TUESDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2021
DREDGE
MANDATE
Continued from A1
Yencopal said the county’s
other ambulance provider, in
addition to Halfway/Oxbow
and Eagle Valley, is the Baker
City Fire Department.
The Baker City depart-
ment, which provides
ambulance service in the city
and in much of the rest of the
county, has vaccination cards
or approved exceptions for all
its employees who staff am-
bulances, City Manager Jon
Cannon said on Monday.
“We’re moving forward
with all the staff that we have
on hand,” Cannon said.
When asked how many of
the department’s 16 full-time
fi refi ghters, and approxi-
mately six part-time paid
staff, are vaccinated, and how
many requested and received
an exception, Cannon said he
is “hesitant to give numbers
because there are HIPPA
laws and personnel laws and
if I give an exact ratio, then
it starts to give information
on what arguably should be
private.”
HIPPA is a federal law
that keeps people’s medical
records confi dential.
Yencopal and County
Commissioner Mark Ben-
nett said county offi cials are
looking for ways to provide
the ambulance and crew that
the Halfway/Oxbow service
requested in the letter.
The county has requested
aid from the state, Bennett
said.
County commission-
ers on Sept. 22 approved
an emergency declaration
stating that the governor’s
vaccine mandate for health
care workers could leave
NEWS OF
RECORD
If You Go
The Sumpter Dredge
is on the south side of
Sumpter, about 27 miles
west of Baker City via
Highway 7. The Haunted
Dredge experience is set
for Friday, Oct. 29 from
7 p.m. to 9 p.m. There is
no fee to visit the Dredge.
Continued from A1
She just keeps collecting
decorations.
“I had no Halloween stuff
when I moved here four years
ago,” she says.
An eavesdropper on these
volunteers may wonder
what they’re plotting, what
with the talk of a chain saw
and the clowns and other
scary stuff.
“The witch with the
cauldron here, a casket over
there,” Shanks says, moving
through the dim spaces.
And then there are the
actors — although Shanks
won’t reveal how many
she’s recruited for the night
haunting.
“There will be humans,” is
all she says.
During a lull, ShaRee
Serr scrolls through Amazon
searching for accessories to
her witch costume.
“I’ve never done much
with Halloween,” she says,
“but you get around Laramie
and you catch her spirit.”
Serr and her husband,
Karl, live in Wendell, Idaho,
and met Shanks when they
stayed at the Stockade.
Now friends, they traveled
to Sumpter to help Shanks
decorate for the upcoming
holiday.
Demaris, her head intact
after removing the cleaver
headband, can’t help but grin
as she looks at the trans-
formed interior.
But this sunny October
day doesn’t quite represent
BAKER CITY HERALD — A3
LOCAL & STATE
what people will fi nd on
Oct. 29.
“It’s fabulous when it’s
dark,” she says.
Coinciding with the Haunt-
ed Dredge are two night rides
of the Sumpter Valley Rail-
road. The train will leave the
Sumpter Station at 7 p.m. and
8 p.m. Fares for these short
runs are $15 adults, $14 se-
niors/military, and $8 for ages
3-17. For tickets, go to www.
sumptervalleyrailroad.org.
The fourth-annual Trunk-
or-Treat is Saturday, Oct. 30,
from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. on the
main street of town.
More trains are planned for
that day and depart Sumpter
at 11 a.m., 12:30 p.m., 2 p.m.
and 3:30 p.m.
DEATHS
Nancy Gover: 78, a longtime
Richland resident, died Oct. 15,
2021, in Sunnyside, Washington.
Arrangements are under the
direction of Tami’s Pine Valley
Funeral Home & Cremation
Services. Online condolences can
be made at www.tamispineval-
leyfuneralhome.com.
FUNERALS PENDING
Lisa Britton/Baker City Herald
Mary Chakarun works on decorating the Sumpter Dredge with cobwebs and
plastic spiders.
centerpiece of this state heri-
tage area, is leftover from
the area’s gold mining days.
The dredge ran 24 hours a
day, digging up more than $4
million in gold.
It was added to the
National Register of Historic
Places in 1971. Restoration
began in 1995.
When asked if it’s haunt-
ed, Smith just shrugs.
“It’s a dredge. It just col-
Is it haunted?
lected a lot of gold,” he says
Every year the dredge
with a smile.
attracts ghost hunters, says
Although the state
Darold Smith, assistant park
heritage area is accessible
ranger.
“Ever since they did ‘Ghost year-round — several miles
of trails wind through the
Mine,’” Smith says, refer-
dredge piles and ponds —
ring to the show fi lmed near
the dredge itself closes to the
Sumpter that also explored
public the day after Hal-
the dredge. “We had a guy
from Canada who asked if he loween.
“We turn it over to the
could look for ghosts.”
