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Friday, June 21, 2019
East Oregonian
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Walkout: Republican senators leave state as police are deployed
Continued from Page A1
an 18 to 12 majority in the
chamber, but need 20 mem-
bers present for a quorum.
“It’s time for the Senate
Republicans to show up and
do the job they were elected
to do,” Brown, a Democrat,
said at a news conference.
Republican
senators
appeared unfazed and ready
to dig in.
“Send bachelors and come
heavily armed,” Sen. Brian
Boquist, a Republican from
Dallas, said late Wednesday
as the prospect of a walkout
loomed. “I’m not going to
be a political prisoner in the
state of Oregon. It’s just that
simple.”
Boquist, who is reportedly
in Idaho, did not respond to
emails after the Senate presi-
dent publicly rebuked him for
the remarks.
This is the second time in
this legislative session that
minority GOP lawmakers
have used a walkout as a way
to slow the process. Demo-
crats have a rare supermajor-
ity in the House and Senate,
meaning Republicans don’t
have many ways to influence
the debate.
Republicans walked out
of the Senate last month to
block a school funding tax
package. The standoff lasted
four days, until the governor
struck a deal to table legisla-
tion on gun control and vac-
cine requirements.
Hansell said that the writ-
ten deal also included lan-
guage that there would be
a “reset” on cap and trade.
He said when Republicans
felt the deal had been nulli-
fied, with no real changes on
House Bill 2020, Sen. Cliff
Bentz spent several “intense”
hours negotiating a deal
with Brown’s chief of staff
Nik Blosser and Rep. Karin
Power, D-Milwaukie.
One of the most import-
ant aspects to Hansell was
taking out the bill’s emer-
gency clause in order to give
citizens time to put together
a ballot referendum, but he
said Bentz told him that was
a “nonstarter” for Power and
Blosser.
After Democratic lead-
ers rejected the deal that was
worked out shortly before
8 p.m., the Republican sena-
tors decided to go on strike.
“It’s a decision we didn’t
take lightly, and we tried to
avoid it,” Hansell said.
He said if the vote hadn’t
been coming up so quickly
they would have stayed to
continue negotiating, and
were still willing to nego-
tiate. They were also will-
ing to stay outside the state
until after the session was
constitutionally required to
end, however, if Democrats
wouldn’t budge.
The walkout tactic is rare,
but it has been used through-
out history. Abraham Lincoln
once leapt out of a window in
an attempt to deny a quorum
when he was a lawmaker in
Illinois.
In 2003, Texas Democrats
fled to neighboring Okla-
homa to deny a quorum, hol-
ing up in a Holiday Inn to
block a GOP redistricting
bill. The Democrats returned
to Texas after the bill’s dead-
line passed, and it was effec-
tively killed.
On Thursday, Oregon’s
Senate president pleaded with
Republicans to return.
“I beg and beseech my fel-
low legislators to come to the
floor. I need you, the Legisla-
ture needs you, the people of
Oregon need you to pass bud-
gets to take care of our citi-
zens,” Senate President Peter
Courtney said on the Senate
floor.
The walkout brings all
Senate business to a halt with
just over a week left in the leg-
islative session. Senators still
need to vote on the budget.
But the cap-and-trade leg-
islation remains a sticking
point.
Under the proposed bill,
Oregon would put an over-
all limit on greenhouse gas
emissions and auction off pol-
lution “allowances” for each
ton of carbon industries plan
to emit. The legislation would
lower that cap over time to
encourage businesses to move
away from fossil fuels: The
state would reduce emissions
to 45% below 1990 levels by
2035, and 80% below 1990
levels by 2050.
Those opposed to the cap-
and-trade plan say it would
exacerbate a growing divide
between the liberal, urban
parts of the state and the
rural areas. The plan would
increase the cost of fuel, dam-
aging small business, truckers
and the logging industry, they
say.
“Protesting cap and trade
by walking out today rep-
resents our constituency and
exactly how we should be
doing our job,” said Senate
Republican Leader Herman
Baertschiger, Jr., of Grants
Pass.
