Image provided by: Friends of the Sandy Public Library; Sandy, OR
About Sandy post. (Sandy, Oregon) 1938-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 5, 1981)
Inside the Post V oi. 71 Derby day Sandy sports pg. 1, sec. II Pg. 1, sec. Ill Single Copy 20* No. 6 City plans appeal of LID assessment limitation by DAN DILLON The city of Sandy w ill appeal the recent court decision lim itin g the amount of assessments it may collect on the Heritage Square parking lot, lxK-al Improvement D istrict No. 4. By a 6-1 vote Monday night, the Sandy City Council elected to challenge the decision by a Clackamas County circuit judge that would have left the city to absorb $45,000 in legal fees, interest and construction costs The decision to appeal came after a review of the case by a consulting • expert in the field of local government law. the Portland law firm of Ragen, Roberts, O’Scannlain, Robertson and Neill. “ I have every confidence in their abilities,'* said Councilman Calvin Jones a fte r the council voted unanimously, with one abstention, to retain that firm to handle the appeal. City Attorney Jack Hammond asked that the council consider that move because of their expertise and ex perience. Hammond w ill consult on the case. With the appeal process expected to take up to a year, some street im provements in the Sandy area w ill go on the back burner “ I t ’s safe to say that until L ID No. 4 is resolved, we w ill be postponing some improvements that we might have accomplished,” City Manager Roger Jordan said Tuesday. The city w ill h t " “ to set aside some money in case the appeal is un successful. One other project which may be affected by the appeal is a proposed expansion of th4* sewage treatment [riant. “ F ailure to resolve L ID No. 4 would affect our proposed sewer bond sale,” Jordan said. The city is anxious that the appeal process be finished by the end of 1981, then it would proceed w ith a sewer plant expansion, if that project receives voter approval in the fa ll or winter of 1981. The decision the city is appealing was handed down by Clackamas County C ircuit Judge Winston L. Bradshaw on Dec. 22. He said that property owners involved in the L ID may be assessed only $66,198 or the $105,000 the city spent to build the parking lot. The judge’s decision would cut a substantial amount from the c ity ’s street fund and off-street parking fund. A t the time of the judge s decision, Jordan said the city would have to issue new warrants on the project if it ap pealed. That would increase the in terest costs of the project, something the decision says the city can’t collect, unless the appeal is successful. The municipal parking lot, located between Pioneer and P ro c to r boulevards just off Shelley Avenue, was originally approved in A p ril, 1976. At the tim e, the project cost estimate did not include property acquisition, lighting, underground u tilitie s or at torney fees. The city contends that those were le g itim a te costs o f the p ro je ct. However, Judge Bradshaw disagreed. The participating property owners in the project were the Heritage Square Development Corp.; Georgia Shaffer, owner of the Wheatland Building; C arroll and Phyllis Rader, owners of the Frontier Building; B ill and Bette Herzog, owners of T J ’s Fireside Dining, King Lau, owner of the Double Dragon restaurant; Warren Decker, owner of Decker’s Store, and A rth u r Bolster and Wally Scales, owners of the Bolster- Scales professional office building. According to Bradshaw’s opinion, the Heritage Square Development Corp., Shaffer and Decker, who sued the city along w ith the Bolster-Scales p a rt nership, pressed the city to complete the p ro je c t, but w ere w ith o u t know ledge th a t the added im provem ents (lig h ts , u n derground u tilitie s and condemnation costs) would cost more than the original estimate of the engineer, plus 15 percent. The Herzogs, Lau and the Raders accepted th e ir assessments and have applied fo r long-term Bancroft bond ing. Jordan said Monday night’s vote showed the council’s determination that the additions were legitim ate costs $400,000 — or $50 per ounce — was of inferior quality, according to police. They estimated its street value at $100,000. No arrests were made in the raid, but the in v e s tig a tio n is co n tin u in g . According to Senior Trooper Jerry Hupp, five Oregon State Police troopers lead by Sgt. Fred Huffman were assisted in the raid by Sandy police officers after Clackamas County C ir cuit Judge Charles A. Sams issued a search w arrant earlier in the day. People who have moved to rural areas thinking they have escaped the fears of urban life shouldn’t look over their shoulder. B urglary is catching up. Local statistics show there were 91 burglaries in Sandy last year. Of those, more than 42 percent were cleared. This clearance compares w ith the national average fo r ru ra l areas of only 19 percent. While Sandy’s clearance