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About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 1, 2015)
Page 6A OFF PAGE ONE East Oregonian Thursday, January 1, 2015 TOP 10 STORIES OF 2014 Continued from 1A 6 Barreto defeats Turner. John Turner had the blessing and the endorse- ment of retiring District 58 state senator Bob Jenson. But it was not enough to hold off Union County outsider Greg Barreto, who easily won the Republican primary in May and the general election in November. Barreto, a Cove businessman who has never held free-market, constitutional princi- ples to the next legislative session in Salem. He marks the end of a decades-long run of the Pendleton area being the seat of power in District 58. 7 Craigen sentenced. George West Craigen was sentenced Oct. 7 to 27 years to life in prison for the 2011 murder of Cecil “Rob” Carter in Milton-Freewater. A week earlier, jurors deliberated Staff photos by E.J. Harris No. 6 Republican candidate John Turner, center, reacts to the Umatilla County election results in his race against Greg Barreto in the Repub- lican primary for House District 58 last May in Pendleton. Turner lost to Barreto by a two-to-one margin in the Republican primary. County in nearly a decade. EOTEC breaks ground. envisioned a new fair and rodeo grounds outside of Hermiston, that dream became a reality on Dec. 4 at the ground- breaking of the Eastern Oregon Trade and Event Center. The start to construction came after the EOTEC authority board unveiled detailed plans in April, letting exactly what they were getting for events starting in 2016, leaving the old fairgrounds in the center of town as room for the rapid- ly-growing Hermiston School District to expand. 9 Craigen guilty of shooting and killing Carter, despite arguments by Craigen’s attorneys that he suffered delusions and was insane at the time of the murder. The trial, which started Sept. 15, was 8 Staff photo by E.J. Harris No. 10 An excavator tears down a wall on a century-old farmhouse overlooking the 5,000-gallon diesel spill cleanup site last April off Highway 37 north of Pendleton. Staff photos by E.J. Harris No. 7 Defendant George West Craigen pleads his case to Malheur County Circuit Court Judge Lung Hung during a motions hearing last February at the Umatilla County Courthouse in Pendleton. their money. The result was mixed reviews from the general public but a show of support from a va- riety of community partners who stepped up with in-kind donations. The project will provide a home for the Umatilla County Fair, Farm-City Pro Rodeo and other Pendleton launches UAS Range. With city money on the line, Pendleton charged ahead with opening a test range for unmanned aerial vehicles based at the Eastern Oregon Regional Airport. Pendleton was approved by the Federal Aviation Administration to conduct testing on drones Dec. 30, 2013. Shortly thereafter, the city entered a contract with Peak 3 Technical Services to develop a range at the airport. While the Pendleton UAS Range would city as a test site, a bright future isn’t a guarantee. An Oregon State University study projected more economic impact, but the city has already invested $535,000 and is yet to see any revenue. 10 Diesel Spilled. Almost 5,000 gallons of diesel spilled Feb. 28 after a fuel trailer broke loose and tumbled down an embankment onto land belonging to Hill Ranches, just north of Pendleton. The driver of the Maverik truck reportedly swerved to avoid a deer while driving on Highway 37. The spill touched off a massive Oregon Department of Environmen- tal Quality cleanup of one of the largest diesel spills in state history. By the time soil samples tested clean, workers had razed a century-old farmhouse, capped two wells and hauled away 32,094 tons of contaminated soil. Maverik, a convenience store for endangering groundwater and several million dollars for the cleanup. SHOOTING: ‘Even our victims refuse to talk to us, stating they will take care of it later’ Continued from 1A trauma center. Roberts also said the in- vestigation into a shooting that happened minutes before remains hot. Pendleton police Dec. 23 at 11:48 p.m. rushed to the 1400 block of Northwest De- spain Avenue in response to several 9-1-1 calls reporting - ed ex-con Gregory Tinnell, 43, in connection with that shooting on a weapons vio- lation. Police also found two .45 caliber rounds in the front door of 1112 N.W. Furnish Ave., Pendleton. Roberts said that shooting is connected with a Nov. 23 shooting that left bullet holes in a residence in the 300 block of Northwest 14th Street. “What we have is a couple of groups of 20-somethings that have been involved in incidents over the last few months,” he said, “The ma- jority of which have resulted in subjects being stabbed.” But when police arrive, he said, no one talks. Roberts said some of the individuals profess gang membership and will certainly be a hot issue in the coming years. EOTEC may have broken ground this year, but has been an idea for more than 30 years and won’t open for another two. Hermiston’s