The Siuslaw news. (Florence, Lane County, Or.) 1960-current, February 14, 2018, WEDNESDAY EDITION, Image 1

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WEDNESDAY EDITION
Siuslaw Senior
Night
ON TO STATE
SPORTS — B
INSIDE — A10
128TH YEAR ❘ ISSUE NO. 13
❘ FEBRUARY 14, 2018 ❘ $1.00
SERVING WESTERN LANE COUNTY SINCE 1890
F LORENCE
FLORENCE, OREGON
PLANS TO START ITS OWN ‘ REVOLUTION ’
After failing to make Small Business Revolution’s top 5 towns, #MyFlorence prepares to carry on momentum
B Y C HANTELLE M EYER
Siuslaw News
Yesterday, approxi-
mately 50 people
attended an early
morning live stream-
ing
of
“Small
Business Revolution
— Main Street’s” top
five town announce-
ment at River Roasters
in Historic Old Town
Florence. The news that
Florence did not make the
cut was greeted with loud
groans of disappointment.
“We will just have to show them our
own small business revolution!”
Tabitha Early, owner of Polished
Boutique and Salon, commented — a
notion that was shared by many people,
both in attendance and online, who saw
Florence’s recent efforts to support the
local economy as a trend to continue
into 2018 and beyond.
Florence Area
Chamber
of
Commerce’s Downtown Revitalization
Committee and Chairwoman Ellen
Huntingdon brought Florence to
Deluxe Corporation and Small
Business Revolution’s attention last
fall. Huntingdon worked hard with the
Deluxe Corporation staff to place
Florence first in the top 20 towns, then
the top 10. This culminated in a brief
site visit to Florence on Jan. 3 and 4,
with more than 700 people attending a
ceremony to welcome host Amanda
Brinkman and the Small Business
Revolution team.
“You have already won,” Brinkman
said at that time. “Honestly, being fea-
tured in the show isn’t the biggest prize.
The biggest prize is the renewed sense
of pride for your community, for your
neighbors, for understanding how vital
your small businesses are to the success
of this town.”
During the top 5 announcement —
when the communities of Alton, Ill.;
Amesbury, Mass.; Bastrop, Texas;
Martinez, Calif.; and Siloam Springs,
Ark., were selected — online viewers
nationwide waited with baited breath to
see if their town was chosen for the next
step in Small Business Revolution’s
process. The final town, which will be
the winner of a popular vote, will be
announced in one week’s time. It will
then be featured on the third season of
“Small Business Revolution — Main
Street,” a webseries showing on Hulu
and www.deluxe.com/small-business-
revolution, and will receive $500,000
for its small businesses.
See
REVOLUTION 9A
Bursting
Temperature
drop prompts into bloom
for area
shelter opening
More than a dozen people
Valentines
show up for shelter and a
COLD WEATHER
warm meal Monday night
B Y J ARED A NDERSON
Siuslaw News
INSIDE
The Florence Emergency Cold Weather
Shelter opened its doors Tuesday night at the
Presbyterian Church of the Siuslaw as tem-
peratures were expected to fall below 32
degrees.
This is the second time the shelter has
opened this season, and the first for 2018.
The shelter previously opened on Dec. 20,
2017.
“We served dinner to 16 people and had
10 people spend the night,” Pastor Greg
Wood, president of the program, said. “We
served breakfast for 15 people. We had a
couple people camp in their cars overnight.
They came in, had supper, warmed up and
went back out.”
Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-Day Saints, along with Florence
United Methodist church, provided a warm
meal for those taking shelter.
“We had some really good homemade
spaghetti with meat sauce, bread, chocolate
cake, and a cheesy chicken and rice casse-
role,” Wood said. “It was good food.”
As a rule of thumb, the shelter opens when
the temperature is expected to fall below 32
degrees on any given evening. While the
temperature did not officially reach that low
on Tuesday (the National Weather Service
recorded 33 degrees) the expectation led to
the opening.
It’s possible that the shelter may open
once again next week. The forecast calls for
cold weather Sunday through Tuesday, with
temperatures dipping to 32 degrees, with
possible rain.
“But, the weather forecasts are so change-
able,” Wood said. “They’re up and down
every day, but we’re ready to go if needs be.”
To find out if the emergency shelter will
continue to be open through the week, the
public can check the shelter’s Facebook page
(Florence Emergency Cold Weather Shelter),
sign up for its email blast or look for the
shelter flag hung throughout the area, includ-
ing at the Siuslaw Public Library and along
Highway 101.
