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About The Blue Mountain eagle. (John Day, Or.) 1972-current | View Entire Issue (July 17, 2019)
NEWS MyEagleNews.com Wednesday, July 17, 2019 A3 City council updated on John Day projects By Richard Hanners Blue Mountain Eagle Anyone following John Day news knows the city is working hard to promote economic development through a long list of proj- ects, most of which require significant grant funding. City Manager Nick Green updated the coun- cil on this list at the request of Mayor Ron Lundbom at the July 9 council meet- ing. Six projects are in the “close out” phase, nine are in the “process” phase and six more are awaiting noti- fication of grant award deci- sions, Green said. Closing projects • Garden produce is growing in the city’s com- mercial greenhouses, but glass panels need to be installed for the showroom and additional exhaust fans will be installed later in July. The city will make the final payment to EuroMex upon acceptance of the facility, Green said. • While a countywide broadband effort will con- tinue for many more years, final engineering and accep- tance for an optical fiber that was run from the net- work’s hub in the fire hall to the Grant County Educa- tion Service District build- ing was completed June 27. • Transition of 911 emer- gency dispatch service from the city to an independent agency is mostly completed. Final payments to Centu- ryLink must go through the state Office of Emergency Management. • The final draft of an eco- nomic opportunity assess- ment by Johnson Economics was submitted June 28 and needs to be adopted by the council in August. • The final deliverables for a Comprehensive Eco- nomic Development Strat- egy by EcoNorthwest are due by the end of July. The project will be adopted by the council in August. • The final area plan drafted under a $174,150 state Transportation Growth Management grant is expected by the end of July, with formal adoption by the council in August. Projects in process • Stakeholders for a new public pool met with the Grant County Court and the Special District Associ- ation of Oregon’s advisory committee in June. Pending grant decisions by the Ore- gon Department of Parks and Recreation, planning will continue in earnest in Contributed photo John Day agricultural project leader Matt Manitsas, center front, leads a tour of John Day’s new commercial greenhouses during the Regional Economic Diversification Summit in John Day on June 11. October and a ballot mea- sure for public funding will be prepared for the May 2020 election. Negotiations for the sale of city park land near the Kam Wah Chung State Historic Site and the Gleason Pool are ongoing. • Initial survey work for the engineering of a new wastewater treatment plant is completed. Phase 1 of pre- liminary design engineering should be completed in Sep- tember, with Phase 2 com- pleted by December and Phase 3 completed by Sep- tember 2020. • A federal disaster dec- laration was made July 9 for damages during this spring’s flooding. Requests for pub- lic assistance are due by Aug. 9. • Property line adjust- ments are being processed between the city and neigh- bors of the former Oregon Pine mill site and for prop- erty owners on Boulder Lane along the future Davis Creek trail system. • Bids for construction of Phase 1 of the John Day River trail system were approved June 25. Construc- tion is scheduled to begin in July and be completed by August. • Funding and an inter- governmental agreement with the county for the Cha- rolais Heights intersec- tion project were approved in June. Project design and engineering continues. Con- struction is expected in late 2019 or spring 2020 pend- ing an award decision for a large federal BUILD grant the city will submit in July. • Funding and contracts have been approved for a Main Street Revitalization grant for the Len’s Drug remodeling project. Further progress is in the hands of the store’s owners. • Bids were received for purchase of the city-owned Weaver Building on June 25. The council will meet in executive session July 23 to review the proposals. • The bid for a fiber cable run from the fire hall down Canyon Boulevard to First Avenue North and on to city hall was awarded and awaits final acceptance. Pending projects • Awarding of a $653,453 integrated park system and pool planning grant through the Oregon Department of Parks and Recreation could be decided in September, with notice to proceed made in October. • A decision on a federal ReConnect