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Otter-ly missing

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25th March 2010

Rachel Beck

Gazette-Times, Corvallis, Oregon, USA

A downtown Corvallis resident is missing and cannot return without some help from the public: One of the two bronze river otters attached to a granite slab in Riverfront Commemorative Park’s Monroe Plaza has been stolen.

According to Lt. Tim Brewer of the Corvallis Police Department, a city parks employee reported the sculpture missing Monday. It was last seen by the department staff — definitively — about a month ago.

The “River Otters” display was installed in 2002. The sculpture was created by Oregon metal artist Pete Helzer.

Karen Emery, parks director for the City of Corvallis, said the two otters together are valued at $12,000.

“I’m just very disappointed — the department’s very disappointed — that the otter’s been stolen, and we hope that it’s returned,” Emery said.

The otter is about 2 feet high and was attached to the granite slab with mounting pegs and epoxy. The other otter, which is laying on the granite, is still there.

First-degree theft, which is the theft of an item worth more than $1,000, is a class C felony.

The otter is not the first sculpture in town to disappear.

In 2007, a bronze statue of Vulcan, the god of fire, was taken from the Delta Chi fraternity house. It later was found, and the perpetrator arrested, but a couple of young men tried to walk away with it last June before being stopped by a police officer.

Hester Coucke, the curator of The Arts Center near Central Park, said Corvallis has been lucky that its extensive displays of public art — which enliven even alleys and the walls of buildings — are not often vandalized or stolen.

Coucke said that one of the charming bronze squirrel statues that adorned a bench in front of the Arts Center building at 700 S.W. Madison Ave. was stolen about six years ago, and one of the fingers of the ballerina statue at the edge of Central Park was broken off, but the artist repaired it.

The loss of the otter is a particular loss to Corvallis’ children, she said Wednesday.

“Peter Helzer made the otters life-sized and placed them low, so that they’d be accessible for children. It’s extra sad, really.”

The Oregon Legislature has addressed metal thefts in recent years.

Senate Bill 570, which went into effect Jan. 1, tightened up requirements for scrap metal buyers in an attempt to crack down on thefts of everything from sculptures to copper wiring in homes. Among other provisions, the bill requires scrap metal businesses to report any metal suspected of having been stolen to law enforcement within 24 hours and prohibits the transport of most metal property on public roads without a permit.

Unlawful transport of metal property is a misdemeanor.

Brewer said investigators have been in contact with metal recycling companies as they try to track down the otter.

“We’d like to get it back, obviously,” Brewer said.

Anyone with information about the missing otter statue is asked to call Corvallis Police Department detectives at 541-766-6924.