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About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (June 24, 2016)
REGION Friday, June 24, 2016 East Oregonian Page 3A HERMISTON OSHA investigating onion shed ire that killed worker By ALEXA LOUGEE East Oregonian The cause of the fatal June 1 onion shed ire near Hermiston is still under inves- tigation. The ire claimed the life of Columbia Basin Spreaders Inc. employee Joseph Adams, 62, of Umatilla. According to Columbia Basin Spreaders project manager Steve Williams, the shed was going through a renovation process in an effort to update the air low system. Oregon OSHA is investi- gating the ire. According to Gary Beck, state- wide safety enforce- ment manager, the investigation is still at least two months away from concluding, though legally OSHA has up to six months to inish its investiga- tion and produce its Adams indings. Beck said this is a particularly compli- cated case to igure out and there are no witnesses. Adams had worked for the company for more than 10 years, according to his brother Weslie Adams. His death was one of 27 workplace fatalities reported to Oregon OSHA in 2016 as reported on Oregon OSHA’s website. The ire consumed an approximately 400-by-150-foot single-story onion storage building, one of 18 the company uses to store produce, and caused an estimated $1.2 million in damage. Columbia Basin plans to rebuild the facility, though a timeline has not been set. EO ile photo Fireighters battle a ire in an onion shed at the Columbia Basin Spreader facility on June 1 on Westland Road southwest of Hermiston. Fireighters from Umatilla and Morrow counties responded to the blaze. Senators push ire No summer break for facilities crew funding legislation HERMISTON By ALEXA LOUGEE East Oregonian There’s no such thing as a summer vacation for the 40-plus members of Hermiston School District’s facilities department. Tonya Langley, custodial supervisor for the school district, compares it to a house party. “You clean what you can while the guests are there,” Langley said. “But after they leave you do the deep cleaning.” In this case, the guests are the 5,300 district students and the house covers more than 754,050 square feet of schools and district facilities. For the custodial crew, that means deep cleaning each room and hallway from the ceiling to the loor, starting with the lies in the light ixtures and shampooing carpets or applying three coats of wax on linoleum loors. Grounds crews are also busy. It takes ive full-time employees 40 hours a week just to mow the roughly 200 acres of grass within the district. In addition, employees work on irrigation management, sprinkler repair and other construction or repair projects around the district grounds. This summer, three new basketball hoops will be installed at West Park Elementary and a new score- board added at Desert View Staff photo by Alexa Lougee Joey Williams, a custodian at Hermiston High School works to scrape chewing gum from the bottom of a table. Elementary, among a long list of projects spanning the height of a white board in the facilities department ofice. Not on the list? Sleeping in. Facilities crew members start their workday at 6 a.m. “It’s a different kind of busy,” said Martie McQuain, facilities supervisor, about the summertime maintenance schedule. Grounds crews will assist with the installation of ive new modular classrooms around the district. The department also oversees facility use during the summer. Employees prepare ields for sport camps and clinics. They also clean up after events like summer school, Hermiston Parks and Recreation camps, Umatilla Electric Cooperative’s Hydro- mania, iCanBike and more. Mike Kay, executive director of operations for the district, said the facilities department also lends out district property. Facilities crew members recently delivered and took down bleachers for OSU Herm- iston Agricultural Research & Extension Center’s potato ield day. As the district grows, Langley, who has worked for the Hermiston School District facilities department for 16 years, says the crew and their responsibilities have grown too. “We do stuff that goes unnoticed,” she said. That includes following increasingly strict standards for school maintenance. It also includes other projects, like changing every locker combination in the district’s two middle schools and high school, or scraping globs of chewing gum off the under- sides of tables and desks. Joey Williams, a district custodian, remembers one summer when all the gum from desks and tables was gathered from the class- rooms along one hallway and collected into a sizable wad. “It was bigger than a baseball,” he said. —— Contact Alexa Lougee at alougee@eastoregonian. com or 541-564-4534. HERMISTON Man wins top prize in state Scratch-it drawing By ALEXA LOUGEE East Oregonian Eastside Market in Herm- iston will soon add a third Oregon Lottery Scratch-it winner banner to its wall of growing recognition. Owner Joe Thompson said an Oregon Scratch-it ticket sold back in April wasn’t an instant winner, but did eventually pay off. Larry Storment originally purchased the Big Money Crossword ticket, but wasn’t deterred when it didn’t win. He entered the ticket’s serial number into the Oregon Lottery’s 2nd Chance website. On June 21, his ticket was selected to win the game’s top prize of $50,000. “I thought, ‘Yeah, right, someone’s playing games with me,’” Storment said. The Hermiston man is the irst Eastern Oregon winner of the drawing since it began in February 2013. Storment plans to use the winnings to replace the sidewalk around his home and potentially paint his garage. Also, Storment’s wife, Linda, plans to take a trip back east. Oregon Scratch-it players For more than two years Storment has gone to East- can enter any non-winning side Market every weekday crossword or bingo ticket morning for a cup of coffee. into the 2nd Chance drawing. Once the tickets While there he for that game are buys a Scratch-it sold out statewide, ticket or two. He which can take one said that despite to three months, the big win, he’ll then a drawing is continue with his held on the third daily routine. Tuesday of the As for the month. Eastside Market, According to this is the third Patrick Johnson of Scratch-it lottery Storment the Oregon Lottery, winner in as many months, totaling $175,000. the 2016 monthly average The market won’t receive a odds of winning in the 1 percent commission from second chance drawing are this ticket, but that doesn’t one in 41,397. For compar- make Thompson feel any ison, Oregon Lottery’s 5X Crossword ticket has three less lucky. “There certainly seems to top prizes and the odds of hitting the top prize are one be a trend,” he said. Veronica Zapata Auto Health Home Life habla español 541/289-3300 • 800/225-2521 Veronica Zapata Family Insurance Agent The Stratton Agency Hermiston / Pendleton • stratton-insurance.com in 720,000. —— Contact Alexa Lougee at alougee@eastoregonian.com or 541-564-4534. By GEORGE PLAVEN East Oregonian Oregon’s congressional leaders continue to push toward changing the way federal land management agencies pay for ighting large, costly wildires across the West. As it stands, when the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management exhaust their annual ireighting budgets, they must dip into other programs to make up the Wyden cost — a practice known as “ire-borrowing.” That differs from the way the government pays for other natural disasters, like hurricanes and loods. Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden testiied Thursday on a draft bill in the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, urging lawmakers to put an end to ire-borrowing. The Wildire Budgeting, Response and Forest Management Act of 2016 would, in part, provide a budget cap adjustment for the Forest Service and BLM when they run out of money to ight ires. According to the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise, ire suppression cost more than $2.1 billion in 2015. That’s higher than the 10-year average of $1.6 billion. Wyden said ireighting now eats up more than half of the Forest Service’s total budget, and ire-borrowing takes money away from much-needed restoration projects. In a joint statement with Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, they described the practice as a “broken, dysfunctional system.” “All other forest work nationwide gets put on hold every time there is a signii- cant ire season in the West,” they said. “And the wildires are not getting any better. In fact, they’re getting bigger, they’re lasting longer and they’re costing more each year. Over in the House, Oregon’s lone Republican Rep. Greg Walden has succeeded in getting his bill, the Resilient Federal Forests Act, passed for a fourth year in a row. That bill proposes to end ire-bor- rowing by creating an account under the Disaster Relief Fund speciically for wildires. The Forest Service and BLM could then request additional funding through the Federal Emergency Management Agency within 30 days of exhausting their ire suppression budgets. Both bills also address a range of broader forestry management, but Wyden said he and Sen. Crapo want to ensure the funding piece does not get lost in the discussion. “The Congress cannot in good conscience let another ire year go by, with lives and property at stake, without ixing this once and for all,” they said. If the Senate bill passes, then differences between the two bills would need to be hammered out and approved in a conference committee before moving to the President’s desk. ——— Contact George Plaven at gplaven@eastoregonian. com or 541-966-0825. MUNICIPAL BONDS On or about Tuesday, June 28, 2016, D.A. Davidson & Co. expects to offer: $ 12,500,000* Milton-Freewater Unified School District No. 7 Umatilla County, Oregon General Obligation Bonds, Series 2016 New Issue | Book-Entry Only | Not Bank Qualified Maturities*: June 15, | S&P Rating: The District: “A+” S&P Rating: Oregon School Bond Guaranty Act: “AA+” Tax-Exempt: In the opinion of Bond Counsel, under existing statutes and court decisions and assuming continuing compliance with certain tax covenants described herein, (i) interest on the Bonds is excluded from gross income for Federal income tax purposes pursuant to Section 103 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended (the “Code”), and (ii) interest on the Bonds is not treated as a preference item in calculating the alternative minimum tax imposed on individuals and corporations under the Code; such interest, however, is included in the adjusted current earnings of certain corporations for purposes of calculating the alternative minimum tax imposed on such corporations. In the opinion of Bond Counsel, interest on the Bonds is exempt from Oregon personal income tax under existing law. Purpose: The Bonds, together with other legally available funds, if any, are being issued to (i) finance the costs of constructing a new K-3 school and sports complex and various capital improvements to District facilities; and (ii) pay costs related to the issuance, sale and delivery of the Bonds. Redemption*: The Bonds maturing on June 15, 2027* and thereafter are subject to redemption prior to maturity on June 15, 2026* and on any date thereafter at a price of par, plus accrued interest, if any, to the date of redemption. Maturities/Interest Rates*: The Bonds will mature on June 15, 2017 through 2036. Interest rates on the Bonds are expected to be established on or about Tuesday, June 28, 2016. Security: The Bonds are general obligations of the District and, as such, the full faith, credit and resources of the District have been irrevocably pledged for their prompt payment. For as long as any of the Bonds are outstanding, the District will levy taxes annually without limitation as to rate or amount on all taxable property in the District in an amount sufficient, together with other money legally available therefor, to pay when due the principal of and interest on the Bonds. Payment of principal of and interest on the Bonds when due, is guaranteed by the full faith and credit of the State of Oregon under the provisions of the Oregon School Bond Guaranty Act. *Preliminary: subject to change. SUBMIT COMMUNITY NEWS Submit information to: community@eastorego- nian.com or drop off to the attention of Tammy Malgesini at 333 E. Main St., Hermiston or Renee Struthers at 211 S.E. Byers Ave., Pendleton. Call 541-564-4539 or 541-966- 0818 with questions. Music on the Lawn FRIDAY, JUNE 24 Scott Wilson SATURDAY, JUNE 25 6:00-9:00 pm Carter Freeman H AMLEY S TEAK H ouse & S aloon COURT & MAIN, PENDLETON • 541.278.1100 Please contact D.A. Davidson & Co. in advance for expected yield information. The Bonds are subject to availability and to the acceptance of an offer to purchase. This is neither an offer to sell nor a solicitation of an offer to buy any of these securities. The offering of these securities is made only by the Official Statement, copies of which are available from D.A. Davidson & Co. WALLA WALLA BRANCH PENDLETON BRANCH (877) 526-5755 102 W. Main Street, Suite 200 Walla Walla, WA 99362 (866) 868-4759 111 South Main Street Pendleton, OR 97801 D.A. Davidson & Co. member SIPC | www.davidsoncompanies.com/ficm
