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Judge orders TRCI to follow its own mask rules
PA GE 4
By CONRAD WILSON
Oregon Public Broadcasting
UMATILLA — A federal
magistrate judge this week found
some Oregon prison staff at the
Two Rivers Correctional Institu-
tion in Umatilla have not followed
the prison’s own pandemic-related
mask rules. In a court order signed
Monday, March 21, the judge
required prison offi cials to follow
their policies.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Stacie
Beckerman largely ruled in favor
of Aaron Hanna, a prisoner at Two
Rivers. Hanna asked the court in
October to force prison offi cials
and correctional offi cers at Two
Rivers to comply with the Oregon
Department of Corrections policy
on masks.
Specifically, Hanna alleged
prison leaders “acted with delib-
erate indiff erence to a substantial
risk of serious harm in violation” of
the Constitution’s Eighth Amend-
ment against cruel and unusual
punishment “by failing consis-
tently to comply with and enforce
ODOC’s mask policy.”
The ruling comes as Gov. Kate
Brown lifted the statewide mask
mandate for indoor public spaces
beginning March 12, though
masks requirements still apply to
settings such as health care facil-
ities.
Cor rections off icials also
“acknowledge that a mask mandate
continues to apply inside most
areas of Oregon’s correctional
institutions,” Beckerman wrote in
her opinion.
The Department of Corrections
declined to comment on the ruling.
In early March, DOC Deputy
Director Heidi Steward noted in
an agency-wide email that masks
were still required in all prisons.
“Our goal is to move away from
mask-wearing in our institutions as
well, but our plan must be approved
fi rst, and it will be a phased-out
approach,” Steward wrote.
In her ruling, Beckerman
requires corrections leaders and
offi cials at Two Rivers to comply
with their own mask policy, saying
it’s in the public’s interest.
Pulling up the stakes
Why some
farmers are
leaving the
West Coast
By SIERRA DAWN
MCCLAIN
Capital Press
P
ressure was building:
The cost of doing busi-
ness was escalating,
each year brought new
regulations and groundwater
supplies in Harney County were
steeply declining, prompting
agencies to move toward limits
on well-drilling.
Shane and Crystal Otley, who
raise cattle and hay near the town
of Burns, said ranching in Oregon
has become more and more diffi -
cult.
“The state is going in a direc-
tion where it’s hard to do business
here,” said Shane Otley, 46.
This winter, the Otleys also
were eyeing House Bill 4002, a
proposal in the Oregon Legisla-
ture to end the agricultural over-
time exemption. Shane Otley
testifi ed against the bill, estimat-
ing it would increase his business
Midge Smith/Contributed Photo
From left, Royce, Lydia and Tyrell Smith and their father Wayne
Smith, pose in this undated photo. The family ranched in Riley, near
Burns, and Seneca, south of John Day, until they moved to Nebraska
in 2020. Farmers in recent years have been leaving the West Coast.
costs by 38%. The bill passed the
House and Senate and awaits the
governor’s signature.
“It just adds another thorn in
the bucket,” said Otley.
Shane and Crystal have long
considered moving to another
state, but until recently, it’s just
been talk.
Now, the Otleys are selling
their ranch.
The family received an off er
and expect to close the deal
April 15. Meanwhile, they’ve been
visiting other states, looking for
the right place to start fresh.
Shane Otley said leaving won’t
be easy. He’s a fourth-generation
farmer with Oregon roots. But he
said he wants to keep his business
alive and give his daughters their
best chance at pursuing farming
somewhere with lower costs and
tax burdens.
The Otleys aren’t the only
farmers leaving the West Coast.
Farmers fed up with the regulatory
climate in California, Oregon and
Washington have for years threat-
ened to move away. But is that
actually happening? Yes and no.
No, farm experts say there does
not appear to be a mass exodus of
farmers leaving the West Coast
states. Calling it that would be
hyperbole.
But yes, farmers are trickling
out, and industry leaders say it’s
been happening more during the
past few years.
There’s no single reason.
Farmers cite a constellation of
motivations for moving: seek-
ing less crowded places, politi-
cal concerns, COVID protocols,
estate taxes, regulations and asso-
ciated costs, opportunities for
expansion, “climate migrants”
fl eeing drought and farmers seek-
ing more secure water supplies.
The common thread is that
farmers are moving to places
where they believe their busi-
nesses, and families, can better
thrive.
Farm migration
According to U.S. Census
Bureau data, between summers
2020 to 2021, 4.3 million U.S.
residents moved from one
state to another. California and
Washington lost residents to
net out-migration, while the
South and Intermountain West
grew in population.
