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About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 31, 2017)
Page 8A OFF PAGE ONE East Oregonian Thursday, August 31, 2017 NEAL: Facility will serve more than 80 children TAXES: Error discovered during an audit of fi nances conducted in early 2017 Continued from 1A the Port of Morrow manager, are the center’s namesakes, honored for their role in the project’s planning and execu- tion. Neal proposed the idea of an early learning center to IMESD superintendent Mark Mulvihill in 2015, and the two were able to pull in other entities to partner with them. The center will be run by Umatilla-Morrow Head Start, and will have three classrooms for those students. There will also be a classroom for IMESD’s Early Interven- tion, Early Childhood Special Education program, which identifi es students who need special services at an early age. Jason Schoenfelder, a Morrow County resident, said he was excited to have his three year-old daughter, Grace, attend the school starting next week. “She was part of the IMESD early childhood development (program) in Hermiston,” Schoenfelder said. He also said he was happy with the facility. “The fact that it’s preschool, and the early child- hood development services in one place,” he said. Angie Hasbell has been a Umatilla-Morrow Head Start teacher for 14 years, and previously taught Head Start at Sam Boardman Elementary School. She will now teach at the new center. Continued from 1A Staff photo by E.J. Harris Gary and Kathy Neal speak before a ribbon cutting ceremony for the Neal Early Learning Center on Wednesday in Boardman. “The facility is beautiful,” she said. “I think it will really address the kids’ needs.” She said some of the perks of the facility included a bath- room in the classroom, as well as access to a nice outdoor play area. She added that at Sam Boardman, she was the only Head Start teacher. “It will be nice to have more to collaborate with,” she said. The facility will serve more than 80 three-to-fi ve year-olds. But next door, at the Workforce Training Center, there will be an area for infants and toddlers, which will be available 10 hours a day for working families. Neal said she initially envisioned the center in the same building as the Work- force Training program, so that children could learn as their parents were learning. While that didn’t happen, the two facilities are next door to each other. Neal said she couldn’t believe everything had come together so well. “It’s the most humbling thing in my life, but also the most proud,” she said. “We’re years out before we will know the actual difference it makes, but it will make an immediate difference in kids’ lives.” Neal, whose background is in real estate and banking, moved to the area in 1989 with her husband. “We saw the potential in this area,” she said. “We just knew it was going some- where.” She added, “everybody wants to make a difference in some way or another.” The facility will welcome students next week. HOUSING: More than 1,000 acres of buildable land Continued from 1A the fi re, working as a branch manager for Stearns Home Loans and developing a nine-lot housing subdivision near InterMountain Educa- tion Service District offi ces off Southgate. In the wake of the reces- sion, Galloway said Pend- leton had an excess of quali- fi ed buyers but a shortage of housing inventory. The problem could get more acute as millennials begin to look into purchasing property. “Seventy percent (of millennials) are living in a basement,” Galloway said. “They’re living with mom and dad.” The land With more than 1,000 acres of buildable land in Pendleton, especially in Southeast Pend- leton along Interstate 84 and the area surrounding Tutuilla Road, some landowners set up tables to solicit interest in their properties. The Rees family and Indian Hills Investment Co. together own more than 100 acres north of Interstate 84 and east of Highway 11. Community Development Director Tim Simons said a developer previously tried to build housing in the area in the 1970s before the project fell apart. Manholes and a rusty fi re hydrant are one of the few modern reminders the bare land was going to be devel- oped. The road that leads to the property, Southeast Kirk Avenue, would need to be reconfi gured to comply with an Oregon Department of Transportation rule that requires secondary streets be no closer than 1,000 feet to an offramp. Representing the owners, appraiser Jerry Imsland said engineering fi rm Anderson Perry & Associates was working on that issue. Across town, rancher Fritz Hill already has a master plan to turn 51 acres of his property north of town into a single- family housing development. Hill said the city needed to look into expanding its urban growth boundary so Pendleton could continue to grow to the north. “It’s just going to sit there and Pendleton is going to keep growing toward Pilot Rock and Rieth,” he said. Simons said that unless Pendleton started experi- encing 5 to 7 percent growth, it was unlikely that the state would approve an expansion of the urban growth boundary. The cost Trying to counter a long- standing narrative that the city’s fees are too onerous, Pendleton city staff shared the estimated cost of building and planning fees for a three-bed- room, two bedroom house. Their estimates showed Pendleton’s fees middling compared to other, simi- lar-sized Oregon cities. While Pendleton’s $5,495 in planning and building fees is almost $1,000 more than Hermiston and $1,600 more than La Grande, it was signifi cantly less than the city of Umatilla. Comparing Pendleton to Stanfi eld, Milton-Free- water, Bend, Central Point, Corvallis, Gresham, Forest Grove and Ontario, Pendleton had the second lowest fees for system development charges and water utility hook-ups. Regardless of planning and development fees, city offi cials have long acknowl- edged that Pendleton’s geography makes it harder to develop affordable housing. Pendleton’s pitch did land on a representative of at least one housing developer. Deborah Flagan, Hayden Homes’ vice president of community engagement, called Pendleton “progres- sive” for convening a housing conference. Based in Redmond, Flagan said Hayden Homes focuses on building work- force housing in “secondary” communities like Pendleton. The Hayden Homes website states that the company has built more than 14,000 homes in Oregon, Washington and Idaho. Flagan said she believes housing follows jobs and Pendleton is unique in that it has available employment. With more information about Pendleton in hand, Flagan said she’ll have to look at the fi nancial viability of developing in Pendleton as the next step. One of the keys, she said, will be fi guring out a way