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SATURDAY, MAY 24, 2014
Serving Oregon’s South Coast Since 1878
SPECIAL VIDEO REPORT: IMPLANTED
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Three SCCF directors quit board Amended bylaws approved, new directors appointed ■
BY CHELSEA DAVIS The World
Photos by Alysha Beck, The World
Cally Smith’s mother, Cammy, shows where Cally’s processor attaches to a cochlear implant under her skin. Cally, 9, was born with bilateral hearing loss and had surgery for a cochlear implant at 14 months old. Her device works by picking up sound and transmitting it to a series of electrodes that stimulate the hearing nerve in her inner ear.
Technology gives sisters the chance to hear BY CHELSEA DAVIS The World
COOS BAY — The decision to put a child through surgery is hard enough, but when the procedure is to place a cochlear implant in a deaf child, many in the deaf community see that as a threat to deaf culture. Cammy and Josh Smith lead a relatively normal life raising seven children in Coos Bay — but two of their daughters were born with bilateral hearing loss. Jaycee is an eighth-grader at Marshfield High, and Cally is homeschooled in third grade. Both have cochlear implants. Cammy and Josh didn’t know Jaycee was deaf until she was 5 months old. One day when baby Jaycee was crying in her crib, Cammy slid in the room so Jaycee couldn’t see her and stood behind the crib. “Jaycee. Jaycee, I’m right here,” Cammy called out. Jaycee didn’t react. Doctors confirmed what they knew, that she was deaf, and discussed cochlear implants. The implants are devices surgically placed under the skin that use electric, instead of acoustic, stimulation to represent sound and speech. “She was perfect how she was,” Josh said. “I wasn’t against (cochlear implants), but I was concerned by the risks.” When Jaycee was 3, the family moved to Coos Bay and put her in the South Coast Education Service District’s preschool program, where she worked on sign language and speech. Deafness is not a “life or death” situation, Cammy pointed out, though she did support the implant. Josh was hesitant, but then he thought, what if Jaycee couldn’t hear a car coming? That idea brought him on board. “But that’s hard to explain to a 5-year-old,” he said. “We asked her: Do you want to hear?” She did. “It’s a heated subject in the deaf community,” said Dr. Todd Landsberg, South Coast ESD audiologist. “It’s a real controversy ... because they see professionals as possibly trying to ‘fix’ their culture.” With the implants, Jaycee and Cally don’t spend much time with other deaf people. “A lot of people think you have to be one or the other: hearing or deaf,” Josh said. “They say you can’t be both. It’s ridiculous.” Landsberg has handled three cochlear implant cases in Coos and Curry counties during his three years with the ESD. SEE IMPLANTED | A8
Sisters Jaycee and Cally Smith were born with bilateral hearing loss and had surgery for cochlear implants at ages 5 and 1. While the Smith family decided to get cochlear implants for their daughters, many in the deaf community deeply oppose changing their culture with technology. Watch the video at: theworldlink.com/special
SPECIAL VIDEO REPORT: IMPLANTED
COOS BAY — The initial directors of the South Coast Community Foundation adopted the new bylaws — and resigned immediately after. On Friday, the original three people who were called upon to build and direct the formation of SCCF — Bill Lansing, John Whitty and Joanne Verger — decided to hand over the organization to a new board and leave. “...the directors felt that they had done all things necessary to allow the foundation to move forward,” the three wrote in a news release. They approved the amended SCCF bylaws proposed by the Community Enhancement Plan work group, recognized the foundation’s four Inside members and appointed Port picks SCCF reprefour new directors, all sentative; cities to effective Monday. appoint members in Jordan Cove Energy coming weeks. Page A2 Project’s application for a rural long-term enterprise zone property tax exemption must be decided by the four Bay Area Enterprise Zone Coos County, the Oregon sponsors: International Port of Coos Bay, and the cities of Coos Bay and North Bend. In lieu of property taxes, the agreement would require Jordan Cove to pay a community service fee every year. Those fees would be funneled through a proposed Community Enhancement Plan, currently being hashed out by a work group of local officials from the four enterprise zone sponsors. SEE SCCF | A8
Coos Bay to leave cross atop veterans memorial ■
Wisconsin group mulls lawsuit BY THOMAS MORIARTY The World
Center: Sisters Jaycee Smith, 14, and Cally, 9, sign the American Sign Language alphabet. Both girls were born with bilateral hearing loss and had surgery for cochlear implants, which let them hear sound. Bottom: Jaycee Smith practices piano with Tammy Aley during a lesson at the Smith home.
COOS BAY — A controversial memorial cross in Coos Bay’s Mingus Park will remain where it is for the foreseeable future. Mayor Chrystal Shoji confirmed Friday that the Mingus Park Vietnam War Memorial and its cross will remain where they are, and that the city plans to deal with any legal challenges as they come down the road. “The council is taking no action on the veterans memorial in Mingus Park,” Shoji said Friday. “That’s all we have to say.” The mayor’s statement comes after a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling affirming the constitutionality of legislative prayer. The city had previously cited the then-pending ruling in delaying its decision on what to do with the memorial’s controversial cross, whose removal has been demanded by the Freedom From Religion Foundation and the American Civil Liberties Union. After a heated public meeting in March 2013, the city retained the services of the Texas-based Liberty Institute to conduct a legal assessment of the cross. The results of the assessment, which were discussed by the council in executive session, haven’t been publicly released.
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