EIGHT - Heppner Gazette-Times, Heppner, Oregon Wednesday, January 25, 2023
High appointed to Heppner City Council County Republicans
discuss need for
PCPs
Cody High
By Andrea Di Salvo
In a split vote, the Hep-
pner City Council voted
to appoint Cody High to
a vacant councilor posi-
tion at its regular council
meeting Jan. 9 in Heppner.
High will be filling out the
remainder of a term left
by newly-elected Heppner
Mayor Corey Sweeney.
With three candidates,
the selection of an appoin-
tee was the topic of some
discussion.
“They’re all three sharp
candidates,” said Sweeney.
“I don’t think we could
make a really bad decision,”
agreed councilor Sharon
Inskeep.
Councilor and Mor-
row County Sheriff John
Bowles was absent from
the meeting, and council-
or Dale Bates suggested
holding off on the decision
so Bowles could be pres-
ent, and perhaps having a
vote by ballot, but council-
or Adam Doherty said he
thought the decision should
be immediate. Doherty
moved to appoint High,
who had been a former city
council member and mayor.
“Familiarity and ex-
perience matters in city
government,” he said.
High was appointed
with a 3-2 vote, with Bates
and councilor JoAnna
Lamb dissenting.
Sweeney, who was
sworn in by outgoing mayor
Jim Kindle at the meeting,
also shared some of his
goals for his coming term.
“I’m excited to be the
city mayor,” said Sweeney.
“My goals for city may-
or—to have the circuit court
stay in Heppner, that’s my
number one goal for the city
of Heppner. Number two,
probably, would be the sew-
er project, not kicking that
down the road any more,
getting it done and taken
care of. Three would be
working with Tamra Mab-
bott and the planning com-
mission to see the growth
we need in Heppner for
housing and whatnot.”
Council members Dale
Bates, Sharon Inskeep and
Adam Doherty were also
sworn in, and John Bowles
was elected council pres-
ident.
In other business, Hep-
pner City Manager Kraig
Cutsforth reported that not
much had changed on the
sewer project.
“I met with Anderson
Perry, and I think they were
more concentrating on our
waste disposal than they
were what we’re doing with
our rebuilding of our sewer
plant, so I don’t have a lot of
information,” he said.
He also reported that
the final draft of the water
management and conserva-
tion plan was with the state,
and Cutsforth said they
were waiting to hear back
from the state on that.
“We’ll know more
about it in about 20 or 30
days,” Cutsforth said. “It’s
now in front of the state for
review. It only took us a
year and one month.”
Cutsforth advised the
council that Feb. 13 at 6
p.m., before the regular
council meeting, there will
be a public meeting with
a group working on eco-
nomic development and
lands assessment for the
community.
“It has got a lot of in-
formation in it. I think it’s
worth coming and seeing,”
he said.
He also reminded the
council that there will be
a public meeting later this
month for a goal-setting
session. That meeting will
be Jan. 26 at 5:30 p.m.
Cutsforth said he vis-
ited with the auditor and
received a draft of the au-
dit. He said he had done a
cursory review and didn’t
see any issues but would
be reviewing that more.
He has continued to look
for a street sweeper, “but
it’s not that time of year, so
I haven’t really seen any.
There’s not a large amount
of them out there at the
moment,” he said. He also
reported that the city had
received complaints about
the squeaky windmill at
the museum and were able
to get the windmill chained
down, that the heater in the
shop was replaced, and that
he visited with a Colum-
bia River Enterprise Zone
(CREZ) representative re-
garding the CREZ meeting
reschedule.
“Normally by now we
would know what and if
we were going to get any
funds through CREZ, but
they’re going through some
changes just like us, so
that meeting has been re-
scheduled and we’ll know
here within a couple weeks
what they’re doing. We may
be receiving funds from
them,” he added.
In other business, the
council:
-Removed former
councilors Jim Kindle and
David Gunderson as check
signers and appointed Co-
rey Sweeney and Adam
Doherty.
-Approved lease re-
newals for Dickenson Chi-
ropractic and the Howard
and Beth Bryant Foun-
dation. Both leases were
extended another year at a
monthly rent of $450.
-Passed a resolution
ratifying various commit-
tee appointments. Added
to existing appointments
were Eric Chick, Adam
Bergstrom, Trevor Rhea
and JoAnna Lamb to the
fire department advisory
committee and Sharon In-
skeep to the St. Patrick’s
Celebration committee.
