Wasco County Commissioners met Wednesday morning with one big item on the agenda. Whether or not to set aside $15 million dollars in a Wasco County Endowment & Resiliency Fund.
The money to fund this, comes from accumulated tax-abatement and Strategic Investment Program (SIP) payments made by Google.
During the public testimony, former Wasco County Commissioner Bill Lennox asked Commissioners to maybe invest a little less and let County residents see a benefit now:
“Once again, we need to look and be progressive in terms of the way we do things in our community. And one of them is to take this windfall, grow it, yes, grow it, but also allow the community to feel the benefits as they are”.
Commissioner Jeff Justesen believes the County is already seeing benefits:
“I would love to see some benefits from it today, but I think we’re already seeing some of the benefits. We get tax dollars from these entities already, and Wasco County’s benefiting from those, not just for our core services, but some of these additional projects that hopefully will bring benefit to the community. I think that Kramer Field’s a great example. The facilities department’s done a great job of reviving Kramer Field”.
Commission Chair Scott Hege spoke about what makes him proud of this whole process:
“The thing I’m most proud of, honestly most proud of is the staff here and the directors here that have told us that this is what they want to do. They told us that they don’t need more money to operate. They told us they’re willing and able to live within their budgets and they want this money to be set aside for the future. That is so huge. It’s unbelievable in a government today that the government workers would tell the leaders of this organization, put the money aside for people in the future. We’re willing to put that aside”.
It was a unanimous vote and the Commissioners and Staff are helping to shape the future.
You can find out more about the Wasco County Endowment & Resiliency Fund by clicking this link:
https://www.wascocountyor.gov/how_do_i_(faq)/find_search_for/endowment.php#collapse152280b4