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Tackling community issues. Celebrating local voices.
First came an electric snap, then the slow crackle of something burning. Doors opened, curtains parted. Outside, neighbors saw thick branches ablaze, draped around power lines.
That happened in January 2024. People in a pocket of Eugene’s South University neighborhood watched as the snow came down, slowly dousing the flames as firefighters responded.
Kim Donahey and others who live on her street have watched these fires again and again for nearly 12 years. Typically, the power line-driven fires have occurred in winter, when moisture makes tree limbs heavy and close enough to high-voltage lines to spark…