In the news: Members of the Redmond Rod and Gun Club have been looking for a new location for the past two years after their landlord, Deschutes County, told them they’d have to vacate their gun range east of Redmond so the county could sell the land to help fund a new jail.
After considerable searching for a large parcel of land away from population, the club last year enlisted Sen. Ron Wyden to help them obtain a piece of Bureau of Land Management property just across the North Unit Canal in Crook County, a site not far from the current range. The approximately 307-acre parcel runs north from Highway 126 at mile post 4.
In January a couple of dozen residents and representatives of West Powell Butte Estates, Twin Lakes Ranch subdivision and the under construction Remington Ranch resort let gun club representatives know in no uncertain terms that they have money and are willing to use it to thwart any gun club use of BLM land west of Powell Butte.
In the end gun club members acknowledged that given their druthers they’d rather stay where they are, and Powell Butte residents latched on to that with the idea to pursue finding another piece of land for the county to sell for jail money. Gun club members agreed to ask Deschutes County officials about that possibility.
Update: The gun club continues to seek a new location.
“We’re still working on it,” Glaze said. “Nothing ever moves fast when you’re working with government agencies.”
While the site near Powell Butte Estates remains on the list of potential locations, it comes with many obstacles, he said and he poor economy has given the club more time to find a new location.
Deschutes County has extended the club’s lease on its east Redmond location through the end of June 2011. With the down real state market the county doesn’t anticipate selling the land anytime soon and will continue to extend the club’s lease, Glaze said.
In the news: Maintaining and enhancing city services and preserving the city’s infrastructure in the face of economic decline took top spots in the Redmond City Council’s goal-setting session in February.
Councilors supported exploring the potential to expand the role of Redmond Area Park and Recreation District in developing, maintaining and operating Redmond parks.
Later David Brandt, city manager, said the suggestion exploration grew out of a comment from a councilor that parks are always first on the funding chopping block and asking if there was something that could be done.
Brandt said he’d approach the park district to see if there is interest in putting together a team to study the issues and the most efficient way of providing park services. The result could be a total merger of operations, such as Bend Metro Park and Recreation District, which provides all of the park services in Bend, keeping everything as it exists today with the district and city cooperating in a number of areas, or something in between.
Update: As the year ends, the parks goal has not received a lot of discussion, though the idea is not dead and people are still talking about it, said Mayor George Endicott.
The city parks division and RAPRD did cooperate in a revival of the Redmond City Parks Foundation by creating a nonprofit that will raise money to benefit both the city and the park district, Endicott said.
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