12 CapitalPress.com
July 3, 2015
Hundreds of residences and some hotels were evacuated
FIRE from Page 1
in there, including a new $10
million cherry line we just
completed a month ago,”
Gonsalves said.
Stemilt Growers Inc. sus-
tained major losses to its pear
and Rainier cherry packing
plant.
Northwest Wholesale Inc.,
at 1567 N. Wenatchee Ave., was
gutted, and nearby Michelsen
Packaging Co.’s stack of apple
trays and pads and pallets was
reduced to large mounds of
ash. Company president Dan
Beddeson estimated the loss at
$200,000.
All four businesses were
located in a triangular area bor-
dered by North Wenatchee Av-
enue, Hawley Street and Miller
Street. The wind apparently
blew embers over a wide por-
tion of town from Broadview
and Horse Lake Road downhill
and across North Wenatchee
Avenue to ignite the pallets,
pads and trays and then spread
the fire to the plants, said Mike
Burnett, chief of Chelan County
Fire District No. 1.
The Sleepy Hollow fire start-
ed about two miles northwest of
town near the Sleepy Hollow
Heights subdivision, Burnett
said. The fire was reported at
2:15 p.m. By 8 p.m. it had trav-
eled eastward along hillsides
south of the Wenatchee River
to reach Broadview and Horse
Lake Road.
Hundreds of residences and
some hotels at the north end of
town were evacuated and more
were under temporary evacua-
tion the next morning because
of an ammonia leak at one of
the burning warehouses, Moore
said.
“Wenatchee Fire Depart-
ment was spread pretty thin.
Tax relief available for fire victims
OLYMPIA — Businesses
in Wenatchee impacted by
the June 28 Sleepy Hollow
Fire can receive tax relief,
the state Department of Rev-
enue says.
Businesses may ask for:
more time to file and pay tax-
es; waiver of a late payment
penalty; extension on expiring
reseller permits, business li-
censes and registrations; and
rescheduling of audits.
Taxes are due on July
25 for businesses that report
monthly. Quarterly filers must
file and pay by July 31.
Individuals and businesses
that own property in declared
disaster areas may be eligible
for property tax relief. Proper-
They had no assets to prevent
our fire from taking off,” Gon-
salves said. “We waited until 11
p.m. for a response. It was too
much for the city to handle.”
Burnett estimated about 300
firefighters came from as far
away as Leavenworth, Tonas-
ket and Moses Lake. Fire trucks
and personnel arrived during the
night from Seattle, Bellevue and
South King County.
A couple of firefighters ex-
perienced some heat and smoke
issues but there were no injuries,
Burnett said.
It was still 90 degrees at
Wenatchee’s Pangborn Memo-
rial Airport at midnight after a
2:55 p.m. high of 108 degrees.
Burnett said the state Depart-
ment of Natural Resources will
investigate the cause.
The fire was 3,000 acres and
still growing in the hills west
of Wenatchee the afternoon of
Dan Wheat/Capital Press
The state is offering businesses in Wenatchee impacted by the
June 28 Sleepy Hollow Fire tax relief. The ash is the remains
of apple trays and pallets owned by Michelsen Packaging Co.
The gutted buidling is Northwest Wholesale Inc.
ty owners may visit Revenue’s
disaster relief page for links to
forms to file with county as-
sessors.
Businesses may request
June 29, Moore said. Skies were
clear of smoke over town the
morning of June 30. Firefight-
ers were working to tie fire lines
together in the hills on the west
and southern edges, said Rick
Scriven, a fire spokesman. Fire-
fighters were working with the
state Department of Ecology to
“tear walls apart” to get into the
Stemilt packing plant for final
containment there, he said.
The warehouse fires were
knocked down by 8 a.m. June
29 but were not under control,
said Glen Widener, a Wenatchee
Fire Department battalion chief.
“Stemilt lost a lot of cher-
ries,” he said.
Firefighters were still pour-
ing water on Stemilt’s Miller
Street plant. The roof was in
danger of caving in, Widener
said.
“We’re in a defensive
mode,” he said.
extensions or penalty waiv-
ers by sending secure emails
or calling the department at
1-800-647-7706.
— Dan Wheat
The fire at the Stemilt plant
burned through the next day,
making it impossible for com-
pany personnel to get inside and
assess damage to packing lines,
said Brianna Shales, compa-
ny spokesperson. The roof and
structure were damaged, she
said. The buildings and packing
lines are insured, she said.
The Stemilt plant is on the
west side of Miller Street. The
company’s red cherry plant, east
of the street, was not damaged,
Shales said.
“We will be fully operation-
al by Wednesday or Thursday
(July 1 or 2) morning, getting
help from our neighbors. It im-
pacts less than 2.5 percent of our
packing plan on cherries,” said
West Mathison, company pres-
ident.
The Rainier crop is about
done and Stemilt was down to
packing 10 to 20 tons per day
Dan Wheat/Capital Press
A helicopter fights the wildfire on a ridge at the north end of
Wenatchee, Wash., at 8:18 p.m. June 28. A dozen homes and
several agriculture-related businesses were lost to the fire.
compared to hundreds of tons
of red cherries elsewhere, said
Roger Pepperl, Stemilt mar-
keting director. The balance of
Rainiers will be packed else-
where and the workers will be
moved with them, he said.