A small group of loggers
gathered to protest outside
the Capitol on Thursday.
Bridger Hasbrouck, a
32-year-old self-employed
logger from Dallas, said
the bill if passed would be
“devastating” to his busi-
ness because he uses diesel
fuel to power all his logging
equipment.
“There’s a whole lot
involved but the biggest thing
that’s very crippling is the fact
that these bills would impose
regulations that would take
trucks off the road that peo-
ple are using to earn their liv-
ing,” he said.
Democrats say the mea-
sure is an efficient way to
lower emissions while invest-
ing in low-income and rural
communities’ ability to adapt
to climate change. It has
the support of environmen-
tal groups, farmworkers and
some trade unions.
The proposal also con-
tains a $10 million invest-
ment to protect workers
adversely affected by climate
change policy.
“‘Rural’ here is not one
voice,” said Mimi Casteel,
a farmer in rural Hopewell,
Oregon. “This is not just
about gas prices — this is
about the future of humanity.”
California has had for a
decade an economy-wide,
cap-and-trade policy like the
one Oregon is considering.
Nine northeastern states have
more limited cap-and-trade
programs that target only the
power sector.
East Oregonian reporter
Jade McDowell contributed
to this story.
Health: Agencies work together to keep public, firefighters safe during fire season
Continued from Page A1
ral disaster is far from pre-
dictable. Ryan Miller, acting
assistant district forester for
Oregon Department of For-
estry in Prineville, said the
2019 fire season theme is an
emphasis on firefighter and
public safety.
“No matter what, no fire
is worth someone’s life.
You’ll be hearing this mes-
sage from us throughout the
season,” he said.
Safety means attacking
fires from safe areas, evac-
uating people when fire
risks their homes, comply-
ing with burn bans and other
fire restrictions and reduc-
ing hazardous fuels around
homes.
“There are ways peo-
ple can modify their activ-
ity,” Miller said. “By creat-
ing space around homes and
structures you not only protect
the property, but also the lives
Wash.
Mont.
Ore.
Idaho
Wyo.
Calif.
Nev.
Utah
Ariz.
Above normal
wildfire conditions
Source: National Interagency Fire Center
Alan Kenaga/Capital Press
of the fire fighters.”
Land and fire manag-
ers have been working with
homeowners to reduce the risk
of loss to wildfires for many
years, but a newer threat to
firefighter safety and suppres-
sion efforts are drones run by
hobbyists and journalists hop-
ing to get aerial photos of an
Projected
wildland fire
potential,
July 2019
The areas marked in red
indicate a greater than usual
likelihood that significant
wildland fires will occur.
active wildfire.
“It’s been a big problem
— a lot of people are flying
them,” Miller said. “If we see
them, we will shut down all
operations immediately until
the air is clear and safe.”
As the cost of drones has
come down, their use has
increased. Miller said in 2017
there were 36 encounters with
drones on wildfires, down
from 41 in 2016. He said fly-
ing a drone during a wild-
fire is illegal and subject to a
large fine or mandatory court
appearance.
Also affecting health and
safety, yet not as easy to
manage, is air quality.
“Smoke
management
and air quality have been
big topics the last fire sea-
sons,” Miller said. “Right
now, we are seeing quite a
bit of smoke from northern
Alberta.”
People try to mitigate
smoke during summer inver-
sions by wearing bandanas
or dust masks over their
faces, but Miller said they
do not work. He suggested
people where masks recom-
mended by the Environmen-
tal Protection Agency rated
“M95” or “P100” to limit
some particulate matter from
entering into the lungs.
Smoke from wildfires
is monitored by the state’s
Department of Environmen-
tal Quality. The agency has
monitors all over the state
called nephelometers that
feed data into an online pro-
gram. The website tracks air
quality every hour of the day
for each of the sites listed on
an interactive map.
Oregon Department of
Forestry meteorologist Nick
Yonker said the agency is
setting up more nephelome-
ters this summer so his staff
can monitor the effects of
wildfire and decide if pre-
scribed fire or field burn-
ing is prudent based on air
quality.
