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About Wallowa County chieftain. (Enterprise, Wallowa County, Or.) 1943-current | View Entire Issue (April 13, 2016)
Wallowa County Chieftain News wallowa.com April 13, 2016 A7 QUINOA Continued from Page A1 Wallowa County quinoa is better because of where it come from, Thiel said. “It’s grown in glacial silt, isolated, easy to certify or- ganic. Just a few hundred feet difference on another proper- ty in the valley will mean a shorter growing season (and possibly no quinoa). We have pretty virgin soils, so the mineral contact is still in tact and it’s right there at the ori- gin of the water supply.” Plenty of people in Wal- lowa County have been inter- ested in quinoa for a while. Deb Reth of Wallowa grew a test plot. Janie Tippett of Jo- seph grew a test plot. Jerome Goertzen of Enterprise has been growing it and wants to test it in Imnaha. Kurt and Kevin Melville of Cornerstone Farms in BREWERY Continued from Page A1 “It’s more about trying to repair what’s happened to our resources in this county.” While starting small, Hays sees significant but steady growth to the busi- ness over the next five to 10 years. “The whole focus is mak- ing beer to ship out of the county. ... This is awesome because it’s a pure Wallowa County brew. The Klages barley is engineered locally, grown locally, malted locally MEETING Continued from Page A1 Host Dave Miller mod- erated a panel of guests that included Malheur National Forest Supervisor Steve Bev- erlin; Darilyn Parry Brown, executive director of the Hells Canyon Preservation Council; King Williams, a natural resources consul- tant based in John Day; Eric Quaempts, natural resources director for the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indi- an Reservation; and James Nash, a Ày ¿shing out¿tter and ¿fth-generation rancher from Enterprise. The Blue Mountains For- est Plan comprises 4.9 mil- lion acres of public lands on the Umatilla, Wallowa-Whit- man and Malheur national forests in Eastern Oregon. Each forest gets its own in- dividual plan, with the docu- ments adding up to thousands of pages of desired condi- tions for the landscape. Beverlin described the forests like a quilt, patched together in various shades of green, brown and black. It’s up to the Forest Service to make sure tree stands are healthy, that access is main- tained and habitat preserved. The challenge, Beverlin said, is striking an appropriate bal- ance. “I think some people be- lieve that every acre can pro- vide every use for everyone. It can’t,” Beverlin said. “It’s going to take compromise from everyone.” Finding that compromise has been an ongoing effort. When the Forest Service re- leased its draft Environmen- tal Impact Statement for the Forest Plan in 2014, the reac- tion was “less than stellar,” as Beverlin put it. That prompt- ed another round of public meetings in 2015, which has led to two new alternatives that will be included in the ¿nal EIS later this fall. Former Joseph mayor Peggy Kite-Martin spoke during the show, saying that the forests are part of East- ern Oregon’s culture. She said the politics of the debate have left forest users in a dif- ¿cult situation as the pendu- lum swings back and forth between industry and conser- vation. “Our culture is in dan- ger of dying because people can’t get out into the woods,” Kite-Martin said. Public access was a com- mon concern among mem- bers of the crowd, who vent- ed their frustrations over Ellen Morris Bishop/For The Chieftain Wallowa County quinoa seeds spread across a pan. Enterprise got in on the qui- noa idea early on, allowing a few test rows to be plant- ed on Kurt’s property and then more than ¿ve acres on Kevin’s property in the last two years. This year Kevin is planting 30 acres under con- tract with PNW Grain and Feed Association. Bob’s Red Mill is even ex- pressing an interest in locally grown quinoa, according to Golder. Golder who is “the go to guy” for the latest knowledge on the burgeoning quinoa business likes to say “I ain’t no businessman, I ain’t no scientist, and I ain’t no farmer, but I seem to be able to bring them together.” “Ted’s knowledge touches every aspect or level of in- and fermented locally with local wild yeast and bottled in ceramic bottles from lo- cal clay. It’ll probably be the most local beer happening in the world today.” Hays said he’s not trying to compete with Terminal Gravity Brewing in Enter- prise as he is seeking a dif- ferent clientele. He added it would be a highly experimental brewery with the possibility of host- ing visiting brewers and per- haps brewing several dozen different kinds of beer. The initial brewing will be about 50 handmade bot- tles. “We’ll probably never drink it because it will be collectible,” Hays said. He added that he hopes to even- tually increase production to brew several thousand gal- lons at a time but stressed that it will never be a large- scale beer operation with truck