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Photo by Scott Newton
Flames swept through the Sandy I n ion High School district office early Wednesday morning, destroying the double-wide mobile home that housed five SUHS employees. Fiscal and personnel records were damaged in the blaie.
Flames destroy high school district offices
by DAN D IL LO N
F ire investigators Wednesday sifted
through the rubble of Sandy Union High
School's district office for clues to the cause
of an early-morning blaze that gutted the
structure and found faulty wiring
A breakdown between aluminum wiring
and an electrical outlet in the superinten
dent's office touched off the blaze, said San
dy F ire M arshal Jim Gallagher
The value of the 1,000-square-foot. double
wide mobile home, which served as an office
Vandals hit
Gov’t. Camp
rest area
by M IC H A E L P. JONES
Post Correspondent
Beverly Stonebrook has decided
that the Oregon State Highway D iv i
sion is no Scrooge afterall.
The Brightwood woman recently
received word that her battle with
the highw ay division over the
brightly-colored bows advertising
her annual Christmas sale is over
Since last Christmas, Stonebrook’s
ribbons have become a common sign
along Highway 26 near the Salmon
River Bridge. To form er customers,
the bows tell them a sale is being con
ducted at her A-fram e house, located
just below the west end of the bridge.
To others, the bows spark a curiosi
ty that causes them follow the bright
ly colored ribbons to her house where
they find Stonebrook's talents as a
florist, artist and interior decorator
on display. W all hangings and
wreaths decorated with dried weeds
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Inside Tab
Inside Tab
WEATHER
Extended Forecast: Ram at
times through Sunday Highs.
40s to mid-Ms Lows. 35 to 45
Southwest winds 10 Io 20
P r e c ip it a t io n :
D ecem ber
Total: 7.53 inches; 3 65 inches
above normal
Troutdale airport
H L Pr.
Saturday
47 38 31
Sunday
48 39 IS
Monday
45 38 1.3
Tuesday
46 36 57
Firefighting efforts were hampered by a
strong south winds which whipped the
flames and the close exposure of the school
building which had to be protected.
“The exposure there really made it a pro
blem ," Rathke said. “ It doesn’t allow you to
concentrate fully on the fire
"The building was basically gone when we
got there, but the potential for the science
wing was there,” Rathke said.
“ I think our guys did a super job.”
Firefighters had the flames knocked down
and the science wing protected eight
minutes after the alarm . The fire was under
control at 12:38 a m
Ixical firefighters were on the scene until
2:10 a.m . mopping up and salvaging
records.
Student records are kept in another part
of the school building. However, SUHS
Superintendent Jack Peters said the district
lost all fiscal records.
Employees’s records were in a fire-
resistant cabinet Peters was unsure early
Wednesday if they would be salvageable
A "brand new" copying machine, valued
at $4,000, was destroyed, as well as com
puter equipment, a term inal and printer,
valued at $10,000 Adding machines ($800),
typewriters ($600) and other office equip
ment was lost
In addition, Peters lost memorabilia from
33 years in education.
and flowers, cover the walls of her
living room and dining room.
On the tables and counters are
numerous baskets and jars, filled
with her special m ixture of pot
pourri. The scents fill the air.
Also on display are traditional
C h ristm as w reaths, swags and
garlands, as well as dried eed and
flower arrangements.
B u s in e s s
is n 't
bad,
s a id
Stonebrook, but the going was pretty
rough in the beginning when she first
opened
a fte r
T h a n k s g iv in g
Somebody was removing her rib
bons She estimated about $100 worth
of ribbons for her Christmas sale
alone had vanished
During her Valentine's Day sale.
Mother's and F ath er’s Day, Easter
and Veteran’s Day, she lost a $200
worth of ribbons
F in a lly , Stonebrook said she
discovered who the ribbon thief was.
It was the highway division
Stonebrook said employees of the
highway division said she was in
violation of state law. She said they
informed her if she wanted to place
her ribbons along the highway she’d
have to have a sign permit.
“ I tried to explain to them that a a
couple feet of ribbon tied into a bow
was far from being a sign, but it was
no use," said Stonebrook. "So I told
them to send me the information for
a p erm it.”
Stonebrook said when the thick
packet arrived from the highway
division explaining "the what fors
and how comes" the ribbons were not
even close to being covered.
For only $5 a year, the process
which one has to go through just to
place a sign tem porarily along the
highway, was very bureaucratic and
difficult to follow, said Stonebrook
So she decided to try to reason with
representatives of the highway divi
sion again, hoping to salvage what
she could of her sale.
Stonebrook and highway division
representatives failed to clear the air
at the meeting,, She said she told
them she’d hire an unemployed
squirrel, and have it place the bows
on the very top of her hemlock tree
"T heir response was my tree was
even in violation with state law ,"
said Stonebrook.
said Failm esger "We couldn't really
figure out what was going on."
