County parks to host disabled vets for free

The Board of Josephine County Commissioners voted to enact a pilot program offering one free camping trip per year to disabled veterans residing in JoCo.
On Friday, March 21, during the county’s weekly business session at the Anne G. Basker Auditorium in Grants Pass, JoCo Recreation Director Tamara Martin was invited to the podium to detail the pilot program.
“Director Picard from the Veteran Service Office as well as Commissioner Barnett, we have been working together to look at expanding the current veterans programs that we offer through our park system,” Martin said. “Currently, right now a Josephine County disabled vet with a service connected disability is eligible for a free affixed parking pass for the Josephine County Parks. It’s an annual pass and we give out approximately 475 to 500 of these passes on an annual basis. And it’s a service that we hope will encourage our local veterans community to get out into the parks for a variety of issues or recreational opportunities: fishing, hiking, hanging out with the family, or whatever that might look like for them.”
Martin said the new camping program would have the same eligibility requirements as the annual parking permit, and would cover up to a three-night trip to any county park.
“You have to prove that you are a Josephine County resident and then provide us some information on that service-connected disability,” Martin explained. “(The trip) can be in any of our parks and utilize any of our services from tents to yurts, depending on what that veteran might like to do. The only exclusion that it has with it is that it does not include our group sites and it does not include the holiday weekend. So there are some blackout times that would not be able to be used.”
“This is just another way that Josephine County can show that they honor our veterans,” Barnett said in response to the program, while Commissioner Ron Smith remarked, “I think it’s a good way to show honor for our veterans and it’s a good, simple process – it’s very good.”
The board also granted Martin authority to transfer money from Fairgrounds Permanent Fund 54 to Recreation-Fair Fund 47.
The recreation director recounted the Fund 54 was established to absorb the proceeds from the sale of the former Flying Lark facility to River Valley Church, funds that were earmarked for improvements and repairs to the Josephine County Fairgrounds.
“Part of that ordinance is access for the fairgrounds to utilize the interest that is garnered from that fund to reinvest back into the fairgrounds for improvements and for, well, whatever else can kind of come up along the way,” said Martin. “So the board order that you have today is a request and approval, hopefully, for the authority to transfer the interest only payments that are being made into the Fund 47 so that I can access those funds to reinvest back into the fairgrounds.”
The third and final action taken by the board at last Friday’s meeting was approving an amendment to the county’s intergovernmental agreement with the Department of Transportation/ Middle Rogue Metropolitan Planning Organization.
Transit Program Supervisor Scott Chancey explained, “This is an amendment to the existing agreement that states that the transit program, which is operated obviously by Josephine County, is part of the Metropolitan Planning Organization’s process for allocating and distributing federal transportation dollars within Josephine County. So this amendment extends the date as well as changes the contact information for ODOT and the MPO.”