A8
OREGON
East Oregonian
Saturday, July 31, 2021
Some state employees to get COVID-19 hazard pay
BY HILLARY BORRUD
The Oregonian
SALEM — Gov. Kate
Brown has agreed to award
state workers who were
required to report to work in
person during the pandemic
one-time “COVID hazard
payments” of up to $1,550
under new tentative labor
agreements.
All state employees who
had to work in-person for
at least 480 hours between
March 8, 2020, and June
30, 2021, will be eligible,
according to a summary of
the tentative deal the state
reached with SEIU 503. A
member of AFSCME Coun-
cil 75’s bargaining team on
Tuesday, July 27, confirmed
that union reached the same
deal.
To be eligible for the
top amount, employees
must have worked at least
1,040 mandatory in-person
hours, the equivalent of 26
40-hour weeks. Employees
who worked fewer manda-
tory in-person hours but met
the 480-hour minimum will
receive $1,050, according to
SEIU 503’s online announce-
ment of its tentative labor
agreement with the state.
A state spokesperson clar-
ified on July 28 that all state
employees who meet those
thresholds will be eligible for
the payments, regardless of
whether they are represented
by a union.
During the five-month
legislative session that
ended in June, unions
pushed hard for lawmak-
ers to approve “essential
worker” stimulus payments
a nd some law m a ke r s
supported the idea.
But legislators could not
agree which workers should
receive the payments, so a
broad proposal that would
have benefited categories
of workers across the econ-
omy — including the private
sector — never gained much
traction. The $450 million
proposal also envisioned
$1,200 back-to-work incen-
tive payments for front-
line workers who collected
unemployment during the
pandemic. Front-line workers
who stayed on the job would
have received $2,000 in stim-
ulus money, The Oregonian
reported.
Christina Sydenstricker
Brown, a direct support
specialist who cares for
people with intellectual and
developmental disabilities
with co-occurring mental
health issues, is a member
of AFSCME’s bargaining
team. Sydenstricker Brown
said she expects approxi-
mately 1,000 state employees
to qualify for the additional
overtime payment, including
workers at the Department of
Corrections, Oregon Youth
Authority, state psychiatric
hospital and the stabiliza-
tion and crisis unit where she
works.
Sydenstricker Brown
said she and her co-work-
ers played an essential
role during the pandemic,
donning full personal protec-
tive equipment to provide
in-person care to people with
special needs.
“Just working through
that and the anxiety that the
individuals and my peers
and myself felt was stress-
ful,” Sydenstricker Brown
said. “But we did the job
… We kept Oregon going
through this pandemic and
we still are keeping Oregon
going through this pandemic.
So I just want to thank all
my co-workers and all the
other essential workers
out there that helped keep
Oregon going.”
BOOTLEG FIRE | FIREFIGHTING PRACTICES
State authorizes
Brown: Oregon must modernize wolf kill
Baker County rancher allowed
to kill up to four wolves from
Lookout Mountain Pack
Baker City Herald
Arden Barnes/The Herald And News via AP
Oregon Gov. Kate Brown visits the Bly Fire Camp on the southern edge of the Bootleg Fire in Klamath County on Wednes-
day, July 28, 2021.
Governor’s
remarks occur
during tour of the
Bootleg Fire
By JOE SIESS
Klamath Falls Herald and
News
BLY — Gov. Kate Brown
visited the nation’s largest
wildfire on Wednesday, July
28, flying past 413,000 acres
of burned forest in a heli-
copter, then speaking with
fire officials in Bly.
After seeing the devas-
tation, Brown said the
state has to rethink how it
fights wildfires in an era of
hotter, larger blazes — and
mitigate dangers before
they spark.
“There is absolutely no
question that we need to
modernize our firefighting
practices,” she said.
Brown acknowledged
the difficulty that Klam-
ath County communities,
and the broader region,
are facing in a summer
compounded by COVID,
drought and now wildfire.
“My heart goes out to
the people of the Klamath
Basin,” the governor said.
“This is a really challeng-
ing summer.
We know this is going to
be an incredibly challenging
fire season, and obviously
we’ve got the challenges
around drought.”
Brown said the state
is committed to assist-
ing displaced families as
quickly as possible, and said
federal assistance is on the
way.
“This is an all hands on
deck moment,” she said,
promising to call Rep.
DeFazio, D-Springfield,
chairman of the House
Committee on Transpor-
tation and Infrastructure,
who is leading alongside
Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Or-
egon, a delegation push-
ing for Federal Emergency
Management Agency read-
iness.
Brown said there are
other ways for the state to
prove its readiness.
“We must do more of
the preventative mitigation
work (such as) the thinning
and the prescriptive burn-
ing,” she said from fire
camp in Bly. “The goal is
to eliminate biomass fuel
off the forest floors so that
you either prevent fires or
if there are fires, it is not as
damaging.”
Brown said stopping
wildfires before they start
is smarter policy, but crews
also need the workers and
funds necessary to fight
them when they get out of
hand. Brown said mega-
fires are threatening Oregon
communities, damaging to
the environment, dangerous
for firefighters and expen-
sive for taxpayers.
