The INDEPENDENT, June 1, 2006
Page 3
Letters
Spaghetti dinner will
help fund fireworks
To the Editor:
The Buckhorn Restaurant is
again providing a spaghetti din-
ner as a fundraiser for Vernon-
ia’s 4th of July fireworks.
The dinner will be Thursday,
June 22, from 5:00 to 8:00
p.m., and will include salad,
bread, spaghetti and dessert.
Prices are $8.00 for adults and
$4.00 for children under twelve.
Letters have been sent to
businesses and some individu-
als asking for donations for the
fireworks, and cans have been
placed in some of the business-
es. We will also be collecting
[donations] after the fireworks
and your generosity will be
greatly appreciated, as always.
The fireworks cost approxi-
mately $3,000.00, so it takes all
of you contributing to reach this
goal.
De Loris Webb
Vernonia Pride
Once asset is gone,
it can’t be replaced
To the Editor:
Although I live in Idaho now,
I lived in western Oregon for
the better part of my life. Ore-
gon is a great state, where the
citizens make sensible deci-
sions more often than the
norm. In the case of your Ver-
nonia Airport that is in jeopardy,
I am afraid the city may make a
mistake that they will live to re-
gret.
A rural airport is an asset
that, once gone, will never
come back. I am the manager
of a small airport in Lava Hot
Springs, Idaho. Like your town,
not everyone sees the benefit
of the airport. In my town, I am
fully aware that benefits includ-
ing tourist trade, air ambulance
access, fire-fighters’ landing
site, emergency landing site,
and “town color” are over-
looked by most town residents.
A recent vote showed that
less than 40 percent of the
town’s residents have any inter-
est in the airport. In our town,
less that 25 percent of the peo-
ple use the city parks, and less
that 5 percent use the tennis
courts. Nearly every facility in
town is used by less than a ma-
jority of the residents. The air-
port is no different. Clearly, it
does not make sense to say
that a majority of residents
need to utilize a city facility in
order to justify the facility’s pub-
lic ownership or existence.
Think about the future. In
this day and age, the city would
never be able to replace the air-
port once it is gone. Especially
those of you who have no
strong feelings one way or the
other, do you really want to en-
able the airport to be taken
away from future generations,
just for the enrichment of spe-
cial interests today? Please
make the effort to understand
the issues, voice your con-
cerns, and do what needs to be
done to protect the city’s asset.
Sincerely,
Reed White, Manager
Lava Hot Springs Airport
Idaho
Airport is important
in emergency events
To the Editor:
To the people of Vernonia:
As a member of the local air-
port commission, as a pilot, and
as a recent passenger on Air
Life, our airport is an important
asset to Baker City and Baker
County. We have one business,
perhaps two, who are signifi-
cant contributors to the eco-
nomic base of the community
and who would not be here if it
were not for the airport. The air-
port gives us quick access to
medical services not available
in our community. Even though
it is a city owned airport, the
county has twice now voted to
support bond issues to main-
tain and improve the airport.
I would urge the city of Ver-
nonia to reconsider declaring
your airport surplus and to keep
it as a city asset and work to
improve it. Even though cur-
rently a grass strip, it is the sin-
gle best economic attractor the
city has. In any survey of the
items that a business looks for
when locating to a community,
the availability of an airport
usually is at the top of the list.
I understand that at one time
the Vernonia airport was paying
Between the Bookends
By Denise Holmes, Librarian
Banks Public Library
Summer Fun at the Banks Library is ready to
take kids on adventures in learning with Paws,
Claws, Scales and Tales! Come in and sign up
for special programs and the Summer Reading
Program.
Preschool & Grades K-6
Thursdays at 2:00 p.m.
June 22:
June 29:
July 13:
July 20:
BJ the Clown
Juggle Mania
Reptile Man
Furfest - For kids entering 4th & 5th
grades. Space for this program is
limited, so registration is required.
July 27: When Animals Were People
Aug. 3: Pink Pig Puppet Theatre
Preschool through High School
Reading Program
June 1-August 31, 2006
June 1: Sign-up begins
July 15: Last day of sign-up
Aug 1: Turn in completed reading record
and receive award book
Aug 31: Last day to turn in reading record
Developing an appreciation for reading at a
young age provides positive and creative outlets
for a child’s energy and imagination, as well as a
strong foundation for their future. According to
reading experts, kids who do not read over the
summer lose about one-third of a grade level by
the beginning of the next school year. Let your
public library help your children maintain their
academic skills while enjoying creative learning.