-Heard from Heppner
Fire Chief Steve Rhea that
the department had six lift
assists, one secure landing
zone, two motor vehicle
accidents with injuries, one
water heater explosion, one
citizen assist, three motor
vehicle accidents without
injury, one motor vehicle
accident with three ex-
tractions and 28 chief calls.
He also reported working
on the ISO survey review,
awaiting ready to build op-
tion sheet from a company
in Texas for a Type 3 engine
for the Rural Fire Protection
District and completing a
VFA grant award for pur-
chase of loose equipment.
He said total department
numbers for 2022 were 205
calls for service and 316
chief calls. Both numbers
were up from 2021.
-Learned that Morrow
County Sheriff’s Deputy
Colleen Neubert worked
152 hours and Deputy Dan-
iel Thomas worked 161
hours, for a total of 313
Mayor Corey Sweeney
hours. Other staff worked
87.5 hours for a department
total of 400.5 hours. Hep-
pner had three theft com-
plaints, 24 citizen assists,
one stolen vehicle, four
motor vehicle crashes, two
juvenile complaints, one hit
and run, 10 traffic stops, one
animal complaint and five
dog complaints.
-Heard from Heppner
Public Works Director Chad
Doherty, who reported that
the water department made
and installed lids on vaults,
repaired a broken water
line, fixed a water leak,
replaced meters, responded
to six frozen meters, and re-
sponded to two after-hours
calls for meter shutoffs for
broken pipes in homes.
The sewer department
cleaned contact basins, did
11 septic dumps, cleaned
sewers and replaced the
packing and fixed the stroke
on the sludge pump.
The streets department
sanded and plowed the
streets on multiple days
and applied deicer multiple
days.
The parks department
picked up leaves in the
parks and attended the
Christmas tree lighting to
turn on the lights.
“We had a good turn-
out. There were a lot of
people there,” he said.
The shop department
took an excavator for re-
pairs, burned a debris pile,
changed the oil in two
Rams, and met with the
city manager and Perkins
Door for overhead door
repairs and installation of
new power doors.
“We finally got some-
one to come out,” said Chad
Doherty. “That power door
has been broken for proba-
bly six months. If anyone’s
trying to deal with overhead
doors right now, you can’t
get anything.”
“ We ’ v e t r i e d f o r
months, and it’s not just
them,” added Cutsforth.
“It’s happened to a lot of
that industry.”
The Morrow County
Republicans discussed the
need for more Precinct
Committeepersons (PCPs)
at a regular meeting Jan. 12
in Heppner.
Committee Chair Clint
Carlson spoke about the
need for more Morrow
County PCPs; PCPs rep-
resent their political party
on the local level. He also
spoke about the importance
of having PCPs in case
an appointment needs to
be made to an empty leg-
islative seat, as recently
happened when State Rep-
resentative David Brock
Smith was appointed to fill
the State Senate District
1 vacancy left by Dallas
Heard.
“That’s what we as
PCPs do,” he said. “That’s
one of our most important
jobs.”
Robin Jones was ap-
pointed PCP for Heppner.
That still leaves one va-
cancy in Heppner, one in
Lexington, seven in Irrigon
and nine in Boardman. Ione
PCP positions are full.
Also at the meeting,
the committee discussed
an upcoming fundraiser,
a spaghetti dinner Thurs-
day, June 22, 6-8 p.m. The
committee discussed trying
to get local elected officials
to speak and give updates
on their work. Mr. Carlson
also mentioned the possibil-
ity of getting Bryan Dean
Wright, host of podcast The
President’s Daily Brief and
former CIA agent, to speak.
Wright is not local but has
family in the area.
“I think he’d be really
interesting for people to
come listen to,” said Carl-
son.
A location has not been
chosen for the dinner, but
committee treasurer Brian
Snyder said he would look
into the Port of Morrow as
a location.
The committee dis-
cussed establishing a bud-
get, and Snyder asked for
guidance on categories so
he could put together a
rough draft of a budget to
present at the next meeting.
Categories included travel
to state Republican meet-
ings, office supplies and
fundraisers as expenses.
Income would come solely
through fundraisers and do-
nations. The committee also
discussed other fundraising
ideas, such as a mailer or
reaching out via email or
Facebook.
It was announced that
an Oregon Republican
Party (ORP) meeting is
planned for Feb. 18. A new
ORP secretary will be elect-
ed at the meeting.
The next meeting of the
Morrow County Republi-
can Party will be Thursday,
Feb. 23, at 6 p.m. at the
Morrow County Govern-
ment Building in Irrigon.
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