Committee will explore potential facilities

Out of the debate over an amphitheater in Sisters came many alternative ideas for "community assets" that would benefit Sisters and boost economic activity.

The city has convened a group of local citizens to flesh out the ideas that got the most "votes" during a town hall brainstorming session last March. The initial charter of this committee was to review in some depth each of the four projects that garnered the greatest interest. As an ad hoc committee, their initial deadline was to develop reports and recommendations on each of the four projects with the idea of selecting at least one to be put on the November general election ballot to gage citizens' response to the concept.

During the course of the meeting, the members broadened their charter to review and make recommendations on not only the four projects from the town hall, but on other projects that they felt might be of interest to the voters. They also declared an interest in working beyond the November election timeline if they come up with some viable alternatives.

The four projects from the town hall meeting include: An art/science/history building; an expo center; a Sisters Park & Recreation District (SPRD) field house; and a winter sports park.

Bill Hall was selected as chairman of the group which includes Jerry Norquist, Bill Willitts, Liam Hughes and Marshall Jackson. Matt Cyrus and Caprielle Foote-Lewis are also on the committee but were not available for Monday's meeting.

Council members McKibben Womack, Wendy Holzman, Mayor Brad Boyd and City Manager Andrew Gorayeb will serve as advisors and resources to the committee, but will not be voting members of the committee.

Hall is a newcomer to Sisters city projects; he retired to Sisters four years ago. He has a background in process improvement. After the March town hall meeting, Hall submitted a packet to the city council with 23 detailed one-page potential project summaries.

Norquist has been active in local bicycling and Sisters Trails Alliance efforts. Bill Willitts has been involved in a number of local projects, most notably as the developer of the FivePine Lodge & Conference Center. Hughes is the executive director of SPRD.

Jackson took over last year as Sisters Middle School principal after a number of years in the Bend-La Pine school system. Cyrus has a long family history of involvement in local community development, most notably Aspen Lakes Golf Course. Foote-Lewis was selected by EDCO in November 2013 to serve as Sisters Economic Development Manager.

In giving his input to the group's charter, Mayor Boyd said, "Frankly, I don't want to be competing directly with the private businesses in town that have already invested heavily in the community."

Boyd raised the question, "Is the (proposed) project bringing us visitors during our peak season, or is it bringing us visitors all year round or is it bringing in visitors in the off-season?"

Jackson asked, "Is the main goal to attract people from outside, or is it to provide something to the residents of the area, and it might happen to bring outside folks?"

Boyd replied, "I think the goal is to do both. Using the winter sports park as an example, if we had skating, SPRD could offer skating lessons, there could be a Sisters-based hockey league and they could play teams from Bend, but I think this would also be attractive to tourists."

Based on his attendance at community meetings over a number of years, Norquist noted, "One of the things that you hear loud and clear is that people do not want to lose this small-village environment. They don't want to lose the reason why they moved here. They came here for the lifestyle. You can do a lot of things, but don't try to change this environment.

"I think that it is important that whatever we look at in terms of benefits to the community that we really tell that story. (The story is) that we are doing this (the projects) around keeping this small-village environment," continued Norquist.

Norquist also strongly urged the group to include Black Butte Ranch in the discussions. He said, "I think it is really important that we talk to Black Butte Ranch. They are very important to the development of this community."

Gorayeb urged the group to include someone from the Sisters Area Chamber of Commerce.

Working around vacations and business projects, the group will try to get to an every-other-week meeting schedule. Their next meeting will be July 17.