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Wallowa.com
Wednesday, February 6, 2019
A11
Poker Run nets cash for locals
By Steve Tool
Wallowa County Chieftain
The Wallowa County Gamblers all-vol-
unteer snowmobile club held their annual
Poker Run fundraiser on Jan. 19. Club trea-
surer Chad Cooney said the club sold 358
hands at $5 per hand. He wasn’t sure of the
exact number of attendees but said that both
sides of the Salt Creek Summit parking lot
were full.
For a number of reasons, the run is held
more as a lottery than traditional poker
hands. At each of the six stops on the run,
participants choose from a bag of poker chips
numbering 1-40. That number is marked on
a card. The 36-mile run ends at the Joseph
Community Center where the card numbers
are counted and totaled. The total number is
entered into a lottery with other totals and
a computer draws one of those numbers for
prizes.
This year’s event raised about $3,500, of
which the club will keep about $1,000.
The route started at Salt Creek Summit
parking lot and followed along five stops,
each with a bonfire. After completion the
participants loaded up and traveled to the
Joseph Community Center for the lottery
drawing and a tri-tip dinner.
Cooney said his favorite thing about the
event was that it got everyone into the out-
doors, including some non-participants.
“We had people that came through that
didn’t have cards or anything,” he said. They
just rode through to be there with us.”
Club president Dustin James agreed.
“We had beautiful weather with great
snow,” he said. He added he’d like to thank
all the club volunteers and the sponsors who
put in heroic efforts to get the event off the
ground this year.
The monies the club receives for the
event are given to such local local non-prof-
its as the food bank. The club hasn’t decided
on the recipient of this year’s funds.
Courtesy Photo
Wallowa County Snowmobile Assocoation Poker Run participants gather for a few moments of warmth at Lick Creek, just one of the six stops
on the 70-mile run.
New primary proposal could mean big changes for Oregon politics
By Claire Withycombe
Oregon Capital Bureau
The growing bloc of Ore-
gonians who don’t belong
to any political party could
have more say in elections
under a new proposal from
Secretary of State Dennis
Richardson.
Richardson got the idea
from a former rival: Alan
Zundel, the Pacific Green
Party’s candidate for secre-
tary of state in 2016.
And now Richardson’s
office is advocating for Sen-
ate Bill 225, which is based
on a concept Zundel sug-
gested to him last year. It
would allow nonaffiliated
voters to participate in their
own primary.
“I’ve been interested in
how our electoral process
works for a long time, par-
ticularly in how the two-
party system limits compe-
tition and keeps the voting
public from exposure to
more than just two points
of view on issues,” Zundel
said.
Under current law, nonaf-
filiated Oregonians can vote
in primary elections only for
nonpartisan positions such
as for judge.
Richardson and Zun-
del want the state’s 880,000
nonaffiliated voters — who
now outnumber registered
Republicans — to be able
to choose nonaffiliated can-
didates for those partisan
offices.
“Although nearly one-
third of Oregon voters are
not affiliated with any polit-
ical party, those non-affil-
iated voters often feel left
out of the primary process
in the current system,” Steve
Elzinga, Richardson’s gov-
ernmental and legal affairs
director, told lawmakers on
Wednesday.
Under the proposal, non-
affiliated candidates could
enter a state-run primary
where nonaffiliated voters
could cast a ballot for the
nonaffiliated candidate they
preferred.
Officials from Richard-
son’s office shared the pro-
posal last week with sen-
ators at a meeting of a
committee focused on cam-
paign finance laws.
State
Sen.
Floyd
Prozanski,
D-Eugene,
expressed concerns about
allowing nonaffiliated vot-
ers to participate in a major
party primary and poten-
tially
“sabotage”
the
outcome.
The bill wouldn’t do that,
though, Elzinga clarified.
“It creates a new, effec-
tively, a new party for non-
affiliated voters,” Elzinga
responded. “They have their
own separate primary for
voting on nonaffiliated can-
didates, and the top nonaf-
filiated candidate goes to the
general election as the non-
affiliated nominee.”
Major party candidates
would be ineligible to win
the nonaffiliated primary
election “so it doesn’t create
a proxy battle,” Elzinga said.
A second proposal from
Richardson could apply to
the roughly 45,000 Ore-
gonians who belong to the
state’s five minor parties —
the Libertarian, Constitu-
tion, Working Families, Pro-
gressive and Pacific Green.
Oregon laws “benefit
long-established major parties
at the expense of smaller par-
ties,” Elzinga told lawmakers.
Members of those par-
ties can select a general elec-
tion candidate through a par-
ty-run process. Richardson
has proposed allowing the
state to pay for and run those
primaries instead.
“I will tell you, frankly,
some of the minor parties
are not excited about that,”
Elzinga said. “They like the
current process, and so we
don’t feel it’s appropriate to
Win a Professionally Guided
Buck
Hunt
On the 33,000 acre
Zumwalt Prairie
for you and
two guests!
require them to do so, but to
give them that option at least
at that time, I think is a good
starting point.”
The state would pay about
$140,000 to run the nonaf-
filiated primary every elec-
tion year, and $140,000 per
minor party that chooses to
participate in a state-funded
primary.
Richardson’s proposal is
now before the Senate Rules
Committee, where its fate is
uncertain.
The winner will receive a 3-day guided hunting
trip for you and up to two guests on The Nature
Conservancy’s 33,000 acre protected Zumwalt
Prairie outside Joseph, Oregon. Terrain is rough
and physically challenging. Oregon hunting
regulations apply. The Nature Conservancy
has generously donated the LOP tag to benefi t
Chief Joseph Summer Camp, a week-long edu-
cational day camp held each July since 1961 in
Joseph, Oregon serving the rural kids of Wallowa
County. Raffl e to be held at camp location,
Ferguson Ridge Ski Area. You do not have to
be present to win; winner will be notifi ed
within 24 hours of drawing.
Tickets:
$100 each
Only 100 tickets
will be sold!
Drawing to be held
April 6, 2019
To purchase tickets, contact Board President
Dana Ingram at 541-910-5146 or make check payable to
CJSC for $100 and mail to:
CJSC, c/o Dana Ingram, P.O. Box 588 Joseph, OR 97846
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