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A new Mediterranean restaurant opens on East 13th Avenue

Atlas Mediterranean, a new Mediterranean restaurant on East 13th Avenue, held its grand opening on Jan. 24. 

Atlas owner, Gabe Garboden, found the space for Atlas in February of last year. “There’s not any customizable Mediterranean food around here and we thought a lot of people would like it,” Garboden said.

Garboden said he had found the restaurant busier by the day, and he credited the high foot traffic on East 13th Avenue for the business’ free marketing. “This is arguably the most walked street in all of Eugene,” Garboden said. 

All the food at Atlas is made in-house from their tzatziki and hummus to the pita pressed fresh every morning. 

The target audience for Atlas was the students and so far their favorite dish on the menu is the Classic Chicken Gyro. “People see the word classic and if they’re here for the first time it’s like, ‘lets try what’s tried and true,’” Rachel Ridenour, director of operations for Atlas, said. 

“I love Mediterranean food, but I haven’t tried it yet. I’ve heard it’s like a solid restaurant,” University of Oregon student Elliot Lee said. “I planned on trying it today after work.” 

Before opening Atlas, Garboden and Ridenour worked to create Sprout Kitchen. Sprout Kitchen offered bowls, sandwiches and salads as well as pre-packaged meals to help with meal prep. The team at Sprout moved to Atlas after the restaurant closed its doors on Nov. 20. Sprout Kitchen was open for six months. 

Atlas is in talks with the University of Oregon’s athletic department to be a part of the red card program which allocates funds to athletes for approved restaurants in Eugene.  

“It all comes back to the product. If you have the best food you will succeed, everything else is secondary,” Garboden said.

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Eugene Police Commission seeks to create mental health policy

Currently, the Eugene Police Department does not have a concrete written policy about officer mental health. However, the Law Enforcement Mental Health and Wellness subcommittee is putting in time to create one. 

“The eyes of the entire country are on Eugene,” Jensina Hawk, police commission chair, said. “We are known for being progressive in thinking when it comes to dealing with things like this.” 

Two years ago, the mental health and wellness subcommittee was born after Hawk voiced her hopes to set milestones for the department as they worked to create a policy having to do with police mental health generally and following critical incidents that are currently undefined. 

She posed a question to the Police Commission and City Council: “What does success look like? How do we know if we’re 50%, 60% or 0% done with this?” 

Hawk was then given the responsibility of running the subcommittee. Later, this position was turned over to Jack Radey who was appointed to the police commission in July after two previous denials. 

Typically, the city of Eugene grants six months of working time to a committee. Hawk’s was permitted to meet for two years. The committee now has six months left. 

The subcommittee has been working to set standard practices for and relating to officer mental wellness. As for now, the tools for EPD officers are limited. 

“There are in fact policies and they are, I suspect, carried out when an officer is observed to be having problems,” Radey said. A supervisor who sees these problems by having daily interactions may recommend the officer to get help. 

“In extreme cases where the chief is convinced that someone is in trouble, he can order that person ‘you need to go see a mental health professional and don’t come back until you have.’ This is used sparingly, I believe,” Radey said. 

Additionally, Radey said 10% of EPD officers are trained peer counselors. A supervisor can recommend an officer to talk to one of the counselors. 

Radey said the police department wants a full-time in-house mental health professional, but the subcommittee is considering potential issues with that motion. 

“It’s 300 people in the department, it’s a small family, everybody knows everything. You walk down the hall and talk to Dr. Jones, the word slide would spread,” Radey said. 

Radey said officers may be hesitant to speak to someone who also works for the department out of fear the counselor may share information with someone in power. Though legally a counselor cannot share what is said in a session unless it has to do with “imminent danger to themselves or others where breaking therapist confidentiality would be necessary to stop the danger,” the concern is still present for some. 

“There have been areas where we haven’t made much headway because of an unclear division of responsibility,” Hawk said. “Obviously the chief has the final say so.”

The subcommittee also acknowledged that the human resource department, which is run by the City of Eugene, may have jurisdiction over officer mental health. Hawk said she wonders how the rights of the police union may play into creating mental health standards. 

