What Oregon towns/cities do you recommend working in and why?

Hi Fiona,
If you are looking for a 'safe', smaller city, family oriented, and with easy access to the forests and mountains, my top three choices would be: Eugene, Corvallis and Bend.

Eugene is a small, bike-friendly smaller city surrounded by forests, and just a short drive to the mountains. I find the housing prices heading to outrageous, but coming from Canada, perhaps they wouldn't seem as bad to you. We have two large hospitals here, both moving within the area and enlarging. It's a laid-back town with a lively cultural scene. Very little snow, lots of rain. Beautiful summers. Lots of hiking/biking trails, as well as the rivers. And friendly folks.

Corvallis is a smaller city - also home to a university. Prices are higher than in some other areas. Seems like a great place to me, but haven't lived there and really don't know that much about it. Lots of beautiful scenery and great hiking trails.

Bend is the up and coming community, that is growing by leaps and bounds. It is just east (across the mountain pass) from Eugene. Lots of snow, skiing etc. Much colder, but believe lots less rain than closer to the coast. Think housing prices are high there also.

Salem is the capital city. Small but very nice, and they have a lovely hospital.

There are many smaller communities on the coast. Newport is one of the larger communities with a nice hospital. I personally loved living on the coast, but of course, that makes it further to travel to the mountains.

Coos Bay/North Bend are lovely small communities on south central coast. Nice size hospital. May be a bit too small for you though, and not much really going on locally.

Going further down the state, there is the Grant's Pass/Medford area. Ashland is a quaint (but expensive) town that is a lot of fun to visit. Home of Southern Oregon University, and has lots of cultural events.

Hope this has been some help to you. Feel free to PM me if you'd like further information. And I'd love to hear where you decide on. It surely is a beautiful state!

Silverton is a small town with a beautiful hospital, fully represented and so well paid. It acts as the central medical center for surrounding rural areas. The coast is 1.5 hours away, the mountains 1 hour in the other direction.

Oregon has many towns that are a communtale distance to the bigger cities and towns and you can save money on housing and property by not being right in the heart of the city. I always recommend findyourspot.com (or findmyspot.com) great resource for you!

Southern Oregon is beautiful and also offers smaller towns and lots of outdoorsy things to do. I also like Eugene-

The Albany/Corvallis area fits your specifications, although housing costs are considerably higher in Corvallis than in Albany. Corvallis is bike-friendly to a fault, politically liberal, ecology-minded and tolerant of diversity; Albany is more blue-collar, but it's a nice small city with lots of beautiful old historic homes and some thriving industries, including health care with a 76-bed general hospital, three nursing homes and many health clinics, most of which are part of Samaritan Health Services, the biggest provider of health care in the mid-valley. Our winters are soggy and gray, but we usually have only one or two cold snaps, and even then the temps rarely dip below the teens; on the other hand, our summers are perfection itself, with daytime temps in the upper 70s-low 80s most of the time, and cool evenings that are good for sleeping.

I live in Portland and LOVE it. It's the largest city in Oregon along the Willamette and Columbia rivers, but houses are spendy these days. You'd probably want to live in a suburb like Beaverton/Hillsboro for example. There are several large hospitals as well as OHSU which is a large research/hospital institution. Mt. Hood is an hour away (for skiing in winter and hiking in summer). Portland is surrounded by miles and miles of hiking trails along the SW hills - called Forest Park. St. Helens isn't too far and you can see it from the city. Smith rock is a popular place for rock climbing. There is an ever growing art community here - you've got to check out First Thursday in the Pearl District - the art gallerys open their doors and you can drink wine and gawk at paintings! Lots of wonderful restaurants and activities in this city. And the beautiful Oregon coast is only 1.5 hour drive away!

Some hospitals are:

Providence Health Systems
Legacy Health Systems
Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU)

Good luck!

You'll love Oregon!

I live in SW Washington County, Aloha. I live in a brand new area. Housing prices are cheaper than nearer the city, we paid 195k for a 3 bedroom, 2-car garage house in 2004. Apartment rates are substantially cheaper too. Let's see, the area is well patrolled and safe, most of the families here have children (we don't). I live about 40 mins from downtown Portland in good traffic, can be as much as 1 1/2 hours at rush times, but I've sort of learned to tune it out.

LTCs in my area are ALWAYS hiring. As for psych, the hospitals prefer BSNs or ADNs with psych experience, but may be willing to train someone with Med/Surg, corrections, or youth-detention experience. Right now the Children's Farm Home in Corvallis needs nurses badly---they keep sending me recruiting letters, but I have zero interest in working with either teenagers or criminals, let alone the two combined---and they pay fairly decently. Good Samaritan Regional Medical Center also has a psych unit and they too are willing to train the right people; their pay and benefits are pretty much the best in this part of Oregon.