Nehalem Bay Health District’s
Meeting of the Wheeler Care Center, LLC
Wednesday, April 24, 2024
5:30 pm
This meeting is open to the public and those interested can attend via Zoom video conferencing.
For questions or other information: info@nehalembayhd.org
Join Zoom Meeting:
us02web.zoom.us/j/88112248618
Click the above link to view our latest eBrief.
Included in this edition:
evcnb.org/events-and-training/food-drive-04272024
Time to practice your emergency evacuation and yellow radio skills. AND do some good for the community at the same time. Bring your cans of food (or monetary donation) with you and you’ll be doing yourself and others a favor.
Saturday, April 27 10am til 1pm
evcnb.org/events-and-training/water-sanitation-and-hygiene-05182024am
Take our WaSH class to learn important information about obtaining safe water and dealing with waste during a disaster.
Register for your spot in class today!
evcnb.org/events-and-training/gobag-popup-05112024
In need of a GoBag or GoBag Supplies?
What about Water, Sanitation & Hygiene (WaSH) supplies?
Visit or GoBag and WaSH Pop-Up Shop today.
Her presentation also will be available through the library’s website, cannonbeachlibrary.org
Bhanoo’s appearance is part of the Oregon Book Awards Authors Tour, presented in partnership with Literary Arts and hosted by the library’s NW Authors Series.
“Seeking Fortune Elsewhere” won the 2023 Ken Kesey Award. The award is part of the Oregon Book Awards, presented annually by Literary Arts to honor and celebrate the work of Oregon’s authors.
“Seeking Fortune Elsewhere” features intimate stories of South Indian immigrants and the families they left behind. It asks how women both claim and surrender power. Occurring in places including Pittsburgh, eastern Washington and Tamil Nadu, these stories focus on dislocation and how immigrants and their families confront the costs of leaving, staying and growing apart,
A fiction writer and journalist Bhanoo also won the New American Voices Award. In 2021, she won an O. Henry Prize. She worked as a reporter for The New York Times and The Washington Post and teaches creative writing and journalism at Oregon State University.
Store is located on 101 in Wheeler. Hours are Thursday through Monday, 12-6. Come see the new, expanded store space. Some really beautiful vintage furniture pieces are for sale at great prices.
Help bring the magic of theater to life and join a welcoming community at Riverbend Players Community Theater!
www.riverbendplayers.org/volunteer
Hi there!
My name is Linda Makohon, and I’m the Volunteer Committee Chairperson for Riverbend Players Community Theater.
We’re a local theater company that produces high-quality productions for the Nehalem Valley.
We’re always looking for new volunteers to help us, and I’m excited that you’re interested in joining our team.
There are many different ways to volunteer with us. You could help with acting, stage crew, costume design, set design, marketing, or promotion.
No matter your skills or interests, we can find a way to use them to make our theater productions even better.
We’re a friendly, inclusive, and supportive group of people, and we would be honored to have you join us.
If you’re interested in volunteering, please fill out the form on our website or contact me at lmakohon@riverbendplayers.org
We look forward to hearing from you!
It’s time to empower parents to choose the educational setting best suited to the needs of their child. Parents deserve to provide their child with a quality education regardless of zip code, income level, or learning style. Education dollars will be allowed to follow students to their preferred educational setting. Stop the government control and protect the autonomy and uniqueness of private schools and homeschools by getting involved now.
What can you do? Sign two petitions or donate money to help bring education options to Oregon K-12 students.
Learn more at:
EducationFreedomforOregon.com
Oregon schools are failing our students. Oregon ranks one of the bottom schools in our country. Children in public schools were locked out of schools longer than almost all other schools. You can help by getting involved right away.
Teen Night at North Coast Pinball is tomorrow night, Friday April 19th, from 6-8PM- FREE PINBALL and Games for ALL TEENS! Please spread the word and send your teens in for some free fun!
Contact Christy (503) 800-1092, or Christy@cosmichealingnw.com for info, questions, or to donate
Thank you!!
Drip, Drip, Drop
Recent posts and op/eds about the water—monthly billing vs quarterly, why the rate increase, what about tiered usage, where does our water come from and what’s the deal between Manzanita and Wheeler—all made me curious. As is my custom, I’m writing in order to understand. I’ve included the sources I used at the bitter end. Let’s get going.
The last time the city raised the water rates was back in 2014. That council agreed to look at the rates every year to keep up with costs of operation, maintenance, and upgrades but it didn’t happen. It’s been nine years without an increase.
At the June 14, 2023, Council Work Session Director of Public Works, Dan Weitzel presented a water rate study and information about our water. It was clear we needed to catch up with those nine years of inflation and incentivize conservation among heavy users, not because we don’t have the water, but because it costs money to get water to your Slip n Slide.
This isn’t just a Manzanita problem. All over the country there are plenty of cities and towns that have failed to keep critical infrastructure like water systems, power grids, roads and bridges maintained and upgraded so stuff works and is safe. Probably because nobody wants to pay for them. Put things off long enough and you’ve got problems. Do everything on the cheap and you’ll eventually pay in unexpected and unpleasant ways.
We live in Manzanita where the annual rainfall is 81.5 inches according to Climate Data.org, but our water comes from wells on Foss Road. Wheeler has a 99 year lease and a water rights permit to share water with Manzanita as a Joint System. Wheeler pays their share of the costs of operations and maintenance based on the water they use which is about 19%. Water usage is divided between us based on each city’s percentage of the same type of dwelling units in each town. The Intergovernmental Agreement (IGA) has two categories of charges. One is for stuff like permits, repairs, and labor, which is charged whether or not Wheeler uses any water, and the other charge is for the actual production of water Wheeler does use. That’s stuff like chlorine, electricity, and labor. They do that math on the last day of February by looking at the master meters.
