FROM PAGE ONE
A6 — THE OBSERVER
TUESDAY, AUGUST 30, 2022
FISH
Continued from Page A1
Lemanski said ODFW began to get reports
from anglers soon after the July 26 release,
including one report from a Forest Service
employee who took photos of dead fi sh.
The dead trout were concentrated near the
boat ramp at the southeast corner of the lake
— which is where the hatchery truck dis-
gorges its load of rainbow trout.
Lemanski said it doesn’t appear that a large
number of fi sh were dead before they were
released, however, since there were no reports
of dead fi sh fl oating near the boat ramp during
or immediately after the release.
He suspects most of the fi sh died within a
day or less, based on the timing of the reports.
Lemanski encouraged anglers and others
who see more than a few dead fi sh in one area
to document the scene with photographs and
a tally of the fi sh, then report the incident to
ODFW by calling 541-963-2138.
MARKER
Continued from Page A1
Allen, who is in charge of the
marker Meeker installed in 1906
during a trip across the United
States promoting the Oregon Trail.
The marker’s time capsule space
was believed to have contents at
the time, according to a Meeker
journal entry.
However, it was barren when
it was opened this summer, on
June 23, at a public event attended
by about 150 people. Allen said
the marker reportedly had been
moved several times in the Walnut
Street neighborhood since 1906
because of building projects. He
said during the transfers the con-
tents of the time capsule may have
fallen out.
Allen said he is grateful for
Witty’s help in anchoring the
marker so it likely will not be
moved again.
“(Witty) did a wonderful job,”
Dozens of people congregate at
Anthony Lake during Labor Day
weekend 2020. The lake, in the Elkhorn
Mountains, is a popular fi shing spot.
Lisa Britton/Baker City Herald, File
he said.
Witty created the form for the
marker with six 60-pound bags
of concrete. The Cove resident
said he was delighted to extend a
helping hand.
“I’m excited about the oppor-
tunity to give back. It is all about
community,” he said.
The 2022 items now in the
time capsule include a $1 bill, an
Oregon Trail brochure, a silver
medallion of Ezra Meeker, a
copy of the Overland Journal, a
DEFENSE
Continued from Page A1
until a month ago — was the only
stable of attorneys from which
Union County Circuit Court has
drawn its public defenders for
more than 30 years.
When Boyd and other attor-
neys within the consortium
received their yearly contract
from OPDS, they hoped to nego-
tiate some of the terms, but were
unsuccessful. They agreed to
sign the contract but Singer, the
director of the OPDS, refused,
claiming they missed the deadline
— despite active negotiation con-
tinuing between OPDS and sev-
eral other nonprofi t and private
organizations, according to Boyd.
“It did not improve public
defense in Union County at all,”
he said. “In fact, it made our
system less effi cient.”
Without prior discussion, the
consortium members learned that
it would be under new adminis-
tration and was eff ectively dis-
solved. Three of the members
received contracts under the new
administration.
Boyd, after what he cited as
an unsuccessful attempt to fi nd
a new lawyer to replace him,
received an individual contract on
the evening of the last day of the
contract window.
“There was no benefi t to
public defense on this deal,” Boyd
asserted. “It was entirely to con-
trol us.”
Rob Harris, director of the
Washington County consor-
tium and president of the Oregon
Defense Consortium Associa-
tion, communicated with Singer
and urged the commission to sign
the contract so the attorneys in
the consortium could get back to
work. His recommendation was
not heeded.
Harris said he heard from
other consortiums around the
state expressing concern about the
contracts — specifi cally in regard
to travel expectations, apparent
pushes for full-time defense work,
and a new reporting system for
retained work. Yet he said that
Boyd’s group got caught in a
bigger picture change that Singer
wanted to make.
“Frankly, this was the most
diffi cult contracting process I’ve
been through in 30 years,” Harris
said. “It was very disruptive and
very diffi cult.”
Local implications
After OPDS dissolved the
Eastern Oregon Public Defenders,
The Observer, File
“We would’ve had families perhaps, parents in
those dependency hearings, parents whose parental
rights were at stake who didn’t have lawyers. That’s
like a mini constitutional crisis.”
— Union County Circuit Judge Thomas B. Powers, pictured presiding
over arraignments in the county courthouse in July 2021
the county was left without an
established, state-contracted con-
sortium to draw from. While the
contracts under the new admin-
istration were being fi nalized,
the county did not have a single
public defense lawyer in its judi-
cial district under contract with
OPDS.
“I’d never seen anything like
that,” said Union County Cir-
cuit Court Judge Thomas Powers.
“That was bad for the community,
it was bad for the families and
defendants, and it was bad for this
court’s ability to effi ciently run
the court system.”
During the fi rst two weeks of
July, Boyd and the dissolved con-
sortium’s attorneys volunteered
to accept appointments directly
from the court, and Powers began
assigning them cases on a non-
contract basis. Despite OPDS’s
inability to provide contracted
attorneys, Powers noted that the
court was able to cover all the
cases they needed to over the
course of several weeks. But the
consequences could have been
dire, he said.
“We would’ve had families
perhaps, parents in those depen-
dency hearings, parents whose
parental rights were at stake who
didn’t have lawyers,” Powers said.
“That’s like a mini constitutional
crisis.”
Powers said the contract issues
that arose from the changes
Singer instituted diverted local
attorneys away from their clients
and cases. Still, he credited the
attorneys and the court staff for
their continued eff orts.
