SINCE 1979 • VOLUME 39, NO. 16 SECTION A JANUARY 19, 2018 $1.00 Homegrown Theatre fi nds home By DEREK WILEY Of the Keizertimes Keizer Homegrown The- atre will have its own home for its 2018 season. The theatre, which did three of its 2017 shows in Salem at Chemeketa Community College and the Kroc Center, is moving into the events space at the Keizer Heritage Center. “It's nice to have a real address,” said Linda Baker, the company's founder. “It's easier for them to fi nd us. It's easier for them to connect with us. When we are in the middle of Keizer, our Keizer audiences are much larger than when we're out wondering around in the outermost parts.” KHT has scheduled an open house for Saturday, Feb. 17 from 12-3 p.m. with snacks, coffee, tea and juice to welcome the community to the new home, which seats an audience of 75. The company performed Love Letters in the space last year. “It's going to be wonderful,” Baker said. “There's a lot of opportunity. There's a wonderful synergy that we get to create, too, with our art association right next door and all kinds of really neat things can happen. We'll be able to do more sophisticated sets and lighting because we'll “ It’s nice to have a real address.” Changes coming to football? — Zinda Baker, Founder, Keizer Homegrown Theatre File be able to put that in place and leave it in place.” KHT will have auditions for its entire 2018 season at its new space, 980 Chemawa Rd. NE, on Thursday, Jan. 25 at 6-8 p.m. and Saturday, Jan. 27 from 12-3 p.m. The company is opening the season with The Brother's Grim Spectaculathon, a one-act readers theatre in which two narrators attempt to recreate all 209 of the fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm in a wild, fast-paced extravaganza. To make it more diffi cult, they combine them into one gigantic fable using Rapunzel, Rumpelstiltskin, Hansel and Gretel, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella and other more obscure stories like Lean Lisa and The Devil's Keizer Homegrown Theater will make its permanent home up- stairs in the newly-renamed Keizer Cultural Center on Chema- wa Road Northeast. Grandmother. “It's insanely funny. It really is,” Baker said. “If people really want to do something truly absurd and ridiculous. That's what the Spectaculathon is. It is very tongue-in-cheek, very irreverent.” The Brother's Grim Cinema greenlit at Keizer Station PARK WAZKWAY DENNIS RAY AVE NE Please see CINEMA, Page A8 Please see CITIZEN, Page A9 N IZE R S TA TIO N DR HAVE ZOCK master plan at Keizer Sta- tion allowing for the new building. In November 2017, the proposed design was unveiled at a meeting of the Keizer Planning Com- mission and waivers were approved for fewer windows than would otherwise have been required. The city will begin col- NE lecting rent on the prop- erty – $12,260 per month, or $142,120 annually – 90 days after the theater opens or beginning March 1, 2019. Rent will increase two percent per year with a “look back” every 10 years to adjust up or down based on the Consumer Price In- dex. Merkley, Schrader fi nd narrow paths for progress after 2017 By ERIC A. HOWALD Of the Keizertimes Sen. Jeff Merkley and Rep. Kurt Schrader sat down with members of the media for a brief question-and-answer session before taking the fl oor for a town hall at Claggett Creek Middle School on Sat- urday, Jan. 13. Despite short time, the congressmen fi elded a num- ber of questions on a number of topics facing Oregon and the nation. The pair started by talking about the next steps in an ef- fort to stop the repeal of net neutrality, rules that prevent internet service providers from throttling internet speeds and charging premiums for faster service. In December, the Federal Communications Commission voted along par- ty lines to repeal net neutrality PAGE A3 First Citizen to be named Saturday Construction of the the- ater will require a new, sig- naled intersection on Keizer Station Boulevard, that proj- ect was already in the works as part of a deal with the Salem-Keizer Transit Dis- trict but will likely be fast- tracked now that the theater is imminent. KE THEATER 2,000 trees removed Please see HOME, Page A8 The Keizer Chamber of Commerce is getting geared up for a party Saturday, Jan. 20. Tickets are now on sale for the upcoming First Citizen & Awards Banquet sponsored by the Keizer Chamber of Com- merce. Ticket cost is $55 for individuals. The night begins at 6 p.m. To purchase tickets, go to www.keizerchamber.com. In addition to naming the city’s new First Citizen, awards are presented for Merchant of the Year, Service to Educa- tion and a President’s Award goes to a person selected by the outgoing president of the Chamber board of directors. The Keizer Civic Center, 930 Chemawa Road N.E., will host the event. BZ VD McZEOD ZN NE By ERIC A. HOWALD Of the Keizertimes Keizer is getting a movie theater. At its meeting Tuesday, Jan. 16, the Keizer City Council authorized City Manager Chris Eppley to sign a lease for a site in Keizer Station with the owner of Keizer Cinema 9 LLC, Charles Na- kvasil. The site is located across from the Transit Center on Keizer Station Boulevard Northeast and the lease will net the city nearly $150,000 annually over at least the next 50 years. The cinema will have the option to extend the lease for up to 99 years. Construction is expected to begin soon with an open- ing in the fall or winter. Keizer Cinema 9 will be a fi rst-run theater with nine screens offering beer, liquor, wine and food. In October 2016, Nakva- sil approached the city about leasing the land through a broker, Pate Retail Proper- ties. In July 2017, Keizer made adjustments to the Spectaculathon will open at the Cherry Blossom Theatre Festival on March 10 at the World Beat Gallery in downtown Salem and then move to the new Keizer space the following two weekends, March 16-18 and 23-25. PAGE A11 despite out- pourings of opposition. Members of the U.S. Senate are planning to put the issue to a Con- g ressional Review Act (CRA) vote that might stop the re- peal. The Congressio- nal Review A. Howald Act allows ABOVE: Sen. Jeff Merkley speaks with constituents as a town hall meeting disperses KEIZERTIMES/Eric at Claggett Creek Middle Congress an School. RIGHT: Rep. Kurt Schrader talks with another group of constituents. expedited way to over- place under President Barack it has to be put on the Fed- offi ce received were 100-to-1 rule a regulation. It’s also the Obama. eral Registry. I am not sure (against the repeal) and noth- same tactic the Trump Ad- “We already have enough of the timing of that, but my ing has 100-to-1 support. It’s ministration and Republican- co-sponsors to force a vote impression is that is a couple the one issue it seems like ev- controlled Congress have used on the fl oor as soon as it goes of months before it happens,” erybody agrees on.” to kill many regulations put in through all the hoops. I think Merkley said. “Phone calls my Please see NARROW, Page A9 Mastering the cube PAGE A4 New K9 officer