Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 21, 2019)
OFF PAGE ONE Saturday, September 21, 2019 East Oregonian A11 Health care: Kitzhaber addresses concerns at health care summit Continued from Page A1 question. We’ve been ask- ing about the subsidies and who pays,” he said. “Instead we should be asking, ‘Why does health care cost so much in the first place?’” He said price points in the U.S. are higher than most anywhere else in the world. “Why?” he asked the group. Kitzhaber ticked off sev- eral reasons. Private equity investors are buying up the most profitable parts of the system, driving up costs. Insurance companies have cut eligibility and lowered reimbursement rates. The national debt increases to pay for hikes in Medicare and Medicaid costs. “The insured uninsured” have $5,000 deductibles and “don’t really have insurance at all,” he quipped. “Cost shifting is the way we avoid confronting reality.” One way out, he said, is funding health care from a specific pot of money indexed to a sustainable growth rate. “That’s exactly what we’re trying to do in Oregon with the CCOs,” Kitzhaber said. In 2009, as a state sena- tor, Kitzhaber helped pio- neer the Oregon Health Plan. He later helped birth the state’s system of 15 coordinated care organiza- tions, locally governed net- works of health care pro- viders who deliver care to the state’s most vulnera- ble residents. The idea is to focus on prevention to get people healthy, reduce vis- Staff photo by Kathy Aney Former Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber chats with Chuck Hoffmann after speaking about health care delivery in Oregon on Thursday at the EOCCO Clinician & Staff Summit in Hermiston. its to expensive emergency rooms and lower costs. The EOCCO serves Umatilla, Morrow and 10 other East- ern Oregon counties. During the first five years, some CCOs per- formed better than others, but the state saved more than $1 billion. There were bumps, too, including the Cover Oregon disaster, and the state’s Affordable Care Act insurance exchange website designed by Ora- cle Corp., which failed spectacularly. Kitzhaber is unhappy with recent reforms to Ore- gon health care, which he called CCO 2.0. Last week, he sent a letter to Gov. Kate Brown, House Speaker Tina Kotek and Senate President Peter Courtney to weigh in on two developments he considers especially worrisome. He opposes new report- ing requirements that will force CCOs to hire more personnel, increase costs and “appeared to have been copied and pasted from the current insurance code.” “I am concerned that this increase in rules, reg- ulations and reporting will be particularly burdensome on smaller rural CCOs which have become import- ant community assets,” he wrote. The reforms, intended to increase over- sight, may squelch the abil- ity of locally based CCOs to operate. “These provisions and others appear to retreat from the community model based on local control and a sense of local ownership in favor of a more punitive top-down approach,” he wrote. Kitzhaber also objects to the state granting Trillium Community Health, owned by Fortune 500 company Centene Corp., to contract to administer the Oregon Health Plan in Clackamas, Multnomah and Washing- ton counties, in addition to Lane County, which it already administers. The governor said Ore- gon has much to lose if the CCO model goes south, including 30 years of col- laboration and a chance to pioneer health care policy for the country as a whole. “If we lose this model, we lose the opportunity to steer the national debate,” he said. “Right now, the model is in question.” Kitzhaber resigned in 2015 under a cloud as the FBI investigated his fiance and first lady, Cylvia Hayes, for influence peddling. He left office barely a month into his fourth term as governor. Still, Kitzhaber remains a strong voice in the world of health care reform policy. A health policy pub- lication called “State of Reform” recently quoted Kitzhaber comparing him- self to Don Quixote during a private dinner in Wash- ington, D.C., where he goes frequently to talk about health care reform. “I think of these trips as ‘Don Quixote goes to Washington,’” he said. “Health care reform is probably my windmill.” Smoke: Planning commission approved application 8 days after arrest Continued from Page A1 charging Thurman. “I don’t anticipate, based on the initial conversation I had with the district attor- ney, that Mr. Thurman, in any way, shape or form, will have his ability to open and operate a dispensary be compromised,” he said. Both the city and the Ore- gon Liquor Control Com- mission need to approve the building and the owner before a marijuana busi- ness can start operating, but Thurman said the 2017 arrest wasn’t an impedi- ment to getting approval from both agencies. Thurman pleaded guilty to possession of mari- juana and careless driv- ing and pleaded no con- test to driving under the influence of intoxicants in Wasco County in 2012, but the case was dismissed in Staff photo by Ben Lonergan Signs outside of Thur’s Smoke Shop at 502 S.E. 16th St. in Pendleton advertise the newly opened business. Staff photo by Ben Lonergan Bryson Thurman poses for a portrait in his business, Thur’s Smoke Shop, on Thursday afternoon in Pendleton. The new- ly opened location is located at 502 S.E. 16th Street. 2014 when he completed a drug and alcohol treatment program. The other thing that delayed the opening of the new Thur’s was relatively mundane in comparison to the BENT arrest. Thurman decided to have the new Thur’s facility built from Wine: Milton-Freewater will use grant money to hire California firm Continued from Page A1 want to help our agricul- ture-based economy and make it possible for those who produce wine and grapes in the Rocks Dis- trict of Milton-Freewater to get the recognition they deserve.” Hall credited the city’s partnership with Wallowa Valley Vineyards, a winery that owns 36 acres in Mil- ton-Freewater’s Rocks Dis- trict, a designated American Viticultural Area. “We’ve had this vision for close to 10 years and have been trying to turn it into a reality for a long time,” Hall said. Willamette Valley Vine- yard’s farm in Milton-Free- water has the space to house the proposed facil- ity and Business Oregon, and according to Christine Clair, the winery’s direc- tor, Business Oregon pre- fers to invest in projects that has private business involvement. “The facility would be a huge help building a destina- tion and cluster of wineries