Other Newspapers' Opinions: An end of an era
Friday, November 21, 2008 11:12 AM PST
A moment of silence, please, to mourn the passing of the Oregon Fryer Commission. After it’s gone, who’s going to sponsor the chicken dance at the Oaks Park Oktoberfest?
Who’s going to put out those lip-smacking recipes for curried Oregon chicken thighs?
Who’s going to underwrite the next Big Cluck Grill-Off at the Oregon State Fair?
Not the Oregon Fryer Commission. After 51 years of promoting Oregon-grown frying chickens, the commission has decided to disband by June 30.
This is sad news for Oregonians who can remember when you could hardly turn on the TV without seeing ads promoting happy, healthy chickens lovingly readied for the frying pan on enlightened Oregon farms. Remember the dancing chickens in the Lynden ads? Or those sorry-looking imported Arkansas chickens in the Fircrest ads?
But times have changed in the chicken world. Lynden Farms of Portland and Fircrest Farms of Creswell were among several Oregon producers that got bought up by California giant Foster Farms, which contracts today for 90 percent of Oregon’s fryer production.
Foster does its own advertising, so there isn’t much left for the Oregon Fryer Commission to do. Legislative action to disband it will be little more than a formality in January.
Now the commissioners will have to figure out what to do with the $67,000 they expect to be left after they fly the coop.
They’re considering returning it to growers, giving it to Oregon State University’s poultry program or donating it to a worthy program like Future Farmers of America.
Those are all fine ideas, but here’s one more for consideration: Bring back the Big Cluck Grill-Off once more at the state fair, just for old times’ sake.
A half-century of chicken promotion shouldn’t end with just a peep.
— The Oregonian