grant application submitted by Oregon Tele- phone Corp. that could fund running fiber cable across northwest Grant County could be made in August. The city has committed $1 million to back this grant application in a partnership with Ortelco. • A decision on a $3 mil- lion federal Community Connect grant to run fiber cable from major trunk line in Burns to Seneca could be made in November. Together with the ReConnect grant, the funding chould bring broadband to Grant Coun- ty’s eight cities. • The deadline to submit an application for a large federal BUILD grant for new road construction in John Day was July 15. An award decision will be made in December. • Scoping for improve- ments to the planer shed at the former Oregon Pine mill site was approved by the council in June. Applica- tions for funding from the Ford Family Foundation are due by this fall. • Applications for a brownfield redevelop- ment grant from the federal Environmental Protection Agency for improvements to a portion of the former Oregon Pine mill site can be submitted in 2020. Grant County approved for federal disaster assistance Spring flood damages in six counties estimated at $8.2 million By Richard Hanners Blue Mountain Eagle Eagle file photo Sand bags were stationed at the Nugget Street bridge on April 19 as Canyon Creek threatened to run over its banks. Nugget Street has since reopened. Several areas in East- ern Oregon received record to near-record rainfall over a 48-hour period that coin- cided with snowmelt and caused rivers, creeks and streams to overflow their banks. Several SNO- TEL gauges in the moun- tains recorded 6-12 inches of snowmelt runoff during April. In Grant County, the John Day River backed up at Pic- ture Gorge, flooding ranches counties filed a joint prelim- inary damage assessment with the Federal Emergency Management Administra- tion. The total came to $8.2 million. Sens. Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley and Reps. Greg Walden and Peter DeFazio wrote to Trump in support of Gov. Kate Brown’s request for a presidential major disaster declaration for the counties. Estimated damages included $5.3 million for roads and bridges; $1.3 mil- lion for utilities; $534,125 for emergency protective mea- sures; $425,000 for water control facilities; $317,840 for parks; $154,675 for debris removal; and $15,000 for public buildings. In addition, the Oregon Department of Transporta- tion requested emergency relief through the Federal Highway Administration for damage to major trans- portation networks. The ODOT estimate totaled $3.7 million. Monday - Thursday 7am- 6pm Friday 8am - 5pm Mendy Sharpe FNP Apppointments available 128879 A federal disaster dec- laration for six counties in Oregon opens up the oppor- tunity for federal assistance to supplement state and local recovery efforts. President Donald Trump issued the declaration on July 9. The declaration applies to Grant, Curry, Douglas, Linn, Umatilla and Wheeler counties for areas affected by severe storms, flooding, landslides and mudslides from April 6-21. A federal disaster dec- laration allows local gov- ernments to be eligible for loans, insurance relief and other assistance. According to a report by Daniel Stoelb, of the Oregon Office of Emergency Man- agement, an unusually wet period occurred over Ore- gon during the April time period, driven by powerful west-southwest winds laden with Pacific moisture. for several miles east. High- way 26 shoulders in Picture Gorge were eroded by the flooding river. Floodwater from the South Fork of the John Day River covered portions of Dayville, and the John Day River overflowed its banks all the way to Mt. Vernon. Runoff from lands burned during the 2015 Canyon Creek Complex fire engorged Canyon Creek, damaging the Inland Street and Nugget Street bridges in Canyon City. Groundwater rose up into the boiler room at Grant Union Junior-Senior High School, and shoulders along Highway 395 south of Can- yon City were eroded. The powerful current in Canyon Creek eroded a 23-foot high embankment below Fourth Avenue South- west in John Day, endanger- ing one of the main routes to Grant County Regional Airport. The six Oregon coun- ties and the cities in those 128811 541-523-6377 541-963-6577 541-573-6377 541-576-2160 gon! For the first time in Eastern Ore VETERAN BENEFIT EXPO19 9 A.M. TO 3 P.M. SATURDAY, JULY 27TH PENDLETON CONVENTION CENTER Learn about all of your Federal and State benefits Under one roof! 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