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About The Observer. (La Grande, Or.) 1968-current | View Entire Issue (June 27, 2020)
LOCAL Saturday, June 27, 2020 POLICE Continued from Page 1A bills throughout Friday, including restricting the use of chokeholds, creating a statewide online data- base of discipline records and requiring officers to intervene and report a fellow officer engaged in misconduct. Summary of bills Here’s a summary of the police accountability bills as amended in committee, after about an hour of tes- timony Thursday and some on Tuesday, before the ses- sion started: •Arbitration: Senate Bill 1604 bars a labor arbi- trator from lessening the discipline against a police officer if the arbitrator con- cludes that misconduct is consistent with the finding of the agency that employed the officer. This bill passed the Senate in 2019 and is faced with using deadly force as defined by a 1971 law. The original bill would have Rasmussen banned such tech- Bowen Bell niques outright. 2020, but died without a •Officer duty to inter- vene and report: House vote in the House. Bill 4205, as amended, •Deadly force investi- gations: House Bill 4201, requires officers to inter- vene when they witness as amended, creates a joint misconduct, which includes legislative committee to “unjustified or excessive review how complaints force,” unless they cannot about police use of force are investigated, how inves- do it safely — and to report tigations into use of deadly such misconduct to a super- visor. The original bill force are conducted, and how independent reviews of would have required a state agency to adopt such rules. police use of force should •Database: House Bill be done. The amendment 4207 directs the Depart- substitutes for the orig- ment of Public Safety inal bill, which would have Standards and Training to transferred responsibility create a statewide data- for use-of-force investiga- tions from district attorneys base of disciplinary records of officers, and certifi- in Oregon’s 36 counties to cations, suspensions and the state attorney general. revocations. •Chokeholds: House •Use of tear gas: House Bill 4203, as amended, Bill 4208, as amended, bans chokeholds or similar techniques unless an officer restricts police from using tHe OBSerVer — 5A tear gas except to quell a riot. It also requires police to announce the use of tear gas, allow time for the crowd to disperse, and repeat the announcement before its use. The original bill would have banned the use of tear gas outright. Local law enforcement responses La Grande Police Chief Gary Bell said it is too soon to speculate and comment on any of the proposed reforms. “I have been monitoring the police reform discus- sion the Oregon Legislature will be considering and feel that the details in any adopted language will be important for meaningful reforms,” Bell said. “My hope is that any reforms will serve the public interest and aid us in our delivery of service to our community.” Union County Sheriff Boyd Rasmussen, who is up for reelection, said he supports the legislation that is backed by the Oregon State Sheriff’s Associa- tion. He said while officers can hold their individual beliefs, he believes most officers fall in line with his and the association’s thoughts. “I personally want citi- zens to feel safe with how our deputies perform and treat the public and of course how they handle any use of force situation,” Ras- mussen said. On House Bill 4201, Union County sheriff’s deputy Cody Bowen, who is a candidate for sheriff, said changing who inves- tigates cases of the use of force likely will not change the national situation. When it comes to choke- holds, Bowen said the actions of a few officers have cast a large shadow on police as a whole. SPORTS JOBS Continued from Page 1A Continued from Page 1A our youth,” the letter states. The county board in the letter urges Brown and her staff to act quickly in devel- oping guidelines that make it possible for young people to participate in sports. “We need swift and deci- sive action on this immedi- ately so our kids can begin to engage in their fall sports programs without delays,” the commissioners said. The board’s action is connected with the efforts of Let Them Play In Oregon, an online cam- paign to bring back youth athletics, which has been sidelined since mid-March when Brown issued a direc- tive closing all schools and shutting down many busi- Retail trade now has the third-most claims in the county with 111, down just four from April. Health care and social assistance, which in