THURSDAY, APRIL 20, 2017
Lightning strikes
the Umatilla Indian
Reservation
Wednesday as
a thunderstorm
moves through the
area south east of
Pendleton. Showers
and thunderstorms
are likely to return
Thursday, accord-
ing to the National
Weather Service.
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
141st Year, No. 133
One dollar
WINNER OF THE 2016 ONPA GENERAL EXCELLENCE AWARD
HERMISTON
Food trucks,
flower pots,
parking spots
in the works
for downtown
By JADE MCDOWELL
East Oregonian
Action groups created in February
to revitalize downtown Hermiston are
putting their plans into motion.
Main Street coordinator Emma
Porricolo said input from the citizens’
committee on parking helped inform an
item on Monday’s city council agenda that
will change the on-street parking along the
east side of Second Street between Main
Street and Hurlburt Avenue from parallel
parking to diagonal parking and add a new
handicapped-accessible spot.
She said the group is also working
on plans for wayfi nding signs around
downtown that would help direct people
to public lots.
“We’re looking for funding still,” she
said.
The “retail and restaurants” group
has focused on increasing the appeal of
See HERMISTON/8A
Pendleton man loses truck, trailer to fi re
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
Flames engulf a Dodge truck and fi fth-wheel trailer it was hauling Wednesday on Trail Road east of Pendleton.
For the full story see Page 3A.
BMCC ARTS & CULTURE WEEK
PENDLETON
Bosnian War refugee shares her story
‘Fresh start’
program to
help build new
veterinary clinic
“They took over the
radio and TV sta-
tions fi rst. So when
they started killing
people there was no
way to report it.”
Serves as poignant
reminder of crises today
By JAYATI RAMAKRISHNAN
East Oregonian
Selena Hutchins talks cheer-
fully about college, her drive
down from Seattle and the job
where she makes mobile games.
But she still chokes up talking
about the fi rst few years of her
life.
— Selena Hutchins,
survivor who escaped the
Bosnian genocide
Staff photo by Jayati Ramakrishnan
Selena Hutchins, a refugee of the Bosnian war, shares her
story with students at Blue Mountain Community College
Hutchins came to the Blue
Mountain Community College
Hermiston campus Wednesday
as part of BMCC’s Arts and
Culture Week to talk to students
about her escape from the
Bosnian genocide.
She sets the stage with some
basic facts about the Bosnian
War, which happened at a time
when many of her audience
members were children, or not
yet born. From March 1992 to
December 1995, the war was the
fi rst genocide in Europe since
World War II and killed between
25,000 and 329,000 people.
“That number is so disparate
because it depends on who you
ask,” Hutchins said. “Those
who started it versus those who
suffered from it.”
Every year, she said, the “offi -
cial” number grows when more
victims of the war are identifi ed.
The purpose of the war, she
said, was to create a country
called Greater Serbia following
the breakup of Yugoslavia. But
some wanted only a Christian
population, and so began the
genocide of thousands of people,
most of whom were Muslims.
Hutchins is from a town
called Bijeljina, where the war
started.
“They took over the radio and
TV stations fi rst,” Hutchins said.
“So when they started killing
people there was no way to
report it.”
Hutchins talked matter-of-
By ANTONIO SIERRA
East Oregonian
factly about her experiences to
a silently engrossed audience,
recalling the time her father
spent as a soldier, as all men were
required to do, how she slept in
street clothes with her shoes right
next to her bed, and the time her
family spent in a refugee camp.
She noted that the camp
where she stayed in Hungary is
now being used to house Syrian
refugees.
When the United States and
Australia began accepting refu-
gees, Hutchins’ family applied
to come to both countries. Her
mother, who had learned English
in college, helped hundreds of
others with their applications.
They got accepted to both,
and her family chose to live in
America. They moved to a small
town outside Seattle, where it
took her about two months to
learn English.
The transition was diffi cult,
Faced with unusual funding requests,
the Pendleton Development Commission
took unusual steps to approve them.
Neither the Pendleton Veterinary Clinic
nor the Pendleton Downtown Association
used one of the commission’s established
programs, but they still got at least some of
what they wanted, even if it took creating a
new program and an unusually close vote
to get it done.
The commission agreed to give the
Pendleton Veterinary Clinic a $100,000
grant to help build a new clinic on
Southwest Emigrant Avenue, between
First Community Credit Union and Papa
Murphy’s.
Clinic owner Fiona Hillenbrand already
has fi nancing in place for the $1 million
project and wants to purchase blighted
property across Emigrant and replace it
with new housing in the future.
In a presentation, Hillenbrand explained
that the Pendleton Veterinary Clinic had
outgrown its current building at 1901 S.W.
Court Ave., which was originally built in
1949.
The new 5,000-square-foot facility
would allow Hillenbrand to hire a new
veterinarian, two support staff and several
part-time employees, she said.
See HUTCHINS/8A
See PENDLETON/8A