PAGE A4, KEIZERTIMES, JANUARY 3, 2020
Tickets on sale for
First Citizen banquet
Opinion
Fasten your seatbelts
Fasten you seatbelts, 2020 could
prove to be a bumpy time on all
fronts.
No one should expect a wave of
civility to wash over the country
anytime in the next 12
months.
Not one vote has been
taken in the presidential
nominating races and the
Democratic candidates
are already at each oth-
er. The more they attack
each other’s positions the
more likely that will turn
off many voters and come Novem-
ber a majority may decide to stick
with what they have.
At the end of 2019 there were not
one, but two, attacks on religion: the
shooter at the church in White Set-
tlement, Texas, that killed two, and
the machete attack at a rabbi’s New
York home in the middle of a Ha-
nukkah celebration.
In a country divided by ideology,
culture and religious beliefs, is there
any reason to believe such attacks
won’t be in the news again in 2020?
Closer to home, many people are
upset over laws that took
effect on January 1. The
plastic shopping bag ban
has many up in arms,
wondering how such
a law came to be. The
short answer is: elections
have consequences.
Many
households
have benefi ted from the
economic boom the country is ex-
periencing; the stock and bond mar-
kets are in record territory and many
experts predict a better year ahead.
Unfortunately a large portion of the
nation’s populace is not sharing in
the good times. Too many people are
homeless or have been affected by
the opioid crisis.
The world may seem to be spin-
zaitz
writes
ning out of control but if it doesn’t
affect us personally it is hard to get
too worked up over how Brexit will
change Europe or how the continu-
ing confl icts in the Middle East will
play out in 2020.
But there is reason, also, to be op-
timistic about this year. Unemploy-
ment is very low; wages, fi nally, are
beginning to rise. In eight months
we can watch young athletes achieve
greatness at the Tokyo Olympics.
Students will graduate and enter
the work force. New families will
be started. Locally, longtime family
businesses continue to thrive, pre-
paring to pass the reins to the next
generation.
The new year can prove to be very
bumpy but with the fortitude Amer-
icans always show, we can have the
government, the laws and the culture
we want. All it takes is patience and
tolerance, that’s not too much to ask.
Is it?
—LAZ
Our family’s 12 days of Christmas
By CHRISTIANA KENNEDY
In response to Andrew Jackson’s
December 20 column, A wish list for
Keizer, we folks here in the Kenne-
dy household have come
up with our wish list for
Keizer as well.
VA benefi ts offi ce:
A place where retired
and honorably discharged
military veterans can pro-
cess paperwork and have
advocates working for
them, without having to
drive to Portland. This facility does
not have to be a large facility.
Sweet Tomatoes restaurant:
Soup, salad and fresh baked goods.
Bath and Body Works store (in
Keizer Station, perhaps!)
Movie theatre
Momiji’s: We are just outside of
the delivery zone and I am not try-
ing to offend anyone, but the sushi
in Keizer is not up to par.
Sam’s Club: Yes Costco’s deals
and products are great, however, lo-
cation, location, location. Did you
know Virginia and Oregon are the
only states that do not
have a Sam’s Club? I
advocate for a ware-
house store that has a
better location, same
great deals, but a frac-
tion of the crowds.
Roller
skating
rink: Not everyone
wants to go to The
Hoop.That one is brought to you
by our 14 year-old daughter.
Outdoor public swimming
pool
Wings restaurant: That does
not promote boobs and skimpy
clothes on the women servers. Fam-
ily friendly!
Wendy’s fast food restaurant
Updated bowling alley: 1964
called and wants all their stuff back!
guest
column
Seriously—when the ceiling tiles
are being replaced by turkey roasting
pans to catch the dripping water, it’s
time to upgrade.
Last but certainly not least...
An aquarium! Am I reaching for
the stars on this one? Yes. But real-
ly? Why do we have to drive to the
coast to see all the beautiful wonders
of the ocean when the ocean can be
brought to us? Families and people
of all ages would be able to have a
fun activity to participate in during
all the seasons, and without having
to make a drive outside of Keizer.
