BAKER CITY HERALD • TUESDAY, JANUARY 25, 2022 A3
LOCAL & STATE
Cafe
For each international din-
ner, Sara decorates the dining
Continued from A1
room in a style of the featured
country or culture and pro-
The other dishes were
vides an informational sheet
Basque soup and Basque
with tidbits about the food or
salad, flat-grilled rib steak,
area’s history.
Basque beans, green beans,
“We try to feed your mind
flan and Basque rice pud-
and your body,” she said.
ding.
Reservations are required
“She’s amazing. She can
for these once-a-month expe-
do anything,” Sara said of
riences, and prices vary. She
Brown’s cooking.
offers two seatings, and has
Food for the international filled up every time.
dinners is made from scratch.
“Our community has been
“I really try to stay true to very supportive,” she said.
what they would make,” Sara
Prior to each featured
said.
night, she posts the menu on
There’s been one excep-
the cafe’s board and on the
tion — she did order scrapple Facebook page.
fresh from Pennsylvania for
She’d like to bring in guest
the Amish dinner.
chefs for future international
(Scrapple is a special
nights, especially meals with
Amish food made from pork an Asian influence.
scraps and spices.)
To inquire about the next
The Amish dinner also
international dinner, or make
featured chicken and waffles a reservation, call 541-893-
and shoo-fly pie.
6167.
For Russian night, Sara
made a bird’s milk cake.
Friday night dinners
“Jeff said it was the best I’ve
On the other three Friday
ever done,” Sara said.
nights of the month Sara stays
“It was,” Jeff said, popping open until 7 p.m. and offers
into the cafe’s dining room.
special meals.
Council
Lisa Britton/Baker City Herald
Miss Pickett greets everyone at Sara’s Richland Cafe. She even has her
own Instagram page.
“We want to give people an opportunity to open
their horizons.”
— Sara Artley, co-owner of Sara’s Richland Cafe
Reservations for these
non-international nights are
recommended, but not re-
quired.
These meals are also posted
on the cafe’s Facebook page.
Sara’s Richland Cafe is
open Monday through Satur-
Roadkill
Continued from A1
“This is not to say this is
going to solve our raven prob-
lem, because it’s not,” she said.
“But it is a deterrent. If we’re
doing a good job of denying
food sources to ravens, they’ll
have to travel farther, and
probably not spend as much
time in that area (that includes
sage grouse habitat).”
Sage grouse tend to remain
in relatively small areas, De-
frees said, so the consistent
presence of ravens can con-
stitute an ongoing threat to
the grouse.
Defrees said Oregon State
University researchers are
studying, in the Cow Val-
ley area along Highway 26 in
northern Malheur County,
the effects on raven concen-
trations by removing road-
killed animals.
Reducing raven numbers
Dealing with ravens is not
so simple as summoning a
group of volunteers with shot-
guns. That’s because ravens,
unlike sage grouse, are pro-
tected under the Migratory
Bird Treaty Act.
That federal law does allow
government agencies to ap-
ply for permits to kill ravens,
however.
In Baker County, the U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service and
ODFW last year started a two-
year project to remove raven
nests in and near sage grouse
habitat in Baker County, De-
frees said.
Depending on how effec-
tive that tactic is at curbing ra-
ven populations, the agencies
could also use a permit to kill
ravens, Defrees said.
Birds and politics
Sage grouse, which are
about the size of a chicken,
have been a candidate for
federal protection for more
than a decade.
In September 2015 the U.S.
Fish and Wildlife Service de-
cided not to list the bird as
threatened or endangered.
But environmental groups
have repeatedly asked the
federal government to clas-
sify the bird as a threatened
or endangered species, a
Nick Myatt/Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, File
A male sage grouse inflates the air sacs in its breast and fans its tail
feathers as part of the bird’s elaborate spring courting ritual.
decision that could curtail
activities, including cattle
grazing and motorized vehi-
cle use on public land, that
could degrade sage grouse
habitat.
