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Wednesday, March 25, 2020 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon
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Editorial…
Shoulder to shoulder, six feet apart
The battle against the spread of the
COVID-19 virus is testing Sisters9 resilience
as nothing has before. Wildfire, hard winters,
road closures, housing crises 4 we9ve weath-
ered them all, and yet none of them posed the
long-term challenges that the events of Spring
2020 present.
The Nugget remains committed to being
the voice of the Sisters community. We will
continue to provide accurate and reliable infor-
mation to the community via our print edition
and also through www.nuggetnews.com and
our Facebook page. Perhaps even more impor-
tantly, we will continue to paint the portrait of
our community as it strives to overcome these
hard times.
As a small, independent newspaper, these
times pose significant challenges to us as they
do to all of you. We rely on advertisers9 and
readers9 support, and we understand that those
sources of support are under significant pres-
sure and changing rapidly.
Readers of The Nugget can support us by
supporting our advertisers, as we will continue
to do in any way possible through and beyond
this crisis. Those readers who have signed
on with supporting subscriptions are valued
partners.
We9re all keeping our distance physically,
but we must still stand shoulder-to-shoulder,
and together we will weather this terrible
storm.
Jim Cornelius
Editor in Chief
Letters to the Editor…
The Nugget welcomes contributions from its readers, which must include the writer9s name, address and phone number. Letters
to the Editor is an open forum for the community and contains unsolicited opinions not necessarily shared by the Editor. The
Nugget reserves the right to edit, omit, respond or ask for a response to letters submitted to the Editor. Letters should be no
longer than 300 words. Unpublished items are not acknowledged or returned. The deadline for all letters is 10 a.m. Monday.
To the Editor:
In my very, very distant life I acquired my
nursing license. Nursing 101 taught us all to
wash our hands before seeing a patient, and
after visiting that patient. We also constantly
washed after handling charts, machines, and
stethoscope and sphygmomanometer were
cleaned even without touching patients. We
were also instructed and learned to wash our
medical/pharmacy keys after each visit with
soap and hot water.
HIV presented itself the second year of
my nursing career. I volunteered to work that
unit. We did not know at that time how it was
spread, or who was or wasn9t a carrier, or how
fatal it was. Many of those infected (blood test
verification) demonstrated very little signs or
symptoms. It was later tagged a <gay= disease,
but that soon changed with blood transfusion
cases. There really wasn9t much we could do
then but make patients comfortable. Some peo-
ple were concerned, and some weren9t. When
children began getting HIV, mostly from trans-
fusion or birth, people started to get <panicky,
= I see similar societal characteristics with the
current coronavirus.
I urge everyone, particularly the young, to
take this seriously. And I do urge people to
follow hygiene guidelines, and don9t forget to
add your keys to the wash list. As a nurse, keys
were washed at the same time as our hands. I
haven9t heard any medical person on the news
telling people to wash their keys, but I would
recommend it.
You can wash house and work keys with
soap and water. Sanitize the bob with a Clorox
wipe. I do this at least once a day. I think peo-
ple would be surprised the amount of dirt that
comes off those keys.
Stay healthy!
Bill Anttila
s
s
s
To the Editor:
I was at Bi-Mart and had just run in to grab
a couple of boxes of trash compactor bags.
Trying to balance them with my back brace on
was a challenge.
See LETTERS on page 4
Sisters Weather Forecast
Courtesy of the National Weather Service, Pendleton, Oregon
Wednesday
Thursday
Friday
Saturday
Sunday
Monday
Mostly Cloudy
Partly Cloudy
Cloudy
Mostly Cloudy
Mostly Cloudy
Partly Cloudy
44/26
47/30
49/34
53/36
55/36
62/37
The Nugget Newspaper, LLC
Website: www.nuggetnews.com
442 E. Main Ave., P.O. Box 698, Sisters, Oregon 97759
Tel: 541-549-9941 | Email: editor@nuggetnews.com
Postmaster: Send address changes to
The Nugget Newspaper,
P.O. Box 698, Sisters, OR 97759.
