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Pakistani girl share international honor, A9
North Bend tops South Umpqua, B1
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 11, 2014
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Candidates outline plans to add revenue BY CHELSEA DAVIS The World
By Lou Sennick, The World
Work is finishing up at North Bend’s Grant Circle project outside city hall. Wednesday morning, the concrete deck of the bow was poured then smoothed out. It is hoped that it will all be done sometime next week.
Grant Circle should be completed next week BY KURTIS HAIR The World
NORTH BEND — The community of North Bend will be able to see what the Urban Renewal Agency has to offer as the Grant Circle Project should be completed next week. Grant Circle, which is located one block off of U.S. Highway 101, was a part of the Urban Renewal Agency’s list of renewal projects that was generated in 1997. Last year, the agency sent the project out to bid and construction began in May. City Administrator Terence O’Connor said the project should be finished next week, and it’s some-
thing the community can take pride in. “It’ll be a focal point for community gathering,” O’Connor said. “There’s places for people to sit and enjoy the bay view. It’s exciting.” The city held a design competition for the project and only local architects were allowed to compete. HGE Inc. was awarded the bid. O’Connor said there were hopes for the project to be completed in time for the July Jubilee, but the construction schedule didn’t match up with the celebration. In 1895, Grant Circle had been constructed as a place for community gathering, but about 50 years ago,
Union and California avenues cut the circle into quadrants, creating more traffic flow in the area. O’Connor said the project will help relieve some of the traffic problems. The estimated cost for the project was about $535,000. For O’Connor, the finished product will be a highlight for the city, he said. “There is a bow of a ship that harkens back to our ship building times,” O’Connor said. “There will be a small section of that plaza that will be planted with native trees to represent what this area nature-wise is like, and places to sit and enjoy the views and the weather.”
COQUILLE — Voters want to see stark differences between incumbent county commissioner John Sweet and challenger Don Gurney. But each candidate’s ultimate goal is the same: Increase Coos County’s revenue. Where they differ is their plans get that money. Sweet’s lengthy resume working for giants like Sause Bros., Weyerhaeuser and Georgia Pacific makes his name well-known throughout the county. He took office in January 2013, his first time serving in an elected position. While the incumbent usually has a leg up, this race has been tight. In the May primary, Gurney barely slipped past Sweet, 42-41. Gurney says people are frustrated with this race because he and Sweet are so friendly — at meetings, in public and at recent debates. “That’s because we are friends,” Gurney said. Gurney’s Coos County roots run just as deep. He was raised in the Bay Area and graduated from Marshfield High School before a long career in the military. After a stint as a boatworks superintendent in Portland, he came home and now lives in Myrtle Point. He’s not an unknown challenger. Timber issues, especially the Coos Bay Wagon Road lands, have consumed him for years and he’s been after county commissioners for just as long. The county needs to be more aggressive, he said, rather than just writing letters to U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden and other legislators urging change. “I think revenue is the key part of running our county government,” he said. “I don’t know of anybody else who knows any other way than a march on Washington.” Gurney said his No. 1 focus would be fighting for the separation of O&C and Coos Bay Wagon Road lands in federal legislation, something the county has been trying to do for three decades. If elected, Gurney suggested he would look into suing the federal government. SEE CANDIDATES | A10
GOP, White House clash on Secret Service scandal
Officials grapple with weak growth WASHINGTON (AP) — Finance ministers from the world’s largest economies said Friday they are determined to prevent a slide into another global recession, but a top U.S. official expressed frustration that a number of major economies were not doing enough to bolster growth. After two days of discussions, finance officials from the Group of 20 nations unveiled plans for a global initiative to build roads and other infrastructure projects to help boost world growth by $2 trillion over the next five years and create millions of jobs.
But officials conceded that this longer-run effort will not help with the pressing problems of weak growth in Europe and a number of other parts of the world. And U.S. Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew complained that governments in Europe, Japan and China were failing to deliver needed support. “European leaders should focus on recalibrating policies to address persistent demand weaknesses,” Lew said in comments prepared for a session of the policy-setting committee of the International Monetary Fund. Weak reports on industrial production and trade out of Germany,
BY ERICA WERNER The Associated Press
Europe’s largest economy, jolted financial markets and raised worries that Europe could be headed for another recession. U.S. stocks endured their worst week since May 2012 with the losses continuing on Friday when the Dow Jones industrial average slid 115 points. It was against this backdrop that G20 finance ministers and central bank presidents met for two days of talks that wrapped up Friday in advance of the annual meetings of the 188-nation IMF and its sister lending institution,
WASHINGTON — Two years after a prostitution scandal rocked the Secret Service, a Republican congressman renewed allegations Thursday about possible involvement by a White House volunteer and said he smelled efforts to cover it up. White House officials adamantly denied wrongdoing and said there’d been no attempt to keep anything quiet. Rep. Jason Chaffetz, who’s been investigating the Secret Service as chairman of a House oversight subcommittee, said in an interview that the White House had new questions to answer in light of information he had received from Secret Service whistleblowers, as well as from a report in Thursday’s Washington Post. “The immediate question for the White House is
SEE GROWTH | A10
SEE SCANDAL | A10
Old Tower B&B gets facade grant The World
Police reports . . . . A2 What’s Up . . . . . . . Go! South Coast. . . . . . A3 Opinion. . . . . . . . . . A4
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COOS BAY —The president of the Coos Bay City Council was approved for an Urban Renewal Agency grant by the council this week to improve the facade of her bed and breakfast establishment. City Councilor Stephanie Kramer recused herself from the discussion, citing a conflict of interest because she By Devan Patel, The World stood to gain financially. She had subThe Urban Renewal Agency approved a facade improvement grant for mitted a grant application for $9,950 Stephanie Kramer’s business, The Old Tower House Bed & Breakfast. for repairs on The Old Tower House Bed
Gordon Hayes, Myrtle Point Socratis Katsikis, Coos Bay Margaret Perkins, Coos Bay Edward Ward, North Bend Julianna Valliere, Lac du Flambeau, Wisc. Audrey Dersham, Bandon
& Breakfast, which she owns and operates with her husband, Tom. The Empire Urban Renewal Facade Improvement Program matched 50 percent of the lowest bid on facade repairs, which was $19,900. The other two bids for the repair work were substantially greater sums of $26,500 and $28,875. With Kramer recused from her councilor duties, the council elected to approve the application, citing her role as a business owner in addition to the cultural significance of her property. The property was placed on the National Register of Historic Places by
Robert Miller, Coos Bay Delpha Bailey, Coos Bay Harold Neumann, Coos Bay Henry Short, Coos Bay Dorothy Davies, North Bend
Obituaries | A5
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the U.S National Park Service in 1984 and is on the city’s culture resource list. Much of the repairs on The Old Tower House Bed & Breakfast will go toward improving its aesthetics. “The front of the building shingles are getting really worn out, but we’ll try and keep the ones we can,” Kramer said. “Insulation was also put in the house, but it was done so poorly that the plugs were sticking out.” The bed and breakfast will also undergo repainting after years of wear and tear, Kramer said. SEE GRANT | A10
Mostly sunny 65/53 Weather | A10
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