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About Applegater. (Jacksonville, OR) 2008-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 1, 2017)
10 Winter 2017 Applegater Public Invitation You are cordially invited to a special community meeting of the Cantrall Buckley Park Committee. Cantrall Buckley Park news BY JEREMY CRISWELL Hooray! The restoration of our playground restroom is complete! This long overdue renovation is the final phase of our playground restoration and it looks great! The broken-down wooden screening has been removed, fresh access sidewalks have been poured, and a new gable end roof has been installed just in time for winter. With a fresh coat of paint, new tile, and all new fixtures throughout, we finally have a bright and sanitary Jackson County Park Rangers Jonathon Bernhardt and restroom to appropriately serve Dustin Stafford at work on the day-use restroom. our park users. The finishing (Photo: Tom Carstens.) touches will include an ADA access path leading from the playground to the restroom, s e ve r a l b e n c h e s , a n d t h e addition of native plants in the surrounding planting beds. With the bathroom restoration now done, work can resume on the Community Mosaic Mural that we began all the way back in 2015. Over 200 community members have already made tiles for the project and it is now time to get back to work on bringing this mural Tim Zacha, daughter Zyris, and son Zennon sign in as to life. In the coming months, volunteers at the SOLVE cleanup event we’ll make the last of the tiles at Cantrall Buckley Park. (Photo: Tom Carstens.) and set them in concrete panels that will be installed on the river-facing wall of the restroom. I’ll be looking for ways to pull community members back in for the last parts of this project, so keep an eye out for chances to get involved! Keeping our beautiful park beautiful, local community volunteers participated in the 34 th Annual SOLVE Beach & Riverside Cleanup, presented by the Oregon Lottery, on September 23, 2017. Cantrall Buckley Park was one of the 130 sites for this statewide event, and we had 13 adult and youth Winner! This photo of Tom and Kathy Carstens ready to collect trash at the Cantrall Park cleanup event participants. was one of four winning pictures in A big thank-you to our SOLVE’s statewide photo contest volunteers, who removed 30 for this event. (Photo: Janis Mohr-Tipton.) pounds of trash, six truckloads of invasive blackberry vines, and two truckloads of dead branches and of SOLVE in cleaning up Oregon. The debris from several areas of the park. Janis focus has changed since 1969, when Mohr-Tipton organized the event and S.O.L.V. stood for Stop Oregon Litter and provided snacks and a butterfly glider craft Vandalism. Today, the word SOLVE more for the youth at the end of the work time. accurately reflects the actions of volunteers, Janis also provided educational material like the ones in our community, to improve from SOLVE (solveoregon.org) to show our park’s environment. Jeremy Criswell what native plantings can replace invasive jerr37@jeffnet.org blackberries. She also explained the role Where: Applegate Valley Fire District Community Center, 1095 Upper Applegate Road, Ruch When: Wednesday, December 13, 6 - 7:30 pm What: 1. Learn directly from Jackson County Parks about plans for management of Cantrall Buckley. 2. Find out what the Park Committee is planning. 3. Bring your own ideas for the future of the park! Message from Jackson County Parks The following is excerpted from a letter dated October 31, 2017, to A Greater Applegate from Jackson County Roads and Parks about the transition in the management of Cantrall Buckley Park. When GACDC [now A Greater Applegate] took over operations of Cantrall Buckley Park, the Jackson County Parks program was at an unprecedented crossroads where all funding for park operations was removed from the county general fund budget. This change forced many hard decisions regarding park management, one of which was the potential closure of Cantrall Buckley. Instead, GACDC stepped up to maintain and operate the park over the past two decades. Fortunately, due to a series of changes within our parks program, we are no longer at the level of crisis we were at 20 years ago and are much more stable—not rich, but stable. I share this brief background for two reasons. First, a big thank-you to GACDC is in order for stepping up and operating the park while the county sorted out its park program. GACDC provided a bridge for the county until we reached the point where we can, and should, step back in and operate the park, which we agree is a real gem. Second, I want to assure you that discussions of closing the park are not going to resurface the first time we hit a bump in the road. The park is safe, will stay open, and will be taken care of. Steve Lambert will continue to be the point of contact for the county and will lead the process to complete this transition from our end. We look forward to working with you in a partnership role in the future to continue to improve this special place. John Vial Director, Jackson County Roads and Parks Carol Milazzo Debbie Tollefson Don Tollefson Principle Broker Owner Principle Broker Owner Broker 541-973-9184 541-973-9185 541-415-1844 “We Focus on Relationships, not Commissions.” Your local, hometown realtors. If you want personal, individualized service and great communication, call us! Applegate Valley Office Jacksonville Office 7380 Highway 238 / Ruch, OR 935 North Fifth Street / Jacksonville, OR Next to Ruch Country Store By the Gas Station 541-261-0949 541-218-0947