“The challenge is these
fires are substantially hotter.
They are faster; they are
simply much more ferocious
than in decades past,” she
said. “So we have to make
sure that we have both the
people power and the equip-
ment to tackle them.”
BAKER CITY — The
Oregon Department of Fish
and Wildlife issued a permit
Thursday, July 29, allowing
a Baker County ranching
couple, or their designated
agents, to kill up to four
wolves from the Lookout
Mountain Pack.
The pack, which consists
of an estimated nine wolves,
has attacked cattle four times
in the past two weeks, killing
two and injuring two others
and has been determined to
be chronically depredating
and presents a significant
risk to livestock present in
the area, according to an
ODFW press release.
The permit allows the
livestock producers or their
agents to kill up to four
uncollared wolves in a desig-
nated area, a mix of private
land and public land where
they have a grazing permit,
where wolves are deter-
mined to be a significant
risk to livestock present. The
permit expires Aug. 21 or
when livestock are removed
from the area, whichever
comes first.
ODFW staff may kill
wolves included in the
permit to assist the producer.
The permit does not allow
killing of the pack’s breed-
ing pair, both of which have
tracking collars.
Under the Wolf Plan
rules, livestock producers
must be using and document
non-lethal methods appro-
priate to the situation before
lethal control can be consid-
ered. Also, there can be no
identified circumstances on
the property, such as bone
piles or carcasses, that could
be attracting wolves.
ODFW found no attrac-
tants during its investigations
of depredations. The produc-
ers have been implementing
nonlethal measures for years
and since January 2021 these
measures included night
checking of calving cows, use
of rag box, placing calving
cows near house and barns
in small 30-acre pastures,
hazing wolves out of the
calving areas, burying dead
calves and cows and frequent
communication with ODFW
on the wolves’ location.
Since cattle were placed in
the large rangeland pastures,
the livestock producers have
checked them frequently,
placed cows in specific
pastures based on wolf
activity, and recorded and
communicated wolf pres-
ence to ODFW and neigh-
boring producers. Since the
depredations started on July
14, producers have increased
their human presence, hazed
wolves using firearms,
removed injured livestock
from pastures, and shifted
cattle to pastures with less
forage available to try and
prevent further conflict.
The Lookout Mountain
wolves were first documented
in 2019 and were documented
as a breeding pair for the first
time in 2020, meaning they
had two pups that survived
through the end of the year.
Four wolves including two
pups were documented at the
end of 2020 and seven 2021
pups were observed in May.
Both adult breeders have
functioning radio collars.
Lethal action is autho-
rized with the goal of putting
an end to the chronic depre-
dation but livestock produc-
ers also will continue to use
nonlethal measures.
Vaccination rates vary greatly
depending on where you live
By SUZANNE ROIG
The Bulletin
SALEM — Vaccina-
tion rates drop significantly
outside of the Portland
metro area, according to
results of a Oregon Values
and Beliefs Center survey.
The online survey of
Oregon residents showed
the three counties making
up the Portland area had a
77% vaccination rate. In
the survey, 42% overall
said they had not received a
COVID-19 vaccine.
The survey conducted
July 9-14 of 1,464 residents
has a margin of error for the
full sample ranging from
plus or minus 1.5% to plus
or minus 2.6%, depending
on the response category for
any given question.
The survey results mirror
those from December 2020
that gauged how likely
someone would be to get
the vaccine when it became
available. The results were
published at the same time
Oregon Gov. Kate Brown
announced the state would
follow Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention
indoor-mask guidelines.
People who identified as
socially conservative were
four times as likely to say
they would not receive the
vaccine than those who said
they were liberal. What’s
more, nearly all those
surveyed who said they were
college educated reported
having received at least
one dose of the COVID-19
vaccine.
“In Oregon, as in most
other states, vaccination has
become a politically polar-
ized issue,” said Amaury
Vogel, Oregon Values and
Beliefs Center associate
executive director. “Politi-
cal ideology when it comes
to social issues, is a strong
predictor of whether or not a
person has received at least
one dose of a COVID-19
vaccine.”
As of Thursday, July 29,
the Oregon Health Author-
ity reported 30,936 people
have been fully vacci-
nated or are in progress in
Umatilla and Morrow coun-
ties. That translates to about
44% of the population who
are 18 and older in the two
counties, according to the
OHA data.
“Oregonians who remain
unvaccinated share the same
reasons as being the most
influential in their decision
not to get vaccinated: Long-
and short-term side effects
and the concerns that the
vaccine was developed too
quickly,” Vogel said.
The Oregon Values and
Voices project, a nonparti-
san charitable organization,
has partnered with Pamplin
Media Group, EO Media
Group and the Oregon
Values and Beliefs Center.
EO Media Group owns
newspapers in Oregon and
Washington state, including
the East Oregonian.
Mary Altaffer/The Associated Press, File/Bend Bulletin
A health care worker fills a syringe with the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine, Thursday, July 22, 2021,
at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. The number of Americans getting a
COVID-19 vaccine has been rising in recent days as virus cases once again surge and officials
raise dire warnings about the consequences of remaining unvaccinated.
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