WILDFIRES: Local firefighters return home after nine days on Eagle Creek PAGE 2A
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2017
141st Year, No. 237
One dollar
WINNER OF THE 2017 ONPA GENERAL EXCELLENCE AWARD
HERMISTON
Franchise
fees hiked
to pay
for street
projects
Average resident
will pay $48.72
annually to fund
improvements
By JADE MCDOWELL
East Oregonian
Hermiston residents
will see an increase in
their bills that will add
more than $400,000 to
the city’s street repair
fund.
The council voted
Monday to raise franchise
fees, part of an agreement
that various companies
selling electricity, natural
gas, cable television,
telephone landlines and
internet have made with
the city in exchange for
placing cables and wires
in the city’s right of way.
Assistant city manager
Mark Morgan estimated
the increases — in most
cases from 3 percent to 5
percent — will increase
the average Hermiston
resident’s electric bill by
about $1.70 per month.
Other impacts are harder
to estimate, he said,
because not all house-
holds pay for things like
cable or natural gas, but
it should average out to
about $2.36 a month per
resident for everything
else combined.
Total, the impact will
be about $48.72 per year
for the average Herm-
iston resident.
The move will raise an
estimated $413,000 per
year for street projects.
Currently the city’s
total budget for street
improvements is about
$200,000 per year. At
that rate, Morgan said,
it would take the city 59
years to complete its top
seven capital improve-
ment projects if it stopped
spending money on any
maintenance.
“Obviously,
with
inflation as it is, we would
never actually catch up,”
he said.
With the extra money
from the franchise fees,
in addition to an antic-
ipated $400,000 a year
from the gas tax increase
passed by the legislature
this summer, Morgan said
that timeline shrinks to
more like 11 years.
The city’s five-year
capital improvement plan
for streets, which the
city council also passed
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
Calf roper Stetson Vest of Childress, Texas, says his parents’ choice for his name originated from their love of the Stetson brand.
Destined to rodeo
With names like Stetson, Tuf, Cash and Speed,
it’s no wonder these men grew up to be cowboys
Turns out yes, in most cases. They’re
not stage names; they’re going by what
their folks called them and what it says on
their birth certificate.
What’s in a name?
That’s true of Stetson Vest, a tie-down
A lot, depending on who you ask.
Though it’s still widely debated, some roper from Childress, Texas, who will
researchers swear that our names have compete Wednesday in the Pendleton
an influence on the choices we make — Round-Up Arena. His name is a product
everything from who we marry to what of his parents’ appreciation for the famous
hat brand — a company that
we wear to what careers we
filed bankruptcy a year after
pursue. Scientists call it the
Stetson’s birth.
implicit-egotism effect: We
More inside
“My parents sort of
tend to gravitate toward the
• Tough Enough
didn’t want to name me that
things that most resemble
to Wear Pink,
anymore, but they were stuck
us. The Romans called it
Children’s Rodeo
with it,” he said. Ultimately,
nomen est omen: Our name
coming Thursday
he’s glad.
is our destiny.
to Round-Up 3A
Stetson grew up with a
Old West celebrities and
• Slack kicks off
rope
in hand, and people
showmen may have been
107 th Pendleton
always told him that with
privy to that logic when they
Round-Up 1B
a name like his, he’d have
shook their common names
no choice but to become a
for flashier, suggestive
champion cowboy.
aliases. Greats like Buffalo
“It was kind of meant to be,” he said.
Bill (William Frederick Cody), Black
Bart (Charles E. Boles) and Calamity “Names go along with personalities and
Jane (Martha Jane Cannary) replaced lifestyles.”
Having come from a long line huge
their honest monikers to attract attention,
avoid the law or reflect a lifelong nick- tie-down ropers didn’t hurt. His grand-
father, Clifton Smith, was a two-time
name.
So what about rodeo cowboys? Are National Finals Rodeo qualifier. His uncle
those western-perfect names on your
See NAMES/8A
Round-Up program the real deal?
By EMILY OLSON
East Oregonian
“It was kind of meant to be.
Names go along with personalities and lifestyles.”
— Stetson Vest, tie-down roper from Childress, Texas
EO file photo
Brooke Taynton of Canyon City signs her autograph on the
inside of professional bronc rider Bobby Mote’s hat out-
side of Hamley’s in Pendleton in 2013.
End of the rodeo trail
for Bobby Mote
By KATHY ANEY
East Oregonian
After terrorists flew planes
into the twin towers in 2001,
Americans reeled in disbelief
and shock. They struggled to
get back to everyday life.
For bareback rider Bobby
Mote that meant climbing
onto wild broncs for crazy,
corkscrewing eight-second
rides. A couple of days
after 9/11 at the Pendleton
Round-Up, the cowboy
settled himself onto a restless
brute named Broadway. He
remembers Toby Keith’s
“The American Way” coming
through the speakers.
Then came an ear-splitting
roar that cut Toby off in
mid-bar.
“Two jets did a fly-over,”
Mote recalled. “They flew in
low and loud. It made the hair
on the back of my neck stand
up.”
See MOTE/8A
See FEES/6A
Unique vendors look for Round-Up niche
Zipline operator, antler artisan and
cowboy masseuse try to lasso customers
By ANTONIO SIERRA
East Oregonian
Staff photo by Kathy Aney
Lisa Porter cruises down a zip line operated by her family. The ride is located in a
gravel lot on Southwest Court Place between Oxford Suites and Wal-Mart.
During the second full
week of September in
Pendleton, the cowboy hats,
leather boots and food carts
come out in force.
But amongst the legion of
Western apparel booths and
snack shacks, some vendors
are selling a very different
type of product.
At one new pop-up
business in an empty lot near
Wal-Mart, country music
blares over the loud speakers
and some of the workers are
wearing cowboy hats. But
rodeo atmosphere isn’t the
main draw. Late Monday
afternoon, four customers
pay Porter Family Entertain-
ment for a chance to climb a
ride a zipline from a 25-foot
tower the business erected on
the graveled lot.
The customers bumped
fists and took videos during
their descent before gently
landing at the bottom, gently
jostling the tower as they
wait to be unharnessed.
Standing at the top of the
tower, Caleb Porter joked
that customers were getting
an authentic rodeo smell,
referencing the empty horse
See VENDORS/8A