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WALLOWA COUNTY SENIOR
Meal sites are open for in-dining!
Meal site information: Wallowa 886-8971, Enterprise
426-3840, Home delivered meals 426-3840.
Mon. Mar. 21: Asian chicken rice bowl on a bed of rice,
roasted vegetables, mandarin oranges &
fortune cookie (sponsored by Lostine
Presbyterian Church & Resale Store)
Wed. Mar. 23: Beef stew, corn bread, cottage cheese, peaches
& ambrosia salad (sponsored by City
of Wallowa)
Fri. Mar. 25: Cheese ravioli with meat sauce, seasoned
green beans, green salad, French bread &
mixed fruit (sponsored by Wallowa
Assembly of God)
To sponsor a senior meal,
call 426-3840 or stop by the
Community Connection office.
Wednesday, March 16, 2022
A15
Community Connection of Northeast
Oregon brings support to the region
By ANN BLOOM
For the Wallowa County
Chieftain
WALLOWA COUNTY
— Older adults in Wallowa
County are supported by a
strong web of services to help
them remain in their homes
for as long as they want —
from congregate meal sites,
to in-home care services, to
family caregiver services to
home-delivered meals.
All are off ered through, or
can be coordinated through,
Community Connection of
Northeast Oregon, and are as
close as a phone call away.
“It is a misconception
that the meal program is for
low-income people,” said
Connie Guentert, manager
of Community Connection.
“It’s about socializing and
congregating,” and all are
welcome, she said.
“We are super lucky to
have two meal sites in the
county,” Guentert said.
One is in the senior center
in the Community Connec-
tion building, and the second
is in Wallowa at the senior
center. She said the meals are
prepared to be “as fl avorful
as possible.” The focus is on
taste and visual appeal.
The meals are based on
the U.S. Department of Agri-
culture 2020-25 Dietary
Guidelines for Americans.
They are portion-controlled
and meet the dietary guide-
lines for older adults drawing
on foods from the fi ve food
groups necessary for health.
The fi ve food groups that
comprise the senior meals
at the sites include lean pro-
teins, low-fat dairy prod-
ucts, fruits and vegetables
(fresh, canned, dried, frozen
and 100% juice) and whole
grains. The menus are avail-
able in the Chieftain and are
broadcast on KWVR radio.
For those attending the
meal site who are over 60, the
suggested donation, which
is voluntary, is $4. If one is
under 60, the cost is $6. The
Meals on Wheels Program is
for homebound seniors. Both
Meals on Wheels and the
Congregate Meal Program
are funded through the Older
Americans’ Act.
In addition to the meal
programs, Community Con-
nection off ers other senior
support programs designed
to help seniors stay in their
own homes for as long as
possible. For example, Ore-
gon Project Independence is
“designed to support seniors
in their own home and
remain independent as long
as possible with assistance
of in-home care assistants,”
explained Guentert.
It all comes down to
dignity.
“(We want to) support a
senior who’s lived in their
home remain in their home
with respect and dignity with
minimal funding, which is
what we should aspire to.
The alternative is a facility,”
Guentert said.
To qualify for nurs-
ing-home care, a person
must spend down, or spend
their resources to qualify for
Medicaid, a federal program
in which the government
pays for a person’s care. The
program is income-based.
Guentert said that is not what
families want to do. They
want to leave their homes
and their resources to their
families.
Another senior program
that partners with OPI is the
Family Caregiver Program
which “supports the care-
giver, not the care receiver,”
Guentert said.
She refers to this web of
support services for seniors
as “wrap-around support-
ive services” to allow older
adults to remain healthy and
independent.
“Our community is so
remote. Our parents and
grandparents grew up in this
community, and they want to
stay here,” she said.
She goes on to explain
that the support services
off ered are to help seniors,
“age in their communities
and thrive. There is a diff er-
ence between thriving and
existing.” She noted that
aging in place involves a
healthy, livable community
and that a livable commu-
nity includes mental, physi-
cal and emotional health.
“Senior programs have
grown in this community. It’s
a blessing to our citizens,”
she said.
Guentert stressed the
importance of older adults
in the Wallowa County
community
cannot
be
underestimated.
“Our community is made
up of many components,”
she said.
Those components are a
diversity of ethnicities, races
and ages.
“The seniors are a major
part of that,” she said. “They
have worked all their lives to
live here. They’re an import-
ant aspect that should never
be forgotten. We can’t have
a community without them.”
‘No logical explanation’ in cattle mutilation
By STEVEN MITCHELL
Blue Mountain Eagle
JOHN DAY — A muti-
lated bull mysteriously
turned up dead at a ranch in
Bear Valley last month with
surgically removed body
parts.
According to a Feb. 28
entry of the Oregon State
Police log, a rancher called
a John Day Wildlife Trooper
to report a bull had been
killed and mutilated on his
ranch with its testicles, scro-
tum, tongue and lips pre-
cisely removed.
Mat Carter, a rancher
from the Crown Cattle
Company, said he reported
the mutilation to the state’s
wildlife trooper after discov-
ering the dead bull roughly
a quarter to half a mile from
his house.
The cause of death is
unknown.
When Carter found the
bull, it had likely been dead
a few days and was already
decomposing. The 24-hour
window during which an
autopsy could have been
performed on the body had
passed.
According to Carter,
there were no signs of vul-
tures, coyotes or other scav-
engers around the bull.
“There’s
no
tracks,
there’s no signs, there’s no
nothing,” Carter said.
He said it is hard to imag-
ine anyone would have come
on to his property, killed a
bull, drained its blood, and
then cleanly cut out specifi c
body parts.
According to Carter, with
no evidence or leads to fol-
low up on for law enforce-
ment, the incident remains a
mystery.
And this was not the fi rst
cow mutilation on his ranch,
Carter said.
Several years ago, Car-
ter said he was almost sure
one of his cows had been
mutilated. However, he said,
there was no way to say with
certainty because he did
not get to it quickly enough
before fl ies and other scav-
engers made it impossible to
determine what happened.
He said a similar situation
occurred in August, which is
why he tries to inspect cattle
deaths a little more closely
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when they occur.
Indeed, Carter’s situa-
tion is not unique. Accord-
ing to FBI records, since
the 1970s, thousands of kill-
ings and mutilations of cat-
tle have happened across
the U.S. Last year Wheeler
County had fi ve cases while
Harney County had four in
four years, with the previ-
ous two occurring in May
and June.
The cases, the data
reports, are similar to Car-
ter’s case.
A cow or bull is found
dead in a remote area with
no signs of how someone
might have made it onto a
property undetected. There
are no footprints, tire tracks
or fi ngerprints. There is very
little — if any — spilled
blood and no visible punc-
ture wounds, bullets or
strangulation marks.
The bizarre nature of the
mutilation and lack of evi-
dence makes it all the more
baffl ing and frustrating for
Carter.
Meanwhile,
theories
abound about who is behind
the cow mutilations, be it
aliens, demons or cults.
However, in the thou-
sands of cases since the
1970s, no one has ever been
caught.
For his part, Carter said
he does not try to speculate
on it, nor does he believe in
UFOs or any other kind of
strange phenomenon.
“It’s really odd, Car-
ter said. “There’s no logical
explanation.”