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About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 27, 2015)
REGION Friday, February 27, 2015 East Oregonian IONE Page 3A PENDLETON School-based health center coming to town 3ODVV¿OHVIRU%0&& Clinic would qualify for state funding board position HQGRI-XQHWRJHWWKHFOLQLF RSHQHGDQGFHUWL¿HGLQRUGHU to qualify for the next two- By GEORGE PLAVEN to travel for it,” Grigg said. year funding cycle, Grigg East Oregonian “A lot of folks in that com- said. ³:H¶UH SUHWW\ FRQ¿GHQW´ munity go to Heppner or No other community in Hermiston for care ... For Grigg said. “The biggest Morrow County is as isolat- them, having this in their thing is the timing.” School-based health cen- ed from health care as tiny community will save them a ters are promoted by OHA lot of time and money.” Ione, population 330. ,I FHUWL¿HG E\ 2+$ WKH primarily for students as a Tucked away in rolling ZKHDW¿HOGVHDVWRI+HSSQHU newly established Ione Com- way to keep kids healthy and and south of Boardman, the munity Clinic would receive in class, while at the same city has no medical center of annual funding from dollars time saving their parents time its own. That means residents approved each biennium away from work. Services spend at least an hour, maybe by the legislature. That’s include routine physical ex- two, in the car both ways ev- $60,000 per year, under ams, preventative health and ery time they need to make a the current level of funding vaccinations. In some cases, OHA al- through 2015. doctor’s appointment. Without that support, lows the centers to extend Dan Grigg, CEO of the Morrow County Health Grigg said it would be im- appointments to other com- District, recognized the possible to offer primary care munity members. Grigg said challenge about a year ago in an area as small as Ione. the Ione clinic will be avail- and banded together with He anticipates the clinic will able to anyone in need of a local partners to create a see between 122 and 244 vis- checkup. There are already 68 state-funded, school-based LWVLQLWV¿UVW\HDURSHUDWLQJ school-based health centers clinic that would serve not at 15 hours per week. As the clinic’s primary in 20 counties statewide, in- only the students of Ione Community School, but the medical sponsor, the health cluding clinics at Pendleton district will provide two High School and Sunridge community as a whole. The idea was widely nurse practitioners who will Middle School. Last school supported, and Grigg said split time visiting with pa- year, the centers served they have already received a tients. Advantage Dental will 22,408 patients and saw a to- $60,000 advance phase grant offer periodic dental care, tal of 65,705 visits. One stipulation is the from the Oregon Health Au- and mental health services thority to open what would available through Communi- centers must be located on school property. Ione Com- EH WKH FRXQW\¶V ¿UVW VFKRRO ty Counseling Solutions. Ione Community School munity Clinic will be located based health center. “It’s a chance for the peo- and Morrow County Public just across the street from ple of Ione to have access to Health round out the part- Ione Community School on medical care without having nership. They have until the East Third Street, in a resi- dential home purchased just recently by the school. Money came from a $114,000 grant from the Ione Education Foundation, and school principal Sarah Crane said they are pursuing addi- tional grants to renovate the home into a more appealing clinic space. The goal is to have the FHQWHURSHQEHIRUH-XO\WKH deadline to qualify for OHA funding. The health district will lease the space once it is ready to be staffed. Crane said she was ex- tremely excited when Grigg approached her with the idea. Now, kids can get to the doc- tor without having to miss an entire day of school, she said. “I wanted to make sure our kids are in school as much as possible,” Crane said. The majority of the com- munity was also excited ZKHQWKHSLWFKHGWKHEHQH¿WV of a local clinic, Crane said. As long as they could secure the grants, they didn’t see a downside to the project. “It’s going to be a great site,” Crane said. “It’s just nice for us to get some ser- vices like this.” ——— Contact George Plaven at gplaven@eastoregonian. com or 541-564-4547. WAL-MART: Will start letting associates know their schedules at least two and a half weeks in advance Continued from 1A is employed by Wal-Mart. In Umatilla County that number jumps to about one in 34. The county has an unusu- ally high percentage of Wal- Mart employees because it is the site of one of the retailer’s 42 U.S. distribution centers, each of which processes freight for between 90 and 100 surrounding stores. The Hermiston center is the city’s second-largest employer with about 800 employees whose job ti- tles range from lift driver to maintenance