Three key pieces of news came out of the Goldendale City Council meeting last night.
First, the newest member of the council was sworn it. Filiberto Ontiveros took the Position #2 seat formerly held by John Sullivan, who resigned recently to pursue business interests. After the meeting, Ontiveros said he had looked forward to being on the council.
He was warmly welcomed by all, particularly Jane Roberts who said now she wasn’t the newbie anymore.
Second, Mayor Mike Canon announced that the city had exercised its reversionary interest in two lots in the city’s industrial park in accordance with the statutory warranty deed recorded with Auscrete company February 28, 2018. That deed said that if Auscrete failed to build a building and employ people within a year, the city could buy back the lots for $90,000, having originally accepted a $100,000 check. Mayor Canon said they were not able to raise additional funds from investors to build the building and buy the equipment to start manufacturing. Instead, he said, they have rented space in the last building left in the former Commonwealth Aluminum site and will be ordering the manufacturing machinery and setting up shop there.
And the majority of the meeting featured a second quarter report on activities from Dana Peck, executive director of the Greater Goldendale Chamber of Commerce. He told councilors that last week he’d met with a national group of investors and their consultants on a potential development on the site of the former Commonwealth Aluminum. He said that they’d been ask not to divulge the specifics quite yet, but he described the project as “enormous,” and said it was a potential customer for the pump storage project and were also interested in setting up a separate renewable energy project, with the idea being that between the two, they could operate on totally green energy.
You can see a photo of the new council member and read an expanded version of the story on our website, Gorge News Center Dot Com.