On July 5, 2023, Manzanita’s Council approved a new rate structure with tiers for water usage that is only $7 more a month. It used to be that our bill was 39.50 for 4,000 gallons of water but the typical usage for a full-time two person household is a little less than 2,000 gallons. If the cap was still 4,000 gallons, the monthly charge would go to about $70 bucks a month to actually pay for the 4,000 gallons according to the utilities budget and the Oregon Association of Water Utilities.
So, if you use 2,000 gallons of water or less, you’re paying 47.56. Since we’re now billed monthly you can see right away when you’re using more water than usual. A neighbor of ours only discovered a major and expensive leak after receiving a big bill they weren’t expecting. I know others may disagree but we like a monthly bill instead of quarterly because we can fit $47.56 into our monthly bills better than we can fit 142.68 quarterly. But that’s us not everyone.
In the summer most people do use more water what with the Slip n Slide and the warm weather. For a few months in the summer the average household uses about 4,000 gallons so if you want to keep the water bill down you’ll need to be intentional and dare I say mindful about how much water you use. There are ways to conserve—using gray water to water plants, not watering in the heat of the day, using a drip system, doing laundry less often, fixing all the wonky faucets, only running the dishwasher when it’s full, bringing back the potty rule that, ‘If it’s yellow, it’s mellow. If it’s brown flush it down!”
If you’re a water hog you’re going to pay more, and you’ll be billed more but isn’t that how all of life is. You’ve got to pay to play, and water may fall from the skies here, but it is not free and it’s not infinite. Nothing in our world is except maybe our good intentions.
For those of us who garden, like a hot bath or a long shower and compulsively fill our bird baths and dachshund’s wading pool (oh my, that’s me) we’ll be billed 9.50 for each 1,000 gallons over 2,000 up to 5,000 gallons; $11 per 1,000 gallons from 5001 to 10,000 gallons and for folks using more than 10,000 gallons it will cost 12.25 per 1,000 gallons and that’s a whole bunch of water.
To make sure we don’t get in the hole again the rates will increase annually based on the consumer price index which will vary every year. Council will review the rates every year and do a water study every three years to keep on top of it.
The past is over, and the future isn’t here yet. We build it by making good choices about how we use what we have, and how we treat each other. If we plan on leaving anything behind when we exit stage left, we need to figure out new ways to live together using our resources wisely no matter how much money we do or don’t have.
Sources:
June 14, 2023, Special Session: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3jXaUP5zdY&t=36s
ci.manzanita.or.us/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Work-Session-Packet-061423.pdf
July 5, 2023, Council Meeting https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wcu2wzbFl6k&t=4s
Manzanita Today Newsletter archives issue July 10, 2023.
Kim Rosenberg loretta.kim.rosenberg@gmail.com
Help bring the magic of theater to life and join a welcoming community at Riverbend Players Community Theater!
www.riverbendplayers.org/volunteer
Hi there!
My name is Linda Makohon, and I’m the Volunteer Committee Chairperson for Riverbend Players Community Theater.
We’re a local theater company that produces high-quality productions for the Nehalem Valley.
We’re always looking for new volunteers to help us, and I’m excited that you’re interested in joining our team.
There are many different ways to volunteer with us. You could help with acting, stage crew, costume design, set design, marketing, or promotion.
No matter your skills or interests, we can find a way to use them to make our theater productions even better.
We’re a friendly, inclusive, and supportive group of people, and we would be honored to have you join us.
If you’re interested in volunteering, please fill out the form on our website or contact me at lmakohon@riverbendplayers.org
We look forward to hearing from you!
–
I wrote a springtime poem and published it at the Upper Left Edge. If you’d like to read it, click the link below. Feel free to pass it along.
Onward,
Watt Childress
www.upperleftedge.com/2024/04/17/here-try-some-of-this-ointment/
https://youtu.be/5nyFKDGOV14?si=eoEshsSp2bvjDV3q
Serious inquiries only! Must have motorcycle endorsement. This bike is for taller individuals must have inseam of 32″ or longer to hold this bike upright!
Call or text Mike 612-710-9474
Manzanita
We volunteers at the Hoffman Wonder Garden are pretty psyched about Sunday’s plant sale. That’s ’cause we know what’s on offer, 100 fabulous manzanitas and assorted native and worldly wildflowers you DO want in your sunny garden.
Here’s a few of the manzis we’ve got for you, the pictures below in the same order as these descriptions:
‘Howard McMinn’ – Whoa, is this guy handsome, ultimately 7′ tall and just as wide. You might think him a bit roly-poly but no! More like a pink-flowering, multi-stemmed small tree once pruned. As with all manzis, though, let him bulk up for a few years before revealing his shape.
‘St Helena’ – Big gorgeous Helena! Since she’s capable of 10’x10′, be sure to plant her in the open where she can flex her might and not be crowded by small fry. Wait for those white flowers, twinkling like holiday lights winter through early spring.
‘Harmony’ – Its name describes how you’ll be feeling about your garden when you add this easy-growing, floriferous rounded shrub. A good beginner’s manzanita, reaching – at most – 7’x7′ at absolute maturity, it’s super easy to tip back and keep smaller. Morning shade but aft sun? Go for ‘Harmony’!
Text Abbie at (971) 570-5385!