There’s plenty of untouched land in
the area to make this dream a reality.
We hope you like our ideas. It is
refreshing to know our family is not
alone in wanting more convenient
and fun facilities within our Keizer
community.
(Christiana Kennedy is a Keizer
mom, hard worker, and volunteer.)
Service to Education and a Presi-
dent’s Award goes to a person se-
lected by the outgoing president
of the Chamber board of direc-
tors.
The Keizer Civic Center, 930
Chemawa Road N.E., will host
the event.
In 2019, Vicki Jackson was
honored as the Keizer First Citi-
zen, Kyle Juran was named Mer-
chant of the Year, Brian Aicher was
picked for the Service to Educa-
tion Award and Larry Schmidgall
received the President’s Award.
One of the Keizer Chamber of
Commerce’s biggest parties of the
year is Saturday, Jan. 18.
Tickets are now on sale for the
upcoming First Citizen & Awards
Banquet sponsored by the Keizer
Chamber of Commerce. Ticket
cost is $55 for individuals or $400
for table sponsorship. 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 pre-
sented for Merchant of the Year,
cuffed
in Keizer
Timothy Lane
Blankenship
Arrested Dec. 17 for:
Hit-and-run
Previous convictions:
More than a decade old
Donald Bradley
Biehn
Arrested Dec. 18 for:
Assault
Pending charges:
Criminal mistreatment,
assault
Darryl Dean
Gibson
Arrested Dec. 25
for:
Interfering with a
police offi cer
Other pending
charges:
Menacing, unlawful
use of a weapon,
interfering with a
police offi cer
Marcel Jose Ojeda
Arrested Dec. 18 for:
Disorderly conduct
Pending charges:
Mail theft, interfering with
a police offi cer
A resolution fulfilled
By ERIC A. HOWALD
Every year I promise myself that
I will look back on what was ac-
complished with a
somewhat less critical
eye than I generally ap-
proach everything else.
It’s a year’s end resolu-
tion that I fail at regu-
larly.
Two experiences in
the past few months
have made the self-imposed task
more diffi cult to ignore.
The fi rst came came in Septem-
ber. After several months of talking
with local residents of manufac-
tured home parks about their vary-
ing hardships, I was poring over a
trove of documented problems at a
Keizer park with a pair of women.
One of them began questioning the
point of trying to hold the property
owner to account given a history of
apathy.
“This is different,” the other res-
ident told her. “Now there’s some-
one listening to us.”
A few days after reporting on the
problems, the owner sent out doz-
ens of contractors to fi x the prob-
lems. Despite the positive outcome,
it’s that small exchange between
two people unaccustomed to being
heard that keeps replaying over and
over in my head.
A month later, I was taking a
break between interviews and sit-
ting under a tree providing shelter
from a light rain when
a large passenger van
pulled into the long
driveway and headed in
my direction.
As the driver ap-
proached, I realized I
recognized him. My eyes
got wide and a smile
broke even wider across my face.
Wiz pulled up right next to me and
hopped out of the driver’s seat.
Wiz and I met in October 2016
when he and some of his friends
were rousted from a growing home-
less encampment under the awning
of the Roths building. At the time,
it was nothing more than an emp-
ty shell. I asked if anyone wanted to
be a voice for the people who were
being displaced and Wiz offered to
share his story.
In the three years since, Wiz and
I became friends. He drops by the
offi ce regularly to check in or when
he needs to share some of the bur-
den of what he’s seen living in the
streets. I’ve tried to be his Jiminy
Cricket, a constant voice urging
him to make contact with those that
could help him put a roof over his
head. We hug whenever he departs
and I worry when the absences
moments
of
lucidity
grow longer than usual.
Wiz told me getting the van was
a possibility, but I’ve seen enough
sky-high goals – Wiz’s, others’, my
own – dissipate into the ether to
deter continued blind faith. I only
realized in retrospect how hard he’d
been working toward that moment.
Earlier this year, he quit drinking
on his own. He told me about it 70
days in. He worked with the courts
to get his license back.
