The Hillsboro Herald was founded to bring the voice of our greater Hillsboro Community forward and to have those voices heard. The Hillsboro Argus was the watchdog, gatekeeper, provider of truth and real stories for 100 years. When it disappeared (killed by the Oregonian after purchase), the voices of the Tualatin Valley and Hillsboro did not die; they were merely silenced in the winds. The Herald has crossed over 650 authentic and original stories in the past 4 years. We have now crossed over 4 million readers. The Mantra from Hillsboro City Hall and Washington County is “It is just a blog…look away..pay no heed.” To that, we smile and laugh, knowing the amount of activity and community actions we have helped to happen- conversations that needed to happen. I have personally paid for my writing and opinions, mainly by those who have pirated our Valley of its resources and riches.
Today, we feature one of those voices- a citizen by the name of Trisha Ford decided to sound off afger reading our story last week:
https://hillsboroherald.com/hillsboro-closes-major-roads-for-private-developers-as-industrial-growth-explodes/
Here is Trisha’s Voice which we share with you all in our continuing series, Voices of The People. We hope more of you will write us and share your voices- whatever is on your mind- this is your forum too! Send submissions to hillsboroherald@gmail.com
Good morning Mr. Knudsen,
I opened Google this morning to your very informative and well written as always, article on “Hillsboro closes major road”I’ve been following this story for several years as I didn’t like how the city started poaching the VanderZanden farm which I found court records going all the way back to 2010. The family fought incredibly hard to keep their land to just have Hillsboro rezone it with the help of our STATE lawmakers so in the end it was sold. The family didn’t care about money- they just wanted to be left alone to farm their land. The history lost shows me that once again our city officials/planning committee simply don’t care about the residents but the all mighty dollar. To see what is becoming of the VanderZaden farm breaks my heart considering the history of that land. Our history. Hillsboro’s history. My family and I moved here 21 years ago. We raised our children here. We love Hillsboro but what I’ve found when dealing with our city council is they don’t listen to the people. I’ve dealt with our city council and each time it’s always on deaf ears. They make up their minds well before they “have to” listen to the public. We elect these people to protect our land, our homes and they aren’t doing that.
16 data centers and counting while our electricity has gone up (I added up all the increases since 2020) 70%. Our water bills keep increasing. The city and the utilities are hiding the fact that this is due to our 16 data centers. When I went and researched what the data centers are being charged by PGE they are being changed 10 cents KW whereas residents are being charge 19 cents a KW. Our property taxes keep going up while commercial property gets tax breaks. Data centers use an incredible amount of water (and electricity). We have ground water from the lake beneath the city that I’m sure they are hoping to utilize but that water feeds our very tall heritage trees that we are already seeing die around town.
With the new data centers on Jackson, does the city even care that these data centers will destroy our wetlands, displace our wildlife, kill entire ecosystems? Or are they so in bed with investors that they just don’t care? No one living here wants any of this. The city doesn’t consider the residents who fund this city. The city is destroying families. Making it harder to live here with rising costs of utilities and property taxes due to their inconsiderate land purchases turned industrial.
I so appreciate your voice. Your articles. You give us as residents a voice. When our city won’t listen to us.
Trisha Ford
Yes, history. If you look back at history, you will see nothing stays the same. Everything changes. Just like now in Hillsboro. There is a reason you can never go home, because that place is now different, no longer the same place and people you remember. You mention the “almighty dollar”. Yeah, dollars do come in handy, if you had more of them (dollars) you would not have to complain about the the price of everything…