COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL May 4, 2016
'Oregon Beauty' kicks off Art Walk season
Friday marked the year's
fi rst Art Walk in the his-
toric downtown district of
Cottage Grove. The walk
featured a variety of art-
ists such as Springfi eld
resident Sarah Bast (right),
who moved to Oregon in
2007 from New Hampshire
and fell in love with the
beauty of the state. Bast
focuses on acrylic paint-
ings of farm animals, as
she is very enthusiastic
about the agricultural
industry.
Other art featured medi-
ums such as sterling and
copper jewlery, yarn art,
pine needle basketry, pho-
tography, pencil drawings
and even tattoo art from
Studio Tattoo.
BY JON STINNETT
The Cottage Grove Sentinel
L
New city website (still at cottagegrove.org) goes live
T
he City of Cottage
Grove’s online presence
underwent a signifi cant trans-
formation last week, as a new
city webpage went live on Tues-
day, April 26.
City Manager Richard Mey-
ers wrote in the City’s Friday
Update publication (which itself
has a new look on the new web-
site and will now be managed
by subscription) that the site,
which is still located at www.
County offi cials
present plan to
collaborate with
rural communities
Talk of a liaison with rural
governments is presented
photo by Sam Wright
BY JON STINNETT
The Cottage Grove Sentinel
3A
cottagegrove.org, went live with
“only a few issues.” The new site
brings all of the City’s pages —
including city functions, police,
the Cottage Grove Library and
Middlefi eld Golf Course — to-
gether in one location.
“It is designed to easily be
edited and modifi ed so it will
always be a work in progress,”
Meyers wrote, adding that much
of the information that needs to
be transferred from the old site
has already been moved.
Last month, Meyers an-
nounced that the City would be
“going to Google” for its new
site and email services. The new
page was designed by Lake Os-
wego-based Aha Consulting and
was expected to cost between
$6800 and $8000. The City’s in-
ternet technologies services will
be handled through the Lane
Council of Governments, which
has facilitated the move to the
new website. The transition
ends the City’s relationship with
locally based Oregon Internet
Properties for these services.
Meyers said he expects cloud-
based storage to benefi t the City,
which must keep track of emails
and other public documents for
long periods. Information can
be added to the new site by any-
one, which means that Meyers
no longer has to code informa-
tion for the site himself.
At its April 25 meeting, the
City Council was advised that
its members’ email accounts
would be down during the tran-
sition and that they would soon
receive new tablets to access
their email.
House fi re damages
rural home
N
o injuries were reported by South Lane County Fire
and Rescue as the result of a house fi re that displaced
a family on Adams Road Thursday.
The department was called to a report of a structure fi re
in the 78000 block of Adams just before 11 a.m. Thursday,
where crews fi rst on scene discovered heavy smoke and
fl ames coming from the second fl oor of the home.
According to a press release, crews were able to extinguish
the fi re and contain it to the home’s second fl oor, though the
fi rst fl oor did sustain moderate smoke and water damage.
The home was reportedly occupied by two adults and two
courtesy photo
children, though no injuries were reported. The cause of the
Fire
crews
battled
a
blaze
on
Adams
Road
Thursday.
fi re is still under investigation.
CAN A WEBSITE
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ADVICE?
ane County offi cials ap-
proached the Cottage
Grove City Council at its April
25 meeting with a promise to
bolster relations between the
two governments and work to-
ward common goals.
County Administrator Steve
Mohrisky and two Hatfi eld fel-
lows tasked with analyzing the
relationship between communi-
ties like Cottage Grove and the
County presented a plan aimed
at greater collaboration, a plan
that featured the possibility of
a liaison position to act as a
bridge between the County and
rural governments.
“We have some work to do in
continuing to partner with rural
communities in helping to sup-
port vibrant local economies,”
Mohrisky told the Council, sev-
eral members of which were not
shy in later sharing their skepti-
cism that much attention would
be paid to concerns outside the
Eugene/Springfi eld area.
First, though, Mohrisky and
the Hatfi eld fellows, Stephen
Dobrinich and Aniko Drlik-
Muehleck, told of a plan that
was developed “as a result of the
listening we’ve tried to do” with
a focus on support and advo-
cacy for rural communities. He
said that lottery funds had been
set aside during the County’s
upcoming budget process for a
liaison position in an extension
of a pilot project begun in Flor-
ence.
A Power Point presentation
helped detail what the County
sees as a collaborative effort at
economic development that in-
cludes more than just efforts to
recruit new businesses, includ-
ing work to foster education and
a thriving Main Street.
The challenges to such a re-
lationship included the lack of
time and resources dedicated to
such efforts, as well as a lack of
communication and coordina-
tion.
“Communities were not feel-
ing connected to the County,”
said Drlik-Muehleck. “They had
no idea what was going on, and
the communities didn’t know
what each other were doing.”
She said that another shortage
involved capacity and exper-
tise, pointing out that most rural
communities cannot afford to
fund staff dedicated to econom-
ic development efforts. Infra-
structure shortcomings includ-
ing deteriorating roads and lack
of access to high-speed Internet
service were also noted as barri-
ers to stronger rural economies.
Further, Drlik-Muehleck said
that Lane County lacks a coor-
dinated strategy for economic
development, adding that rural
towns harbor a “perception of
invisibility” that makes them
feel that they are consistently
overlooked.
During their time to provide
reactions to the County’s pre-
sentation, several Councilors
agreed with that statement.
“We’re the third-largest com-
munity in Lane County,” Mayor
Tom Munroe said. “You’ve got
to get more towns involved; it
can’t just be Eugene and Spring-
fi eld.”
“Lane County is an arm of
Eugene and Springfi eld,” said
Councilor Garland Burback.
“Whatever Eugene/Springfi eld
wants is what Lane County does.
Unless they can prove different,
I don’t see anything changing.”
Please see COUNTY, Page 10A
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