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LITTLE
HOUSE OF
HORRORS
DAWGS
BEAT THE
BUCKS
LIFESTYLES/1C
FOOTBALL/1B
OCTOBER 31-NOVEMBER 1, 2015
140 Year, No. 12
$1.50
WINNER OF THE 2015 ONPA GENERAL EXCELLENCE AWARD
The price to pave
Cities use different methods to budget street maintenance
By ANTONIO SIERRA
East Oregonian
EO fi le photo
A new layer of asphalt is applied to Southwest Nye Avenue
early last summer in Pendleton.
HERMISTON
EOTEC
discusses
Byron Smith
joining board
In the waning days of the
campaign for a Pendleton gas tax,
both the pro and anti-tax political
action committees are still battling
for votes.
While the Oregon Fuels Associ-
ation PAC has asked followers of
its Facebook page to change their
pro¿ le picture to an anti-gas tax
slogan, the Lets Move Forward PAC
has continued to woo the members
of service organizations and recently
earned the endorsement of the Pend-
leton Chamber of Commerce.
One consistent line of attack
against the 5-cent per gallon gas
tax is that the city could generate
more revenue for street pavement
if it diverted more of its share of
the state gas tax toward pavement
preservation.
“The City of Pendleton expects
to receive $950,400 in state shared
fuel tax revenue in 2016,” an Oregon
Fuels Association PAC mailer states.
“If the City of Pendleton would
commit the fuel tax money it has
to repaving our streets, it would not
See ROADS/12A
“We need to have those kids in seats so we can teach them.”
— Tricia Mooney, Assistant Superintendent, Pendleton School District
Attending to
attendance
By JADE MCDOWELL
East Oregonian
The Eastern Oregon Trade and Event
Center authority board discussed the impli-
cations of the city of Hermiston’s $600,000
contribution during its Friday meeting.
The city council voted unanimously on
Monday to kick in the $600,000 toward
construction costs with the stipulation that
a city administrator join the EOTEC board.
During Friday’s EOTEC meeting
chairman Ed Brook-
shier said he and
the other executive
committee members
“absolutely” felt that
city
administrator
should be Byron Smith,
and that he should
replace Brookshier on
the board when his
term is up at the end of Smith
December.
Brookshier, who was Hermiston city
manager himself when he ¿ rst joined the
EOTEC board, said he felt con¿ dent that
Smith is committed to making EOTEC a
success and would be a good addition to the
board.
Kim Puzey said while he agreed that
Smith would make a great addition to
the board, he also wanted to express that
Brookshier’s vision had been crucial to the
project, as had his willingness to step up
into the chair position after former board
chair Chet Prior died.
“You certainly have my appreciation,”
Puzey said.
Don Miller agreed, noting that he was
concerned about losing Brookshier’s
expertise and wondered if a non-voting
See EOTEC/12A
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
American Indian students and high school seniors have high chronic absentee rates both locally and statewide.
Problem of high absenteeism, especially
for high school seniors and tribal students
By SEAN HART
East Oregonian
Mirroring statewide trends,
many local American Indian
students and high school seniors
are chronically absent from
school.
The Oregon Department of
Education recently released data
about the percentage of students
who missed 10 percent or more
of the school year in 2014-15
and are considered chronically
absent. At the state level, 17
percent of all students were
classi¿ ed thus, but the rates
were far worse for “American
Indian/Alaska Native” students
— 30 percent — and even worse
for high school seniors — 32
percent.
Pendleton High School
seniors beat the state average
with 21 percent chronically
absent, but American Indian
attendance was slightly worse
at 34 percent. With a large
American Indian population of
401 students, 13 percent of the
district population, the rate has
a signi¿ cant impact on the total
district rate of 18 percent.
Assistant
Superintendent
Tricia Mooney said the district
focuses on the American Indian
subgroup and collaborates with
the Confederated Tribes of the
See STUDENTS/12A
Police chiefs applaud Obama’s
gun safety reform proposals
Chief Edmiston shakes
President’s soft hand
By SEAN HART
East Oregonian
Candy crush
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
Dorothy Smith, owner of O So Kleen, hands out Halloween can-
dy to children dressed as Batgirl on Main Street on Friday in
Hermiston. For more Main Street trick-or-treaters see Page 3A.
President
Barack
Obama
addressed a large crowd at the
annual International Association
of Chiefs of Police conference this
week in Chicago, and Hermiston
police chief Jason Edmiston was
sitting in the ¿ fth row.
Edmiston was lucky enough to
be in the right place to shake the
president’s hand as he left after the
speech.
“I don’t necessarily agree with
everything this president has done,”
he said. “However, I don’t disagree
with some of what he said, speci¿ -
cally at this conference. I really do
respect the of¿ ce of the president. I
think that’s about as thankless of a
job as a police of¿ cer.”
Obama focused on three main
topics ensuring of¿ cers had the
necessary resources to perform
their job, making criminal justice
reforms to “make the system
smarter and fairer” and reducing
risks to of¿ cers through “common-
sense gun safety reforms.”
Edmiston said while federal
resources for local police agencies
sounds appealing, the real dif¿ culty
for smaller, rural agencies is the
bureaucratic red tape. While larger
See OBAMA/10A