Local actor narrates classic tale
4th of July Fireworks
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LINCOLN CITY, OREGON Your weekly community Newspaper since 1927
JUNE 29, 2016 | $1.00
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‘2+1’ standard for occupancy rattles VRDs Objectors say per-bedroom limit would put them out of business RICK MARK rmark@countrymedia.net
NEWS GUARD PHOTOS/CASSIE RUUD
This year’s summer kite festival, Windstock, featured giant bears, fish, an octopus, dragons and frogs, to name a few.
KITE FEST An estimated 20,000 people turned out for the 2016 Summer Kite Festival, ‘Windstock’ and let their kites take wing and soar above the ocean. A sunny sky and healthy wind sustained throughout the two-day festival, an improvement from last year’s summer festival where the wind was either too high or too slow. This year, fish, dragons, bears and myriad other imaginative creations took to the sky above the D River Wayside with little to no issues. The next Kite Festival will take place the first weekend in October.
If visitors had forgotten their kites, a booth was available to make your own aerial creation as this young woman did.
The steady stream of wind made it possible for sharks to swim in the air and for giant flounders to rise from the sand.
RICK MARK rmark@countrymedia.net
There may be hope yet for the aging Elks Lodge in Oceanlake. Once a gathering place for thousands of members of the Benevolent and Protective Order of the Elks Lodge No. 1886, the huge 60-yearold building has been sitting empty for more than a year, ever since the last remnants of Elk membership closed its doors for the last time. The Elks Lodge was the center for much of Lincoln City’s social life for decades. The 35,000-square-foot building was home to banquets, weddings, and Lincoln City’s grandest charity balls. The building has a huge dance floor, a dining hall, and a health club featuring racquetball courts and a spa. The Elks ran a thrift shop in the building, one
Open 8a-7p Mon-Fri, 8a-6p Sat
of several ways the Lodge raised money to help those in need with food and toys at Christmastime. Lincoln City had looked into buying the building, which looms over the parking lot of the nearby Community Center. The city considered the building a loss, however, not worth renovating. It would have been torn down. Instead, the Elks sold the building in March to Mike and Lila Bradley. “I just couldn’t see them tearing that beautiful building down,� said Mike Bradley, a 40-year Elks member and a long-time masonry and tile contractor in Lincoln City. “Back in the glory days of the Elks, we had two bands playing in one evening, upstairs and down. It has three lounges, a beautiful stage, and the largest dance floor in the county. We had
weddings, birthday parties, and the Purple Ball at Christmas.� Mike and Lila, who is Lincoln City’s public works director, plan to renovate the building, which needs a lot. “The bones are there,� Mike Bradley said. “The building itself is a rock. The structure is fabulous. There’s very little wood; it’s mostly block and concrete with beautiful beams holding up the roof.� The old-growth Douglas-fir beams can be seen extending past the west wall. Bradley said the Elks had rejected the city’s purchase offer, “which was essentially zero.� He said the city had offered the Elks $175,000 for the building provided the Elks tear the building down NEWS GUARD PHOTO/RICK MARK and dispose of the remains. Will Bradley, left, and Mike Bradley think it will take a year to Bradley said it might have renovate the Elks Lodge in Oceanlake. One early project was to See ELKS, Page A2 install LED lighting, seen here.
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Long-time Elks vow to save old lodge from the wrecking ball
VOL. 89 | NO. 26
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The Taft Tiger Booster Club served up tasty treats for visitors and kite-fliers, having been awarded the concession stand for both the summer and fall Kite Festivals by the city in the spring.
Several proposed changes to Lincoln City’s vacation rental dwelling ordinance were on the City Council agenda this week, but nearly 90 minutes worth of comments from the public revealed one issue on almost everybody’s mind: occupancy limits. The proposed ordinance, hammered out over several months by city planners, refines the city’s approach to handling things like noise complaints and parking. For the most part, those changes seemed acceptable to the three dozen or so citizens gathered in Council Chambers on Monday. But the proposed limit on the number of occupants in a vacation rental on any given night ran into a wall of opposition. The draft ordinance restricts total overnight occupancy to two people per bedroom plus one additional person per house. Under that rule, a fourbedroom VRD could have no more than nine guests. A five-bedroom home could have 11. Children under 3 would not be counted. Opponents expressed a common theme. Their houses, some with more than 3,000 square feet of space, were designed to hold 16, 18, 20 people or more. “We’re booked every
single weekend,� said Charles Prince, whose five-bedroom VRD in Nelscott can sleep as many as 20 people. “I worry that Lincoln City is putting out a ‘Not Welcome’ sign.� People who vacation at his house “come here and spend money,� he said. “You’re pulling the rug out from under a lot of revenue that supports the community.� The City Council heard comments from about 20 people, most of them focused on occupancy. Some people questioned the proposed change in “quiet hours,� which would start at 10 p.m. rather than 7 p.m. Minor changes to the system for reporting complaints drew little opposition. Of more concern was a limit the law would put on the transferability of a VRD license upon the death of an owner. The proposed ordinance would allow a transfer to a spouse or domestic partner, but transfer to an heir would be allowed for only a year. After the comment period, Council did not directly address the concerns, deciding instead to wait until the July 11 meeting to give the issue further consideration. Councilor Kip Ward told The News Guard that the “2+1� plan for counting bodies in the bedrooms was based largely on New-
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