Page 8A
OFF PAGE ONE
East Oregonian
Thursday, August 4, 2016
Smooth wildire evacuation in Blue Mountains FAIR: Three different
the response from authorities,
was no imminent threat at this out.
eating contests this year
“We left a lot of stuff — we helped make it a relatively
time.”
By JOSH BENHAM
La Grande Observer
For La Grande’s Cami
Bean and Milton-Freewater’s
Andrea Muma, the moment
of truth came at 7:30 p.m.
Saturday.
Bean and Muma were
among a large contingent
camping at Westminster
Woods Camp and Conference
Center, a campground owned
and operated by the First
Presbyterian Church in Pend-
leton, about a quarter-mile
from Emigrant Springs State
Heritage Area. Bean said
during the day Saturday, news
began spreading about the
Weigh Station Fire that was
just miles away.
“We’d had several people
coming up for the day saying
there was a ire and telling
us about it,” Bean said. “My
husband called (the Oregon
Department of Forestry) to
ind out how far away (the
ire) was. They told us there
Muma, who was planning
on staying until Sunday,
said the group monitored
the blaze throughout the day
and remained in contact with
authorities.
The situation became
more serious in the evening
when the Umatilla County
Sheriff’s Ofice informed the
campers at 6 p.m. that people
in the area needed to be ready
to leave within 10 minutes
notice. An hour and a half
later, the guesswork was over.
“(Park rangers) drove in
around 7:30 and said we had
10 minutes to leave,” Muma
said. “Most people were
already prepared. We knew
all day it was a possibility.”
Muma rang a dinner
bell near the campground’s
kitchen building to alert
everyone. Bean said she and
her husband were the last two
to leave the premises in order
to make sure everyone got
left my tents up there — and
just got what was important
and took off and met back in
La Grande,” she said.
Muma, who said she’s
been close to forest ires
before, said she wasn’t too
worried but several people
were very stressed. Bean said
the scene was semi-chaotic
initially.
“Everyone was scared.
People were terriied,” she
said. “I was trying to tell
people to trust the process.
They’ll get everyone out.”
Despite the nerves, Bean
said the evacuation went as
smooth as one could hope.
She said smoke could be seen,
but it wasn’t overwhelming.
The only time she saw much
in the way of a lame was a
glow later on in the evening
when they were leaving.
Muma and Bean both said
the leaders in the camp
giving updates, along with
painless evacuation.
“(The evacuation) went
really well,” Bean said.
“People were making sure
everyone was OK. (Emer-
gency personnel) were on
top of it. They didn’t want us
to bail out of there unneces-
sarily, and it wasn’t like we
could see lames. (But) I am
glad they were better safe
than sorry.”
While most of the group
drove to La Grande to meet
back up, Muma decided to
just go home. But with the
interstate shut down, she had
to take highways 82 and 204
to get home.
“It was a long, crowded
drive,” she said. “All the
trafic was bumper to bumper
in both directions.”
Bean said by Sunday
evening, campers who had
left behind tents and other
possessions were allowed to
retrieve them.
TAX: Meeting Friday to consider making changes
Continued from 1A
The Legislature “may
appropriate revenues gener-
ated by the measure in any
way it chooses,” the opinion
stated.
Davis wrote in an email
that based on the opinion,
the draft language is “both
factually incorrect and also
misleading to the public.”
In all likelihood, most, if
not all of the money, would
be used for the intended
purposes, said Rep. Peter
Buckley, D-Ashland, one
of the Legislature’s chief
budget writers. Education is
the state’s largest budget line,
and the costs of health care
programs are anticipated to
climb next year, Buckley said.
“If lawmakers want to
spend the money elsewhere,
they would have to change
the law,” said Katherine
Driessen, an Our Oregon
spokeswoman. “Speculation
about whether they will or
they won’t is just that. Given
the dire funding crisis our
critical services are facing,
we expect they will be hard-
pressed to change the law to
spend the money on anything
other than our schools, health
care, and senior services.”
Lawmakers also contend
that PERS is part of the
budgets for K-12, health care
and senior services, and some
of the revenue from Measure
97 could be used to help offset
$885 million in projected cost
increases to the state’s public
pension program.
“It could be used for
reserves or PERS, if it’s
needed to,” said Buckley,
who co-chairs the committee
with Sen. Richard Devlin,
D-Tualatin.
“I could put a certain
amount into K-12 and say I’m
not covering the PERS funds
then the school districts don’t
have that much in additional
resources because they do
have cover the PERS costs,
so it isn’t like there is a barrier
between these two,” Devlin
said.
