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About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 18, 2015)
Page 6A OFF PAGE ONE East Oregonian BROWN: Last visit to Hermiston was Sept. 2014 Continued from 1A ers and with farmers,” Pe- dro said. She said during her visits Brown has done everything from meeting with Ambre Energy about the Port of Morrow coal export project to discussing water needs and irrigation practices with local farmers. “She gets to meet with folks and become better informed, and that’s what I think she really tries to do when she’s here is under- stand the issues we’re fac- ing,” Pedro said. “I appreci- ate that.” Brown’s last visit to Hermiston was Sept. 11, 2014. She spoke to Herm- iston’s government affairs WHDPDERXWZD\VKHURI¿FH was cutting red tape for small businesses, and visit- ed Hermiston High School to talk about the importance of voter registration. Pedro said she reached RXW WR %URZQ¶V RI¿FH RQ Tuesday and extended an invitation for Brown to visit Hermiston in her new role of governor as soon as she has time. Chuck Sams, commu- nications director for the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reserva- tion, said the tribes also look forward to working with Brown in her new ca- pacity. “She gets to meet with folks and become better informed, and that’s what I think she really tries to do when she’s here is under- stand the issues we’re facing.” — Debbie Pedro, Hermiston Chamber of Commerce director “We have had a wonder- ful relationship with Kate Brown for more than 20 years,” he said. He said Brown has vis- ited the reservation many times and often talks about WKHIDFWWKDWKHU¿UVWOHJLVOD- tive committee assignment as a freshman in the Oregon House of Representatives was to be on the Legisla- tive Commission on Indian Services, where she served for 15 years. He said with the exception of late gov- ernor Vic Atiyeh it is rare for a governor to come into RI¿FHZLWKWKDWW\SHRIH[- perience. ——— Contact Jade McDowell at jmcdowell@eastorego- nian.com or 541-564-4536. INAUGURATION: Brown has not named a successor for Secretary of State whose names have been raised as possible succes- tion, Brown, as secretary sors are not ruling it out. of state, will succeed Gov. House Majority Leader John Kitzhaber, who an- Rep. Val Hoyle, D-Eu- nounced his resignation gene, has not commented last week. Oregon does not publicly on whether she is have a lieutenant governor. interested in the position, Kitzhaber’s resigna- but Senate Majority Lead- tion takes effect at 10 a.m. er Sen. Diane Rosenbaum, Wednesday. '3RUWODQGFRQ¿UPHGLQD “The oath needs to be at written statement that she 10, because that’s when the is interested in the job. resignation occurs,” Seker- “I am deeply apprecia- ak said. tive of the support I have Oregon Supreme Court heard from fellow Orego- Chief Justice Thomas nians for the possibility of Balmer will administer the serving as Oregon’s next oath, House Speaker Rep. Secretary of State,” Rosen- Tina Kotek, D-Portland, baum wrote. “If chosen, said Monday. I will discuss this matter Members of the public with my family before who want to attend can making a decision about watch from the House gal- how I can best serve the lery, and Sekerak hopes people of Oregon.” to begin seating people at The secretary of state 9:30 a.m. who replaces Brown can “I’m waiting to hear run for two full terms, be- what the agenda’s going cause the remainder of to be myself,” Sekerak her current term does not said. He added that with count against the normal the Legislature in session, term limit. there is less time to move Brown is also work- furniture on the House ing to hire new staff- ÀRRU WR DFFRPPRGDWH DW- ers. On Monday, Brown tendees and “I think it’s named Brian Shipley as going to be a more limited her chief of staff. Shipley affair.” is currently a lobbyist for Brown has yet to iden- Oregon Health & Science WLI\ D VXFFHVVRU WR ¿QLVK University in Portland, the remainder of her term but previously worked as secretary of state, which for two governors and for expires in 2016. Brown. Kotek told reporters — The Capital Bureau Monday that she is not is a collaboration between interested in the position, EO Media Group and but two other lawmakers Pamplin Media Group. Continued from 1A MARIJUANA: Expressed interest in using La Grande’s laws as a model Continued from 1A “Although (Umatilla) County voted 63 percent to 37 percent against rec- reational marijuana, I hear more support from constit- uents for medical marijua- na dispensaries ... May 1 is coming quick, we need to do something,” he said. Wood said staff from the city of La Grande held a series of public meetings, inviting advocates and op- ponents, to help craft their medical marijuana regu- lations. Today, La Grande has one of the few operat- ing dispensaries in Eastern Oregon and has already conditionally approved one more. Multiple councilors ex- pressed interest in using La Grande’s laws as a model to help guide the creation of Pendleton’s regulations. Councilman Al Plute chided the council for not starting the rule making process earlier, but other members came to the coun- cil’s defense, saying recent developments in marijuana regulation hadn’t happened at the time of the morato- rium. “For us to be able to re- invent the wheel, there’s no need to,” Councilman Neil Brown said. “The wheel is telling us we’re going, whether we agree with the wheel or not. At least we have a starting point, and a year ago we didn’t have that option.” Whatever decisions