OFF PAGE ONE
Thursday, December 17, 2020
East Oregonian
A7
Updates: 10 flood-related projects
Continued from Page A1
against COVID-19 at Leg-
acy Emanuel Medical Cen-
ter in North Portland, mak-
ing the state the 49th in
the country to do so after
receiving its first ship-
ments on Monday, Dec. 14.
At least 3 million Orego-
nians are planned to receive
the Pfizer-BioNTech vac-
cine in the next six to nine
months, with the Moderna
vaccine also expected to be
approved by the Food and
Drug Administration.
The vaccine is a two-step
process, and after receiving
the first dose, Oregonians
can expect to make a sec-
ond appointment to receive
a final dose 21 days later.
Yellowhawk
officials
said in the Dec. 15 press
release it is expecting
weekly shipments to begin
January 2021, although it
added that the demand for
the vaccine is high and the
Indian Health Service will
ultimately determine when
doses will be distributed.
Ben Lonergan/East Oregonian
Cans of food fill donation bins outside of the Hermiston
Community Center on Saturday, Dec. 5, 2020.
Ben Lonergan/East Oregonian, File
A bridge in Thorn Hollow bows as the Umatilla River rises below it on Feb. 6, 2020.
Hermiston police
collect about 90%
of nonperishable
food than normal
Seeking additional
funding for Thorn
Hollow Bridge
Also on the agenda for
the Dec. 16 meeting was
the discussion of the Thorn
Hollow Bridge, which was
left impassable by the rag-
ing waters that flooded the
Umatilla Indian Reserva-
tion and Umatilla County in
February.
Officials from Umatilla
County and CTUIR decided
in the meeting that they
would jointly send a mes-
sage to the Northwest Con-
gressional delegation, Gov.
Kate Brown’s office and
Oregon lawmakers for addi-
tional funding and support.
Tom Fellows, the coun-
ty’s public works direc-
tor, said the county has
made little progress on the
bridge because it does not
qualify for federal high-
ways funding. He added
that the county has yet to
reach an agreement with
the Oregon Department of
Transportation.
“I can’t tell you when
I’m going to expect that. I’ll
By JADE MCDOWELL
East Oregonian
Ben Lonergan/East Oregonian, File
Rock that once made up the bank of the Umatilla River eroded, leaving the road surface
along Bingham Road in rural Umatilla County dangerously damaged in early February.
expect it when I see it come
across my desk,” he said.
County
Commis-
sioner Murdock said he
has reached out “a number
of times” to Oregon Sen.
Ron Wyden’s office seek-
ing assistance on the bridge,
but he has not received a
response. So, he proposed
in the meeting the joint mes-
sage between the county
and tribal leadership.
Attaining funding and
support becomes especially
dire as the CTUIR and
county prepares for flood
season. Chuck Sams said
the tribe is still waiting to
receive relief from the Fed-
eral Emergency Manage-
ment Agency from 2019.
Fellows also said he
doesn’t know when the
county can expect funding
from FEMA for past flood-
ing either.
“Honestly, we haven’t
even scratched the sur-
face of the paperwork yet,”
he said. “We can’t seem to
get through their maze of
paperwork and requests to
even start thinking about
getting a bill into them for
anything. It’s pretty much
an insane operation to deal
with.”
Fellows said there are
10 projects the county is
approaching in regards to
the floods.
Umatilla tribal leader
Jeremy Wolf encouraged
another joint effort between
county and tribal leadership
to seek financial support
from outside organizations.
Officials are planning to
hold more meetings in the
next few months with the
city of Pendleton and other
organizations to plan efforts
toward flood mitigation.
Games: ‘Families are coming together again’
Continued from Page A1
games has spiked.
“We’ve seen a surge in
sales for games across the
board,” Aichele said. “A lot
of family games are doing
really well. All those clas-
sics we all grew up with have
seen an uptick.”
The store’s cashiers ring
up sales of a long list of other
games too: Ticket to Ride,
CodeNames, Catan, Betrayal
at House on the Hill, 7 Won-
ders, Azul and even the aptly
named Pandemic.
In the latter game, play-
ers can save humanity in 45
minutes or less. Or not. Play-
ers, as medics, researchers
or scientists, frantically tra-
verse the world to treat out-
breaks and find cures. If they
succeed, humanity survives.
If not, the worst comes to
pass.
At the Walla Walla
store, games and puzzles
sold briskly even during a
state-mandated shutdown.
The store continued to fill
call-in orders that were
picked up curbside.
The games and puz-
zles flew off the shelf more
quickly than anticipated.
“I usually do a big order
once a year from my various
distributors,” Aichele said.
“In April, we had to restock.”
By that time, suppliers
had run short. The game
Wingspan, for instance,
wasn’t to be had.
Sales of chess sets shot
up too, but that may owe less
to the pandemic and more
to the series “The Queen’s
Gambit,” which premiered in
mid-October on Netflix.
At
the
Pendleton
Walmart, game and puz-
zle sales are outpacing
last year’s. Store manager
Shawna Nulf marveled at the
popularity of a game called
Pendleton-Opoly,
which
plays like the traditional
game of Monopoly but uses
Christmas
Express wraps
up collection
of canned food
HERMISTON
—
Hermiston Police Depart-
ment has completed its
collection of canned food
donations for Christmas
Express.
The annual program,
in its 52nd year, provides
boxes of food and gifts to
hundreds of households in
need.
Police Chief Jason
Edmiston said on Monday,
Dec. 14, that in the end
the department collected
about 90% of the nonper-
ishable food it normally
does. Monetary donations
were up by about 40%,
however, which helped
cover the approximately
$6,000 more than usual
the department had to
spend on food, in part due
to problem the depart-
ment ran into when solic-
iting grocery store bids
for turkeys and other food
used to fill out the boxes.
