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Shady Cove community center battles for survival Colleen Lambert, administrative manager, says residents in Shady Cove are angry the town community center may close down. [Mail Tribune / John Darling] Friday Jul 21, 2017 at 3:58 PM Jul 21, 2017 at 3:59 PM John Darling for the Mail Tribune SHADY COVE — Without a quick infusion of cash, grants or pledges, the 36-year old Shady Cove Community Center will close at the end of August — a fate that has many residents feeling angry about the loss of something at the center of their lives. The community center supplies local residents, especially seniors, with a wide range of services, including a thrift store, Wednesday lunch, ACCESS food pantry, youth programs, music jams, an end-of-month flea market and a rental space for weddings, birthdays and other events. Much of what the community center offers is invisible or undefined. “It’s the center of our community. If you need an emergency rental, like a wheelchair, this is where you get it. Youth activities after school include classes on cooking, sewing, first aid. If you need a birth certificate or Wi-Fi or help with a letter from the DMV, this is where you come,” says center administrative manager Colleen Lambert. These benefits are all the more valuable because Shady Cove is so far from bigger cities — 22 miles from Medford — and many people don’t have transportation, she adds. “It’s absolutely devastating and detrimental. People are very angry, upset, irritated, frustrated and just pissed off. It’s very hard for people to swallow,” says Limarie Hulsey, manager of the thrift store. The store and large hall, which are behind City Hall, come up short about $1,500 a month, an unsustainable shortfall, she adds. Expenses run about $4,500 a month. The decline of the center, which is a nonprofit connected to no government agency, parallels the loss of its vital volunteer base, says board chairman Alan Styles. Many new residents hail from larger cities in California and don’t have the tradition of community service, he says, and many residents are increasingly busy on computer screens. “The center isn’t just for old folks, but that’s mainly who walks in the doors. Older folks are part of old Oregon and have this orientation of community-mindedness. Newer folks, they don’t. It’s a major adjustment moving from large cities to small. ... They’re busy with their own lives,” says Styles. Some of the Shady Cove folk, such as former center board chairman Stan Johnson, go way back and depend on the center as part of life. “I came here in 1946. We had a mill and a store. That was it. Just plain country folks. I fixed up the hall and kept the vehicles going,” says Johnson. “This is going to hurt the community. We used to have a grant writer, but he died. Grants are out there if you know how to dig for them, but we don’t now.” In younger years, Johnson organized the Rubber Duck Races on the Rogue River, which winds through Shady Cove. They would solicit up to $4,000 in donations, and you’d put your name on a rubber duck, launch it from the bridge in mid-town and maybe win a little prize. His wife, Lynda Johnson, says of the closure, “I don’t like it. I volunteered for a long time. It’ll be hard on a lot of people who depend on it for lunches, thrift store and all kinds of social activities.” Fundraising and donations have “pretty much slowed to a stop,” Styles notes, “and the buildings are extremely old. The maintenance costs are eating us alive.” The center, which has two full-time employees, received grants from United Way, Carpenter Foundation and others, but those are mission-specific and not aimed at administrative expenses that are dragging the center down, says Lambert. Lambert is focusing on the huge goal of finding 10 or 15 people willing to pledge $100 a month to help meet expenses. If that happens, the center could stay alive. “My fondest hope is that the community take over this financial responsibility. I’m sending all my positive energy bubbles out for this. ... If the community gets more aware of the situation and more supportive, maybe we can stay open.” The center is popular with out-of-towners, such as James Baltusnik, who comes from Ashland to peruse the thrift shop and take breakfast at Mac’s Diner. The closure will impact other businesses in town, he notes. “It makes me very angry,” says Angel Bolinger, a thrift-shop volunteer. “We help a lot of people, and they’re all going to be turned away. No one knew this was coming. It’s all so sudden.” The buildings are owned by Jackson County School District 9. The city of Shady Cove has indicated that if the center closes, it would like to have the large spaces for an evacuation site in case of floods or other disasters. The Red Cross has certified the buildings as emergency housing, Lambert says. It started in 1981 as a double-wide for Crater Bank, which left and donated them to the center. The thrift store will stay open until Aug. 31, to get rid of inventory. — John Darling is a freelance writer living in Ashland. Email him at [email protected].