KATHRYN B. BROWN
Owner
ANDREW CUTLER
Publisher/Editor
PHIL WRIGHT
News Editor
THURSDAY, AUGUST 5, 2021
A4
Founded October 16, 1875
OUR VIEW
Public
interest
demands
details
W
hen people die in a heat wave,
should their names, addresses
and race be a matter of public
record?
At least 83 people died from hyperther-
mia in the July heat wave. Some, most,
or perhaps all of those deaths were likely
preventable. Yes, there were government
warnings about the heat wave. Weather
broadcasts said it was coming. Still, many
Oregonians don’t have air conditioning.
Never really needed it. Older people are
especially vulnerable to hyperthermia.
The body just can’t regulate the tempera-
ture from the environment and their body
temperature keeps climbing.
Two media outlets — The Oregonian
and The Portland Tribune — requested the
names and addresses of the people who
were confirmed to have died from hyper-
thermia during the heat wave. The Orego-
nian also requested the races/ethnicities.
The state medical examiner said no.
The argument was those records are
conditionally exempt from disclosure.
That basically means they are exempt from
being made public unless there is a good
argument that the public interest demands
it. The medical examiner said releasing the
records could make future death investi-
gations more difficult. Families may not
want to cooperate if they know the results
may be made public. And in these incidents
some families had asked the information
be kept private.
But there is an interest in knowing more
about who died. With the information
requested, the public could better under-
stand if people in some geographic areas
or of some socio-economic background or
minority status were disproportionately
affected. The public then could hold their
government accountable.
The Oregon Attorney General’s Office
agreed with that argument, at least a
version of it, and ordered the release of
the records. In the order, it noted it has
required the medical examiner to disclose
“the name, month and year of birth, date
of death and cause of death for each person
whose death was determined to be a homi-
cide” for similar reasons of public interest.
It’s not clear yet if the recent order will
be challenged in court.
We agree in this case the public interest
outweighs the medical examiner’s argu-
ment. But what do you think? You can
write us a letter to the editor and send it to
editor@eastoregonian.com.
EDITORIALS
Unsigned editorials are the opinion of the East
Oregonian editorial board. Other columns,
letters and cartoons on this page express the
opinions of the authors and not necessarily
that of the East Oregonian.
LETTERS
The East Oregonian welcomes original letters
of 400 words or less on public issues and public
policies for publication in the newspaper and on
our website. The newspaper reserves the right
to withhold letters that address concerns about
individual services and products or letters that
infringe on the rights of private citizens. Letters
must be signed by the author and include the
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Unsigned letters will not be published.
SEND LETTERS TO:
editor@eastoregonian.com,
or via mail to Andrew Cutler,
211 S.E. Byers Ave. Pendleton, OR 97801
Risk and reward in the backcountry
BILL
ANEY
THIS LAND IS OUR LAND
O
utdoor adventures can restore
the soul, inspire beautiful art,
poetry and music, and change
lives for the good.
They can also end in tragedy.
I read several recent reports of people
coming face to face with nature with
dramatic results. One was a Michigan
woman who died while on a guided
rafting trip in the Grand Canyon, swept
away from an established campsite by
a flash flood. Another was a man in
southwestern Oregon who wandered
lost for 17 days before being rescued; he
thought he was taking a simple 1¼-mile
hike from his car to a lake for fishing.
One tragic loss of life, one incredibly
fortunate rescue, both the result of a
natural quest for adventure in the back-
country.
Kathy and I have had a few of our
own close encounters of the natu-
ral kind. Perhaps the experience that
impacted us the most happened while
we were teenagers. We were climbing
Mount Hood with the Portland-based
Mazamas group, hoping to summit the
peak and thereby qualify for member-
ship in the club and gain access to the
club’s mountain cabin.
It was a bright sunny Memorial Day
weekend, and as we neared the final
pitch to the top of the mountain we were
instructed to attach our crampons and
rope up. We tethered ourselves to a half
dozen other climbers to traverse across
a steep, icy slope. Kathy and I were tied
about 10 feet apart in the middle of this
string of climbers, halfway across the
slope, when we heard the screams of
“Rock! Rock! Rock!” We recognized
this as the universal warning that there
were rocks careening downslope. Our
fellow climbers on the left scampered
left and those to the right scrambled
right, leaving Kathy and I hung out like
marionettes on a string and directly in
the path of the tumbling rocks. We hit
the snow and tucked into fetal positions
as snow and scree began flying over and
landing on and around us. We both felt a
tremendous sharp tug on the rope before
the noise and chaos ended.