to build housing that can be sold at just under $200,000. ——— Contact Antonio Sierra at asierra@eastoregonian.com or 541-966-0836. FISH: Estimates suggest enough fi sh will return to sustain hatchery programs Continued from 1A which is just 30 percent of the most recent 10-year average. Despite the disappointing forecast, Jeff Yanke, ODFW district fi sh biologist in Enter- prise, is encouraging anglers not to panic. “Coupled with the right river conditions, even in a low run year, we can still have a worthwhile steelhead fi shery,” Yanke said. “Folks will just need to have a little more patience, and that is one quality steelhead anglers always bring to the river.” Oregon offi cials expect the reduced bag limits will be temporary, but mark a conser- vative start to the season. “It’s easy to get burned on a low return year like this if you overestimate,” Yanke said. “We want to manage (the fi shery) conservatively right off the bat.” So far, only 5 percent of the Grande Ronde and Imnaha steelhead have moved upstream of the Columbia River. Yanke said he should have a better idea of actual returns come October. Local guides and outfi tters are already feeling the effects of this year’s steelhead outlook. Grant Richie, who owns the Minam Store along Highway 82 in Wallowa County, said he is defi nitely seeing a lower rate of book- ings for guided raft trips this fall. Richie said he usually leads one, fi ve-day guided trip down the Wallowa and Grande Ronde rivers between Minam and Troy during the fall season, with about six to eight people per trip. This year, he said he is booking just two to four people per trip. One visitor who booked a year in advance called recently with concerns the entire river would be shut down, Richie said. “With all the bad reports this spring, we’re defi nitely seeing a lower rate of book- ings for this fall,” he said. Though Richie acknowl- edged the run is down, he said there are still steelhead to be caught. “There will be fi sh in the river,” he said. Yanke also reiterated that, though the bag limit for steelhead has been lowered, current estimates suggest enough fi sh will return to sustain their hatchery programs and provide enough fi sh for harvest. A one-fi sh limit simply prevents a situation where anglers would be forced to put back an injured fi sh, he added. ——— Contact George Plaven at gplaven@eastoregonian.com or 541-966-0825. the increase, but even more upset by the way the district approached it. “My parents have lived here for many years, and have a lot of questions,” said Sandra Alarcon. She asked the district how and why the error occurred, and what percentage of the payment was missed. She also asked why the message delivered to residents was so vague. “The implication was that people were not paying taxes,” Alarcon said. Rosa Holt, a Stanfi eld resident, noted that the message made it seem like the oversight was the fault of residents. “It made it seem like it was our responsibility, instead of taking responsi- bility as a governing body,” Holt said. “I’m under- paying, but I didn’t know I was underpaying. I think there needs to be some accountability and owner- ship. A lot is conveyed in the way you communicate.” Another audience member who declined to be named said the board should have informed people about the error as soon as they knew. “You found out in January and let us know in August?” she asked. Board members acknowledged that they should have done a better job communicating the information. They said they were directed by their auditing fi rm to let residents know in August, a few months before their property tax statements go out in October. An audience member said she would have liked to see the board give residents more notice, so they could have time to plan their budgets for the increase. “There are a lot of people on fi xed incomes,” she said. Residents will pay a 1.78 percent increase on their property taxes for the school bond for the next fi scal year. For the 2018- 2019 fi scal year, the board will assess the bond again. Superintendent Shelley Liscom said the reason for sending the an unoffi - cial-looking fl yer to citi- zens, instead of something on district letterhead, was that they didn’t want to give residents a false sense of how much they knew about specifi c tax bills. “We couldn’t answer how it was going to affect people specifi cally,” she said. “We were trying to stay out of that.” Those at the meeting said they understood the diffi cult spot the district was in, but encouraged them to send out another letter apologizing to citizens. “People are upset,” said Cecili Longhorn. “The worst thing is, I think it will affect us getting a new school bond. I would apolo- gize for how the last (letter) was worded.” Liscom had said in that letter to residents that the error was discovered during an audit of the 2015-2016 school year fi nances, which was conducted in early 2017. Liscom and business manager Kris James said last week that they did not know how the error originated. But James said the fi rm who did the audit, Pendleton-based Cockburn and McClintock, told the previous business manager more than once that there was a discrepancy between the amount needed to cover the bond, which expires in 2019, and the amount citi- zens were being charged. But James said the previous business manager did not convey that to the super- intendent, and that other employees of the district were not aware of the issue until early this year. - EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY - Administrative Support / Inside Sales Great work environment. Super awesome team. Good base pay PLUS commissions. Retirement plan. Weekends off. Interested? We are looking for a motivated, confident individual to join our team at East Oregonian in Pendleton. This full- time position will do inside sales and provide administrative support to the advertising director and publisher. No media or sales experience? No problem, as long as you understand the importance of great customer service, working hard and a desire to enjoy your job. Could this be you? Benefits include Paid Time Off (PTO) and 401(k)/Roth 401(k) retirement plan. Send resume and letter of interest to EO Media Group, PO Box 2048, Salem, OR 97308-2048 or e-mail hr@eomediagroup.com Come work with us! We are an awesome team. 3234 S.W. Nye Pendleton, OR Join us at 5 pm on August 31 st for our for our annual ROUND-UP BBQ! ROUND-UP QUEEN & COURT HAPPY CANYON PRINCESSES MAIN STREET COWBOYS SIDE SADDLERS GOOD FOOD GREAT ENTERTAINMENT WITH VENUES INSIDE AND OUT. Send resume and letter of interest to EO Media Group, PO Box 2048 • Salem, OR 97308-2048, by fax to 503-371-2935 or e-mail hr@eomediagroup.com Come work with us! We are an awesome team.