“What we need is to find a way to support our officers so they stay functioning well and so they are well and sane and as happy in their careers as they can be,” Radey said. “In a perfect world, I would find online a department roughly our size who has a policy that just seems brilliant and we would adopt it,” he said. “I am 77 years old and I have never lived in a perfect world.”

Radey said he hopes to find a model the subcommittee can take inspiration from. 

“I doubt we can get the work done in six months honestly speaking, but we can certainly make a good cut at it,” he said. 

He said he believes the subcommittee, the union and police department leadership are all in agreement about steps needing to be taken to support Eugene officers’ mental health. 

*Jensina Hawk, Jack Radey, nor other members of the subcommittee speak on behalf of the Eugene Police Department 

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Therapy groups in Eugene aim to be open for the community

Access to therapy can be difficult, especially due to the fact that there are many people who want therapy but not many therapists. As of 2022, there were 5,723 practicing therapists in Oregon, and in 2021, 172,00 Oregonians experienced mental illness in various ways. According to Oregon State University in 2022, “Oregon ranks as the sixth worst state in the nation for prevalence of mental illness.”

Oregon law holds telehealth therapy conversations to the same standards as in-person therapy. Some therapy groups around Eugene added virtual therapy to their practices during the pandemic and kept virtual therapy as an option for their patients. 

Erin Frazier-Maskiell, owner of Alive Holistic Counseling, said about 60% of their clients opt for virtual therapy rather than in-person.  

Alive has locations in Eugene, Roseburg and an office in Vancouver, Washington. They also offer care to residents in Idaho. Other than in-person and virtual, Alive offers art and equine (horse) therapy along with other holistic treatments. Additionally, Alive has a counseling clinic for student therapists to receive education and practice hours. 

“I think therapy is really important, it’s helping with a lot,” University of Oregon senior Josie Cunningham said. “It is expensive though and I really wish it was more accessible to everyone. It sucks that it is so difficult to get seen by a therapist.”

Alive’s virtual therapy program began after COVID-19. “That was a gift of the pandemic, we had to be creative and open up access,” Frazier-Maskiell said. The world partially shutting down was not the only reason for virtual therapy. Clients who utilize it may have children they cannot find temporary care for, have limited mobility, do not drive or just may not feel like going to in-person therapy. 

The group also has a nonprofit called “Share the Chair.” This organization provides scholarships to people of color who are graduate students in the field of mental health. “When we increase these numbers as clinicians, we increase clients because they will feel represented in health and those experiences that are specific to them,” Frazier-Maskiell said. 

Alive is taking donations from the community and other therapists to provide scholarships for school as well as help pay for licensing and testing fees

In order for a therapist to become licensed in Oregon they must pay $175 for an application, $125 for the initial license and $165 annually to renew their status as an active therapist. 

The state of Oregon helps its residents access therapy by including mental health services in the Oregon Health Plan. Additionally, Alive has a referral list for therapists in the community who provide service for free or a low cost. 

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Flu season is here and it does not only affect humans

Eugene Cascades Raptor Center has been caring for a variety of bird species since 1990. Just 15 minutes south from the University of Oregon campus, the center is a non-profit organization that offers tours, education and has a hospital to help treat sick or injured raptors.

The center has 30 birds that they call “educational ambassadors.” These birds will remain at the center for the rest of their lives. 

“There are a few different ways these birds come to us to be educational ambassadors,” volunteer Sofia Bajenaru said. “Some of the birds were injured… something about them that means they are unreleasable, another way a bird may be unreleasable is if they have imprinted on humans.” 

If a bird imprints on a human, it becomes dangerous for both the bird and for people because the bird becomes too comfortable around humans. Oftentimes, this means the bird cannot hunt or take care of themselves. Bird imprinting typically occurs from “well-meaning but misguided choices to try and rehabilitate the birds themselves,” Bajenaru said

As humans begin to get vaccines to combat the flu, birds soar into a flu season of their very own. 

“Avian influenza is kinda like human influenza where it changes from season to season,” Jennifer Appleby Chu, the visitor services coordinator for the center, said. One of the main differences between human and bird flu is that avian flu is fatal for birds and, for the time being, there is no vaccine. 

