A4
BAKER CITY
Opinion
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news@bakercityherald.com
Thursday, August 4, 2022 • Baker City, Oregon
EDITORIAL
Welcome work
in the watershed
W
e can’t permanently and completely
protect Baker City’s watershed from
wildfire.
Fire is a natural force too powerful to totally tame,
as the catastrophic blazes that have become all too
common across the West over the past decade attest.
But we can reduce the risk — perhaps by a mean-
ingful amount — that a fire will devastate the 10,000-
acre watershed, creating a water supply crisis and
likely forcing the city to spend more than $10 million
to build a water filtration plant.
U.S. Forest Service officials plan to start, as soon as
the summer of 2023, the most ambitious such project
in and around the watershed in decades.
Kendall Cikanek, ranger for the Wallowa-Whitman
National Forest’s Whitman District, announced in late
July that the forest has scheduled a public open house
to give residents information about the watershed
project. The open house is set for Aug. 17 6 p.m. to
8 p.m. at the Baker County Events Center, 2600 East
St.
Forest Service and Baker City officials have talked
for many years about the threat wildfire poses to the
watershed, most of which is densely forested. The
area, on the east slopes of the Elkhorn Mountains west
of town, is public property but most of the watershed
is closed to the public. The city allows limited access
for hunters when the fire danger isn’t extreme, and
one open road, leading to Marble Creek Pass, runs
through the watershed.
The forests in parts of the watershed are types where
wildfires have historically been infrequent, but when
they do burn they tend to be severe. Cikanek said
there hasn’t been a large fire in the watershed since
the 1880s. And when researchers studied old fire-
scarred trees in the watershed in the mid 1990s, they
concluded that such a blaze, based on past intervals, is
overdue.
Fortunately the watershed is not only close to Baker
City, where the Wallowa-Whitman has firefighters
stationed, but it’s visible from most of the valley, so
when a fire does start — typically sparked by lightning
— the smoke is seen, and reported, quickly. Fire crews
have rapidly doused every blaze in the watershed over
the past several decades.
But the risk remains. And the danger continues to
increase as climate change results in longer, more se-
vere fire seasons.
Wallowa-Whitman officials intend to curb that risk
through a variety of tactics, with two chief goals. The
first is to reduce the chances that a fire will spread into
the watershed from outside its boundaries. The sec-
ond is to give firefighters a better chance to confine a
fire inside the watershed to no more than a few drain-
ages. The latter goal is vital because the city diverts
water from a dozen streams and springs. The fewer of
those sources affected by a fire, the more likely the city
could still have a sufficient supply while the burned
drainages are healing — particularly with the city’s
second backup well coming online later this year.
The Wallowa-Whitman proposes to achieve these
goals through a combination of cutting trees — in-
cluding commercial logging, primarily outside the
watershed itself — and prescribed burning to reduce
the amount of combustible stuff. A key component of
the plan inside the watershed is to create fire breaks
— swathes where the number of trees and amount of
ground litter are both substantially reduced — along
the tops of the ridges that divide major streams such
as Elk, Salmon, Marble and Mill creeks. Fire crews
could use these fire breaks as anchors, a sort of no
man’s land where flames could be stopped.
Like all cities, Baker City needs a reliable water sup-
ply. Wildfire is one of the biggest threats to that supply,
which makes the Wallowa-Whitman’s watershed proj-
ect both crucial and most welcome.
— Jayson Jacoby, Baker City Herald editor
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
• We welcome letters on any issue
of public interest. Customer com-
plaints about specific businesses
will not be printed.
• The Baker City Herald will not
knowingly print false or mislead-
ing claims. However, we cannot
verify the accuracy of all state-
ments in letters.
• Writers are limited to one letter
every 15 days.
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information cannot be published.
• Letters will be edited for brevity,
grammar, taste and legal reasons.
Mail: To the Editor, Baker City
Herald,
P.O. Box 807, Baker City, OR 97814
Email: news@bakercityherald.
com
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
conservative movement. My
B2H power line
personal appreciation and
would ruin views,
gratitude to these individu-
raise wildfire risk
als who are putting forward
After moving to Baker
City in 2008 from La Grande
I have walked, hiked, and
run the trails at the Oregon
Trail Interpretive Center,
often several times a week.
It’s difficult to describe the
peacefulness and beauty that
comes with every season
there. When friends or fam-
ily members come to Baker
City I am proud to take them
to this amazing heritage site
that sits outside Baker City
with phenomenal views of
the valley and our Elkhorn
Mountains. This amazing
vista would be destroyed
due to the monstrously huge
towers that would obstruct
the view and destroy some of
the historic wagon ruts. The
B2H line would destroy the
sweeping vistas of the care-
fully sited Oregon Trail In-
terpretive Center which was
built at a cost of millions of
taxpayer dollars.