April had 146 claims, saw more than 35% of those individuals drop off the claims list and down to 94. The number of con- tinued claims being filed may be down, but that doesn’t appear to be an indicator the economy has improved, and the number of jobs being worked shows that. The hard-hit manufac- turing is an example of this. While the number of continued claims fell Observer file photo La Grande and McLoughlin meet in a boys basketball game earlier this year. The Union County commissioners voted 3-0 Wednesday to send a letter to Gov. Kate Brown asking her to include guidelines for allowing young people to participate in organized athletics in the updated version of her Phase 2 reopening plan. nesses. Let Them Play in Oregon was created June 5 and now has 25,981 mem- bers, according to its Face- book page, Let Them Play! Oregonians for Athletes. “Like any training tech- nique that officers are taught it can be done cor- rectly and effectively or done wrong and cause serious problems,” Bowen said. “That falls back on the character of the person, not the tool used.” Bowen also said he con- siders tear gas a “great tool when used correctly to deescalate certain sit- uations.” Although it can cause injury, he said, “that usually occurs when people refuse to follow lawful orders and disperse.” Law enforcement also should have the same rights as any citizen when it comes to criminal sen- tencing, Bowen said, including reduction or sen- tencing structure but no special treatment. ——— Peter Wong for the Oregon Capital Bureau and Observer reporter Sabrina Thompson contributed to this article. by close to 180 month- over-month from April to May, there also were 90 fewer people at work in the industry over that same time, and still down about 50% from the total in May of 1,310. Union County, which had an unemployment rate of 4.2% in March — middle of the pack for Eastern Oregon — has the highest now in Eastern Oregon and trails just Crook County, at 17.5%, for the high mark of any county east of the Cascades. Jef- ferson County also is at 17%. Lincoln County has the state’s highest rate at 23.9%, one of two coun- ties on the coast above 23% and one of five above 17%. Wet spring sprouts weeds that are driving controllers ‘nuts’ By Bill Bradshaw EO Media Group ENTERPRISE — For a one-man weed-control crew, Andy Marcum has a lot to do. As the manager of the Wallowa County Vege- tation Department, Mar- cum’s department keeps track of approximately 200,000 acres in the county and actually applies chemi- cals to about 2,000 of those acres. And right now, he’s at his peak season for eradi- cating noxious weeds. “June is nuts,” Marcum said. “We had such a wet spring, everything is coming out now.’ Noxious and inva- sive weeds are a partic- COVID Continued from Page 1A across the state with a pop- ulation of less than 1,000 at the 2010 Census. There are 191 combined cases statewide within those ZIP codes. The 28 cases in the report for the other six ZIP codes in the county would give each an average of about 4.67 cases. The three smaller ZIP codes in Union County likely are lower than that. The website oregon-demo- graphics.com lists 416 ZIP codes in the state. Based on that number and the data on the OHA report, there are roughly 140 ZIPs in the state with less than 1,000 people. Given they make up 191 of the cases in the state, that gives those areas an average of 1.36 cases per ZIP. Factor that in, and the other three cities in the county could be looking at about eight each, which would be above average. The statewide average for the 108 ZIPs on the report with “1-9” listed is 3.39 cases apiece. The reason for the seemingly obscure way the numbers are posted is spelled out in the report. “In order to protect patient privacy, ZIP codes with small populations or ular problem for farmers since they crowd out desir- able species and take nutri- ents from the soil and water the desirables need. The Oregon Department of Agriculture has more than 130 species on its noxious weeds list. There are eight noxious and invasive weeds that are of top priority for con- trol in the county and in the state: leafy spurge, common bugloss, spotted knapweed, meadow hawkweed, yellow flag iris, whitetop, musk thistle and welted thistle. “We are the home to the only population of welted thistle in the United States,” he said. “It was found by (rancher and county com- missioner) Todd Nash three years ago. We hope to have it eradicated in the next five years. A couple more weeds are not as prevalent, but they are present and Marcum wants to see they stay