technician. The rest of Wal-Mart’s 1,300 workers in the county are spread between the Hermis- ton and Pendleton supercen- ters. Even if few local employ- ees end up seeing a raise, Garcia said they will still be affected by other components of Wal-Mart’s announce- ment. Responding to complaints from employees tired of nev- er knowing their schedule un- til the last minute, Wal-Mart also announced it would be RIIHULQJ D ¿[HG VFKHGXOH WR DQ XQVSHFL¿HG QXPEHU of store employees and let- ting associates know their schedules at least two and a half weeks in advance. Open shifts will be posted where employees can see them, al- lowing associates that want to pick up more hours to vol- unteer for the extra work. Garcia said the change will make it easier on local work- ers to arrange transportation and childcare, even though it means moving away from the standard retail practice Staff photo by E.J. Harris Produce manager Brandon Bradley stocks mushrooms on Thursday at the Wal-Mart store in Pendleton. of using algorithms to match HPSOR\HHVFKHGXOHVWRÀXFWX- ating customer patterns. “It really is a change in the industry, because retail is so responsive to customer de- mand,” Garcia said. Wal-Mart announced it will also roll out a training program to provide workers a clear path for moving up in the company. Garcia said LW¶VDUHÀHFWLRQRI:DO0DUW¶V desire for workers to consid- er their time with the retailer a step in a career where they gained valuable experience, rather than just a job. “We want them to have a career mindset, where even if they decide to go somewhere else, having worked at Wal- Mart means something,” she said. Garcia said associates around the country, includ- ing those in Hermiston and Pendleton, will be given more hands-on opportunities to practice and learn “those skills that are critical for a successful career” including leadership and communica- tion. Most Wal-Mart employ- ees don’t spend their entire career with the company, but some do. Garcia said eight employees of the Pendleton Wal-Mart have been with the store for at least 20 years. About 300,000 Wal-Mart employees have been with the company more than 10 years. Some have greeted Wal- Mart’s announcement with skepticism that the store is offering up a modest increase in order to blunt demand for a $15 an hour federal minimum wage. Garcia pointed out Wal- Mart’s promise of $100 million in grants aimed at helping improve the plight of retail workers across the industry. The company an- QRXQFHG LWV ¿UVW URXQG RI grants Thursday, giving $16 million to employment train- LQJ QRQSUR¿WV OLNH 'UHVV IRU Success and Achieving the Dream. “The $100 million com- PLWPHQW LV VLJQL¿FDQW EH- cause it signals Wal-Mart is not just interested in strength- ening our core business but also the retail industry,” Gar- cia said. ——— Contact Jade McDowell at jmcdowell@eastorego- nian.com or 541-564-4536. BRIEFLY Hermiston schools remove cumin from lunches HERMISTON — The Hermiston School District is removing recipes with cumin from the menu after a bulletin from the Food and Drug Administration warned some cumin powder products were contaminated with traces of peanuts. Not all cumin products have been recalled but Chartwells School Dining Services, the district’s contractor for school breakfast and lunch, is Live Music at t suspending all use of cumin as a precaution to protect students with peanut allergies. Cumin is a spice popular in Asian and Latin American cuisine. Public invited to meet HHS SULQFLSDO¿QDOLVWV HERMISTON — The Hermiston School District KDVVHOHFWHGWZR¿QDOLVWV to replace Hermiston High 6FKRROSULQFLSDO-RFHO\Q -RQHVZKRLVUHWLULQJDWWKH end of the school year. FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 27 Tyler Brooks & Isaac Callender SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 28 Dan Haug 9 PM - M IDNIGHT 541.278.1100 8 S.E. COURT, PENDLETON Both candidates come from out of state. Beth VanderVeen is director of student services and athletics for Mukilteo School District in Everett, Washington. She has 19 years of school administration experience and in 2006 was named Washington’s High School Principal of the Year. -RVHSK+DUULVLVWKH freshman academy and athletics director for Cookeville High School in Cookeville, Tennessee. He started in education as a teacher in 2008. The public is invited to meet both candidates and give feedback via anonymous questionnaire on Tuesday, March 3 in the Hermiston library from 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. East Oregonian Susan Plass, former director of grants at Blue Mountain Community College, announced her candidacy for the BMCC Board of Edu- cation in a press release. The BMCC district covers Umatilla, Mor- row, and Baker counties and is divided into sev- en zones, each represented by an elected board Plass member. Zone 7, which Plass is running for, encompasses