Much of the food usu-
ally comes from large
food drive competitions
between classrooms at
Hermiston’s
schools.
This year, with almost all
students learning from
home, the department set
up a collection point out-
side Hermiston Commu-
nity Center instead. More
than halfway through
the two-week collec-
tion period, Mayor David
Drotzmann posted a plea
to Facebook stating that
the police department had
only collected about 20%
of its usual haul.
People came through
in the last few days, how-
ever, including major
donations from Umatilla
Electric Cooperative and
Hermiston Christian Cen-
ter that had been holding
drives of their own. Over-
all, Edmiston told the
city council on Dec. 14,
he was “very happy” that
donations had come in as
high as they had in such a
challenging year.
The city puts together
500 boxes each year to
donate to households
referred to the program
by the schools, social
services agencies and
other local groups that
are aware of what fami-
lies might be struggling.
Edmiston said despite the
obvious levels of need in
the community, refer-
rals for the program were
actually down 20%, sug-
gesting that local agen-
cies had not been able to
check in with families as
much as normal due to the
pandemic.
Any leftover food the
city might have from
the program will simply
be added to the Agape
House’s food bank to be
given out to visitors in
January, he said.
City staff put dona-
tions together into boxes
on Tuesday, Dec. 15, and
the boxes will then be
taken to the Agape House,
where people who have
been notified they have a
box waiting for them will
be able to pick one up.
Letter : The Electoral
College voted on Dec. 15
Continued from Page A1
Kathy Aney/East Oregonian
Julie Aichele, game buyer at Walla Walla Book & Game in Washington, holds up one of the
hot-selling board games of the last few months, Pandemic: Hot Zone North America.
local landmarks, such as the
Rainbow Cafe, Hamley’s
Steakhouse & Saloon and
Hal’s Hamburgers.
“We can’t keep it in
stock,” Nulf said. “People
are calling daily to see if it
is in. We sold two shipments.
There are over 300 (games)
coming in next week.”
She theorizes that fami-
lies are looking for ways to
stay sane during isolation.
“With COVID, people
are staying home,” she said.
“They are trying to find ways
to entertain their family.”
Joe Brown, owner of the
Hobby Habit in La Grande,
agrees.
“People are getting laid
off of work,” Brown said.
“There’s nothing to do at
home. The stuff we sell
really cures that boredom.”
Addison Schulberg, of
Pendleton, isn’t off work,
but spends more of his off
hours at home. He and girl-
friend Zoe Holmes spend
hours playing a card game
called Anomia with Schul-
berg’s parents, Carol Hanks
and Ken Schulberg. He said
his huge collection of board
games will likely get more
attention as the pandemic
wears on.
“I’ve been playing a
lot more Scrabble,” he
said. “That has definitely
increased since COVID
began. Never had time
before.”
Game lover Karl Davis
once got his fix with a board
game group that met weekly
at the Pendleton Center for
the Arts. When COVID-
19 struck, they continued to
play virtually on a platform
called Tabletop Simulator.
“We actually started play-
ing board games online since
we couldn’t play in person,”
Davis said.
In addition, he plays at
home with his wife, Nina
Blasser, and another cou-
ple in their COVID bubble.
Among others, they playful
Azul and Scythe, a compet-
itive Risk-like board game.
He and Blasser play solo
games while sitting at their
dining room table. She likes
a farming simulation game
called Agricola. Davis is
partial to Arkham Horror.
Aichele said she finds
time for game playing as
well. She tries out many of
them before ordering for
the store. Her faves include
Ticket to Ride, Carcassonne,
Catan and Munchkin. Her
husband prefers strategy
games, such as Axis and
Allies or Risk.
With winter weather
keeping people inside and
people working from home,
she figures the obsession
with board games and puz-
zles will continue for a while.
“People are home,” she
said. “Families are coming
together again. What bet-
ter than to do a puzzle or a
game?”
tion workers removing
bins from under tables late
at night during the vote
counting process.
President
Donald
Trump and conservative
groups and media have
pointed to the video as evi-
dence of election fraud,
alleging that the bins were
filled with ballots that were
processed after Republican
poll watchers were told to
go home for the night.
But after an investiga-
tion, Georgia election offi-
cials determined that the
bins were empty and were
a part of the normal bal-
lot counting process. Poll
watchers were never told
to leave, but some observ-
ers left for the night when
a group of election workers
left the facility.
Levy and Barreto were
the signatories from North-
east Oregon and Levy was
the only legislator-elect to
add her name. The other
signatories were Sen.
Chuck Thomsen of Hood
River, Sen. Alan Olsen of
Canby, Sen. Dennis Linthi-
cum of Klamath Falls, Sen.
Kim Thatcher of Keizer,
Rep. Bill Post of Keizer,
Rep. Gary Leif of Rose-
burg, Rep. Vikki Breese
Iverson of Prineville, Rep.
Mike Nearman of Inde-
pendence, Rep. E. Werner
Reschke of Klamath Falls
and David Brock Smith of
Port Orford.
State Sen. Bill Hansell,
R-Athena, said the let-
ter was never circulated
to him so he never got the
chance to sign it. Hansell
said he didn’t know if
he would have signed it
because he would need to
gauge the purpose and tone
of the letter.
State Rep. Greg Smith,
R-Heppner, did not return
a phone message request-
ing comment as of press
time.
The Electoral College
voted on Tuesday, Dec. 15,
further affirming Biden’s
win.
Before
the
Elec-
toral College vote, Levy
declined to comment on
whether Biden had won
the presidential election,
citing other pending litiga-
tion related to the presiden-
tial election.
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