State Sen. Bill Morrisette
District 6
?This is the ultimate teachable moment,? said Onno Husing, after hearing of the terrible Dec. 26 events in the Indian Ocean. He meant teachable in Oregon.
Husing directs the Oregon Coastal Zone Management Association. He also was the one-man staff of the Oregon Joint Interim Uniform Tsunami Response Planning Task Force.
In 2002-2003, I chaired that newly created task force because of my concern, and that of others, that a 9.0 scale earthquake would someday occur close to the Oregon Coast and trigger a giant tsunami wave over lower-elevation parts of the Coast. My interest was sparked by Wilbur Ternyik, longtime public official in Florence, who told me several years ago that the Coast ? Coast visitors in particular ? was ill-prepared for a tsunami.
During the spring of 2002, a group of policy makers, emergency management personnel and a state regional geologist met to discuss how best to protect an unbelieving public from a tsunami that could propel a 40-foot wave to the beach in 15 to 30 minutes. The geologist warned that such a wave had happened in Oregon before, in 1700, and that one today could kill 10,000 people if it hit crowded Seaside on a warm summer weekend.
Our task force ultimately submitted Senate Bill 650 during the last legislative session, It would have authorized the state Office of Emergency Management (which supported the bill) to establish tsunami warning information, evacuation plans and a uniform tsunami warning signal. The warning signal was already being planned and randomly implemented as we met.
What was not acceptable to some on the Coast is the part of the bill that read: ?Requires transient lodging facilities located within the tsunami inundation zones to post tsunami warning information and evacuation plans.? Objecting to highway signs designating tsunami danger areas, one coastal mayor said, ?It sounds like we are inviting people to come to my city to die.?
He was an exception ? many coastal officials recognized the problem and supported the bill. But a powerful legislative committee co-chairman killed it.
Now the events of Dec. 26 may persuade both legislators and a previously apathetic public that something terrifyingly similar could ? and, inevitably, someday will ? happen in Oregon. Husing is organizing a Tsunami Summit of experts and officials in February.
I will re-introduce SB 650 in the new legislative session that begins this month.
Senator Bill Morrisette, D-Springfield, represents central Lane and Linn counties. You may e-mail him at [email protected], or phone him at his home in Springfield, 541- 746-1378. Or you may contact his legislative assistant, Don Bishoff, at [email protected], or 541-343-0892.