I remember hearing people to the
right of me crying out “Is she all right?”
and people to the left of Kathy yelling
“Is he okay?” We dug ourselves out and
found that a large boulder, about 4 feet
in diameter, had landed and stopped
directly on the rope between the two
of us, jerking us towards it. I couldn’t
see Kathy and she couldn’t see me, so
we were incredibly relieved to find that
neither was injured. We each had about
3 feet between us and the rock. Our
group had to all untie to pull the rope
through from under the rock to free it,
allowing us to continue across the slope
and eventually to the summit.
We realized how close this was to
tragedy — a couple of feet one way
or the other and one of us wouldn’t be
around to continue our life together, get
married, have and raise our kids, and be
each other’s best friends for life.
One point of this story is that having
public lands and backcountry gives us
the opportunity to explore and experi-
ence nature in the raw, including all the
risks and rewards that go along with it.
To be sure, more experience allows
us to better recognize risks, be better
prepared, and consequently have even
more successful outings. Still, there are
risks, and sometimes bad outcomes.
Mother Nature is indifferent about
all of this. She is not malicious, nor is
she benevolent. She just is. Experienced
backcountry adventurers don’t see their
encounters with nature as battles, but
rather as a sort of cooperative effort;
they take what nature gives them, learn
to work with that, and are better for it.
Too many mosquitoes at the lake?
Make camp on a small knoll where
breezes keep the insects at bay. Facing
a steep trail with innumerable switch-
backs up a rocky open slope? Get an
early start to complete the climb in the
shade. Worried about losing your bear-
ings while traveling off trail in the back-
country? Learn to use the sun and your
own shadow to keep a relatively straight
course instead of traveling in circles.
We are so fortunate to have millions
of acres of public lands in our backyard
for rest, play and rejuvenation. With
this comes responsibility for our own
well-being in the backcountry, including
preparation, experience, flexibility and
knowing our limits. This often means
the difference between tragedy and a
good story to tell.
Luck should be the last thing we rely
on to get home safe.
———
Bill Aney is a forester and wildlife biol-
ogist living in Pendleton and loving the
Blue Mountains.
dren too young for vaccinations and
improve the chance of an uninterrupted
school year.
Here’s a suggested slogan: Protect
the Round-Up and the Pendleton
community (and possibly save your life)
— please get vaccinated.
Hal McCune
Pendleton
do know is this citizen doesn’t approve
of this recipe for complete disaster.
I found out by accident of this event
and was stunned that someone thought
of this as a wonderful idea. Perhaps
someone has an agenda for promotion at
the prison. Maybe this isn’t the first such
event where “Joe Public” didn’t need
told. Why be secretive if this is so great?
To say that I’m unhappy about this is an
understatement.
Inmates were sentenced for offenses
by a judge, after a fair trial, so now it’s
OK to thumb your nose at the judicial
system? Rewarding for misconduct
is never a win. It teaches people that
accountability doesn’t matter. While
this is my thoughts, I have a hard time
believing other citizens know about the
event or think this is a positive thing for
Hermiston.
We are a community of doers and
movers. Let’s move this out of the possi-
bility of being a reality Hermiston.
Karen Primmer
Hermiston
YOUR VIEWS
Round-Up, Happy Canyon
should lead the
COVID-19 charge
Sadly, Umatilla County is a state
leader in low COVID-19 vaccination
rates and high infection rates (an obvi-
ous correlation). That makes our county
a perilous place for large gatherings,
such as Round-Up.
The Round-Up and Happy Canyon
directors need to do all they can to
make their events as safe as possible
for the volunteers who make Round-Up
happen, as well as the fans and the
community. I suggest a good starting
place is for all the directors to get vacci-
nated against COVID-19, if they haven’t
already, and then share their decision
with the public while strongly encour-
aging volunteers and fans who haven’t
been vaccinated to follow their lead.
More vaccinations could go a long
way toward ensuring there will be a
Round-Up this year, protect our chil-
Let’s not reward bad
behavior
Inmates outside the walls of Two
Rivers Correctional Institution for a
family play date — what?
Forthcoming is a date to have
inmates, also known as adults in
custody, to be allowed at Hermiston
Spray Park. Reportedly, the inmates will
be allowed time with their families at
the park. So who approved this reward
for bad behavior? Was it the Oregon
Department of Corrections? Citizens of
Hermiston? Good questions, but what I