Image provided by: Morrow County Museum; Heppner, OR
About Heppner gazette-times. (Heppner, Or.) 1925-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 19, 1978)
VOL. 96, NO. 5W' Football rates high among fall activities in Southern Morrow County as both Heppner and lone teams are standing at the top of their leagues. In this photo taken at Umatilla last Friday, no less than six Mustang defenders are in on the stop Heppner, Ione& Lexington City council and mayoral races in Heppner, lone and Lexington failed to develop for the November 7 election as most positions had only one candidate filing. In Heppner, the mayor's position and four seats on the council are open. Mayor Jerry Sweeney was the only incum bent to file, to succeed himself for another two year term. Filing for council positions in Heppner were Ron Forrar, for a two year term; Robert Local men on numerous charges Two farm workers from the Sand Hollow area of Morrow County are lodged in Umatilla County jail on charges rang ing from first degree theft to illegal posession of game animals. In jail in lieu of $8,000 bail is Terry Michael Barker, 21. Lodged in lieu of $6,000 bail is Rickie Gene Hill, 18. Both men face charges including receiving stolen pro perty, first degree theft, manufacturing a controlled substance (marijuana), and illegal posession of game animals (deer and pheasant). Barker faces additional char ges of driving while suspended and furnishing alcohol to a minor. The two are accused in the theft of two rifles from the truck of two Portland hunters parked in Heppner; five Morrow County traffic signs; and CB and AM-FM radios from a tractor owned by Ralph Crum. The arrests were made by state police, assisted by Hep pner city police. After Heppner police logged the rifle thefts in a regional police information network, police in Goldendale, Wash., reported that one of the stolen The Library University of Oregon Eugene, Or 97403 For Microfilm 42 .1 t"" it. 1 8s Candida tes file for city council, "Butch" Laughlin, Frank Pearson and Joe Miller, each filing for seperate four year council terms. Laughlin was recently appointed to the Heppner council to fill the unexpired term of Hubert Wilson, who resigned earlier this year: Lexington council incum bents Ed Baker and Bill Smith have filed for their positions again, each for four year terms. A race did develop in arrested weapons had turned up there, according to local law enforce ment officials. An investigation by Goldendale officers provided information that led local lawmen to the Morrow County suspects. Cases against the two will be presented to an upcoming Morrow County grand jury for consideration, according to District Attorney Dennis Doh erty. Stolen pickup recovered here Two Washington teenagers were arrested on auto theft charges last week, following a 20-mile high-speed chase up Willow Creek Road. Heppner Police Chief Dean Gilman apprehended the pair after they wrecked a pickup truck reported " stolen from Yakima a short distance below Cutsforth Forest Park. The youths, both 16, escaped serious injury in the smashup, but the pickup was demolish ed. The truck was spotted in Heppner, after officers here were alerted to the theft and warned that the suspects might be headed this way. I 1 jsfl I I 33 CSV THURSDAY, OCT. 19, 1978 tv iNiaf of a Viking. Pictured clockwise are Joedy Marlatt (58), Larry Palmer (81), Steve Marlatt (44), Earl Hammond (48), Jim Parker (74), and Doug Holland (4). The Cardinals play at Echo Friday while the Mustangs host Wahtonka.- mayor positions Lexington for a two year council position between Bill Sheirbon and Charlene Pap ineau. In lone, three incumbents are seeking four year terms and one council position had Board sets bid date, accepts representation area changes A revised plan for construct ing a new shop building at Riverside High School will be put out for bid on Nov. 1, with Nov. 21 set as the date for opening bids on the project. The bidding timetable was set during a Monday night meeting of the Morrow County Board of Education. Last month, bids on the original design for the River side shop building came in well above the amount the school board had budgeted for structure. The low bid on the shop was $478,000 and the amount the board had planned on spending was $330,500. On Oct. 9, the board voted not to accept the $478,000 low bid, and to rebid the project on a plan that would use a steel modular design, with a comb ination steel and block alternate. Superintendant Matt Doher ty announced that there were no responses to advertise ments to bid on a contract for a bus run to Blakes Addition along upper Willow Creek. The board voted to accept a report from a special com mitee to consider board representation changes. The report recommends that scho ol district zones 6 and 7 at Heppner, currently represent ed on the board by Pauline Winter and Dr. Wallace Wolff, eventually be expanded to include the school district at large. The change