City approves second round of grants

In a 5-0 vote Thursday night, the Sisters City Council, acting as the Sisters Urban Renewal Agency, approved all 15 of the applications they received that met the published criteria for small project improvement grants. The improvement projects totaled just over $91,000 against a budgeted $100,000.

This is the second round of funding for this project. These grants are targeted to help improve the appearance of the downtown businesses through façade rehabilitation and restoration that emphasizes uniqueness and historical value. Projects must achieve visible results that enhance Sisters' downtown image, marketability and economic vitality.

City manager Andrew Gorayeb and Community Development Director Pauline Hardie took a tour of the downtown area earlier in the week to check on the results of the first 10 grants.

Gorayeb said, "In my personal opinion, these projects are definitely changing the face of the town to a certain extent in a positive way."

"Every person that sent in an application was very thankful (for the program)," said Hardie.

Councilor Wendy Holzman said, "I just want to say how excited I am that we are doing this program. I think it is fabulous that it fixes up our town."

In other council business, Gorayeb said that ODOT will be issuing a statement shortly indicating that Cascade Avenue will be open and drivable as of Friday morning, May 16, at the latest. The traffic light at Barclay/McKinney Butte and Highway 20 is scheduled to be decommissioned on May 19.

There is still considerable work to be done, but the road will remain open during that work. The project is not scheduled to be fully buttoned up until October.

Gorayeb said, "From my perspective ... this project started out as kind of an 'off-the-rack' project. The design work was extensive but it really wasn't custom-made for our town. The result now, and ODOT has been very helpful and cooperative, is a custom job. (Contractor) Knife River has played a huge role in that, too."

On a different subject, Public Works Director Paul Bertagna reported that the die-off of trees at the city's sewage treatment facility east of town continues with an additional 95 trees being flagged for removal. This is the second round of the die-off as a direct result of the drying up of the Uncle John ditch when Three Creeks Irrigation District installed a pressurized pipe to carry the flow.

Bertagna estimates a total of about 31,000 board feet from this die-off. The initial logging was about 280 trees for about 100,000 board feet. Based on the forester's recommendation the city will sell the trees on the stump for firewood on a bid basis.