Air quality indices are
estimates based on the amount
of particulate matter in the
atmosphere like ozone, nitro-
gen dioxide or sulfur dioxide.
These particulates, in large
amounts, can get deep into the
lungs and impair cardiovas-
cular functions. Today, every
monitor in Oregon is report-
ing good air quality. During
fire season, the air quality can
change quickly when smoke
settles in from all over the
West.
“When the air is kinda
hazy and you don’t see the
mountains, that’s a moder-
ate level of air quality and it
could have an impact if some-
one has asthma or other car-
diopulmonary issues,” Yon-
ker said.
Once the air qual-
ity reaches the third level,
“unhealthy for sensitive
groups,” people with lung ail-
ments are encouraged to stay
inside and should have air fil-
tration. Healthier people can
handle bad air quality into
the “unhealthy” and even the
“very unhealthy” stages, but
are encouraged to stay inside
and use air filtration by the
time it reaches the highest
level of “hazardous.”
Bees: Men tend hives behind razor wire
Continued from Page A1
EO File Photo
Milton-Freewater School District superintendent Rob Clark talks about the passing of the
school bond at a ground breaking ceremony for the new Gib Olinger Elementary School in
May 2017 in Milton-Freewater. Clark counted the bond and the new school it resulted in as
one of the highlights of his tenure at the district.
Clark: M-F superintendent resigns
Continued from Page A1
East Oregonian Thursday,
Clark explained why he
was leaving Eastern Oregon
for Washington’s Olympic
Peninsula.
Clark said he already
owns a condominium in the
area and the move would put
them closer to him and his
wife’s families.
Additionally, he spent 28
years of his career in Wash-
ington before relocating to
Milton-Freewater and he’d
like to work at least two
more years in Washington
for retirement purposes.
Clark admitted his depar-
ture comes late in public
education’s hiring season,
but his soon-to-be prede-
cessor took a job outside the
K-12 system and he didn’t
announce his resignation
until early May.
“I’m ready to start my
new adventure,” he said.
For the school board’s
part, it doesn’t seem to be
sweating the prospect of
finding a new leader in a
short time frame.
“We’ll look at what we
want, and during this com-
ing year we’ll probably have
an interim superintendent,”
Milton-Freewater School
Board President Duane
Geyer told the Union -Bul-
letin. “We’ll let the dust set-
tle so we can have multiple
options. We’re not required
to look outside the district,
or we can. I think it’s great
when someone can come up
through the system. We’re in
good shape.”
The school board will
hold a special meeting June
24 to discuss the transition
period.
With Clark set to depart
from the district on July
3, he can now put his time
in Milton-Freewater in
perspective.
Clark said the highlight
of his tenure with the district
was passing a $12.5 million
bond in 2016, a development
that built Milton-Freewater’s
first new school in nearly a
century.
The district was aided by
$19 million in state and pri-
vate grants that were con-
tingent on the bond passing,
but supporters were still try-
ing to convince a voter base
that hadn’t approved a bond
since 1982 and had rejected
multiple attempts since that
time.
Once the bond passed,
the district was able to ren-
ovate all of its schools and
completely reconfigure its
elementary schools.
The bond funded the
construction of Gib Olinger
Elementary School, a mul-
tistory building that serves
K-3.
With so many students
being moved to Gib Olinger,
the district was able to
demolish Grove Elementary
School and put a sports com-
plex in its place and repur-
pose Freewater Elementary
School for other programs.
Clark said he was also
proud that he was able to
raise the number of Latino
teachers and the district’s
academic performance.
In a district where more
than half of the students
identify as Hispanic or
Latino, 16% of Milton-Free-
water’s faculty was con-
sidered “racially/ethnically
diverse” in 2017-18 up from
10% in 2013-14, according
to the 2018 Oregon Educator
Equity Report.
beekeepers only has two
hives, this was a blow.
The program started
three months ago with eight
inmates. Peters, EOCI’s
inmate work program coor-
dinator, agreed to guide the
novice beekeepers though he
himself had little experience
in tending bees. Fortunately
Peters is a quick study.