F a ilm e s g e r said Stonebrook’s
bows can remain up until after her
Christmas sale is completed He said
as long as the ribbons are removed
and replaced at the tim e there is
another sale, there w ill be no pro
blems
So in retaliation, Stonebrook plac
ed a couple of dozen brightly -colored
bows on top of he2 hemlock tree The
sight drew the attention of travelers
on the highway, and more people
began to stop at her sale.
The state highway division gets ex
tra federal funds, said Failmesger.
for controlling signs along the right-
of-ways of federal highways He said
sign control has been here since the
"Lady Bird Johnson e ra ," and will
probably be here for a long time to
come.
Recently the highway division and
Stonebrook buried the hatchet Ron
Failmesger, regional traffic opera
tions supervisor, said he was not
aware of any problems between the
bows and the highway division.
When Stonebrook heard that her
bows could remain, how did she feel’
“ I wish the state highway division
the merriest of all Christmases,
because I ’m no Scrooge either "
"The main thing the bows did was
make them wonder about them ,”
City sets money aside
to boost development
The c ity of Sandy gave its
economic development interests an
early Christmas present this week
As a result, businesses around the
state and region are going to have a
better feel for what Sandy has to of
fer businesses.
Monday night, the City Council ap
propriated money to sing the praises
of Sandy, along with Estacada and
Molalla, as sites for possible in
dustrial relocation The local money
w ill match the contributions of the
other two members of the Small
Cities Industrial Attraction Pro
gram . up to $1,500
The money is earm arked to serve
as a "last resort source for advertis
ing with the Clackamas County Small
Cities group," according to City
Manager Tom Reber Any funds re
maining w ill be used specifically for
the local effort.
At a Dec. 15 meeting of the steering
committee, advertising strategy was
spelled out. including the advertising
copy which w ill be placed in
newspapers and magazines
The money w ill initially be used for
advertisements "extolling the vir-
SECTION II
Classified Ads
T V Revue
Night watchm an Donn Nicholls had
checked the area an hour to an hour and a
half before the flames were reported and
n o tic e n o th in g u n u s u a l. G a lla g h e r
estimated the fire smoldered approximately
by DAN DILLON
SECTION I
Editorial. Opinion
Obituaries
Senior Center News
Church Notes
W hat’s Cooking
Sports, Recreation
The fire was reported at 12:23 a.m.
Wednesday by a neighbor, Sara Fork, 38425
Park St
45 minutes before it was reported.
By the tim e the first engine arrived on the
scene, "the west two-thirds of the trailer
had flames roaring out," Sandy F ire Chief
Bob Rathke said. The facial boards on the
science wing of the school, six feet west of
the burning office, had also begun burning.
Woman discovers state no ‘Scrooge’ after all
Vandals struck the state Highway
Division rest area at Government
Camp last weekend, creating an ex
tra burden for crews already busy
with snow removal.
“ This is a te rrib le tim e for
vandals," said Vickie Rocker, public
information officer for the state
H ig h w a y
D iv is io n .
“ O ur
maintenance people are up to their
eyeballs in snow.”
Rocker said vandals smashed out
12 windows, ripped doors out of stalls
and broke beer bottles in the
building
Because of the tim ing of the inci
dent and other duties of state crews,
she said the Highway Division is
uncertain when the facility w ill be re
opened for public use. That w ill be a
particular problem with tourists and
skiers traveling through the moun
tain area during the holiday season
She added that state crews have
nailed plastic sheeting over the w in
dows to keep the pipes from freezing
until perm anent repairs can be
made
Index
building for five people at SUHS, hadn't
been determined Wednesday morning, but
prelim inary estimates by Gallagher put the
loss of building and contents at approx
im ately $50,000.
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"The whole thrust is that w e’re
close enough to Portland, and then
far enough away to have some
liveability," he explained
Along with the three $1,500 con
tributions from the participants.
Morgan said the program has some
money from the recent U S Bank of
Oregon drive to boost economic
development Some of that will be us
ed to pay for creating lists of poten
tial businesses that might be in
terested in relocating in the eastern
Clackamas County area
Money from the County itself is
tied to the three small cities’ w ill
ingness to appropriate money also.
Morgan said
The Small Cities Industrial A ttrac
tion Program was undertaken about
a year and a half ago through the
C o m m u n ity D evelo p m en t Block
G ran t from C lackam as County;
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Photo hv D m DtRen
More than IM area families began picking up Christmas baskets yesterday furnished by Sandy Kiwanis Club members
and volunteers. Volunteers, pictured above, worked for the past week sorting food and Christmas presents for the an
nual holiday project.
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tues of the three small cities." said
George Morgan, local chairm an of
the Economic Development Commis
sion and a representative on the
County steering committee "W e in
tend to do some advertising on our
own when our own campaign is
underway.
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