Lisa Britton/Baker City Herald
ghosts,” Smith says with
The wooden behemoth,
Marsha Demaris models a creepy Halloween prop while
fl oating silent in a pond as the a grin.
decorating the Sumpter Dredge for an Oct. 29 event.
both ambulance providers
and volunteer fi re districts in
the county, whose members
often are the fi rst to respond
to traffi c crashes and other
emergencies, unable to fulfi ll
that mission as often as they
have in the past.
The county has several
volunteer districts whose
members respond to emer-
gencies as well as fi res, but
which, unlike ambulance
services, are not certifi ed
or equipped to transport
patients.
In the Huntington area,
which does not have a local
ambulance provider, calls are
usually handled by either
a private company in the
Treasure Valley, or by the
Baker City Fire Department,
Yencopal said.
He said the private
ambulance operator in the
Treasure Valley might not
be as available to respond to
calls in the Huntington area,
including traffi c crashes on
Interstate 84, due to effects of
the mandate.
The governor’s mandate
also applies to hospitals.
Mark Snider, public rela-
tions and digital strategy
coordinator for the Saint
Alphonsus Health System, in
response to a question from
the Herald about staffi ng
at the Baker City hospi-
tal, wrote on Monday, Oct.
18 that “we expect a high
level of compliance with the
Governor’s requirement, and
will assess staffi ng after the
deadline.”
According to the Oregon
Health Authority (OHA), of
the 314 licensed health care
workers in Baker County,
69% were fully vaccinated as
of Oct. 4.
That’s the ninth-lowest
rate among Oregon’s
36 counties.
Among counties in the
region, Union County has the
highest rate, at 77%. Uma-
tilla and Wallowa counties
both have a 70% rate, while
Grant County is at 58% and
Malheur County at 54%.
Statewide, 82% of licensed
health care workers are
fully vaccinated, according
to OHA.
Baker School District
Of the district’s 263
employees, 208 — 79% — are
vaccinated, and all 55 of the
remaining employees have a
medical or religious excep-
tion, District Superintendent
Mark Witty said on Monday
morning, Oct. 18.
He said only one district
employee has resigned due
to a philosophical objection to
the vaccine mandate.
That employee, who is a
certifi ed worker — a group
that includes teachers and
other classroom staff — left
in mid September, which gave
the district enough time to
hire a replacement before the
mandate deadline, Witty said.
Vaccination rates for the
district’s three groups of
employees:
• Certifi ed and adminis-
trative — 80%. This group
includes the district’s approxi-
mately 111 certifi ed employ-
ees, including teachers.
• Classifi ed — 78%. This
group includes non-teaching
staff such as bus drivers and
custodians. There are about
110 classifi ed employees.
• Confi dential — 79%.
There are 22 employees in
this category, which includes
some non-teaching adminis-
trative staff.
Witty, who said he is fully
vaccinated, did not have a
breakdown, by the three cat-
egories, of how many of the 55
district employees have medi-
cal or religious exceptions.
He said the majority of
those are religious exceptions.
Witty said the district did
not deny any requests for
exceptions.
“We didn’t go over those
with a fi ne-tooth comb; I don’t
know who would want to,”
Witty said.
He said he is confi dent
that employees who submit-
ted a religious exception form
did so earnestly, and that he
respects their choice.
Employees who chose an
exception rather than being
vaccinated are required to
either wear an N95 mask
while working, or take weekly
COVID-19 tests. Witty said
most of the 58 employees who
aren’t vaccinated chose the
weekly testing option.
Those workers will take
the test at home, probably on
Sunday evening or Monday
morning, and the district will
then send the test kits to a
laboratory in Corvallis. The
OHA is paying for the testing,
Witty said.
He expects to receive
results within one day.
Witty said the weekly tests
are available for all district
employees, and he said some
fully vaccinated employees
also have signed up to receive
the weekly test kits.
He said he’s grateful
for the cooperation of the
district’s employees, including
its two unions, one of which
represents certifi ed employ-
ees, the other representing
classifi ed staff.
“We have people honestly
disagreeing with the man-
date, there’s no doubt about
that,” Witty said. “This doesn’t
satisfy everybody, but at the
end of the day our staff is
here to serve students, and
they want to try to do that.”
Department of Corrections
Most employees at state
prisons, including the Powder
River Correctional Facility in
Baker City, have until Nov.
30 to be fully vaccinated due
to an agreement between the
state and one labor union
approved Friday, Oct. 15, said
Jennifer Black, communica-
tions manager for the Oregon
Department of Corrections.
Employees who are
partially vaccinated by Oct.
18 have until Nov. 30 to fully
comply, Black said.
This applies to most
correctional department
employees statewide.
“There are just a few who
are subject to a straight Oc-
tober 18th compliance date,”
Black wrote.
