Fliers tout real hearing on proposed clinic, but sender is a mystery

By Michelle Dupler, Herald staff writer

PASCO -- A number of households in west Pasco received a yellow flier in the mail over the last few days telling them the city's planning commission would have a hearing on a proposed Planned Parenthood facility Thursday.

The fliers bear the city's emblem and the name and signature of David McDonald, the city's planner.

But they weren't sent by the city, and no one in city government knows who did.

"We did not mail that out to look like that," McDonald said. "They essentially took the notification the city is required to mail and redid it a little."

The senders redid the flier by adding two phrases on the back side -- the side people would unfold and view first when opening their mail.

One sentence informs the recipient there's a permit hearing at City Hall on June 18. The other reads, "Planned Parenthood is the nation's largest provider of abortions."

At issue is a proposal to bring a Planned Parenthood of Central Washington clinic to West Court Street near Mark Twain Elementary School. Opponents have said they're worried about the location because of the protests and even the possibility of violence.

The health clinic would be at 3901 W. Court St., in a building previously used as a Century 21 office that's about 60 to 80 feet south of the school's playfield.

The clinic would provide reproductive health care services such as annual exams, cancer screenings, testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infections, access to birth control and vasectomies. Abortions would not be performed there.

"Overwhelmingly in all of the communities we're working in, we're about education and prevention," said spokeswoman Gina Popovic. "The real crisis here is the health care shortage nationally. There is a health care shortage in Pasco. There is a need for women to have access to birth control, cancer screenings and infection checks. These people are creating a barrier to accessing health care."

In 2006, the birth rate for 15- to 17-year-old girls in Franklin County was nearly 53 per 1,000, above the statewide average of about 15 per 1,000, the Benton-Franklin Health District reported.

In 2007, Franklin County had the state's second-highest HIV rate and third-highest chlamydia rate -- about 40 percent higher than the state average, according to a state health report. Benton County's chlamydia rate was nearly 10 percent below the state average.

Health officials at the time attributed Franklin County's high rates to a general lack of youth access to information and services and the county's larger proportion of high-risk groups such as Hispanics, 15- to 24-year-olds and people with low incomes.

The proposal is getting a public hearing at 7 p.m. Thursday because Planned Parenthood has applied for a special permit to operate the clinic in an area zoned for offices and retail businesses.

No one knows who mass-mailed the fliers to households in west Pasco. There's no return address, just a bulk mail permit number that Pasco City Manager Gary Crutchfield speculated probably belongs to a printing company.

So even if city officials could trace the bulk mail permit -- and the owners of those permits aren't a matter of public record -- that wouldn't tell them who was sending fliers under the guise of the city's Community Development Department.

Ernie Swanson, spokesman for the U.S. Postal Service in Seattle, said misrepresenting who sent a flier probably isn't criminal if the senders aren't trying to defraud people of money, or are using the city's emblem to promote their own event.

"It may not be entirely ethical, but I doubt it's anything that would be prosecuted because they're trying to bring attention to a meeting held by the city," Swanson said.

Crutchfield said the flier likely would generate public interest in Thursday's hearing, which the city would encourage anyway. The city already had sent notices to all property owners within 300 feet of the proposed clinic.

"That's what it's all about -- public input," he said.

But Popovic took a different view.

"I think whoever is responsible should be apologizing to the community of Pasco for these grossly misleading mailers," she said. "It's dishonest at best."

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Wednesday, Jun. 17, 2009

Fliers tout real hearing on proposed clinic, but sender is a mystery

By Michelle Dupler, Herald staff writer