Image provided by: Morrow County Museum; Heppner, OR
About Heppner gazette-times. (Heppner, Or.) 1925-current | View Entire Issue (June 19, 1980)
t The Heppner r.azrtte-Time. Heppner. Oregon. Thuriday. June l. 1980-THREE LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 'New Heppnerspan a (The following Irttrr win Rubmittrd for publication.) June 16, 1980 Governor Victor Atiyeh Stale Capital Building Salem, Oregon 97310 Dear Governor Atlyeh: I wish to advise you of a proposed gross misappropria tion of taxpayers' funds. The Oregon State Highway Dept. is proposing to destroy and rebuild a perfectly good, functioning concrete bridge within the city limits of Heppner, Oregon. This bridge was constructed Seniors fight Editor: At the United Seniors' meeting on April 23. 1980. action was taken to consider this resolution. A motion was made to pass the resolution and it was passed unanimous ly. Whereas: There are 380.000 senior citizens in Oregon past 65 years old; and Whereas: More than 50 percent or 190.000 plus have incomes below the poverty level; and Whereas: The large per centage of those remaining re on the brink of poverty; and Whereas: It is no longer safe for anyone to carry even small mounts of money on their Qons; and hereas: The elderly are the least able to defend themselves against robbery, both legal and criminal; and Whereas: The credit card industry makes from 2 per cent to 5 percent from each retail sale at present plus interest on any unpaid balance after thirty days; and Whereas : If 3000,000 of our elderly In the state held credit cards and are charged $10 a year for them, amounting to $3,000,000 which the credit o Nick Ranieri gets the lead out. And saves PGE customers about $480,000 a year. In the past year, Nick Ranieri and his co-workers have saved PGE custom ers nearly a half million dollars. They reclaim, recycle and remanu facture materials and parts that are constantly rising in price like the lead used in electric insulators. Reclaiming and the lead, along and aluminum, saves about $10,000 every month. And another $30,000 is saved monthly by remanufactur ing rather than replacing various parts, such as clamps, switches brackets. 4 l& J I 1 in 1921 and has withstood all the floods In Heppner, mainly due to Its bring considerably higher than the city. The proposed reconstruc tion and subsequent widening of this bridge would devalue the residences affected by greatly reducing the street frontage, and would eliminate street parking for four resi dences and a grocery store; there is no other parking availuble for two residences. The taxpayers of Morrow County voted down the school budget the first time, also the city budget. We are in a recession. The stale general , fund is looking at a deficit, our credit fees card industry would loan out at 20 percent plus interest; and Whereas: United Seniors and itenior groups listed below believe there is a more humane way to "make a buck" than by grinding the faces of the poor, and the elderly poor in particular. Therefore: Be it resolved: United Seniors and senior groups listed below go on record opposing any annual fee for the use of credit cards, or any increase of percentage charged on retail sales. Be it further resolved: That a copy of this resolution be mailed to 'all stale and. national offices of the credit card industry and to all major news outlets in Oregon. The above document is approved and supported by: Carmalitel.Weddle. -President Salem Area Seniors Rex Griggs. Oregon State Council for Senior Citizens S.T.Ford. Chairperson. Dist. 3. Area Agency on Aging Advisory Council that are more important now than ever before. Electricity costs are going up everywhere, it's not just here. Both private and public utilities through out the country are facing soaring recycling prices. Higher with copper equipment costs, fuel costs and interest rates have everyone on a tight budget. And the rapid growth of new cus tomers in our service area is another of the problems we face. and tax waste , local plywood plant and saw mill have reduced their em ployees by some 200 persons (Rreatly reducing the traffic, both commercial and private on this bridge). If the Willow Crpek dam goes through, the Willow Creek highway will be re routed practically eliminating any log truck traffic and greatly reducing private traf fic, In view of these facts, how would, you Justify the misuse of $10(1.000 to $150,000 of taxpayers hardarned funds? If the Stale Highway Dept. still insists on widening this bridge over the opposition of the local taxpayers, it could be done at a fraction of the cost by merely filling the space between the pedestrian lanes and the guard rails and adding new pedestrian lanes; this would create no harm to anyone and give a bridge traffic widlh of 29'6" which is 3'6" wider than the available street with parallel parking. I fail to see any reason for a bridge being wider than the street it serves. If the state still insists on squandering our funds, you could consider replacing the highway bridge into Echo. Oregon, that crosses the Umalilla River. It was built in 192B and is 6" narrower than the Heppner bridge that is the subject of this letter. The Echo bridge has a heavy traffic of trucks, including a great number of potato trucks that are wider than most trucks. ( Heppner 's bridge has no potato truck traffic. There is also the bridge at the fool of the Hardman grade that has Ix-cn responsible for a number of dealhs and crashes. I hope this letter will be given your most earnest attention. Thank you. Yours truly, Paul N. Hansen 2fi0Kast May Street Heppner, Oregon 97836 In total, it