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APRIL 23 – 24, 2022
146th Year, No. 54
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WINNER OF 16 ONPA AWARDS IN 2021
BLUE MOUNTAIN COMMUNITY COLLEGE
Showdown in the works over faculty, program cuts
College president
says labor agreement
with faculty prevents
necessary changes
By PHIL WRIGHT
East Oregonian
PENDLETON — The Blue
Mountain Community College
Budget Committee has its first
public meeting to discuss the plan to
cut faculty and programs to meet the
college’s bottom line.
BMCC Faculty Association no longer can make cuts to those
President Pete Hernberg said some areas. Now, he told the East Orego-
instructors plan to be at the public nian in a meeting April 19, it’s time to
meeting Monday, April 25,
“right-size” Blue Mountain,
at the Pendleton campus, but
and that means eliminating
he stayed mum about any
faculty.
addresses or statements they
His proposal calls for
might make to the commit-
cutting 10 full-time faculty
tee.
and several part-time posi-
BMCC President Mark
tions in multiple disciplines
and eliminating criminal
Browning contends the
college started the 2022-23
Browning
justice, college prep and
budget process with a
industrial systems technol-
$2 million hole. After cutting 39 clas- ogy programs. Browning said BMCC
sifi ed and administrative positions is top heavy with faculty compared to
from 2020 through 2022, the college other Oregon community colleges.
BMCC has 47 full-time faculty
teaching just more than the equiv-
alent of 1,000 full-time students,
he said, while Clatsop Community
College has 29 full-time faculty and
800 full-time students and Treasure
Valley CC in Ontario has 566 full-
time students and 26 faculty.
Hernberg contends Browning is
confl ating the 35 full-time faculty
who teach on campus with those
who teach in the two state prisons
in Umatilla County. The teachers at
Eastern Oregon Correctional Insti-
tution, Pendleton and Two Rivers
Correctional Institution, Umatilla,
receive separate funding, he said, and
those students don’t count as part of
the college’s 1,000 full-time students.
Hernberg teaches math and said
he keeps a close watch on funding for
the college, so Browning’s claim the
college is $2 million short is shock-
ing.
“The revenue is projected to be up
$300,000 from where we were a year
ago,” Hernberg said.
And some of the cuts in the
proposal, he said, are for classes
that are full.
See BMCC, Page A8
EDUCATION
The harm
of bullying
Schools deal with
the problem but are
not always able to
improve situations
By ERICK PETERSON
East Oregonian
HERMISTON — When 11-year-
old Marc Martinez goes to school,
he is not always able to concentrate
on education.
Martinez said he goes to school
with a diff erent worry. Like some
of his classmates at Sunset Elemen-
tary in Hermiston, and other
students everywhere else, he said
he is greatly concerned with being
bullied.
This is an issue of interest at
schools, including the Hermiston
School District, at which Martinez
attends.
A large crowd turns out Monday,
April 18, 2022, for the opening
ceremony of a weeklong Plateau
Long Tent event on Whitman
College’s Ankeny Field, Walla Walla.
Greg Lehman/Walla Walla Union-Bulletin
Services to address bullying
Dan Greenough is the Hermiston
School District’s director of student
services. He said he is not certain of
how much bullying there is within
the district, but there is enough to
warrant concern. And the district
has “a number of prevention pieces”
to address bullying.
For instance, he said, council-
ors deliver lessons about bullying
to students on a monthly basis, and
students take surveys so the schools
can better understand their experi-
ence and tailor lessons to problem
areas.
The Hermiston School District
also hired two additional social
workers, to its previous one social
worker, within the last year to help
address bullying and other mental
health issues.
“They are a support to students,”
he said.
The pandemic, and students
being kept at home for extended
periods, have necessitated this addi-
tion, he said.
See Bullying, Page A8
Whitman, CTUIR partner for educational opportunity
By JEREMY BURNHAM
Walla Walla Union-Bulletin
Greg Lehman/Walla Walla Union-Bulletin
ALLA WALLLA —
Kwalk ineet, or “long
tent” in English, is a
traditional structure
used by people in this
area dating back thou-
sands of years, Don
Sampson, chief of the Waluulapam, said.
But this week, students at Whitman
College and members of the public can
get an up-close look at one.
A kwalk ineet has been constructed
at Ankeny Field on the Whitman campus
and will remain there for the rest of the
week. The display is the result of a part-
nership between the college and the
Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla
Indian Reservation.
People tour the photographic display Monday, April 18, 2022, inside the tent at the open-
ing ceremony of a weeklong Plateau Long Tent event on Whitman College’s Ankeny Field.
See CTUIR, Page A9
W
VA plan calls for big changes to its Walla Walla medical center
By DAVIS CARBAUGH AND
JOHN TILLMAN
EO Media Group
WASHINGTON — Oregon U.S.
Sen. Ron Wyden this week said he
plans to personally contact the Depart-
ment of Veterans Aff airs regarding
recommendations to reduce services
at the Jonathan M. Wainwright Memo-
rial VA Medical Center in Walla Walla.
The VA in mid March released
a report from the Asset and Infra-
structure Review Commission to
modernize and realign the VA health
care system. According to the Walla
Walla Union-Bulletin, the report is in
response to the 2018’s MISSION Act,
also known as the Veteran Community
Care Act.
After site visits, listening sessions
and data gathering around the coun-
try, the AIR Commission listed and said he will be reaching out to the
among its recommendations that VA himself for an explanation and how
the Walla Walla VA reduce services to address the four major concerns
to primary care and mental
brought up at the meeting and
health, which could result in
potential changes to the Walla
the facility being reclassifi ed
Walla medical center.
as a community-based outpa-
“Vets have earned the bene-
tient clinic, known better as
fi ts because of their extraordi-
nary service,” Wyden said.
a CBOC, rather than a full
medical center, according to
“The vets committed their
the Walla Walla UB.
lives to our country and now
At a virtual town hall
Wyden
I’m going to make sure we
make our commitment to them
for Union County residents
on Wednesday, April 20, Wyden really clear.”
addressed several concerns related to
A market analysis showed veteran
veteran health care in Eastern Oregon. enrollment in VISN 20, the service
Key points included slow hiring region centered by the Walla Walla
processes, travel pay, diffi culties at call VA, is predicted to increase modestly
centers across VA clinics and attaining and largely outside of Walla Walla.
health care services outside of the VA. According to the Walla Walla paper,
Wyden noted he has been hearing the recommended strategy is to invest
often from veterans on similar issues in new outpatient facilities and expand
services in existing clinics to meet
future demand, while “rightsizing”
services at the Walla Walla VA, offi -
cials said.
The full set of recommendations
call for closing a total of 17 VA medi-
cal centers nationwide while build-
ing 14 new ones and 140 new clinics,
according to the Spokane Spokes-
man-Review, and encourages veter-
ans, especially in rural areas, to seek
care from private providers.
Under the proposal, Walla Walla
would become an outpatient clinic
similar to those in Coeur d’Alene,
Idaho, and Wenatchee, Washington,
per the Spokesman-Review. Along
with ending surgeries and other inpa-
tient treatment at the Walla Walla
hospital, the plan proposes relocating
See Changes, Page A9