The illness follows migration patterns of birds that are commonly found near water, scientifically known as waterfowl. 

Celilo is a Bald Eagle, one of the raptors in care at the Cascades Raptor Center in Eugene, Ore. Celilo originally came into human care from the wild in 2002. Then came to the Cascades Raptor Center in 2010.
(Anna Liv Myklebust)

“Waterfowls are the biggest carriers of the virus because they are not always affected by it, they also congregate in huge numbers, travel long distances, they can contaminate large bodies of water with the virus,” Appleby Chu said. 

Some bird rehabilitation centers will not take waterfowl during the flu season because of the potential risk.  

“We think about its effects on our facility; what are the ways this could get tracked in here and how do we prevent that from happening,” Appleby Chu said. 

The facility only lets essential staff inside the hospital building. Each staff member that enters must soak their shoes in water and disinfectant footbaths. A lot of staff, including Appleby Chu, have shoes that are only worn at work.  

The symptoms of the flu vary for every bird but they can include discoloration, drooping wings and sudden death. 

“It is a virus that is constantly evolving and mutating just like any other organism, this year we are seeing it affect animals it wasn’t before, it has been found present in domestic cattle and occasionally canines,” Appleby Chu said.

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Christmas Tree Season

A Christmas tree typically takes seven to 10 years to reach full growth, however, the tree will not make it to its holiday home without help. Oregon is the top producing state in the country for Christmas trees, and Northern Lights Christmas Tree Farm is one of the top producers for Lane County according to Bob Schutte, co-owner of Northern Lights. 

Located 20 minutes southeast of the University of Oregon, Northern Lights has 162 acres of land with about 80 dedicated to growing four different types of Christmas trees. “Christmas trees are just like people. They come in all different sizes and shapes,” Schutte said. Bob and his wife Lynn opened the farm together 40 years ago. 

Before the farm opened, the Schuttes were looking for a few acres of land to start their new lives as retirees. Bob’s brother gave him a call when the 162 acre lot next to his home went up for sale, and they ended up with the land and a new career path. 

Bob’s typical day has him tending to the trees or building a new fence so their cows won’t run off.  “Cows and Christmas trees do not mix,” Schutte said. 

“We’ve been doing it long enough that you know, our setup has been working good for us. It gets fine tuned every year,” Schutte said. 

“There’s a lot of skills that go into figuring out what makes a Christmas tree grow. ‘Why doesn’t this field grow so good? Why does this field of trees die at three years of age? Because they planted in the low area where we had a lot of ground.’ Okay, wow, learn not to do that again,” he said. 

To best price his trees, Schutte will look at the operating costs from the last year and take into account how inflation may affect the upcoming year. “This season, on a Christmas tree farm, has to carry us all the way to the next season. So, if the price of tractor parts goes up all of a sudden in March, man, that hits me hard,” Schutte said. 

He has noticed their operating costs rise every year. “That’s in part because of me,” he said, “as I get older and older, and I want to do less and less right. So, you know, I’ll hire another hand, yeah, help with feeding the cows or doing whatever needs to be done.” 

In 2023 the price for a Christmas tree increased by 10-15%. According to the American Christmas Tree Association, prices have inflated by another 10% this year. Last year, Northern Lights sold Nordman and Noble trees at $55 for their shortest tree and $240 for their tallest. This year, those varieties of tree will run the customer $58 and $270 respectively.

To diversify their income throughout the year, Northern Lights hosts summer weddings next to their home that neighbors the Willamette River. Additionally, a pumpkin patch grows on a few of the acres where customers can pick during October. Pumpkins were sold for 59 cents a pound. They also sell grass fed beef, jerky and sausages. 

Along with the “u-cut” and pre-cut tree sections, there are a coffee, donut and corn and hot dog carts. The farm also offers free hayrides, a gift shop and a tent to buy wreaths. 

“It’s so cute and festive,” first time Northern Lights Customer Grace Clark said while contemplating purchasing a noble fir. 

Northern Lights will be selling their trees until 5 p.m. on Christmas Eve.

