OFF PAGE ONE
Brown wants transportation meetings closed
Page 12A
East Oregonian
By HILLARY BORRUD
Capital Bureau
SALEM — Gov. Kate Brown’s
ofice declined Friday to explain why
the governor wants powerful state
transportation oficials to meet in
secret.
Brown has promised to increase
government transparency, but this
week a spokesman for the governor
said it is legal for a majority of the
Oregon Transportation Commission
to meet privately without any notice.
The commissioners are meeting
as part of a committee planning for a
review of the Oregon Department of
Transportation, which Brown ordered
last year. Two of the ive members of
the Oregon Transportation Commis-
sion were at the committee’s irst
meeting in March and a third member
was expected to attend, according to
a public record released by the state.
That would have resulted in a quorum
— enough commissioners to make
decisions — but the third commis-
sioner ultimately skipped the meeting
for reasons that were unclear.
Under Oregon’s public meetings
law, government committees that
make recommendations, oversee
agencies and set policies must hold
open meetings. There are certain
exceptions, including for groups that
advise the governor.
Chris Pair, a press secretary
for Brown, said Friday that this
exemption applies to the oversight
committee because it is working on
the review ordered by the governor.
Pair declined to comment on why
the committee needs to meet behind
closed doors.
However, the committee appears
to be advising the Oregon Transpor-
tation Commission, rather than the
governor.
Commission chairwoman Tammy
Baney appointed the committee,
and it is providing monthly progress
reports to the Oregon Transportation
Commission.
Transportation
commissioner
Susan Morgan, the chairwoman of
the ODOT review committee, also
did not respond to questions about
why the committee must meet in
private.
Jack Orchard, a lawyer for the
Oregon Newspaper Publishers Asso-
ciation who has been involved in
public records and meetings issues,
said that regardless of whether there is
a quorum of transportation commis-
sioners, the review committee’s
meetings should be open to the public
because the group is deliberating on a
topic of public interest: What issues a
contractor should examine as part of
a review of the Oregon Department
of Transportation.
“Something’s not right here,”
Orchard said Friday. “If this group
was charged with deining the scope
of the review, clearly that’s a piece
of public business ... The statute’s
broad enough that it says this group
is subject to the public meetings law.”
Brown ordered the review to
address the concerns of lawmakers
and interest groups about the agency’s
ability to effectively spend hundreds
of millions of dollars the Legislature
could approve for transportation proj-
ects in 2017. The review is important
because some lawmakers are only
willing to approve higher taxes and
fees on drivers to pay for the projects
if the Department of Transportation
can demonstrate it is operating efi-
ciently.
The Oregon Department of
Transportation estimated last year
the review could cost $300,000 to
$500,000.
LANGUAGE: Only a handfull of native Umatilla speakers remain
Continued from 1A
Four days a week, Jones and two
CTUIR volunteers, Quaempts and
Linda Sampson, visit each classroom
and teach the kids both Umatilla
language and culture through the
Walk to Language program.
In its irst year, the program has
not only received praise from the
Pendleton School District and the
CTUIR, but also Gov. Kate Brown,
who observed a lesson when she
toured the early learning center in
March.
On Thursday afternoon, it was
just Jones and Quaempts, who were
teaching the children a lesson on
salmon.
After teaching students the
Umatilla names for the various vari-
eties of salmon like chinook (tkwinat),
coho (sinux) and sockeye (kalux), the
teachers gave students cotton balls
scented with chocolate or cinnamon
and asked them to ind a similar scent
in the classroom, evoking the way
salmon use their sense of smell to
ind the stream where they were born
to spawn.
Jones and Quaempts wrapped the
lesson by handing out crackers with
salmon and a salmon-themed activity
book published by the Columbia
River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission.
As the students munched on their
snacks and colored in the books,
Quaempts recalled how different the
district approached American Indian
language and culture when she was
a student at the early learning center,
then known as Hawthorne Elemen-
tary School.
Quaempts
remembered
her
teacher correcting her vociferously
on her irst day of school, making her
use her American name instead of her
Indian one.
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
Students line up for a sample of canned salmon on Thursday during a
Umatilla language class at the Pendleton Early Learning Center.
Quaempts said those memories of
feeling alone makes her honored to
teach the next generation in a more
inclusive way.
Walk to Language may play a part
in keeping the Umatilla language
alive.
The two other languages of the
tribes that belong to the CTUIR —
Walla Walla and Cayuse — have
died out and only a handful of native
Umatilla speakers remain.
Quaempts said its important for
the non-Native students as well.
