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About The Observer. (La Grande, Or.) 1968-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 3, 2020)
2A — THE OBSERVER D AILY P LANNER TODAY Today is Friday, Jan. 3, the third day of 2020. There are 363 days left in the year. TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT On Jan. 3, 2008, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama won Democratic caucuses in Iowa, while Mike Hucka- bee won the Republican caucuses. ON THIS DATE In 1833, Britain seized control of the Falkland Is- lands in the South Atlantic. In 1868, Japan’s Meiji Restoration re-established the authority of the emperor and heralded the fall of the military rulers known as shoguns; the upheaval paved the way for Japan’s drive toward becoming a modern power. In 1938, the March of Dimes campaign to fi ght polio was established by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who himself had been affl icted with the crippling disease. In 1961, President Dwight D. Eisenhower announced the United States was formally terminating diplomatic and consular relations with Cuba. In 1967, Jack Ruby, the man who shot and killed Lee Harvey Oswald, the ac- cused assassin of President John F. Kennedy, died in a Dallas hospital. In 1977, Apple Computer was incorporated in Cuper- tino, California, by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak and Mike Markkula Jr. In 1990, ousted Panama- nian leader Manuel Noriega surrendered to U.S. forces, 10 days after taking refuge in the Vatican’s diplomatic mission. In 2013, students from Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Con- necticut, reconvened at a dif- ferent building in the town of Monroe about three weeks after the massacre that had claimed the lives of 20 fi rst- graders and six educators. CORRECTION In the Jan. 1 article, “City drops ball on 2020” the cor- rect name for the building where the ball dropped is the Pheonix Building. LOTTERY Megabucks: $8.2 million 1-2-26-32-44-45 Mega Millions: $60 million 30-44-49-53-56-11-x3 Powerball: $237 million 49-53-57-59-62-26-x2 Win for Life: Jan. 1 10-53-66-76 Pick 4: Jan. 2 •1p.m.:7-4-2-2 •4p.m.:0-7-1-6 •7p.m.:2-1-3-6 •10p.m.:5-2-9-8 Pick 4: Jan. 1 •1p.m.:9-1-7-0 •4p.m.:9-5-8-6 •7p.m.:3-5-3-4 •10p.m.:5-4-7-8 NEWSPAPER LATE? Every effort is made to de- liver your Observer in a timely manner. Occasionally condi- tions exist that make delivery more diffi cult. If you are not on a motor route, delivery should be before5:30p.m.Ifyoudonot receiveyourpaperby5:30p.m. Monday through Friday, please call 541-963-3161 by 6 p.m. If your delivery is by motor carrier, delivery should be by 6 p.m. For calls after 6, please call 541-975- 1690, leave your name, address and phone number. Your paper will be delivered the next business day. QUOTE OF THE DAY “Not all who wander are lost.” — J.R.R. Tolkien, English author FRIDAY, JANUARY 3, 2020 LOCAL Bend police make 2 arrests Across the Outback ■ Baker County woman part of team that designed, built solar- powered car to compete in competition in Australia Submitted photo Sarah Spaugh of Baker County helped design and build Stanford Univer- sity’s solar-powered car that competed in an international competition last fall in Australia. By Brenna Visser behind schedule,” she said. They should have had the vehicle By Lisa Britton For EO Media Group fi nished and tested by the beginning of June 2019. But that month found the BAKER CITY — Sarah Spaugh’s team members working from 9 a.m. to story seems to end almost before it midnight in a rush to complete the car. starts. The team designs every part of the Her story about racing a solar- car. Some pieces they make on campus, powered car across the Australian while others are created by profes- Outback, anyway. sional machinists. “Our car did not, unfortunate- “It’s very much ground up,” ly, fi nish the race,” Spaugh said. Spaugh said. “Our battery caught on fi re — it Her team didn’t have much burned up on the side of the road chance to test their design be- in the middle of the Outback.” fore shipping the car to Austra- Spaugh, 23, grew up in lia in August. McEwen, near Sumpter. She has Spaugh And testing is crucial to any earned her bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from Stanford invention. “When you build something from University, and this month begins scratch, the fi rst time you take it out studying for her master’s degree in things will start breaking,” Spaugh electrical engineering. said. “It’s worth it, a trial by fi