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Lightning causes small fi res, 2A
Missing mountains, 1B
Weekend
Edition
SATURDAY-MONDAY • August 1, 2020
COVID-19
Oregon’s
case count
doubled
in July
Good day to our valued subscriber Allen Evans of La Grande
• $1.50
Schools go virtual
La Grande schools to
open Aug. 31 with
distance education only
By Dick Mason
The Observer
Children under age 10
added 466 cases, 10-19
year olds added 1,172
By Ronald Bond
The Observer
LA GRANDE — Union
County on Thursday, July 30,
was removed from the gover-
nor’s watch list, one of two coun-
ties along with Lincoln taken off
after seeing a drastic reduction
in cases following outbreaks in
June.
The move came on a day
when Union County saw an
eight-day run without new
COVID-19 cases end. The
Center for Human Development
reported one case Thursday and
two Friday, giving the county a
total of 388.
Union County’s slowdown
in cases is welcome news at the
end of a month where the total
number of cases in the state dou-
bled — again.
Oregon on Thursday passed
18,000 cases, and as of Friday
afternoon has 18,492, according
to the Oregon Health Authority.
That’s more than 9,500 cases in
the month of July.
At the end of June, there
were 8,931 cases. It’s the second
month in a row the number of
total cases has at least doubled.
For the month, Oregon has aver-
aged 318.7 new cases a day.
During the month of June,
younger Oregonians were more
likely — at a disproportionate
rate — to contract the disease,
and did so again in the month of
July.
Individuals from 20-29, who
account for 21.7% of all cases
in the state, saw their number
rise by 2,247 cases to 4,009 and
in July made up close to one-
fourth (23.5%) of all cases. That
demographic makes up the most
cases with 764 more than 30-39
year olds (3,245 cases), which
have had 1,680 cases during the
month.
People in the 30-39 range
accounted for 17.57% of all cases
in July, a mark just ahead of the
number of cases (17.55%) they
have made up for since the start
of the pandemic.
The 40-49 demographic
increased by 1,617 cases to
3,096, making up 16.9% of the
month’s total, just above the
amount of overall cases it has
See, Cases/Page 5A
LA GRANDE — La Grande School Dis-
trict students will start the 2020-21 school
year at home.
The district will launch the school year
Monday, Aug. 31, with all students attending
via its Comprehensive Distance Learning
program. This means students will be taking
classes online rather than at school because of
the coronavirus pandemic.
Students will take classes online via the
district’s Hybrid Model or its La Grande
Learning Academy, which provides online
education throughout the school year. Stu-
dents enrolled in the Hybrid Model will
receive online education via the district’s
Comprehensive Distance Education Learning
Program until schools can reopen for
in-person instruction.
La Grande School District Superinten-
dent George Mendoza said the district has
spent the summer focused on developing an
in-person instructional model that would
allow a full return to school based on state
social distancing and other rules. However,
he said, the new metrics for schools that Gov.
Kate Brown announced earlier this week
takes in-person classes off the table.
“This guidance puts our plans for
in-person learning on hold due to not meeting
current indicator requirements from the
Oregon School Health and Safety Metrics,”
Mendoza said in a letter to parents, guardians
and community members Thursday, July 30.
The superintendent said the hybrid mod-
el’s distance education will be more compre-
hensive than what the La Grande schools pro-
vided to students last spring. Mendoza said
students will be able to interact more with
their teachers in the new distance education
model.
“Students will have a daily connection to
ensure that they learn,” Mendoza said.
The superintendent said he wants to get
students in the Hybrid Model back into school
buildings soon.
Staff photo by Dick Mason
La Grande School District technology specialist Jeff Roberts examines one of the district’s
network closets Thursday, July 30, at Willow School, part of the district’s computer tech-
nology infrastructure. It will receive heavy use from its students when school starts Aug.
31 because all of the district’s students will take their classes via distance education.
“I didn’t get into education 30 years ago to teach
students over a computer, but that is the reality
and what we have to do.”
See, Schools/Page 5A
—Lance Dixon, North Powder School District superintendent
Videos offer virtual visits to tourist sites
By Jayson Jacoby
EO Media Group
BAKER CITY — The gadget
in Joe Hathaway’s hands looked
like it could be a prop from a
“Star Wars” movie except this
device, a sort of oversized pair of
goggles, actually worked.
When you snug its elastic
strap over your head, it can
put you in a speedboat zinging
across Phillips Reservoir, an
experience lacking only the cool
spray spattering your cheeks.
Or you can take a run through
fresh powder at Anthony Lakes
Ski Area. While wearing shorts
and a T-shirt instead of a heavy,
insulated parka.
The term for the technology is
“virtual reality,” said Hathaway,
communications coordinator for
Oregon Trail Electric Coopera-
tive. But the scenes are real. The
virtual part is that you’re not sit-
ting in the boat or grasping the
ski poles.
The device allows you to see
what the cameras saw when they
captured the images. You can
also tilt your head to experience
the same 360-degree view as if
you were actually there. You can
turn around and see the boat’s
wake. Or glance back and see
the cloud of snow still lingering
INDEX
Classified ..... 2B
Comics ......... 5B
Community . 3A
Crossword ... 2B
Photo by Jayson Jacoby/EO Media Group
Kate Reid, right, owner of the Royal Artisan gallery in Baker City,
watches a virtual reality video using a headset that allows users to
view the 3-D video in 360 degrees by moving their head. Lea Get-
tle, left, OTEC’s manager of administration and strategic services,
helped introduced Reid to the technology.
in the air — something not rec-
ommended when you’re actually
skiing toward actual trees.
This virtual reality experience
is part of OTEC’s effort to help
boost the economies of the four
counties where it supplies elec-
tricity — Baker, Union, Grant
and Harney.
OTEC, with fi nancial assis-
tance from motel room taxes
WEATHER
Dear Abby ... 6B
Horoscope ... 2B
Lottery.......... 2A
Obituaries .... 3A
TUESDAY
Opinion ........ 4A
Outdoors ..... 1B
Sports .......... 6A
Weather ....... 6B
from those counties and from
Travel Oregon, has produced a
series of videos that showcase
what each county offers to tour-
ists and to prospective residents
and business owners.
Another video touts the
region’s agriculture industry.
Although each video can be
viewed in 3-D with a compatible
headset, allowing for the real-
Full forecast on the back of B section
Tonight
Sunday
56 LOW
91/58
Clear and moonlit
Mostly sunny
CLASS-ACTION LAWSUIT
istic full-range view, 2-D ver-
sions of the videos are available
on OTEC’s website, www.eco-
nomicdevelopment.otec.coop
Hathaway said many visitors
centers and other tourism facil-
ities around the nation have 3-D
headsets, and OTEC will make
the videos available as widely as
possible.
“This is a really innovative
way for us to differentiate our-
selves from other rural commu-
nities,” said Lea Gettle, OTEC’s
manager of administration and
strategic services. “We want
to put our communities on a
pedestal.”
OTEC’s venture into virtual
reality started in early 2019 when
the cooperative, based in Baker
City, contracted to produce three
safety-related videos, including
one that shows how the coop-
erative’s crews and emergency
responders would deal with a sit-
uation in which a vehicle crashes
into a power pole.
Around the same time, OTEC
hired the Golden Shovel Agency,
a Minnesota company that con-
tracts with electric cooperatives
and other customers, to make
the videos for each county in
See, Virtual/Page 5A
CONTACT US
541-963-3161
Issue 91
2 sections, 12 pages
La Grande, Oregon
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to news@lagrande
observer.com.
More contact info
on Page 4A.
Online at lagrandeobserver.com