WEDNESDAY EDITION | JULY 10, 2019 | $1.00
CGSENTINEL.COM
3
Est. 1889
S entinel
C ottage G rove
VOL. 131, NO. 27
S ERVING
THE COMMUNITIES OF
C OTTAGE G ROVE ,
D ORENA , D RAIN ,
E LKTON , L ORANE AND
Y ONCALLA
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PERSONAL | BUSINESS
BENEFIT PLANNING | SURETY
Skill center could offer ‘Rock Solid’ opportunities
By Damien Sherwood
dsherwood@cgsentinel.com
(541) 942-0555
PayneWest.com /Cottage-Grove
WEATHER
Al Gaines wants to get young
people off the streets and into the
work force.
“I’ve had this vision for a while,”
he said.
Using Cottage Grove as a base,
Gaines hopes to establish the Solid
Rock Skill Center, a facility which
will equip troubled youth in Lane
Mostly cloudy with a
high of 78 and a low
tonight of 60.
Full forecast on A5
County with trade skills and set
them on a path for success.
Cottage Grove isn’t ground zero
for the project, however. Gaines
made his first attempt when he
was living in Springfield, hoping
to make an impact on the ongoing
problem of homelessness in the
area.
“There are 1,500 kids just in Eu-
gene that are homeless,” he said.
“And they’re just surviving day to
day.”
A count of the homeless in Lane
County this January tallied a rise of
32 percent from the previous year,
according to Lane County Human
Services.
Providing young people with
skills, Gaines felt, could redirect
their trajectory off the streets.
“If these kids wanted to get off
the street and learn a trade, they
could get on with their lives,” he
said.
The project began when Gaines
was contacted by the city managers
of Eugene and Springfield to work
on solutions to the homeless issue.
As a journeyman welder/fabrica-
tor, design engineer and having
experience in process control sys-
tems, Gaines was hopeful his own
skills could be passed on to
See SKILLS 7A
‘Freedom on the Fourth’
COMMUNITY
Public Piano
provides ‘keys’ to city
A3
SPORTS — B
ECEC offers more
than just butterflies
B1
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Police Logs
Births
A2
• LORANE NEWS
A5
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PHOTOS BY DAMIEN SHERWOOD/COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL
R
esidents of Cottage Gove, Yoncalla and London
took time to celebrate the nation’s Independence
Day last Thursday on July Fourth with parades, fire-
works and special events. (see more photos on page 8A
and 9A)
Row River clean-up yields
hundreds of pounds of trash
By Sophia Edelblute
sedelblute@cgsentinel.com
541- 942-3325 ph • 541-942-3328 fax
P.O. Box 35, Cottage Grove, OR 97424
Volunteers hauled more than
500 pounds of garbage from the
Row and Coast Fork Willamette
Rivers during this year’s Water
Ouzel Clean-Up Float, which was
held by the Coast Fork Willamette
Watershed Council. The float,
which took place June 29, includ-
ed eight volunteers who brought
their own boats and supplies to
help out during the more than
seven-hour clean-up project.
In past years, there has been a
larger turnout of volunteers. But
the original date of the clean-
up had to be pushed back about
a month due to storm damage
along part of the river. While the
number of volunteers declined,
the amount of garbage in the river
increased. According to Amanda
See ROW 7A
CG Airport to receive funding for
security improvements
By Damien Sherwood
dsherwood@cgsentinel.com
Security enhancements are
coming to the Cottage Grove
State Airport as $120,000 in
Airport Improvement Grants
have been announced through
Rep. Peter DeFazio’s office.
“It’s imperative that we con-
tinue to invest in Oregon’s rural
airports in order to keep local
economies moving,” DeFazio
announced in a press release
July 2. “I will continue to push
for funds like these to keep air
travel in our communities safe
and efficient.”
The funds will go toward the
installation of fencing on the
airport’s western perimeter, a
length of land with no discern-
able division between proper-
ties stretching from Taylor’s
See FUNDS 6A
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