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Shop small shop local, The Holiday Market is back

Ever since the Eugene Saturday Market started in 1970, it has brought together artists and lovers of handcrafted art. Community members flock to 8th and Oak streets, rain or shine, most Saturdays of the year. 

But when the weather becomes unruly and holiday season approaches, the Saturday Market moves inside to the Lane County Fairgrounds where it becomes the Holiday Market. 

“The Holiday Market is the most festive way to experience the holidays,” Renee Thompson the marketing manager said, “We have thousands of various handmade gifts to choose from, live entertainment and an international food court.”  

Approximately 500 artisans are signed up to sell at this year’s Holiday Market. Three hundred of those vendors sell on any particular day. The market has 15 days of operation, which is more than last year due to this year’s leap. Not every vendor sells every selling day, as there are seven selling weekends and thus seven sign-up blocks. 

The Vendors apply to sell at the Holiday Market during the summer, even long time sellers must apply before signing up for selling blocks. 

“We do recommend that people try and do all seven selling blocks because that makes it so that customers can come and find you, and then you can really work toward having that booth space be your booth space,” Thompson said. 

Jenni Babcock of Jenni B Jeweled sells her earrings, necklaces and bracelets at both the Saturday and Holiday markets. 

“I work my buns off for the Holiday Market,” Babcock said, “A lot of times before the market I am up until 2 or 3 a.m. working on getting things done, I think that is pretty true for a lot of vendors.”

Her favorite piece to make is her heart-shaped necklaces. Babcock purchases vintage fabric from thrift shops and estate sales, cuts the fabric into a heart, then inserts it into a shaped metal pendant, which she also has made, and lastly attaches the completed pendant to a metal beaded chain. 

Other than shopping, the Holiday Market spreads holiday cheer by having dress-up days during certain dates. “People love to have them every year…We’re starting off this Saturday with holidays and the tropics, and so a lot of people will bring their favorite Hawaiian shirt and stuff like that,” Thompson said. 

The market also hosts a game, the elf game. The objective of the elf game is simple: find as many elves as possible. The number of elves varies and community members will purchase (or make) dress up elves to bring for the game. The elves are then hidden around the market. 

Guests who care to play are given a card with rhymes and riddles to guide them to find the elves.  

“If you reach a certain threshold, you can get a prize, and then if you find even more, you can be entered in for a drawing,” Thompson said. The elf game is revving to go, but only for the first two weekends of the market. 

The first weekend of the Holiday Market was Nov. 16 and 17. “It’s very much about highlighting what is in the community, so you never really know what is going to happen,” Thompson said.

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The Walk to Find New Coffee Shops

“Walk, Sip, Win” was the slogan for the Lane Council of Governments Coffee Shop Hop, which is exactly what Lane community members did during the month of October. 

The Hop is part of LCOG’s Walktober, a city-wide campaign encouraging the community to get out there and go for a walk. During October, LCOG hosted a bird, thrift shop and tree walk. Also offered were self-guided walks around Eugene posted to the Walktober website. 

The Coffee Shop Hop event partnered with 18 different coffee shops and one tea house. Every location offered a discount to those participating. Every business was listed on a printed passport that included a spot for a sticker next to each shop. If the passport holder received every sticker they could enter themselves into a raffle. There were five raffle winners, each winning a $25 gift card to the coffee shop of their choosing paid for by transportation services. The raffle closed on Nov. 11.

Passports were available to pick up the coffee shops involved. LCOG Assistant Transportation Planner Delaney Thompson said that“We [LCOG] printed 3,000 [passports] and distributed basically all of them.”

The passports are bright red with a cover of two blue birds, on a stroll, holding coffee mugs. 

Artist Erick Wonderly designed this year’s Coffee Shop Hop artwork. Wonderly also recently painted a mural at Portal Tea Company, the Hop’s only non-coffee shop.

PTC is located in the heart of downtown, next to Kesey Square, and was new to the Hop this year.

Daphne Patrick, a tea tender for PTC, said that recently the community’s favorite drinks are “the chocolate matte, vanilla rose and pumpkin spice, people really love them.” 

