full text of the proposed rules at the following website: www.healthoregon.org/diseasereporting

If you have any questions or would prefer to be sent a hard copy of the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, please send an email to publichealth.rules@dhsoha.state.or.us

7:35 Josephine County Commissioner Herman Baertschiger discusses the claims made against him by people pushing his recall from office.

8:10 Bridget Barton, Republican Candidate for Governor in studio discussing the issues. More about her campaign – www.BridgetBartonForOregon.com

8:35 Andy Pollack –  author of WHY MEADOW DIED – The People and Policies that created Parkland’s Shooter and Endanger America’s Students

Andy and I discuss last week’s school shooting in Michigan, and the similarities to the Parkland shootings.

Andy is offering free software to law enforcement agencies willing to use it. It’s designed to let the public immediately contact police/sheriffs in a mass event.

More at www.SchoolSafetyGrant.org

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Monday 12-06-21 Bill Meyer Show Guest Information

 6:35 Peter Rex is an American entrepreneur. He is the founder and CEO of Rex, a technology, investment and real estate company, headquartered in Austin, Texas. He co-founded InvestResa real estate, asset and property management company. Today, Peter and I discuss a recent op-ed he wrote for USA Today about the atheistic bent of the high tech world, and problems for the culture because of it.

 Silicon Valley makes a god of Big Tech. 

But religious faith is exactly what it needs.

I crossed myself before lunch and then was peppered with questions. 

Do some tech bosses really not know a single Christian?

The venture capitalist had never seen anything like it. In hundreds if not thousands of pitch meetings he’d run, no one seems to have ever crossed themselves. When I did just that – moving my hand from forehead to chest to both shoulders before digging into lunch – the questions came flying. What was that, what does it mean, why do you do it? This incident, in a 2018 pitch, was far from an outlier. I’ve found that Silicon Valley has little knowledge of faith, yet faith is exactly what it needs.

Before I began building and investing in tech companies in the mid-2010s, I knew that religious belief was rare in the industry. Surveys show that at least half of tech workers are atheists or agnostic, compared to just 7% of Americans, and a 2018 episode of Silicon Valley half-joked that it’s easier to come out of the closet than it is to come out as Christian.

But I wasn’t prepared for what that meant in practice. In my experience, there’s a hostility to faith that stifles tech workers and shapes tech itself for the worse.

I’ve seen a specific kind of discrimination toward people of faith, whether Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or members of any other religion. It’s a soft discrimination – a quiet hostility that leads to hesitation on the part of believers. The industry’s pervading ethos is that faith is for the unenlightened and unintelligent, which is likely a product of the elite education institutions where tech leaders and workers are often trained. Wherever it comes from, such subtle contempt causes people of faith to disguise who they really are.

I’ve seen it in hiring. Candidates who went to religious schools try to downplay it on their resumes. Those who worked at religious organizations often omit it from their list of prior experience. My company interviewed one promising person who used to work at a pro-life group, yet deliberately misspelled it on her LinkedIn profile. She didn’t want anyone to click it and learn about the group.

I’ve seen it in the day-to-day work environment, as well.

My company’s vice president of communications used to work for a major tech CEO who admitted not knowing any Christians personally. Many of our employees have left tech companies where they felt compelled to hide the most important facet of their lives, often because they’ve seen the pressure and opposition others faced for being overtly religious. I feel the same pressure. My personal motto is “serving Jesus in business,” which often elicits a combination of eye rolls, ended conversations, and online vitriol something a lot of people would rather avoid.

It matters that people are afraid to admit their religious beliefs. When people can’t bring their beliefs to bear, it affects the risks they take, the ideas they offer, and the innovations they pursue. Silicon Valley is holding back untold opportunities for human progress.

But closed doors aren’t the only or even the biggest problem. What’s worse are the doors that tech leaders, in their lack of belief, are choosing to open.

The tech industry may think faith is for rubes, but that only leaves Silicon Valley with a God-shaped hole that’s being filled with lesser substitutes. In particular, I’ve found that tech leaders think they are gods.

You see glimpses in Silicon Valley’s elitism and disdain for morality, such as LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman’s explicit desire to invest in companies built around the seven deadly sins, like lust, laziness, and anger.

You also see it in the industry’s embrace of “transhumanism” and pursuit of immortality through tech-enabled enhancements. I find it telling that in an industry where the afterlife is often an afterthought, leaders like Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and Google’s Sergey Brin and Larry Page are trying to end aging and death itself.

Equally dangerous, and prevalent, is the view that technology itself is a god.

Look no further than the fascination with the “metaverse,” an all-encompassing alternate reality. The hope is that this fake existence will save us from the mess we’ve made in real life. This misplaced faith has also led to a belief that tech can ignore the old constraints of right and wrong. Is it any wonder tech is increasingly used to censor and suppress? Is it any surprise that violations of privacy are common, as in Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica scandal, and addiction is prized over individual empowerment, especially on social media?

In the eyes of many who wield it, tech is beyond the stain of sin, and the means of its use matter less than the end to which it can deliver us – namely, paradise.

Most Americans say Silicon Valley needs some combination of regulation, anti-trust action, or some other form of government punishment and control.

I tend to think it needs something else, something deeper. The tech industry could use an infusion of faith, from a wide variety of religious traditions. There’s no better way to help tech see what it can’t do, what it shouldn’t do, and most importantly, what it’s truly capable of doing – namely, empowering and serving people.

