6 A
SIUSLAW NEWS ❚ SATURDAY, OCTOBER 7, 2017
S CARE -CROW H AUNTED M AZE OPENS FOUR NIGHTS OF ‘N IGHTMARES ’
Children’s Repertory of
Oregon Workshop (CROW) is
searching for more help in fin-
ishing renovations to its
Center for the Performing
Arts.
The incomplete area marks
about a third of the unique per-
forming arts educational
space, and is comprised of a
planned dressing room for
boys and girls, workshop for
scenic artistry, green room and
cast member restroom.
$20,000 in upgrades are still
needed to finalize the plumb-
Millennials
from 1A
but the lack of available gather-
ing places can be isolating.
“I think one of the barriers in
meeting people is the fact that,
after work, there isn’t much
opportunity to really meet any-
one. Unless I go to a restaurant
or a bar, there aren’t any other
places where I could meet any-
body. I could just go to the gym
and meet people there, but it’s
weird to make friends at a
gym,” he said. “I think it’s that
lack of a space where there’s a
chance that a young person will
walk in that’s an issue.”
Geraldine Lucio, 30, didn’t
know where to find people her
own age when she moved to
Florence three years ago, either.
In fact, she still doesn’t. When
asked how many millennials
were in Florence, she said, “I
don’t know, 20 or 30?”
That’s not to say Lucio does-
n’t have friends. As owner of
the Old Town Barbershop, she
has plenty of people coming
through her doors, and she vol-
unteers with multiple organiza-
tions like the Elks.
“But I feel all my friends are
older than 50,” she said. “I do
have a little group of who are in
their mid-20s to early 30s, but I
mainly hang out with older peo-
ple.”
It’s not that Lucio or Lokic
are averse to befriending differ-
ent generations.
“I feel Florence is different
and unique because all the cool
older people migrated here,”
Lucio said. “I guess it’s kind of
weird, but I like it. It’s not like I
went looking for 70-year-old
friends, it’s just how it hap-
pened. My oldest friend is 97.
No prejudice towards the ages.”
But Lucio understands how a
new person coming into town
can have difficulty finding peo-
ple, particularly if they’re under
50.
When asked to give advice to
Lokic, Lucio said, “Go sit at the
bar and make friends? I don’t
know. What else is there to do?
There’s not really much. You
have to find friends.”
Lokic isn’t desperate. He
knows that once he gets
involved with the community
through volunteer opportunities
and connections through work,
he’ll find people. As for now, he
finds himself going to Eugene
to hang out with college friends
on some weekends.
But that outlook may change,
particularly when it comes to
ing, electrical, drywall, floor-
ing and paint on the back sec-
tion of the facility.
CROW, a nonprofit organi-
zation, is dedicated to provid-
ing youth arts opportunities
and experiences that reach all
ages.
Through classes, camps,
workshops, an annual Haunted
maze, live theatrical presenta-
tions on the mainstage of
the Florence Events Center
and an annual community
holiday performance, CROW
looks to prove that the arts
dating.
“I’m sure the younger people
in my age group I’ve already
met already have a significant
other or are married,” he said.
“So, I think that’s a challenge. I
don’t know, it’d be nice to find
someone here. I’ll keep my eyes
open.”
Statistically, millennials are
putting off marriage at historic
rates. According to a 2014 Pew
Research Center study, only 26
percent of millennials aged 19
to 32 are married. For the
boomer generation, it was 48
percent.
Brynne Sapp, a 27-year-old
who grew up in Florence, mar-
ried when she was 19, but has
since divorced.
“I’m so glad I’m not there,
because even when I was mar-
ried it wasn’t the life that I
wanted,” she said. “Maybe it’s
all the options we have. Maybe
it’s having the world in our
pocket at all times and being
able to see what everybody else
is doing and seeing all the pos-
sibilities. All the endless possi-
bilities. I just don’t want to be
tied down.”
Of the millennials inter-
viewed for this article, only one
was married.
One Florence 20-something,
who preferred to remain anony-
mous, grew up in Florence and
isn’t having much luck when it
comes to finding a suitable part-
ner.
“Usually my relationships
start from long friends,” he said.
“Options are limited, so you get
what you can get. Romance is a
tough thing in Florence. Not
just the number of people, but
also limited interests and diver-
sity. For instance, women who
care about ATVing might not be
your type.”
So, he ends up going to
Eugene to find people.
“I’ve totally given up on
Florence, to be honest,” he said.
“If your article is titled ‘How to
Date in Florence,’ change it to
‘Don’t Do It.’”
He does admit that the major-
ity of people he’s tried to date
are people he grew up with. His
outlook could change if he were
to find transplants from other
states or cities; he would be
more amenable to staying, but
like Lokic, he has no idea where
to find them.
“For me, dating is the top
reason to leave,” he said.
Even if local millennials
were able to find people , where
to go on that first date is anoth-
er hurdle to conquer.
really do matter.
This fall, CROW will be
holding a variety of fundrais-
ers to meet their renovation
goal, along with funding year-
ly programming. Scare-
CROW, the annual haunted
maze, will have the terrifying
theme of “Nightmares.”
“Come see the CROW
Center transformed into a
frightening abyss of theatrical
scenarios that are sure to give
you a few nightmares of your
own,” says Heard.