See Farmers, Page A7
Members of the Smith family herd their cattle in Eastern
Oregon in this undated photo. The Smiths had properties in
Riley, near Burns, and Seneca, south of John Day, but in 2020
moved to Nebraska. Patriarch Wayne Smith said, “In Oregon,
it was an uphill battle to stay in business.”
Midge Smith/Contributed Photo
PA GE 6
PA GE 12
Legacy
of Mark
O. Hatfield
kiosks,
importa each discussing ” includes thre
nt during
e
causes
Hatfield
he
’s 46-year found
career.
The Department of Corrections
argues “that although their mask-
ing compliance may be imperfect,
they have acted reasonably under
the circumstances,” Beckerman
wrote. “Defendants set the bar too
low.”
Hanna largely represented
himself from his initial filing
last fall until a hearing on
March 9, when attorney Juan
Chavez helped him argue the case
before Beckerman.
See TRCI, Page A7
Merkley
talks health
care, Russia
at town hall
By ANTONIO SIERRA
East Oregonian
UMATILLA COUNTY —
COVID-19 may be transitioning
to an endemic phase, but health
care still was on the top of many
Umatilla County residents’ minds
at a Monday, March 22, virtual
town hall hosted by U.S. Sen. Jeff
Merkley.
“I am sick and tired of COVID.
I’m hoping we’re at the end of the
tunnel,” he said.
“We thought this
a year ago and it
turned out omicron
was waiting for
us.”
Good She p -
herd Health Care
Merkley
System CEO
Brian Sims said
he was concerned rural hospitals
wouldn’t have the infrastructure
to handle the next health crisis
should it occur. Merkley said he
was pushing legislation that would
direct money toward preparation
for further mutations of the virus.
“I feel like it’s carrying an
umbrella,” he said. “(When you)
carry an umbrella, it won’t rain.I
‘m hoping if we prepare right, we
won’t get a dangerous new muta-
tion.”
In addition to housing and
affordable child care, Cathy
Putnam, a board member for Agape
House, said there were plenty of
county residents in need of mental
health services but not many places
to provide them.
Besides hiring more school
counselors, Merkley said he would
like to see a public education
campaign about the negative eff ects
of electronics, which he said were
preventing youth from developing
social skills.
See Merkley, Page A1
CTUIR sees parallels between their history and Ukraine
By ANTONIO SIERRA
East Oregonian
MISSION — In 1856, B.F.
Shaw, a colonel with Washington
Territory Volunteer Infantry, led
his soldiers into the Grande Ronde
Valley and murdered dozens of
Cayuse who lived in a village near
present-day Summerville.
In 2022, Russian President
Vladimir Putin ordered the inva-
sion of Ukraine, leading to the
death of more than 900 civilians,
as of Sunday, March 20, according
to NPR.
Centuries and continents sepa-
rate these two events, but for the
leaders of the Confederated Tribes
of the Umatilla Indian Reservation,
the parallels are apparent.
On March 14, the CTUIR
announced its board of trustees
approved a $5,000 donation to
Doctors Without Borders to aid
in the burgeoning humanitarian
crisis unfolding in Ukraine. But the
announcement also included more
pointed language condemning
Putin and Russia for the invasion
and the “ongoing genocide of the
Ukrainian people” before drawing
comparisons between the current
war and its own history.
“Today, millions of Ukraini-
ans are (being) forcibly removed,
killed, or are fl eeing their home-
lands. The Confederated Tribes
of the Umatilla, Walla Walla,
and Cayuse experienced similar
assaults on our people, our land
and our sovereign rights in the
1850’s,” the press release states.
Our homelands were invaded and
many of our people killed during
that time. The CTUIR ultimately
ceded 6.4 million acres of our lands
and resources to the United States
in the Treaty of 1855, and some of
these lands were illegally entered
by non-Indian settlers prior to the
ratifi cation of the Treaty by the
United States Congress in 1859.”
In an interview, Bobbie Conner,
a tribal historian and the director
of the Tamastslikt Cultural Insti-
tute, said the treaty was supposed
to protect the tribes from encroach-
ment and violence from settlers,
but that’s not what happened in
1856.
That year, Shaw attacked the
encampment killing approximately
60 people — men, women, chil-
dren and elders — in the process.
The infantry then proceeded to
destroy their homes and confi scate
their horses. While contemporary
accounts described it as a battle
and lionized Shaw and his Army,
Conner said “massacre” was the
more appropriate term.
“These unprovoked attacks on
peaceful, coexisting people are
exactly in my mind a parallel of
what is happening now,” she said.
“Only the armaments and the meth-
ods and the wholesale slaughter
or annihilation of people is much
more exponentially damaging.”
Conner further explained how
violence from Western settlers
and the U.S. government infl icted
against American Indians are often
mislabeled “cultural confl icts.” but
were more about power and land.
See Ukraine, Page A7