Opinion

Shop wisely and widely

Another day, another dollar. Earned and spent.

After spending almost $21 million on buying the lease, building the store, hiring and training staff, and stocking shelves with products, the long-successful retailer Fred Meyer will be hoping for profitable returns, sooner and later.

It will probably earn them. It is a fine store, with fine products and fine personnel. When it opens today, many people in the area will enjoy the one-stop principle in its most advanced form - 165,000 square feet containing 225,000 products worth $4.5 million, all under one roof.

We welcome Freddys to town and wish them well. They are employing hundreds of local people, and they pledge to be involved in community projects in the future.

But as we ring in the new, it's impossible for us not to spare more than a passing thought for Roth's IGA and its employees. They will bow out of the local grocery scene by June, after deciding not to invest heavily in its Canby store in order to compete with Fred Meyer and the newly remodeled Cutsforth's Thriftway. Roth's spent 19 years in this community, and its loyal customers will miss Curt & Co.

We reflect, too, that it has been more than two years since the landmark Mangus Variety Store closed its doors after 66 years in business. Sadly, we fear it may have marked the end of the road for the good ol' five-and-dime, the little store with a little bit of everything. Maybe it's just as well it didn't make it to the year 2000. How could it compete with Freddys, the large store with a large amount of everything?

Despite inquiries, the store at the corner of Holly and 2nd Avenue still remains vacant, as do other properties in downtown Canby. Only when people or businesses take a chance and invest in these properties will we truly move closer to the city's vision for the future - a healthy, viable business climate in all our commercial areas.

The Fred Meyer megastore will provide much of what a shopper needs, but so do small, independent, downtown stores. We view this as an opportunity, as a way to keep people in town and to help them discover all the good things that are already here. And there are a lot of great businesses already here.

We've always advocated - and will continue to support - the notion of shopping at hometown businesses owned and operated by hometown people, many of whom are your neighbors, friends, City Council members and baseball coaches.

Spread the wealth throughout the community. Shop wisely and widely.

Letters to the editor

N. Redwood resident airs traffic concerns

To the editor:
At the request of (Canby Community Development Director) Jerry Pineau, I am putting my concerns and thoughts to paper for your consideration.

I live on North Redwood Street, where our family home has existed through three generations, and three more generations have lived or visited this home.

Looking back at the family tree, this includes the McArthurs, Haines, Stewarts, and the Potters, our children and grandchildren. We have proudly called Canby "home" for more than 80 years during these generations, and even though we are not within the city limits, we do care very much about what happens to "our" town.

I'm sure you are aware that I have expressed much concern over the temporary traffic disruption to the intersection of N. Redwood and Highway 99E.

I realize that I'm jousting at windmills to expect that the railroad crossing work by Union Pacific will not/has not happened so there will be no need for those who use N. Redwood to find alternate routes of travel.

But looking at the equal rights of us weighted against the equal rights of the rest of the greater Canby area affected by your decisions I do not see any actions being taken in our behalf by the City of Canby, it's hired personnel and City Council.

You seem to have forgotten us in your haste to accommodate the financial interests of the developers and their agents for the new shopping center at our intersection.

The traffic studies I have copies of show that somewhere between 1,000 and 2,000 vehicles each day are going to need to find alternative routes of travel. In the Canby Herald, you are quoted saying that we should use N.

Pine St. We all know that Territorial is an extremely hazardous intersection, causing that portion of 99E to be declared a Traffic Safety Corridor, and that increasing the traffic load at that intersection would only put more citizens at high risk.

In order to provide safe and expeditious access through the city of Canby on N. Pine St., could you please make the following commitments or alterations while we are waiting for the full opening of the N. Redwood/99E intersection.

1. Encourage Clackamas County - which has jurisdiction of the northern half of N. Pine St. - to make the necessary improvements needed so that the street can carry this heavier load of traffic. At least make a public pledge to keep it in reasonable repair.

2. Establish pedestrian cross walks on N. Pine so the children can cross it safely to access the city parks and youth activities there.

3. Install a STOP sign at the intersection of N. Pine and 3rd St, making that intersection operate similar to those at Ivy, Grant & Elm, thus offering those using the N. Pine alternative route the same safe opportunity to access 99E as the rest of the city has at the intersections further south.

I realize these requests are after the fact as you have already put the new traffic pattern into effect, but I hold that you have ignored us entirely as you have charged ahead with your vision of the future that continues to take viable business away from downtown Canby.

Thus leaving it with many empty store fronts and compromising the livelihoods of those loyal Canbyites that have invested their lives and futures in Canby with the businesses that have made Canby the wonderful place it is today.

Please consider this appeal asking that you again look to the protection of your citizens and community, rather than the greedy pockets of the developers who have no interest in our city but the financial filling of their pockets to be spent in other communities.
Mike Potter
Canby