Third Class Postage Paid at Sisters, Oregon.
Editor in Chief: Jim Cornelius
Production Manager: Leith Easterling
Graphic Design: Jess Draper & Lisa May
Community Marketing Partners:
Vicki Curlett & Patti Jo Beal
Classifieds & Circulation: Kema Clark
Owner: J. Louis Mullen
The Nugget is mailed to residents within the Sisters School District; subscriptions are available outside delivery area.
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Resilient, together
By Mayor Chuck Ryan and
City Manager Cory Misley
We do not need to
begin by underscoring how
unprecedented and uncer-
tain of a time we are in. The
people at the City of Sisters
4 the Council members,
committee members, staff
4 empathize with the chal-
lenges and frustrations that
our community is dealing
with in a variety of ways. We
are doing what we can, while
acknowledging that we do
not have health experts or
emergency response manag-
ers on staff. Last week, the
City participated in count-
less meetings and conversa-
tions with all levels of pub-
lic partners 4 local special
districts, County, State, and
Federal 4 to coordinate and
align efforts.
The City has already
taken numerous steps to pro-
tect the health and welfare of
staff and community mem-
bers. We closed City Hall
to the public, canceled all
board and committee meet-
ings, and declared a state
of emergency providing
flexibility to respond more
quickly to a rapidly chang-
ing situation.
The state of emergency
declaration was not made to
cause alarm, in fact just the
opposite. It was a calm and
calculated decision based
on the information avail-
able and our responsibili-
ties at the forefront of our
minds. It allows us to take
many actions, and we do
not yet know whether or
to what extent they may be
needed. We will continue to
work with the best and most
timely information from
the most credible sources.
City Council members and
staff are in frequent com-
munication, and Council
meetings will continue via
teleconference.
This dynamic situation is
like building an airplane in
flight. There is no manual
for how to make every deci-
sion or address every con-
sequence. You, loved ones,
neighbors, and community
members are already or may
be impacted from a health
or economic perspective or
worse both. Instead of look-
ing to the past or future, we
must exercise courage and
vigilance in each moment.
This is truly a test of char-
acter individually and col-
lectively. Fortunately, as
evidenced in the recent
Sisters Country Vision work,
this community knows how
to band together to solve
problems and move forward.
The City is prioritizing
essential services that it is
solely responsible for: pri-
marily water and wastewater.
We see no cause for concern
regarding those services and
we have prepared contingen-
cies. Beyond those, we are
striving to maintain almost
all other services at normal
levels albeit in an adjusted
way. We were assured by the
Deschutes County Sheriff9s
Office that our law enforce-
ment will continue at cur-
rent levels. Although we
closed City Hall to the pub-
lic last week, staff that can
are telecommuting, working
on a staggered schedule, or
exercising social distancing
within City Hall.
City and county govern-
ments have been consulted
on some of the State9s
measures, while some we
have learned of through the
media. This is a changing
environment we are all sort-
ing through together each
day.
The messages last week
and continuing through the
weekend from community
members offering resources
or looking to help coordi-
nate efforts are inspiring and
a testament to the compas-
sion within Sisters Country.
We must be in this moment
for each other and work
collaboratively to provide
resources for those most in
need.
If you have questions,
resources, or just need
someone to talk to briefly,
please contact City Hall
at 541-323-5205 or www.
ci.sisters.or.us/contact. It
will take time for new pro-
grams and resources to be
organized. We are moni-
toring County, State, and
Federal actions along those
lines, and exploring what
we can do within our com-
munity with partners such as
Sisters Country Economic
Development and Sisters
Chamber of Commerce.
Although we will not have
all of the answers 3 we will
answer the call and do our
best to provide assistance.
The City website will
be updated frequently with
City, County, State, and
Federal information related
to the Coronavirus: www.
ci.sisters.or.us/coronavirus.
Opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the writer and
are not necessarily shared by the Editor or The Nugget Newspaper.