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About Cottage Grove sentinel. (Cottage Grove, Or.) 1909-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 10, 2018)
COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL JANUARY 10, 2018 7A Panic over gas law City Continued from A1 Grovers still can't own pump gas By Zach Silva zsilva@cgsentinel.com A slight amendment to a seemingly obscure Oregon law that went into effect on Jan. 1 made national headlines last week. Oregon’s House Bill 2482, which allows individuals in counties of 40,000 or less to pump their own gas at any time of the day, was an amendment to ORS 480.341 which said individuals could pump their own gas in these same rural counties after 6 p.m. and before 6 a.m. The “sun-up to sun-down” rule as one local gas attendant put it. This law impacts half of the counties in Oregon but only seven percent of all residents. While this small change to a small law that effects counties of small populations did not drastically change any- thing, it made big waves across social media in the opening days of the year. After KTVL, a CBS affi liate in Medford, shared an article about the change on their Facebook page, the story took off. Their post received over 61,000 shares and 54,000 comments and was refer- enced in stories by new outlets across the country including The Seattle Times, The Washington Post and USA Today. The headlines that accompanied these articles used words and phrases such as ‘panic’ and ‘Oregonians losing their minds.’ While there was a sense of joy from people outside of Oregon in seeing Oregonians online go into a brief hysteria about the prospect and nuance of having to pump their own gas, the reality is that just a small portion of individuals will be impacted. Amidst the hubbub, there were individuals in Cottage Grove who were also perplexed by the change. “There’s been a lot confusion. There’s been a lot of questions, people showing up not knowing what to do. Just hanging around, ‘do we do it, do you do it?’ kind of thing.” said gas attendant Dalton Pardun who works at the Chevron in town that is just off of I-5. “And especially the out-of-staters are even worse because they catch word that hey, we can do it and then it becomes a stand-off thing. [They’re] like, ‘why are you here, what are you doing?’” Attendants from other gas stations around the city also noted an uptick in questions from customers about who should be fi lling up their car. Lane County's population was last marked at over 300,000 resi- dents, making it exempt from the new law and requiring the contin- ued use of gas attendents. improving water service to Taylor, Parks, Red Hill and Cottage Heights homeowners. Installed 6 crosswalks on south 10t h along Bohemia Park and added cross hatching to cross- walks at 10th and Main. Grind and repaving of South 6th Street and Mosby Creek projects were completed. Utility Division, Supervisor Tony Kirk retired after 40 years of service and Mike O'Reilly was promoted to Utilities Su- pervisor. The department has also been repainting striping throughout town as well as maintaining and repairing the sewer and water main lines in town. Maintenance Division, Com- bined the Building Mainte- nance Department and Parks Department which allows for fl exibility with staffi ng during the spring and early summer for park maintenance. Installed new lighting along Row River Trail starting at Trail Head and con- tinuing east to 16 th Street. In- stalled irrigation at Lulu's Dog Park. Building Division had 148 commercial permits issued with a total value of $26.SM, 489 Residential permits issued with a total value of $7.SM and 46 new home permits issued. Planning Division started the housing needs analysis. Also a full time Planning Tech was added, this position will handle land use compliance violations and assist the City Planner in processing planning applica- tions. FEMA rating of level 7 saving homeowners in the fl ood plain 15% on their fl ood insur- ance. Third annual Emergency Preparedness Fair at Cottage Theater. Repainted Opal Whit- ley Mural and 98 planning per- mits processed. Water Treatment Plant, New emergency generators were in- stalled at the Holly pump station and Reservoirs site. Cleaned the inside of the water reservoirs and high service booster pump station at the water treatment plant. Installed scada at all pump stations and reservoirs connecting them electronically to the water treatment plant. Waste Treatment, Erich Schroeder was promoted to Waste Treatment Superinten- dent. Purchased 2 portable wa- ter samplers, installed a secu- rity camera system. Hosted the Pacifi c Northwest Clean Water Association September Board meeting and rebuilt Effl uent fi l- ters with a staff saving of over $20,000. Armory, Lead removal of the exterior staircases and thorough cleaning resulted in a no lead detected in test. Upgraded the power breaker box on stage and lighting. Completed win- dow restoration and awarded bid for construction documents. 37 events were hosted at the Armory in 2017, and 21 are al- ready booked for 2018 . 2017 Safety Record, Admin- istration, public works and de- velopment, and fi nance depart- ments worked 51,586.23 hours without a loss time accident. Library is the hardest to cover because so much goes on there. Like hosting "A Place For All People" from the Smithsonian Exhibit or "Bridging Cultures" a display of Islamic and Muslim books, art, fi lm and music. Pete Barrell, Community Services Director, received the Movers and Shakers award from the Library Journal Magazine and honored at the American Li- brary Association annual con- ference. Each week during the summer the library took forty kids on Outdoor Adventure fi eld trips. They hosted 44 sum- mer programs for all ages. Over 1400 children attended summer reading program special events, 220 children read books in the summer reading program. The Community Center was home for almost 40 groups or organi- zations for meetings or events. Finance Department prepared a $33M budget that the budget committee and city council ad- opted. Over 23% of utility bills are being paid on line. They also participated in the purchase of the police radio upgrades. The fi nance staff was involved with researching the best way to move forward with our me- ter reading equipment. Hand held meter reading devices had increased in price to be over $4,000 each. They were able to replace the equipment using smart phones and software that allows the phone to be used as a reading device and upload the informa- tion immediately to the cloud. This allows for better customer service when a leak is suspect- ed, with a much shorter turn- around time to address the po- tential leak. The Youth Advisory Council had a great year presenting their Nitrous Oxide bill to the Legis- lation at the State Capitol. The YAC was recognized through- out the state and was asked to speak at the League of Oregon Cities conference. I'd personally like to take a moment and thank my employer Weyerhaeuser and the manage- ment lead team. Their support of me in this position and will- ing to let me be fl exible with my schedule has truly helped in the success of this past year. LATHAM Continued from A1 The support you need to find quality SENIOR LIVING SOLUTIONS A Place for Mom has helped over one million families find senior living solutions that meet their unique needs. 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