From the editor
The Eugene Weekly section on Happening People this week features our own Dan and Barbara Gleason, bird experts and artists extraordinaires, for their efforts to improve care of and education about our avian residents and visitors. Congratulations to the Gleasons! You can seek advice at their Wildbirds Unlimited store on south Willamette, across from Tsunami Books.
Our January meeting gathering on the 18th brought neighbors together to vote and approve the new charter, the name change, and our approval of the new borders. The official enactment of these changes will happen through the city Council sometime in the next months. But we will begin using the new name in our internal communications starting with this newsletter. Gradually we will change over the websites. For the moment the official Web site remains crestdriveca.com, and the nextdoor site is still named Crest Drive, but that will be changing as we negotiate with the nextdoor company.
City Councilor Betty Taylor attended the meeting and spoke about what was coming up soon before the city Council: the multiple property tax exemption, the expansion of the urban growth boundary, and the library financing proposal. If you have an opinion you want to express about these issues, get them to the Council by email or mail soon.
She also urged that if neighbors want to bring issues before the city Council (for instance, the little roundabout on Lincoln and Crest), working through the neighborhood organization increases the impact on the Council.
The meeting discussed Rest Haven. The owner of the cemetery, Tim Wiper, has proposed changing the designation of the land in the Metro Plan from “parks and open space” to “low density residential” – the land is already zoned “R-1” — the lowest density residential zone. Hower the Metro plan overlay designation controls usage. Changing the designation will allow future development on the site. Such development will be coming, but what form it would take is unclear at the moment. Any development proposals will go through the usual conditional use permit discussions with chances for public comment. Neighbors expressed their concern about preserving the forested slopes on the edges of the property along Braeburn.
The meeting also featured and spirited discussion about what topics what concerns the Association should be taking up in the coming year. You can find the full minutes of the meeting at crestdriveca.com — click the button in the top bar.
This weekend the annual Green Home and Garden Show is open in the event center at the fairgrounds on 13th. See http://www.eugenehomeshow.com/GoodEarthHomeShowOverview.html for details.
EMERGENCIES…
Preparing for emergencies is on everyone’s mind, but we tend to put it off.
Our Association is hoping to encourage small local groups to organize themselves as local teams for their block or two, to help prepare. This would also enable us to get to know our neighbors better and to know the strengths and weaknesses of our local areas should outside help be unavailable during a serious emergency.
In this connection, there will be an event at the end of February:
Community Emergency Response Teams (CERT) and Neighborhood Watch programs along with Neighborhood Associations are invited to participate in a Wildfire disaster tabletop exercise being facilitated via the internet at the Hilyard Center in South Eugene. This exercise has been designed specifically for organizations that work to support the disaster caused needs of community and neighborhood residents during and following a disaster. By participating in this exercise, you will be able to assess your organizations existing disaster response capabilities.
This program is free for all participants but pre-registration is required.
Last summer’s wildfires had many of thinking about the potential for wildfire in South Eugene. How would our neighborhood respond if the South Hills caught on fire?
A team of national, regional, state and local agencies and organizations have undertaken an effort to help communities assess their capability to prepare for, respond to and recover from a variety of natural disasters through a series of disaster exercises facilitated via the internet entitled “Formidable Footprint”.
Southeast Neighbors will be conducting a neighborhood wildfire exercise on Saturday, February 28 from 10am to 1pm at the Hilyard Center at 2580 Hilyard St. Join us as we discover our community strengths and weaknesses and help make South Eugene stronger and better prepared for emergencies.
Date/Time
Saturday, February 28, 2015 from 10:00am to 1:00pm
Location
Hilyard Center Main Hall, 2580 Hilyard St
Exercise Registration
This program is free for all participants but pre-registration is required. There are several important reasons to register: Preparing for emergencies is everybody’s business but we tend to put it off. There will be an event at the end of February which might be of use to you.
Prior to the exercise important situational awareness materials will be e-mailed to all registered participants.
Each participant in the exercise will be required to submit an evaluation after the exercise has ended.
Individual exercise Certificates of Participation will only be generated for registered participants.
To register for the exercise, go to
http://www.onxsystem.com/?q=onx/ex/2431.
Location Information
Hilyard Community Center is located in south Eugene at 2580 Hilyard Street across the parking lot from Amazon Pool. Hilyard Community Center houses the City of Eugene’s Adaptive Recreation Program and was designed for maximum accessibility including: wheelchair accessible bathrooms, full kitchen, FM loop systems, large raised print signs and easy access to the outdoors.
Repair2Reuse Cafe’s
on Jan 30
Lane County will host the Repair2ReUse Cafe’s with the first one to be held at MECCA, January 30 and at other locations in the following months.
Currently there is a need for a repairer of modern sewing machines for January and a need for folks who have skills with consumer electronics for February.
SHiNA 