PTC offered a 15% off discount for those participating in the Hop. “We get a lot more business when the college students come back around, but I definitely saw people utilizing it [the discount],” Patrick said. 

Nestled in the Fifth Street Market shopping center, Magpies Coffee Shop offered a discount of 10% for those participating in the Hop. Magpies also participated in the event last year.

“I think it was fun,” Claire Larson, a barista at Magpies, said. “They [community members] got to try our coffee for the first time which in turn made them want to come back.” Larson said their most popular drink is their caramel latte, one of the syrup flavors that is made in-house. 

Dark Pine also participated in the event last year. “I think it’s a pretty good program,” Tanner Little, the owner of Dark Pine, said. “I’m always looking for opportunities to get new faces to try us out and that is what the Coffee Shop Hop does for not just me but every coffee shop that participates.” The shop offered a discount of $1.

Every shop that participated last year decided to partake again.

“It was nice to work with the business owners again because they were so kind and really jazzed,” Thompson said. 

Additionally, three new shops joined the Hop: Havana Cafe, PTC and Park Street Cafe. 

Thompson and their team plan to get started on planning the 2025 Coffee Shop Hop after May is Bike Month, another month-long campaign put on by transportation services, concluding in early June. “I’m just really hoping it will continue to grow,” Thompson said.

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Lane County Courthouse remains difficult to access for some

Anywhere between four and 600 people visit the Lane County Courthouse daily. Located in the heart of downtown Eugene, the building was constructed in 1959 and since then, has undergone minimal renovations.

Lane County is responsible for maintaining the building and utilities. The most recent upgrade was a chair lift installed six months ago to help jurors in wheelchairs get from the jury assembly room in the basement, to the security entrance on the first floor of the courthouse.

Despite this upgrade, the building remains difficult to access for some with disabilities.

“If you had a catalog of [county owned] buildings that listed best to worst maintained, I think this side of the building [the courthouse] would pretty much be at the bottom of the list,” Trial Court Administrator Liz Rambo said.

The courthouse was built on a split level, which is typical of many buildings. However, because of the way the security entrance must be set up, access to the courtrooms begins on the second level. Those who are unable to use the stairs may use an elevator that moves patrons up and down six feet and two inches.

The elevator was installed through state funds from a lottery. “It was specifically earmarked, if I remember correctly, for court security projects,” Rambo said. However, the county was able to use the money for the elevator rather than increasing security measures that were already solidly in place. Courthouse employees heard concerns from disability advocacy groups that the location of the courthouse was inaccessible.

In response, in May 2019, the Eugene community voted on a bond measure that would allow the county to build a new courthouse. “The proposed new location was the parking lot right next door,” Rambo said.

The central location of the courthouse in downtown Eugene would have remained. Daphne Patrick, a University of Oregon student, said she likes
the current location of the courthouse because of its centrality.

“I think being close to downtown is nice, there is a lot of parking in the area,” said Patrick “It is in a highly populated area so I think it is pretty alright.”

The bond failed, garnering only 41% of the vote.

In 2020, civil employees decided to pause the conversation of building a new court house so the community’s energy could be focused on dealing with COVID-19.

Courthouse employees worked every day, in-person, during the COVID-19 pandemic. “[We] did a lot of physical distancing and put jurors in one room and watchers in another,” Rambo said.

A potential courthouse renovation could access some funds from the federal American Recovery Plan Act, which set aside money for essential workers, utilities and infrastructure. Under ARPA, the Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Funds program authorized $350 billion to be spent by state, territorial, local and Tribal governments with the goal of bettering the community.

Oregon has received a total of $6.4 billion from ARPA. Of that money, Lane County received approximately $124 million to go toward county investments.

“If my dreams were answered I would love a building that would welcome people,” Rambo said. “For people to feel like it’s their building, where they go to get justice services, right now, it’s not really feeling like it.”

Rambo said that employees of the Lane County Courthouse do what they can to make the facility more accessible. They provide headsets and built a ramp in a courtroom for a judge who used a wheelchair.

“Everything is expensive, we have done everything that can be easily done, all the rest of it feels hard.” Rambo said.

