Mistaken sign?

A mistake, or the future look of Hood River? If you drive down 13th Street you will notice a new advertising billboard has sprung up on the Heights. Is this a new trend or a misapplication of the sign ordinance?

The stated goal of the ordinance is to “maintain a balance between the need to identify buildings and activities and the negative impact on community image created by visual clutter.” It seems the purpose is to allow businesses to identify themselves at their locations, not to provide off-site advertising. The ordinance also regulates the size of the signage and location to keep in scale with the size of the business.

The code allows for the area of the sign as a percentage of the face of the building. In the past I was told the face of the building was the portion facing the street (obviously). Thus on our corner lot (Merriam Prosthetics, 12th and C) we have two faces that apply.

The lot where the billboard is located only has one side facing the street but the building department allowed two non-street-facing sides to be used in the calculation. Although the lot is zoned commercial there is not a business there; rather it is a rental duplex and the sign has nothing to do with the property.

I hope this was an unfortunate mistake by the building department, and not a sign of new interpretation of the code. If I’m wrong there are potentially many dozens of other properties that could see billboards sprouting up in the future.

Tom Merriam
Hood River

Hosford’s renewal

The Hood River News story regarding Port Commissioner Don Hosford (Jan. 7) was certainly well-deserved as Commissioner Hosford was active in many of the successes of the Port; however the story did not speak to his accomplishments on the City of Hood River Urban Renewal Agency.

For many years, Hosford was a member of the Urban Renewal Agency and was instrumental in the way downtown Hood River looks today. Urban Renewal is responsible for the public projects such as the recently completed Oak Street project and the reconstruction of Second and First streets.

One of the most significant accomplishments that Mr. Hosford can be credited for is the work that has been done to develop Overlook Park at Second and State streets. Every year, this park comes alive with beautiful landscaping and many children are seen playing in the fountain. In the winter, it becomes a focal point for Christmas activities.

The next time you walk down Oak Street or stand at Overlook Park look at the transformation that has taken place over the years and know that Don Hosford played a big part in making that happen.

Bob Francis, city manager
Hood River

Gorge pollution

On Tuesday, Jan. 13, the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality held a final public hearing in The Dalles to determine if a 30-year-old power plant in Boardman owned by PGE, with virtually no pollution controls, should be allowed to continue to badly pollute the entire Northwest.

The amount of coal it consumes, which comes from Wyoming, is staggering. The plant vaporizes three railroad carloads of finely pulverized, talcum powder-sized coal every hour, every day, all year long. We are told that in a single week four to five trains, each consisting of 115 rail cars of coal, are burned in its giant fiery furnace.

What comes out is electricity — and pollution — in huge yearly amounts. Tons of CO2, sulfur, nitrogen oxides, dirty particulate ash, and mercury!

This is in the air Gorge residents breathe — sometimes worse than the smog in LA or NYC. This is in the rain that falls on Gorge residents — sometimes with an acidity equal to vinegar. We are literally poisoning our nest and planet with this sort of destructive behavior.

Is this something we want to continue to live with? The DEQ wants to know; at least up until their Jan. 30 comment deadline.

Here is who to write, call, fax or e-mail —- and thanks for caring enough to comment.

Brian Finneran
DEQ
811 S.W. Sixth Ave.
Portland, OR 97204
regionalhaze@deq.state.or.us
Fax: (503) 229-5676
Phone: (800) 452-4011

If you want to learn more, Internet search using: DEQ regional haze.

Alison McDonald
Hood River

Blinded by GOP

Recently it has become quite obvious that there are many parts of the South that are still very racist. The most profound recent example is the fact that many high schools in the South have separate proms for their white and black students and, in fact, the parents of the white students fight vigorously to keep integrated prom nights from occurring.

It is a known fact that these areas are also strongly Republican (red states) and strongly associate themselves as being religious. The fact that they fight for racism as strongly as they fight for oppression in the name of their God is well-known.

They pass laws banning homosexuals; they fight to keep women from having access to health care; they fight to keep women from having access to birth control and abortion; they fight to keep our young from having access to information about reproduction and sexually transmitted disease; they constantly fight to alter science to conform to their biblical perspective; and they persistently and chronically attempt to censor literature, music and theater.

