Image provided by: Morrow County Museum; Heppner, OR
About Heppner gazette-times. (Heppner, Or.) 1925-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 29, 1995)
Artifactory Fair set for this Saturday Merry Brannon (left) and friend Brittany Boothe show some of the items Brannon will sell at the Artifactory. Brannon makes dried and silk flower arrangements, tree decorations and wooden Christmas ornaments. e imes VOL. 114 NO. 48 6 Pages Wednesday, November 29, 1995, a m. and local singer Tim Cundell will provide music beginning at 10 a m. The G reens W orkshop, where people can make their own Christmas wreaths, will be held in conjunction with the Artifactory. The Soroptimist Q ub will sell baked potatoes, hot dogs, chili, pie, hot chocolate, hot cider, pop, tea and coffee. School board approves busing service contract By April Hilton-Sykes The Morrow County School Board, at a special meeting Monday, Nov. 27, at the district offices in Lexington, approved a contract to hire out school busing services to Mid Colum bia Bus Co., Inc. Mary Kay Brant, Oregon School Employees Association representative, Ed Edwards, director of labor/government relations with Oregon School Employees Association, and several classified employees asked the board not to approve the busing contract, saying that the board's action would hurt the community. The union also charged that the board's action would break a three-year con tract that the board had with the bus drivers. The OSEA has filed unfair labor practices suits against the district in connection with hir ing out bus services; however, the local OSEA chapter voted against striking over the issue. Ben Hubert and Dodie Givens rehearse their parts in the upcoming HHS Drama Club production School district superinten dent Chuck Starr admonished the union, particulary for ad vertisements, news stories and radio program s that were "derogatory" to him and to school board members. Starr said that the union call ed him "dishonest" and the union said that board members were "co-conspirators" with Mid Columbia. Starr also said that he objected to OSEA members challenging the board about facts and figures that board members could not have possibly known unless asked ahead of time. He stressed that the board had read the busing contract, contrary to OSEA ch arg es, and that board member Dwayne Carroll was instrumental in drawing up the contract specifications. Starr also refuted OSEA charges that potential bidders were not given sufficient time to submit bid proposals. The board's contract with Mid Columbia will be effective January 2, 19%. Other specifi cations include the following: -the board reserves the right to inspect, approve or reject any vehicle. Regular route gasoline buses will not exceed 12 years and diesel, 15; -the contractor agrees to pur chase from the district any or all school buses, spare parts, tires, supplies or other mate rials directly associated with the operation of home-to- school transportation; -the contractor agrees to pay for the buses at total cash value at high yellow book; -the contractor will pay $726,900 in one lump sum, which will be invested in the state pool by the district for three years, so the district may buy the buses back at the end of that period; -contractor agrees to schedule all routes for contract purposes with the approval of the district; -during inclement weather, the district will have the sole responsibility of altering bus routes or cancelling bus service for that day, with the contrac tor inspecting designated roads; -the district agrees to pay 80 percent of the yearly total ow ed to the contractor for home to school transportation in nine equal monthly payments; -the contractor is entitled to exclusive use and possession the district's transportation facilities (bus garages and sheds) and will pay the district monthly rate of $1,500 each for the Heppner and Boardman facilities and $250 each for the lone and Irrigon facilities for a total of $3,500 monthly rent -hiring and firing personnel is up to the contractor, but the district can require the contract to dismiss any person or drive who the district feels is not qualified to operate a school bus; -the contractor will offer employment to all regular school bus drivers currently employed by the school district and who qualify for employ ment by the contractor; -the contractor agrees to pay said employees at equal or greater hourly rates of pay or monthly salaries, plus incre ments, as set forth in the 1995-% agreement between the district and its current roster of school bus drivers; -the contractor shall provide individual health insurance for those currently employed bus drivers receiving health in surance from the district's health