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WEDNESDAY, APRIL 20, 2022
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APPEAL TRIBUNE
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Gervais Middle School students sit spaced apart during lunch. The district is
one of the first to use a pager-like device for contact tracing. ABIGAIL DOLLINS /
STATESMAN JOURNAL
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Sublimity has a new ballot drop box
in front of its city hall at 245 NW John-
son Street.
To Place an Ad
Aurora municipal bond
Published every Wednesday by the Statesman Journal, P.O. Box 13009, Salem, OR 97309.
Continued from Page 1A
vais, Aurora and Donald will decide in
the election.
Sublimity fluoride ballot measure
The Sublimity City Council was hold-
ing a work session to decide what goals
they wanted to pursue in January 2020.
A resident, Larry Etzel, asked if the
council had discussed that the city puts
fluoride in its drinking water. They
hadn’t.
Sublimity is one of 29 – Dallas, Inde-
pendence, Keizer, Monmouth, Salem,
Silverton and Turner among them – out
of Oregon’s 241 incorporated cities that
provides fluoride to its citizens through
its drinking water.
It equates to about 22% of the state’s
population (902,000) who receive fluo-
ride, according to the Oregon Health Au-
thority. That ranks the state 48th among
the United States.
Fluoride, a naturally occurring min-
eral, protects teeth from decay that can
lead to cavities. Communities that add
fluoride to their water decrease cavities
in children by 15%, according to a study
by the Community Preventive Services
Task Force
“And currently, we’re adding .6 parts
per million is how much fluoride is in
our water. Not a huge amount and
there’s a very minimal amount that’s
naturally occurring,” Sublimity Mayor
Jim Kingsbury said.
Etzel, 68, moved to the city from a
family farm about eight years ago. He’s a
retired pilot who is involved in commu-
nity organizations, including one that
teaches disabled people to ski.
He said of the 74 water districts in
Marion County, six have fluoride in the
water.
“My question is, what do these other
68 water districts know that we don’t?”
Etzel said. “That’s kind of why I present-
ed this to the city council, just to see if
they would be interested in this.”
According to the Fluoride Action Net-
work, there have been 83 studies about
the links between intelligence and fluo-
ride and 74 have shown that elevated
fluoride exposure is associated with re-
duced IQ.
“My goal in pursuing this is to get
people to do a little bit of research so
that they can make an informed deci-
sion,” Etzel said.
“You’re going to run into dental pro-
fessionals who say this is absolutely
necessary. My dentist tells me the same
thing. It may help reduce cavities in
kids. But what are the other effects of
this? The studies that show the lower
IQ’s in kids. Do I want them to put some-
thing in my water that’s going to cause
negative effects in kids?”
Kingsbury said adding fluoride costs
the city $5,000 per year.
Sublimity uses well water for drink-
ing water. It has four wells and adds flu-
oride in each one, he said.
The city has been adding fluoride into
its drinking water since 1955, when it
was a city with a population of about
400 people.
Kingsbury said the city never asked
its citizens in a ballot measure if they
wanted it, though.
The city asked it residents in its
newsletter to tell it if they wanted fluo-
ride in the water. There was a lot of feed-
back. It was mixed.
“Generally, you know when some-
thing comes up, generally it’s pretty well
either one side or another,” said Kings-
bury, in his fourth year as mayor. “And
this item was significantly different in
the fact that there was a lot of people
who were for and a lot of people against
and it was something we couldn’t in
good faith make a decision one way or
another.”
After nine months of input, the city
decided to put it to the citizens as a bal-
lot measure.
Kingsbury said it’s important for the
city to let the citizens decide whether
they want fluoride or not.
“Just from my own personal stand-
point, I think that’s important,” he said.
“I think it’s important for persons to
make up their own mind about what
they feel they want in their water. If
there is a benefit to fluoride, if there isn’t
a benefit to fluoride, if you could get flu-
oride another way.”
When the ice storms hit in February
2021, the shortcoming of Aurora’s wa-
ter infrastructure was exposed.
The city’s wells were idled when
power was knocked out, and without
emergency power sources like genera-
tors, the city was within a day of run-
ning out of water to supply to citizens.
Other cities brought Aurora water,
which kept it going until power was re-
stored, but it’s trying to prevent that
situation from happening again.
The city is asking voters to approve
a $7.1 million bond, paid for increasing
property taxes by $2.90 per $1,000 of
assessed value over the next 21 years
to pay for large municipal improve-
ments.
It would pay for improvements to
the water systems including a pump
station on the north side of Mill Creek
and emergency generators for the
city’s wells.
It also would pay for a new city hall,
community center and library. That
also would include an emergency
management hub and shelter for use
during extreme weather conditions.
It would fund improvements to the
city’s wastewater and stormwater sys-
tems, including replacing tank liners
and chemical storage facilities.
Gervais school district bond
The Gervais School District is one of
two in the Willamette Valley that
doesn’t have a bond to improve its fa-
cilities. It has not passed a bond since
1990.
The district received a $4 million
grant from the state to fund improve-
ments to facilities, but it only gets the
money to spend if it passes a bond.
The Gervais School District is ask-
ing taxpayers to approve a $31 million
bond for construction of new buildings
and improvements and repairs on ex-
isting buildings in the district.
The bond is estimated to cost prop-
erty tax owners $2.21 per $1,000 of as-
sessed value. For the average home-
owner in the district with a property
valued at $210,000, it would cost them
$37 per month.
Gervais High School would receive
$10.2 million in additions and up-
grades to the existing building. It
would also pay to construct new class-
rooms, restrooms, a covered walkway
and vestibule.
The middle school would receive
$18 million in renovations and up-
grades, and add a new STEM class-
room and a multipurpose building. It
also would add parking and walkways.
