Coast Guard honored at Veterans Parade
Hundreds of people lined the parade route through Old Town Florence Friday afternoon for the annual Veterans Day Parade. Leading the way were members and families from the U.S. Coast Guard Siuslaw River Station. The parade took about 40-minutes to go from the Events Center on Quince Street, through Bay Street and ending at Veterans Memorial Park near the bridge.
The local Coast Guard will be celebrating 100 years of service in Florence next spring. Senior Chief Tim Tregoning (truh-GO-neeng) said it’s nice for the crew to be recognized for their work, but the better part is in knowing they are accepted as part of the community. He said the first lifesaving station in Florence was erected on the site of the current station in 1917.
Tim Tregoning – “Originally built right here at this site. They had a lookout at Cannery Point. The lookout’s not there but the station’s still on the original ground that we were established on.”
Members of the Siuslaw River Station will also be honored as Grand Marshals of the 110th Rhododendron Festival in May 2017.
November is Hospice Month
For more than 25 years health care providers from Peace Harbor Hospital have been offering end-of-life care to patients and their families… in their homes… throughout the Siuslaw Region.
But, it’s not just been health professionals. Kathy Murphy, the manager of Home Care Services for Peace Harbor said they have assembled a large team of volunteers. Some of them do things like make blankets for patients; provide office support; and even patient comfort care.
One program is the “Flowers of Love” program. Individuals like the Spencer Family provide blossoms and bouquets from their own gardens to brighten the home of patients. Those are supplemented by flowers from Florence in Bloom and Fred Meyer.
Peace Harbor Hospice is observing National Hospice and Palliative Care Month throughout November and thanking their volunteers.
Backlog of ballots must be cleared before write-ins are released
It could still be another two weeks before the winners of the write-in contests for the Dunes City Council are determined. Lane County Clerk Cheryl Betschart says her office needs to resolve all outstanding issues with any ballots before moving on to the write-ins.
Cheryl Betschart – “As we typically do after the election we’ve got people that we send notification to if they did not sign the return identification envelope. Anyone that’s had a challenge signature, so the signature did not match what we had on the registration record, those two groups can come in 14 days after the election to resolve that discrepancy.”
That means the tally could change up until the close of business on the 22nd. She said the write in candidates and their votes will not be made public until after they are mailed to Dunes City on the 25th.
Dunes City results could still be two weeks away
Things are still up in the air in the race for the Fifth District Oregon Senate seat. Incumbent Arnie Roblan still leads, but the margin between he and Dick Anderson has narrowed ever-so-slightly. Roblan’s lead is now 289 votes… he led by 294 late last week.
Election workers in all seven counties are continuing to tabulate and work through the back-log of those signature challenges and ballots that may have been inadvertently sent to the incorrect county.
King tide project seeks to document high tides
Some of the highest tides of the year are taking place over the next two days along the Oregon Coast. Midday high tides today, Tuesday and Wednesday will be at or above nine feet at the Siuslaw River Entrance.
For the seventh year in a row, the Oregon Shores Conservation Coalition will be sponsoring the “King Tide Project”, a citizen science project aimed at documenting the juxtaposition of man-made structures and the highest tides.
Residents are being asked to photograph things like roads, seawalls, trails or bridges at high tide to show the location of the water.
Those photos can be posted to the group’s website .
Today’s high tide at the river entrance is at 11:05; Tuesday it will be 11:49; then Wednesday at 12:35 pm.