that way. He said there are only three sites in the Wal- lowa Valley where yellow small numbers of cases will be aggregated,” it states. “Cases from ZIP codes with less than 1,000 people will be reported as one number. ZIP codes that have fewer than 10 cases will be reported as ‘1–9.’” The 97850 ZIP code accounted for the fourth- highest total of cases in the state at the time the report was compiled, but has the highest number of cases per 10,000 residents of the ZIP codes for which the data is available (any with 10 or more cases) at 135.7 cases per 10,000. There were 118 ZIP codes listed with at least 10 cases, which made up 6,474 (91.4%) of the cases in the state. The report also gives an indicator of how many COVID-19 patients Grande Ronde Hospital has had during the outbreak, and while the data is vague like the case count, it does show the medical center hasn’t been overrun. Grande Ronde Hos- pital is in a list of 30 hos- pitals that, during the week of June 15-21, reported “1-9 COVID-19 patients,” which would indicate at the time of the report its well within the threshold of what the hospital can manage. As The Observer has previously reported, the hospital states it has the capacity to handle up to 25 patients, and can extend resources to handle 40 in an emergency situa- tion. Should Grande Ronde need it, its Pavilion also is set to take an additional 160 patients. Data on the OHA web- site, which also is vague about case numbers, shows as of Wednesday morning the number of Union County hospitalizations due to COVID-19 was “greater than 5.” Mardi Ford, spokes- person for the hospital, said Friday the total census of Grande Ronde’s patients in-house was 19. “That’s every admitted patient in family birthing center as well as surgical, medical and intensive,” she said. “Our average histor- ical daily census is around 13-14 (54%), so as you can see in the midst of a pan- demic, being at 76% of our 25-bed capacity for all patients is actually reas- suring. And if we need to do so, we are granted license in an emergency situation to nearly double that 25-bed capacity.” Ford added the hospital was handling the situation well. The Oregon Health Authority report did not have any data on the Union County outbreak, which health authorities have said has at least 236 cases con- nected to the Lighthouse Pentecostal Church in Island City. Since the data in the report was compiled, La GRANDE AUTO REPAIR 975-2000 www.lagrandeautorepair.com MOST ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY AVAILABLE Joe Horst ACDelcoTSS Photo by Bill Bradshaw/EO Media Group Andy Marcum, manager of the Wallowa County Vegeta- tion Department, sprays herbicide on Scotch thistle he found June 18 near Enterprise. PACIFIC NORTHWEST ALASKA, WASHINGTON, OREGON, IDAHO, MONTANA REACH 3 million Pacific Northwesterners with just One Call! n PNDC CLASSIFIED - Daily Newspapers 29 newspapers - 1,187,980 circulation Number of words: 25 l Extra word cost: $10 Cost: $540 (Runs 3 consecutive days including wkds.) n PNDN 2x2 DISPLAY - Daily Newspapers 27 newspapers - 1,016,864 circulation Size: 2x2 (3.25”x2”) Cost: 1x 2x2: $1,050 More info: Cecelia@cnpa.com or call (916) 288-6011 starthistle are found. They’re in Joseph Canyon and apparently migrated there from Washington state, he said. “I don’t want to see that spread,” Marcum said. Another problem weed is Scotch thistle. “That’s the really big nasty one that nobody likes having on their prop- erty,” Marcum said. “It’s everywhere.” The most prevalent weeds he works to eradicate are meadow hawkweed and Scotch thistle. But they’re all a problem. “It’s a huge economic hit to farmers, especially here in the valley where grain growers are,” Marcum said. “Spraying helps reduce the risk” to crops and of the weeds spreading. Although Marcum is the sole staff member of the Vegetation Department, he’s not entirely alone in his efforts to control weeds. He has funding to hire five contractors who take on specific projects through August. Marcum also gets assistance from Carl McFetridge, a mainte- nance worker with the Wal- lowa County Road Main- tenance Department, who controls weeds at the Wal- lowa County Fairgrounds in Enterprise and along the sides of county roads. The two are the only county employees who are licensed for weed control. the county has added 51 cases. The ZIP codes including Joseph, Enterprise and Wallowa each have “1-9” on the data. Lostine’s ZIP code is not listed, indi- cating it falls in the 191 cases in ZIP with less than 1,000 population. To date, Wallowa County has eight cases.
