News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
Sorted by date Results 1 - 9 of 9
City employees may feel the pain as Sisters slices its budget with a knife honed by two years of deficit spending. At a staff meeting on August 7, City Administrator Barbara Warren asked department heads to immediately begin looking for ways to cut expenses. The budget was adopted by the city council in June for the fiscal year that began July 1. (See page 2 for related stories.) Warren told The Nugget that without the cuts, expenditures would exceed the $511,339 of budgeted revenues in the general fund by $55,000 to... Full story
All it takes is a lightning strike, or a carelessly tossed cigarette, and a handful of brave individuals must lay their lives on the line to save acres of forests or to keep a blaze from engulfing campgrounds and homes. After nearly a month of dirty, exhausting and dangerous work, the 3,648-acre Jefferson blaze was contained on August 2 by fire crews from the Sisters Fire District and surrounding areas. The stubborn blaze tested the mettle of the men and women who have been battling it since it was started by an errant... Full story
To the Editor: Robert and Sally Johnsen's letter in the Wednesday, August 7 Nugget regarding the proposed logging of the Blue and Suttle Lake watershed by the Forest Service is another warning of the apparent indifference the Forest Service has for ecological consequences of such actions. Unfortunately, what the Forest Service says they want to do is not what really happens on the land. Clear-cutting is still alive and well, and we'll see the results of that kind of "treatment" on the quality of our streams and wildlife... Full story
Sometimes food glows. Still vibrant from the vine and stalk, from the root and tree and out of the black soil of the garden, good food has color and snap and life in it -- and it is life giving. It is the art we eat. With its lovely forms and transient beauty, it is preceded by a luxuriant olfactory forecast, and then consummated with its own disappearance into a hungry face whose wan and innocent expression is transformed from anxious to relaxed, the gaze turning outward again and resting contentedly on companion faces. The... Full story
Sisters students now have a vast trove of research information at their fingertips. Starting this year, all 25 computers in the Sisters Middle/High School computer lab and the six computers in the library are hooked up for instant access to the Internet. According to teacher Jon Renner, the complete Internet access adds Sisters to the many schools on the network worldwide, though, he said, "there aren't many that are as small as we are that have good access." Last year only... Full story
As the fiscal noose tightens on Sisters schools, the school board is searching for ways to save co-curricular programs. The Sisters School Board approved the funding of coaches for wrestling programs in the middle and high schools August 8, embarking on a policy shift that allows the partial funding of some programs from gifts and donations. The school board, faced with a dramatic shortfall in its unappropriated ending fund budget, followed the recommendations of Superintendent Steve Swisher to approve the funding of coaches'... Full story
Phone communication to and from Sisters, Black Butte and Camp Sherman was cut on August 6 when a dump truck with its bed raised ripped out a fiber optic phone line east of Sisters. According to Hollis Lasley, Regional Manager for US West, at about 4:30 p.m. a dump truck operated by the State of Oregon involved in repaving highway 126 between Sisters and Redmond broke the cable suspended 17 and-a-half feet above the ground near Buckhorn Lane. Lasley said that 2,350 accounts in Sisters were affected and 1,500 in the Camp... Full story
Water from the City of Sisters will flow into commercial and residential developments on Pine Meadow Ranch development unless opponents of the project succeed in shutting off the spigot. The Sisters City Council approved PMR Development's application for city water service at their Thursday, August 8, meeting. Steve McGhehey of PMR Development submitted the application and noted that PMR needs to know what its water source will be so it can proceed with plans to develop its commercial- and residential-zoned property. PMR... Full story
A brush fire scorched about half an a acre of wilderness near Indian Ford Campground northwest of Sisters Friday, August 9. Three crews from the Sisters-Camp Sherman Rural Fire District, two from the Sisters Ranger District, and two from the Oregon Department of Forestry responded to a call from the Black Butte firetower at about 2 p.m. It took crews about four hours to extinguish the blaze just north of the campground using water and a fire line for containment. Firefighters did not evacuate the campground. The official... Full story
