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About Capital press. (Salem, OR) 19??-current | View Entire Issue (July 21, 2017)
FRIDAY, JULY 21, 2017 VOLUME 90, NUMBER 29 WWW.CAPITALPRESS.COM $2.00 Willamette Valley vineyards fund health care van for workers By ERIC MORTENSON Capital Press D TO OUR HEALTH Photos by Eric Mortenson/Capital Press Leda Garside takes a blood pressure reading on a worker at Stoller Vineyards during a mobile medical clinic stop at the vineyard July 6. Garside is a registered nurse and director of Tuality Healthcare’s ¡Salud! Services, which is primarily funded by the wine industry. Western migrant worker health Most commonly diagnosed non-communicable conditions* A 2014 study conducted by the National Center for Farmworker Health found that Western migrant workers had higher rates of hypertension, asthma and obesity than in other regions of the U.S. Rank/condition Percentage 1. Hypertension 19.5% 2. Diabetes mellitus 14.5 3. Overweight/obesity 12.6 4. Depression/other Jose Reyna, right, a physical therapy professor at Pacifi c University, talks with a White Rose Estate vineyard worker about his back pain. 4.4 5. Asthma 3.7 Source: National Center for Farmworker Health * Study includes 70 migrant health centers treating 574,687 patients. AYTON, Ore. — It’s 2 p.m., two hours short of quitting time, when the pickup trucks roll in from the vineyards. Workers, all Latino, hop down from the truck beds; 10, now two dozen, 44 in all. They take seats in the shade of the Stoller Vineyards maintenance shop, chatting, laughing, still wearing their fi eld garb: hats, hoods and head scarves to pro- tect from the sun, long sleeves despite the heat, many with pruning shears in holders on their belts. The green and white ¡Salud! Services van before them is a fa- miliar sight by now. It is from Tu- ality Healthcare, which operates hos- pitals and clinics west of Portland and for more than 25 years has brought ba- sic medical care to Willamette Valley vineyard workers. The van, staffed by bi-lingual nurses and medical assistants, provides blood pressure and cholesterol checks, vaccinations, treatment and referrals — about 5,000 patient visits annually. “¡Salud!” is like a toast in Spanish, meaning “cheers” or “good health.” Oregon vineyards recognize a broad- er translation, and it is the reason they pay for the mobile medical service. The industry raises an average of $700,000 annually — including a record $928,000 in 2016 — with a two-day auction of their best Pinot noir wines. The vintners’ broader interpretation of ¡Salud! is part of the van’s logo, which shows a kneeling worker tending a grapevine. It includes the slogan, “To Our Health,” because everyone in the industry benefi ts. Hand in hand Leda Garside, a registered nurse who manages ¡Salud! Services, is from Costa Rica and counts herself lucky. She came to the U.S. with an American husband, the proper papers and an edu- cation. Many of the patients she sees at the mobile clinic lack those advantages, yet they are the “backbone” of Oregon agriculture, she said. Alan Kenaga/Capital Press Turn to HEALTH, Page 12 Zinke: How monument’s boundaries were set remains mystery By MATUESZ PERKOWSKI Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument expansion Capital Press Area in detail Original monument boundary Newly expanded boundary Cascade JACKSON 99 140 KL AMATH Aspen Lake 5 Range Ashland 66 Ore. you Siski M . tns R th Calif. r CASCADE- SISKIYOU NAT’L MON. ive N 10 miles 5 Kl a m a Ore. Calif. Alan Kenaga/Capital Press While he’s prepared to accept the premise that the area’s fl ora and fau- na justify a monument designation, Zinke said the Cascade-Siskiyou’s boundaries seem arbitrary in some areas. So far, nobody at the Interior Depart- ment has taken responsibility for draw- ing the boundaries or explaining their placement, he said. It’s become clear the boundaries weren’t established at the direction of local U.S. Bureau of Land Management offi cials, Zinke said. “They had nearly no input in draw- ing the boundaries and that concerns me,” he said. Turn to ZINKE, Page 12 Labor tight but adequate for now; September could be tighter By DAN WHEAT Capital Press Halfway through Washing- ton’s cherry harvest, the labor supply seems adequate, grow- ers say. But there’s concern about early September, when har- vest workers are needed for apples, pears, grapes and hops — all at the same time. In California, Daniel Sumner, director of the Uni- versity of California Agricul- tural Issues Center at UC-Da- vis, says he thinks the labor shortage is worse than it was the last several years. “We have been hearing from growers in several loca- tions around the state that la- bor is harder to fi nd and wag- es are higher,” Sumner said. Growers and packers of la- bor-intensive crops through- out the West have been wor- ried about having enough seasonal workers because fewer people are illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border and a heightened fear of deportation by U.S. immi- gration authorities. Turn to LABOR, Page 12 Dan Wheat/Capital Press Enrique Ventura picks Rainier cherries in Doug Drescher’s Orondo, Wash., orchard on July 12. Growers are paying more and are worried about having enough pickers for the fall apple harvest. EVER WONDERED WHAT TO DO WITH THAT OLD, WORN OUT COMMODITY TRAILER? Our Rebin Program can turn your old trailer into a new trailer! We will remove all working mechanical parts, and replace the bin with a new Stainless Steel STC Bin on your existing running gear. All parts deemed reusable are reinstalled on the new bin. All of this at the fraction of the cost of a new trailer! WWW.STCTRAILERS.COM 494 W. Hwy 39 Blackfoot, ID 83321 208-785-1364 29-2/#17 Medford 238 MEDFORD, Ore. — Since undertak- ing a review of Oregon’s Cascade-Siskiy- ou National Monument, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke hasn’t gotten a satisfactory answer to a key question. “How were the boundaries made? Nobody knows how the boundaries were made,” Zinke said during a July 15 visit to the monument. The original 53,000-acre monument was created in 2000 but was increased to roughly 100,000 acres by the Obama ad- ministration last year. It’s now one of 27 national monuments created in the last two decades that are un- der review by the Trump administration. Zinke’s recommendation for potential changes to the Cascade Siskiyou’s mon- ument is due Aug. 23, after which any fi - nal decision will be in President Donald Trump’s hands. “He’s the best boss I’ve ever worked for. He doesn’t micromanage,” said Zin- ke. Unlike many national monuments, the Cascade-Siskiyou isn’t known for a par- ticular geological feature, but rather for its unique biodiversity. “Other monuments don’t have the same object,” said Zinke. Another particular trait of the Cas- cade-Siskiyou is the large amount of private land that’s enclosed within its boundaries, which can create access problems for landowners, he said.
