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East Oregonian
Tuesday, December 13, 2016
TRADE: Cafeteria doubles as an event space
TRIAL: Government asked for a 60-day delay
Continued from 1A
Continued from 1A
to the old district office
across the street while the
old Hawthorne School was
renovated into the Pendleton
Early Learning Center.
The Pendleton Tech and
Trade Center will be the last
major project completed from
the district’s $55 million bond.
Thompson sees the center
as an extension of the high
school campus that will allow
students from both schools to
move freely between them.
Besides the alternative high
school classrooms, Thompson
showed Hawthorne students
some of the CTE spaces they
could inhabit with their Pend-
leton High peers, like the labs
with the 3-D printer and the
milling machine.
Perhaps the most compre-
hensive section of the center
was the wing for the culinary
program, which has risen in
prominence over the past few
years.
The center’s cafeteria also
doubles as an event space for
community meetings or open
air cafe (the room has retract-
able, wall-length windows)
catered by the culinary
program.
Once culinary students
learn a new recipe in a
Monday’s filing in U.S.
District Court in Portland
indicates that the govern-
ment is not backing down
despite the Oct. 27 acquittal
of the occupation’s leaders,
brothers Ammon and Ryan
Bundy, and five others.
Both groups faced
the same charges: felony
conspiracy to impede
federal officers from doing
their job and possession of a
firearm in a federal facility.
But prosecutors appear
to be padding their luck
with the misdemeanor
counts. Those plans make
sense, legal experts said,
particularly in light of how
the first jury saw the case.
“I think one of the diffi-
culties of this case always
was that the actual felony
charges didn’t exactly
fit what the government
theory was and, in an odd
way, the misdemeanor
charges might,” said Laurie
Levenson, a law professor
and former federal prose-
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
Principal Curt Thompson talks to Hawthorne students
in a remodeled classroom Monday at the Pendleton
Tech and Trade Center.
customized classroom with
a stove and live video feed,
they can jump into the profes-
sional-grade kitchen with a
walk-in refrigerator and an
industrial dishwasher that can
wash a load in 30 seconds.
“This kitchen is as nice
as you’ll see anywhere,”
Thompson said. “Even in a
big fancy hotel in Vegas.”
Thompson
assured
students that they would
be able to access the high-
level culinary and robotics
classes that will be held
at the center. Although
those classes usually have
lower-level prerequisites at
Pendleton High School that
conflict with the Hawthorne
schedule, Thompson said
those requirements would
be waived for alternative
students.
Although the tour was
accompanied by the usual
wisecracks,
Hawthorne
students also characterized
the new facility as “sick” and
“legit.”
Even as work crews
continue to put the finishing
touches on the new school,
Thompson said further
expansion could be in the
cards for the Pendleton Tech
and Trade Center.
BOND: District’s last survey indicated that
46 percent of likely voters supported the bond
Continued from 1A
Heights and Highland Hills
are not safe schools. We owe
it to our students to have safe
schools.”
Right now the district is
using 34 modular classrooms
to handle overflow and super-
intendent Fred Maiocco said
that number could be as high
as 50 in two years. The district
was using 20 portable class-
rooms when voters approved
a $69.9 million bond in 2008
to replace and expand multiple
schools. Since then the district
has grown by an additional
600 students, beating Port-
land State University’s most
aggressive projections for
yearly growth.
The district’s last survey
indicated that 46 percent of
likely voters supported the
bond and 48 percent did
not, leaving about 6 percent
undecided.
Maiocco said waiting until
May 2019 could give the
district more opportunities
to educate those undecided
voters, but could also make the
district lose the momentum
it has built after a three year
process putting together an
in-depth facilities master plan.
From a financial stand-
point, waiting two more
years would mean more of
the district’s previous bonds
would be paid off. On the
other hand, Maiocco said,
construction costs are rising
at about 1 percent a month
with no end in sight, so
delaying construction by two
years would raise the cost of
building the schools.
Another consideration is
the Oregon School Capital
Improvement
Matching
Program, which has provided
$4 million matching grants to
several other Eastern Oregon
schools that recently passed
bonds. The May election
would be the last time the
money would be available,
although
Maiocco
said
even that is not a sure thing
anymore after Governor
Kate Brown’s recent budget
proposal recommended that
program be ended early. If
legislators listen to pushback
from schools and keep it
for one last election cycle,
however, Hermiston would
be eligible for $5.76 million
under the current matrix.
If Hermiston does not
get those matching funds,
Maiocco said the district
would still be able to build
the schools but would not
have the $5 million it has built
into the bond to purchase new
property that would be kept in
reserve for the next time the
district needs to build a new
school.
Board member Dave
Smith said that there is “no
doubt” the district has done
its homework, and that the
need is there. Waiting two
years to go for the bond, he
said, would only make it more
expensive.
Board member Josh Goller
agreed, and added that it
would also mean two more
years of less-than-ideal class-
rooms for students.
“Our students get one shot
at those grade levels,” he said.