Lawmakers also want to
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“One side is going to say the Legislature can do whatever
they want with this so then you shouldn’t approve the mea-
sure. The other side is going to say: Voter, you’re going to
get everything you ever wanted if you vote for the measure.”
— Sen. Richard Devlin, D-Tualatin
have the lexibility to repur-
pose revenue in the event of
an economic downturn or
other inancial crisis, in order
to avert layoffs or cuts in basic
services, Buckley said.
“You’re going to get this
from both sides,” Devlin
said of the battle over IP 28.
“One side is going to say the
Legislature can do whatever
they want with this so then
you shouldn’t approve the
measure. The other side is
going to say: Voter, you’re
going to get everything you
ever wanted if you vote for
the measure.”
At least two others have
echoed Davis’s request for a
change to the language in the
voters’ pamphlet: Gregory
Chaimov, a former legislative
counsel and attorney for the
opposition campaign Defeat
the Tax on Oregon Sales, and
John Tapogna of ECONorth-
west.
The draft language “would
lead a voter to believe that
Measure 97 revenue would
be earmarked exclusively for
pre-K-12, health care and
senior services, and that the
revenue would supplement,
and would not supplant,
current spending on those
services. For legal and tech-
nical reasons, that’s unlikely
to be the case,” Tapaogna
wrote.
Melissa Unger, political
director for SEIU Local 503,
said the voters’ pamphlet
should relect how the
measure requires the revenue
to be used.
“Clearly stating that the
measure requires funds to
these four speciic areas is a
key component to the measure
and should be included and
clearly stated,” Unger wrote.
Two committees respon-
sible for writing the inancial
impact statement and explan-
atory statement in the voters’
pamphlet are scheduled to
meet Friday and Monday to
consider the public comments
and whether to make changes.
“Section 3 of the measure
very clearly spells out where
the money will go, and that’s
early education, k-12 educa-
tion, senior services, and
healthcare,” Driessen said.
“We expect the committee
will agree with us on that
because that would clearly
be the law once Measure 97
passes.”
Continued from 1A
looking forward to the
experience.
“There’s a lot of simi-
larities in all fairs,” he said.
“But having ive nights of
headline entertainment is
something different for
me.”
Slone said probably
the
most
noticeable
differences people will see
between last year’s fair
and this year’s is moving
the Latino Night perfor-
mances to a more promi-
nent slot, from Wednesday
night to Friday night. The
Latino Night bands — this
year’s headliner is hit
duranguense band Montez
de Durango — tend to
inspire more dancing than
on other nights, so there
will also be plenty of space
cleared around the stage
for that.
“At the end of the work
week they can let their
hair down a little bit, so to
speak,” Slone said.
There also will be
eating contests sponsored
by Fiesta Foods spread
throughout the week. On
Wednesday at 5 p.m., after
the BBQ contest, there
will be a pie-eating contest
on the Coke Stage. On
Thursday at 7 is a mango-
eating contest, on Friday
at 7 is the jalapeño-eating
contest.
Last year’s fair turnout
was one of its largest,
and Slone said he expects
another big turnout for the
101st Umatilla County
Fair.
The extended weather
forecast predicts high
temperatures between 85
and 98 degrees through the
week, with low wind and
no precipitation.
MOON: Hopes to unveil new
lander design in September
Continued from 1A
Getting the OK — not
technically a license but
a determination that it
would do no harm and the
company can go ahead —
“is a milestone and it is not
implausible that they will
succeed,” said retired space
policy expert John Logsdon
of George Washington
University.
The company is also
competing with several
other groups for the Google
Lunar X Prize. The $20
million prize will go to the
irst private irm to get a
lander to the moon that can
then move a bit. But Rich-
ards said that’s not the main
way the irm hopes to make
money.
Richards said the irst
light has ive customers,
including a company that
is selling the opportunity to
take people’s ashes to the
moon. His parents’ ashes
will be on the light. He said
they used to sing the song
“Fly Me To The Moon” to
him “and I’m going to.” The
company uses a Diana Krall
recording of the song for its
telephone hold music.
However, Richards said
his irm hasn’t inished
building the lander and
hopes to unveil a new design
in September, which he said
is “about the size of R2-D2”
from Star Wars and will be
propelled by environmen-
tally friendly hydrogen
peroxide.
The plan is to ly on a
rocket built by Rocket Lab,
which has yet to launch a
ship. If that doesn’t work the
FAA approval is done in a
way that they could just hire
another irm, like SpaceX,
Richards said.
The governments of U.S.,
China and the former Soviet
Union have landed rovers on
Mars, with the Chinese Jade
Rabbit rover just retiring. No
human has stepped on the
moon since 1972.