For those who cannot walk to the shelter, a
pickup service will be available beginning at
5 p.m. with locations at the library, Safeway
and Fred Meyer.
For more information, contact Wood at
541-991-8208.
Classifieds . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Community . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Kid Scoop . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Library Tidings . . . . . . . . . . .
B6
A3
B5
A5
T
hose celebrating Valentine’s
Day today in the Siuslaw
region got a head start on finery
with beautiful sunshine earlier this
week and fragrant bouquets. Area
merchants and stores have a vari-
ety of sweetheart-themed prod-
ucts for the special day. A wide
assortment of flowers, gifts, candy
and balloons are available across
town for romance, friendship and
appreciation. As Helen Keller
once said, “The best and most
beautiful things in the world can-
not be seen or even touched.
They must be felt with the heart.”
MARK BRENNAN/
SIUSLAW NEWS
Boys & Girls Club contemplates financials
While not in crisis, the club sees possible funding shortfalls in the near future
B Y J ARED A NDERSON
Siuslaw News
The Boys and Girls Club of
Western Lane County (BGC) is
now at a crossroads.
After controversy embroiled the
organization in 2015, the task of
rebuilding the club’s image was
taken on by various community
members
and
organizations,
including former executive director
Chuck Trent, current director Jack
Davis, BGC staff and board mem-
bers, and multiple donations from
the community with both sweat
equity and cash donations in the
hundreds of thousands of dollars.
“The community needs this
club, and this club needs the com-
munity,” Davis said about how the
club fits into the Siuslaw region.
The club’s programming is
growing at an unprecedented rate,
but so are the associated costs.
While the public’s opinion of
the club has grown, BGC worries
that the community believes the
club no longer needs funding, cre-
Opinion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A4
Records . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A2
Sports . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B
Weather Data . . . . . . . . . . . A2
THIS WEEK ’ S
ating the possibility of decreased
donations. And current national
trends may hamper the club’s abil-
ity to receive additional funds by
the year’s end.
As the club reorganizes its
image,
financial
difficulties
remain.
Currently, BGC is in need of at
least $40,000 to make it through
the summer, representatives said.
The move planned for the Nan
Osborne Memorial Teen Center
(formerly the Quality Childcare of
Florence building) is not fully
funded by a “significant” amount,
though construction has already
begun.
The club is not in crisis, BGC
representatives state, but the possi-
bility exists.
“We don’t have a problem today,
we don’t have a problem this
month and we probably won’t have
a problem next month,” Davis
said. “We’re looking at the inter-
section of two issues. There’s high-
er overhead, and we’re looking at
less income this spring than we did
last year by a significant amount.
When those two meet, that’s when
we’re going to have a problem.”
Current board members Michael
Pearson, Jordan Nivilinszky and
Harold Kinney, joined Davis to
describe the challenges facing the
club today.
Teen Center
In 2014, BCG merged with
Quality Child Care of Florence
(QCCF), another organization that
offered child care and a learning
environment designed to meet the
needs of infants, toddlers and pre-
school children, in hopes to reduce
overhead and increase efficiency,
according to an official 2016 audit
of the club.
But in 2015, QCCF closed, leav-
ing BGC the building that once
housed the program. Afterwards,
the board decided to use the build-
ing as a Teen Center.
The current headquarters of the
club, located at 1501 Airport Road
in Florence, serves a combination
of high school and junior high stu-
TODAY
THURSDAY
FRIDAY
SATURDAY
48 38
49 39
50 43
48 39
WEATHER
Full Forecast, A3
dents. As of now, Teen Center
enrollment is down, but the board
foresees a near future where the
club will have to accommodate
high school aged youth.
“If you look at all the kids in
(Elementary Program Director
Samantha Gauderman’s) elemen-
tary program, they’re moving up,”
Kinney said. “It keeps growing. If
we keep doing a good job there,
then they’re going to move into the
middle school and they’re going to
come here, and pretty soon, they’re
going to continue and be a part of
the Teen Center.”
Part of that preparation is the
QCCF building.
High school and junior high
school youth have different needs
and social aspects, Davis
explained. While the club plans on
having high schoolers mentor the
younger members, it became obvi-
ous to the staff that the two cohorts
needed the ability to spend time
apart.
S IUSLAW N EWS
2 S ECTIONS ❘ 18 P AGES
C OPYRIGHT 2018
See
BOYS & GIRLS 7A