 

 

 

[Editors Note: This article corrects the number of courthouse visitors to four to 600 visitors per day. The print issue incorrectly states these numbers as 400 to 600 visitors per day.]

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What Ride-sharing is like in Eugene

Rodrigo Nieto started driving for Lyft to save for a down payment on a home, “Originally, I was just going to work for a little bit, maybe a summer, but I ended up liking it,” Nieto said.

Nieto said although he enjoys working for Lyft because he appreciates the flexibility, the money is not great. “I only do it really part-time,” Nieto said. 

Lyft has around 2 million employees spanning over American states and Canadian provinces. 

Logan Green, Lyft’s original CEO, often found himself desperate for a ride from Santa Barbara to Los Angeles. He frequented Greyhound buses. The commute was for Green to visit his girlfriend. Zimride, the first name for Lyft, was created in 2007 for students to ride share to and from college campuses.

The hourly pay for a Lyft driver in Eugene is $14 an hour. According to Ziprecruiter.com, the highest hourly salary is $19.56 and the lowest is $5.31. Nationally, Lyft drivers make an average of $16 an hour. 

Lyft drivers are paid through a company-provided rate card. Their payout is calculated by base fare of a ride, distance and time. Drivers keep the entirety of their tips. 

The general requirements to be a Lyft driver are being over the age of 25, acquiring a background check, uploading car insurance and having a four-door vehicle. 

To be eligible to drive for Lyft in Eugene there are specifications that other cities do not require; The driver is required to have a car that is from 2009 or newer, have a first aid kit, use a phone mount, undergo an annual vehicle inspection and have a driver certification card. 

Gary Schuster has been driving in Eugene for three and a half years. Generally, he said he enjoys his job. “I make as much money doing this as I would at another job and this, I have no boss,” said Schuster, “If I take a day off I don’t have to ask.” 

Schuster started working for Lyft because of finances. He had a different job prior to driving but he found that he only was able to make ends meet when he worked overtime. “They always wanted to cut overtime to save money so I started doing this [Lyft] as a second job and I just liked it better,” Schuester said. 

During his time as a driver, Schuster said typically, people are either nice or quiet, including UO students. “Ninety nine percent of the time they are either quiet on their phones or they are friendly and talkative,” Gary said. 

For the past few years, the UO had a discount set up with the Lyft app to offer students cheaper rides after the sun sets. As of June 30, they have canceled the program. According to the UO transportation website, they hope to partner with a different rideshare company in the next few months to restart the program. 

 

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Family weekend, businesses boom

The University of Oregon’s Fall Family Weekend begins on Oct. 25. According to UO’s website, “Fall Family Weekend is an opportunity for you to reconnect with your student and experience Duck life.”

Many parents and family members expected to fly into Eugene to see their loved ones in college or attend the Ducks football game. Hotels around the Eugene area are preparing for the influx of visitors.

Downtown Eugene’s two 4-star hotels, The Graduate and The Gordon, sold out months prior to Family Weekend.

Out of the 275 rooms in The Graduate, each one was booked by June.

The Graduate Hotel also includes a bar and coffee shop in its lobby, called Poindexter. Employees of the coffee shop expect to be and remain busy throughout the entirety of Family Weekend.

“We make a bunch of extra Jello shots, we cut extra bagels, roll extra silverware, we are just preparing for not being able to do that during the weekend,” Food and Beverage Supervisor Tammi Livesey said.

“We communicate with the parents in a pre-email,” Gordon General Manager Kathryn Allen said, “the town is super excited to have them but we want to make sure they understand that the town is super busy.”

Allen said the hotel sold out for parent’s weekend in June. She attributes how quickly rooms were booked to the Ducks football game against University of Illinois on Saturday, Oct. 26, in addition to Family Weekend.

The prices for Family Weekend were set a year in advance and did not change, regardless of how early or late the room was booked. The price for a deluxe king room during a typical weekend is around $250. Once every room at the Gordon sells out, pricing is no longer available to view on the booking website. Allen declined to share the pricing of the rooms for the weekend of Oct. 25.

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