TUESDAY, MARCH 9, 2021
FAIR
Continued from Page 1A
Brazeau Red Hawk said
the board realizes there
is a chance the fair would
have to cancel again if
COVID-19 rates spike or
if the state tightens rules
regarding public events
because of the pandemic.
“The state will either
let us fl y or we cancel,”
Brazeau Red Hawk said.
The fair in 2020 went
online only, which allowed
youths in 4-H and FFA to
show their animals virtually
at the fairgrounds. It was
successful but did not come
close to replicating the fair
experience for the partici-
pants or the public.
“I hope we do not have
to do that again,” Brazeau
Red Hawk said.
The Union County Fair
Board now is inviting ven-
dors to register for the 2021
fair.
Brazeau Red Hawk is
optimistic that response
from vendors will be
strong. She noted that in
2020 about 90% of the
vendors the fair had in
2019 expressed interest in
signing up before the fair
was canceled.
The fair manager is not
sure if an amusement com-
pany will again provide car-
nival rides at the fair.
“I’ve contacted several
and they all said they will
THE OBSERVER — 5A
not make commitments
until April,” she said.
Brazeau Red Hawk
noted Cascade Amuse-
ments of Portland, which
provided rides for many
years including 2019, is no
longer operating because
the owners retired.
She said even if the fair
does not land an amusement
ride company, some carni-
val-type activities will con-
tinue, including the plastic
bubble ball station that
Frank’s Bubble Fun oper-
ates, which allows people to
roll around inside a big con-
tainer of plastic balls.
To meet social distancing
standards, if COVID-19
restrictions still remain in
place when the fair opens,
the fairgrounds may be
divided into sections and
the number of people who
could be in each at one time
limited. Restrictions on
how many people could go
into buildings also likely
would be in place.
Brazeau Red Hawk
said she is encouraged
that activity at the Union
County Fairgrounds is
picking up. She noted a
yard sale is set to be con-
ducted there in May, and
several birthday parties and
weddings are scheduled
several months from now.
“This means that more
people are beginning
to think that things
will be okay,” Brazeau
Red Hawk said.
Alex Wittwer/The Observer
The blue sky behind the Union County Fair sign Wednes-
day, March 4, 2021, hints at the coming of warm-weather
activities and events, including the fair, which will resume
this summer if it is safe to do so.
CLASSROOM
Continued from Page 1A
Gov. Kate Brown’s pro-
posed 2021-23 state budget
includes signifi cant funding
for the expansion of Head
Start in Oregon.
Early Head Start serves
children and infants up to
age 3. Regular Head Start
provides education to chil-
dren ages 4 and 5.
The Early Head Start
program would operate
fi ve days a week, year
round. Kleng said this will
provide an opportunity to
boost the cognitive devel-
opment of children at a
critical time.
“Eighty percent of brain
development occurs from
prenatal (before birth) to
age 3,” Kleng said.
The program will do
more than boost intellec-
tual development, as it also
will make daily life easier
for parents and guardians.
“It will give resi-
dents a chance to receive
child care while they are
working,” said Stan Steffey
of Community Develop-
ment Partners.
EOU Head Start has
centers in La Grande,
Elgin, Union and Baker
City. The organization’s
services are available at
no cost to qualifying fam-
ilies in Union and Baker
counties.
EOU Head Start has an
Early Head Start program,
but it is a home-based pro-
gram rather than operating
in a central location.
EOU Head Start staff
make regular visits to
families of children age
3 and younger. The pro-
gram teaches parents how
to best help with their
child’s development and
shows parents they are a
“child’s fi rst and important
teacher,” Kleng said.
He said families of chil-
dren already in the pro-
gram would be welcome
in the classroom at Timber
Ridge Apartments.
Contstruction at the
Timber Ridge Apartments
should begin in about four
months, Steffey said.
“We will get started
around mid-year,” he said.