rate is twice the national average, the city is taking steps to prevent fu rth e r burglaries. SUHS seeks ’2.1 million with lower tax rates The Sandy Union High School w ill ask d istrict patrons to approve a $2.1 m illion A' ballot when they go to the polls March 31 T hat levy would cost d is tric t homeowners approximately $4.34 per $1,000 assessed valuation in property- taxes. D istrict superintendent Jack Peters told the SUHS Budget Committee Monday night that the 1980-81 levy cost taxpayers $4.90 per $1,000 assessed valuation The reduction is due to a legislative freeze on the amount school districts may levy. Peters said that last year the high school’s levying lim it was placed at 14 percent of the 1979 level. For the current year, he said, the lim it was 12.6 percent above the 1979 level, and the 1981-82 academic year, the lim it is the 1979 level itself. The final figure approved by the budget committee for the 1981-82 budget is $4.625,322. Peters said the committee also proposed, “ after a lot of discussion.” a $96,500 B’ ballot proposal. I f passed, that levy w ill provide a counselor, an acoustic ceiling for the a rt classroom, an acoustical treatment for the lib ra ry floor and development of new baseball diamonds on high school property. The superintendent said the com mittee decided to put the improvements of Rannow Stadium and the athletic track into the regular high school budget covered by the ‘A ’ ballot. Staff photo Lemon tree very pretty The citrus crop may be failing this season in Florida, but in Sandy i t ’s another story — at least inside Pioneer Real Estate where salesman Herb Fenwick inspects the six lemons on the office’s year-old tree. The tree is sprouting new blossoms almost daily now, Fenwich said. i Continued on Page 4) SUHS students defend school, discipline by MARK FLOYD Students at Sandy Union High School are hurt, angered and outraged at charges made by members of the Hoodland I^utheran Church that their school lacked discipline Seven members of the Ijjth e ra n congregation met with SUHS principal John McMahan last week and con fronted him w ith a variety of charges and rum ors, including possible lack of discipline, an excess of alcohol and drug use at the school and on buses, a lack of college preparation and leniency with regards to suspension A vast m a jo rity of students in terviewed vehemently denied the charges and questioned the Hoodland men’s source of facts “ I think they (the charges) are un based,” said junior Tim Sytsma " I ’d be w illing to wager that most of those men haven’t been to our school They’re getting secondhand information and taking it as fact. I especially take ex ception to what they said about peer pressure to drink at dances I haven't noticed any peer pressire and. if there is some, you should change your peers ” A number of students felt that the teachers and administration were taking a bum rap as well “ I feel like they’re saying the school should babysit us.” noted Paula “The students and teachers feel that this is one of the better places to be around h ere.” —Suzanne Jones Woster, senior. “ This is not a day care (enter That's supposed to start at home. Teachers shouldn't have to babysit kids all day.” Dana Rainier, a transfer student from California, agreed “ I think a lot of the responsibility of influence is up to the parents, not the school But it is up to the kids to make decisions on peer pressure I came from California and things were a lot worse down there ” Any high school w ill have its ( The lone dissenting vote was cast by Councilman Vern Richards who ex pressed concern about the con sequences of an unsuccessful appeal. Street improvement projects that w ill now be postponed until the resolution include work on North B luff Road, Revenue Avenue and Hood Street. Police initiate program aimed at prevention Sandy drug raid yields 400 pounds of marijuana Sandy police joined state troopers Tuesday in a raid on a Sandy home that netted nearly 400 pounds of what police called •in fe rio rq u a lity” m arijuana. According to the state police, 380 pounds of m arijuana, a pickup truck, a car and numerous guns were seized in the 4:30 p.m. raid of a house at 34900 SE C olorado Road. P olice said the m arijuana was found inside the house and pickup The m arijuana, which norm ally would have a street value in excess of and its willingness to “ exhaust every possible rem edy” before it feels comfortable absorbing the $45,000 the judge says it must. “ I don’t think the people of Sandy elected us to hand those people $45,000,” Councilman Don B lair said Monday night. C ouncilm an Deane W esselink agreed, “ I w o u ld n ’t feel I ’m representing the taxpayers if I didn’t follow the opinion of attorneys we hired for an opinion.” problems, but both students and ad m inistrators agree that it is a small m inority who are causing the problems. “ I think it ’s true that sooner or later people w