in representat ion is being proposed to keep up with shifting population The Heppner Morrow County's Award no one file. Seeking re-election are Bill Rietmann, Albee Akers and Elmer Holtz. May or Linda LaRue has filed to succeed herself in that pos ition, having been appointed to the post last May. patterns in the county, most notably the increasing popula tion in the county's north end. The special commitee had considered adding two addit ional school board positions to accomodate the north end increase, but rejected the concept of a nine-person board, since such a panel was felt to be too large to function smoothly, The expanded representa tion area of board members representing zones 6 and 7 would not take effect until - Winning Weekly HEPPNER, OREGON Corps flood Final Even if the proposed Willow Creek dam becomes a reality, it appears that the down stream towns of lone, Lexing tonand quite possibly even Heppner will not be out of hot water in terms of highly restrictive flood plain desig nations by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The three Southern Morrow County communities, in order to comply with federal Flood Insurance Administration reg ulations, earlier this year requested the Corps to provide updated general flood plain maps. The maps would show potential floodway patterns and give approximate depths that floodwaters could rise in the event of a catastrophic, "100 year" flood. lone, which also needed the maps in order to plan the location of a lagoon for a proposed new sewer system, recently received the results of the updated Corps survey. ,. Similar updated . flood plain , maps are expected to be completed for Lexington and Heppner by the end of the month. In the case of lone, should the Corps survey stand as presented, "it's going to kill this town," said Mayor Linda LaRue. The Corps' map puts more than half of lone in either a "floodway" category, or within the theoretical 100-year flood plain. Under Flood Insurance Ad after the terms of Mrs. Winter and Dr. Wolff expire. The change in representation must also be approved by county voters during a school district election. The next such elect ion is scheduled for April of next year. In other developments Mon day night, the board voted to hire Mildred Baker as first grade teacher at A.C. Hough ton; Joyce Fenton as fourth and fifth grade teacher at A.C. Houghton; Liz Curtis as home economics teacher at Heppner Heppner gets full time DMV office A full-service licensing and driver examination office will become a reality in Heppner sometime this coming spring, the State Department of Motor Vehicles announced this week. Last Friday, the Oregon Legislature's Emergency Board approved a request for funding for the Heppner DMV office. The city has been served by a mobile DMV examining office on a once-a-month basis. DMV officials in Salem said that the new office in Heppner would be open on a four-day per week basis, staffed by one person. The Heppner examiner would travel to Condon or Fossil during the fifth working day of each week. Personnel from the state's General Serviced department are expected to arrive in Heppner soon to begin locating a site for the office. DMV officials said they did not know whether the office would be rented or if a new building would be constructed. Target date for opening the office will be sometime in March, although it may take as long as May before the Heppner DMV branch opens for business. Newspaper TWO SECTIONS returns with big plains figures for ministration regulations, no new buildings or additions to existing structures can be built in the floodway, and no buildings can be built or major improvements made in the flood plain, unless the struc ture is floodproofed. Flood proofing requires raising structures above the 100-year flood elevation, which in the Corps survey of lone is about three feet above ground level for most of the flood plain area. The lone schools complex, and most of the area between Second Street to the south canyon wall is included in the floodway designated area. Although lone does not have a history of serious floodings it even escaped serious dam age during the 1903 flood that devastated Heppner Corps of Engineers personnel deter mined through their computer aided study that a floodwave of 30,000 cubic feet of water per second was possible within the next 100 years, according to Mayor LaRue. "I was told that that was equivalent to the output of the Columbia River, above the Snake (River confluence)," she said. "...We asked them for the data they used to feed into the computer to arrive at this conclusion. They said they'd get the information to us,. but I haven't seen it yet." Mayor LaRue said that before undertaking the lone Elementary, and Joy Krein as art teacher at Heppner Elem entary. Vickie Van Dorn was hired as a title 1 aide at A.C. Houghton and Joel Lydy was hired as a bus driver at Riverside. The board voted to seek bids on three new school buses, and deferred making a decision on whether to reimburse teach ers for uninsured personal items stolen during recent break-ins at Heppner High School and A.C. Houghton Elementary. 