re.” Every two years a team from Creating the car, she said, allows Stanford enters a solar car in the students to put theories learned in class- Bridgestone World Solar Challenge in rooms to work on a real-world project. Australia. The event, according to its “The learning happens when you’re website, “is primarily a design com- designing, building, testing,” she said. petition to discover the world’s most She learned a lot about how cars effi cient electric car.” work. Spaugh joined her fi rst solar car “I had a decent idea of how it team in 2016 during her junior year worked in a gasoline car,” she said. at Palo Alto — halfway through the “This showed me how it works in an two-year cycle. electric car, down to the nitty-gritty.” “A full car is a two-year project,” she said. “You spend six months just on Heading Down Under aerodynamics.” That car raced in October 2017. She To compete in the race, Spaugh and was part of the tech crew. her teammates took a term off school. Spaugh’s more recent solar car She arrived in Australia on Aug. 28 to project ran from 2017 to the race in arrange transportation, food and other October 2019. This time she was on logistics of supporting a team through the leadership team. the middle of the continent. The competition has been a Stanford The rest of the team arrived Sept. tradition since the late 1980s. 4. They spent the remainder of that “It’s an established student club — month testing and tweaking their so- one of the more life-consuming clubs,” lar car while camping in the Outback. she said. Growing up in Eastern Oregon, One year ago Spaugh’s team of 22 Spaugh is no stranger to the outdoors. students created a timeline for fi nish- That wasn’t the case with some of her ing the car’s subsystems. teammates. “We’re notorious as a team for falling “You have people who had never camped in their lives,” she said. During testing the Stanford team traveled the race course in reverse, from Adelaide north to Darwin. The route is approximately 3,000 kilome- ters (1,864 miles). “It’s a big experience being there,” Spaugh said. “Getting the car function- ing, and fi xing it when it breaks down.” During tests the team recorded data to determine how much energy the car uses at various speeds. The goal, Spaugh said, was “to get the fastest time possible without run- ning out of battery.” On a fl at road with no wind, she estimates the Stanford car could go about 250 miles at 55 mph. The team had fi ve rental vehicles to haul supplies and one was outfi tted with antennae to collect data transmit- ted from the solar car. Although they’d struggled with a bug in the electrical system and issues with the motor controller, Spaugh said the car was working great as race day approached. The Challenge ran from Oct. 13 to Oct. 20. The route started in Darwin in the Northern Territory and traveled the Stuart Highway to Port Augusta, and then Highway 1 to fi nish in Ad- elaide in South Australia. The remote nature of inland Austra- lia requires careful planning for gas stops and food supplies. “There’s a stretch where you go a couple days without a grocery store,” Spaugh said. The battery fi re that ended the Stanford team’s race is still a bit of a mystery. The students know it was caused by a short circuit, but they will have to wait until the car returns in a few months to investigate. “Then we use it to teach the next generation of team how to solar car. Or how to not solar car,” Spaugh said with a smile. “A big thing in engineering is learning from your mistakes.” Oregon could get new Congressional seat ■ 2020 Census could yield sixth seat for the state By Jeff Mapes Numbers get bigger The new estimates show Oregon grew by 0.9% between July 1, 2018, and July 1, 2019, to a total population of 4,217,737. The state came close to gaining a sixth seat in 2010, and the state’s growth since then has been relatively strong. Oregon Public Broadcasting SALEM — As the nation heads into the 2020 Census, Oregon appears more likely than ever to gain a sixth congressional seat, according to new population estimates. The Census Bureau estimates released Monday show that Oregon’s popula- tion growth — while slowing in the past year — remains strong enough to put the state in line for another seat. “I think you’re probably looking good” to gain an additional seat, said Kimball Brace, president of Election Data Services of Virginia. His fi rm uses several differ- ent models to project how congressional seats may be apportioned, and he said all of them show a sixth