ill encounter drugs and alcohol in their lives.” said senior Danuan Bollermann And it your fam ily hasn't prepared you for it, you’re going to have a problem dealing w ith it. But it shouldn’t be up to the school ” “ There’s always going to be a few who cause problems.” noted Suzanne Jones, junior. “ But i t ’s a very small percentage, 5 percent at the maximum. I think i t ’s really sad when there’s a small percentage of people who make trouble, and it doesn’t happen very often, but the community just doesn’t listen There are far more better things that happen around here than bad. “ Ih e students and teachers feel that this is one of the better places to be around here,” Jones added One of the suggestions which came out of the meeting between McMahan and the Hoodland men was to rid the school of the “ bad apples” by forcing long-term suspensions However, many of the students disagreed w ith that proposed policy. “ Suspending people for six weeks is not confronting the problem,” said junior Sue K rick. “ They want to weed out the bad apples, but it is the bad apples who need help They need parent support, someone to help them ” “ The idea of suspending people for that long won’t help,” agreed Boiler- man “ It won’t eliminate the problem. If we get them out of here, we’ll just put them in society.” One idea which is being discussed is to allow suspensions to be served out in the school, but in a separate room from other students and under teacher supervision Many students agreed with the charge that there was a lack of college preparation, but they failed to place the blame on Sandy High. “ I think the problem starts in grade school,” Waster said. “ If our teachers never helped us with English or math, what are our high school teachers to do?” “ I went to a private school through ninth grade and I can see the change,” said junior K im Fuller. “ At the private school, I was expected to do work, so I did it without thinking Now, I don’t think I ’m as good a student, but I don’t apply myself like I should. If you apply yourself, you’re OK.” “ I think Sandy is a good, well- rounded sch o o l,” Sytsm a said “ Schools like Lincoln are very high academically, and you can go to Benson Tech and take two English classes and 27 shop classes. I like Sandy I t ’s got a variety — grades are im portant, but I like the sports and activities, too ” Sandy High School may have its problems, but members of the student body feel these problems are individual cases involving a small p e rc e n tile of students They also feel that the school is much better this year than in years past and that the whole thing has been blown out of proportion Sandy High students are happy with the school, their teachers and the ad m inistration And they want everyone to know it To that end, the Sandy Police Department is implem enting a com m unity education program to start prevention measures among com m unity residents. According to Police Chief Fred Punzel, the program w ill be three-phased, using police officers and volunteers. The program w ill firs t focus on home security, pointing out the use of locks, fences and other home preventive m easures to slow down, i f not eliminate, burglars. “ The thing th a t’s bothering us most in the residential burglaries is that the access to houses is super-simple,” Punzel said. “ With this we can say, ‘Hey, this is how they’re getting into your house,’ ” he said. The second phase of the program w ill cover the proper identification of valuables in the home. Punzel said that most households have not marked their valuable merchandise or w ritten down the serial number somewhere for safe keeping. Consequently, there is no iden tifica tio n number for the police to put in the computer to trace the stolen items. If more people identify their m er chandise w ith their cfriver’s license number, he said, it would be easier to trace stolen goods The final phase ol the program w ill help neighborhoods institute a neigh borhood watch program, where neigh bors keep an eye out for one anotlier during absences from the home. Hie program w ill kick off w ith a two- day training session for police officers and volunteers, March 10-11, at the Sandy Community Center Anyone interested in participating in the program is asked to contact the Sandy I*olice Department, 668-5566. for more inform ation. Index SECTION I Keeping Posted............................. 2 I iegal N otices............................... 4 Senior Center News ...................... 5 School Menus ................................ 5 Obituaries .................................... 5 E ditorials, letters ......................6-7 SECTION II Area N e w s ...................................... 1 About People...................................2 Home and G a rd e n ....................... 8 Classified A dverbsing........... . .9-14 SECTION in Sports, R ecreation.......................1-4 Television Directory . Inside Tab
