A4 The SpokeSman • TueSday, SepTember 27, 2022
LocalNews
Redmond store finds connections
between customers and their food
Schoolhouse Produce sells a
local bounty
BY NICK ROSENBERGER
Redmond Spokesman
Hanging on a wood beam at the
checkout counter, the telephone at
Schoolhouse Produce would ring once
a day when Dennis Slimkosky called in
his soup order.
About two months ago, the order
never came in, though store owner
Heidi Cook waited.
Starting with the tuna sandwich,
Slimkosky had quickly become a reg-
ular enamored with the grocery store’s
homemade soups. He loved them so
much, Cook said, he began to give cri-
tiques and suggest recipes and became
deeply ingrained in the comings and go-
ings of the small store.
“We were his third space,” Cook said,
referencing an article from The Atlantic
explaining that everyone needs a place
away from home and work to commune
with other people. Schoolhouse, a Red-
mond market that focuses on organic
produce, specialty foods and local in-
gredients, became that third space for
Slimkosky.
Eventually, however, his health deteri-
orated. About two months ago, his daily
order never came in and Cook learned
he had passed away — leaving behind a
Mexican street dog named Daisy. Cook
called his caregivers and adopted her.
“No one at Fred Meyer is going to
adopt your dog if you die,” Cook said.
“But he was such an integral part of our
lives.”
Slimkosky, like many others, had
found a home at Schoolhouse Produce.
A book, chockfull of names and their re-
quests, sits on the counter. Items line the
shelves, many of which come with per-
sonal stories.
One young customer named Travis,
Cook said, would come in solely for the
spiciest peppers they could find. Any
time a new one came in, they knew they
had to call him and let them know.
Another young customer, she said,
visits the store nearly every week to buy
his wife a bottle of sparkling rosé.
“It’s like the sweetest offering,” Cook
nick rosenberger/Spokesman
Heidi Cook stands in front of the produce section at Schoolhouse Produce at1430 SW Highland Ave in Redmond on Sept. 13.
nick rosenberger/Spokesman
Schoolhouse Produce can be found at 1430 SW Highland Ave in Redmond.
said. “He’s the only one who buys that
wine.”
Stories like that are what tie Cook to
the store and the customers to Cook.
When someone comes in asking about
food, she tries to have her own story
ready — in hopes of creating a connec-
tion and a good customer experience.
“To me, it’s creative. It’s like a painting
or something,” she said. “I’m just fasci-
nated by people and their experience
with food.”
This fascination comes in part from
a cooking show called the Frugal Gour-
met, which Cook watched in college.
The host would start the show by go-
ing to his local farmer’s market, then
prepare something with the items he
found and the ingredients in his larder
and pantry. Even though Cook is sure it
was staged, the fun and flexibility of the
work affected her.
“It was like jazz,” she said. “It was like
he was improvising.”
Stand in the store’s lime-green inte-
rior long enough and you can see Cook’s
own improvisation start to play as famil-
iar customers waltz in, whether its local
high schoolers asking about apples or
moms looking for lettuce.
“Sometimes people just want to talk
and food is a really good way to allow
that to happen,” Cook said. “I can tell
when someone is in here for another
reason other than shopping.”
“People come to hang out,” said Allen
Martin, an employee who has worked at
the store for more than three years.
Store employees know what a lot of
the customers prefer, Martin said, so they
can be more personable and help game-
plan a special meal, rather than being a
stocker like at some chain grocery stores.
Cook also owns the local salsa pro-
ducer Salsa De Wela. She originally sold
that salsa to Schoolhouse Produce, but
loved the store so much that she’d shop
and talk with the previous owner after
delivering her salsas. When she heard
the previous owner was looking to sell,
she said it felt like the perfect opportu-
nity to try on ownership.
Cook said the store’s central core is
its organic produce. Throughout the
summer, they focus on Central Ore-
gon-grown produce and try to support
local farmers.
“All of our carrots, all of our greens,
all of our root vegetables, the turnips,
the radishes, all of the kales, all of this is
local, Central Oregon grown organic,”
Cook said.
They also sell locally grass-fed lamb,
beef and pork and usually have farm
fresh eggs from local farmers.