He said the construc-
tion budget for the project
is being fi nalized. Once the
budget is in place, the pro-
cess of arranging for the
start of the work will pick
up quickly.
Construction of Timber
Ridge Apartments, which
will be owned by the
Northeast Oregon Housing
Authority, will take about
one and a half years,
Steffey said.
A portion of funding for
the construction of Timber
Ridge Apartments is comig
from the state’s Local
Innovation Fast Track pro-
gram, also known as LIFT.
The Oregon Legislature
approved this program
about two years ago and
it is providing funding for
affordable housing proj-
ects throughout Oregon.
The Timber Ridge project’s
general contractor is set to
be CB Construction of La
Grande.
La Grande Commu-
nity Development Director
Mike Boquist said the
city’s planning commission
will have to approve plans
before construction starts
in order to ensure
the project conforms
to the city’s codes.
RETURN
Continued from Page 1A
In neighboring Washington state,
Gov. Jay Inslee has implored educa-
tors to return to the classroom, but
most students there are in online
classes and the Seattle teachers’
union is defying a district plan to
return special education students to
schools. In Chicago, the teachers’
union agreed last month to return
to class with expanded access to
vaccinations and metrics that will
lead to school closures again if case
numbers spike.
Under the Oregon order, stu-
dents in K-5 must have an in-person
learning option by March 29. Stu-
dents in grades six through 12 must
have one by April 19. Students who
prefer to remain in online class are
to be given that option.
State education offi cials have
until March 19 to revise their
guidelines for in-person instruction
to help districts facilitate the return,
Brown said.
In a letter to the state Health
Authority, the governor said the
“science was clear” and that she
was “relieved” that she could bring
children back to class.
“I feel so much hope for Ore-
gon’s kids, their parents and their
schools, as we continue to navi-
gate this pandemic,” she said in the
letter. “Our kids are our future and
we need to do everything we can to
make up for the losses of 2020.”
Many parents reacted with
relief and said the past year had
been extremely diffi cult for their
children.
“It’s very positive and defi n-
itively a step in the right direc-
tion — and frankly, it’s about time.
Clearly, it’s been hard for districts
to fi gure out what’s going to be best
for their students, and it’s taken a
long time,” said Katie Chrisman,
who has a child each in elemen-
tary school, middle school and high
school in the Portland suburbs.
Her children “haven’t had a ton
of suffering, but they’re defi nitely
not thriving — and for me, that’s
been the biggest concern,” she said.
Other parents, as well as some
state GOP lawmakers, said more
was needed.
Rene Gonzalez, with a parent
group called Ed300 that has called
for a return to full-time in-person
learning fi ve days a week, said
teachers’ unions have been infl ex-
ible and the state education and
health offi cials had set up “insur-
mountable barriers” for a return to
classrooms for too long.
“We will not rest until every
Oregon child has access to fi ve-
days-a-week, full time in-person
school; until children’s co-curric-
SNOWPACK
Continued from Page 1A
Nathan Petrucci saw
blatant evidence of the
month’s achievements
fi rsthand.
Petrucci, a deputy
watermaster for Baker
County, wallowed through
freshly fallen powder
recently with another
deputy watermaster, Luke
Albert.
The pair’s destination
was a meadow just east of
Anthony Lake, in the Elk-
horn Mountains about 35
miles northwest of Baker
City.
This is one of Oregon’s
oldest snow survey sites
— crews have trudged
into the meadow every
winter since 1936 to
sample the snow, a key
element in estimating the
coming summer’s water
supply.
Petrucci, who also was
a member of the group
that measured snow in the
meadow in late January,
said the scene “was quite a
bit different.”
The snow was almost
twice as deep — 89 inches
compared with 45 inches a
month earlier.
“It was nice to see,”
Petrucci said in an inter-
view on Thursday, March
4.
