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About The Siuslaw news. (Florence, Lane County, Or.) 1960-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 31, 2015)
THESIUSLAWNEWS . COM ❘ / SIUSLAWNEWS ❘ @ SIUSLAWNEWS SATURDAY EDITION ❘ OCTOBER 31, 2015 ❘ $1.00 VIKS LOSE TO LIONS SPORTS — B SERVING WESTERN LANE COUNTY SINCE 1890 FLORENCE, OREGON Ghouls, goblins and terrifying decorations bring Florence into the holiday spirit Nonprofit heads into its busiest season debt free, but still in need of help JACK DAVIS/SIUSLAW NEWS Siuslaw Outreach Services burns its mortgage after becoming debt free. B Y J ACK D AVIS Siuslaw News ortunately for Siuslaw Outreach Services (SOS), Lane County lifted its burn ban in time for the nonprofit organization to hold a “Burn the Mortgage” party last Wednesday. SOS Executive Director David Wiegan oversaw the Oct. 28 gala event, complete with apple cider “bubbly.” “When we started doing the planning for our annual Soiree fundraiser last spring, we wanted to have a theme,” Wiegan explained. “The theme for this year was to ‘burn the mortgage.’ It really helps the fundraising when you have a specific goal.” The third annual SOS Soiree was held Oct. 4 at Homegrown Public House and attracted more than 60 participants. “We were very fortunate in that we had some very generous donations come in,” Wiegan said. “We were able to raise a total of $26,353. Our mortgage balance was approximately $23,400. “We were able to go into Oregon Pacific Bank and pay it off.” The original mortgage was dated March 14, 1994, and was for $153,000. Shawn Murray, SOS board president at that time, signed it. “We are very happy to pay it off,” Wiegan said. “We are now debt free. For any nonprofit organization, it is always a very desirable goal to be debt free. Inevitably there are going to be lean times. The inevitable rain will fall.” SOS is a Florence-based nonprofit organ- ization that helps individuals and families with domestic violence and sexual assault advocacy services, housing, utility and other assistance programs, prescription drug assistance, shower and laundry vouchers, emergency shelter transportation vouchers and special veteran voucher programs. According to Wiegan, in the past 12 months SOS has given assistance to 2,103 unduplicated recipients. Of this number, more than 500 were self-reported as home- less. SOS purchased and distributed 108 sleep- ing bags, 93 tents and 20 tarps during this time. “These were just the ones we purchased,” Wiegan said. “Many more were donated and distributed.” F PHOTOS BY JACK DAVIS AND CHANTELLE MEYER/SIUSLAW NEWS F lorence has been buzzing this past week with things that go bump in the night, as the town began to celebrate Halloween early. Clockwise from top left: Scary decorations line a house’s driveway north of town off Highway 101; a dragon sits atop Premier Landscaping; employees at St. Vinnie’s get into the holiday spirit; Scare-CROW volunteers prepare to scare in the funhouse; Siuslaw Elementary School Vice-Principal Andy Marohl dresses as a vampire; Driftwood Shores’ Surfside Restaurant displays one of the pumpkins created for the resort’s annual Employee Pumpkin Carving Contest; and visitors wait to enter the Scare-CROW haunted maze TO PHO ESY URT CO featuring youth actors as monsters. S ELLER ’ S MARKET REPORTED IN Appraiser notes area’s highest volume of home sales since before 2005 B Y C HANTELLE M EYER Siuslaw News INSIDE The Florence-area hous- ing market is seeing an increase in sales, according to a report by state-certified residential appraiser Tawfik Ahdab. Ahdab’s report on the third quarter of the 2015 market was discussed at Classifieds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B9 Coastal Events . . . . . . . . . . A10 Courts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A2 Opinion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A4 last week’s Florence City Council meeting. “This last quarter that wrapped up was the highest sales volume of residential home sales for the Florence area since pre-2005,” said Florence Planning Director Wendy FarleyCampbell. The report gave quarter- Religion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A5 SideShow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B8 Sports . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B Word on the Street . . . . . . . A7 THIS WEEK ’ S F LORENCE ly market data on single- family residential sales, such as volume of houses available, days houses are for sale and average and median bought price. It also included the num- ber of pending sales that did not close. “It’s possible that closed sales in 2015 could reach a level not seen since 11 or 12 years ago. The mar- ket expansion is therefore accelerating,” Ahdab said. Florence City Manager Erin Reynolds said, “We just wanted to highlight See MARKET 7A TODAY SUNDAY MONDAY TUESDAY 61 59 58 49 57 47 56 46 WEATHER Full Forecast, A3 S IUSLAW N EWS 125 TH Y EAR ❘ I SSUE N O . 87 C OPYRIGHT 2015 See SOS 7A CYAN MAGENTA YELLOW BLACK SOS burns mortgage