The elementary school would re-
ceive $3 million in additions and up-
grades to the existing building. It also
would add a covered play area.
In addition, the district’s sports
fields would receive new lighting and
bleachers, a concessions stand, and
locker rooms. The district has received
an $800,000 grant to pay for turf for
the fields, and may use bond money to
pay the rest of the $350,000 it needs to
pay for the rest of that improvement.
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Help your business
thrive with a focus
on retention
Angela Oven
Chemeketa Small Business
Development Center
Did you know that 57% of your
employees are looking for a new
job? It’s a startling statistic.
Consider your own team. Rough-
ly half of them are planning to leave
when the right opportunity pre-
sents itself. Did your throat just
close a little bit?
If you’ve seen the news this year,
you know that there are more open
jobs than employees to fill them.
Waits at restaurants are longer than
ever, customer patience is waning
and the yelp reviews are pouring in.
The public doesn’t like the new
landscape that defines today’s
workforce.
Guess what? Neither do your em-
ployees, according to the latest re-
ports.
Maybe you just lost somebody on
your team and you’re facing the
prospect of hiring. IF and that’s just
IF you happen to get the right per-
son hired, it will cost you about a
third of their annual salary to train
them, and there is a 33% chance
they will leave in their first six
months.
These are the realities of hiring
today. It isn’t fun! How do you fight
back? You focus on retention.
Let’s look at some ways you KEEP
the great employees you have.
Why do your employees stay with
you? Is it money? Probably not.
Today’s employees look at the
money as a vehicle to fuel their life-
styles. Work is a secondary priority
to them, and it honestly should be.
Work-life balance is more impor-
tant than ever so rethink that man-
datory overtime. Rethink the mind-
set that your staff gets a paycheck
so what else could they possibly ex-
Sheds
Continued from Page 1A
Donald police levy
Donald is asking voters to fund po-
lice services with an operational levy.
The city is asking voters to approve
a $2.07 per $1,000 of assessed value
increase in property taxes for the next
five years.
The taxes would raise $254,000
each year for five years and raise a total
of $1,065,414.44.
That money would be used to con-
tract with the Marion County Sheriff ’s
office to provide a police officer exclu-
sively for the city. Cities in the county
including Jefferson and Sublimity
have similar arrangements with the
county.
Donald city manager Eric Under-
wood said the city would contract for
40 hours per week for the deputy,
though the specific hours the officer
works have not been determined.
Bill Poehler covers Marion County
for the Statesman Journal. He can be
reached
at
bpoehler@StatesmanJournal.com
she was gifted a shed constructed by
local volunteers and members of the
Associated General Contractors Ore-
gon-Columbia chapter.
The shed is one of 65 given to peo-
ple who lost their homes in the fire.
The shed build project began in
February 2021 with a local church in-
tending to build 10 sheds.
But as the need increased and more
groups got involved, the effort flour-
ished. So far 65 sheds have been built
with the goal to reach 80 by the end of
May. Work will restart later this year.
Bill Smith, with Parker, Smith and
Feek and AGC, said the building picked
up after Blazer Industries donated
warehouse space in Stayton to assem-
ble and paint the structures. On Sat-
urday, volunteers hammered, built
and painted inside the warehouse.
Smith said supply chain issues have
meant that each shed, which once cost
$1,400 to build, now costs $4,000.
Funded by donations and volunteer
work, the sheds are given to wildfire
survivors.
pect.
They want to be part of some-
thing. They want to feel like they are
making a difference with the work
they are doing.
What motivates your team? Try
asking them.
A stay interview is a tool to take
your team’s pulse. It is nothing more
than a simple conversation about
why your employee loves working for
you, and maybe why they don’t. The
benefits are tremendous, and it will
be illuminating to you as an owner or
a manager if done correctly. Here are
some tips for successful stay inter-
views:
h Consider doing them off site.
Lunch, coffee or a quick glass of wine
after work are all great options that
communicate a less formal conversa-
tion.
h Give them permission to be hon-
est. If you want a truthful answer,
they must trust you not to respond
reactively.
h Use a growth mindset. This isn’t
the time to focus on “but this is how
we’ve always done it.”
h LISTEN. Read that again. Listen
carefully. Take the time to hear what
they say.
h Commit to changing things to
keep them happy and engaged.
Hiring is a huge pain point for most
owners and managers today. With a
laser focus on employee retention,
your teams become more stable, en-
abling your business to thrive. Be
proactive about finding ways to in-
centivize them to stay with your com-
pany. It gives you more time to focus
on other areas of your business and
develops a positive, healthy culture
among your staff members.
Angela Oven is a business adviser
at the Chemeketa Small Business De-
velopment Center. The Small Busi-
ness Adviser column is produced by
the center. Questions can be submit-
ted to sbdc@chemeketa.edu or call
(503) 399-5088.
McGuire’s shed now rests where her
husband’s garage and machine shop
once was. She had it painted in the same
mint green shade with bright green trim
that she wants to paint her house.
On her property, the sounds of cluck-
ing chickens and the rushing river fill
the air. Some of the trees are regrowing.
Pots house the plants for her future gar-
den. Her new home is being built to ac-
commodate her many kids, grandkids
and, as of recently, one great-grandkid.
She said the shed has been vital for
helping her re-establish her sense of
ownership and peace at home.
“It instills hope,” she said.
The shed also keeps her belongings
safe from would-be thieves who’ve tak-
en to frequenting wildfire victims’
homes in the canyon.
McGuire said she was grateful for the
volunteers and said the need for the
sheds remained in the community.
“It’s a godsend,” she said. “I don’t
know what I would have done without
it.”
For questions, comments and news
tips, email reporter Whitney Wood-
worth
at
wmwoodworth
@statesmanjournal.com, call 503-910-
6616 or follow on Twitter @wmwood-
worth