16 PAGES for towns lone devastating flood plain update, Corps officials assured her that local flood history would be taken into account. "But they didn't do it," she said, "they said they couldn't use the past to predict what could happen in the future." If lone accepts the flood plain designation, growth would be stifled in the floodway area, since no new structures would be allowed to be built. Floodproofing could well prove to be cost prohibit ive in the flood plain designated area. A sizeable area of the city that is not included in either the flood way or flood plain is located on a 200-fot-wide railroad right-of-way, where construction would also be impossible. Meaning that if lone is to grow, it would basically have to grow on the steep canyon walls, where development would be extremely costly. Should lone reject the des ignation, and thus lose federal flood insurance benefits, pro spective homeowners would face extreme difficulty in securing financing for pur chasing shelter, since most federal lending agencies and banks require flood insurance in flood zones. During hearings in Heppner last year, Corps officials stated that a Willow Creek dam would decrease but not eliminat the danger of flood ing downstream from Heppner. The recently reveal ed flood plain update for lone indicates that the dam's effect on that city's flood potential is negligible at best. Terming the Corps' flood map "unrealistic," Mayor LaRue noted that it would make more sense to outlaw construction along the San Andreas fault line in Califor nia, where there is substantial "proof that a hazard really exists," due to earthquakes. "I think there might be a better chance that Mt. Hood will erupt than for a flood of this size to happen," she said, "but they're not stopping people from building over there." The lone mayor said her city plans to appeal the Corps' designation, by gathering hist orical weather data, and possibly "somehow scraping the money together to hire our own engineer." The East Cental Oregon Association of Counties plans to join the fight by helping to gather the weather data, and alerting area political figures to the town's plight. Although flood plain updates for Heppner and Lexington are not expected to be released sooner than the end of the month, Morrow County and ECOAC officials anticip ate similar trouble for the two upstream towns. In a draft letter to Land Conservation and Development Commission (LCDC), Chairman Richard Gervais, the ECOAC stated that it expects flood plain updates for Heppner and Lexington to be "at least as extensive as those reported in lone." "I hate to think what Heppner will be like," Mayor LaRue quoted a Corps official as saying as he left a heated 20c ger public meeting on the lone flood plain update. The Corps flood plain update for lone, coupled with antici pated flood plain changes for Lexington and Heppner, throws a wrench into the comprehensive planning ef forts of the three communities. The cities rec- ently completed long-range comprehensive plans, which used preliminary and now, apparently outdated flood plain studies to design comprehensive plan maps, technical reports, zoning and subdivision ordinances. Since the updated lone flood plain designation has changed so dramatically from the previous study, with similar changes expected for Heppner and Lexington, ECOAC has requested that the LCDC the agency requesting the plans give the three cities until July 1 of 1979 to revise their comprehensive plans. ECOAC is also seeking $9,691 to fund the revised planning effort for the three municipalities. "Why build a dam if the flood plain's not eliminated?" questioned Judge D.O. Nelson, when the new flood plain woes were outlined Tuesday during a meeting of the Morrow County Intergovernmental Council. The Intergovernmental Council plans to meet with representatives from the Corps during the group's next meeting early in MNovember. Applications being taken for 1978 Morrow County Fair & Rodeo Court Application are now being considered for Morrow County girls aspiring to serve on the coming year's Morrow County Fair and Rodeo Court. Those seeking royalty status must be residents of Morrow County, at least 16 years of age or a junior in high school. Application forms are avail able at school offices at Riverside, lone and Heppner high schools. Further inform ation may be obtained by contacting Fay Seitz at 676 5396. Applications must be receiv ed no later than Nov. 14. Columbia Basin plans power outage forRuggs area Columbia Basin Electric Cooperative customers served by the Ruggs Substation will experience a planned power outage Tuesday, Oct. 24 be tween the hours of 9-11 a.m. Routine repair to the sub station is the reason for the outage, according to a CBEC spokesman. iwtww"i."':'i$; ;"' TM?inf wwBfsa