in Milton-Freewater, a really special wine growing area,” she said. It’s the cobble-strewn soil that makes it such a special wine growing area, Clair said. The only area with a similar soil type, she said, is in France. “The special cobblestones right at the soil are good for the vines and Syrah grows exceptionally well in this,” Clair said. “For the Walla Walla Valley, some of the highest-scored wine comes from this appellation.” If the market assessment, conducted by Tincknell and Tincknell of California is favorable, Clair said the cost savings would go beyond sharing a building, but could include sharing equipment, like a wine press. “To invest in a press that costs $150,000 is big expense for a boutique win- ery, but if six to 10 wine makers go in on one it makes it much more feasible,” Clair said. The facility would do more than make getting into the wine business more affordable, but would also highlight wine made in Ore- gon that is often marketed and sold as Washington wine. The partnership was a good match for the city and Willamette Valley Vine- yards. The city needed pri- vate business involvement and helps the winery reach what Clair called “economy of scale” much faster with the intent to rent out part of the proposed facility. Part of the grant fund- ing pays for design work to be completed by Steve Mar- tin and Associates. Clair said the company is a highly reputable architecture and engineering design firm. She said if all looks favor- able when the studies are completed next Septem- ber, Willamette Valley will begin a five-year timeline to raise money and com- plete construction. Though it is too soon to discuss cap- ital financing, Clair said the way her winery has raised money in the past has been selling shares in the com- pany to local community members. She said that is how Willamette Valley Vineyards raised the capital to plant two fields of vines in the Walla Walla Valley when they first got started. “We have the ability to fundraise with people who love wine and their community,” Clair said. “When you are the owner of something, you want to support the business and help them succeed.” the ground up, and he said delays from the contractor pushed back the opening. Thurman’s encounter with BENT wasn’t the only obstacle he faced toward opening his pot shop. Thurman originally applied for a conditional use permit from the city in February 2017, around the same time that Pendleton’s other three cannabis stores — Pendleton Cannabis, Kind Leaf Pendleton, and High Desert Cannabis — sought to open their doors. But the initial proposed location for the Thur’s dis- pensary, 1292 S.W. Tutu- illa Road, drew opposition from residential neighbors, nearby businesses, and the Pendleton School District. Thur’s secured approval from the Pendleton Plan- ning Commission, but after opponents appealed the decision, he withdrew his application and set his sights on a former parking lot for the old St. Anthony Hospital building on South- west Court. The planning commis- sion approved Thur’s con- ditional use application on May 25, 2017, eight days after Thurman’s arrest. With Thur’s now open, Thurman said he’s now focused on finding his niche in Pendleton’s burgeoning pot market. Despite not doing any advertising ahead of the opening, Thurman said business has been strong in its opening week. Special: Hansell thinks death penalty rule change should be left to voters Continued from Page A1 They may well have had the votes to change it.” Either way, he said, he was in favor of holding a special session to correct the part of the bill that made it retroactive. Hansell credited Floyd Prozanski, D-Eugene, a sen- ator who chairs the Judiciary Committee behind the bill, for working to get a special session organized. An Aug. 15 letter from the Oregon District Attor- ney’s Association urged Prozanski and Rep. Jenni- fer Williamson, D-Portland, to call a special session after the DOJ declared the bill retroactive. “This law is a failure on multiple levels — a failure to respect the will of vot- ers, a failure to draft a clear law for Oregon’s most dan- gerous criminals, and a fail- ure of trust by telling voters it is not retroactive when the opposite is true,” the letter said. The ODAA also sug- gested that six of the current 31 death row inmates in Ore- gon would be considered for aggravated murder prosecu- tion under the new law. Prozanski and Hansell both expressed concern over the families of victims who might be affected by the retroactivity. Hansell said there was widespread bipartisan sup- port in the Senate to hold the session, and that he thought there was support among both parties in the House as well. “It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to fix this, but there were people who were unwilling. I thought there was support on the House side. I don’t know if the gov- ernor was dodging it,” he said. Prozanski agreed that Senate was ready to make the quick change in a special session on Sept. 27, two days before the bill is set to go into effect. But he didn’t think it was Brown’s fault that the session never happened. “The Senate, as far as I’m concerned, stepped up to the issue that needed to be taken care of,” Prozanski said. “From my perspective, the reason it couldn’t go forward because the House was play- ing politics.” Prozanski said he thought Monday’s republican leader- ship shakeup, which resulted in the election of Rep. Chris- tine Drazan, R-Canby, as minority leader, was the reason the House couldn’t convince Brown there was enough support to hold quick and easy special session. “We tried and we just weren’t able to convince her and her caucus to say yes,” Prozanski said of Drazan. “I personally encouraged Brown to bring us in any- way. I can also understand that when you call a spe- cial session, there are some things that can happen.” Rep. Greg Smith, R-Hep- pner, said he didn’t think a special session was neces- sarily on the table in the first place, although he would have liked to see the bill amended. “We heard rumors about the special session, but I never heard from leadership that it was a go,” he said. Smith said he thinks vot- ers will petition to over- haul the legislation. Hansell said he is hopeful, but hasn’t heard any evidence that this will happen. “There’s always that option. There’s been no effort because everyone assumed that legislature can fix it. Now that we’re not moving in that direction, I would think there’s certainly a possibility,” Hansell said.