“One of my farmers was just telling us
we’re their third-biggest client and we’re
not the third biggest client of anybody,”
she said. “We’re really excited about
that.”
And, as often as possible, scraps and
unsold produce go to customers to feed
their livestock
Many of the customers come in spe-
cifically for their lettuces, Cook said. She
said that may be because staff trim their
lettuces every morning. They won’t put
out anything they wouldn’t buy them-
selves, she said.
“If you wouldn’t give it as a present,
we shouldn’t sell it,” she said.
Many of the packaged products on
sale in the store are also local, including
items from Dry Canyon Salts, Prescott
Honey Farms, Holm Made Toffee and
Justy’s Jelly.
The store also has full lunch offerings
with smoothies, sandwiches, salads and
the daily homemade soups that Slim-
kosky loved so much.
█
Reporter: nrosenberger@redmondspokesman.
com
Mosaic Medical celebrates 20 years
BY SUZANNE ROIG
CO Media Group
Seventeen years ago, a preg-
nant Luz Monroy, of Redmond,
needed medical help.
An immigrant who only
spoke Spanish, Monroy also had
no health insurance.
But Mosaic Medical took
care of her. The Federally Qual-
ified Health Clinic found ways
to help her through her labor
and delivery. Later, it helped her
when she needed health care
for a gall bladder issue, and help
with managing her diabetes.
Monroy, an in-home, self em-
ployed child care provider, has
gone to the Redmond clinic for
ultrasounds and medical proce-
dures, COVID-19 tests and vac-
cinations.
Never once was she made
to feel like she was asking too
much when she couldn’t afford
to pay.
And everything is done in her
native language, Spanish, she
said through a Mosaic Medical
translator, Jason Villanueva.
“Everything is done in Span-
ish. The paperwork is in Span-
ish. The doctor speaks Spanish.
That has left an impression on
me,” Monroy said. “And there’s
always a translator available.”
It’s all in a day’s work at Mo-
saic, which began in the two
room Ochoco Community
Clinic in Prineville in 2002. To-
day, it’s grown into a 14-clinic,
three county community health
health center serving Medicaid
or uninsured patients by pro-
viding an ever growing range of
medical services to the commu-
nity. This year marks the non-
profit clinic’s 20th anniversary.
Scott Cooper, former Mosaic
board of director and now ex-
ecutive director of NeighborIm-
pact, said the community values
that started the health center are
the same ones present today:
Help people in need to maintain
Mosaic Medical
ryan brennecke/The bulletin
Megan Haase, family nurse practitioner and CEO of Mosaic Medical,
stands in front of the health center’s mobile clinic during a stop in down-
town Bend on Wednesday.
a healthy lifestyle.
From the beginning, Mosaic
has wanted to serve the immi-
grant community in Central
Oregon, Cooper said. It took
vision to create a Federally
Qualified Community Health
Center, which receives funding
from the Public Health Services
Act through the U.S. Health Re-
sources and Services Adminis-
tration. The designation allows
the health center to open in tra-
ditionally underserved commu-
nities and maintain a mission of
being the safety net.
As part of the designation,
Mosaic must re-assess its mis-
sion and determine if it’s meet-
ing the needs of the community,
Cooper said.
“Mosaic provides huge cov-
erage around our region with
services,” Cooper said. “Prior
to Mosaic, there was always
chronic conversations about the
unmet health needs of the com-
munity. Now we just send peo-
ple to Mosaic.
“It’s one of the gems of Cen-
tral Oregon.”
Mosaic’s primary principle
is to help everyone who comes
in the door, said Megan Haase,
Mosaic Medical CEO and fam-
ily nurse practitioner. Haase,
who was Mosaic’s second med-
ical provider in the Prineville
clinic, has worked her way up
the ranks and became the CEO
in 2010, leading the clinic’s ex-
pansion and team-based care
model.
Haase calls the approach bar-
rier busting. Everyone deserves
access to quality health care
that is affordable, and acces-
sible, she said. Over the years,
through outreach Mosaic has
formed relationships with hous-
ing groups, schools and mental
health centers. Those relation-
ships work together to break the
barriers, Haase said.
