S ERVING THE S ILVERTON A REA S INCE 1880
50 C ENTS
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A U NIQUE E DITION OF THE S TATESMAN J OURNAL
V OL . 135, N O . 21
W EDNESDAY , M AY 11, 2016
SILVERTONAPPEAL.COM
Mt. Angel city manager moving on
CHRISTENA BROOKS
SPECIAL TO THE APPEAL TRIBUNE
MT. ANGEL – Oregon’s Oktoberfest
town is saying “Prost!” to departing City
Manager Eileen Stein.
After three years on the job, Stein has
been hired away by West Linn. Her last
day is May 20. Then she’ll start as city
manager of West Linn, population
26,000, located 45 minutes north of Mt.
Angel near Oregon City. She was among
32 applicants for the job.
“West Linn is getting an amazing city
manager,” said Mt. Angel City Council
President Kelly Grassman. “ They’re
getting someone who is going to get them
wherever where they want to go. She is
really good at looking at the whole pic-
ture, hearing everyone’s viewpoints,
saying, ‘OK, this is what I’m hearing you
say,’ and then fine-tuning it until she gets
it right.”
Mt. Angel Police Chief Mike Healy
will be interim city manager until the po-
sition can be permanently filled. Healy
has been chief in Mt. Angel for five
years. Before that, he was chief in Leba-
non and Stayton, the latter of which he
similarly served as interim city man-
ager in the 1990s.
In coming months, Healy said he aims
“to help the elected officials in any way I
can with the recruitment process, to
keep all staff going forward accomplish-
ing the day-to-day operations of the City,
and do my normal duties as the chief.”
Councilors intend to hire a new city
manager sometime before Oktoberfest
in mid-September, according to the con-
tract they approved on May 2 with the
Mid-Willamette Valley Council of Gov-
ernments. For $5,500, the organization
will facilitate the hiring process, seeking
and sorting
applicants.
Its services
include run-
ning back-
ground
Eileen Stein
checking on
Mike Healy
at least five
finalists.
Decisions will be the council’s.
Stein came to Mt. Angel in 2013 with
more than 20 years experience in gov-
ernment administration. She was Sis-
ters’ city manager for 11 years, and, be-
fore that, she held a variety of adminis-
trative positions for Springfield, includ-
ing senior management analyst.
She holds undergraduate and gradu-
ate degrees from the University of Cali-
fornia at Irvine.
She’s also on the League of Oregon
Cities board of directors.
“If she wasn’t working in local gov-
ernment, she’d be the CEO of a Fortune
500 company,” business blogger Dan
England wrote.
In her three years in Mt. Angel, Stein
helped the council accomplish “a long
list” of its goals, Grassman said. “There
was stuff on there we’d been trying to get
done for a long time.”
A few of the city’s accomplishments
over the last three years: a city charter
update, SDC rate changes, development
code overhaul, personnel manual re-
writes, fiscal policy fixes, downtown fa-
çade improvements, and an in-depth util-
ity system analysis.
Her attention to detail is second to
none, said Justin Hogue, assistant city
manager.
“She’s very knowledgeable. While she
was here, what she did was lay the foun-
dation for us to keep building on.”
Wait begins for Silverton
Horse
riders
scar new
bike trail
ZACH URNESS
STATESMAN JOURNAL
PHOTOS COURTESY OF SMALL BUSINESS REVOLUTION
Small Business Revolution put together a short film on Silverton, among two finalists for its national Main Street project grant award.
Downtown is
national finalist
for $500K grant
JUSTIN MUCH
STAYTON MAIL
Silverton makes it a point to highlight
a charming downtown with appealing
waterfront features and the down-home,
Main Street Americana feel within the
shadows of its historical buildings.
That point was well taken by the na-
tionally recognized Small Business Revo-
lution on Main Street project, which an-
nounced this week that Silverton is one of
two finalists for its makeover project.
That puts the city in the running to re-
ceive $500,000 for a downtown makeover
from Deluxe Corporation.
The voting period has closed, and area
residents are eagerly awaiting the re-
sults.
The Small Business Revolution pro-
ject is eliciting voters who support the
two finalists: Silverton and Wabash, Ind.
People could vote before May 10 and the
winner is anticipated to be announced
Silverton boasts waterfront features and the down-home, Main Street Americana feel within
the shadows of its historical buildings.
May 12 or 13.
The
website
www.smallbusinessrevolution.org
in-
cludes short films of each finalist com-
munity.
Silverton and Wabash were pared
down from 94,000 communities nation-
wide that applied for the grant through
the contest, according to Silverton City
Manager Bob Willoughby.
Willoughby nominated his city after
officials from the regional Land Conser-
vation and Development office pointed
the contest out to him. Understanding the
Just days after the grand
opening of a trail specially de-
signed for mountain bikers at
Silver Falls State Park, a
group of horseback riders re-
portedly inflicted damage on a
pathway they are prohibited
from traveling.
The Catamount Trail, a 4.5-
mile route in the park’s back-
country, was created in part to
ease tensions between moun-
tain bikers and equestrians in
a place where the two groups
are sometimes at odds.
However, on May 2, a group
of seven equestrians rode the
length of the trail in what Sa-
lem Area Trail Alliance coor-
dinator Beth Dayton called
“an act of intentional vandal-
ism, carefully timed to follow
the very public opening of the
trail.”
The Catamount Trail was
constructed and financed by
volunteers of the biking group
SATA. It has specially de-
signed bike features, such as
banked turns, and is only open
to mountain bikes and hikers.
Three signs — at the trail’s
west, east and main trailhead
— clearly indicate horses are
not allowed.
The horse riders left deep
footprints and did “consider-
able damage” to the trail, SA-
TA said in a Facebook post.
Volunteer work will be needed
to repair the damage and there
is discussion of adding an off-
set fence to keep horses off the
trail, Dayton said.
“The worst thing about this
action is not so much the phys-
ical damage to the trail sur-
face, which can be repaired in
time, but the effect this might
have on polarizing opinion and
inflaming passions when in re-
ality, the majority of both
mountain bikers and equestri-
ans understand that there is
room on the trails for all of us,”
Dayton said. “It is sad to think
of the very few individuals
See VOTE, Page 3A
See TRAIL, Page 2A
Join the ‘Creekside
Chat’ conversation
Online at
Silverton
Appeal.com
SILVERTON APPEAL TRIBUNE
NEWS UPDATES
A shout out to Silver-
ton-Mount Angel area res-
idents: Do you have news,
an event or a cause you
would like to see publi-
cized?
If so, stop by Silver
Creek Coffee House in
downtown
Silverton
around midday Wednes-
day, May 18, where States-
man Journal Executive
Editor Michael Davis and
East Willamette Valley re-
porter Justin Much will be
having a cup on Silver
Creek and visiting with lo-
INSIDE
WE'RE WHERE YOU ARE.
Briefs......................................3A
Calendar ...............................2A
Classifieds..............................4B
Engagements ......................2A
Life..........................................4A
Marriages .............................2A
Obituaries.............................2A
WE'RE YOUR
LOCALS IN
SILVERTON.
» Breaking news
» Get updates from the
Silverton area
Michael
Davis
Justin
Much
cal
resi-
dents in the inaugural
“Creekside Chat.”
With Creekside Chat,
similar to the “Holding
Court” in Salem (http://
www.statesmanjour-
nal.com/search/Hold-
See CHAT, Page 3A
PHOTOS
» Photo galleries
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