When British officials announced in August that they had foiled a plot to bomb U.S. bound airlines with liquid explosives, law enforcement and emergency management agencies around the country kicked into high gear when the federal government raised its threat level.
Airport security was stepped up and major metropolitan areas like New York City and Los Angeles increased patrols, and smaller cities like Eugene and institutions like the University also have contingency plans for
terrorist attacks.
In the years since Sept. 11, 2001, Eugene has taken unprecedented steps to prevent similar tragedies and to manage them in the event that they do occur. Were an attack to take place in Eugene – or on campus – it would be one or two days before the federal government moved in and commandeered the scene and in the intervening time the city would be responsible for managing the aftermath by itself.
Department of Public Safety Director Thomas Hicks said while University grounds have not yet fallen victim to a terrorist attack, DPS officers not only undergo regular training exercises, but have tightened campus security and expanded the web of communication between agencies. Now DPS representatives attend meetings every other week with other agencies and members of the intelligence community to share information.
At large events, such as games at Autzen Stadium and McArthur Court, “there is certainly a risk,” Hicks said.
Nevertheless, Hicks said it is necessary to remain grounded, recognizing that Eugene is not as dramatic a target for terrorists as are most major cities or national monuments.
“We’re not New York, we’re not even Seattle,” Hicks said. “We want to make sure we stay within the level of reality.”
While the City of Eugene Emergency Program Manager Chuck Solin agrees with Hicks that the city and the University may be low on international terrorists radar, he said complacency could leave sites vulnerable to attack.
“Quite frankly, we’ve had acts of terrorism in Eugene,” he said, referring to bombings of a USDA Forest Service station, an EPD station and a truck dealership.
Solin said since Sept. 11 a new unity has arisen between fire, police, hospitals, public transportation and utilities. This expanded communication has made contingency plans for the entire city to respond to a terrorist bombing while keeping the city running smoothly in unaffected areas.
In addition to tightening the network, especially between the police and fire departments, the city has “put a lot more police officers through terrorist training,” Solin said.
The city has also formed a Hazardous Environment and Tactics team (HEAT), Solin said, which is a SWAT team trained to perform under hazardous conditions.
He said the HEAT team, as well as other emergency response units, performed a training exercise on campus two years ago, supposing a science building exploded sending toxic chemicals into the surrounding area. HEAT team members and EPD and DPS officers sealed off Franklin Boulevard and simulated a terrorist attack response while wearing hazardous material protective suits.
Exercises like these are necessary, EPD Capt. Chuck Tilby said, because Eugene is home to terrorist targets such as oil and natural gas distribution systems, an airport, railways and
a research university.
He said because of the security measures already in-place within major cities, terrorists are shifting their focus to smaller targets, such as Eugene. International terrorists tried to establish a base in eastern Oregon and that local law enforcement agencies focus a great deal of attention on far right- and left-wing activist groups, he said. In particular he mentioned the Animal Liberation Front.
“One of the things that’s happened inside that movement is a growing propensity toward violence,” Tilby said. “There’s a militancy you wouldn’t have seen five years ago.”
Ann Berlin, who runs the ALF’s Web site (www.animalliberationfront.com), said that while ALF activists have never physically injured or killed a person, and have often been subject to violence, militancy may indeed be on the rise.
“I don’t think there is growing militancy if by that one refers to the percentage of animal rights advocates who believe harming people is an acceptable tactic,” Berlin wrote in an e-mail. “But the total population of animal rights advocates is growing, so the number of militants might grow. But it’s a difficult question.”
Berlin also said the ALF credo prohibits bombing and arson, but more militant wings of the animal rights movement do exist that may condone such acts.
But the most visible individuals involved in property destruction and sabotage in Eugene are not ALF activists, but the environmentalists who were convicted of involvement in several bombings throughout the Northwest under the banner of the Earth Liberation Front. ELF, which like ALF has no hierarchy and is more an ideology than a group, is a major focus for local law enforcement agencies. They have collectively been charged with or claimed responsibility for more than $100 million in damages since 1996.
University spokesman Phillip Weiler said the University has fallen victim to eco-sabotage in the past, but those acts destroyed property, not lives.
“I would contrast that with acts of political terrorism when collateral damage in terms of innocent victims is part of the equation,” he said.
Delineating between al-Qaida-style attacks and environmentalist bombings is common in Eugene. Protesters have come out in support of defendants in the recent
city court cases where ELF activists were convicted on charges stemming from a series of bombings in the late 1990s including the 1998 bombing of a ski resort in Vail, Colo. that caused more than $12 million in damages.
Jeff “Free” Luers, now serving a 22-year prison sentence for the political firebombing of three sport utility vehicles in Eugene, has become somewhat of a folk-hero in the city, being the subject of benefit concerts at the WOW Hall and garnering the Eugene Weekly’s “favorite activist” award.
Eugene Weekly described Luers as “an international icon for repression of dissent.”
But despite public support, ELF, ALF or for that matter any saboteurs, would pose serious danger to the community were they to bomb a research lab that housed potentially toxic chemicals, Tilby said, and the threat is real.
“Those things exist,” he said. “We’re not just sitting around making stuff up.”
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