Weekly Newsish Roundup: KEEP IT LOCAL! LIBERTY DENIED April 6 – 12

Apr 22, 2017 | Newsish, Weekly News Roundup

KEEP IT LOCAL! LIBERTY DENIED! 

Check out your weekly Newsish Roundup for April 6 – 12.

In the news today:

  • Liberty Denied!
  • Coffee with Will and Lori McNeil
  • Get out and Go!
  • Around the Mountain
  • Behind the Streams: Go Local

This video was brought to you by Northwest Furniture and Mattress, Grande Ronde Hospital, and Anything2Digital.com. For more local content, visit our website at http://lagrandealive.tv!

Category: Newsish
Youtube Video: https://youtu.be/bDi89UPDkBo

Hey La Grande Alive! This is your weekly Newsish Roundup brought to you by Grande Ronde Hospital, Northwest Furniture and Mattress, and Anything2Digital.com.

Liberty Denied 
There’s a lot of discouraged people right now in La Grande. Last night, Wednesday April 4th, the city of La Grande denied the Liberty Theatre Foundation a large amount of funding to restore the Liberty Theater in La Grande. The backstory of this request is this: the Liberty Theater requested $250,000 from the city of La Grande, $150,000 of which would be a debt forgiveness of a loan already given. If the theater had been awarded this money, said Kelly Ducote, the grant-writer for the foundation, they would have requested a million more dollars from the state.

But according to Dale Mamman who I spoke with briefly this morning, neither of the loans were granted last night. The city voted at the city council meeting last night 3-3 with one person abstaining because of a conflict of interest. And with a tie, no die. The motion failed, putting the foundation, according to Dale Mammen, back to square one.

Now I also talked to Justin Rock, one of the dissenting votes, this morning and he said he personally believed the project is amazing. But he’s a businessman, he said. And the project, even if the state awarded it the million dollars they’re hoping for, would only be halfway funded. He wants to fund projects that are more fully developed.

But there is hope, at least according to Rob McIntyre, the project manager of the a theater in Athena much like the Liberty theater. He has been working on his project for almost a decade. He said they have been at the place the Liberty has at least four times and, I quote, If you can grit your teeth, you can do it. Don’t give up, he said. Focus on the small parts of the project and, eventually, the project will progress.

But what do you think, La Grande Alive? Should the city have funded the Liberty Project? What direction should they head in the future? Your comments in the section below.

This title story was brought to you by…Grande Ronde Hospital 

Coffee With Will and Lori McNeil 
I once heard a story about a professional ballerina who said that every time before she went on stage her stomach got butterflies. No matter how many times you perform, you’re always nervous beforehand, and that’s no exception for me with Coffee With Will. And this week, I had to take a deep, deep breath because I got the opportunity to interview, the one, the only, Mrs. Oregon United States 2016, Lori McNeil, right here in La Grande, Oregon, and, though she’s a personal friend, she’s kind of a big deal.

LGA Alive TV - 040617 Newsish RoundupEvery year everyone who participates in the Mrs Oregon pageant runs on a particular platform, and Lori’s platform is literacy. Lori believes that literacy is essential to children’s confidence and self-esteem.

In addition to being Mrs. Oregon 2016, Lori is a self-published author of educational children’s books. She has 2 books published, 8 more on the way. And her passion for educating children, she said, goes all the way back to her childhood she spent seeing the cost of reading difficulties in her friends.

Overall the conversation was a fun conversation with one of the most accomplished people I’ve ever interviewed. The rest of this conversation is available to be watched on LaGrandeAlive’s Facebook page.

Upcoming Events
And here’s your upcoming events with Emily Adair in Get out and Go!

A couple other events this week. This Saturday there will be a Bridal Show at the Eastern Oregon University Gilbert Center. It’s the biggest bridal show in Eastern Oregon, and there will be local vendors, custom wedding clothes makers, plus an appearance by Lori McNeil, my Coffee With Will interviewee. Also, next thursday there is a Alegre Travel Vacation Night put on by, well, put on by Alegre Travel. It will be held at the masonic lodge right above the business. For a RSVP, call this number (541-963-9000).

Around the Mountain 
And here’s your EOU sports with Evan and Chris in Around the Mount in 90 seconds!

Local Sports 
The La Grande Tigers trounced Hermiston twice on tuesday. Like that alliteration? Trounced them twice on tuesday, winning their first game 4-2 and their second 11-1. Union Cove’s game v.s. Arlington / Sherman / Congdon was cancelled, as have all the Elgin games up to this point in the season. La Grande is scheduled to play Pendleton two games today at 3pm.

Behind the Streams – Go Local
LGA Alive TV - 040617 Newsish RoundupAnd this week in behind the streams, we take a look behind the scenes at the local-business side of La Grande Alive and why, exactly, you should spend your cash with local businesses.

La Grande Alive Live
And be sure to tune into La Grande Alive Live, our weekday evening live stream. Every day at 6pm. We have all your most-recent La Grande Alive content on our website and our Facebook page.

And that’s your weekly Newsish roundup…