She said white farmers and
ranchers used to learn Umatilla words
and phrases to speak with their Indian
neighbors, and teaching non-tribal
members could similarly expand their
cultural understanding.
The children seem to be retaining
the Umatilla vocabulary and stoking
their cultural curiosity.
Whenever a student runs into
Quaempts in the community, they
excitedly greet her with a “Niix
pachwy,” or its morning or evening
equivalent, and begin asking her
about other words.
Early learning center faculty say
the kids pick up on the language
faster than the adults.
“It’s the highlight of their week,”
teacher Joshua McGraw said.
Topics range from lessons on First
Foods or winter words to teaching
the kids Umatilla translations of
Christmas songs like “Jingle Bells”
and “The Dancing Christmas Tree,”
but the teachers all agreed that Walk
to Language was a beneit to their
classroom.
As Walk to Language winds down
its irst year, Quaempts said she’s
already committed to coming back
next year to continue the lessons.
———
Contact Antonio Sierra at
asierra@eastoregonian.com
or
541-966-0836.
PGG: Northwest Grain Growers serves 1,600 members in the region
Continued from 1A
in early July.
United Grain was formed in 1969
and is owned by the Mitsui Group
of Japan. Flagg said the company
has traditionally focused on exports,
but has started shifting philosophies
to work more directly with growers.
That has included building shuttle
train stations in Montana and North
Dakota to haul larger amounts of
grain from those ields to a Vancouver
terminal that can store more than 7
million bushels.
John W. Adams, a former PGG
member who farms roughly 3,500
acres north of Pendleton, said he
will listen to offers from United
Grain while continuing to do
business with Northwest Grain
Growers, based in Walla Walla, and
Pendleton Flour Mills.
“We’re going to be just ine,”
Adams said.
Northwest Grain Growers serves
1,600 members in the region and
General Manager Chris Peha said
they are growing. The co-op added
two grain piles in Athena in 2014,
which Adams said have become an
attractive option. Peha did not say
whether the co-op intends to invest
more heavily in Oregon following
the dissolution of PGG.
“We focus on our own business,
not what other people are doing,” he
said.
Adams said it’s always good
for farmers to have more than one
place to market their grain, though
where they go depends heavily
on their location. Gavilon Grain,
another Japanese-owned irm, has
also added piles in Athena in recent
years, providing another choice on
the north end of the county. Gavilon
distributes more than 45 million tons
of grain every year, making it the
second-largest merchandiser in the
country.
Elsewhere, Pendleton Flour Mills
has also purchased wheat directly
from farmers since the early 1900s.
Its main lour mill is located in town,
with a satellite elevator in nearby
Mission. Then there’s Morrow
County Grain Growers, headquar-
tered in Lexington, which operates
eight grain elevators with a licensed
capacity for more than 3.9 million
bushels.
Like PGG, Morrow County
Grain Growers was established in
1930 and has grown to incorporate
multiple divisions including energy,
agronomy and its own farm equip-
ment dealership. Grain comes to
MCGG from as far away as Idaho,
stored at the Hogue-Warner Elevator
on Paterson Ferry Road.
———
Contact George Plaven at
gplaven@eastoregonian.com
or
541-966-0825.
Saturday, May 7, 2016
HEALTH: Serious mental
illness costs U.S. $193.2B
in lost earnings per year
Continued from 1A
throughout “the entire case load,”
from family court to serious
criminal cases. Perkinson said
in criminal court a person can
plead guilty by insanity, there
is no defense allowing “mental
health as a factor in committing
a crime.”
Davis said the entanglement
of mental illness and lawbreaking
can become a cycle.
“There are people totally
criminally liable that still have
mental illness that sent them on
this path,” she said.
Evaluations
Deputy district attorney Kate
Hansen said mental illness does
not preclude someone from
understanding when they break
the law. Still, the state has an
obligation to help a defendant
understand the law and legal
proceedings so he or she can aid
and assist in their defense.
Getting a defendant mental
health help comes with obsta-
cles. Davis said a client would
need a evaluation from someone
with state certiication. That
takes time and jeopardizes a
person’s right to a speedy trial,
which in Oregon is 60 days,
though a judge can extend that
another 60.
If a psychologist determines
the person can aid or assist in
her defense, the prosecution
can proceed. Davis said the rub
comes when a client needs time
and treatment to achieve a level
of clarity.
That can often take six
months. But that’s also the
maximum amount of time a
person can serve for disorderly
conduct, a class B misdemeanor
in Oregon. When the treatment
takes longer than the sentence
for the crime, the state has to let
the person go.