Although the depth
increase was impressive, a
different statistic — snow
Alex Wittwer/The Observer
A student at La Grande Middle School walks toward a bus after school on
Tuesday, Feb. 23, 2021. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown has said she will order all
K-12 public schools to provide in-person learning by April.
ular activities and community life
fully return; and until libraries
across the state (have) reopened,”
he said in a videotaped statement.
Data tallied by the state Depart-
ment of Education show about
20% of Oregon’s public schools
are already operating with full-
time on-site learning, mostly in
rural areas with fewer students in
the eastern and central parts of the
state. Another 23% are offering
hybrid learning, and 56% currently
have almost all distance learning,
with limited in-person instruction
for students with extra needs.
Rylee Ahnen, spokesperson
for the Oregon Education Asso-
ciation, the state’s largest public
school employees union, said in
a statement that teachers support
returning to the classroom if it can
be done safely.
The union understands the frus-
trations of both school districts
and parents, he said, as everyone
navigates how to return to class.
He added that most districts were
already planning to resume some
sort of in-person learning in the
coming weeks.
“We hear, understand, and
share the frustration expressed by
many in our communities about
the uncertainty this pandemic has
caused for our public education
system,” he said.
The union represents 44,000
K-12 teachers across Oregon.
Oregon started vaccinating
teachers in late January ahead of
seniors, but the state health depart-
ment can’t say for sure how many
educators have been vaccinated
because it does not track the profes-
sion of recipients.
The union also could not say
what percentage of teachers have
water content — is the
one that matters most in
gauging snowpack.
Water content, as the
term implies, measures
the amount of water that
will trickle away when the
snow melts this spring and
summer.
In that respect Febru-
ary’s feat wasn’t quite as
noteworthy. The water con-
tent rose from 13 inches
at the start of February to
22.6 inches at the end.
But that’s still a sig-
nifi cant jump. The water
content was 18% below
average when February
began, but it was 32%
above average when the
month ended.
Although the onslaught
of storms that distin-
guished February dissi-
pated with the arrival of
March, Petrucci said this
week’s mainly sunny and
milder weather potentially
can have a benefi t for the
summer water supply. The
daily cycle, with the snow
surface thawing during
the day and refreezing at
night, creates ice layers.
Those layers will slow the
melting of the snowpack
this spring, Petrucci said.
“We like it to ice up,”
he said.
Lohmann warned
higher than average snow-
pack means there is a
slightly above average risk
of fl ooding from the spring
snowmelt. Water supply
forecasts at this time show
received the vaccine.
Brown said all but six coun-
ties in the state currently meet or
exceed the advisory metrics for a
return to in-person, hybrid learning
for all grade levels. Five of the
counties that do not yet meet the
guidelines for all grade levels make
the cut-off for a return to elemen-
tary school.
After the dates announced by
Brown, all public schools in Oregon
will operate either on a full-day of
in-person school or a hybrid model,
in which students spend parts of
the day or some days each week
in a classroom setting and other
parts of the day or week online.
The approach that districts choose
will be dictated by COVID-19 case
numbers in their county and local
decision-making, offi cials said.
Portland Public Schools, the
state’s largest district with 49,000
students in 81 schools, was already
planning to bring elementary stu-
dents back in April. It’s unclear
whether Brown’s order will affect
that timeline.
The Salem-Keizer School Dis-
trict, the state’s second-largest after
Portland, announced Friday that it
would welcome middle and high
school students back to a hybrid
model that combines in-person
learning and distance learning
starting April 13.
Elementary students in the dis-
trict have already been back in
class on a hybrid model.
Elsewhere, California’s governor
on Friday signed a law aiming to
return public school students to
classrooms. It offers $2 billion to
school districts that reopen physical
classrooms by the end of March.
— Observer reporter Dick Mason
contributed to this article.
— Observer
multimedia journalist
Alex Wittwer contributed
to this report.
amounts from 100-120%
of normal for streamfl ows
for the April through Sep-
tember period.
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