 My name is Donna Goldbutchano. I was mayor of Eagle Point in 1982 to 1984. I had come to Southern Oregon when I was a high schooler. I actually started off in Klamath Falls, followed my sister who was going to college at Oregon Institute of Technology. So at the time I was about 15, I went to my 11th grade year at Klamath Union High School and sometime during that course got a scholarship to go to Oregon Institute of Technology and they didn't care whether I had a high school diploma or not. So I was able to start college at OIT when I was 16. I was kind of a lost soul before that. I had been kind of in and out of my home, my family home, and I was on my own. I went into X-ray and moved to Portland for my externship and then returned to Southern Oregon to the Rogue Valley after a couple of years being in the city. So when I came to Southern Oregon, my first rental was out in Sam's Valley and when I decided to buy a home with my husband, we bought an Eagle Point. I got involved in politics. A few years after my move down, I had a girlfriend, Rebecca DeBoer, who decided she was going to run for state representative and she needed some help on her campaign. And that's what introduced me to politics and I absolutely enjoyed working on her campaign so much and then was so thrilled when she got elected. And I guess maybe she inspired me to so that you can do whatever you want to do if you just roll up your sleeves, get busy. So that's what I did. I first started my interest in politics by getting on the planning commission for Eagle Point. There wasn't a lot to do then as Eagle Point was a fairly small community. It was still fourth in size for the Rogue Valley but it only had 3,000 residents. So I worked on the planning commission, learned the people involved, had a lot of help. You know, we don't go through this life alone. We get where we get not only because of our own determination and our own efforts but because of those people that are around us that give us that helping hand when you need it. So I always felt like I had to get back. You know, I was scooped off the streets in a lot of ways and I was given an opportunity, you know, that put me in a place that I wouldn't probably have been had not somebody, many people reached out and given me a hand. And it was the same with Eagle Point. When I decided to run for mayor, in some ways it was on Elm Fluke. Nobody had signed up to run for mayor and I thought, I can do this. I can make a difference. This is something that I enjoy doing, that I can participate in, that I can give back. And I am a strong believer in that you need to give back to your community. That every citizen in the United States should give at least two years. That that should be the minimum that you give back to your community. So mayor turned out to be perfect. It was two-year term. I was going to give back what I needed to give back to my community to make my heart and my head feel whole. I guess it didn't work because I've been volunteering ever since. And so I have had a lifelong experience of feeling the joy that it is to give to others versus just taking from what this great country has to give us. So that's how I got involved in politics, ran against two other men. It was, you know, I was young, I was 26 I think at the time. I had been working in the medical profession for a while. So I, you know, I wasn't a dummy. I ran a good campaign. I had a great supporter and my husband at the time. And, you know, in some ways we won the election because you don't do it alone. So when I was elected mayor, Bob Moore was city administrator at the time. And shortly after I took office in January, Bob suffered a stroke. And so he decided that he wasn't going to come back to work afterwards. And so the first order of business was to find a new city administrator. We scoured and we found a young man who was recently out of college getting his degree in public administration, but he was not a newcomer to city administration. He had worked in many levels coming up through the ranks. And his name was Richard Box. And he was the best thing that happened to me as mayor. He had so many fabulous ideas. He was so enthusiastic. He was able to take a small little town of 3,000 people and see a bigger vision and to put us on course for what I think Eagle Point is today. He took our budget and totally revamped our budget and how we came up with the amount of monies that we were going to need in order to operate an efficient system. He took us from the horse and buggy days into the modern age. You know, just thinking about things and preparing the foundation for Eagle Point being a really fabulous little community like it is today. And I think a great deal of gratitude goes to him. I also had the support and encouragement from folks like Rose Draper that was our librarian and on the city council for years. She, I felt support from her and that was important. Stephanie Householder was also another lady that was a city councilor and went on to be mayor after my term. Takes a village. During my time as mayor, what did I do? Golly, I'm not sure that I in and of itself did anything. I think I presented an environment of inclusion, an environment of support, of creating the foundation, of being a, what's important to me as a responsive but incredibly fiscally conservative responsible government is what I believed in that we will establish the framework, the skeleton of the town in order for the business people and others to thrive and they provide the heart and the love and the community that it takes to make a town more than just brick and mortar. So I think that's hopefully what I contributed while I was mayor of Eagle Point. You were the first female mayor. Yeah. Isn't that great? Did that put you in an awkward situation in like the council of mayors or council of government or the old timers in the town? How did that work? I'm sure that there were those folks that didn't embrace me as much as I had hoped but and we did have some issues but I think they were handled appropriately and they don't stick out as being foremost in my mind. They were just little bumps in the road. We had a city council member that would come out to the house and drive by on his motorcycle and he'd see my husband working outside and he'd stop and he'd say, you know, you need to tell your wife to vote like this and my husband at the time who was absolutely fabulous would just look at him and say, I am not the mayor of this town and if you have an issue you need to go talk to Donna. You know, so it was handled and he soon, you know, quit driving by and giving advice to my husband on how he should manipulate me into voting certain ways or doing certain things. So, you know, it was handled. They had some not so nice nicknames for me that came right from the get go but I did what I had to do. You just do it one step at a time and it just takes determination and I do believe that you can do anything you want in this country if you're just willing to work for it. You know, you're always going to have adversity. Just