The maze will be held the
While Lucio spends the
majority of her leisure time out-
doors, she did find some aspects
of the town lacking, particularly
compared to her previous city
of Austin, Texas.
“There was live music every-
where. I miss the fresh water
swimming holes there and out-
door volleyball,” she said.
It’s the live music she missed
the most, a sentiment shared by
almost all millennials inter-
viewed for this series.
Lucio brought up the
Florence Events Center (FEC)
as an example. She does attend
some of the shows, and made it
a point to say she fully support-
ed the venue, “But it’s hard for
me to go to the events center
because some of it is stale to
me,” she said.
Lucio attempted to offset this
by lending her barber shop out
to local acts that couldn’t be
found at the FEC, like a drag
show by local performer Fanny
Rugburn and a concert by local
band Speakerwave.
The purpose was to have an
open floor venue where people
could mingle and dance.
While many of her shows
were well attended, they took
Lucio a lot of work to set up.
Between her business and her
volunteerism, she had to give
up on the idea for the time
being.
“I’m on a ‘no’ binge right
now,” she said.
It’s not the first time a small
business attempted to create an
open floor dance hall in
Florence.
SK Lindsey, former owner of
the Kenneth B. Art Gallery, had
better success with live music
when, on the weekends, she
turned her art space into a night-
club. Well known national
bands like Sol Seed and Soul
Vibrator filled the venue with
audiences spilling out into the
parking lot.
And the bands, Lindsey said,
were hungry to come out to the
coast.
“They would offer to play
very cheap because they wanted
the ‘coast’ audience. College
crowds were an easy market,
but bands like Petunia and the
Vipers recognized the value of
increasing their audience, so
they gave me a steal of a price,”
Lindsey said.
Audiences from Portland
were attending her shows, but
she eventually had to close
down after a couple of bands
flopped.
“I was scraping by with a
Last Resort Players presents
Starring Elyse Stewart as Annie
and Trudy as Sandy
The Musical
Photo by Kathleen Wenzel
November 3, 4, 10 & 11 @ 7:00 p.m.
November 5 & 12 @ 2:00 p.m.
at the
Florence Events Center
Oh Boy! Get your tickets today!
EventCenter.org * 541-997-1994
nights of Oct. 27, 28, 30, and
31 from 6-9 p.m. The maze is
recommended for those eight
and older. Tickets are $5 per
person.
Entry is at your own discre-
tion. It’s not for little kids or
“big chickens.”
“Your attendance at these
events makes a dramatic dif-
ference in the lives of our local
children,” said
Heard.
“Through CROW’s arts edu-
cational programs, we not
only inspire and educate many
future leaders and provide
countless opportunities for
local kids to succeed in the
arts, but we will keep troubled
kids on the right track and help
provide them with a home
away from home. Thank you
to every single person out
there who has helped us on
any step of the way.”
For more information, visit
www.crowkids.com or call
Melanie Heard at 541-999-
8641.
Tax-deductible donations
can be mailed to PO Box 184,
Florence, OR 97439.
couple of bands, and when the
music wasn’t very good that set
me back,”she said.
There are places in Florence
that do offer this kind of enter-
tainment. Traveler’s Cove has
live local bands weekly, and it’s
a favored place for Lucio to go
dancing on the weekend, but the
dancing area is extremely limit-
ed.
Three Rivers Casino Resort’s
Blue Bills Sports Bar and Tap
books live music, mostly coun-
try bands, but their local success
has yet to be seen.
What’s ultimately missing
from these experiences is vari-
ety. Like other age groups, mil-
lennials like concerts, dancing,
arcades and a whole host of
other activities.
Without those, most millen-
nials interviewed either opt for
taking their money to a bigger
city or hang out at home with a
small group of friends.
“I seriously believe some-
body could make this happen in
town,” Lindsey said about her
try at a nightclub. “Younger
people were showing up and
they were getting dressed up
like it was a fun night out. I
think if the young people had a
place to go, and if they really
knew about it, they would come
out in crowds.”
The questions becomes, who
is going to start it?
“We have to start it,” Lucio
said. “Or you organize it. Or
COURTESY PHOTO
CROW’s Scare-CROW Haunted
Maze returns for third year.
you round up people for a meet-
up. I don’t know why that is. It’s
weird. It’s just how this town is.
You have to make the most of
it.”
Of course, putting one’s foot
forward to make that change
can be either a financial gam-
ble, as it was for Lindsey, or
time consuming, as it was for
Lucio.
Lucio was invited to be on
the Seacoast Entertainment
Association (SEA) board,
which helps bring live enter-
tainment to schools, libraries,
residential facilities and the
FEC.
“The majority of people on
the board are probably older
than 50,” she said. “But I was
on a ‘no’ binge because I was
doing too much.”
While she was too over-
whelmed to take part SEA, she
believed that millennials should
be more involved in making
decisions in the community’s
future.
“Put younger people in
charge of things here. I feel like
the older community wants to
keep it the way it was, and they
don’t really like seeing change
sometimes,” she said.
All who were interviewed
felt that the current infrastruc-
ture in the area can support a
full life for millennials, but
business owners, employers,
city officials and the millennials
themselves have to organize
and step up.
“It’s not happening unless
you do it,” Lucio said.
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