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.
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