the council makes on dispen- saries will be a separate issue from the legalization of recreational marijuana under Measure 91, which goes into effect July 1. Roberts said the council would have the discretion to enact similar regulations for dispensaries and retail- ers of recreational marijua- na or create different rules for each. ——— Contact Antonio Sierra at asierra@eastoregonian. com or 541-966-0836. Wednesday, February 18, 2015 Oregon Senate passes low-carbon fuel bill low-carbon fuel standard. The U.S. Department of Jus- tice served the subpoena on SALEM — Democrats the Department of Adminis- in the Oregon Senate passed trative Services Friday. The Oregon Department low-carbon fuel legislation Tuesday, despite appeals by of Justice and state ethics Republicans who sought to commission are also in- SXW WKH ELOO RQ KROG LQGH¿- vestigating Kitzhaber and Hayes’ dealings. Kitzhaber nitely or refer it to voters. It passed 17-13 on a near- announced Friday he would ly party line vote, with Sen. resign, effective 10 a.m. Betsy Johnson, D-Scap- Wednesday. “Even if you agree with poose, the lone Democrat to vote “no.” Johnson also vot- the policy, that should ed against the low-carbon give you pause,” Sen. Tim Knopp, R-Bend, said of the fuel standard in 2013. Republicans have tried subpoena Tuesday. Senate Majority Leader for weeks to stop Senate Bill 324 by tying it to outgoing Sen. Diane Rosenbaum dis- Gov. John Kitzhaber and missed the idea of any con- KLV ¿DQFpH &\OYLD +D\HV nection. “There is no link between who was a paid consultant for groups that worked to Cylvia Hayes’ contracts and organize support for the fuel the clean fuels program,” Rosenbaum said. standard. SB 324 is now in the Opponents had fresh ammunition on Tuesday: a House of Representatives, federal subpoena that or- where it will be assigned to dered the state to provide a a committee. Republicans long list of records related to proposed several motions Hayes’ consulting, includ- to sideline the bill, none of ing any that deal with the which succeeded despite By HILLARY BORRUD Capital Bureau three hours of maneuvering. One proposal would have referred the legislation to voters in a November spe- cial election, but Democrats voted down that idea. Oregon already has a low-carbon fuels law that was passed in 2009, but it is set to sunset this year. SB 324 would make that fuel standard permanent. The Oregon Environmental Quality Commission voted in January to adopt regula- tions that will require fuel importers and producers to reduce the carbon content of transportation fuels by 10 percent over the next decade, starting in January 2016. Fuel importers and pro- ducers have at least two options to meet the stan- dard: blend more low-car- bon ethanol and biodiesel into transportation fuels, or by purchase carbon credits. The Oregon Department of Environmental Quali- ty plans to set up a system for entities such as electric vehicle charging stations to generate carbon credits. The agency expects the fuel standard will reduce greenhouse gas emissions in Oregon by a total of 7.3 million tons over the next decade. When spread over 10 years, that decrease is relatively small. In 2010, the latest year for which DEQ has data, vehicles in Oregon emitted 22.6 million tons of carbon dioxide. The average emis- sions decrease anticipated from the low-carbon fuels program would have trans- lated to a 3 percent reduc- tion in 2010. Democrats including Sen. Michael Dembrow, D-Portland, said they con- tinue to support the bill because it is an important VWHSWR¿JKWFOLPDWHFKDQJH Dembrow said when he vot- ed for the original bill in 2009, his second grandchild had just been born and his grandchildren were also on his mind as he voted for SB 324 on Tuesday. VACCINE: Only one reported case of measles so far in Oregon Continued from 1A Roundup Republic Women in Pendleton about measles, vaccinations and why herd immunity sometimes isn’t enough. Measles had been de- clared eliminated from on- going measles transmissions in 2000, but is staging a comeback. The Centers for Disease Control estimates that before the measles vac- cination program started in 1963, three or four million got measles each year in the United States. More than 400 died, around 48,000 were hospitalized and 4,000 de- veloped encephalitis, a con- dition where the brain swells. DeBolt said people have for- gotten the danger. “It’s so contagious,” she said. “Not everyone sur- vives.” She said measles gets deadly when it devolves into complications such as pneu- monia or encephalitis, which can lead to deafness and re- tardation. “You can’t make the as- sumption your kid is going to be one of the lucky ones,” DeBolt said. DeBolt said distrust of the MMR vaccine started with a 1998 report published in The Lancet medical journal that suggested a link between vaccine and autism. The AP Photo/Ted S. Warren Sonja Wright, left, of Ellensburg, Wash., holds her daughter Iris, 4 months, as she waits to testify against House Bill 2009 during a hearing at the Capitol in Olym- pia Tuesday. The bill would remove personal or philo- sophical opposition as an acceptable reason for parents to not vaccinate their school-age children. Currently, Washington allows school vaccination exemptions for medical, religious and personal or philosophical beliefs. study followed eight chil- dren, reporting that signs of autism appeared within days of inoculation. The study, DeBolt said, was discredited, but still lurks on the Internet. Researcher Andrew