THE BAKER COUNTY PRESS — 3
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 2017
Business / Agriculture
Melva’s Upholstery up for sale
BY SAMANTHA
O’CONNER
Tons Price Range Wtd Avg
Alfalfa/Orchard Mix Large Square Premium
10 140.00-140.00 140.00
Barley Large Square Good / Premium
100 115.00-115.00 115.00
Barley Straw / Utility
60 40.00-40.00 40.00
USDA Market News Service—AMS.USDA.gov
— Cattle Market Report —
Submitted Photo.
The interior of the business is stuffed with equipment and materials, ready to
use in this turnkey opportunity.
amazing and had her redo
all sorts of really neat old
furniture and she did a re-
ally good job.”
Butler moved to the
Sumpter Valley in 1990
and she worked in Baker
City at Safeway and
Marvin Wood Products.
Between working at
Safeway and Marvin Wood
Products, Butler worked at
Broadway Upholstery and
that is where she learned
some of the upholstery.
Long explained Butler
started the upholstery out
of her mother’s back shed
and she started with renew-
ing the seats in Long’s
Maverick as a gift.
“At first it was just kind
of a side job for her and
more and more people
wanted her to do their stuff
and she ultimately decided
it was time to go full time,”
explained Long. “At the
time, she was working at
Marvin’s Wood Products,
and she made the leap and
opened the shop down
further on Tenth Street and
we helped her.”
Melva’s Upholstery had
backed up orders that are
being referred to another
upholstery business in
town.
“There’s a guy, Dave,
he works out by A&D
Restoration, and took over
his father’s old upholstery
business and we’ve been
sending work his way,”
explained Long. “He’s just
starting out so it’s a smaller
operation but he does do
high quality work from
what we’ve heard. He’s
just not at a point where he
could take over a shop like
this.”
Christy explained that in
hiring, they usually put on
one or two extra people.
They also go through their
list of extra board mem-
bers, which is up to ten or
twelve individuals, and
make sure their cell phones
and information is current
and they are available.
They are called laborers
or lumbers, people that
transport cargo from truck
wrecks to other trailers.
They have transported
many different types of
cargo, such as apples, crab
meat, pizzas, and many
others.
In the winter, they have a
crew of four full-time, two
part-time, and ten extra
board people they can
bring in. They have around
21 company vehicles that
range from traffic control
vehicles, flagging trucks,
to heavy wreckers. They
have done up to 100 calls
in a 24-hour period and it
usually requires everything
they have and everyone
doing the job.
“In the two decades that
I’ve been providing service
for the state, my task is
keeping roads and lanes
open,” explained Christy.
“What we do is purely re-
actionary. By the time we
are clearing up roads, the
incident has already hap-
pened. ODOT’s mandate is
to prevent those incidents
from occurring. We work
closely with ODOT, I think
they do a superb job and
over the last 20 years that
I’ve seen, I’ve seen an
increasing number of com-
mercial vehicle accidents
and a lot of times multi
vehicle collision incidents
that close the freeway for
extended periods of time.
We never used to see these
issues twenty years ago. A
lot of the problems we are
having right now is speed
induced and lack of driver
education.
“There’s nothing anybody
can do to prevent poor
judgment on the part of
truck drivers and motorists.
There’s no way that you
can prevent accidents from
occurring if the people that
are making the accidents
happen aren’t educated
enough to keep themselves
out of an accident.”
Christy explained that it
wasn’t long ago they re-
sponded to a 17-car pile-up
ten or fifteen miles out of
town and it was induced by
poor driver ability, either
by driving too fast or too
close.
Last winter, Superior
Towing received 400 calls
in one day.
“There’s no way we can
respond to 400 calls, but
there’s 400 cries for help
and we can only service
just a small portion of that.
It’s just impossible to do
it all. All this is from poor
judgment from people
driving cars or people driv-
ing trucks,” said Christy.
Christy advises people
who are traveling in the
winter time to stay away
from trucks. If you have to
pass a truck, do it quickly
and get around them. He
explains that you do not
want to be around anybody
and trust their judgment.
Christy explained it is
important to be cautious
and drive slow, take your
time, try to drive during
the daylight, and be aware
that conditions change
rapidly. One of the biggest
risks in winter driving is
black ice.
“When you see snow on
Wednesday, November 8, 2017
Vale, Oregon
Cattle sold through the auction: 3,832
Steer Calves
300-400# Bulk 189.00-213.00 Top 217.50
400-500# Bulk 159.00-200.00 Top 201.00
500-600# Bulk 143.00-168.00 Top 169.00
Heifer Calves
300-400# Bulk 161.00-191.00 Top 200.00
400-500# Bulk 136.00-168.00 Top 169.00
500-600# Bulk 134.00-147.00 Top 147.50
Yearling Steers
600-700# Bulk 139.00-155.00 Top 156.00
700-800# Bulk 127.00-146.00 Top 147.00
800-900# Bulk 118.00-138.00 Top 139.00
900-1,000# Bulk N/A Top N/A
Yearling Heifers
600-700# Bulk 125.00-144.00 Top 146.50
700-800# Bulk 119.00-132.00 Top 134.00
800-900# Bulk 103.00-118.00 Top 120.00
900-1,000# Bulk N/A Top N/A
Prepping for winter
CONTINUED FROM
PAGE 1
Friday, November 10, 2017 — Eastern Oregon
Prices trended generally steady in a limited test.
Retail/Stable type hay remains the largest demanded
hay. Many hay producers have sold out for the
year. Recent showers and snow has hampered hay
movement.
Samantha@TheBakerCountyPress.com
Baker City’s well-known
10th Street business,
Melva’s Upholstery, is now
up for sale. Melva Butler
passed away October 12th
and her daughter, Jennifer
Long, is selling the uphol-
stery business.
Butler opened her
business in 2010, where
she refinished furniture,
automotive equipment,
redid the seats in the car
and the full interior of a
vehicle. She also refinished
equipment seats, couches,
and chairs. Long explained
that Butler could fix wood
damage as well.
Soon, the business was
booming with orders
stacked up.
Long explained that the
building is leased and, if
someone does not buy the
business, they will need to
move the equipment into
storage until they are able
to sell it.
“I would hope that they
could provide similar
quality, because that’s
what everybody went to
her for is the high quality
of work that she did and
good pricing,” said Long.
“Everybody just thought
the quality of work was
— Weekly Hay Report —
the ground, you know it’s
slick,” explained Christy.
“But there are other condi-
tions on the road that you
necessarily see, especially
at night. Black ice, or
pavement that looks to be
dry but it’s just a sheet of
ice, those kinds of things
get a lot of people to have
an accident because no-
body can differentiate the
dry pavement from black
ice. Unless you pull over,
get out, stand and with
your foot and see what the
condition of the road is, a
lot of times you can’t tell.”
SEE WINTER
PAGE 4
Thin Shelly Cows 49-59.00
Butcher Cows 59-67.00
Butcher Bulls 63-79.00
Stock Cows N/A
Younger Hfrts. 78.00-108.00
Stock Cows Young - N/A
ProducersLivestock.com
541-473-3136
— Log Price Report —
Prices are based on the majority of saw mills in
Northeastern Oregon and Central Idaho. The prices
listed below are a composite prices of various saw-
mills willing to visit with me about this topic.
Ponderosa Pine—small diameter class 8-11 inches
diameter class $250 per mbf. Only one sawmill was
willing to buy small diameter pine at this time.
Ponderosa Pine—medium diameter class 12-17
inches diameter class $300 to $350 per mbf
Ponderosa Pine-large diameter class 18 plus inches
diameter class $380 to $410 per mbf
The Pine prices are still approximately $40 per mbf
below average lumber/log market due to 2017 fire
salvage
Doug Fir & Western Larch—$380 to $420 per
mbf. Normal prices typically ranged between $425
to $475 per mbf.
White Fir-$300 per mbf. Normal prices typically
ranged between $340 to $360 per mbf.
Engelmann Spruce—$350 at one Idaho sawmill,
other sawmills including with White fir prices.
In general, the log prices still impacted from 2015
fire season and fire salvage that resulted. Sawmills
are starting to get log yard inventory in line with
sawmill production needs. With a new Administra-
tion as of 1/20/2017, a more normal economic envi-
ronment should result and hopefully a more healthy
housing situation will result in a better climate for
Northeast Oregon Sawmill and private forest land-
owners.
Courtesy of Arvid Andersen,
Andersen Forestry Consulting
— Precious Metals Report —
Price per ounce, USD
Gold: $1,282.10
Silver: $17.05
Platinum: $927.68
Palladium: $987.60
Bloomberg.com
— Ag Commodities —
Corn: $337.50/bu/USD
Wheat: $445.75/bu/USD
Soybeans: $967.50/bu/USD
Oats: $267.50 bu/USD
Rough Rice: $11.48/cwt/USD
Canola: $512.70 CAD/mwt
Live Cattle: $125.18//lb./USD
Feeder Cattle: $153.93/lb./USD
Lean Hogs: $67.50/lb./USD
Bloomberg.com