I have no doubt that Wiz pulled
into the parking lot thinking he’d
found another lost soul, sitting alone
and wishing for invisibility, that he
could use his new wheels to help.
The sight of him driving up in the
van was redemptive.
Once Wiz was out of the van, we
hugged and shouted at each other
over the blaring stereo system and
hugged again and shouted some
more. Somewhere in the midst
of the euphoria, Wiz said, “If you
hadn’t seen me that day, listened …”
He trailed off because my body
language shifted. My natural reac-
tion to this type of gratitude is – al-
ways – defl ect, defl ect, defl ect.
To Wiz, it hadn’t mattered so
much that I’d written about him in
the paper, it was the too-often un-
derrated acts of seeing and listening
that he saw as having a throughline
to the moments we shared outside
his van three years later.
This is what seeing and listening
accomplished in the past year: they
helped make the world of dozens
of people in a manufactured home
park a little bit safer and – along
with some incredible kindness on
the part of others – helped another
man kick the bottle and put a roof,
of a sort, over his head.
All it took was a willingness to
see and a humble ear.
Kira Bovee
Victoria Kuzmenko
Arrested Dec. 20 for:
Assault
Previous convictions:
None
Arrested Dec. 26
for:
Criminal mischief
Other pending
charges:
Assault, theft
Brent Nasset
Arrested Dec. 20 for:
Disorderly conduct
Previous convictions:
DUII, theft
William James
Gentry
Arrested Dec. 28
for:
Parole violation
Manuel Campos
Arrested Dec. 21 for:
Assault, DUII, reckless
endangering
Previous
convictions:
Menacing, assault,
strangulation
Pending charges:
Assault, criminal mischief
Dylan Alexander
Jeffus
Arrested Dec. 22 for:
Reckless endangering
Pending charges:
Theft, resisting arrest,
burglary
Steven Wayne
DeVault
Arrested Dec. 28
for:
Theft
Previous
convictions:
Burglary, theft,
assault
(Eric A. Howald is the managing
editor of the Keizertimes.)
obituaries
letter
Keizertimes
Wheatland Publishing Corp. • 142 Chemawa Road N. • Keizer, Oregon 97303
phone: 503.390.1051 • web: www.keizertimes.com • email: kt@keizertimes.com
EDITOR & PUBLISHER
Lyndon Zaitz
publisher@keizertimes.com
2019-2020 President
Oregon Newspaper Publishers
Association
POSTMASTER
Send address changes to:
Keizertimes Circulation
142 Chemawa Road N.
Keizer, OR 97303
Periodical postage paid at Salem, Oregon
SUBSCRIPTIONS
One year:
$35 in Marion County,
$43 outside Marion County,
$55 outside Oregon
PUBLISHED EVERY FRIDAY
Publication No: USPS 679-430
Mitigate
climate change
To the Editor:
Science says: The two most effec-
tive things we human individuals can
do to mitigate climate change are,
(1) drive less and, (2) stop eating red
meat.
Something to think about while
you’re sucking exhaust fumes in the
In-N-Out que waiting to order a
double dead cow.
Just sayin’.
Martin Doerfl er
Keizer
Submit an obituary through our website at keizertimes.com
or send an email to: editor@keizertimes.com
Jill Marie Poole
July 8, 1946 – December 25, 2019
Jill Marie Poole, age 73, of
Keizer, Ore. passed away on
Wednesday, Dec. 25, 2019. She
was born on July 8, 1946, in
Salem, Ore., to Durward and
Bethel Steinke.
Jill graduated
from
North
Salem
High
School in 1964.
She retired after
working 30 years
for the State of
J. Poole
Oregon.
Jill married Ronald E Poole on
Aug. 15, 1997.
She is survived by her husband
Ronald Poole; children: Troy
Wilson and Torri Ford (Wilson);
four
grandchildren:
Ashley
Earls, Alisa Earls, Lillian Wilson
and Jordan Wilson; one great-
grandchild: Madysin Earls.
A Memorial Service will
be held on Jan. 3 at 11 a.m. at
Keizer Funeral Chapel in Keizer.
Celebration of Life will follow at
Town & Country Bowl.