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About Vernonia's voice. (Vernonia, OR) 2007-current | View Entire Issue (April 26, 2011)
8 community april26 2011 County Chamber of Commerce Endorses Sheriff’s Measure 5-210 One of Many Major Endorsements of Sheriff’s Stable Funding Drive The board of directors of the South Columbia County Chamber of Commerce has voted to endorse Sheriff’s Measure 5-210: the Sheriff’s Stable Funding measure on the May 17 ballot in Columbia County. Chamber Secretary Tricia Stockwell said that the Chamber voted to endorse the levy campaign after a six week online poll of the membership heavily favored the measure’s passage. Sheriff Jeff Dickerson welcomed the measure’s endorsement by the Chamber, saying, “Business leaders intuitively know the relationship between economic vitality and adequate public safety in our community. They recognize that this levy measure is vital to our community and to our safety.” The Chamber’s endorsement is the latest in a flurry of endorsements, some of which include: Columbia County Democratic Central Committee, Scappoose City Council, Rainier City Council, Columbia 911 Dispatchers, Saint Helens Professional Firefighters, Scappoose Professional Firefighters, Columbia River Fire and Rescue Volunteers, Scappoose Mayor Scott Burge, Saint Helens Mayor Randy Peterson, Rainier Mayor Jerry Cole, Representative Brad Witt, Clatskanie Mayor Diane Pohl, Circuit Court Judges Steve Reed, Ted Grove and Jenefer Grant, Retired Circuit Court Judge Donald Kalberer, Port of St. Helens Commissioner Robert Keyser, St. Helens City Councilman Phil Barlow, and many others. Measure 5-210 would provide Columbia County for six additional patrol deputies, three crime investigators, two sworn supervisors, support staff and retain two corrections deputies and a jail mental health program. The measure would levy 62 cents per thousand of the assessed value of property. County Could Provide Stable Funding for Sheriff’s Office continued from front page and respond to 9-1-1 calls. Often, there is only one and sometimes no deputies on duty at certain times; every day, there are at least four hours where there are no deputies on duty. It often takes over an hour for the Sheriff’s Office to respond to emergency calls. The lack of adequate coverage was magnified this past year with the on-duty death of Rainier Police Chief Ralph Painter. Painter was tragically murdered while responding to a call. “He was alone, with no back-up,” says Dickerson. “I’m not saying that if we had previously voted this levy in, that tragedy wouldn’t have happened. All I’m saying is, it points out what happens too many times in this county-- officers are forced to go it alone, or are forced to wait interminably long for back-up. It’s unfortunate, but that’s what happens right now.” Additionally the Sheriff’s department oversees Animal Control, provides marine patrols on the Columbia River, issues concealed handgun licenses, serves civil papers, and operates Search and Rescue throughout the County. Overall, the department has about fifty total employees— distributed across the various responsibilities of the Sheriff. “All of these are seemingly little things, but they are big issues and are services that only the Sheriff’s office can provide to the citizens of our county,” says Dickerson. Dickerson says he and his staff have developed what he described as an “aggressive campaign to inform people” about this levy. Dickerson says the campaign was preceded by a poll of citizens to find out what the tolerance level for the amount of the levy would be and to ask what services the citizens wanted from the Sheriff. According to Dickerson, what the citizens said they wanted was 1) better response times to emergencies, There are better locations to dispose of paint than a land ll. Recycling your old paint is simple ple and something that everyone e can do. More importantly, y, protecting our environment ent is something we should d all want to do. That’s s why the PaintCare d program was created to make it easy for everyone to recycle and properly dispose of every can of unused paint. Vernonia Hardware and Supply 1026 Bridge St. Vernonia, OR Mon.-Thurs. 9-6, Fri.-Sat. 9-7, Sun. 12-5 Here’s how it works. Purchase paint, pay a small recovery fee h with purchase, then with whatever paint you want to recycle, simply drop it off at the ge. collection site for no extra charge. re You’re done. We’ll take it from there. To learn more, visit us at www.paintcare.org buy right. reuse. recycle. 2) better coverage and investigators to deter criminal activities, and 3) support and back-up assistance for local law enforcement. With those goals in mind, Dickerson designed a program to meet what the citizens said they wanted. “I saw that it would be a tremendous failure for us to tax a lesser amount and not get the job done,” says Dickerson. “We wanted to be able to claim success at the end of the four years and be able to point to improvements and changes. We needed to devise a strategic plan that would implement something that would benefit the citizens from their perspective.” Dickerson says the strategic plan includes having an officer dedicated to the Nehalem Valley area, including Vernonia, Mist and Birkenfeld, for forty hours a week. There would also be one officer dedicated to the North County area and one to the South County area. “I see tremendous value for us and the citizens to have someone who is specifically responsible for those areas,” says Dickerson. According to Dickerson, the polling that was done showed support for a levy if citizens felt they knew exactly what the money would go for and that the money was sure to stay with the Sheriff’s Office. To that end, Dickerson was able to get the Board of County Commissioners to pass a unanimous Resolution that commits to continue the current percentage of the General Fund to the Sheriff’s Office and to keep 100 percent of all new taxes under this levy in the Sheriff’s Office. Dickerson knows this is not a good time to be asking citizens for more money. But he also feels that the needs of the community are becoming more urgent and that now is the opportunity to get this passed and create secure funding for the Sheriff’s Office. According to Dickerson, the campaign has raised $30,000— about one-third of that has come from the Deputy Sheriff’s Association. “We won’t be able to raise these funds again,” says Dickerson. “This is our window.” “It’s a fine line we have to walk— we don’t want people to feel like we are using scare tactics,” says Dickerson. “So we’ve tried to focus on the positives. We’ve tried to talk about what will happen— we will get dedicated patrols, we will get a Nehalem Valley presence, we will get twenty-four hour coverage and we will fund three investigators so we will finally be able to follow up on some of the crimes.” Dickerson has tried to be realistic about expectations for the levy. “The way I look at it, if we’re going to raise people’s taxes just to save positions, then they will feel like they paid more taxes and didn’t get anything new from it,” he explains. “We tried to create a program that would save positions, but also come up with a plan that is reasonably priced, as far as I’m concerned, that will add service.” “My goal when I took office was to create the best possible agency with the resources we had,” concluded Dickerson. “My vision was to make the case that the Sheriff’s Office represents value to the citizens— value worth investing in. I looked at it like a business model— how do we create value so that people can invest in it. Unfortunately, the investors are low on funds right now. But we are stuck with a difficult situation, and we have to ask them for their support.” For more information about Measure 5-210, go to www.sheriffstablefunding.com
