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Serving Baker County since 1870 • bakercityherald.com
July 20, 2021
Local • Home & Living • Sports
IN THIS EDITION:
$1.50
DROUGHT
Dry conditions bring hardship to Eastern Oregon farms and ranches
New brochures guide visitors to
fresh produce and more
Lair family purchases 45-acre
cherry orchard near Cove
Smutz family well into its second
century on Foothill Road farm
Ranchers optimistic about meat
packing antitrust probe
10
12
16
22
SUMMER EDITION, JULY 2021
An EO Media Group Publication
INCLUDED WITH
THURSDAY’S ISSUE
COVID
rules
remain
at jail
Festival, Which Was Canceled In 2020, Brings Crowds To Park, Downtown
Jubilee Returns
24-page special section
examines the effects of
severe drought on farming
and ranching in Northeast-
ern Oregon, and other top-
ics related to agriculture.
By Corey Kirk
ckirk@bakercityherald.com
QUICK HITS
Good Day Wish
To A Subscriber
A special good day to
Herald subscriber Toni Hays
of Baker City.
Oregon, A3
A recall effort against
Sen. Lynn Findley, R-Vale,
has been offi cially ap-
proved to begin circulating
petitions.
BRIEFING
Baker County
commissioners to
meet Wednesday
Baker County Commis-
sioners will meet Wednes-
day, July 21 at 9 a.m. at the
Courthouse, 1995 Third St.
Agenda items include:
• A request for funding
from the Baker Rural Fire
District.
• Public hearing for a
proposal to authorize the
county to sell two parcels
of county property near
East Pine Creek in the
eastern part of the county.
One parcel is 40 acres, the
other 60 acres.
Baker
all-stars
at state
tourney
Lisa Britton/Baker City Herald
Delicioso restaurant had a colorful fl oat in the Miners Jubilee parade Saturday, July 17.
By Joanna Mann and
Jayson Jacoby
Baker City Herald
The throngs of people strolling
through Geiser-Pollman Park helped
to tell the story.
The crowds that lined downtown
sidewalks for Baker City’s fi rst parade
in nearly two years added their own
hefty chapter Saturday morning, July
17.
So did the rodeo fans who gathered
in the grandstand and bleachers at
the Fairgrounds two straight nights to
watch riders try to stay aboard the un-
dulating spines of broncs and bulls.
See Jubilee/Page A3
“I knew it was going to be huge,
cause we can all fi nally gather
again, but I had no idea it was
going to be that big.”
While the community con-
tinues to return to normalcy
nearly a year and a half into
the COVID-19 pandemic,
the situation hasn’t changed
much at the Baker County
Jail.
The jail, built in 1991 at
3410 K St.
in northwest
Baker City,
remains under
social distanc-
ing guidelines
Ash
issued by the
Centers for
Disease Control and the
Oregon Health Authority
for the time being, Sheriff
Travis Ash said.
“We are still following
the CDC guidance, we have
weekly meetings with the
OHA and the Oregon State
Sheriffs Association,” Ash
said.
See Jail/Page A3
Baker
avoids
fires,
but not
smoke
— Shelly Cutler, executive
director, Baker County
Chamber of Commerce
WEATHER
Tuesday
By Jayson Jacoby
89 / 53
jjacoby@bakercityherald.com
Partly sunny
Wednesday
88 / 48
Mostly sunny
The space below is for
a postage label for issues
that are mailed.
Lisa Britton/Baker City Herald
Shriner Mike Rudi walked with the Baker County Shrine Club’s fl oat during the Miners Jubilee parade on
Saturday, July 17. Like Miners Jubilee, the East-West Shrine All-Star Football Game returns this year after a
one-year hiatus in 2020 due to the pandemic. The fundraiser for the Shriners’ Hospital for Children in Port-
land is set for Aug. 7 at Baker Bulldog Memorial Stadium.
Baker County has so far
missed the big wildfi res
burning in Oregon and
elsewhere in the West, but
the county hasn’t avoided
the most noxious of their
byproducts.
Smoke.
With a persistent pattern
of southwesterly winds at
higher altitudes, smoke from
the Bootleg fi re in Klam-
ath and Lake counties has
wafted into Baker County.
See Smoke/Page A2
Stubborn pattern prolongs heat wave
■ Presence of a high pressure ridge is typical for summer, a meteorologist says, but duration is unusual
By Jayson Jacoby
jjacoby@bakercityherald.com
Hot weather in mid-July is hardly
a surprise in Baker County, Jay Bre-
idenbach points out.
This is, after all, statistically the
county’s hottest month.
The daily record high temperature
is 100 or above on 19 of July’s 31 days
— the most of any month.
But Breidenbach, who is a me-
teorologist, concedes there’s nothing
typical about the spell of hot weather
that started with the summer solstice
nearly a month ago.
TODAY
Issue 30, 12 pages
“Normally it’s hot in the summer-
time, of course,” said Breidenbach, the
warning coordination meteorologist at
the National Weather Service’s Boise
offi ce, which handles forecasts for
Baker County.
“What is not typical is the duration
of this pattern.”
Here’s a few statistics to put into
perspective Breidenbach’s point about
the persistence of heat so far this
summer.
• The last day the temperature at
the Baker City Airport didn’t reach at
least 83 degrees was June 16.
Calendar ....................A2
Classified ............. B2-B4
Comics ....................... B5
Community News ....A3
Crossword ........B2 & B4
Dear Abby ................. B6
• Over the next 32 days — June 17
through July 18 — the temperature
at the airport topped 90 on 22 days.
That’s just below the average of about
24 such days — for the entire year —
recorded between 1943 and 2012.
• The temperature surpassed 90
degrees on 19 of 20 days, June 26
through July 15. On the only excep-
tion, July 7, the high was 89 degrees.
That snapped a streak of 11 straight
90-degree-plus days, the longest
stretch in almost four years and the
sixth-longest in at least the past half
century.
Horoscope ........B3 & B4
News of Record ........A2
Obituaries ..................A2
That single degree prevented what
would have been a record-setting
stretch of 20 straight days with a high
of 90 or hotter. The record at the air-
port is 16 days, set in 1994 and tied in
2017. Both of those hot spells spanned
late July and early August.
The city enjoyed a respite over the
fi rst part of Miners Jubilee weekend,
but it was of the modest variety — the
high temperature was 88 degrees on
both Friday, July 16 and Saturday,
July 17.
Opinion ......................A4
Turning Backs ...........A2
Senior Menus ...........A2
See Heat Wave/Page A5
Sports ........................A6
Turning Backs ...........A2
Weather ..................... B6
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