Banks Public Library: 111 Market Street.
Hours: Tues., Wed., Thurs., 12 - 7:00 p.m.;
Fri. and Sat. 12 - 5:00 p.m.
Preschool Story Time:
Wednesdays at 10:15 a.m.
Phone: (503 ) 324-1382 for information
(503) 846-3245 to renew material
Internet: <www.WILInet.wccls.lib.or.us.>
Browse library resources, reserve or renew
materials online. Call for information.
its way and had a good airport
manager who was working on
improving the airport and then
something happened. I would
hope that Vernonia would form
an airport advisory commission
(including pilots) whose goal is
to develop proposals for the de-
velopment and promotion of
the Vernonia Airport. It is much
easier to keep a city asset like
the airport than to get it back if
you lose it.
Sincerely,
Jon Croghan
Baker City
Airport will be lost
because of neglect
To the Editor:
Open Letter to the Vernonia
City Council.
As someone who’s been in-
volved in aviation and airport is-
sues for a long time, I was con-
cerned when I heard about the
proposed sale of Vernonia’s air-
port to a private developer. So I
decided to come out to the city
council’s airport workshop
meeting and see what the fuss
was all about. It didn’t take me
long to recognize a sadly famil-
iar pattern: the city neglects the
airport until it is no longer vi-
able, then claims they can’t
support it and puts it up for
sale.
Based on her statements at
the meeting, the mayor seems
to have made up her mind that
the only way the airport can re-
main viable is if it is sold to
someone who can develop it. I
must respectfully disagree with
that assessment.
Please don’t misunderstand
me – I know little about the pro-
posed developer’s plans or re-
sources, and would very much
like to think he could make a go
of it. If I believed it was the only
way to keep it open, I’d be the
first to support the plan. But I’ve
been around aviation long
enough to know that privatizing
a public airport is all too often
the first step in its eventual de-
mise. Short of an outright rever-
sion clause which is very unlike-
ly to get past any bank loan offi-
cer, all the promises and restric-
tions in the world won’t keep an
airport from being converted to
some other use if the developer
can’t get insurance, falls on
hard times, declares bankrupt-
cy, or sells to some other entity
with no interest in maintaining
the land as an airport.
Public entities nearly always
have better access to the types
of resources that are necessary
to properly manage airports
than do private ones, and con-
trary to what the mayor would
have us believe, there’s no rea-
son the city can’t make their air-
port viable. For proof one only
needs to look back a few years,
when the city had a competent
airport manager who had a
clear stake in the long term via-
bility of the airport. The airport
was self-sustaining (generating
a surplus in fact), had tiedowns
and a nice little camping area
popular with flyers, was receiv-
ing airport improvement grant
funds from the state (is still eli-
gible for them in fact, contrary
to the mayor’s assertion at the
meeting), and had plans for
new hangars on airport land
under a long term lease
arrangement.
Somewhere along the line
that plan went off track, and it’s
a real shame that it did. Be-
cause in all likelihood you
wouldn’t be talking about sell-
ing it today if those plans had
been allowed to proceed. Im-
provement breeds improve-
ment, and the measures pro-
posed at that time – building
modern hangars and paving
the runway – would very likely
have spurred more growth of
the kind that the city is now talk-
ing about selling the airport to
achieve. When a city supports
their airport and takes steps to
improve it, aviation businesses
are that much more likely to
come in and lease airport land,
adding jobs to the community
and lease payments to the city.
One needs only to look a few
miles west to see an example
of what I’m talking about. A few
years ago the situation was
much the same at Seaside: the
municipal airport was falling
into disrepair, the city was tired
of spending money to keep it
up, and there was talk of clos-
ing it and making it into an in-
dustrial park. But the Seaside
city council took a different ap-
proach. They formed a new air-
port advisory committee, being
careful to appoint knowledge-
able and resourceful people
from the aviation and local
business communities. The
committee’s task was simple:
help the city make the airport
Please see page 26