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THURSDAY, AUGUST 31, 2017
141st Year, No. 228
WINNER OF THE 2017 ONPA GENERAL EXCELLENCE AWARD
BOARDMAN
One dollar
STANFIELD
School board
spreads bond
back payment
over two years
Residents will see 1.78 percent
increase in their property taxes
By JAYATI RAMAKRISHNAN
East Oregonian
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
Grace, 3, and Cora Schoerfelder, 2, look at wooden cars at a play station in a classroom Wednesday during a ribbon cutting cere-
mony for the Neal Early Learning Center in Boardman. Grace Schoenfelder will be attending class at the learning center this fall.
Neal Early Learning Center opens
Collaborative project
finished in two years
The Stanfi eld School Board voted
at a special meeting on Wednesday to
re-issue a $636,866 levy for the 2017-
2018 fi scal year.
The decision came after the district
received backlash for a recently-dis-
covered error in levying taxes to pay
off a school bond. The district sent out a
letter last week informing residents that
they had been collecting too little for
a bond that paid for a new elementary
school nearly 20 years ago, and that
they would be increasing residents’
property taxes for the next fi scal year
to compensate.
After receiving criticism from
community members, the board met
with auditors and Paul Chalmers, the
county assessor, to re-assess the amount
they would levy. The board determined
it could spread the payments out over
two years so that taxpayers will pay the
difference in smaller increments than
initially announced.
Six Stanfi eld residents were present
at the meeting. Each told board
members they had been shocked by
See TAXES/8A
By JAYATI RAMAKRISHNAN
East Oregonian
PENDLETON
The Neal Early Learning
Center will serve as a hub for
teaching
Morrow
County’s
youngest residents, but for those
who envisioned the center it’s
much more than that.
“We’re incubating minds,”
said Kathy Neal on Wednesday,
making some opening remarks at
the new facility’s ribbon cutting.
“It’s designed and dedicated to
nurture every child in the county.”
The center, a collaborative
effort between the Port of Morrow,
InterMountain Education Service
District, the Morrow County
School District and Umatil-
la-Morrow Head Start, stands at
the Port of Morrow in Boardman,
adjacent to the Sage Center and
Blue Mountain Community
College’s Workforce Training
Center. Representatives from
all those organizations spoke at
the event, praising the resolve of
those groups to get the project up
and running. State Representative
City makes
housing pitch
to developers
Offi cials tout seller’s market,
workforce at convention
By ANTONIO SIERRA
East Oregonian
have passed Bonneville Dam,
According to city offi cials, Pendleton
has approximately 1,109 acres of land
available for housing development.
How those acres could be developed
to boost Pendleton’s housing stock is an
open question.
The city convened its fi rst Pendleton
Housing Convention at the convention
center Wednesday to attempt to answer
some of those questions.
Mayor John Turner, who also
chairs the city’s housing committee,
explained to the audience of about 90
developers, landowners and govern-
ment offi cials that a 2016 housing study
commissioned by the city showed that
Pendleton needs 125 more rental units
and 90 for-sale units.
But whether its Pendleton’s uneven
topography, its rocky soil, a lack of
utilities or other factors, building
affordable housing in Pendleton won’t
be an easy task.
The market
Having worked in Pendleton real
estate since 1994, Jef Farley of Coldwell
Banker Whitney & Associates has expe-
rience with the local real estate market.
Farley said Pendleton is currently
a seller’s market — it would take 3.8
months for all the current homes for sale
on the market to sell. A balanced market
is set at fi ve months.
Pendleton is especially lacking in
modern housing. Farley calculated
that only 2 percent of the city’s current
housing market is comprised of
three-bedroom/two-bathroom homes
with a garage built within the past
decade.
Although the rental market is just as
tight, Farley said Pendleton is a wide-
open market for new housing develop-
ments compared to more competitive
areas like the Tri-Cities.
Greg Galloway has a few coals in
See FISH/8A
See HOUSING/8A
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
The Neal Early Learning Center is a collaborative effort between the Port of Morrow, InterMountain
Education Service District, the Morrow County School District and Umatilla-Morrow Head Start.
Greg Smith, who helped get state
funding for the project, was also
present.
“Innovation in the education
world can be slow, and very
methodical,” Neal said. “Not in this
case. It took two years at the most.
That’s unheard of for a ground-up
project — it’s lightning-fast.”
Neal and her husband Gary,
See NEAL/8A
“We’re years out before we will know the actual difference it makes,
but it will make an immediate difference in kids’ lives.”
— Kathy Neal, proposed the idea of an early learning center to IMESD in 2015
Bag limits lowered for summer steelhead
Fish counts down
at Bonneville Dam
By GEORGE PLAVEN
East Oregonian
Low projected returns mean
anglers can expect to keep fewer
summer steelhead on the Grande
Ronde and Imnaha rivers when the
season opens Friday.
The Oregon Department of Fish
& Wildlife announced Tuesday it
has lowered the bag limit to one
fi sh per day on both tributaries.
The mainstem Snake River,
meanwhile, has been limited to
catch and release only, mirroring
regulations implemented earlier
this month in Idaho.
Summer steelhead returns have
AP fi le photo
This undated photo shows a steelhead caught in the Rogue River
near Central Point.
been historically low so far in
2017. As of Monday, only 70,000
hatchery and 25,000 wild steelhead