MERRY CHRISTMAS
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 25, 2013
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Giving spirit continues beyond holidays BY TIM NOVOTNY The World
COOS BAY — The stories are heartwarming, and yet sobering at the same time. One child gets new shoes to replace the ones held together by duct tape. Another child, shivering through a school day with a parent’s coat scraping the wet pavement, gets a brand new winter coat. These are just a couple of the success stories created by the United Way of Southwestern
Oregon’s Kids’ Coats and Shoes program. Hundreds of children have benefited from one of the first programs to show up on the local United Way calendar at the start of a new year. Now entering its fifth year, they have been able to turn community contributions into instant help for more than 700 kids in Coos and Curry counties. Bill Harsh, executive director of the United Way of Southwestern Oregon, knows this is a tough time of year to be fundraising, but said
NB schools overspend on program
even a small amount can make a big difference. “It costs about $11 per student,” he said, “so, if someone were to donate say $45, they would actually be helping four children in our area.” The program covers one child in each kindergarten through fourthgrade public school classroom in Coos and Curry counties. In Coos Bay and North Bend, teachers hand out a voucher to a chosen student in need. That student’s family can then exchange the certificate for a
new coat or new shoes at Walmart. In all other areas, the teachers select a student and the United Way picks a day at the end of January, or early February, to deliver a pair of new shoes to the student in need. “We created this program just to make it so a kid who is wet, or a kid who is cold, can get help right away,” Harsh said. “We do it after Christmas because some of those children may get shoes or a coat as a gift and we want to make sure we are helping someone who is
absolutely without any other recourse.” The agency is hoping to raise about $4,000, which would help an estimated 350 school children this year. If you would like to donate, Harsh says you can send a check to the United Way of Southwestern Oregon at P.O. Box 1288, in Coos Bay. You can also give him a call at 541-267-5202 to get more information. They are hoping to have all donations reach them by midJanuary.
An explosive year in Oregon
BY CHELSEA DAVIS The World
NORTH BEND — North Bend School District is shelling out more money on an alternative education program than it had originally planned. The district’s PEAK program (Positive Educational Alternatives for K ids) launched this fall with 35 students, most of whom are in high school. “Some of the kids out there have fallen behind in credits,” said acting superintendent Bill Yester. “PEAK has smaller class sizes and the students stay in one room; they don’t move.” The program is held in the basement of the South Coast Education Service District building, but is staffed with North Bend teachers. The district pays rent to the South Coast ESD. Out of the $438,000 program, 84 percent comes from salaries. The most expensive position is the program’s principal, Ralph Brooks, who is paid $140,000 annually. “But he has other duties,” Yester said. “He’s a half-time administrator and the rest of the time he’s the truancy, safety and security officer for the district. “I don’t think half of his salary should be counted into that because he has other duties.” The district is spending approximately $128,000 more on the program than it had budgeted. The district had $310,000 available for the program, about half of which comes from ESD resolution dollars. “A lot of it is salaries,” he said. “They added a half-time special education position, two certified teachers, educational assistants, a two-hour secretary and administrator’s pay. The salaries are what’s driving expenses.” At the school board’s Dec. 16 meeting, members asked whether cuts to the program need to be made now or at the end of the school year. SEE NB SCHOOLS | A8
By Alysha Beck, The World
Oregon State Police Explosives Unit Detective Blain Allen, kneeling, examines a bombing scene the morning of Aug. 23 at the Mingus Park Vietnam War Memorial.
OSP among national leaders in incidents BY THOMAS MORIARTY The World
While recent explosivesrelated crimes on the South Coast have given many cause for alarm, Oregon State Police say those incidents fall in line with numbers that put the state near the top of the heap for bomb cases. According to Detective Blain Allen of the OSP Explosives Unit, the agency led the country last year in reportsto the BATF’s Bomb and Arson Tracking System, or
BATS — a database that allows law enforcement agencies and fire departments to track explosivesrelated criminal incidents. Allen, whose Central Point team is responsible for the southwestern third of the state, said explosives incidents are more common than many think. “Between January and Oct. 12 of this year, we rendered safe 22 live explosive devices,” he said. Five of those incidents were in Coos, Curry and western
Douglas counties. Jay Yarbrough, 39, was sentenced to five years’ probation for possession of destructive devices Nov. 12 after police found several improvised explosive devices inside his Coos Bay home in June while on a domestic violence call. Yarbrough will spend five years in prison for the unlawful use of a weapon during the domestic violence incident. On Aug. 22, someone detonated an improvised explosive device at the Mingus Park
Vietnam War Memorial. The blast was loud enough to startle police dispatchers inside Coos Bay City Hall, five blocks away. Allen and his team spent hours examining device fragments and sifting through nearby Dumpsters for evidence. Two weeks later, someone placed another IED inside The Prayer Chapel on Commercial Avenue. Although the device didn’t detonate, it did start a SEE OSP | A8
What next for health law: Calm or more turbulence?
INSIDE
WASHINGTON — Whether you love it or hate it or are just plain confused by it, you’ve got to give the health care law this much: There’s plenty of drama. The nail-biting goes on. As the clock ticks toward the Jan. 1 start of insurance coverage under President Barack Obama’s big, bold and bedraggled creation, there are inklings it might get a second wind.
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But that could turn out to be just hot air. Time will tell, soon, as policies take effect in new health insurance markets that have been enrolling customers — or trying — for nearly three months. A look at the law’s broad strokes, its brush with disaster and the roots of a possible rebound:
The good No more denying people coverage when they’ve been sick. No
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more stratospheric premiums for the previously or currently ill, either. No more cutting off insurance payments because someone has used up a year’s worth of benefits. For all the headaches signing up, questionnaires are also notable for questions they do not ask: Have you been treated for cancer? What is your medical history? It won’t matter anymore. Few in the polarized debate over the health care overhaul defend the history of an insurance system that
can drive people into poverty when they get sick or steer them away from treatment they need. The critics quarrel with the means more than these particular ends. And families like the fact that adult children can stay on their parents’ plans until they are 26, an early consequence of the law and one of its few visible effects until now.
The bad
short of new federal standards. Far fewer gained insurance in the new markets in that time. This happened despite Obama’s repeated and now discredited pledge that people happy with their insurance could simply keep it. He partnered that assurance with a promise that people happy with their doctors could keep them, too. Not so, in many cases. Another rude awakening.
More than 4 million people lost coverage because their policies fell
Heartfelt story Three members of a Southern California family, including a mom and two sons, have undergone heart transplants.
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FORECAST
The Associated Press
NATION
BY CALVIN WOODWARD
Sunny 52/34 Weather | A8
SEE HEALTH | A8