part of the city of Pendleton and part of the Umatilla Indian Res- ervation. The election is May 19. Plass retired in 2012 af- ter working at BMCC for 10 years. While there, she helped raise $9.1 million to support academic pro- grams, student services and the physical plant. “My knowledge of the college, its operations, and its strengths and challenges will give me an excellent running start on the board,” Plass said in the press re- lease. “My goal is to work toward a stronger, sustain- able emphasis on student success and community en- gagement, while maintaining the board’s focus on ¿VFDOUHVSRQVLELO- ity and taxpayer accountability.” Plass is a member of the Pendleton Arts Commission and LV DQ RI¿FHU DQG board member of the Pendleton Al- trusa Club. She has served on the boards of the Pend- leton Altrusa Foundation, the United Way of Umatilla and Morrow Counties, and the Oregon International Council. Plass was an adminis- trator at the University of Oregon for 16 years and a graduate teaching fel- low for 4 years. She also worked in the private sector for 2 years. Her husband of \HDUV-DFN6DQGHUVLVD retired UO professor. CAPECO seeks socks By TAMMY MALGESINI East Oregonian Have you ever won- dered what a pile of 20,000 socks would look like? The Oregon Housing Alli- ance is hoping the Oregon State Legislature will get a glimpse Wednesday, March 11, which is Housing Oppor- tunity Day. Oregonians are asked to donate socks between now and March 11, with the hope of collecting 20,000 pairs. The purpose is to re- mind state legislators about the 20,000 kids who expe- rienced homelessness last year, including 278 in Uma- tilla and Morrow counties. Diana Quezada, community resource developer at Com- munity Action Program of East Central Oregon, is hopeful people in Eastern Oregon will donate 5,000 pairs of unused socks in the effort. “Our involvement is to get the word out there that people are homeless,” she said. “And organizations like CAPECO are trying to help but we don’t have enough money.” With the socks, the hous- ing alliance hopes to illus- trate to legislators the need for emergency rent assis- tance, shelters and basically keeping the feet of thou- sands warm. On the line is $20 million for emergency rental assistance that will help prevent homelessness. Clean, unused socks are being accepted at two Uma- tilla County locations — the &$3(&2RI¿FHDWWKH-RKQ Murray Building, 721 S.E. Third St., Suite D, Pendle- ton, and at Agape House, 500 W. Harper Road, Herm- iston. CAPECO was incorpo- rated in October 1987 and serves Umatilla, Morrow, Gilliam and Wheeler coun- ties. The organization be- lieves every family has the basic right to access safe, de- cent and affordable housing. Based on that belief, CAPE- CO offers help, including one-time rental assistance, Graphic contributed by Oregon Hous- ing Alliance The Oregon Housing Alli- ance is collecting 20,000 socks, representing the number of school chil- dren who experienced homelessness last year. CAPECO has donation sites in Pendleton and Hermiston for the effort. longterm rent subsidies and homeownership education services. Quezada said the organi- zation works with people to provide tools and education to assist them in evaluating their options to see what housing scenario is right giv- en their resources and needs. Limited agency funds re- sults in cutting back services available to help the public, Quezada said. She is hopeful the socks campaign will help raise awareness about the problem. “Hopefully people will become involved and not ignore the issue,” she said. “If people turn a blind eye, it doesn’t really help them.” Quezada said people can donate money, or help in being part of the solution by coming up with plans or ideas on how to help families that are homeless. The idea, Quezada said, is to help peo- ple shift from just surviving to thriving. After the donated socks have been piled high on the Capitol steps, they will be JLYHQWRQRQSUR¿WRUJDQL]D- tions across the state to dis- tribute to those in need. For more information about the 20,000 socks ef- fort, visit www.oregonhous- ingalliance.org/socks or call CAPECO at 541-276-5073. ——— Contact Community Ed- itor Tammy Malgesini at tmalgesini@eastoregonian. com or 541-564-4539 SUBMIT COMMUNITY NEWS Submit information to: community@eastoregonian.com or drop off to the attention of Tammy Malgesini at 333 E. Main St., Herm- iston or Renee Struthers at 211 S.E. Byers Ave., Pendleton. Call 541-564-4539 or 541-966-0818 with questions. SENTIMENTAL B a ck J O U R N E Y to th e 4 0 's When: Friday, February 27th • 6-9 pm Where: Hamley’s Slickfork Saloon What: • no-host bar • hors d’oeuvres • silent auction • music by the PHS Jazz Band • dressing up optional but encouraged Cost: $40 pre-registration • $50 at-the-door Tickets: Armchair Books & Heritage Station Museum (541) 276-0012 Presented by:
