News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
Kate Aspen was surprised when she opened her November 4 election ballot to find that the Cloverdale Fire District bond wasn't on the ballot. She's lived on Holmes Road since 1977 and always assumed she was part of the district.
Then she checked her tax statement. The fire district wasn't there, either.
Cloverdale training officer Michael Valoppi told The Nugget that the district has heard from three people so far who have made the same discovery.
"Chief (Thad Olson) has been in touch with the assessor and we're working on that," Valoppi said.
The affected properties seem to start within the district, but the location of the house seems to lie outside the district, Valoppi said. That doesn't leave the homes unprotected, but it is a situation that needs to be clarified and fixed.
"We're still going to respond to them, because their address is in our district," Valoppi said.
According to Chief Olson, if a fire occurred right now, those property owners would be billed for services.
"We definitely want to get it set up so we can annex those (properties) in," Valoppi said.
An alternative in this situation is a contract for services.
Julie Spor at the Sisters-Camp Sherman Rural Fire Protection District noted that there are a handful of properties in Sisters Country that lie outside of the Sisters district boundaries. They are in outlying areas on Three Creek Road (Road 16); out Wilt Road; and out Stevens Canyon Road.
Sisters RFPD has contracts with those property owners. According to Spor, they pay the same rate as they would if they were taxed, but on a contract basis. The contracts also include a stipulation that the property owner will accept annexation if the district decided to annex their property.
Outlying areas can fall into a jurisdictional limbo when it comes to fire protection.
"There are huge stretches of Deschutes County that don't have structural or even wildland protection because of where they're at," Olson said.
Ed Keith, Deschutes County Forester, noted that there's as much as 175,000 acres in the county that are unprotected. In Sisters Country, gaps occur in the Plainview area and in the Lower Bridge area. Properties in those areas may be protected by contract.
Property owners who are uncertain of their status should check their tax statement, and if they are not paying taxes to a fire district, they should contact their local fire district for more information.
Jim Cornelius is editor in chief of The Nugget and author of “Warriors of the Wildlands: True Tales of the Frontier Partisans.” A history buff, he explores frontier history across three centuries and several continents on his podcast, The Frontier Partisans. For more information visit www.frontierpartisans.com.
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