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About The nugget. (Sisters, Or.) 1994-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 11, 2019)
The Nugget Vol. XLII No. 50 Citizens weigh in on future of SPRD P OSTAL CUSTOMER PRE-SORTED STANDARD ECRWSS U.S. POSTAGE PAID Sisters, OR Permit No. 15 News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon www.NuggetNews.com Wednesday, December 11, 2019 Honoring Sisters veterans passed... Assessing public safety in Sisters By Sue Stafford By Sue Stafford Correspondent Correspondent Last week9s public meet- ing on the next two years for Sisters Park & Recreation District was modest in size (12 people), but rich with insight- ful, thoughtful input from those in attendance. <It is exciting to see com- munity members taking the time to share with us their thoughts and opinions on how Sisters Park & Recreation The Deschutes County S h e r i ff 9s O ff i c e m o t t o is <Proudly Serving Our Community,= and the Sisters- Camp Sherman Rural Fire Protection District puts the residents of the district at the top of their organization chart. Both agencies are charged with providing for the pub- lic safety of the communities they serve with police and fire See SPRD on page 32 PHOTO PROVIDED Local veterans have placed a large wreath to left of the flag pole at the Village Green veterans memorial, adorned with bright red tags. Each tag has a name of the 42 local veterans who are buried at Camp Polk cemetery. The wreath was to be placed at the cemetery, but snow forced another plan. The wreath was donated by a local resident, and will stay at the park through the end of the year. Veterans who worked on this project were Lance Trowbridge, Earl Schroeder, Jeff Mackey and Bill Anttila. Slash pile burning created smoky skies By T. Lee Brown Correspondent Slash burning in Deschutes National Forest west of Sisters caused unhealthy air and confusion about burn- ing regulations last Friday and Saturday. Large landing piles were lit Friday morn- ing by the U.S. Forest Service (USFS). By afternoon, they looked like early solstice bonfires. Smoke billowed in columns of slush-gray and pine-yel- low. Walking among the fires, the forest looked like a scene from <The Lord of the Rings= movies, with signal fires blooming across snow- capped peaks. USFS chose Friday to burn landing piles despite indications of stagnant air in the area. In town, measure- ments of PM2.5, fine particu- late matter, pushed up to 183 on Friday, according to the World Air Quality Project9s realtime air quality map. The map uses monitoring data from sources including the State of Oregon9s Department Inside... of Environmental Quality (DEQ). The 183 level is in the <red zone,= considered unhealthy for breathing 4 slightly worse than Beijing9s air qual- ity, which stood at 181 that day. The red zone covers fine particulate matter measure- ments of 151 through 200. According to AQICN, <Everyone may begin to experience health effects; members of sensitive groups may experience more serious health effect.= By Saturday morning, a shroud of smog wrapped around the homes of Crossroads, several miles west of town near Highway 242. USFS Fire Management Officer James Osbourne told The Nugget, <We took a num- ber of calls because of the air stagnation reports.= On Thursday, Crossroads residents had received notices stating: <Please be advised that Sisters-Camp Sherman Fire Department has closed outdoor burning due to a See BURNING on page 15 See SAFETY on page 16 Project will plant thousands of trees By Jim Cornelius Editor in Chief It will take a generation for the landscape to recover from the devastating Milli Fire that scorched over 24,000 acres in Sisters Country in the late summer of 2017. Some local youth are giving the forest a jumpstart with a plan to plant 10,000 trees in the Trout Creek area this spring. Representatives from the Waldorf School of Bend will have a table at Sisters Coffee Co. on Saturday, December 21, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. where they will share infor- mation on the project and accept donations for a fund- raiser for the school. The project grew out of a sixth-grade fundraiser at the school, where students auc- tioned off a community effort to reduce carbon footprint by creating a <micro-forest.= Waldorf School parent Erin Hansen told The Nugget, <we ended up getting some surplus trees from the Forest Service.= There were 500, in fact, and Hansen wasn9t sure the young students would be able to knock the work out PHOTO PROVIDED Pete Stoddard of the Sisters Ranger District found a good place for students to plant and explained reforestation in a burned forest. in the time they had. But Pete Stoddard of the Sisters Ranger District found a safe and viable spot for them to work 4 and work they did, getting all 500 trees planted in about 2-1/2 hours. Stoddard provided a real See TREES on page 38 Letters/Weather ................ 2 Obituary ............................ 7 Entertainment ..................13 Sisters Naturalist ..............31 Classifieds ..................35-36 Meetings ........................... 3 Announcements ................12 Holidays in Sisters .......17-29 Crossword .......................34 Real Estate ................. 37-40