Sherman also pointed to
the maintenance problems
of the older schools, and
the recent analysis showing
$846,075 in cost savings over
five years thanks to the energy
efficiency of the district’s new
schools.
On Monday the board
discussed one example of a
maintenance problem in the
part of the high school built
in 1992, which would be
replaced during the proposed
expansion. Freezing tempera-
tures caused a water line in
the school’s fire suppression
system to burst on Thursday,
flooding the math and science
classrooms, hallways, kitchen
and commons area.
The school was evacuated
for 14 minutes due to safety
concerns about the mixture of
water and electrical fixtures,
then the gym was cleared for
use by students waiting for a
bus to take them home.
Maiocco had high praise
for the response of the district’s
custodial staff, which rushed
to answer the “all hands on
deck” call, and O So Kleen,
which responded within 20
minutes to begin cleanup. All
classrooms were back in use
by Monday morning.
“Within two and a half
hours all the water was picked
up ... It was just absolutely
amazing how fast that whole
team came together and got
things done,” Maiocco said.
He said insurance adjusters
had examined the damage,
and there was still extensive
cosmetic work that would
need to be done over the
winter break.
The board approved the
emergency funding request,
with an abstention from
Smith, who owns O So Kleen.
cutor at Loyola Law School
in Los Angeles.
“It gives the jury more
options and room to
compromise — and it still
sets them up for a convic-
tion,” she said.
Those charges also
would allow the govern-
ment to seize any property
used in the crimes if the
defendants are convicted,
said Tung Yin, a criminal
law professor at Lewis
& Clark Law School in
Portland. The provision is
more commonly used in
drug cases to go after prop-
erty purchased with drug
proceeds, he said.
In this case, the prop-
erty could include guns,
personal vehicles and other
belongings the defendants
used during the takeover,
said Andrew M. Kohlmetz,
lawyer for defendant Jason
Patrick.
The government also
asked for a 60-day delay
for the trial, which was to
begin in February, a request
opposed by all the defense
attorneys, Kohlmetz said.
The heavily armed
occupiers
seized
the
Malheur National Wildlife
Refuge on Jan. 2 to protest
the imprisonment of two
Oregon ranchers convicted
for setting fires on public
land and demand the
federal government turn
over public lands to local
control.
Federal
prosecutors
took two weeks to present
their case against the first
seven defendants, finishing
with a display of more than
30 guns seized after the
standoff.
During trial, Ammon
Bundy testified that the plan
was to take ownership of
the refuge by occupying it
for a period of time and then
turn it over to local officials
to use as they saw fit.
He also said the
occupiers carried guns
because they would have
been arrested immediately
otherwise and to protect
themselves against possible
government attack.
RIVER: Annual salmon returns around 16M fish
Continued from 1A
toxins in the river,” Merkley
said. “Now, Congress is
finally doing something
about it.”
The Columbia River
is the largest river in the
Northwest, with a drainage
basin roughly the size of
France. It is historically the
largest salmon-producing
river system in the world,
with annual returns peaking
at around 16 million fish.
However, the basin
is the only large aquatic
ecosystem in the U.S.
that receives no dedicated
funding to clean up and
monitor toxic chemicals.
The EPA has identified
numerous toxins in the
basin, including arsenic,
lead, pesticides and flame
retardants. High levels of
pollutants can build up
in the fatty tissue of fish
and lamprey, which are
consumed by people and
can cause significant health
problems and birth defects.
“Preserving
and
protecting the river is a
must to ensure the river
remains the clean and
healthy lifeblood of our
region,” Wyden said.
The program does
not add any new EPA
regulations. The bill was
supported by the Columbia
River Inter-Tribal Fish
Commission — repre-
senting
the
Umatilla,
Yakama, Warm Springs and
Nez Perce tribes — as well
as the Pacific Northwest
Waterways
Association,
Lower Columbia Estuary
Partnership and Salm-
on-Safe.
Local tribes also praised
another bill contained
within the Water Resources
Development that will
ensure the return of the
Kennewick Man, or Ancient
One, for a proper burial.
“Thanks to the support
of almost the entire Pacific
Northwest delegation, it
now looks like the Ancient
One will soon return
home,” said Aaron Ashley,
member of the Confeder-
ated Tribes of the Umatilla
Indian Reservation Board
of Trustees and chairman
of the CTUIR Cultural
Resources
Committee.
“When he does, we will
both mourn and rejoice as
he is finally laid to rest with
our ancestors. After a very
long time, this is a hopeful
moment for our people.”
Remains of the Kenne-
wick Man were discovered
in 1996 on federal land
near the Columbia River. In
2015, new genetic evidence
determined the remains
were closer to modern
American Indians than any
other population, according
to a report by the Associated
Press.
The Umatilla, Yakama,
Nez Perce and Colville
tribes, along with the
Wanapum Band, will lay
the Ancient One to rest at an
undisclosed location. The
remains must first be trans-
ferred from the U.S. Army
Corps of Engineers to the
Washington Department of
Archaeology and Historic
Preservation, which is
handling repatriation.
———
Contact George Plaven
at gplaven@eastoregonian.
com or 541-966-0825.
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