It’s funny, it’s entertaining, it features some pretty cool skateboarding. But it may not be the type of recognition that Philomath wants.
You see, David Gravette, a skateboarder who has developed a strong following on social media, stopped in Philomath and recorded a segment for his YouTube series, “The Worst Skatepark Ever.” The Bronson Speed Co. video went online last week and as of Friday afternoon, had over 256,000 views.
The video starts with Gravette taking a sip of a hot beverage.
“Feel that cold chill in the air?” he says. “That’s worst skate park season and we’ve got ourselves a ringer here at Philomath (incorrect pronunciation), Oregon. Just a classic mid-’90s gem of when there was no skate park companies; there was just people who tried to design habitats for the skateboarders to be enclosed in and you get stuff like this.”
Gravette was close on his estimate of when the skate park was built. It was actually about five years later with the facility opening during the summer of 2000.
Gravette then takes viewers through the obstacles. He started with the skate park’s center feature. “It’s supposed to be a pyramid, more of a wall,” he says. “Yeah, pretty miserable, pretty sharp looking. Sharp and scary.”
Gravette follows with some impressive skateboarding and camera work.
Despite the “worst skatepark label,” his comments weren’t all bad.
“This is a pretty cool obstacle,” he said, referring to a corner feature that resembles a quarter-pipe with a ledge. “It’s unique, I’ve never seen one of these at a skate park probably because once you go in here with any speed, you just go out here (motioning to off the end and into the grass) but it does look kind of fun to take some pumps around. No deck, so you’re going to have to keep your blunts on point.”
At one point in the video after completing a trick, Gravette high-fives a youngster.
Gravette also commented on the skate park’s “mini-ramp” — which he felt familiar with because it resembled one in his hometown skate park. The “star obstacle” for him, however, appeared to be a spot that I guess I would describe as a flatbox with a flatrail.
“You can’t complain about this,” he says. “This is beautiful right here — all sorts of options. A ‘slappy-man’s paradise,’ no need to ollie.”
He actually becomes frustrated at one point. If you watch the video, be warned that there are some F-bombs.
I found the video to be pretty entertaining and don’t see it as a slam on Philomath at all. It’s funny, the guy obviously has awesome skateboarding skills and it brings home the fact that Philomath has an outdated facility here in town.
Coincidentally, earlier this week the City Council approved a conceptual design and location for a new skate park. The mayor even mentioned the video during the council meeting. Nobody seemed upset, and in fact, someone suggested that it could be used as a fundraising tool as the city tries to come up with ways to pay for a new one.
“It’s a beautiful little spot they’ve got out here,” he said, looking around Philomath City Park. “Just an ugly ass skate park. Maybe if I walk around enough, it’ll get better.”
2. Above and beyond during ice storm
The ice storm that froze over Philomath earlier this month brought out the best in some folks. Sure, I stayed home hunkered down with my kids and did the best that I could through phone calls to report on what was happening. But there were people out there in that mess doing their best to try to keep things as safe as they could during a slippery stretch that seemed to go on forever.
At the City Council meeting early this week, Public Works employees Andrew Turner and Lige Weedman and Philomath Police Ofc. Jim Weikel were recognized for their exceptional service to the city in the midst of the worst ice storm we’ve seen in years.
City Manager Chris Workman issued a notice to employees on Tuesday, Jan. 16 — the day after a federal holiday — that all offices would be closed to the winter storm. Sheets of ice covered the roadways and tree limbs and power lines had come down.
“In response, the Public Works director Garry Black asked the city manager, “what if I have guys who want to work today?”
Workman’s first thought was that they’re crazy.
Still, Turner and Weedman clocked in and removed downed tree limbs from the streets, thawed out water meters, responded to property owners who had frozen pipes and helped with sanding of city streets.
“All of the crew worked really hard this week to bring it back but these two in particular stepped up, came up when they didn’t have to and really put the city in a good spot and made us proud,” Workman said.
Philomath Police Lt. David Gurski then spoke about how Weikel put the city above himself.
“Jim’s regularly scheduled shift was last Friday, right before the ice storm, and we work four 12s (hours) — four on and four off — and he came prepared to weather the storm, so to speak, with his adventure van and ended up spending six days in our parking lot and actually picked up another shift for another officer who wasn’t able to make it due to inclement weather,” Gurski said.
Turner, Weedman and Weigel each received certificates of appreciation from the city manager and mayor.
From my perspective, Philomath Fire and Rescue should be mentioned here for the work they did to respond to emergencies. There were bad falls on the ice for people that required medical attention and firefighters even put out a fire on the second floor of an apartment complex. And I also believe the school district folks deserve mention as they drove the streets in the very early morning hours trying to make determinations on whether or not to have school. That must’ve been an interesting experience in the predawn hours.
3. Take caution with self-cleaning ovens
Philomath Fire and Rescue had an interesting call this past week that involved a self-cleaning oven.
Here’s what happened. Just after 10 a.m. Thursday, a smoke detector in one of our community’s apartment complexes went off and the local fire department ended up being dispatched to the scene.
“The apartment was unoccupied and the oven was set to self-clean in preparation for a new tenant,” Public Information Officer Rich Saalsaa, who is also the deputy fire chief, reported in his weekly report to the media. “There was smoke to the floor on arrival. We turned off the oven and used a fan to ventilate the apartment.”
The response featured a fire engine crew of three and Saalsaa as a duty officer.
So, no fire but a bit of a scare. I’ve never really thought about this (because my wife does things like clean ovens, not me) but there should be caution exercised when completing this particular task.
Here are some tips from Saalsaa:
“Before setting a self-clean cycle on your oven, you should first remove all heavy debris from the oven before setting the cycle.
“The oven can reach temperatures of 800-900 degrees and while it will burn away the stuck-on food and grease, smoke can be produced that will set off the smoke detectors.
“The area should be well-ventilated and someone should be in attendance to ensure that a fire does not develop,” adding that pre-cleaning will lessen the possibility.
When things like this happen in the community, Saalsaa will often include educational tips for whatever happened on a particular call. In this case, it was a self-cleaning oven. And by the way, the person at the apartment complex that may have been involved with this incident should not feel all that bad. Heck, it could’ve happened to any number of people. (It’s certainly something I could see myself doing).
(Brad Fuqua is publisher/editor of the Philomath News. He can be reached at News@PhilomathNews.com).
