SINCE 1979 • VOLUME 39, NO. 42
SECTION A
JULY 20, 2018
$1.00
KLL walks off $ 13K in debt
City
council
shrugs
By ERIC A. HOWALD
Of the Keizertimes
Withholding nearly $30,000
in payments to Keizer Little
League complex proved to be
nearly a break-even proposition
for the organization running it
during a meeting of the Keizer
City Council July 16.
Two months ago, it was
revealed that Keizer Little
League (KLL), the organiza-
tion charged with the main-
tenance and management of
the park fi elds, kept $13,434
of concession sales it was con-
tractually obligated to reinvest
in the facility itself. During
the past eight weeks, the city’s
fi nance director assisted the
league president and secretary,
OWED
FORGIVEN
SLOT & TOURNAMENT FEES
$
15 , 0 3 0
FORGIVEN DEBT (
CONCESSION
REVENUE
)
13 , 4 3 4
$
CONCESSION REVENUE
$
TO PAY
13 , 4 3 4
TOTAL OWED
$
DELINQUENT SLOT FEES
28 , 4 6 4
Brad Arnsmeier and Lisa Buik,
respectively, with compiling
complete fi nancial data on the
group’s activities. When the re-
port was released last week, it
turned out KLL owed more
than double the initial amount.
KLL also kept $15,030 in slot
fees and tournament revenues
amassed in 2017. According
$
13 , 5 5 0
to the contract, those revenues
should also have been put into
the account of the park com-
plex.
Offering no apologies, Arn-
meier told city councilors that
the KLL board concluded that
a 50/50 sharing of concession
revenues was “an equitable split.
I hope that when we fi nish the
process tonight that you agree.”
Arnsmeier said he told City
Manager Chris Eppley in Janu-
ary of the plan to keep the con-
cession revenues while waiting
to see if the city would retroac-
tively amend the park manage-
ment contract to include con-
cession revenue sharing with
the management group.
Arnsmeier did relatively lit-
tle talking during the meeting,
but city staff made that easier.
Before getting into the detailed
review City Finance Direc-
tor Tim Wood heaped effusive
praise on Arnsmeier and Buik.
Eppley also stepped in to de-
fend the KLL organization.
“When we fi rst started
looking at this, I asked (Wood
and City Attorney Shannon
Johnson) the ugly question:
does anyone think that KLL
was embezzling money?” said
Eppley. “Tim was able to say,
‘no.’ None of us believed that
it was the case. This is an issue
of transitory boards who are
not professional bookkeepers.
If kids weren’t playing baseball
and the fi elds weren’t in great
shape, I would be a lot more
concerned.”
In exchange for the retro-
active change to the contract
splitting concession sales and
permitting the managing or-
ganization to keep tournament
Vandals to
Junior
Olympics
PAGE B1
Please see KLL, Page A7
‘It’s the hardest,
best thing
we’ve ever done’
ONE YEAR GONE
KEIZERTIMES/Derek Wiley
Lou Sumetz, left, with Cynthia Martinez Perez's mother Angelica and step father Cesar
Castillo, talks about their faith during the last year at a candlelight vigil on Monday, July 16.
Vigil gathers community to
support search for mother
By DEREK WILEY
Of the Keizertimes
One year after Cynthia Martinez Perez
of Woodburn went missing from a Keizer
night club, family friends and complete
strangers gathered on Monday, July 16 at
Chalmers Jones Park for a candlelight vigil.
“She’s always in our hearts and minds and
prayers,” said Angelica Castillo, Cynthia’s
mother. “We miss her, we love her, we need
her back. We want to keep Cynthia’s name
going to where she does not get forgotten
and knows how much we love her.”
The vigil was planned by a Keizer
woman who never met Martinez Perez but
related to her story.
“I live in Keizer and I’m a single mom
of three,” Rebecca said. “I can’t imagine
my three children laying their head (down)
every night not knowing where I was. I want
to give her children those answers. I want
to fi nd their mother and what happened
to her. I’m her voice. She’s still out there
somewhere and we need to let her children
know where she is.”
Martinez Perez’s family and close friends
were blown away by the comfort they’ve
received from strangers like Rebecca.
“I just really want to thank the
community for coming together and
doing all of this for people that you guys
didn’t even know to begin with,” Cielo
Larios said. “I would like to thank the
Hispanic community as well, just thousands
of people have come together with
Please see GONE, Page A6
By CASEY
CHAFFIN
Keizertimes Intern
Jessica Ratliff had
fi ve kids in her home:
four of her own, and
one foster baby. Then
The foster care system in Marion
a Department of Hu-
County is struggling to meet demand.
man Services (DHS)
This is the fourth part of a
worker called: Can you
continuing series in the Keizertimes
take a foster sibling set,
investigating the state of local
two kids under the age
foster care and shedding light on
of two?
ways to get involved.
“How many peo-
Check back next week for
ple have you called?”
another installment.
Ratliff asked.
Twenty-four people.
no one wants to go get in-
Ratliff was the twenty-
volved with it. When all you
fi fth.
Ratliff said yes, for the see in the headlines around it
are scandals and abuse, people
meantime.
“When you tell me you’ve don’t want to sign up and do
called 24 other homes, I can that,” Ratliff said. But that’s
do it, but I can’t do it for not the mindset the commu-
long,” she said. Foster families nity needs.
“If people don’t like what
often have to provide short-
term care while DHS work- they see on TV about fos-
ers fi nd suitable long-term ter homes, they need to step
placements, often outside of up and be the good foster
Marion County. Ideally, there homes. We just need people
would be open foster homes to step into that role and give
available for immediate long- these little children what they
term care, but that’s just not need,” she said.
Ratliff and her husband
the case. There are too few
foster families and too many opened up their home to
foster youth just under four
kids in foster care.
Foster parents usually show years ago and have generally
up in the news for the wrong fostered kids under the age of
reasons: abuse, mismanage- four. They’ve taken in about
ment of the foster stipend, and eight long-term placements
so forth. But the cameras don’t and many more short-term
show up to document the fos- placements over that time.
“It’s the hardest, best thing
ter parents working hard and
doing the best they can for the we’ve ever done,” she said.
But foster parenting isn’t a
kids that come into their care.
“I think because there’s task to be taken on lightly. Foster
such negativity in the press Please see FOSTER, Page A10
around foster care lately that
Solar
greenhouse?
PAGE A2
Roberson
retires
PAGE A3
Council requests halt to recreational shooting
By ERIC A. HOWALD
Of the Keizertimes
The largest contingent
yet of west Keizer neighbors
turned out at the Keizer City
Council meeting Monday, July
16, to request a halt to recre-
ational shooting at a quarry in
West Salem.
About 40 neighbors were
in attendance while about a
half-dozen pleaded with city
councilors to do something.
For the fi rst time, Sheryl
Bauer, who was in her kitch-
en on June 2 when a bullet
from the quarry penetrated
her home exterior walls and
stopped two feet away from
her, offered public comment
on the incident.
Bauer was holding back
tears as she spoke, saying,
“We’re are doing this for our-
selves, but we are also doing
this for our neighbors. We
got to know them a lot faster
than we expected and they are
wonderful, wonderful people
and everybody is scared to
death.”
Bauer and her husband,
Tom, moved to their home
on Raphael Drive North not
long before the bullet came
through the wall.
Tom added the couple was
most fearful for the lives of
their grandchildren who have
been lifted up and set on the
File
Please see SHOOT, Page A7
This quarry across the Willamette River in Polk Country is
where shots are originating from.
7-on-7
football
PAGE B1