football team sure didn’t win the state football title with one season of hard work, and Greg Barreto didn’t win a seat in the Oregon House just on the strength of a good election day — and his story certainly isn’t over. Because news stories, like the clock, don’t have a beginning and an end. We report on the parts that affect us, but can never gather up all the strands that lead to an event or estimate its impact. That’s what the history books are for. Instead, we try to explain the moments as they come. We give the context that Sureños, which is associat- Most couchsurf from place to place and support themselves though illegal activities, Rob- erts said, but when they get together to drink and party, someone offends someone Roberts said the situation is frustrating on several lev- els, from a lack of sanctions that could keep the offenders behind bars to the code of si- lence they live behind. “Even our victims refuse to talk to us, stating they will take care of it later,” Roberts said “It’s that kind of mental- ity.” That silence also makes it impossible for police to pre- dict what these groups will do next. At least so far the bloodshed and violence has been among group members general population, Roberts said, but there is no doubt these groups are a public safety problem. ——— Contact Phil Wright at pwright@eastoregonian.com or 541-966-0833. NEW YEAR: Continued from 1A resources, health and police, the economy and education. upcoming community events and photos of what the day looked like and what happened. Tick, tick, tick. bigger picture, which is being painted each day as the people of the Eastern Oregon go about their lives. As you read the top 10 stories list on today’s front page, you’re again getting a snapshot. They’re incredibly brief blurbs on the complex And most of the stories of 2014. The planned coal export facility planning began well before Jan. 1 reporters are given inch counts and deadlines, and know that their task isn’t to tell everything every time. We want our readers to be able to pick up any given newspaper and know what’s happening on a given day. But we hope by reading the newspaper every day, even the seemingly mundane stories, you’ll come away with a better view of the clock — and the world. Daniel Wattenburger is the managing editor of the East Oregonian. Contact him at dwattenburger@ eastoregonian.com, 541- 278-2673 or on Twitter @ DWattenburger. NEIGHBOR: Was teaching at college by age 23 Continued from 1A scholar who works at the Columbia Basin Agricultural Research Center in Pendle- ton. - ters grew up in a Nepalese farming village near the base of Mount Annapurna, the world’s 10th highest moun- tain. His family grew rice, corn, millet, bananas, gua- vas, cowpeas, soybeans and pumpkins on land terraced into the side of a hill. He walked up a 50-60-percent slope to get to school each day. In eighth grade, Ghimire decided to become a soil sci- entist. “We learned that we lose 22 tons of soil a year,” Ghi- mire said. “If we kept losing this amount of soil, Nepal will become a mountain des- ert.” At the Tribhuvan Univer- sity Institute of Agriculture and Animal Science in Ram- cow and mango orchard. Ghimire earned his under- graduate and master’s de- grees and was teaching at the college by age 23. He also met his future wife, Prakriti “From my home in Nepal, I could see a whole mountain range, but I never touched snow.” — Rajan Ghimire Bista, an agriculturist who also works at the agricul- tural center. Their family now includes 3-year-old son Prasam. The soil scientist’s jour- ney to Pendleton included several months in the Neth- erlands, where he researched years at the University of Wyoming in Laramie, where he worked his way up from graduate assistant to post- doctoral research associate. Oddly, it was in Wyoming that Ghimire experienced snow up close and personal “From my home in Nepal, I could see a whole mountain range,” he said, “but I never touched snow.” In Pendleton, Ghimire and Bista looked at home in their University of Wy- oming T-shirts, which bear a logo strikingly similar to the Pendleton Round-Up cowboy. The family experi- enced the Round-Up, where their little boy discovered he loved watching horse racing and bull riding, but had to turn his head during the rop- ing. Ghimire and Bista speak three languages — their native Nepali, English and Hindi. Prasam speaks mixed Nepali-English. At work, Ghimire spends his days studying soil organ- ic matter in different man- agement systems for pro- ducing dryland winter wheat and doing other projects that keep his brain engaged. One draw of the research station, he said, is its history of 80 years of continuous research. “There is one research plot started in 1931 and an- other in 1940,” he said. Nepal stays in Ghimire’s thoughts. He hopes to learn as much as he can about in- creasing productivity and sustainability to help Nep- alese farmers improve food production and conserve soil. ——— Contact Kathy Aney at kaney@eastoregonian.com or call 541-966-0810. NEW YEAR , , NEW COMICS in the
