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137th Year, No. 25
Wednesday, September 29, 2021
wallowa.com
County sees 12th COVID-19 related death
Wallowa County reports 18 new cases over the weekend, bringing total case count to 558
Chieftain staff
Paul
Pelley
ENTERPRISE — In
the last week, the Oregon
Health Authority reported
the 12th COVID-19 related
death in Wallowa County,
and saw the total number
of cases during the pan-
demic rise past 550.
On Monday, Sept. 27,
OHA reported 18 new
COVID-19 cases in the
county from over the week-
end, which brought the
total to 558. This month,
there have been 139 cases,
but the county on place
to fall short of the 180
cases that came through in
August.
The 12th death in the
county was reported on
Friday, Sept. 24, and was
a 62-year-old woman who
died at home on Sept 20,
and tested positive post-
mortem on Sept. 21. The
OHA did not report if she
had underlying conditions.
The woman is the fi fth
known COVID-19 related
fatality during the most
recent surge of COVID-19.
OHA data shows the
rate of vaccination in
Wallowa County is up to
64.5% of residents 18 and
older, with 3,714 peo-
ple in the age range being
vaccinated. Of the entire
population there has been
3,886 people, or 54.3%
of the population, to get
vaccinated.
Enterprise
Prepare for
‘shopping
learning
curve’
ENTERPRISE — Paul Pelley and wife,
Gail, have lived in the county for about a
year and a half, moving to Enterprise in
April 2020 from San Jose, California.
“We spent seven years in San Jose
and I learned that to live in San Jose, you
have to be insane,” he said. “I realized
that I’m not, and I wanted to go some-
where I could live in a town with no traf-
fi c lights and no Starbucks.”
He retired as a certifi ed fi nancial
planner 14 years ago and his wife spent
40 years as a registered nurse when
they lived in Florida before moving to
San Jose. They have two adult children,
a son and a daughter, as well as three
grandchildren.
Pelley recently shared his thoughts
about living in Wallowa County.
What’s your favorite thing about
Wallowa County?
The people. They’re very friendly and
they do what they say they’re going to
do. I just enjoy being in a small town.
Are you pleased to see snow on
the mountaintops again?
Yes. When I saw that, I thought, “Now
we’re going to have a change in the sea-
sons.” After spending time in Alaska, that
made us ready for here — we got all our
winter at once.
Are you concerned about the
recent coronavirus spike?
Yes, I am. Our daughter, who works
at a hospital ... told us that over the
last couple of months they’ve had 42
COVID-related deaths, and a good many
of them were 20 or 30 years old. So I’m
very concerned about it.
What do you think of
government mandates on
masks and vaccinations?
I think that government has over-
stepped its boundaries. It should be left
up to the people, but people are not
making good decisions. … I’m a num-
bers person, and when they’re dying at
younger ages, that, to me, is pretty black
and white.
As summer ends, what was your
favorite experience?
We had both of our kids up here.
Both of them were concerned about
us moving to a little town with no traf-
fi c lights and being so far away. Both of
them, after being here, have approved
of our decision and they want to come
back.
What’s your advice for people
who are thinking about moving
here?
Get prepared for a place that rolls
up its sidewalks early. There’s a “shop-
ping learning curve” you’ve got to go
through. You have to shop when they’re
open and just work your life around it.
Bill Bradshaw/Wallowa County Chieftain
Landon Braden, Enterprise High School’s new counselor, off ers a face mask to second-grader Skylynn Adams at Enterprise Elementary
School on Thursday, Sept. 23, 2021, where he is acting principal.
Coming home
New Enterprise High School counselor is a Joseph High School graduate
By BILL BRADSHAW
Wallowa County Chieftain
ENTERPRISE — Enter-
prise High School’s new coun-
selor sees his job as being
more than just someone who
directs students toward getting
the necessary credits to gradu-
ate. He helps with their special
problems.
“I don’t think Enterprise
High School has had a coun-
selor — a mental health coun-
selor,” said Landon Braden,
who has been on the job for just
a month. “They’ve had a very
good relationship with the Wal-
lowa Valley Center for Wellness
in providing those services, but
it’s at least been a very long
time since they’ve had a coun-
selor on staff in the school. The
biggest part of that position is
Bill Bradshaw/Wallowa County Chieftain
Landon Braden, the new counselor for Enterprise High School,
discusses his thoughts on education Thursday, Sept. 23, 2021, in the
principal’s offi ce of Enterprise Elementary School, where he is acting
principal.
you’re building the program.
The Wallowa Valley Center for
Wellness has done a very good
job in building the system and
having those services, but add-
ing a full-time counselor inside
the school adds another com-
ponent to it. I see it as a mul-
titiered system so that the kids
who are having a hard time
focusing because of something
they’re going through, whether
that be a relationship or some-
thing at home.”
Braden said that multitiered
system involves fi rst, himself as
the counselor on campus. The
second tier brings in a coun-
selor from the Center for Well-
ness. The third tier would bring
in a specialized counselor to
help work through an intensive
See Braden, Page A7
Where are the workers: A changing demographic
Editor’s Note: This is the fourth
in a fi ve-part series by EO Media
Group looking at the issue of the
lack of workers for jobs in Central
and Eastern Oregon — why work-
ers are not returning to previously
held jobs and how businesses are
pivoting to function without being
fully staff ed.
By BILL BRADSHAW and
ALEX WITTWER
EO Media Group
WALLOWA COUNTY — It’s
no secret that employers across
the state are struggling to fi nd
workers. Business owners col-
lectively furrow their brow at the
trickle of job applications as more
and more businesses open and the
share of workers seems to be van-
ishing
into
thin air.
For some,
that
means
closing restau-
rants entirely
— but far
more
often
the eff ects of
a
tightening
labor market mean that expansion
of operations becomes diffi cult.
“It’s pretty much across all
industries,” said Stacy Beck-
man, general manager of Wallowa
County Grain Growers in Enter-
prise. “Managers I’ve talked to
are having diffi culty trying to get
help.”
He said the business he runs
didn’t actually lose any workers to
the pandemic, but expanding his
workforce has been a challenge.
“Trying to add (workers) is
tough,” he said. “It’s even tougher
in a smaller community like we
are.”
Cindy Ellis, who co-owns and
operates Heavenly’s Restaurant
in Enterprise, switched to take-
out only when the pandemic fi rst
struck, but was able to resume
indoor seating as businesses were
allowed to reopen. But then reli-
able employees became scarce.
“We had to cut our indoor seat-
ing because someone we hired
didn’t show,” she said.
Ellis said Heavenly’s was open
for indoor seating when inter-
viewed on Thursday, Sept. 16.
“We got a lot of folks from
Elgin,” she said, and despite a small
workforce, “we were swamped.”
Boomers retiring
at a faster rate
Eastern Oregon saw only negli-
gible gains in population over the
the past decade, according to U.S.
Census Bureau data. And looming
within the numbers is a certainty
that has taken the back seat to pan-
demic woes and commentary: The
boomers are retiring.
In Eastern Oregon, the work-
ing population is aging out much
quicker than in previous years.
The Oregon Employment Depart-
ment reported in May 2021 that
the working population in Eastern
Oregon had grown signifi cantly
older from 2010 to 2020. That
increased share means the number
of workers age 55 and over makes
See Workers, Page A7