According to ODFW’s
2021 sage grouse report, the
estimated population of the
birds in Baker County (and a
small part of southern Union
County) in the spring of that
year was 704. That’s a 42.6%
increase from the estimate
of 494 birds in spring 2020,
but the report notes that this
increase “was likely a result
of the analysis methodology
used to generate population
estimates.”
The report states that sage
grouse populations in the
county have risen since 2014,
including an average annual
increase of 1.7% in the num-
ber of male grouse at “leks”
— the open areas where the
birds gather each spring and
where the males perform the
species’ elaborate courting rit-
ual, which includes inflating
air sacs in their breasts and
fanning their tail feathers.
However, between 2005
and 2021, among leks that
were surveyed in both years,
the number of males present
declined by 81%.
“This area has experienced
a long-term population de-
cline and has remained stag-
nant in recent years,” the re-
port states.
COVID
Daily case totals exceeded
25 on all but one day from
Continued from A1
Jan. 11 to Jan. 20, including a
one-day record of 55 on Jan.
And Staten pointed out that 18, and the second-highest to-
during previous surges, Baker tal of 40, on Jan. 20.
County has tended to lag be-
The daily counts for Jan.
hind the state in reaching a
21, 22 and 23 were 23, nine
peak of new infections.
and nine.
A total of 29 people went to a
Weekend case totals tend to
free testing clinic in Baker City be artificially low due to delays
on Saturday, Jan. 22, but those in reporting.
PCR test results won’t be avail-
However, the total of nine
able until later this week, Staten cases for Saturday, Jan. 22, was
said on Monday, Jan. 24.
lower than for each of the pre-
The county’s case total for
vious three Saturdays — 29
the week Jan. 16-22 was 183.
cases on Jan. 15, 10 on Jan. 8,
That eclipsed the record set
and 12 on Jan. 1.
the previous week, Jan. 9-15,
Sundays typically have the
with 176 cases.
fewest cases — nine on Jan. 23,
(Both weeks broke the re- four on Jan. 16, six on Jan. 9
cord of 139 cases set Sept.
and zero on Jan. 2.
12-18.)
Staten said that although a
Prepare for unexpected
power outages with a
Generac home standby
generator
Carcass conundrum
Although other animals
are killed by cars, deer are
the biggest animals fre-
quently hit on Highway 86
east of Baker City.
The challenges, Defrees
said, are how to gather the
carcasses in a timely way, and
then what to do with them.
She said Oregon Depart-
ment of Transportation
(ODOT) crews can’t be ex-
pected to pick up carcasses
and haul them to a process-
ing site.
The proposed place for that
is Baker Sanitary Service’s
landfill near Sutton Creek, a
few miles southeast of Baker
City off Old Highway 30.
The idea, Defrees said, is to
turn the carcasses into com-
post.
Ace Clark, manager for
ODOT’s District 13, which
includes Baker County, said
he has met with Defrees and
Baker Sanitary Service offi-
cials about the proposal, most
recently on Jan. 13.
Clark said ODOT does not
plan to use any of the LIT’s
Lottery money to do any work
in Baker County in collecting
and hauling carcasses. He said
ODOT did give Defrees and
Baker Sanitary Service infor-
mation about the composting
guidelines the agency uses.
For about a decade, ODOT
has had a composting center
near Heppner where road-
small number of people who
have taken home tests that
were positive have reported
those results to the Health De-
partment, she believes there
are county residents who have
also tested positive at home but
have not reported the result.
She urges people who have
symptoms consistent with
COVID-19, but who test nega-
tive with a home test, still try to
be isolated for at least five days.
Those tests aren’t as accurate
as the lab-processed PCR tests,
Staten said.
