Polk County Itemizer-Observer • September 2, 2015 3A
Polk County News
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JOLENE GUZMAN/Itemizer-Observer
Hermelinda Garcia closed the doors on her salon on Aug. 24. Garcia spent 42 years
as a salon owner. She opened her first shop in 1973 in Independence.
Garcia retires after
42 years of hairstyling
By Jolene Guzman
The Itemizer-Observer
INDEPENDENCE — In
her career as a salon owner,
Hermelinda Garcia can
count 42 years, three loca-
tions, and countless friends.
Garcia, who goes by
“Linda,” recently surpassed
another milestone, age 70.
“It was time to retire,” she
said Monday, a week after
her last day at Hermelinda’s
Beauty Salon. “I’ve been
doing it all my life.”
Garcia began cutting hair
for family and friends at an
early age, but when it came
time to select a career, she
took a different path — for a
while.
“When I got out of high
school, I was a nurse’s aide,”
she explained. “Then I de-
cided I liked doing hair bet-
ter.”
Originally from St. Paul,
Garcia moved to Independ-
ence after marrying her hus-
band, Julio. Opening her first
shop in 1973 and becoming
involved in the community,
she quickly made a name for
herself — and for him — in
Independence.
“I’ve lived here a lot
longer than she has, but I’m
still known as Linda’s hus-
band,” he said, chuckling.
Linda Garcia served on a
cultural awareness com-
mission in Independence,
on the PTA when her chil-
dren were in school and on
the Independence Public
Library board.
She recalls fondly teach-
ing hair care classes to girls
at the library when her
daughter was young.
“A lot of them are grown
ladies now and they re-
member learning about
hair from Linda,” Julio Gar-
cia said. “They all remem-
ber Linda.”
The same is true of her
customers at the salon.
She’s had generations of the
same families come to her
throughout her career.
“I made a lot of friends,”
she said. “They become
your friends.”
And if you are wonder-
ing, yes, the relationship be-
tween hairdresser and cus-
tomer is much the same as
between bartender and pa-
tron. Garcia has heard
many good stories in her 42
years behind the chair.
Some, she said with a
knowing smile, are not fit to
print.
“It was a lot of fun,” she
said. “It was.”
She said her former salon
at 1331 Monmouth St. in In-
dependence is ready to re-
open with a new owner,
something she’s pleased to
see.
Just like how she began,
Garcia still will cut hair for
family members at her
home with a special license
from the state. It isn’t quite
the same as arriving at the
shop at 8:30 each morning
to greet customers, though.
“I (will) miss it,” she said.
MINET receives security
update after system audit
By Emily Mentzer
The Itemizer-Observer
MONMOUTH — Mon-
mouth Independence Net-
works employees have been
busy getting updates made
and security improvements
done.
“We’re doing work on ba-
sically all the systems, all
the guts of the system,” said
Scott McClure, MINET
board vice president and
Monmouth city manager.
“The idea is to get a handle
on the core technology —
the computers, the servers,
the networks — and get it
all buttoned down as tight
as possible.”
The work started after an
in-depth system audit was
completed. The audit,
which looks at MINET’s se-
curity, is confidential, Mc-
Clure said, and not avail-
able to the public.
MINET Manager Don
Patten said he would see if a
summary of the report
could be made available,
but did not have it by press
time. The cost of the audit
also was unavailable by
press time.
T h e a u d i t w a s p e r-
formed at Patten’s request
because of recent transi-
tions, including changes in
employees in both the tech
services and information
technology departments,
McClure said.
Patten said MINET work-
ers have begun the process
to correct “numerous defi-
ciencies found in the report,
including ordering new fire-
wall hardware, which will
help prevent attacks and
serve as a disaster recovery
program.
“The unit replaced an
outdated system that was
no longer supported,” Pat-
ten said.
The firewall was not the
only thing that needed up-
dated.
MINET has been in oper-
ation since its original 2004
intergovernmental agree-
ment between the two cities
of Monmouth and Inde-
pendence, and was still
using original equipment,
McClure said.
“It comes as no surprise
to anyone in this room that
we’ve been experiencing
some serious technical is-
sues as a result of failed
maintenance over a num-
ber of years,” Patten said at
Thursday’s MINET board
meeting. “MINET has man-
aged to stabilize most of the
blade servers that offer
services. Several servers
have been taken down.”
The idea behind the sys-
tem audit was to find out
what needed to be done to
meet industry standards,
McClure said.
“Basically it’s getting the
system really cleaned up
and in good operating
order,” McClure said. “We’re
being more proactive to get
it in the best order that we
can.”
One benefit to the
cleanup is when something
goes wrong, it will be much
easier to fix quickly, he said.
In other business:
• The board approved the
board of director’s code of
conduct. Bylaws continue
to be evaluated by the
board’s subcommittee of
McClure and Jerry Hoff-
man, board member and
Independence city coun-
cilor. McClure said bylaws
may be discussed at the
Sept. 17 meeting, but added
that the board has the over-
all governance of the IGA.
“We just did the code of
conduct, do we need some-
thing else about how the
board operates and does
business?” he said. “You
have to be careful if you
have parallel documents. If
something gets altered in
the first one, it gets altered
in the second one.”
• Board member Mike
Lodge made a motion to
hire Gail Fischer, private in-
vestigator and independent
insurance adjuster from Eu-
gene, as an outside consult-
ant to interview board pres-
ident and Independence
City Manager David Clyne
“based on comments he
made at previous board
meetings on continued
misconduct at MINET,”
Lodge said.
Fischer will be hired at
$90 per hour. Clyne said he
would invite her to come
speak at an executive ses-
sion with just board mem-
bers in the future to discuss
how to structure an investi-
gation.
• The board decided it
did not want to publish
video tape of its meetings
anymore.
“Certainly meetings are
open, but there was con-
cern (at the Aug. 17 board
retreat) about information
that might be contextual-
ized, strategies that might
be developed, so we de-
clined to (provide video),”
said Jon Carey, board mem-
ber and Monmouth city
councilor.
Lodge said the board al-
ready provides audio of the
meetings, so adding video
doesn’t impact public ac-
cess one way or another.
Rod Killen, MINET mar-
keting contractor and
Willamette Riverside Stu-
dios owner, said he volun-
teered his time to video
tape MINET board meet-
ings. He noted that barring
him from taking video
would be equal to denying a
private citizen access to
taping a public meeting.
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