Make the McKenzie Connection!
Make the McKenzie Connection!
Sorted by date Results 426 - 450 of 1747
The Eugene Water & Electric Board (EWEB) met drinking water safety standards in 2022 for every type of contaminant regulated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Oregon Health Authority. EWEB produces more than 23 million gallons of drinking water every day. The utility has never failed to meet the standards. Toxic chemicals from agricultural, urban development, waste disposal, and forestry practices can get into groundwater, lakes, and rivers, contaminating water for...
Boat builders were busy all week long at the McKenzie River Discovery Center. Turn to Page 2...
The Lane County Board of Commissioners unanimously approved the Blue River Code Amendments regarding right-of-way setbacks today (4-25-23). The ordinance was approved with an emergency clause for an immediate effective date....
FINN ROCK: The report of a single-vehicle crash on May 20th turned out to be a lucky break for Brandon Hanson, 25. He was westbound near Milepost 38 of the McKenzie Hwy. at 1:45 a.m. when he told police he collided with a large boulder that disabled the Peterbilt truck he was operating. The impact caused the semi’s cab and trailer to veer off the roadway, taking out 11 posts and 6 guardrail panels before dropping 6 to 8 feet into a wetland. The lucky part is that Hanson was uninjured. The O...
FINN ROCK: A public forum for candidates seeking seats on the McKenzie School Board hasn’t panned out as planned. On Tuesday morning the event’s sponsor, the McKenzie Educational Association, reported only four of the eight candidates had agreed to show up to answer six questions that had been sent in advance of the forum. The questions ranged from prior involvement with the school to challenges facing the district as well as any current courses or programs that should be added to or del...
Over the past twenty-five years, Jason Hayes has produced a specialized craft - the McKenzie River Drift Boat. How many? “Too many to count.,” Hayes says. “I lost track a long time ago. Somewhere between 70 to 80 boats.” Besides his own work, he’s spent time educating others, including local youth at McKenzie High School and other wood shops to expose and educate the younger generations about the design now known around the world. “I want to help bring up the next generation and the history her...
MCKENZIE BRIDGE: The work volunteers do isn’t apparent in the short posts that appear in the published weekly logs. Behind the many responses to fire, medical emergencies, or vehicular accidents though, are people who find the extra time to improve the lives of others. During a recognition ceremony last Saturday night, Upper McKenzie Rural Fire District Chief Rainbow Plews took the opportunity to tell a bit about the backstories of the people who show up when responding to calls for help. A...
There’s plenty of history associated with the town of Blue River, including its function as a collection station for the McKenzie Toll Road between Springfield and central Oregon from 1891 to 1895. Also playing a key role was the discovery of gold-bearing quartz ledges in the upper reaches of the Blue River drainage, and the boom when mining operations began in about 1890. Often at the center of that early activity was the Sparks family that built a cabin and a two-story log house, a sawmill, a...
A lot of careful measuring, sanding, and fitting of parts for iconic McKenzie River drift boats is set to wind up this week. The work, part of a boat-building class led by Jason Hayes of Hayes Custom Wooden Boats, has been quietly underway at the McKenzie River Discovery Center. Once again, the week-long class was fully booked and this year the student craftsmen are expected to complete two traditional boats on Friday. Fishing guides and wooden boat fans will gather also again on the opening day...
Under a proposal in the Legislature, Oregon’s service agencies could see spending cuts, which could hit hardest in rural areas. Under the Committee on Ways and Means co-chair budget, state agency spending would be cut by 2.5%. John Mullin, an advocate for the Human Services Coalition of Oregon, said the proposed budget could hurt health providers’ Medicaid reimbursement rates, which is bad news for rural Oregon. “There are really some very challenging issues about finding providers in rural...
A film premiering this week tackles the potential harms of the nuclear industry. Portland State University professor emeritus Jan Haaken directed the documentary “Atomic Bamboozle: The False Promise of a Nuclear Renaissance.” The film draws on historical lessons from the campaign to shut down the Trojan Nuclear Power Plant in Rainier, Oregon. The plant closed in 1992. Haaken said the nuclear industry is promoting a new design concept known as small modular reactors, or SMRs. Her initial int...
WALERVILLE: Traffic snarled to a stop and blocked the McKenzie Highway Monday morning after trucks collided at the site of recurring accidents. According to reports from the Oregon State Police, the accident occurred at 8:07 a.m. at Milepost 13, where the roadway crosses a narrow bridge over the Eugene Water & Electric Board's Walterville Canal. Police say the driver of a white Hino box truck left the road for unknown reasons and then re-entered the highway. He then hit the sidewalk of the...
LEABURG: McKenzie Fire & Rescue is among the finalists in the running for the Eugene Water & Electric Board’s 2023 Greenpower Grant. The fire district‘s proposal would include installing solar panels on their headquarter station in Leaburg. The panels, according to the grant proposal, “would contribute to the preservation of the area’s natural resources in an environmentally friendly way.” The panels are expected to help reduce the Leaburg building’s annual electricity $6,100 bill and could o...