As for symptoms, she said
Health Department workers
who do contact tracing and
case investigations have found
that cold-like symptoms, in-
cluding a sore throat, headache,
congestion and sometimes fe-
day, 7 a.m. to 3 p.m., and Fri-
days from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
And expect a greeter at
the door — the Artley’s bor-
der collie, Miss Pickett, loves
playing fetch. She even has
her own Instagram page: @
MissPickettPup.
killed deer are taken from just
the local area, including state
highways 206, 207 and 74.
That facility was built to
discourage scavengers such
as coyotes from congregat-
ing near ranches and farms,
and potentially increasing
the risk of more collisions
between cars and wildlife.
ODOT also cited bacteria
and other pathogens on ani-
mal carcasses that potentially
cause health and environmen-
tal hazards in its request for a
permit for the compost center.
That project has nothing
to do with sage grouse, since
there are no nearby popula-
tions of the birds.
David Henry, president of
Baker Sanitary Service, and
Garrett Virtue, the landfill
manager, said the company
is interested in working with
Defrees and the sage grouse
LIT to dispose of roadkilled
deer and turn the carcasses
into compost.
Baker Sanitary opened a
compost facility at the land-
fill in the summer of 2021. It
initially processed yard waste,
but Virtue said the company
wants to add food waste and
other meat to the facility. Deer
carcasses present a different
challenge, he said, because
they would need to be ground
up before being added to the
compost process.
He said he’d like to have the
company contribute to the ef-
fort to potentially benefit sage
grouse and create another
source of material for the
compost processing.
“If we can help out and do
a good thing, it’s a win-win
situation for everyone,” Vir-
tue said.
Henry said Baker Sanitary
Service would also need to en-
sure it has a reliable supply of
woody material to add to the
mix, as an increase in meat
and other food wastes would
need to be offset by wood de-
bris to ensure the proper ratio
to produce usable compost.
Virtue said Baker Sanitary
is still looking at the best way
to sell, or otherwise make use
of, the compost it produces.
One possible option is
to use the material to im-
prove the condition of soils
in rangelands in the area,
he said.
ver, have been the more com-
mon ailments recently.
In general, people are report-
ing somewhat less severe symp-
toms than with other variants
— consistent with what health
experts have found with omi-
cron — but Staten cautioned
that omicron can also make
people severely, and potentially
fatally, sick.
Staten said the record-set-
ting number of new cases this
month means the Health De-
partment can’t interview every-
one who tested positive.
She said some people decline
to talk with Health Depart-
ment workers.
Staten said case investigators
have linked some of the recent
cases to holiday gatherings.
They have also noted that
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more households have had
multiple members infected,
which she said is to be ex-
pected given how contagious
omicron is.
The Oregon Health Au-
thority didn’t list any new
workplace outbreaks in Baker
County as of Jan. 16.
Staten said she hopes that,
as statistics in other countries
suggest could happen, the
omicron surge will “go down
almost as fast as it went up.”
But with cases remaining
high in Baker County, she
urges people to continue to
take precautions.
“We want people to have
hope,” Staten said. “We know
people are tired of wearing
masks and social distancing.
It’s hard for everyone.”
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This time the trio of Alder-
son, Spriet and Sells was in
favor, and the threesome of
Continued from A1
McQuisten, Waggoner and
Dixon was opposed.
ahead with the quiet zone
Guyer, in his
plan proposed more
proposal on the
than two years ago
agenda for the Jan.
by a group of resi-
25 meeting, writes
dents.
that although city
That group has
staff could work on
also offered to
aspects of the quiet
raise the estimated
$150,000 needed to
zone project as part
Guyer
upgrade five railroad
of their normal
crossings to make it
work, money raised
harder for a vehicle to reach by the citizens group would
the tracks while a train is
be used “exclusively” to pay
passing. Federal rules re-
for crossing improvements.
quire those improvements
The city could also sponsor
for a city to qualify for a
grant applications promoted
quiet zone.
by the group.
