Corbett Community Forum

Safety Meeting Notes
September 6, 2023

Thank you to Jack Garrison who took notes for NEMCCA this month.
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Historical Society  - Outside deck is almost complete and electrical wiring of the inside of the building is in progress.
Oregon Highway Patrol - Staffing remains at 65% but two new hires are coming on board in October.

County Emergency Management - Provided a comprehensive overview of the Camp Creek Fire which is now 16% contained and its current size remains at a little over 1900 acres.   Currently there are over 500 management staff and firefighters on scene.

There was a discussion of the Emergency Notifications Areas / Zones and the Three Notification Level.  The first and lowest level is only provided to folks who have signed up for notifications via their phones or computers.  One of the issues is the overlap of notifications across several zones.  So some folks may get more than one notification level.
There was a positive comment of the recent Camp Creek Fire public meeting at the Grange which was attended by around 150 folks and that the Great Basin Incident Team was doing pop up updates at the Country Store.

A map was passed around showing the various water districts, in addition to Portland, that rely on Bull Run Reservoir and the various Portland water wells as a source of water.   The average daily water consumption across these water districts is 85-90 million gallons per day but summer peak use can be in the range of 100 to 110 million gallons per day.   As daily use goes down because of cooler weather a majority of the water will be produced by wells vice Bull Run.

Please Note - The Corbett Water District is not part of this Bull Run systems thus not impacted by the fire.

Corbett School - School is back in sessions and thanks to Citizen's Patrol for providing both morning and afternoon traffic control.  Over the summer the school has changed the parking lot traffic pattern and that has improved the traffic flow.

Woodard campus work is in progress.  The metal building is up and the interior is being finished.   Driveways and parking lots will be repaved this week.  Construction competition is anticipated by the end of November with a projected start of school on January 8,  2024.  Woodard school zone is still an unresolved issue but in progress; however, the school zone sign on Bell Road has been installed.

There was a lengthy discussion of the MCSO tactical training that was conducted over the summer in the Corbett School facility and the benefits to the community plus as a result of the training event the campus was surveyed and some area were identified that could be changed.  During the week that training was conducted there were many questions across the community as to what was going on and a lesson learned was the need for better community notification before the fact.

Corbett Water District - The Board has recently suspended charging customers for their private fire lines (unless they have a full-sized meter on their line). They are looking at the policy to determine the best course of action moving forward.

The CWD staff has stayed in touch with the Portland Emergency Coordination Center's daily briefing on the bull run fire and is confident that we will not be seeing this fire spread to our watershed. 
Working with the Fire Department on flow testing this summer we have determined that our PRV stations are potentially limiting hydrant flow. The board has called a zoom meeting on September 7th solely for the purpose of reviewing this topic. Please see our web site for a zoom link, or contact the office for more information

MCSO - Deputy discussed ways to notify him of suspicious activity in the community and best to email him vice telephone.   There was a lengthy overview of the school shooter training that was conducted over a week period at the Corbett Schools and MCSO also conducted training at another school over the summer.

The recent incident on Corbett Hill Road was briefly described.  Person was a local and was provided medical assistance and taken to the hospital.

There was a discussion by MCSO and Emergency Management on the mass notification of the incident in East Portland a few weeks ago.  Because of a software change which was incorrect several thousand folks including most of east county was notified to shelter in place when 911 pushed the notification.   Issue has been corrected and Emergency Management apologized for the problem.  They explained how a zone around an incident is established and how those personnel living in the area are notified.

Citizens Patrol - Discussed the change in the school traffic pattern.   Announced that East County Pioneer Association was having an event this Sunday at the Fire Hall but no further data was provided.   Citizens Patrol was thanked for supporting the NEMCCA litter patrol on Corbett Hill Road.

County Roads - There will be an internal meeting next week on rural road issues and looking to come up with a multi year plan to address the many issues.   Hiring of 10 additional workers is in progress.   There was a brief discussion of the Howard Road quarry and the impact of operations on the road and responsibility.  Ongoing determination of facts.

Grange is joining the Adopt a Road litter patrol effort and there was going to be a follow up discussion on the paperwork following the meeting.  There was a discussion about the past school effort on Evans and the need to reinstate that effort.   School Super was supportive.

The Adopt a Road policy is being rewritten and there are efforts underway to update the list of organizations that previously signed up, if they are still active and future interested in the program.   The  new policy will specify how many times a year patrols must be conducted.  NEMCCA was thanked for their efforts and the new signs on Corbett Hill Road should be installed next week.
The Owner Maintenance Policy for property owner maintenance of road right of way is also being rewritten and expect some changes down the road.  No time for release for this new policy was given but likely not near term.

Forest Service - Time of use permitting is over for the year and there will be a report on the program in the future.  Summer / Seasonal hires did a great job this year and that effort is also coming to a close soon.  There has been some issues at the Sand River Delta over reports on Twitter of potential human remains in the area.   MCSO and the Forest Service confirmed that is not true.  However, there are several personal memorial sites in the Delta and expect that these will be addressed in the future.  The E-bike use and policy is being relooked and will including designated parking areas.   Forest Service is expecting some new hires and with added manpower there is planned refocus on several issues.

Oregon State Parks - Fountain of Youth, i.e. the Dabney drinking water source is still being worked to mitigate the traffic hazards on the Historic Highway and the plan is to divert the water; however, no final solution or date of competition is available.   There was a discussion on the need to complete this project before winter.

Portland Women's Forum public meeting was recently held at the Grange and there was a great deal of public input so they are back to the drawing board to revise the plan and when updated a copy will be provided to NEMCCA for distribution.

Stare Parks has begun to adjust seasonal closing times and summer hires will be gone by October.  Parks will start closing on November 1st.

Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) - There will be a report on permit use coming soon and bid process for the west viaduct reconstruction was released for bid yesterday (Sept 5th).  Construction is anticipated to begin in the Fall of 2024.

ODOT is incurring a 25 position cut due to gas tax funding reductions.  This winter they are anticipating only having one truck vice two in our area during bad weather.   Plus there will likely be more highway closures due to bad weather this winter and the lack of manpower.  New gates have been installed in various locations.

ODOT will be installing new mile post markers on the Historic Highway starting at the Troutdale Bridge in the future; however, underground utilities will likely slow the process of drilling post holes for the new signs.