loads of beer leaving the operation daily. Hays said he plans to have ¿ve employees brewing beer, manufacturing furniture and crafting ceramics by the end of the year. The project already is well underway in Joseph. “We’ve got the building going, we’ve ordered the wells drilled, we’re sampling water and building the sys- tem.” He has already retained the services of local contrac- tor Louis Perry for building construction. Although Hays plans to hire locals in the main, he will also import people to train employees. “For the woodworking, one of my guys is going to move up there to train. My intention is build a solid lo- cal industry there. Whether that’s exclusively local, or I have to ship people in with the expertise for training.” Hays already has a cou- ple of brewers he’s talking to oversee the brewery oper- ations once the project gets off the ground. “I design a lot of the brews myself. We’re not going to center the brewery around one brewer. It’s going to be working different brewers and probably guest brew- ers whether local or abroad. I believe in the alchemy of brewing more than having a master formula.” While Hays is passionate about the project and hopes to eventually be the county’s largest employer, he knows it won’t happen overnight. “It’s not about hiring a road closures. However, environmental issues were also brought to the forefront by Brown, who directs the Hells Canyon Preservation Council. She said the forests already have too many roads, which has caused heavy ero- sion in wild habitat. “I do believe there is a place for ATV riding on our public lands. I really do,” Brown said. “They have to be at the right place, at the right time.” Williams, who owns his own consulting company, said a lack of active man- agement — such as tree thin- ning and cattle grazing — is causing a whole other set of concerns, leaving the for- ests to become overstocked and prone to disease or ¿re. Meanwhile, the region’s tim- ber industry has shriveled. Williams said the forests grow about 800 million board feet of wood every year, of which 500 million board feet is left to waste. Beverlin said the two new forest plan alternatives take that feedback into account, and will focus on increasing both the pace and scale of restoration. That could help provide more logs to the mill, he said, while lowering the risk of destructive wild¿res. Quaempts said the tribes are working where they can with the Forest Service on restoration projects to protect traditional First Foods. The key, Quaempts said, is to be mindful of what the forests are capable of providing. He believes the forests are big enough to accommodate ev- eryone’s interests. Others, like Nash, were less optimistic. Nash said he is not happy with the current state of the forests, and wor- ries that even after a plan is ¿nalized, lawsuits will inev- itably keep the whole thing tangled up in court. “There will be groups that ¿le lawsuits that stop any progress of using the for- ests,” Nash said. “There are a lot of people out there who don’t think people should use the woods.” A majority of the crowd raised their hands when asked if they felt the Forest Service just planned to do whatever it wanted, regard- less of the outcome. Beverlin sharply disagreed. “I don’t believe that’s true,” he said. “Otherwise, why are we here listening again?” Full audio from the show can be found at http://tinyurl. com/hu5eahw. Courtesy photo Marketing pro Ted Golder examines some of the test rows of quinoa grown in Wallowa County. 201 East Hwy 82 Enterprise, OR 97828 541.426.0320 Celebrate spring with new name brand appliances! k e e W e th Ronan Nash is a 7th grade f o t n e student this year. Ronan has an Stud inquisitive mind and likes to Ronan Nash take things apart to discover how they work. He is an Honor Roll student and yearbook editor. His consistent positive attitude and leadership is why he is receiving this recognition. Enterprise Seventh Day Adventist School The Student of the Week is chosen for academic achievement and community involvement. Students are selected by the administrators of their respective schools. Made possible by our sponsors: volvement,” Thiel said. And plenty of good peo- ple are working hard to iron out the local processing prob- lems. Sara Miller at NorthEast Oregon Economic Develop- ment District has been work- ing with Golder and Thiel and the duo have started enlisting the aid of other talent in the county to help them start a crowdfunding campaign. lot of people soon, it’s about building a stable thing that has traction and grows like a redwood tree rather than a berry bush.” In the meantime, he is building community support for the project. “We’re hoping to get local people behind it if we can, because it’s not something I can do alone.” Wallowa County is never far from Hays’ mind, and he is intent on leaving a positive Wallowa County legacy for the future. “When I die, I’ll have giv- en something to my heritage there.”