“We’re fortunate that our local
providers stepped in to prevent
that from happening, and our
court staff was fl exible and adap-
tive and made sure we were able
to get coverage,” said Powers.
“But we dodged a crisis.”
Boyd said it will be important
to focus on how public defense is
structured and funded if the state
hopes to address the state’s lack
of defenders. He asserted that
Singer’s handling of the contract
negotiations only exacerbated
Oregon’s attorney shortage.
A troubled system
For Boyd, it wasn’t simply
Singer’s overhaul of the contract
system that made things chal-
lenging — it was also how Singer
handled the situation. And Boyd’s
sentiments seem to be echoed by
many. Singer spent almost eight
months as the director and gar-
nered a slew of mixed reviews
from commissioners, employees
quarterly publication of the Ore-
gon-California Trails Associa-
tion, plus items that are or recently
have been integral parts of our
daily lives, including two N95 face
masks, a COVID-19 home test kit
and an iPhone. All were placed
in the time capsule on June 30
with the help of Dale Counsell, of
Union County, and several other of
Allen’s friends.
Allen, with help from the Ore-
gon-California Trails Associa-
tion, which he is a member of, is
making arrangements to have the
time capsule sealed until 2122.
“We do not want it to be opened
for 100 years,” he said.
The stone marker is among at
least 35 Meeker set up along the
Oregon Trail during the three jour-
neys he made across the United
States to promote eff orts to pre-
serve the overland route. It was
one of three Meeker put up in
Union County. The two others
were installed at lower and upper
Ladd Canyon.
and Oregon Supreme Court Chief
Justice Martha Walters.
According to Oregon Public
Broadcast articles, many public
defenders admired Singer’s
“urgency, vision and willing-
ness to butt heads.” Although not
everyone shared this sentiment.
Per Ramfjord, the chair of the
Oregon Public Defense Services
Commission, recently fi led a
27-page complaint about Singer’s
conduct. In the memo, Ramfjord
cited the director’s “diffi cult and
unprofessional” conversation style
and provided examples of email
and message correspondence that
left him “disturbed” by both their
tone and content.
According to Ramfjord, he had
to cut one meeting in April short
because Singer became hostile to
Walters in a call.
“In my 38 years of legal prac-
tice, I have never seen a lawyer
engage in such a sustained, out-
rageous and unfounded outburst
against any other lawyer, much
less a judge,” Ramfjord wrote of
the encounter.
He concluded the memo by
emphasizing that his own expe-
riences had been corroborated by
other OPDS employees, legisla-
tors and stakeholders, and that he
did not believe Singer could eff ec-
tively perform his job.
Ramfjord’s sentiment, and the
echoes of others, contributed to
the culminating decision to fi re
Singer. On Aug. 10, commis-
sioners met to vote on Singer’s
position at the Offi ce of Public
Defense Services. The vote was
deadlocked at 4-4. Less than a
week later, citing her desire to
“provide the right leadership,”
Chief Justice Walters fi red the
entire commission.
“I never anticipated exercising
this authority, but this issue is
too important, and the need for
change is too urgent, to delay,”
she wrote in an article to the com-
mission on Aug. 15.
Walters then announced four
new commissioners and reap-
pointed fi ve previous members.
All but one of the reappointed
members had previously voted to
fi re Singer, according to Oregon
Public Broadcasting.
With a new commission in
place, the members elected to
remove Singer from his position
in a 6-2 vote with one member
absent.
Oregon Offi ce of Public Defense
Services will fi nd a new director
who will be the right fi t and will
bring things back on track.
“I’m very much supportive
of the chief justice’s decision to
reconstitute the Public Defense
Services Commission that over-
sees all of this,” the Circuit Court
judge said.
Powers noted that Singer’s
approach to public defense con-
tracts disrupted local services
more than the county had previ-
ously experienced, but the issues
the county is facing aren’t unique.
Counties around the state are
struggling to provide defendants
their constitutionally ensured
right. According to a class action
lawsuit fi led against the state
May 16 by plaintiff s claiming the
state failed to provide them with
court-appointed attorneys, around
500 indigent defendants across
Oregon are without counsel,
despite having been arraigned in
criminal court.
“Mr. Singer came into a very
challenging environment and it
just became apparent that either
between his experience or tem-
perament, (he) was not the right
fi t for the job,” Powers said.
Boyd asserted that if nothing
changes systemically, the state’s
understaffi ng will likely continue
to cause issues for Union and
Wallowa counties. He estimated
that local attorneys are likely to
hit case caps before the end of the
current year-long contract, which
ends June 30, 2023. If this does
occur, there will be no public
defense attorneys who can accept
cases by spring of next year,
as long as case numbers follow
projections.
“For the last two months, since
the beginning of this contract, our
case counts are higher than pro-
jections, meaning that may be
even worse if current case number
trends continue,” he said.
With the recent contract
changes and the dissolving of the
Eastern Oregon Public Defenders
consortium, Boyd posits that the
plight of underrepresented defen-
dants could become a local crisis
within the next year. He suggests
that this is a direct result of how
OPDS, under Singer’s direction,
handled public defense contracts.
Still, Boyd is hopeful Sing-
er’s fi ring will lead to positive
changes in the system.
“I am cautiously optimistic
that everyone can start focusing
on moving forward and dealing
with the crisis and improving
public defense statewide,” Boyd
said.
Reverberations in the Union
County courthouse
In the wake of Singer’s fi ring,
Powers said he agreed with what
unfolded and is confi dent the
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