insurance policy; -those currently employed district bus drivers working four hours or more per day receiving full benefits under the district's health insurance po licy would be eligible to receive individual health insurance from the contractor and would be required to pay the dif ference between the contrac tor's monthly premium and the cap rate as established by the contractor; -those currently employed district bus drivers working less than four hours per day and receiving one-half benefits under the district's heath in surance would be required to pay one-half the individual health insurance premium and the difference between the con tractor's monthly premium and the cap rate as established by the contractor; -those employees who are receiving district health insur ance have the option to pur chase health coverage for their spouse or family beyond the in dividual health insurance from the contractor at the employ ee's expense. Contracted rates for provid ing school bus services are as follows: school bus routes and field trips-$1.69 per mile; special education school bus routes-$1.54 per mile; activity trips-87 cents a mile, with $7.80 driver hourly stand-by rate and driver overtime after eight hours a day and all weekend and holiday hours- $3.90; motor coach-$1.68 per mile with driver overnight rate of $60. In other business, the board awarded a bid to low bidder Ramsay Construction of Cor vallis for carpeting work for remodeled areas and additions to Columbia Middle School and A.C. Houghton Elementary in Irrigon. Ramsay Construction bid $3,102,021 which was under the district's proposed budget of $3,3 million. Other bids were $3,103,700 and $3,163,338. Holiday Sale Hurry our BIG SALES ends Saturday Dec. 1 WCPD meeting rescheduled Willow Creek Park District's December meeting has been rescheduled for Monday, Dec. 4 at 7 p.m. at the Lexington Ci ty Hall. ceramics, dolls, birdhouses, tole painting, sweatshirt jack ets, T-shirts, wool rugs, knitted and crocheted items, dish towels, aprons, tree orna ments, table wreaths, flower baskets, baked goods, clocks, picture frames, stained glass, jewelry, dough art and, for the kids, 'Flubber' and 'Silly Putty'. Santa will make his annual appearance from 10 to 11:30 Morrow County Heppner, Oregon It's a "Hillbilly Weddin'" at HHS There's going to be a weddin' at Heppner High School--a hillbilly w eddin', and y'all are invited. "Hillbilly W eddin'", a three- act farce by Le Roma Greth and published by Heuer Publish ing, will be performed by the H ep p n er Drama Club on Thursday and Friday, Dec. 7 and 8, at 7 p.m. at the HHS cafeterium. Admission is $1 for students and $2 for adults. The play concerns Paw Bel- snickle, a man with a problem- -make that six problems, in the form of six unmarried daugh ters. Third daughter, Juney Lou, is a pretty girl who wants to marry Homer Upschlager. Since he also wants to marry her, the solution may seem simple. But no. Maw Belsnickle has decided Juney Lou cannot be married until Ceelie, at the ripe old age of 19, and Bonnie Mae, the bookworm, are safe ly married off. Maw elects Paw to find husbands for them. Paw has a very simple method of producing the nec essary husbands. He decides to wing them, pick out the buck shot and have the fellows mar ried to his daughters before they know what has happened. A handsome medical student who happens on the scene complicates the issue. Needless to say, there is a lot of confusion and mayhem before the story ends happily for all concerned. Paw Belsnickle will be played by Cory Larson; Maw by Jayme Hansen; Ceelie by Brandi Mar shall; Bonnie Mae by Dodie Givens; and Juney Lou by Traci Dickenson. Other cast mem bers are as follows: Four Belsnickle-Toni Kemp; Five Belsnickle-Tina Kemp; Six Belsnickle-Stormy Howard; Obeey Upschlager-Tim Dicken son; Chiz Upschlager-Josh Coiner; Ronald Maxwell-Ben Hubert; Lucy Maxwell-Kristina Grant; the Reverend-David Michael; Cousin Zeke-Robby Schultz; cousins-Josh Roy, Travis Wilhelm, Cimmie Huth and Jenny Burkenbine. Student directors are Beth Cookston and Phillip Spicer- kuhn. Advisor is Nancy Swar- at. Schultz and Wilhelm are set designers. The National Honor Society will sell refreshments at inter- mission. The annual Artifactory, the arts, crafts and food fair spon sored by Soroptimist Interna tional of Heppner will be this Saturday, Dec. 2, at the Mor row County Fairgrounds from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. The Artifactory will showcase around 35 different vendors this year selling a variety of crafts and baked goods. Items for sale include wood crafts, The cast of the HHS Drama Club production “ Hillbilly Weddin" Morrow County Grain Growers Lexington 989-8221 1 -800-452-7396_________