“I’m a believer that peo-
Under Guyer’s proposal,
ple put city council folks in
the Council would direct the
charge to make decisions
city staff to make the quiet
on their behalf, no different zone a priority for 2022-23,
than what we see at the state and to make the safety im-
level and or at the US gov-
provements at crossings
ernment level,” Guyer said
“when sufficient external
on Monday morning, Jan.
funds are available.”
24. “If there is a reason for
“The Council expects the
the voters to vote on every- City to install all necessary
thing that comes up in city
safety measures and to estab-
council, then what’s the pur- lish the Quiet Zone by 2023,
pose of city council?”
or as soon as possible after
The Tuesday, Jan. 25,
construction is complete,”
Council meeting starts at
Guyer wrote in his proposal.
7 p.m. at City Hall, 1655
He said in an interview
First St.
Monday morning, Jan. 24,
In a quiet zone — a des-
that he believes the positives
ignation both La Grande
of a quiet zone outweigh the
and Pendleton have, two of
negatives.
13 quiet zones in Oregon
Guyer cited health issues
— freight trains are not re-
from the whistles, and their
quired to sound their whis- effect on students learning
tles when approaching a
at South Baker Intermediate
street crossing.
School, which is next to the
Train crews would still
railroad tracks.
trigger their warning whis-
“Most kids probably don’t
tles at their discretion — if, have a problem in getting re-
for instance, they saw a vehi- engaged but there’s that very
cle or pedestrian on or near few that are in the classrooms
the tracks.
that do have difficulty reen-
In Baker City, where about gaging after being disrupted,”
24 freight trains roll through Guyer said.
each day and there are five
“I don’t think the trains
crossings within the city lim- alone are going to be a cause
its, trains moving at 50 mph for somebody’s hearing loss
have to use their whistles
but I think it can be a con-
almost constantly to com-
tributing issue at a very
ply with the requirement
young age,” he said.
that the warning be sounded
Guyer said he knows that
at least 15 seconds, and no
some residents have ex-
more than 20 seconds, in
pressed opposition to the
advance of reaching public
quiet zone based on cost and
crossings.
safety.
(For trains traveling faster
But he pointed out that the
than 45 mph — trains in
citizens group has proposed
Baker City sometimes move to raise money for the work
at about 50 mph — engi-
that would make the cross-
neers can sound the whistle ings safer.
within 1/4 mile of a cross-
He has also heard people
ing, even if that’s less than 15 expressing concerns about
seconds before it reaches the people walking down the
crossing.)
railroad tracks who won’t
The City Council most re- hear an oncoming train that
cently discussed the quiet
doesn’t sound its whistle.
zone issue in October 2021,
But he noted that engi-
when it was still a six-mem- neers are still able to use their
ber group.
horns.
During the Oct. 12 meet-
“This does not eliminate
ing, councilors deadlocked
the engineers from using
twice on 3-3 votes.
their horns when they see an
The first motion was to put issue,” Guyer said.
the quiet zone matter on the
He said he understands
May 2022 primary election
that his support for the quiet
ballot, letting city voters de- zone could diminish his
cide whether the city should chances of being elected to
pursue the designation.
a four-year term on the City
Mayor Kerry McQuisten and Council in the November
Councilors Johnny Waggoner 2022 election (he was ap-
Sr. and Joanna Dixon voted
pointed to replace Lynette
in favor.
Perry, who resigned in Au-
Councilors Shane Al-
gust 2021 due to health is-
derson, Jason Spriet and
sues, and her term runs only
Heather Sells voted against
through the end of 2022).
the motion.
“If they do, I understand,
The second motion was
but I’m still sticking with my
similar to what Guyer is pro- original thought; I think this
posing — to have the city
is a benefit to the commu-
make a formal application
nity as opposed to a negative
with the Federal Railroad
thing,” Guyer said.
Administration for a quiet
zone designation.
The vote on the motion
was divided the same way.
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