“We’re all learning together
as we go,” he said prior to a
recent classroom session.
Peters isn’t a guy who dis-
courages easily. He used the
disappearance of the queen as
another lesson in bee behavior.
The men learned about
what happens to the worker
bees when a queen leaves a
hive. One of the students read
aloud from his beekeeper’s
handbook.
“When a colony loses its
queen … some workers may
start to lay eggs,” he read.
“Since they are incapable of
mating, their eggs will be
infertile. Therefore the popu-
lation of a hive that has laying
workers will slowly decline.”
To head off inevitable
doom, the men would spend
the latter part of the ses-
sion combining their queen-
less colony with their other
hive, which has a queen, but
is relatively weak in numbers.
The men watched a video
about how to accomplish the
maneuver.
“I’ll be talking you through
it,” Peters said. “We’re going
to make some bees angry
today.”
Joining two beehives is a
delicate operation. You don’t
just dump a queenless colony
of bees into another hive like
a group of unwelcome guests.
Peters and five of his bee-
keepers donned bee suits, got
a smoker and headed out to the
hives, which sat on a concrete
pad surrounded by chain-
link fence. The other students
looked on.
Patrick Gazely-Romney
and Antonio Ledesma fired
up the smoker to help calm the
bees during the process. They
wafted smoke into the queen-
less hive and opened it up,
removing frames filled with
bees and shaking them off.
The idea was to consolidate
them onto fewer frames.
The beekeepers removed
the covers of the intact hive
and placed halves of the
doomed hive on each end.
In between, the men placed
pages of the “New York Times”
sports section.
“The bees will gradually
chew through the newspaper
until the colonies unite. The
paper slows the process so
the two colonies can become
accustomed to each other, and
by the time they actually unite
they will behave as a single
colony,” Peters said. “The
pheromones of the queen will
suppress the laying worker
and we will have — hopefully
— a good strong colony.”
One of the beekeepers,
Anthony McDougald calmly
watched the action from the
other side of the chainlink
fence. He said he doesn’t feel
anxious around the bees.
“I listen to the hum of
the bees. It relaxes me,” he
said. “If you’re upset, they’re
upset.”
When the mission was
accomplished, the men
walked back to the classroom.
Only time would tell whether
they had succeeded.
More than 100 men applied
for this program. Peters said
the students will work to
earn their apprentice bee-
keeping certification. Other
shops on the prison campus
provide support for the bee-
keepers. The carpenter shop
built hives, the grounds crew
planted flowers and the metal
shop fabricated tools.
The men seem taken with
their new vocation.
“It’s a good opportunity to
do something positive,” said
David Saucedo. “It’s some-
thing to take with me.”
One of the beekeepers,
Jonathan Montes, frets over
the future of bees which
serve as the world’s pollina-
tors. He urged people to “plant
bee-friendly flowers in their
yards.” He said the bee train-
ing gives him motivation and
he plans to continue beekeep-
ing on the outside after his
release.
“This program has helped
me stay on track,” Montes
said. “It keeps me in a positive
mind frame and focused on
getting out.”
Last week, Peters’ men-
tor, Hermiston beekeeper
Jan Lohman, inspected the
combined hive and delivered
some bad news.
“Her diagnosis was that
the combination was a fail-
ure — the laying workers
killed the queen,” Peters said.
“Our hopes for that hive now
rest on a single capped queen
cell; we’re hoping they raise
it to maturity and she is able
to successfully mate and take
over the hive.”
The outlook isn’t good
though, he admitted.
“Jan
was
pessimis-
tic enough that she donated
another colony to us in an
act of tremendous generos-
ity,” Peters said. “We placed
it last Wednesday, and will
be checking on it this coming
week.”
He remains staunchly
optimistic. His guys learned
plenty after their queen bee
flew off into the sunset.
They gain knowledge every
time they run across a new
scenario.
And their luck hasn’t been
all bad.
“We’ve been doing this for
three months,” he said, “and
have yet to have someone
stung.”
———
Contact Kathy Aney at
kaney@eastoregonian.com or
541-966-0810.