Wake- ¿HOGORVWKLVOLFHQVHWRSUDF- tice medicine in the United Kingdom. “It was proven to be fal- VL¿HG´'H%ROWVDLG³,WZDV retracted.” Later, at least 40 stud- ies that included millions of children showed no link. Parents have balked for other reasons ranging from perceived government inter- ference to overloading their child’s immune system. The decrease in immunization rates has weakened herd im- munity — a condition where unvaccinated people are pro- tected by the sheer numbers of vaccinated people. That’s bad news for babies, who don’t ramp up their creation of antibodies until they’re older and cannot be vacci- nated, so they are vulnerable. Some communities are worse than others. DeBolt feared for her baby while living in a California county with a particularly low im- munization rate. “I didn’t take my son, Robbie, out for three months,” she said. Only one case of measles has popped up so far in Or- egon, but that might change. A Eugene man who visited Disneyland with his family is 2UHJRQ¶V¿UVWFDVHWKLV\HDU Symptoms include hacking cough, runny nose, high fe- ver and eventually a rash. Nine out of 10 non-vacci- nated people will come down with measles when exposed, DeBolt said. The disease goes airborne and lingers in the air for up to two hours. “The risk is very real,” she said. Typically, the MMR vac- cine is given at about one year and again at age 5 or 6. Steiner Hayward said requirements for non-medi- cal exemptions tightened in 2013, when Oregon legisla- tors voted to require parents to talk with a doctor and watch a video. Now, she said, there is interest on both sides of the aisle in eliminat- ing the exemptions entirely. “If we don’t do something now,” she said, “we may have a large public health crisis on our hands.” ——— Contact Kathy Aney at kaney@eastoregonian.com or call 541-966-0810. POWER: ‘We believe not all feasible routes were considered’ Continued from 1A a dime to property values. Gary Rinehart, vice chair of the county planning commis- sion and owner of a small farm south of Pendleton, suggested the project should follow Interstate 84 or other infrastructure. He also said the county could consider an “energy corridor” for these kinds of projects. Steve Corey of Pendle- ton was there on behalf of Cunningham Sheep Co. and Pendleton Ranches Inc. He said the line would damage their forest and grazing prop- erties near Meacham and wheat land near Pilot Rock. The two local farm opera- tions have remarked on the project for six years, he said, but Idaho Power has shown no sense of respect for chang- ing a route. “We’ve just been run over,” Corey said. The line also brings noth- ing to the county, he said, and re-routing the line can move to a neighbor’s property. “Why’d they put us at odds with one another when we don’t really need this?” Co- rey said. He, and others, asked RI¿FLDOVWRORRNIRURSWLRQV to run the line around the county. Shana Bailey of Pilot Rock said the line would go over her home, but she did not want to raise her children under the 500 kilovolt struc- ture, nor would the line bene- ¿WWKHLUIDPLO\KRUVHWUDLQLQJ business or her photography business. J.R. Cook, director of the Northeast Oregon Water Association, said the coun- ty should target the project’s environmental impact state- PHQWIRULWVGH¿FLHQFLHV7KH statement lacks socio-eco- nomic details to identify long and short term changes, he said, and that in turn affects the BLM’s ability to make a determination on allowing the line. Moreover, Cook said, “We believe not all feasible routes were consid- ered,” which is a requirement of federal law. According to the BLM, about 33 percent of the project is on federal public lands and the rest is private and state lands. The line is all about pow- HU FRPSDQ\ SUR¿W DW WKH H[- pense of Umatilla County, Cook said, and protecting high value farm land is a state goal even when it comes into FRQÀLFWZLWKIHGHUDOYDOXHV John Luciani of Echo said Idaho Power employees have trespassed on his land, and the line would make it impos- sible for planes to spray his family’s pea and wheat oper- ations. Brandon Christiansen of Hermiston said the line would cut through his fam- ily’s 5,000-acre farm on the Morrow County side. “When this thing comes right through the middle of your operation, that is a huge wrench in your gears,” he said. Pilot Rock farmer Rich- ard Hemphill put it this way: “You know, farm ground is kind of a precious thing — you can’t make any more.“ But Alan Insko of Pilot Rock said working with the power company is the better approach. “If they are going to go near us I want them to go through me so I have some say in what’s going on,” he said. George Murdock, chair- man of the county board of commissioners, said he would write the county’s response. The draft envi- ronmental impact statement (DEIS) is available for re- view at www.boardmanto- hemingway.com, where you also can submit comments. ——— Contact Phil Wright at pwright@eastoregonian.com or 541-966-0833. DIABETES PREVENTION PROGRAM ARE YOU AT RISK FOR TYPE 2 DIABETES? Take Charge of Your Health! FREE classes to help you learn skills to reduce your risk for diabetes. Must pre-register by calling 541-667-3509 Begins Monday, March 2nd 2:30pm - 4:30pm Kevin Andrews, MD, L.L.C. FREE 16 weekly, then monthly classes Internal Medicine (General Medical Care for Adults) We Really Care 27 SW Frazer, Pendleton, OR 97801 Monday - Wednesday 7:30 AM - 5 PM Open Late Thursday - Appointents Until 6:30 Closed Fridays 541-276-6244 For information call (541) 667-3509 or email healthinfo@gshealth.org