Mathison declined to com-
ment on the fate of his home
in Broadview and those next
door of his vice president of
sales and marketing, Mike
Taylor, and Pepperl. Aeri-
al photos published by The
Wenatchee World newspaper
showed Mathison’s and Pep-
perl’s houses standing but
Taylor’s destroyed.
Gonsalves said Blue
Bird’s buildings and lines are
fully insured. The remaining
50 percent of the company’s
cherry crop yet to be picked,
packed and shipped will be
packed at Monson Fruit Co.
in Selah. Monson and Blue
Bird are co-owners of the
Washington Cherry Growers
packing company.
“We will get organized,
continue on harvest, get
ready for apples and pears
and strategize on rebuild-
ing,” Gonsalves said.
About 300 cherry packing
employees are displaced
and organic apple packers
will be in the fall, he said.
A representative North-
west Wholesale Inc., an
ag-chemical and orchard
equipment supplier, de-
clined to talk to the media.
Its warehouse was gutted.
The company also has of-
fices in Cashmere and
Tonasket.
Michelsen
Packaging
Co., 1105 Hawley St., lost
its trays, pads and pallets
but its building, rented
from Northwest Whole-
sale, was OK, Beddeson
said. The trays, pads and
pallets were insured and
will be replaced from the
company’s headquarters
plant in Yakima, he said.
The company makes apple
packing trays and other
packaging from recycled
paper. It also has facili-
ties in Auburn and Fresno,
Calif.
Latest order affects
16 water rights
held by 11 owners
SHUTOFF from Page 1
Eric Mortenson/Capital Press
Hospital cooks Ramiro Gonzalez, left, and Julieta Capuia fry tofu in four production kitchens at Oregon Health & Science University in Portland.
‘We want to buy everything regionally’
LOCAL from Page 1
rounds, 100 pounds of steaks
and 200 pounds of bones for
soup and broth.
Cory Carman, a fourth
generation cattle rancher,
said the relationship has been
“phenomenal.” OHSU ac-
counts for 20 to 25 percent of
the ranch’s annual sales and is
by far the ranch’s biggest ac-
count, she said. The business
would be “much smaller”
without OHSU’s consistent
demand for quality and quan-
tity.
She said producers pursu-
ing such relationships must
understand they require pa-
tience, collaboration and flex-
ibility on both ends.
“The biggest lesson is hav-
ing that anchor customer,”
Carman said.
Carman said OHSU ap-
proached her out of the blue
when it was looking for grass-
fed beef to serve the thou-
sands who are at “Pill Hill,”
as the campus overlooking
Portland is known, every day.
Complex system
Fernando Divina, OHSU’s
executive chef, said the com-
plex counts about 10,000 food
transactions a day at nine out-
lets within the facility, includ-
ing cafe and snack kiosk sales
and 1,200 meals delivered to
patients’ rooms. OHSU’s an-
nual budget for food and bev-
erages is about $5 million, and
the hospital made a conscious
decision to walk its health talk
by seeking out local produc-
ers, preferably organic.
“We want to buy every-
thing regionally, if possible,”
Divina said. “That’s our goal.”
It isn’t a simple process.
Scott Cochrane, OHSU’s
food purchasing agent, said
large institutions such as
schools often have tight bud-
gets. It’s often cheaper for
them to buy the volume they
need from large distributors.
To purchase in bulk locally
at a competitive price point,
institutions may have to ask
multiple growers to aggregate
their production.
“I know they all want to,
but there’s a point where they
can’t cut their own throat,”
Cochrane said. “There’s a lot
of willing participants on the
outside of the circle who can’t
get in.”
Eecole Copen, OHSU’s
sustainable foods program
coordinator, acknowledged it
takes more work to buy food
from smaller producers.
“You have to commit to
being OK with dealing with
multiple vendors,” she said.
“The whole system is based
on willingness.”
She and others refer to this
type of purchasing as a larger
version of Community Sup-
ported Agriculture, or CSA.
It’s ISA in this case: Institu-
tional Supported Agriculture.
Copen said the payoff is
a strengthened regional food
system.
“We need more farmers,”
she said. “That’s about food
security, growing the local
economy, jobs, income.”
OHSU’s first foray into the
local food scene was estab-
lishing a farmers’ market on
campus. It’s now in its ninth
year and serves as an incuba-
tor for growers who eventual-
ly reach the point where they
can sell wholesale to OHSU’s
food services department.
The idea isn’t just a Port-
land foodie thing. Good Shep-
herd Medical Center in Herm-
iston, about 180 miles east
of Portland, buys vegetables
from Finley’s Fresh Produce,
berries from another local
grower, and pork and chick-
en from suppliers across the
border in Washington. All
of the beef purchased by the
hospital is raised within 50
miles.
Nancy Gummer, Good
Shepherd’s nutrition services
and diabetes education direc-
tor, said she began buying lo-
cally about 10 years ago.