Peter Rex is founder and CEO of Rex, which builds and invests in tech companies. Follow him on Twitter: @PeterRex

 

7:10 Greg Roberts, Rogue Weather Dot Com with today’s outdoor report

7:35 State Rep. Lily Morgan – Changes to Oregon Health Authority Rules – this is the address folks can email comments on the rules  publichealth.rules@dhsoha.state.or.us

Date: November 24, 2021

To: Interested Parties

From: Zintars Beldavs, Section Manager

Acute & Communicable Disease Prevention Section

Subject: Extension of Comment Period for OAR 333-019-0010 and 333-019-1005 –

“School and childcare exclusion, public health, safety requirements for childcare providers, youth programs “

 

The Oregon Health Authority, Public Health Division is extending the public comment period for the proposed rules noted below. The public comment period will close at 5:00 p.m. on December 14, 2021 in order to allow additional time for input from the public.

The Oregon Health Authority (OHA), Public Health Division, is proposing to permanently amend and adopt Oregon Administrative Rules in chapter 333, division 19 pertaining to school and childcare exclusion, and public health and safety requirements for childcare providers and youth programs related to COVID-19.

The two rules proposed for adoption and amendment concern:

  • Exclusion of susceptible staff, children and students from schools and children’s facilities, if they are exposed through close contact to an individual with COVID-19.
  • Public health and safety requirements for childcare providers and youth programs.

Temporary rules were adopted effective June 29, 2021 (Temporary Administrative Order PH 27-2021) and this proposed rulemaking seeks to make those changes permanent.

You are being invited to review and comment on the proposed rules.

The comment period for this rulemaking has been extended until 5:00 p.m. on December 14, 2021.

You may file written comments by sending them to the Public Health Division Rules Coordinator at the following address:

OHA, Public Health Division

Administrative Rules Coordinator

800 NE Oregon Street, Suite 930

E-mail comments to: publichealth.rules@state.or.us or you may also send comments

by fax to: (971) 673-1299.

Final rules will be filed after consideration of all comments.

 

PLEASE NOTE that we are not taking comments on school vaccine or mask requirements at this time. The hearing and comment period for those rules will be announced at a later date.

For more details, please see the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, including the Statement of Need and Fiscal Impact and the full text of the proposed rules at the following website: www.healthoregon.org/diseasereporting .

If you have any questions or would prefer to be sent a hard copy of the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, please send an email to publichealth.rules@dhsoha.state.or.us

8:10 Dr. Dennis Powers “Where Past Meets Present”. Dennis is a retired professor of Business Law at SOU, and has written MANY stellar books. More at www.DennisPowersBooks.com

 Lost Creek Lake: Its Lost Villages

By Dennis Powers

Life along the upper Rogue River in years past was like many in Southern Oregon: tiny towns and villages, farms, auto campgrounds, covered bridges, hunting lodges, rustic homes, orchards, and even gravel roads. This was a wild and beautiful section of the river then, with excellent fishing riffles for steelhead and deep holes for the salmon. It all changed after the 1964 Christmas flood when the Rogue River flooded and inundated towns, including the tiny communities of Laurelhurst and McLeod.

Owing to this, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers finished construction in 1977 of the William Jess Dam north of Shady Cove. The dammed Rogue River created 10-mile-long Lost Creek Lake with its 675 square miles that also covered what was left of these villages–Laurelhurst along the east bank and McLeod on the west.

Laurelhurst’s history dated back to 1867, when William and Frances Rumley settled the first homestead near the river and close to what became the lower end of Laurelhurst Road. A gravel road once dropped to the upper Rogue near Rogue’s Roost, a rustic lodge built in the 1920s with a deck overlooking the river. Nearby was another landmark, the Flounce Rock Ranch.

Under the waters near the Takelma boat ramp on the west shore lies what was once Uncanny Canyon–marked by its towering, painted totem pole–and tilted buildings that created optical illusions modeled after the famous Oregon Vortex (but also where water seemingly ran uphill). Below the dam, Casey’s Auto Camp had operated: A rustic resort with cabins, outhouse, home cooking, and the antics of a captive black bear named “Jerry the Bear” that included holding and drinking a bottle of soft drink or milk.

Once a thriving community of 200 people, Laurelhurst was dismantled to become buried under the waters. The Army Corps needed to clear the land for the reservoir and shoreline: Houses, strawberry and pig farms, pear orchards, a fruit-packing facility, trees, a store or roadside stand, and more structures were cleared.

A piece of the old Laurelhurst Road started near Crowfoot Road and Highway 62 by Casey State Park. McLeod Bridge once crossed the river there, until the 1964 flood wiped it out, and this was the main road to Prospect. In Stewart State Park, pear trees are in the campgrounds where a pear orchard once was.

Laurelhurst boasted a bridge even before McLeod came on the scene: The Peyton covered bridge was built in 1899. It linked the eastern end of Laurelhurst Road with Fort Military Road, a forerunner of Highway 62, on the west side of the river. Replaced by a nearby concrete bridge after the 1964 flood, Lost Creek Lake also swallowed up this bridge—all to be replaced by the long spanning Peyton Bridge that now crosses the wide lake.

A massive dam and lake with over 200 campsites, marina, store, café, and adjacent state parks (Casey and Stewart State Parks) has now replaced the tiny villages that once were. It’s hard to imagine what once used to be there.

Sources: Vicki Aldous, “Stories lie hidden beneath Lost Creek Lake,” Mail Tribune, September 14, 2017, at Lost Villages; Bill Varble, “Once-Thriving Oregon Town Is Lost Forever, Thanks To Dam,” Mail Tribune, March 15, 1992 (online at Seattle Times) at Additional Facts.

 8:45 No Wires Now –  Open For Business – Call Cheriesse at 1-541-680-5875 to save big money on your internet, TV, phone, home security and more.