means savings But, at PGE, we are for of around $480,000. Savings tunate to have people like Nick Ranieri working hard to keep costs down wherever they can. People with cost-savings ideas for you. res n-3 iu f 'County wages behind living costs Editor: June 24th is the' date the Morrow County budget will again be voted on by the taxpayers, I would like to make a few comments con cerning salaries for Morrow County employees. The county cost-of-living adjustment for 1980-81 is based on 8 percent plus one-half of the January Port land Consumer Price Index over that amount. The CPI for January was 14.8 percent. Using the formula than of 8 percent plus 3.4 percent gave a figure of 11.4 percent. This is the amount of increase given to all employees for cost fo living adjustment. The CPI for March was 16.6 percent. So even though our salaries are newly adjusted they are still behind the rate of Senior The only special activity for senior citizens scheduled ahead is the annual trip and noondav luncheon at Cutsforth Park on Wednesday, July 9. Those interested in riding to the park in the senior bus need to tell the Heppner Neighbor hood Center in advance of the picnic date to arrange a place for them. Meals to be served to seniors next week at the three meal sites in this county will include, at Irrigon on Monday evening. June 23--roast turkey and dressing, mashed potat oes and gravy, green beans, sliced tomatoes and green, peppers, with other relishes," 74 less energy The production of steel from scrap metal requires 74 per cent less energy than the production of steel from iron on-, so that 1.000 tons of recycled steel save the energy equivalent of 140.000 gallons of gasoline. inflation. This is something the County Court cannot control. It is up to our national leaders to curb inflation. Since we cannot treat the cause, we have lo treat the effect. Some county positions, like those of the commissioners, were given only cost of living adjustments, others were giv en an actual salary increase. The last three years the cost-of-living adjustment was well below the rate of Infla tion. Employees were losing buying power. It was bound to create a financial crunch, and it did. The county began to lose employees because higher paying jobs were available. The cost to the county to have a high turnover rate is considerable. The choice was Citizens tossed green salad, bread, butter and Jelly and spice cake with topping. At Heppner on Tuesday. June 24-tomatoe juice, puffed turkey sand wiches, macaroni salad, relishes and cheese sticks, vegetarian baked beans and cream puffs with lemon sauce. At lone and . Heppner on Wednesday, June 25meat loaf. mashed potatoes. Har vard beets, tomato aspic salad, cornbread. orange juice and applesauce cupcakes. 7jZ T 7 Y7 1 Prices Effective June 19-, I iL n : Coffee : tVl ,i Dy X All Grinds It : jpy V Pork Back Ribs lime 1 - m : O V ib. II JIN W Western Family 11 IP : X Scott 4 Pak VTT SS? 1 39 Bathroom Tissue 99 ' Kraft Deluxe 14 02. Macaroni & Cheese c : - : " '"' 1 : Western Family Large, Pitted Ripe t Olives I ft i 60" J "Seedless Grapes g$ Fresh Corn s Mre n 1 tt-i'4v lift ' 4 f ?hm B,ng cherr,es 1 off J W I -. "fAMlUET M to raise wages to be competi tive or become a training ground for personnel to reach better Jobs. Asking people to work for less tnan the going rate is equivalent to asking them to donate a portion of their wages for the privilege of holding a county Job. The' Court house Salary Committee reviewed all the salaries, including those ot elected officials and wage earners. It decided on a schedule it deemed fair and equitable for all. (The com mittee based the Judge's salary on the pay of other county employees with simi lar responsibility. The Judge was not involved in that decision.) The budget com mittee reviewed the schedule . and adopted it. The voter of Morrow County is the actual employer. The Salary Committee has recom mended an increase. Now the individual must decide what constitutes good responsible management. The job of County Commis sioner is considered to be a half-time position, or 20 hours a week. One day a week is spent in a court session either in Heppner or Irrigon. The remaining time is spent in a variety of ways: Attending meetings, caring for corres ' pondence. doing necessary reading, listening to indivi dual problems, following upon needed , action and seeking solutions. Let me give you a brief rundown on job-related re sponsibilities that I hold presently: Secretary-treasurer of East Central Oregon Association of Counties, sec retary of Quintra Transporta tion for Elderly and Handi capped, vice chairman of Eastern Oregon State College Regional Services Institute, chairman of ECOAC Econom ic Development Project Re view Committee, member of Public Lands Committee, As sociation Oregon Counties; member of Developmental Disabilities Council of Oregon, member of Legislative Inter im Committee County Law Revision, chairman of ECOAC Budget Committee and chair man of Morrow County Per Bon UcDonaldr 6QACB Door Prizes mm m l.f pq A7Q?S sonnel Policy Committee. In addition to serving on the executive committee or at a member of the above, I also attend Comprehensive Plan ning sessions. Budget School, legislative updates, planning institutes, computer semin ars, and other meetings where court representation is need ed. The list is not complete but I hope that I have given enough to convince the reader that the job of County Commissioner is time consuming, laden with responsibility and calls for constant decision-making. Dorothy Krebs. Morrow County Commissioner 1 676-9921 POD! Free Coffee & Donuts .