Their medieval approach to society has repeatedly proven ineffective and, in fact, I fail to find one example historically wherein these types of oppression have been successful. I believe that there are truly sincere, loving people who are Christians but I question how any Christians at this point in American history can align themselves with the Republican Party and actually consider that they are following their God.

I find it incredulous that Christians would use abortion and sex as a litmus test for how they support our country while true issues actually spoken of in the Bible go completely unaddressed. Things such as war, poverty, racism and greed seem to be tolerated and not worthy of primary social focus while the Christians in this country primarily focus on a few stigma issues that realistically have no bearing on how an almighty God may view our country.

I challenge those of you who consider yourself Christians to be truly spiritually strong and listen to the conscience that exists in the eternal perspective of love and justice and move your political beliefs away from blindly supporting the wolves in sheep’s clothing. As of now Christians in this country are just fodder for the Republican Party so that their cruel selfish perspectives can continue to dictate how we live and as of late suffer.

Ken Earle
Hood River

Thanks, Don

I am moved by the service that our elected officials provide. The recent announcement of Don Hosford’s retirement from the port commission highlights the commitment of our citizen commissioners. Their willingness to sit and be castigated as well as celebrated deserves our respect.

Thank you for your service, Don, and thank you to all the city, county and port commissioners; past, present and future.

Rich McBride
Hood River

Visit, donate to Gorge Rebuild-it Center

Gorge Rebuild-it Center is no stranger to tough times.
    We operate a nonprofit store that accepts and sells affordable reusable building materials. Unable to attract grant funds to initiate the project and without a dime in our pockets, we opened our doors anyway in 2003 when a local business (Windance Sailboards) offered us a free spot for six months.

We have since relocated to the Heights and expanded our store size, staffing and offerings, including a contractor’s license allowing us to “go upstream” from our store to actually salvage and save many fine goods for reuse.

We are essentially a good local parasite, coordinating the redistribution of an incredible array of perfectly reusable building materials that might otherwise get a fateful one-way ticket to the Northern Wasco Landfill.

Gorge Rebuild-it Center is certainly suffering from the surrounding economic crisis. Yet the gist of our problem seems to be cost of acquiring building materials to sell to our customers. Demand for our product is unchanged. We’ve whittled down our staff to get through this tough time. But a glimmer of hope lies in the fact that store sales so far match last year’s.

How can folks help? Donate building material now. We encourage friends and supporters to scan their barns, garages, and storage containers for truly quality building materials that they are willing to donate. Contributions are tax-deductible. Regardless, an influx of quality items right now will quickly translate into desperately needed cash flow for us, and good deals for our customers too; we’re currently having a 20-percent-off sale.

During this challenging time, we’ve had help from another local nonprofit called WINGS. WINGS offers transitional housing and wrap-around support to at-risk 18- to 23-year-old young men in the Mid Columbia area.

I joined the WINGS board in hopes of forming a viable partnership that would offer meaningful work for these young men, while creating for Gorge Rebuild-it Center a reliable and affordable way to glean building materials. Our goal was to pay for the WINGS residents to help us salvage, de-nail clean, and rehabilitate products for sale. In the midst our own layoffs, we couldn’t pay for those services. But they stepped up anyway. Last Friday, the WINGS crew cruised into Portland to help me load a huge trailer with valuable donated office cabinets. And without asking, they showed up Saturday morning at our store to unload, too.

That sort of community spirit is what we need right now to get through these difficult times. I have come to realize that Gorge Rebuild-it Center is not merely a store. There is something more valuable here than just price or quality.

By fostering the reuse ethic in a big way, I do believe Gorge Rebuild-it Center has become an important community project (among many). Our donors and customers always tell us, “You’re doing important work.” I humbly suggest that as a litmus for our community health, we need to figure how this (and other similar projects) can endure. Thank you for considering a visit to our store.

David Skakel
Founder, Gorge Rebuild-it Center

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Gorge Rebuild-it is open Tuesday-Saturday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.; (541) 387-4387.

www.rebuildit.org