The holidays are coming! The holidays are coming! Ring in the start of the season with one of the Resort’s Traditions events
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INSIDE THIS ISSUE Nature Center................ 8 Love Wine Inc.............. 10 Calendar...................... 13 Women’s Club.............. 17
SROA News.................. 22 Public Safety................ 30 Classified..................... 37 Commentary................ 39
Ready for some football? Don’t miss Oregon’s longestrunning pigskin rivalry - the Civil War game on Nov. 24 at SHARC
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S U N R I V E R
S C E N E A COMMUNITY NEWSPAPER PUBLISHED MONTHLY BY THE SUNRIVER OWNERS ASSOCIATION
NOVEMBER • 2012
volume xxxVIII • Number 11
SHARC survey says…
John Gray, right, toured SHARC with SROA general manager Bill Peck earlier this year. Gray said he was ‘impressed.’
Just hanging around
Sunriver developer John Gray dies at 93 John Gray, the developer of Sunriver, died Oct. 19 at the age of 93. Born in Ontario, Ore., and raised in Monroe, Ore., Gray served in the U.S. Army’s 82nd Airborne Division in World War II, earning the rank of lieutenant colonel and a Bronze Star Medal. With degrees from Oregon State University and the Harvard School of Business, Gray became assistant general manager of the Oregon Saw Chain Manufacturing Corp. in 1948 before buying the company in 1953. In the 1960s he began developing resorts including Salishan on the Oregon Coast and Sunriver. Gray and his associates began discussions in the early 1960s for developing Sunriver as a planned community. Gray gathered a planning team comprising Don McCallum, an attorney from Bend; Bob Royston, an award-winning landscape architect from San Francisco; and naturalist Jim Anderson. Their innovative plan included protections for forest, the Great Meadow, and Deschutes River and a permanent nature center to help ensure that Sunriver remained a “...community where man and nature could coexist.” A master plan was submitted in 1965 Turn to Gray, page 3 SUNRIVER SCENE SUNRIVER OWNERS ASSN. VOLUME XXXVIII • NUMBER 11 P.O. BOX 3278 SUNRIVER, OR 97707
Susan berger photos
Dan Oliver uses a chainsaw to thin branches of a ponderosa at SHARC.
Spring River Tree Service crew members Dan Oliver (above center), and Dan Smith (above left) apply a hub and cable system to a three-part trunk of a ponderosa at Fort Rock Park. Cabling and canopy thinning is done on trees in public places that could pose a safety risk, such as split trunks or damaged and dead tree limbs. SROA started a tree hazard mitigation project several years ago, and trees are treated each year as budget allows. “This helps to protect our large, mature ponderosas,” said Patti Gentiluomo, SROA Environmental Services director.
Area geothermal stimulation to begin By Brooke Snavely Beginning Oct. 18, engineers began pumping water down a 10,000-foot deep well on the west flank of the Newberry Volcano in an effort to create underground reservoirs in which water will be heated by contact with hot rock. Creating geothermal reservoirs more than a mile underground is expected to cause swarms of microseismic events – small earthquakes – too small to be felt on the surface. If seismic events strong enough to be detected on the surface occur, project managers are required to stop injecting water. In worse case scenarios, they are required to reduce the water pressure in the well, which should reduce or stop any induced seismic activity.
A network of seismometers has been installed around the project area to monitor in real-time where cracks develop. Using telemetry, engineers will be able to map the size and location of the cracks and manage the size of the underground reservoirs. In a later phase, the water will be brought back to the surface through yet to be drilled production wells to determine how quickly it heats up and the viability of establishing a geothermal power project on the site. Reservoir stimulation Putting cold water on hot rocks will cause the rock to contract, creating tiny fissures. Applying pressurized water will Turn to Geothermal, page 3
By Brooke Snavely Preliminary results of a survey of SHARC users suggests people really like the Sunriver Homeowners Aquatic & Recreation Center. In the first three weeks the survey was available online (at www.surveymonkey.com/s/Sunriver RecSurvey) 720 surveys were taken, 635 were completed and more than 2,000 responses to questions that require a written answer were received. The survey will remain available through Nov. 15 to any of the 228,000 owners, guests and members of the general public who visited SHARC between Memorial Day and Labor Day. Among the findings to date: • 87 percent of survey respondents are Sunriver property owners. • 42 percent visited SHARC 2-5 times, 19 percent visited 6-10 times and 17 percent visited more than 10 times. Aquatics • The water slides, lazy river and outdoor pool are the most enjoyable features. • 42 percent of users asked for more shade structures around the outdoor pool. • 21 percent requested a picnic area near the pools. • 19 percent requested more chairs in the pool patio area. • 74 percent said they’d like “owners’ only” use periods. Fitness • 23 percent use the fitness center occasionally, 8 percent use it most times they visit and 16 percent said fitness is their primary reason to go to SHARC. • 77 percent of use of the fitness center occurs in the morning hours. • 76 percent of visitors to the fitness center found equipment readily available, while 21 percent waited occasionally for equipment to become available • The vast majority of respondents rated the fitness center overall above average or excellent. Turn to Survey, page 3 PRSRT STD. U.S. POSTAGE PAID BEND, OR PERMIT NO. 213