Camp Sherman land use issue

Camp Sherman Appeals for Help on Land Issue Affecting Everyone
I made the 120-mile round trip to Madras this week with almost twenty other residents of Camp Sherman (your westernmost neighbor in Jefferson County) to state our strong opposition to a proposed action by the Jefferson County Board of Commissioners that could affect not just our community, but every property owner in the county. 
Here’s the issue: An out-of-state real estate investor has applied for a conditional use permit to convert a single-family residence here into a short-term rental. We’re opposed because the property is located smack-dab in the middle of a residential neighborhood of single-family residential lots, none allowing short-term rentals for a number of reasons including loud and dangerous traffic coming and going at all hours, some in 40-foot motor coaches; and of course inappropriate noise, lights and behavior. We no longer have a resident deputy, so have no control over such problems, especially in the dead of the night when one of these visitors in a drunken rage is storming around the neighborhood waving a gun, as happened once earlier this year. 
But this goes far beyond “Not-In-My-Backyard” concerns. Our delegation made clear to the Commissioners that the proposed action essentially removes our neighbor and replaces them with a vacationer, which is something entirely different. Today, if something happens when we’re away, we get a phone call or a text. That’s what community is all about. With temporary neighbors, you have no such connection or accountability. 

We want people to vacation in Camp Sherman, but believe both we and they are better served when it’s in appropriately designated places like our many resorts and campgrounds, where behaviors and activities are supervised.  We have lots of those. 
What we don’t have is enough single-family residences to sustain a community, including operation of the Black Butte School, which is struggling to stay alive. If rentals are allowed, neighbors become non-existent and we’re left with absentee corporate owners profiting off our community. In time, everything would become rentals – here and everywhere else.  Jefferson County has never allowed this before and should not allow it now. 
The Board postponed their decision on the application until January 28. We hope you’ll add your voices to ours by making your opinion known to the Board of Commissioners right away, before it’s too late. Ask them to vote NO on appeal of the land issue in Camp Sherman. Thank you.

Don Wilt
Camp Sherman