Gummer said she wanted
to quit buying meat from an-
imals treated with antibiotics
or raised in confined feeding
operations. It took 10 years
to find chicken she felt com-
fortable feeding hospital pa-
tients, staff and visitors.
In addition to buying lo-
cal, Gummer avoids purchas-
ing products that contain arti-
ficial colors, flavors or other
additives. Her food budget is
about $500,000 annually.
“We feel what you eat has
the biggest impact on your
health,” she said. “Food that’s
really healthy for humans is
going to be grown in health-
ier soil, and handled and pro-
cessed in a way that has less
impact on the environment.”
Gummer said.
Flexible partnerships
Increased
institutional
buying of locally grown and
processed food can reshape
the food system, said Aman-
da Oborne, vice president of
food and farms for Ecotrust
and the lead author of the “Ag
of the Middle” report.
Producer and buyer have
to make some adjustments,
however, Oborne said.
Institutions have to be
flexible enough to partner
with farmers and “take what
they’ve got when they’ve got
it” and pay promptly, she said.
They also should increase
their frozen storage space so
they can buy in bulk when
things are in season and use
them over time.
Farmers “have to be able to
think like a bigger operation,”
she said. They need proper
insurance coverage and must
comply with food safety reg-
ulations.
“Those are barriers for in-
stitutional buyers,” Oborne
said. “That liability related
stuff has to be in order.”
Institutions can’t afford
to have employees standing
around chopping, slicing and
dicing vegetables, she added,
and producers should look for
creative ways to provide some
of that minimal processing.
To fill big institutional or-
ders, farmers can coordinate
crop planning and combine
production with neighbors,
she said.
“This is a partnership and
we problem solve together,”
she said. “That’s the mindset
to bring to it.”
water board issued curtailment
notices June 26 for the city’s
four appropriative water rights
on the Tuolumne River dating
back to 1903, though the order
represents only a small portion
of San Francisco’s water sup-
ply.
The city’s rights were in-
cluded as the state curtailed
pre- and post-1914 appropria-
tive water rights on the upper
San Joaquin River as well as se-
nior rights on the Merced River
dating back to 1858.
The latest order affects 16
water rights held by 11 owners,
bringing the total number of
senior right holders to receive
shutoff notices to 297. No more
curtailment orders were im-
minent as of June 30, but that
could change quickly, water
board spokesman Tim Moran
said.
Workers in the board’s Di-
vision of Water Rights “are
analyzing water conditions
in watersheds throughout the
state, and when they determine
there is not enough water in a
stream or river to protect more
senior water rights, they issue
the curtailment notices,” Mo-
ran said in an email.
In all, 8,721 junior right
holders throughout the Sac-
ramento and San Joaquin val-
leys have been told there is
insufficient water to serve their
rights, according to the water
board.
“The need for further cur-
tailment of more senior rights
and curtailments in other wa-
tersheds is being assessed
weekly” by the water board,
the Almond Board of Califor-
nia advised growers in a news-
letter.
State officials said the wa-
ter board uses monthly diver-
sion data in each watershed to
determine availability as well
as daily natural flow data from
the Department of Water Re-
sources. As supplies continue
to decline through the summer,
more senior right holders will
be affected, the water board
cautioned.
The state issued its first
widespread curtailment orders
to senior right holders since
1977 on June 12, affecting 277
rights held by 114 right hold-
ers. As of last week, less than
one-third of the farmers, wa-
ter districts and communities
affected by the shutoffs had
met a deadline to confirm they
stopped pumping, the water
board reported.
The Banta-Carbona Ir-
rigation District in Tracy is
challenging the curtailment
order in court, arguing the
water board overstepped its
authority. The board’s chair,
Felicia Marcus, has said she
welcomes litigation to solve
longstanding questions over
the board’s powers, The Asso-
ciated Press reported.
State officials have main-
tained they have the author-
ity to restrict water use in a
drought under a state consti-
tutional amendment passed
by voters in 1928 requiring all
water use to be “reasonable
and beneficial.”
The water board issued two
letters earlier this year warning
all water right holders that wa-
ter may be unavailable to them
this year because of drought
conditions. Last year, the
board issued curtailment notic-
es to more than 5,000 diverters
in five watersheds, nearly all of
whom have junior rights.
In May, the board approved
a plan for senior right hold-
ers in the Delta to voluntarily
cut their water use by 25 per-
cent from 2013 levels to avoid
more drastic cuts later. In all,
229 applications from farmers
to participate in the plan were
received by a June 1 deadline.
Still, a consortium of mostly
urban water districts called the
State Water Contractors com-
plain that Delta farmers are di-
verting too much.
“These landowners in the
Delta have long-standing wa-
ter rights that entitle them to
water when nature provides it,
but those rights do not entitle
them to stored water paid for
by others and intended for the
environment,” said Stephanie
Morris, the State Water Con-
tractors’ acting general man-
ager.
“If nature ran its course,
the Delta (water) would not be
suitable for drinking or farming
this summer,” Morris said in a
statement.
The complaint drew a sharp
rebuke from Barbara Barrig-
an-Parilla, executive director of
Restore the Delta, who argued
the water contractors are only
concerned with having enough
water to export and are uncon-
cerned about the environment.