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REGION/7A
SPORTS/1B
NATION/7A
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 1, 2017
141st Year, No. 77
One dollar
WINNER OF THE 2016 ONPA GENERAL EXCELLENCE AWARD
ODFW investigating avian cholera outbreak
Several hundred dead ducks found near Stanfi eld, Milton-Freewater
By GEORGE PLAVEN
East Oregonian
Avian cholera may be spreading
among waterfowl in northeast
Oregon after several hundred dead
ducks were found over the weekend
on private land near Stanfi eld and
Milton-Freewater.
Wildlife offi cials in Washington
have already confi rmed an outbreak
of avian cholera around the
Tri-Cities, where more than 1,200
dead ducks were reported last week.
The Oregon Department of Fish
& Wildlife is still awaiting test
results from the state veterinary
diagnostic lab in Corvallis, though
Brandon Reishus, ODFW water-
fowl coordinator, said the deaths
were likely caused by avian cholera.
“To my understanding, they all
showed the classic cholera symp-
toms,” Reishus said.
Birds infected with avian
cholera often appear lethargic and
display a mucous discharge from
the mouth and nose. Reishus said
the birds may also lose control of
their motor functions, convulsing
and swimming in circles.
Death usually follows quickly,
sometimes in as few as six to
12 hours, according to the U.S.
Geologic Survey National Wildlife
Health Center.
“It gets people’s attention,
because it has the potential to kill
a lot of birds in a short period of
time,” Reishus said.
See CHOLERA/8A
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
Never too cold to cast a line
Marty Perrine of Pilot Rock casts his rod while fi shing for steelhead in the Umatilla River on Tuesday in Pendleton. Snow fell again Tuesday in northeastern
Oregon, but temperatures were above freezing for much of the day. For this week’s forecast, see Page 2A.
HERMISTON
Trump taps Gorsuch
Disc golf course, Sunset Park redesign
for Supreme Court
Associated Press
WASHINGTON
(AP)
— President Donald Trump
nominated Neil Gorsuch,
a fast-rising conservative
judge with a writer’s fl air, to
the Supreme Court Tuesday
night, setting up a fi erce fi ght
with Democrats over a jurist
who could shape America’s
legal landscape for decades
to come.
At 49, Gorsuch is the
youngest Supreme Court
nominee
in a quar-
ter-cen-
tury. He’s
known
on
the
Denver-
based 10th
Circuit
Court of
A p p e a l s Neil Gorsuch
f o r
clear, colloquial writing,
advocacy for court review
of government regulations,
defense of religious freedom
and skepticism toward law
enforcement.
“Judge Gorsuch has
outstanding legal skills, a
brilliant mind, tremendous
discipline and has earned
bipartisan support,” Trump
declared, announcing the
nomination in his fi rst tele-
vised prime-time address
from the White House.
Gorsuch’s
nomination
was cheered by conservatives
wary of Trump’s own fl uid
ideology. If confi rmed by the
Senate, he will fi ll the seat
left vacant by the death last
See GORSUCH/8A
in the works when winter goes away
By JADE MCDOWELL
East Oregonian
Snowy weather has put
a damper on park use this
winter, but Hermiston parks
and recreation director
Larry Fetter is still excited
about projects coming up
when the weather thaws.
One of those projects is a
disc golf course. Fetter said
he is discussing agreements
right now with Good Shep-
herd Health Care System
and Hermiston Irrigation
District that would allow the
city to place a course across
from the hospital near the
corner of Northwest 11th
Street and Elm Avenue.
“We’ve already started
seeking funding,” he said.
Fetter said the parks
and recreation committee
has also looked into what
will be needed to get the
course offi cially ranked
by professional disc golf
associations for tournament
play. The 18-hole course
would likely be utilized by
a mix of serious disc golfers
and people who just wanted
to “go out and have a good
time,” Fetter said.
Staff photo by Jade McDowell
Discarded Christmas trees at Butte Park that the city
hasn’t fed through a wood chipper yet are one thing
the parks department has delayed due to snow.
As for parks projects
already underway, Fetter
said the snow and the
prolonged freezing weather
did halt some concrete work
at Sunset Park, which the
city has been working to
expand and renovate.
“We would have made
some winter progress on
Sunset Park, but that’s really
ground down to zero,” he
said.
However, when the
weather gets better the
department will continue to
work on concrete borders,
landscaping,
basketball
hoops and a new set of
playground equipment that
will arrive in the spring.
Fetter said the backstop
screen at Newport Park will
also be installed “as soon as
the weather breaks.”
Newport Park’s softball
fi eld was lowered by a
couple of feet to help catch
water that was fl ooding
neighboring homes during
rainstorms, but Fetter said
when a portion of the snow
melted last week it did so
slowly enough that it didn’t
turn the park into a lake.
In the spring or summer
the
parks
department
will also begin work on a
planned overhaul of Green-
wood Park, the half-acre
neighborhood park tucked
away on Beech Street.
Fetter noted that the
department has had to delay
its annual wood-chipping
of all the Christmas trees
people drop off at Butte
Park each January. The
chips are used as mulch at
parks around Hermiston, but
Fetter said the snow keeps
delaying use of the wood
chipper.
He said the extra snow
this year shouldn’t cause
too many extra maintenance
problems in the spring,
unless a rapid thaw causes
the Umatilla River to over-
fl ow its banks at Riverfront
Park.
“If it’s like it was four
years ago (when the park
fl ooded), we would have
to go in and do some resto-
See PARK/8A