A16
NEWS
Blue Mountain Eagle
Wednesday, January 22, 2020
Variance
Continued from Page A1
Eagle fi le photo
Ken Larssen of Seneca shows his 1902 Colt Single Action
Army revolver to a friend at the Strawberry Mountain Gun
and Knife Show in John Day in 2019.
Guns
Continued from Page A1
Oregon doesn’t require
gun registration, and the rate
of fi rearm ownership isn’t
clear. But a 2015 study in
the journal Injury Preven-
tion estimated that about one
out of four Oregonians own
fi rearms.
A similar proposal stalled
in the 2019 Legislature. So
far, interest in the new leg-
islation appears to be high.
During the weekday hear-
ing, the committee room
was packed, requiring an
overfl ow room. The com-
mittee did not take public
testimony.
Gillam
Continued from Page A1
“If a road gets past a cer-
tain stage, moisture gets
underneath the pavement,
and then you have to do a
total reconstruct,” Gillam
said.
Gillam said the Road
Department has invested
time and money into
chip-sealing
roadways
because it prevents water
from going under the
pavement.
She said she has enjoyed
Already, the NRA and
the Oregon Firearms Fed-
eration have come out in
opposition to the safe stor-
age mandate.
“Gun safety and stor-
age is a matter of personal
responsibility, and every
person’s situation is differ-
ent,” according to a state-
ment on the NRA web-
site. “It is unreasonable for
the law to impose a one-
size-fi ts-all solution. This
poorly thought out pro-
posal is without any con-
sideration for personal cir-
cumstances. In short, this
measure invades people’s
homes and forces them to
render their fi rearms useless
in self-defense.”
working with the people
in the department over the
years, and her retirement
goals include spending more
time with family, taking
photographs and fi shing.
“There’s been ups and
downs, but I hung in there,
and I persevered,” Gillam
said. “It was a rewarding
job to get the funding so we
can continue on keeping the
road system safe in the best
possible way. I’ve appreci-
ated the years of service and
feel a sense of reward that I
made a difference in some
place and in people’s lives.”
requirements, permitting
and due process, he said.
Riverside not comply-
ing with code requirements
and permitting was one rea-
son why the matter was
reviewed by the planning
commission. The variance
also did not go through the
correct procedure when it
was granted, Green said.
“The planning commis-
sion’s intent was to allow
Fox to bring in single-wide
trailers as long as all of the
other conditions of the code
were met,” Green said at
the planning commission
meeting. “We called that a
variance, but we probably
should have called it a con-
ditional use, but the reality
is, whether you called it a
variance or conditional use,
we should not have issued it
because we did not provide
the public with the opportu-
nity to comment.”
Since the issuance of
the variance in 2016, eight
manufactured homes have
been placed in the park, and
two are occupied, Green
said. The variance revoca-
tion affects only housing
added since 2016.
“If your home existed
before 2016, this is not
related to your property at
all,” Green said.
Inspection and
space 23
An inspection completed
by the city found that roof
pitch requirements, ther-
mal envelope requirements,
fl oodplain
development
requirements and building/
placement permit require-
ments had been violated
multiple times, according to
the staff report.
Chris Fox, an owner and
manager of the Riverside
Mobile Home Park, pre-
sented the commission with
a handout including a letter
with a timeline of how and
when units were installed
since 2016.
“I am unaware of any
installs that violate a lot
envelope,” Fox said in the
Contributed photo/City of John Day
A photo presented to the planning commission shows debris next to the house on space 23
at Riverside Home Park.
at Riverside were like that.
“Yes, the trailer court
has lots of issues, and it
needs to be cleaned up, but
there are a lot of us who
have been there for a darn
long time and do have clean
places,” Bailey said.
The eight units and the
future
The Eagle/Rudy Diaz
Chris Fox, manager and one of the owners of Riverside
Home Park, presents his case before the John Day Planning
Commission on Jan. 14.
letter. “I am not out trying
to hoodwink anybody, and
I have been sincere in my
efforts, not only this but in
management, and I have
additional proof that shows
my efforts in trying to get
an installer,” Fox told the
commission.
Green asked the planning
commission to review pho-
tographs of the inspection
of space 23, which was ref-
erenced in Fox’s testimony,
a single-wide unit placed in
the last three years.
The fi rst picture showed
an accessory structure that
was attached using plastic
sheeting and pipes. Fox said
the roof pitch was almost 3
inches of vertical rise for
every 12 inches of horizon-
tal run, but Green said it was
substantially fl at and did not
meet the 3/12 requirement.
There was also a second
accessory structure propped
up by iron bars.
“This
manufactured
home had no permit appli-
cation, and there was no
inspection, and (it) was
occupied without permits,”
Green said.
Fox said the unit is own-
er-occupied and is the big-
gest problem at the park.
However, since Fox is
the property owner, he is
responsible for what hap-
pens on the property, Green
said.
While the photos pre-
sented a property littered
with debris and violations,
Riverside resident Karen
Bailey said that not all units
With
the
variance
revoked, the city is work-
ing with the park owners
to bring the housing up to
code.
“We will allow the
owner to apply for permits
and perform inspections
retroactively after bring-
ing in unpermitted homes,
if the owners are willing to
sign an abatement agree-
ment,” Green said. “The
city has no intention to
cause the tenants any hard-
ship or inconvenience, and
will work with occupants
to ensure their homes are in
compliance with the code.”
Unpermitted units that
were placed in an unsafe
manner must be removed if
they cannot be brought up
to code, Green said.
Fox has 10 days to
decide if he wants to appeal
the planning commission’s
decision to the city coun-
cil, Green said. If Fox does
not appeal, the decision will
stand.
National
Stalking
Awareness
Month
Contact the Grant County Victim Assistance Program at
541-575-4026 or Heart of Grant County at 541-575-4335
This project was supported by Grant No. 2019-WR-AX-0027 awarded by the Office on
Violence Against Women, U.S. Department of Justice. The opinions, findings, conclusions, and
recommendations expressed in this publication/program/exhibition are those of the author(s) and do
not necessarily reflect the views of the Department of Justice, Office on Violence Against Women.
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