move on past that. So don't remember any wildfires back then. You know, it's been such a different world over the last few years. Logging was primary at the time. I mean, our valley was full of mills. Everybody seemed to work in the mills or out in the forest but it was some way timber related. I can't give you a lot of information Ed's voice. You know, I was out there the other day and drove by and I saw the happy hundredth birthday Ed and I realized I've never stepped foot inside the place. It's like darn. You know, I better hurry. But Ed's Oasis was certainly the watering hole for the good old boys and those are the ones that had those not so favorable nicknames of me for me. So yeah, that wasn't what I'd call friendly territory so I never stepped inside Ed's Oasis. At the time, you know, downtown Eagle Point looked significantly different. We had the volunteer fire department that was right across from the city hall. City hall was where Bob Moore Park is now. As I recollect, Mrs. Lucas was still alive when I was mayor and her house sat on the corner where I believed the new fire station is and after I was out of office, they picked up her house and moved it over to where the old city hall was. So that big Victorian style house that is at the edge of Bob Moore Park is in the footprint of where the old city hall was and that I believe is Mrs. Lucas's house and then the new fire hall was built on her property. The library was right next to the city hall. So things were quite a bit different. Of course, no Walmart, no golf course, 3,000 people. We had just moved the covered bridge over the creek for a pedestrian bridge for the school kids. The senior center was something that was under the planning stages and then was constructed during my two years there and that is not anything I take credit for except that we made it as easy as possible for him to do it. Those were done by other groups that were all working together to try and bring Eagle Point into the fine little city that it is today. I loved Leon. I have a second cup. Leon gave me and I hold that dear too. It's an Eagle Point police cup that he had presented me with and Leon took me on my first and maybe my only right along with a policeman and it was night and I just remember being so tense through the entire ride along and we did get a call out on a domestic violence and Leon was fabulous like always and I just said, how do you do this every day not knowing what you're going to see, what you're going to get called out on, who's going to answer the door, how aggressive they're going to be, how do you deal with this Leon? I have huge respect for the folks in blue and the job that they have to do because I know I couldn't do it. It would just permeate through my entire soul and my entire life to have that stress on a day in, day out basis. But it was an excellent experience and that's one of the things, if nothing else, people should get involved in their city government because they get the opportunity to do fun things like ride alongs of the police and I remember being on a fire engine and seeing what the firefighters were doing at the time. We went out to the gun range and did some target practice, you know, seeing what all the other police officers were having to do in order to keep current. So I had a lot of experiences that I would not otherwise have been able to have. Excellent, excellent two years. You know, Bob Moore had the vision for the golf course way back then and it's like we were kind of shaking our head going, really, you know. But he had that vision and he spoke of it often, shared that vision with a lot of other people and clearly after my tenure, somebody picked up that mantle and pursued, you know, getting a golf course out there in Eagle Point, you know. And then once you add the large stores that provide, you know, services and goods for people out in there, I mean, it was just a natural at that point. I don't know. Right place, location, location. You know, at the time, we weren't much different in size than Gold Hill and yet Eagle Point had the foundation and the structure in place in which to grow into what it is today and Gold Hill is pretty much the same as it was the 40-odd years ago when I was mayor. So, you know, I believe that that foundation is important, that you have the infrastructure that's ready to accomplish that kind of growth that Eagle Point has experienced. Well, you also had 62. Right. Corridor to Crater Lake, you know, beautiful creek running right through town, the historic Grist Mill, all of those features that drew people into our area. It's a quick and easy commute into Medford and yet you still have that wonderful country feeling. So, all of that location factors just made it possible, you know, for it to be what it is. And I hope that it always retains that flavor of small hometown. You know, if you want to do a step back to the 50s, you know, if you want to feel that feeling that we all felt where we were safe and we were happy and, you know, kids are inner tubing down the creek and all that, go to a Fourth of July parade in Eagle Point. I mean, it's just the same. It's just fabulous. So, it's held on to that sense of community in many ways and I hope it continues to. So, in regards to your question about Council of Governments and those things and how, you know, at the time I was on the Rogue Valley Council of Governments for Eagle Point, I represented and then I was elected to the Executive Committee for that. So, I got to work with leaders throughout the valley and that was a wonderful learning experience and, again, those folks that have so much more knowledge than I had at the time that were happy to share, never felt like I was being put down or, you know, discarded. I always felt an integral part of the system. So, it was, I have no complaints about it. I did not feel the stress that maybe many women do feel as they're rising through the ranks. Never felt it. Maybe I was oblivious. Only where I had some folks helping me here, contractors putting in a retaining wall in my backyard and the gal that was working alongside her husband and she was just tough as nails and just this cute little thing and at the end of our week together she stopped and she says, I know you and I said, what do you mean you know me? You know, we had, of course, chatted and cabitzed throughout their time here and she says, I just want you to know I remember you. She said, I was in high school in Eagle Point when you got elected and that touched my heart. None of that, you go girl, because she was a force in and of herself and if there's any small way that I may have influenced one little girl to be a strong construction worker or to be the mayor of her town or to do something that somebody else told her she couldn't do because she was female, then I'll go to my grave happy. So, I'm sorry, I get emotional. You know, I haven't talked about this stuff in 40 years and it's like, it was never a big deal. It was just, it was just, you did it. You know, it was your responsibility to do it.