seat for Oregon. However, he and other forecasters caution that some uncertainties remain. There’s been controversy over whether some immi- grant communities will be hesitant to participate in the 2020 Census given the Trump administration’s moves to crack down on illegal immigration. And a major natural disaster or big economic shock could also have a sudden impact on the ■ Human trafficking investigation leads to two arrests state’s population. Brace said California is on the verge of losing a congressional seat for the fi rst time in that state’s history, particularly if there’s an undercount among immigrants there. The new estimates show Oregon grew by 0.9% be- tween July 1, 2018, and July 1, 2019, to a total popula- tion of 4,217,737. The state came close to gaining a sixth seat in 2010, and the state’s growth since then has been relatively strong. Under current law, it’s the job of the Oregon Legislature and Gov. Kate Brown to redraw district lines for both Congress and for legislative seats. However, the Oregon League of Women Voters and several other groups want to put an initiative on the ballot next year that would turn the job over to an indepen- dent commission. Four of Oregon’s fi ve con- gressional seats are now held by Democrats. Both major po- litical parties have been look- ing at how they could draw the lines of a new district to maximize their chances of winning an additional seat. FAMILY OWNED EO Media Group BEND — Two people were arrested during a human traffi cking investigation in southeast Bend on Christ- mas Eve. Around 1:20 p.m. Dec. 24, Bend police pulled over a stolen 2009 silver Dodge Charger near the intersec- tion of Southeast Murphy and Southeast Country Club roads. Jennifer Marie Johnson, a 40-year-old Portland resi- dent, and Tyler John Charles Ford, a 29-year-old Gresham resident, were in the car along with a 15-year-old girl from Portland. Offi cers identifi ed the teen- age girl as a missing person out of the Portland area. Throughout the investiga- tion, offi cers believed the teenager was being groomed for work in the commercial sex trade. Heroin and methamphet- amine were seized from the vehicle, along with stolen and forged identifi cation docu- ments. Several of the recov- ered documents were linked to thefts in the Portland area. Johnson was jailed on suspicion of 10 counts each of identity theft, fi rst-degree forgery and criminal posses- sion of a forged instrument, and one count each of prosti- tution and unlawful posses- sion of methamphetamine. Ford was jailed on suspi- cion of unlawful possession of heroin and was found to be in violation of a restrain- ing order for being in contact with the 15-year-old juvenile female in the vehicle. Phone and Internet Discounts Available to CenturyLink Customers The Oregon Public Utility Commission designated CenturyLink as an Eligible Telecommunications Carrier within its service area for universal service purposes. CenturyLink’s basic local service rates for residential voice lines are $18.48-$19.48 per month and business services are $26.00-$30.00 per month. Specific rates will be provided upon request. CenturyLink participates in a government benefit program (Lifeline) to make residential telephone or broadband service more affordable to eligible low- income individuals and families. Eligible customers are those that meet eligibility standards as defined by the FCC and state commissions. Residents who live on federally recognized Tribal Lands may qualify for additional Tribal benefits if they participate in certain additional federal eligibility programs. The Lifeline discount is available for only one telephone or qualifying broadband service per household, which can be either a wireline or wireless service. Broadband speeds must be 20 Mbps download and 3 Mbps upload or faster to qualify. A household is defined for the purposes of the Lifeline program as any individual or group of individuals who live together at the same address and share income and expenses. Lifeline service is not transferable, and only eligible consumers may enroll in the program. Consumers who willfully make false statements in order to obtain Lifeline telephone or broadband service can be punished by fine or imprisonment and can be barred from the program. If you live in a CenturyLink service area, please call 1-855-954-6546 or visit centurylink.com/lifeline with questions or to request an application for the Lifeline program. 215 Elm Street La Grande (541) 963-5440 northwestfurnitureandmattress.com
