PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE: This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus use an image from my favorite sport, golf. Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all of my professional positions, including as a Congressional press secretary in Washington, D.C., an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and a private sector lobbyist. This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.

I cannot fathom how the Oregon School Activities Association (OSAA) could put high school students lives at risk.

How?

By mandating that high school student athletes from Bend and Salem must play in the same league.

Stupid? Yes.

But the worst part of the decision is that students, who ride on often-old school buses, have to cross dangerous mountain passes, either West to the Salem area or East to the Bend area.

The unfortunate reality is that this stupid decision will only be overturned in response to an accident – and I hope no one is killed in such an accident over tough roads in the winter.

For context, I live in Salem and my kids played sports for South Salem High School. If the OSAA decision had been in effect during my kids’ athletic tenures, I would have tried to prevent them from playing.

Safety matters. For your kids and everyone’s kids!

For the OSAA, no!

What mattered for the OSAA was preserving competition. Safety be damned.

All of this came flooding back yesterday as I read an account on the Oregon Public Broadcasting website. While it was solid human-interest story, it gave short shrift to the safety issue.

In a very long story, all it said was this:

“Many parents and school officials argued trips over the pass in big buses were too dangerous. That argument was later given fuel when a bus carrying South Salem and Sprague cross-country runners suffered a mechanical failure hear Sisters. Runners and coaches spent three hours waiting for another bus — and that was in August. Winter snow and ice could make for a different story.”

Earlier this year, the Salem-Keizer School District, armed with parent concern, filed an administrative appeal of the OSAA decision. Nothing happened. No apparent recognition or consideration of the safety issue.

Michael Gillette, a former justice on the Oregon Supreme Court, heard the appeal, eventually deciding that “discretion, when it comes to reclassifying athletic leagues, ultimately rests with OSAA as an independent body.”

Then, he turned down the appeal.

I have no idea what prompted Gillette to rule as he did, but the short shrift he gave to safety galled many concerned about the decision. Among them, me.

In his opinion, Gillette found it telling that Salem-Keizer wouldn’t consider canceling school sports even with OSAA’s decision.

“High school athletics are, in Oregon as in most of the rest of the country, as much a part of American life as breathing,” he wrote. “… If competition is that valuable, then it needs to be available everywhere—in cities and towns, in large schools and small.

“And, if it is to exist everywhere, it needs an umbrella organization that is dedicated to governing it. OSAA’s mission is to try to achieve that goal, however thankless the effort may be.”

So, pursuing athletic completion at all costs trumps safety.

I say let Salem area schools play “lesser schools.” Same for the Bend.  Preserve safety.

Let me provide one more example of the safety issue. I have two cars, one that accepts chains and one that doesn’t. The owner of the store where I buy tires told me straight out: If the weather over the pass is bad enough to require chains, don’t go!

I wish Salem and Bend schools had that option. Now, in the old buses, the only option is to risk life and limb by heading East or West.