YOUTH TOURNAMENT
BACK IN IRAQ
Local golfers take titles, B1
U.S. planes drop bombs, A7
SATURDAY, AUGUST 9, 2014
Serving Oregon’s South Coast Since 1878 Stephen Brown is leaving Coos County Health Department after eight years as the county's antitobacco coordinator.
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Brown ends 8-year battle against Coos County smoking culture BY CHELSEA DAVIS
Monday, working for Prevention Lane on tobacco-free efforts. Brown was Coos County’s tobacco prevention program coordinator. Over the years, he’s succeeded in making schools, hospitals and city parks smoke-free across the county. He’s had pushback, though. Some elected officials don’t think local municipalities should be responsible
The World By Lou Sennick, The World
NORTH BEND — Coos County’s biggest smoke-free advocate is going to continue his fight against Big Tobacco in Eugene. Thursday marked eight years since Stephen Brown began battling Coos County’s perceived smoking culture. He moves into a new office at Lane County Public Health on
Health rankings Coos County in the 2014 County Health Rankings & Roadmaps report: ■ 26 percent of adults report being frequent smokers. ■ 29 percent report being obese. ■ 18 percent say they drink heavily or binge drink. ■ 62 percent high school graduation rate. ■ 31 percent of children are in poverty. ■ 10.7 percent unemployed.
SEE BROWN | A8
Is an old document a clue?
Gas leak in North Bend
Over 2 decades old, the Pettingill murder remains clouded in mystery ■
BY THOMAS MORIARTY AND TIM NOVOTNY The World
By Lou Sennick, The World
A crew from Northwest Natural Gas begins line repairs at the scene of an accidental gas leak in North Bend on Thursday morning. The crew working on the new Grant Circle park in front of city hall accidently hit the gas line after 9 a.m. Fire and police evacuated city hall and several offices and businesses on the block until the line could be turned off. People were allowed to return to their offices and businesses less than an hour later.
County will list roads on tribal transportation plan BY CHELSEA DAVIS The World
COQUILLE — Coos County commissioners moved forward with the Coquille Indian Tribe’s proposal to list sections of about 20 county roads on its transportation plan to possibly get federal funding down the line. The Coquille Indian Tribe proposed listing 84.3 miles of Coos County roads on its Tribal Transportation Program Roadway Inventory. The idea, Coos County Roadmaster John
Rowe said, is not to give the tribe authority over those roads, but to give the county a shot at funding for road repair. “It has nothing to do with transfer of ownership,” said Commissioner John Sweet. County counsel Josh Soper said the Oregon Government Ethics Commission determined there was no conflict of interest with any of the commissioners. At the July 1 meeting, some county residents were concerned that all three could have conflicts.
Melissa Commissioner Cribbins was the tribe’s legal counsel before she took office, Commissioner Bob Main’s wife works for ORCA Communications (a tribe subsidiary) and Sweet serves on the Coquille Tribal Community Fund board of trustees. Soper said a conflict of interest only exists if there is “financial benefit or detriment to the business with which that person is associated.” “The Indian tribe and its subsidiaries do not qualify as a
business under that law, so there is no conflict of interest for the commissioners,” he said. Todd Tripp, director of the tribe’s department of planning, realty and community services, said this proposal is a means to a possible partnership with the county someday. “If a repair to a road is critical to our needs and your needs ... we could cooperate and tap into federal funding to do that,” Tripp said. “...Without these being on our transportation plan, we have no option to help you."
COOS BAY — When he left his house Aug. 31, 1991, Frank J. Pettingill told his wife he needed a TV guide from Curtis Mathes. A friend needed hobby glue, so he said he would also pick some up from Fred Meyer. That was the last anyone heard from him. Two days later, hikers found the body of the 40-year-old Hallmark Fisheries manager off Blue Ridge Road in the unincorporated area of Sumner, southeast of Coos Bay. His cause of death? Homicidal violence from a weapon investigators have yet to name — or find. “The injury he had — from a weapon, obviously — was a mortal wound,” Coos County District Attorney Paul Frasier recounted in his office recently. “Whoever did it intended for him to die, but it wasn’t like somebody putting a gun to the back of his head and pulling the trigger execution-style.” More than 20 years after his death, SEE PETTINGILL | A8
RV rally wraps-up a large ‘family’ reunion in NB
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Homes threatened One home is destroyed and 740 more are being threatened in the Columbia River Gorge community of Rowena. Page A5
Obituaries | A5
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SEE MONACO | A8
By Alysha Beck, The World
Monaco RVs with the Monaco International RV Club sit parked at The Mill Casino-Hotel & RV Park for the club’s four day rally, which ends Saturday.
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NORTH BEND — The big, shiny, Monaco coaches will soon be pulling out of The Mill Casino-Hotel & RV Park and heading for points unknown after spending the last week learning new things and rekindling old friendships. Monaco International RV Club, a chapter of the Family Motor Coach Association,has been around for 30 years. Each year the members can travel thousands of miles to take part in a handful of rallies around the country. It is an expensive hobby. Some of the larger coaches themselves can start at a half million dollars. Then, factor in that thousands of miles of travel can cost about a buck a mile in fuel costs. Club membership is open to anyone who owns any brand of motor home manufactured by Monaco Coach Corporation or Monaco RV. But, just who are those members? “We’re kind of a real big family,” Jack Brewster said. The New York native has been serving as the rally master for this event.
He says there are currently about 2,000 members, stretching across the U.S. and Canada. They are about evenly split among full-timers and part-timers. Those referred to as full-timers don’t own a brick-andmorter home, as they spend a lot of their time on the road. “I do it because I love to travel the United States,” Brewster said.“It’s a beautiful country with a lot of wonderful, fantastic things to see. And it’s something I can do with my wife and I can have my own bed, my own food in my refrigerator when I want to eat. And we can travel and stop anyplace that we want to. It’s just a wonderful experience that we all enjoy.” Current club president David Piper agrees. He has a home in Oklahoma that he checks in on from time to time, but those times can be few and far between. “Since 2000, I’ve put about 250,000 miles on motor homes,” he said. And those miles are all over the map. “If you drew a line across the bottom of
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The World
DEATHS
BY TIM NOVOTNY