Turnout was great at the McKenzie Valley Young Life’s Easter Egg Hunt at the McKenzie Community Track & Field. There was a special area for 0-4, and a timed release for the other age groups. Added activities included games like sack and three-legged races. Besides the free entry, the event generated donations towards the costs of going to camp for participants in the Young Life programs. At the Walterville Grange Easter Egg Hunt, children of all ages were placed in groups to get a fair chance a...
EUGENE: The Lane County Board of Commissioners could write a prescription for relief from rebuilding anxiety at their April 25th meeting. On the agenda are possible code amendments that were developed in response to concerns faced by owners of buildings destroyed by the Holiday Farm Fire in Blue River. According to senior planner Becky Taylor, the existing rights-of-way in the “downtown” area of Blue River were formally established by plats originally developed when the town was created. Most of the rights-of-way in the area are from 40 to 60 f...
BLUE RIVER: The Lane County Sheriff’s Office and family members are asking the public for help in finding a missing Blue River woman. According to LCSO reports, Mekenna Reiley was last seen on Thursday evening, April 6th. Friends and neighbors say they hadn’t seen or heard from the 40-year-old since. The Sheriff’s Office says that Reiley’s phone, purse, vehicle, and dog were left behind at her residence near Blue River Reservoir, but her location was unknown. It’s feared Reiley may be suffering...
A federal judge has ruled in support of a Bureau of Land Management effort to restrict bureaucratic delays to timber harvests and fuel reduction projects on BLM lands. U.S. District Judge Michael J. McShane on March 27th granted summary judgment in favor of the BLM’s 2020 Final Rule eliminating the agency’s protest process which, the agency argued, had resulted in unnecessary bureaucratic delays to timber harvests and fuel reduction projects on BLM-managed lands, including more than 2 mil...
The federal government has awarded seven financial institutions in Oregon a total of $22.3 million in grants to help underserved communities recover from the pandemic. The money, announced Monday, is part of $1.7 billion awarded to more than 600 institutions nationwide through a U.S. Treasury program to boost recovery among low-income and moderate-income communities that were the hardest hit during the last three years. The grants are designed to provide capital and financing for small...
The Deschutes and Willamette National Forests remind people that overnight permit reservations have begun to be accepted for the Central Cascades Wilderness Permit System. The permits are required for all overnight use within the Mt. Jefferson, Mt. Washington, and Three Sisters wilderness areas from June 15th through October 15th. 40% of Central Cascades Wilderness Overnight Permit reservations became available for advanced reservation Tuesday on Recreation.gov. Officials said the remaining 60%...
The Special District Election scheduled for Tuesday, May 16th, will call for a bit of creativity for some voters. A number of the smaller units of government drew no interest from people willing to serve on them. Without a check box to mark, voters will have the option to write someone in or skip that portion of ballots that will be mailed to local residents on April 27th. Two McKenzie area water districts drew no candidates - the 51-year-old McKenzie Palisades district and the Dearborn district in Rainbow. The Palisades Water District had...
The Oregon Health Authority starts a months-long review of the state’s 1.5 million Medicaid members this week to determine who still qualifies for the health insurance. Normally, states review the financial eligibility of members annually, but during the pandemic, the federal government expanded benefits to states that kept members insured. Medicaid, known as the Oregon Health Plan in Oregon, provides free medical, behavioral health, and dental coverage. The extra federal benefits ended F...
A $120 million initiative to boost literacy would be one of the single largest investments of its type in Oregon history if it passes. But during a public hearing for the proposal at the House Committee on Education on Monday, critics said it doesn’t go far enough and risks wasting money without stricter spending rules. At the end of the hearing, the committee unanimously approved the initiative, moving it to the budget-writing Joint Ways & Means Committee. It would be the seventh major initiati...
A species of woodpecker once thought to limit itself to recently burned areas can breed successfully in the unburned parts of fire-prone landscapes too, according to a study by Oregon State University scientists that holds key implications for improved conservation and forest management efforts. The research led by doctoral student Mark Kerstens and Jim Rivers, a faculty member in the OSU College of Forestry, sheds new light on the black-backed woodpecker, which lives throughout northern North...
State Forester Calvin Mukumoto has proclaimed all of April as Oregon Arbor Month, allowing lots of time for commemorative plantings and other tree-related activities. “Trees play an essential role in the lives of Oregonians,” said State Forester Mukumoto. “Living through the extreme heat of 2021 and the isolation of the COVID pandemic has brought home to all of us the importance of urban trees to provide shade and cooling, as well as contact with nature right in our own neighborhoods. This procl...
LEABURG: Brad Dimock, Colorado River guide, river dory historian, dory builder, teacher, and owner-operator of Fretwater Boatworks in Flagstaff, will be a featured presenter from 5 to 7 p.m. at the McKenzie River Discovery Center’s Hatchery building, April 22nd. His talk will tie into the evening’s theme, “Spawning Grounds: It Started with this River” and will be a show-and-tell of the links between the McKenzie, Rogue, and Colorado dories, some of the histories, and “generally enamor the audie...