Davis said one of her clients
has been at the state hospital for
two months, another for six, and
a third for a year-and-half. A 2014
United States Department of
Justice report estimated the cost
of care at Oregon State Hospital
is $945 per day per person. A full
year runs $344,925.
Serious mental illness costs
America $193.2 billion in lost
earnings per year, according to
the National Alliance on Mental
Illness.
Sometimes a person’s mental
illness is so severe the state can
impose involuntary commit-
ment — putting the person into
a mental health treatment facility
against their will. Morrow
County has about one or two
cases a year, according to infor-
mation from the state courts,
while Umatilla County has
about 25 such cases annually.
Involuntarily
committing
someone,
though,
means
meeting the high standard of
clear and convincing evidence.
Hansen said that standard is just
below the “beyond a reason-
able doubt” needed to convict
someone in criminal court.
The Oregon Court of Appeals
in 2010 upheld the standard
when it overturned a Mult-
nomah County judge who had
committed a man who suffered
schizophrenia and stopped
taking medication for three
months into state care
Even though the man all but
destroyed the room he lived in
and came to believe he was in
a religious battle that required
him to smear his feces on loors
and walls and push broken glass
through walls, the appeals court
found the state failed to show
he was unable to provide for his
basic needs or was a threat to
his own survival. Hansen said
involuntary commitment really
means a person is so deranged
he or she is likely to die any day.
Few criminal defendants are
that mentally ill, Davis said.
But the state also does not want
people suffering from a mental
health episode to be on the
street, so that means probation
or jail and thus more of the same
spinning wheels.
Another option
Some counties and cities,
including Polk County, have
created mental health courts.
Roy Blaine is the trial court
administrator for the circuit
courts of Umatilla and Morrow
counties. He said treatment
courts, such as drug court or a
mental health court, are effective
tools .
Rather than the British adver-
sarial model of court, which is
what the U.S. adopted, a person
comes to a treatment court and
tells their story to the judge, as
well as to parole and probation
oficers, treatment experts and
court staff. Blaine said the idea
is frequent oversight from the
court and state pays off when
people gain control over their
lives.
Drug court is for felons and
tries to reduce the number of
future felonies they commit,
Blaine said. But a mental health
court is more on the other end
of the spectrum. It helps the
frequent, low-level offenders
who trespass, cause public
disturbances and have problems
staying off the street.
Operating a mental health
court takes a lot of money and
staff. The judge has to spend at
least a few hours each week in
the courtroom with clients, and
a team of professionals has to
check that people are taking
medications, attending treatment
programs and so on.
Local circuit court judges, the
district attorney’s ofice, public
defense lawyers and police
leaders have discussed s mental
health court for a while now.
Blaine said a lack of money is
the hold up.
“I’m not at all opposed to
doing that work,” he said. “But I
need the people to do it.”
Davis, too, supports a mental
health court. She suggested a new
model that puts social workers
into public defender ofices. She
said one irm in southern Oregon
is giving it a try, and she likes the
idea because she is not the best
social worker but often ends up
acting like one in her job.
“Having people dedicated to
helping our clients just navigate
life could be useful,” she said.
“The program that has been
instituted in Oregon so far is
promising. What it costs in
social workers is partially offset
by lowering recidivism and
increasing payment of ines and
court costs (because of higher
employment rates).”
Davis also said everyone
— from police on the streets to
judges — can better understand
mental illness. Some symptoms
are obvious, she said, but a
monotone voice, a lack of
movement or speaking also can
be indicators.
“I felt like when I was talking
to my clients I was missing some
of these problems,” she said. It’s
a driving reason why Davis is
working on a master’s degree in
forensic psychology.
She is not jumping profes-
sions, she said, but adding more
tools to work with the kinds of
clients she — and many other
attorneys — sees day in and day
out.
———
Contact Phil Wright at
541-966-0833 or pwright@
eastoregonian.com
Fellow Democrats: We encourage
you to join us in writing in Bill Hansell
for the District 29 Senate Position
• (Former
Mike State and
Jill h orne
Senator and Community Leader)
• (Vetrinarian
Dr. Andrew
and Barbra Clark
and Retired Educator)
• Gary Burke
• Connie Caplinger
(Chair CTUIR Board of Trustees)
(Former County Department Head)
• (Retired
Sam Educator)
Pambrun
• Phillip Houk
• (Retired
Emile
Holeman
County Commissioner)
• Henry Lorenzen
(Mayor of Pendleton)
(Farmer and At orney)
Paid for by friends of Bill Hansell