Keizertimes., March 29, 2019, Image 1

SEE PG A2
SINCE 1979 • VOLUME 40, NO. 26
SECTION A
MARCH 29, 2019
$1.00
Gubser upgrade starts
$
5.5 million project adds cafeteria
KEIZERTIMES/Matt Rawlings
From left: Keizer Mayor Cathy Clark. Gubser teacher Carly Justino, Gubser students
Colin Williams and Marin Williams, and superintendent Christy Perry pose with their
shovels after breaking ground at Gubser Elementary.
“This ground breaking today
BY MATT RAWLINGS
really represents the start of
Of the Keizertimes
The expansion at Gubser important improvements, not just
Elementary kicked off on the here at Gubser, but throughout our
morning of Friday, March 22 whole school district,” said Chuck
with an offi cial groundbreaking Lee, who is the Board Director for
ceremony to signal the start of Zone 6 on the Salem-Keizer Public
School Board
construction.
of Education.
Gubser is
“…the impact to the
“Not
only
one of fi ve
is
this
so
Salem-Keizer
instructional day
signifi cant for
schools begin-
should be minimal.”
our students,
ning construc-
but it changes
tion under the
— Karma Krause,
the economic
2018
bond
Salem-Keizer School District
landscape of
program.
Keizer.”
The $619.7
Gubser was built in 1976
million bond is the largest ever
in the state of Oregon — the without a cafeteria or a full-sized
expansion at Gubser will cost kitchen. Originally designed for
467 students, the school is currently
around $5.5 million.
School board members, local serving 592 students — with stable
offi cials, school staff and community enrollment projected through 2025.
With three new classrooms
supporters gathered under the
outdoor covered area at the Gubser
Please see GUBSER, Page A7
to celebrate the project.
Law, lobbyists in opposition
to manufactured home owners
By ERIC A. HOWALD
Of the Keizertimes
The owners of homes in
Wildwood Mobile Villa, a
manufactured home park in
northwest Keizer are feeling
the pinch of rent burdens, but
it’s not the only way residents
feel they’ve been squeezed –
even when they’ve tried to
take action that might alleviate
the pain.
“We tried to purchase
the park from [a previous
owner], we sent a letter using
Chapter 90 and, because of
the infl uence of MHCO, she
sold it to another owner who
fl ipped it and we tried to buy
it off of him,” said one resident
of the park for more than a
decade.
Residents have asked that
Keizertimes not use their
names in our coverage of their
concerns out of concern of
reprisal by the current owner
of the park.
Chapter 90 is part of the
Oregon revised statues that
lays out the responsibilities of
both owners and tenants at
Please see OWNERS, Page A7
PAGE A14
Keizer
at least
500
acres
PFLAG
celebration
PAGE A6
short of
growth
space
start thinking about what it
would mean when I brought
him home to Keizer and
By ERIC A. HOWALD
Of the Keizertimes
Keizer will come up short
of the space it needs to ab-
sorb expected growth over
the next 20 years, by at least
500 acres.
The news was delivered
by Bob Parker, a project di-
rector at ECONorthwest, at
a meeting of the city’s Hous-
ing Needs and Buildable
Lands Inventory Task Force
Monday, March 25.
The projection also takes
into account a substantial re-
duction in the estimate of va-
cant and redevelopable land.
At a February meeting the
task force gave a preliminary
estimate of 450 available acres
to grow or redevelop. After
removing areas constrained
by fl ood plains and other ele-
ments, the number shrunk to
250 acres, Parker said.
During the next two de-
cades, Keizer is expecting al-
most 10,000 people to move
into the city. Accounting for
the average size of a house-
hold, roughly 2.7 people, that
means the city would need
about 3,650 new dwelling
units (single-family residenc-
es, duplexes, apartments, etc.).
Keeping pace with expect-
ed growth means enticing
developers to construct 191
new dwellings per year be-
tween now and 2039, and the
city has never reached num-
bers close to that.
“Between 2000 and the
third quarter of 2018, Keizer
only had 1,800 new dwelling
units constructed,” Parker said.
Please see BOOK, Page A8
Please see GROWTH, Page A7
KEIZERTIMES/File photo
Residents at Wildwood Mobile Villa are hoping to fi ght back against rent increases.
A call for fellow sojourners
McNary grad’s fi rst book is
deep dive into racial justice
By ERIC A. HOWALD
Of the Keizertimes
Cara Meredith’s journey
from Keizer led her into the
arms of the man she loves and
then into confrontation with
her own “colorblind” view of
the world.
“I think I've gotten a lot
wrong. Sometimes I think my
book is what not to do when
it comes to engaging with
conversations of race,” said
Meredith.
In February, the 1997
McNary High School graduate,
McNary
honors Hall
of Famers
writer and motivational speaker,
celebrated the release of The
Color of Life: A Journey Toward
Love and Racial Justice. The book
is a meditation on faith, her role
as a mother to two interracial
boys and wife to a man whose
legacy includes a prominence
in the Civil Rights movement.
Meredith (nee MacDonald)
met her now husband, James
Henry Meredith, through
an online dating site, but the
notion that her whiteness and
his blackness would be a barrier
never crossed her mind.
Submitted
Cara Meridith
“I had dated other men of
color but, when James and
I got serious, we had to
Local duo
arrested
PAGE A5
Athlete
of the Week
PAGE A11