“There is such a need in
Prineville when we started and
the community wanted to re-
move the barriers,” Haase said.
“They were then and still are
committed to meeting the needs
that existed across Central Or-
egon.
“The impact we’re having on
families every single day are life
changing. To be a part of an or-
ganization like that is a job and
an honor.”
When patients can’t make
their way to a clinic, Mosaic
brings the clinic to them. One
of the services is housed in a RV
that goes to homeless camps to
help that segment of the com-
munity. Recently the clinic
mosaic medical, a feder-
ally qualified health center,
operates 14 clinics around
Central oregon including
four main health centers
in bend, madras, prineville
and redmond and 10 satel-
lite clinics that include five
school-based health centers
and one mobile unit. mo-
saic sites that include full
dental sites are in bend, ma-
dras and redmond. mosaic
also operates three retail
pharmacies in prineville,
madras and bend.
The following is a timeline
of key expansion events:
• 2002: opened its first fed-
erally qualified health cen-
ter clinic in prineville.
• 2005: opened a clinic in
bend.
• 2006: opened a clinic in
madras.
• 2012: opened a clinic in
redmond.
• 2020: opened first phar-
macy in prineville.
Source: Mosaic Medical
added dental and prescription
drugs, two areas that have a
high need in the community.
According to the nonprofit’s
tax documents, about half of
Mosaic patients in 2021 were
were on Medicaid, a quarter
on commercial insurance, 15%
were receiving Medicare and 10
percent were uninsured.
By being a Federally Quali-
fied Community Health Center,
Mosaic can serve everyone, re-
gardless of the ability to pay, said
Linda Hatch, a Mosaic Med-
ical family nurse practitioner
who became involved with the
founding of the clinic by reach-
ing out to Crook County com-
munity leaders.
That first year, Mosaic saw
700 patients. Last year it saw
27,000 patients.
In 2021, the year data are
most current, there were an es-
timated 19,200 people without
health insurance in Deschutes
and Crook counties, or about
7% of the population, accord-
ing to data from the American
Community Survey.
Providing access to a com-
munity’s uninsured or low in-
come plays a role in the econ-
omy, said Jake Procino, Oregon
Employment Department
workforce analyst, for the East
Cascade region. In general, ac-
cess to healthcare has positive
effects on the community be-
cause healthy workers are more
productive on the job and miss
fewer workdays.
“I never envisioned that we’d
be out there breaking down the
barriers to care,” said Hatch,
who still sees patients. “I stayed
with Mosaic because it’s about
helping people. We are here to
help people and meet them at
their level.
“I’ve been here so long that I
can see people making improve-
ments and getting better because
of the access to healthcare.”
Because the community
health nonprofit sees anyone,
regardless of the ability to pay,
groups like NeighborImpact
and the Latino Community As-
sociation work closely, often re-
ferring potential patients.
“Our federally qualified
health center, Mosaic Medical,
plays a huge role in ensuring ac-
cess to affordable healthcare for
many of our immigrant families
and others without health in-
surance,” said Brad Porterfield,
Latino Community Association
executive director. “They have a
significant number of staff and
doctors who speak Spanish and
who believe everyone deserves
quality medical care regardless
of their ability to pay for it.”
Homicide
suspect dies
by suicide
after search
for 7 hours
By SPOKESMAN STAFF
The suspect in a shoot-
ing death in Redmond shot
and killed himself after a
seven-hour police search on
Sunday.
Oregon State Police iden-
tified the victim as Trevit C.
Law, 45, of Redmond.
State police identified the
suspect yesterday as Skyler
R. Myers, 32, of Redmond.
Police responded to 5677
SW Young Avenue at about
8:30 a.m. Sunday. They
found Law, who had been
shot, and performed first aid,
but he died.
The Deschutes County
Sheriff’s Office, Bend Police
Department, Redmond Po-
lice Department and Oregon
State Police searched for My-
ers for seven hours, accord-
ing to a press release.
Police found him near
Gift Road and the Deschutes
Canal, and he shot himself.
Personnel took him to St.
Charles hospital, where he
was pronounced dead.
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