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137th Year, No. 50
Wednesday, March 23, 2022
WALLOWA.COM
Demo work underway
Cougar Dome
retrofi t project
scheduled for
fall completion
Rod
Schnabel
By BILL BRADSHAW
Wallowa County Chieftain
Enterprise
Alaskan
found a new
home here
ENTERPRISE — Rod Schna-
bel grew up in Alaska, but he’s
found a new home in Wallowa
County. He’s lived in Enterprise
for about 20 years.
“I was born in Alaska when it
was a territory,” he said.
He has no family here, but he
has a sister in Oak Harbor, Wash-
ington, and brothers in Chal-
lis, Idaho; Haines, Alaska; and
Phoenix.
Schnabel is no longer work-
ing, being on disability, he said.
He recently shared his
thoughts about living in Wal-
lowa County.
What’s your favorite thing
about Wallowa County?
The sunshine, the nice
weather during the summer-
time. In Juneau, it’s raining every
day. There’s a lot of strange peo-
ple here, but I like a lot of them.
Are you getting cabin fever
yet?
Yeah, if you stay home a lot
you do.
What are you looking
forward to once the
weather warms?
I just sit on the park bench
and watch the people go by.
What do you think of
Russia’s invasion of the
Ukraine?
I’m not in favor of it.
Do you think it’s aff ecting
the high price of fuel?
Yes, because Russia exports a
lot of oil products.
What’s your advice for
people who are thinking
about moving here?
My brother is thinking of
it. (He should) get prepared
because of the weather.
— Bill Bradshaw,
Wallowa County Chieftain
W
ALLOWA — It
looked like a bomb
went off in the Wal-
lowa High School
Cougar Dome on Thursday,
March 17, but it was the result of
workers getting hard at it in their
eff orts to demolish and retrofi t the
structure.
Eff orts to replace key portions
of the structure began in earnest
March 7, Superintendent Tammy
Jones said Thursday, March 17.
“The seismic is about gutting the
gym,” Jones said. “They’re tearing
out the walls and roof.”
She pointed out “hinge points”
that make the building unstable in
case of a seismic event — spots
where the walls don’t extend from
fl oor to ceiling.
Bill Bradshaw/Wallowa County Chieftain
Workers clean up Thursday, March 17, 2022, during the demolition work at Wallowa High School’s Cougar
Dome. It’s part of the work toward the seismic retrofi t the school district received a grant to pay for.
The fault line
Last year, the Chieftain reported
that the Wallowa School District
received a $2.3 million seismic ret-
rofi t grant from the Oregon Depart-
ment of Education. The funds will
be used to make the Cougar Dome
stable and safe in the event of an
earthquake. The grant will fund
primarily structural improvements
so that the large gym building can
serve as public shelter in the event
of an earthquake or other disaster.
The school and the town of Wal-
lowa are along the western end of
the Wallowa fault. That structure
has uplifted the Wallowa Moun-
Bill Bradshaw/Wallowa County Chieftain
See Demo, Page A5
Former Wallowa athlete and NFL player Amos Marsh’s signature was uncovered recently during the demolition
work underway at the Wallowa High School’s Cougar Dome. It’s part of the seismic retrofi t of the structure.
Controversial animal rights
proposal won’t make ballot
‘New Life’ fi lmed here
to resemble Canada
By ALEX WITTWER
EO Media Group
LA GRANDE — A controver-
sial proposal on animal cruelty
laws appears to be off the table, for
now, but proponents of the initia-
tive say their campaign isn’t over
yet.
“We just submitted the initia-
tive for 2024 and are waiting for
confi rmation from the state,” an
organizer with the Yes on IP13
campaign said. “At this point, it
does not look like we will gather
enough for 2022. I believe the plan
is to shift gears to the newly num-
bered initiative as soon as we have
it.”
Initiative Petition 13, other-
wise known as the Abuse, Neglect
and Assault Exemption Modifi ca-
tion and Improvement Act, would
remove exemptions to the Ore-
gon animal abuse laws that protect
hunters, farmers and anglers from
abuse violations. That means hunt-
ers could possibly be prosecuted
for killing and harvesting wild ani-
mals, as could farmers who send
their livestock to slaughterhouses.
David Michelson, the author
of the initiative and the lead orga-
nizer for the campaign, acknowl-
edged the proposal’s long road,
and said that like other social jus-
tice reforms throughout history, it
will take time.
“This is asking for quite a shift
from the norm, and I think, like
with any social change, it’s con-
troversial,” he said. “But every
social justice movement in history
has been met with controversy,
unfortunately.”
Michelson noted a petition to
allow women to vote in Oregon
faced similar political headwinds
Enterprise,
Joseph to be
in indie fi lm
By BILL BRADSHAW
Wallowa County Chieftain
Farmers balked at the pro-
posal, stating it wouldn’t be worth
the eff ort or the ink to do a story
about the initiative. Prominent La
Grande hunter Steve West, of the
TV show “Steve’s Outdoor Adven-
tures,” said the proposition likely
would fail to gather enough signa-
tures to make it on the ballot.
“The people who come up with
this, their hearts are in the right
place because they’re so attached
to animals,” he said. “The reality
is they will never get enough votes
to pass something like this. I just
don’t see any chance in hell that
they even get 100,000 signatures
to even get it to a ballot. It’s just so
out there.”
ENTERPRISE — Wallowa
County is going to be a star. At
least, several locations in Enter-
prise and Joseph will be in the
upcoming independent fi lm
“New Life,” which capitalizes
on the county’s resemblance to
Canada.
“Today we are fi lming in
downtown Enterprise,” said
Hannah Cumming, associate
producer and production coordi-
nator for the fi lm, on Thursday,
March 17. “We’re shooting on
the sidewalk along Main Street,
by the courthouse and near the
city park.”
She said the previous day the
crew shot at a ranch near Joseph.
“It was beautiful there,” Cum-
ming said.
She said the fi lm is about Jess
Murdoch, who gets infected with
a virus that is “causing serious
side eff ects, and she’s being pur-
sued by an offi cial, Elsa, who is
trying to fi gure out why the side
eff ects are not aff ecting her the
way they’re aff ecting everyone
else.”
Murdoch is portrayed by Hay-
ley Erin of Los Angeles, while
Elsa Gray is portrayed by Sonya
Walger of the United Kingdom.
Enterprise is doubling as a
town in Alberta, Canada, near
the U.S. border.
“We were trying to fi nd a
place in Oregon that looked like
Canada,” Cumming said. “The
See Rights, Page A5
See Film, Page A5
Alex Wittwer/EO Media Group
Cattle graze the fi eld at a ranch on Airport Lane, La Grande, on Thursday,
March 17, 2022. A controversial animal rights initiative, known as IP13,
appears to have stalled as organizers failed to gather the signatures
necessary to put it on the ballot this November.
in the early 20th century, but the
story of how women fought for
suff rage in Oregon has been inspi-
rational to the Portland-based
activist, who said he would “like
to see this (initiative) as being part
of that history of progressive ballot
measures that push us forward.”
But even if the initiative fails
to muster the signatures necessary
to reach the ballot this Novem-
ber, Michelson has his eyes set on
2024.
“We are planning, as we have
always planned, to submit our ini-
tiative for 2024 with the antici-
pation that even if we qualify for
2022, it is unlikely that it’ll pass
on the fi rst attempt,” Michelson
said. “Speaking back to the initia-
tive that gave women the right to
vote, it was voted on in six con-
secutive election cycles before it
fi nally passed. It was voted down
fi ve times. If our initiative does not
pass this November, we want to
make sure it’s on the ballot again
in 2024.”
‘Their hearts are in
the right place’