"Mayor Sam Adams, who backs the fluoridation plan and has one of five votes on the Council, comes firmly down on the side that says Portland must address dental care for everyone if its progressive goals and self-image are valid.
'It's about health equity, it's about social justice,' he said in an interview. 'Fluoride is a means to an end,' he added. 'I hope that folks, whether they agree with me or not, understand that my intentions are to help those Portlanders that have no voice in this process.'
Some opponents of fluoridation have lobbed that kind of reasoning right back into the laps of the commissioners.
'I don't appreciate you trying to alleviate your white guilt by putting toxins in our water,' Frances Quaempts-Miller, who described herself as mixed black and Muscogee Indian, said in testifying at the public hearing before the all-white Council of four men and one woman.
Who is empowered to make the choice for Portland has become part of the debate as well. Fluoridation efforts have failed at the ballot box here, most recently in 1980.
And two other members of the City Council, in addition to Mr. Adams, who is not seeking re-election in November, said even before public testimony was taken that they planned to vote for the plan – making a majority – when it goes before them..."