As of press time Monday
afternoon, Black did not have
compliance statistics for Pow-
der River or other individual
prisons.
For the entire Department
of Corrections, the compliance
breakdown as of Monday:
• Fully vaccinated — 67%
• Religious exception —
19%
•Medical exception — 1%
• Not enough information
to verify status — 10%
• In the process of being
verifi ed — 3%
WOLVES
investigation into the Oct. 16
report, which involved a dead
calf, wasn’t fi nished.
Continued from A1
Ratliff said the Lookout
Mountain pack’s breeding
Brian Ratliff, district
wildlife biologist at ODFW’s female, which is wearing
Baker City offi ce, said Mon- a GPS tracking collar, has
day morning, Oct. 18 that the recently been “moving all
over the place” in the pack’s
known territory, which
includes most of the eastern
part of the Lookout Moun-
tain unit between Highway
86 on the north and Inter-
state 84 on the south.
In addition to the three
wolves killed Sept. 17,
ODFW employees shot and
killed two pups from the
Lookout Mountain pack on
Aug. 1.
The agency had estimated
the pack, prior to Aug. 1, con-
sisted of at least nine wolves.
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Baker City Police
Arrests, citations
THIRD-DEGREE THEFT, FAIL-
URE TO APPEAR (out-of-county
warrant): Josi Nadine Sargent, 48,
Baker City, 6:53 p.m. Sunday, Oct.
17 in the 900 block of Elm Street;
cited and released.
MENACING, RECKLESSLY
ENDANGERING: Deni Marie
Speelman, 55, Baker City,
5:02 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 17 in the
2400 block of Carter Street; jailed.
CONTEMPT OF COURT (Two
Baker County Justice Court war-
rants): Kyle Ryan Bork, 21, Baker
City, 4:09 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 17
in the 2400 block of Birch Street;
cited and released.
FAILURE TO APPEAR (out-
of-county warrant): Paul Adam
Heller, 50, Baker City, 4:26 a.m.
Sunday, Oct. 17 in the 2100
block of Second Street; cited and
released.
CONTEMPT OF COURT
(Baker Justice Court warrant):
Brian Anthony Heredia, 32, Baker
City, 4:02 p.m. Friday, Oct. 15 in
the 1200 block of Campbell Street;
cited and released.
FAILURE TO APPEAR (Baker
County Circuit Court warrant):
Austin Lakota Reese, 26, Baker
City, 8:15 a.m. Friday, Oct. 15 in
the 2700 block of Cedar Street;
cited and released.
Baker County Sheriff’s
Offi ce
Arrests, citations
PAROLE VIOLATION: Tyler
Joseph Anders, 32, Baker City,
2:19 p.m. Friday, Oct. 15 in the
1900 block of 17th Street; jailed.
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The Baker
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Betty Hindman: Graveside
service Thursday, Oct. 21 at 1 p.m.
at Mount Hope Cemetery. For
those who would like to make a
donation in Betty’s memory, her
family suggests the Eagle Valley
Cemetery (kiosk) or Community
Connection, through Tami’s Pine
Valley Funeral Home & Cremation
Services, P.O. Box 543, Halfway,
OR 97834. Online condolences
can be made at www.tamispine-
valleyfuneralhome.com.
Raymond Howerton:
Celebration of life with military
honors, Friday, Oct. 22 at 3 p.m. at
the Veterans Memorial Club, 2005
Valley Ave. in Baker City. Please at-
tend for food, drinks, a good time
and story sharing. Online con-
dolences can be made at www.
tamispinevalleyfuneralhome.com.
Beth Johnson Morrissey:
Memorial service will be Oct.
23 at 11 a.m. at the Baker City
Church of the Nazarene, 1250
Hughes Lane, with Pastor Lennie
Spooner offi ciating. The service
will also be livestreamed by the
church; details available at www.
grayswestco.com. Memorial
contributions can be made to the
YMCA Youth Scholarship program
through Gray’s West & Co.
Pioneer Chapel, 1500 Dewey Ave.,
Baker City, OR 97814. To leave a
condolence for Beth’s family, go to
www.grayswestco.com.
Roscoe Curry: Memorial
service Saturday, Oct. 30 at 2 p.m.
at the Church of Jesus Christ
of Latter-day Saints in Halfway.
Military honors will follow at the
Pine Valley Cemetery. Friends are
invited to join the family at the
church following the interment.
For those who would like to make
a donation in Roscoe’s memory,
his family suggests the Gary Si-
nise Foundation or The Church of
Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,
Halfway branch, through Tami’s
Pine Valley Funeral Home &
Cremation Services, P.O. Box 543,
Halfway, OR 97834. Online con-
dolences can be made at www.
tamispinevalleyfuneralhome.com.
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