Serve your community on a City commission

ROSEBURG, Ore. – Looking for a new way to serve your community in the new year? Consider serving on a City commission or the Budget Committee in an advisory capacity to the City Council.

The City is taking applications from people interested in filling vacancies on the Budget Committee or the following commissions: Airport, Homeless, Parks and Recreation, Planning and Public Works.

The Public Works and Homeless commissions have two vacancies each. The other commissions have one vacancy. The Budget Committee has three.

Vacancies typically arise at the start of each year as commissioners with expiring terms notify commission chairs about whether they wish to continue serving. Planning Commissioners serve four-year terms. The person filling that vacancy would serve through December 2028. The other volunteer positions are appointed to three-year terms except on the Public Works Commission. One volunteer appointed to that commission will finish a term expiring Dec. 31, 2025, and the other will serve until Dec. 31, 2027.

Applicants must meet varying residency or commission membership requirements, depending on the opening being filled. Applicants for the Budget Committee, Parks and Recreation Commission and Planning Commission must live in city limits.

Applicants for the Airport Commission must live in city limits. Homeless Commission applicants can be “at large.” One Public Works Commission opening must be filled by someone living in city limits, while the other can be filled by someone living inside Roseburg’s urban services boundary but outside city limits.

The Airport Commission meets at 3:30 p.m. on the third Thursday of every even month, starting in February, to develop polices for development of Roseburg Regional Airport. The position will remain open until filled, so there’s no deadline.

The application deadline for the Budget Committee, which meets as needed each spring to review the City’s proposed annual operating budget, is 5 p.m. Friday, March 14.

The vacancies for the Homeless Commission, which meets at 11 a.m. on fourth Mondays, will remain open until filled.

The application deadline will be extended for the Planning Commission, which meets at 7 p.m. on first Mondays of each month. Commissioners are appointed by the Council after an interview. The commission considers land-use development issues within the city and urban growth boundary.

There’s no deadline for applications to the Parks and Recreation Commission, which meets at 8:15 a.m. on the first Wednesday of each month to consider operation and management programs for the park system, park usage rules, means of economic operations and operation parameters for the Stewart Park Golf Course. Applications will be reviewed weekly. The vacancy will remain open until filled.

Vacancies on the Public Works Commission will remain open until filled. The commission meets at 3:30 p.m. on second Thursdays to provide long-range planning and strategies for financing of capital improvements including sidewalks, lighting and storm drainage; and to consider rules governing operations of the water system and its rate structure.

Online applications and more information about each commission can be found on the City’s “Commissions” webpage. Residents also can get applications emailed to them by requesting one via email at info@cityofroseburg.org. Completed online applications should be emailed to info@cityofroseburg.org.

In addition, residents can pick up applications by visiting the Administration Department at City Hall, 900 SE Douglas Ave., and then mail in applications to that address or drop applications off at the City Hall lobby.

On Monday, Jan. 13, Mayor Larry Rich appointed the following Councilors to chair City Commissions:

• Airport: Tom Michalek;

• Economic Development: Kylee Rummel;

• Historic Resource Review: Katie Williams;

• Homeless: Shelley Briggs Loosley;

• Library: Andrea Zielinski;

• Parks and Recreation: Ruth Smith;

• Public Works: Ellen Porter.

The Planning Commission is not chaired by a City Councilor.

For more information, contact City Administration at info@roseburgor.gov or 541-492-6866.