Editor's note: In my April 18 Three Things column, I mentioned that a Main Street building housing an acupuncture business appeared to be for sale. That was wrong — the owner has confirmed the building is not for sale, and the acupuncturist is not retiring or going anywhere. A correction was posted to the original column on May 2, but word travels faster than corrections, so I'm running this note here too. The News regrets the error.
Try to name something you’ve done for 30 straight years. Not a hobby. Not a relationship. A job. Same employer, same town, showing up.
That’s what Eric Nittka has done for the city of Philomath, and on Monday night the City Council took a moment to recognize the senior utility maintenance worker for hitting the three-decade mark. His anniversary date was May 13.
The numbers alone tell a story. When Public Works Operations Supervisor Garry Black started in 1999 — already six years into Nittka’s tenure — Philomath had about 2,200 residents. Today the city is pushing 6,000.
“That’s a lot of people, a lot of stuff has happened, a lot of development, a lot of building,” Black said.
And Nittka has had a hand in a good chunk of it.
Public Works Director Kevin Fear, who put his own 20 years with the city in perspective, called the milestone impressive. “I can’t imagine being in one job for 30 years,” he said.
Fear noted that Nittka steps up and runs the crew when Black is on vacation, and described him as “very knowledgeable on the city” — the kind of compliment that sounds modest until you think about everything tucked inside it. Streets, water, sewer, storm drains, parks, the stuff most of us only notice when something goes wrong.
Black put it more directly: “Eric is a jack of all trades, he’s a guy that I can put in any type of task and I know he’s going to get it done professionally. He’s the only guy on the crew that is … versed in all aspects of the city of Philomath’s public works department. That’s a tribute to him and his knowledge of how the city operates.”
City Councilor Rich Saalsaa, who first met Nittka when he moved to town 12 years ago, said he’s pretty much always smiling.
“You are like the epitome of a public service person,” Saalsaa told him, “and if there was a plaque about that, your face would be well prominent.”
Mayor Christopher McMorran joked that Nittka was on the job before he himself was born, then added: “We’ll look forward to another 30 years.”
Eric and his wife, Taira, stuck around for a photo with Fear, Black, the mayor and the city manager. Thirty years of quiet, steady work, recognized for a few minutes on a Monday night.
2. Quilt not required
Thursday was Special Person’s Day at Clemens Primary School, which meant I got to have lunch with my kindergartener, Jasper, in the cafeteria.
He had it together. Hot Italian sandwich. Cup of strawberries. Chocolate milk. The full balanced kindergarten power lunch. I rolled in with a burrito I’d microwaved at home and wrapped in aluminum foil to keep warm, a bag of stale chips and a Yoo-Hoo. Not my finest culinary showing, but in my defense, it traveled well.
I also brought a quilt. A whole quilt, tucked under my arm, because somewhere in the back of my head I had confused Special Person’s Day with the Teddy Bear Picnic — which, I am now fairly sure, is in the fall, and which actually does involve sitting outside on the grass. My first hint that I had miscalculated came when I noticed exactly zero other parents carrying anything to sit on. Cool.
I snapped a quick photo of the two of us on my phone. Toward the end of lunch a school staffer came over and offered to take one for us. Jasper, who is not what you would call a willing photographic subject, gave her the thumbs down. Direct feedback. She handled it like a pro.
From there we hit the book fair in the library, which, walking in, struck me as a bit of a madhouse — a word I use only in the Charlton-Heston-in-the-1968-Planet-of-the-Apes sense, because that movie permanently wired that line into my brain. We maneuvered through the crowd and Jasper landed on a book about snakes. Solid pick.
Then it was outside for what remained of recess. Jasper grabbed a trike and pedaled laps around the track that loops the playground equipment while I stood there and watched, grinning like a goof.
Forty minutes, all in. Lunch, book fair, recess. With a busy job and kids with their own busy lives, those forty-minute windows don’t come around as often as I’d like.
Afterward, I walked back to my car that was parked in the middle school lot — heavy quilt under my arm. Worth it.
3. Flags and remembrance
Memorial Day tends to get framed around three-day weekends, barbecues and the unofficial start of summer. The cemeteries get quieter billing. But two local events this month are worth putting on your radar if you’d like to spend a few minutes remembering what the holiday is actually about.
Close to home, volunteers will gather at Mount Union Cemetery in Philomath at 9 a.m. on Sunday, May 24, to place American flags at the graves of veterans. American Legion Post 11 in Corvallis donated 100 new flags for the occasion. If you want to help, that’s the time and place.
Over in Corvallis, Benton County is preparing for its own Memorial Day tradition at Crystal Lake Cemetery. Members of the Oregon National Guard will place U.S. flags on veterans’ graves there during a ceremony at 9 a.m. on Wednesday, May 20.
Crystal Lake is a historic pioneer cemetery with roots going back to 1860. Mount Union Cemetery in Philomath dates back to 1861. Generations of Benton County families are buried in both cemeteries, including veterans from conflicts stretching across the nation’s history.
There’s something quietly powerful about a row of small flags fluttering above headstones. No speeches required. Just a visible reminder, repeated grave by grave, that somebody served — and that somebody local still remembers.
(Brad Fuqua is publisher/editor of the Philomath News. He can be reached at News@PhilomathNews.com).
