Annual MCC membership meeting yields mixed results

By Abby SewellMolalla PioneerAt Molalla Communications Company’s 50th annual membership meeting on Friday night, with more than 900 people in attendance, MCC board members and management handed out prizes, discussed the company’s financial success in 2006, and took a membership vote that passed amendments to the cooperative’s bylaws.
They also voted in Ron Jones as a [...]

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17-year-old arrested on sexual assault charges

By Abby SewellMolalla Pioneer
Shortly after noon today, two Oregon State Police detectives and a trooper arrested a 17-year-old Molalla High School student from the high school campus on sexual assault charges stemming from an incident that took place in December 2006 during an MHS basketball team trip to Sisters, Ore.
The student arrested today was transported [...]

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Anonymous email messages prompt investigation

Hackers access phone company computers, send fake emails
By Abby SewellMolalla Pioneer
On Saturday evening, an anonymous party used a Molalla Pioneer e-mail address to send an unauthorized message to hundreds of people in the Molalla community making allegations of mismanagement in the leadership of Molalla Communications Company.
The email, which led off with the statement “MCC board [...]

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Middle school bomb joke not so funny

Student quickly recants claim of bomb in duffel bag when police show up
By Abby SewellMolalla PioneerThe Molalla Police Department responded to a call at Molalla River Middle School at about 8:30 on Friday morning, after a 12-year-old male student made a joke about having a bomb in his duffel bag.
MPD Chief Jerry Giger said the [...]

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Three head coaches resign

By Tim LaneMolalla PioneerThree head coaches at Molalla High School resigned recently as the extensive time commitment prep sports requires became too much for them.
Tim Baker, the head football coach, Waldo Sotelo, the head girls soccer coach and Shelly Wetzell, the head volleyball coach all notified Molalla High School shortly before spring break.
Baker is a [...]

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Howdy, Mister!

Photo by Abby Sewell
Last Thursday and Friday, preschoolers from the Clackamas County Head Start program got a chance to tour the Molalla High School Land Lab. Land Lab manager Dennis Ettestad, above, introduced the little folks to farm animals like Mister the horse. “These young people will never forget this,” Ettestad said. “Some may live [...]

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Mulino considers forming hamlet

By David HowellMolalla PioneerA leading East Coast university has selected a Clackamas County program focused on giving rural residents a greater say over public services as one of the best government innovations of the year.
And the pioneering program could soon debut in Mulino.
The county Complete Communities’ Hamlet and Village Program has been named a semifinalist [...]

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Volunteers hit trails for Earth Day

RiverWatch volunteers to work on Molalla River Recreation Corridor Trail System
By Abby SewellMolalla PioneerNext Saturday’s Earth Day activities will be more than a walk in the park for dozens of volunteers who will lace up their work boots and head out to the Molalla River Recreation Corridor for a day of hard work in the [...]

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Country Christian student’s threat taken seriously

After evaluation, the 14-year-old boy was released to parents
By Abby SewellMolalla Pioneer
A 14-year-old male student at Country Christian School was picked up by the Clackamas County Sheriff’s Office and taken to the county’s juvenile department for questioning on Wednesday, after making a remark to a staff member that was construed as threatening.
CCSO Detective Jim Strovink [...]

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First Student bus drivers win union election

Molalla First Student bus drivers voted 25 to 11 today in favor of forming a union under the Oregon School Employees Association, according to school bus driver Lori Koos, one of the leaders of the union drive.
The bus drivers filed a petition with the National Labor Relations Board announcing their desire to unionize on March [...]

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Truck flips on Highway 213 Wednesday afternoon

By Abby SewellMolalla Pioneer
A 1998 Toyota Tacoma flipped after hitting a patch of hail on Highway 213 in Mulino Wednesday evening, at about 5:40 p.m.
Traffic was slowed for an hour while the vehicle was blocking the northbound lane. However, Vic Dunton of Mulino, the only occupant of the vehicle, was uninjured.“I hit a hail storm [...]

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Man escapes after police chase in Colton

By Abby SewellMolalla Pioneer
A motorcyclist led Clackamas County Sheriff’s Office deputies on a high speed chase ending in Colton on Sunday evening, before escaping into the woods.
A sheriff’s deputy first spotted the man in Estacada at 6:51 p.m., speeding through the intersection of South Springwater Road and South Spring Creek Road at 104 miles per [...]

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Molalla woman gave a lifetime of love

Donna Schmidt who drowned will be missed by many friends
By Abby SewellMolalla PioneerAt times, a police report can condense a whole lifetime into a few quick and dirty facts. So it was when the body of Donna Laverne Schmidt was discovered in the Molalla River on April 6.
The immediately available facts were limited to a [...]

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Woman found in Molalla River identified

Following a forensic autopsy, Oregon State Medical Examiners have identified the woman whose body was recovered from the Molalla River today as Donna Schmidt, 54, of Molalla.
The cause of death was determined to be drowning, but the circumstances are unknown. Clackamas County Sheriff’s Office Detective Jim Strovink said, however, that the case is not being [...]

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Update: body recovered

Clackamas County Sheriffs Office Marine dive team personnel recovered the body of an unidentified female from the Molalla River just before 11 a.m.
The body was transported to the Oregon State Medical Examiners office in Clackamas for a forensic examination to be conducted this afternoon.
Investigators are releasing no further information at this time.

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