County Commissioners’ Candidate Forum
Time: Noon to 1:15 pm
Venue: WOW Hall
291 West 8th
Eugene, Oregon
97401
- Join the Livestream
- YouTube
- Podcast
We will meet at the WOW Hall, 291 W 8th. Learn more: https://wowhall.org/about-us/. Walk, ride a bike or take the bus. You may park on the street or in the parking lot of FOOD for Lane County's Dining Room, across 8th from the WOW Hall. A freewill donation acknowledging the Dining Room's generosity may be made at the meeting.
Lunch will be available for $15.
Topic:
The board of Lane County commissioners is the core legislative and administrative body for county government. Commissioners set policy (including property tax rates), manage large budgets, oversee county operations like roads and public health, and control contracts and land use. Their power is limited by state law, which defines their authority. All candidates for contested positions were invited to participate in this program. Those who accepted the invitation represent East and West Lane County.
Candidates will provide opening and closing statements and answer questions from the moderator. These will include questions submitted by the live and online audiences, with the goal of providing a broad array of the interests expressed.
Note: All candidates were invited to participate. The candidates listed below have accepted the invitation. Ryan Ceniga advised he had a scheduling conflict. Jake Pelroy did not respond.
Plan to attend the Springfield City Club’s program featuring David Loveall and Sean VanGordon, candidates for the Springfield seat on the board of county commissioners. The program will occur on April 16.
Moderator Rebecca Hansen-White joined the KLCC News Department in November 2023. She started her journalism career in print, first as an editorial assistant at her hometown paper, The Dayton Chronicle in Southeast Washington. She spent the 2017 legislative session at the Washington Statehouse as a correspondent for The Columbia Basin Herald newspaper. She moved to The Spokesman-Review newspaper in Spokane in 2018, covering local government and criminal justice issues. She started her public radio career in 2021 as a reporter, and fill-in host for Spokane Public Radio, where she covered healthcare, rural communities and environmental issues. Hansen-White studied journalism and political science at Washington State University.
Speakers
Title: District 5 County Commissioner
Organization: Lane County
Website: https://www.heatherbuch.com/
Biography:
Biographical statement provided by the speaker and edited for length/proofreading
Heather Buch’s service has been dedicated to listening to rural communities and standing up for Lane County’s small towns. She championed the recently opened South Lane Clinic in Cottage Grove, supported the recovery of the McKenzie Valley after the 2020 Holiday Farm Fire, and promoted public-private partnerships that built more than 600 affordable housing units to help families and individuals get off the streets and connected to services. She voted to increase sheriff patrols, add new mobile crisis vans in metro and rural Lane County, and build a new stabilization center for those experiencing mental health and addiction crises. Before her election to the Lane County Commission in 2019, Buch spent 15 years of her professional career running a small real estate business that specialized in affordable housing.
Title: District 1 County Commissioner
Organization: Candidate
Website: https://thomasforwestlane.com/
Biography:
Biographical statement provided by the speaker and edited for length/proofreading
Thomas Hiura is a multimedia producer and small business owner, a nonprofit leader with the City Club of Eugene and WOW Hall, a trivia author and host, and a Human Rights Commissioner. Born in Japan and raised on River Road from age 2, Hiura has spent decades advocating for students in the north Eugene area. A Eugene Future First Citizen award recipient, he has a background in education and entrepreneurship, especially their connections with the arts, new media storytelling, and grassroots journalism. In 2022-23, he co-led the Springfield History Museum’s ILLUMINATION project, which focused on Asian-American oral histories from our community, and in 2024, he co-led the effort to complete much-needed roof repairs on the historic WOW Hall. He currently serves as president of City Club of Eugene. In 2025, he volunteered as an assistant debate coach at Marist High School while expanding his multimedia production business (established in 2012). He earned a BA in American Studies from Carleton College, and certificates in music business and modern journalism from New York University.
Title: District 5 County Commissioner
Organization: Candidate
Website: https://www.zybachforlane.com/
Biography:
Biographical statement provided by the speaker and edited for length/proofreading
Bob Zybach is a forest scientist, former reforestation contractor, and seventh-generation Oregonian. With Wayne Giesy, he co-founded Oregon Websites & Watersheds Project, Inc, now the oldest continuously-operating nonprofit educational website in history. He graduated from Grant High School and raised a family on their Eddyville tree farm. The family business was Phoenix Reforestation, which operated for nearly 20 years and successfully reforested more than 85,000 acres of forestland, primarily in western Oregon and Washington. Late 1980s spotted owl politics ended the business, and in 1993 Zybach incorporated NW Maps Co. for forest history, research, and publishing purposes. He earned a BS and a PhD in forestry from Oregon State University and continues to conduct research and publish books on related topics.
