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About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 22, 2015)
Umatilla man pleads not guilty in triple murder REGION/3A 39/33 The lights of Pendleton and environs illuminate a low-hanging layer of fog under a star-fi lled sky Tuesday off Old Emigrant Hill Road east of Mission. Staff photo by E.J. Harris THURSDAY, JANUARY 22, 2015 139th Year, No. 70 WINNER OF THE 2013 ONPA GENERAL EXCELLENCE AWARD One dollar HERMISTON Hoops an economic harvest Businesses welcome thousands for basketball tournament By JADE MCDOWELL East Oregonian Hermiston is about to get a little crowded. Around 4,000 visitors are expected to de- scend on the city for the AAU Best of the West youth basketball tournament this weekend, in- creasing the population of Hermiston by about 23 percent. local business owners said when Hermiston School District hosts a big athletic competi- tion like the AAU tournament it means an in- Staff photo by E.J. Harris Jeremy and Cheree Gillette moved to Hermiston last year after Cheree nearly died after falling ill to the H1N1 fl u virus when the couple lived in The Dalles. Woman beats deadly H1N1 complication By KATHY ANEY East Oregonian It’s also a love story. A year ago, Cheree Gillette started feeling sluggish. A tick- ly cough arose as she coached middle school basketball in The Dalles, where she and her hus- band, Jeremy, lived at the time. A couple days later, she grew worse. A physician’s assistant got negative results and sent her home with cough drops. By the weekend, her skin had turned gray and she felt weak. “It was a chore to get dressed,” Cheree said. medic, drove his wife to the emergency room. Her oxygen saturation level had sunk to 78 percent, far below the norm of 95-100 percent. Jeremy pushed to have Cheree transported to Portland. Cheree, however, didn’t want to be that far away from their three children and her doctor wasn’t convinced her condition warranted moving her. Then, her lung function See FLU/6A Tamastslikt to build solar carport By GEORGE PLAVEN East Oregonian Tamastslikt Cultural Institute is taking another major step to- ward its goal of net-zero energy consumption. The museum, located on the Umatilla Indian Reservation, received a $350,000 grant from carport capable of generating up to 200 kilowatts of clean, renew- able energy. The project comes one year after Tamastslikt began operat- ing its 50-kilowatt wind turbine that was also funded, in part, renewable energy program. To- gether, the development of wind and solar resources at Tamasts- likt is expected to save $26,000 per year on the building’s elec- tricity bills and reduce overall energy consumption by 76 per- cent since 2013, said museum director Bobbie Conner. The carport will provide cov- ered, shaded parking over 20 spaces in the museum’s parking lot, with an array of solar pan- els mounted on top to generate power for the building. Permit- get back to him about doing a promotion through them, but he said he’s gotten a “good response” through advertising online. With hotel rooms at a premium in Hermiston, big events mean there are always enough visitors to go around. ta said. See HERMISTON/6A PENDLETON Rebuild committee blazes ahead with Pioneer Park plan By ANTONIO SIERRA East Oregonian MISSION $440,000 in grants expected to save museum roughly $26,000 per year on electricity bill “People come out with busfuls of kids. ... It’s extremely good for our purposes, and the city’s purposes,” Hermiston Rodeway Inn manager Nakul Butta said. He said he’s always willing to work with event organizers on helping out-of-town par- ting for the project is underway, Conner said, and construction could begin in May. In addition, Tamastslikt has secured $90,000 from the En- ergy Trust of Oregon to cover building costs. One more grant is still pending, and if awarded would allow the museum to de- velop an educational curriculum and training program on renew- able energy. “It’s a multi-faceted project,” Conner said. “These two grants will allow us to construct the carport.” Tamastslikt began investing ings in 2003, shortly after hir- See ENERGY/6A After a lengthy delay, work can now be- gin on a picnic shelter, landscaping and oth- er new amenities for Pioneer Park. Much of the project is being paid for by the Steering Committee to Rebuild Pioneer Playground, which received the insurance payments from the Pioneer Park playground Marty King, the chair of the committee, said they wanted to start building the picnic shelter last year. But before the committee could receive permission from the city, she was informed that the proposed construction site on the west side of the park was within the limits of the historic Pioneer Cemetery and would require authorization from the State Historic After a radar study revealed no “buri- al-like objects” underneath the site, the proj- ect could move ahead. But even with state approval, there are still risks. See PARK/3A
