10A COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL FEBRUARY 22, 2017
DEQ fi nes Cottage Grove $4,500
Cottage Grove has been fi ned $4,500
by
the Department of Environmental
cmay@cgsentinel.com
Quality (DEQ).
Initial reports claimed the city was
fi ned for dumping excessively contaminated sewage wastewater
onto city-owned park lands. However, Cottage Grove City Manager
Richard Meyers said that's not entirely true.
"It was the golf course," Meyers said. "If we had been using river
water, the contamination would have been higher."
Fines stem from June 8 through 10 and according to Meyers, Cot-
tage Grove informed DEQ that it had violated its allowed levels.
Further, Meyers said those violations were not bacterial, but rath-
er,related to temperature. "We had some high temperature days and
it was temperature related, there was no bacteria," he said.
As for the bacteria-related violations, Meyers said they were due
to an equipment failure which has since been rectifi ed.
"We're going to ask to use that money, instead of paying DEQ,
to make further improvements to deal with the temperature issues,"
Meyers said.
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Cottage Grove was fi ned $4,500 by DEQ. Shown above, a pool at the city's
wastewater treatment facility taken in January. The fi nes are related to
incidents in June.
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City Manager debriefs on City Day
By Caitlyn May
cmay@cgsentinel.com
Mayor Jeff Gowing and councilors Mike
Fleck, Jake Boone and Kenneth Roberts
accompanied Cottage Grove City Manager
Richard Meyers to City Day at the state cap-
ital eariler this month.
The event, sponsored in part by Oregon League of Cities, aimed
to get local city government offi cials in the same room as state of-
fi cials to discuss the issues important to them and the overall con-
cerns of the state.
"I've been attending these for a few years and this was probably
the biggest," Meyers said.
Cottage Grove offi cials spoke with state senator Floyd Prozanski
and representative Cedric Hayden about issues facing the city and
correlating state legislation, in particular, Senate Bill 504 which
concerns recreational immunity.
"Representative Hayden said he was with us on restoring recre-
ational immunity," Meyers said. He noted that Prozanski said he
needed further research and would form a working group to explore
the issue.
Meyers has said that should recreational immunity not be re-
stored, Cottage Grove may be forced to close its parks to avoid
Contined A1
PeaceHealth employs thousands of
cmay@cgsentinel.com
individuals and locally, operates the
health facility in Cottage Grove. How-
ever, after recent events surrounding im-
migration came to light, PeaceHealth Chief Administrative Offi -
cer for Cottage Grove Community Medical Center reported that
executive orders from Washington D.C. had far-reaching effects.
"Forty-one percent of our providers are foreign-born," Her-
rmann said. He noted that he inquired as to the statistic after
reading a national statistic that reported 41 percent of all medical
providers in the United States are foreign-born.
The issue came to light after President Donald Trump signed
an executive order barring individuals from seven Muslim-ma-
jority nations from entering the United States for a period of 90
days. As a result, reports of green card holders being detained in
airports began to circulate.
While the hype has died down slightly concerning the nation-
al outcry against the order, Herrmann said diversity is a part of
PeaceHealth.
Unable to speak for the company as a whole, Herrmann said,
"Inclusivity is important in terms of our mission. This company
started with immigrants from Ireland."
By Caitlyn May
the legal costs associated with potential lawsuits. Essentially, the
change to recreational immunity allows individuals who injure
themselves while recreating on city-owned land, to sue city em-
ployees. Previously, cities were protected from such lawsuits by
recreational immunity, citing the inherent nature of recreation and
the possibility for injury.
City offi cials also met with several other state offi cials, including
hearing from Governor Kate Brown.
However, Meyers said it was clear that "lines had been drawn"
between the two parties concerning several issues and that he hoped
those lines could be crossed to come to a resolution on what was
best for the state of Oregon.
Other issues discussed at City Day included the lack of afford-
able housing in the state, an issue that hits close to home for Cottage
Grove where local nonprofts are teaming up to propose a tiny home
village to address the growing need.
"From my perception," Meyers said, "and I think from the coun-
cilors' perception, it would have been nice to get all the state repre-
sentatives in a room and say, 'You can't leave until you talk to each
other.' It would have been nice to hold them all in a room and have
them talk to each other so we can fi gure out how to move forward."
Rural
National issues come to
PeaceHealth
LARGEST SELECTION OF NUTS & BOLTS
IN SOUTHERN LANE COUNTY
For Cottage Grove, Thomp-
son is working on assessing its
challenges and benefi ts. “Cot-
tage Grove has a lot of things
going for it,” she said. “Cottage
Grove is on I-5 and close to a
metropolitan area, has already
increased access to broadband
Internet fi ber, has good city
planning and business folks that
are focused on community pros-
perity. Forming a community
development corporation and a
main street program are impres-
sive accomplishments for a city
the size of Cottage Grove. There
are a lot of draws for tourists
and Cottage Grove has done a
good job of promoting tourism
and working with Travel Lane
County. A strong chamber of
commerce partner is a plus as
well.”
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