I’m even more concerned
about B2H because in order
to construct new high volt-
age power lines across east-
ern Oregon, Idaho Power
would be allowed to seize
the property of private land-
owners — in some cases
taking land that has been
respected and cared for by
the same families for gen-
erations. I also oppose B2H
because of the impacts such
a transmission line will have
on the heightened possibil-
ity for wildfire in remote
areas where rural commu-
nities and landowners are
ill-equipped to fight a ma-
jor fire, but bear the full risk
of loss caused by any fires
that do occur. We in Ore-
gon will not benefit from the
B2H line, but Idaho Power
stockholders will. For more
information on the work
that’s being done to stop the
Boardman, OR to Heming-
way, ID power lines go to:
www.stopb2h.org.
Carol Glaser
Baker City
Pleased to see changes
to the GOP central
committee
It was invigorating, no ac-
tually exhilarating, to read in
the Herald (07/30/22) that
the newly elected/confirmed
Republican Precinct Com-
mittee Persons are retriev-
ing and reviving the Baker
County Central Republican
Committee. For far too long
the previous so-called lead-
ership of the Baker County
Republican Committe has
conducted the business of
the County Committee in a
deceptive, tightly controlled,
self-promoting, disingen-
uous manner, with highly
questionable fiscal account-
abilty.
It is with appreciation that
the newly installed PCPs
have the ambition, courage,
moral clarity, with the dedi-
cation to public service to re-
juvenate, bring transparency,
along with honest, robust
discussion on the mission of
promoting Baker County’s,
AND Oregon’s grassroots
their efforts, time and sacri-
fice to Make Baker County
Great Again!
It is definitely time for the
old, tired, non-representa-
tive “RINO establishment” to
step down and get out of the
way. Let the new, fresh con-
servative ideas, driven with
positive, proactive solutions
on the mission to ambi-
tiously bring our rural com-
munity conservative values
back into the mainstream
of Baker County’s political
arena!
I also much appreciate
the straightforward, factual
and accurate article by Clay-
ton Franke, reporter for the
Baker City Herald.
Curtis Martin
North Powder
Some trying to muscle
their way into power
with GOP
I serve as the elected trea-
surer for the Baker County
Republican Central Com-
mittee. I also serve on the
Baker City Council.
I am very familiar with the
facts of how Suzan Jones has
admirably led Baker County
GOP the past 12 years. I am
also familiar with how in-
accurate the allegations are
about her leadership and
this so-called need for a “in-
vestigation.” Frankly, it’s just
a bunch of bovine material
spread around so a few in-
surrectionists could feel im-
portant by muscling their
way to power without having
a quorum.
I could have attended the
July 28 meeting and pro-
vided that missing Executive
Committee member for the
quorum required by the by-
laws. I didn’t — and I think
that the district attorney
would agree with my deci-
sion.
On October 10, 2022, Ken
Hackett’s criminal jury trial
for numerous felonies will
begin. I am witness for the
state against Ken Hackett.
Because Ken Hackett was
one of the leaders of this
“takeover” I don’t feel com-
fortable being in the same
room with him. “Fool me
once, shame on you? Fool
me twice shame on me?”
Unfortunately, in my opin-
ion, many of the precinct
committee people in that
room were victimized by
Hackett and the other ring
leader’s misinformation. I
hope those good hearted
PCPs are not fooled again.
I daresay that the Janu-
ary 6 Committee would be
proud of the insurrection de-
tailed in Saturday’s article.
Joanna Dixon
Baker City
Shrine Game: thrilling
football for a good cause
Having family in Baker
City, I read the Baker City
Herald article: “Shriners
back on schedule” (July
30 issue). I happen to be a
fifth-generation Mason and
a second-generation Shri-
ner, so that made me doubly
pleased to read the article
noting that the famed Shri-
ners East-West game is re-
suming after the COVID-19
postponements. Good thrill-
ing football for a good cause.
Many people don’t real-
ize that all Shriners must
join a Masonic Lodge first,
in order to be eligible for
Shriner membership. The
Masonic Lodge is the grass-
roots friendship society
which instills good charac-
ter inside of a man. Masons
enjoy friendships, fraternal
bonds and ritual connections
which have spanned the gen-
erations. Freemasonry takes
those good men and makes
them better men, who enjoy
fun times when they can let
their hair down.
The Shriners Hospitals
for Children has been go-
ing strong for 100 years
now. Speaking solely for my-
self (although I know a lot
of men who can share the
same sentiment) in that I am
proud I followed in the foot-
steps of my dad and other
ancestors by joinng such a
worthy group of men who
help their communities and
help those in need.
James A. Marples
Longview, Texas
Sarcasm doesn’t help
with progress on train
quiet zone plan
A July 26th letter to the
editor went too far for me.
On the first reading, the
words appeared to draw a
partisan circle, and in that
circle the author placed two
policies that are important to
him. Then, using a series of
cartoonish country expres-
sions, it seemed as if he was
disparaging everyone outside
of his circle.
Now, I don’t think the au-
thor meant it that way.
It was only my first read-
ing. The second time I
picked up more nuance, in-
cluding these suggestions:
(1) Please don’t disagree with
a proposal until you un-
derstand the evidence. (2)
Let’s not make everything
about “us” and “them.” Many
would agree with those
points, if I interpreted them
correctly.
However, for those who
didn’t read this particular
polemic twice, and found
themselves acid-washed by
its sarcasm, I would offer
two comments in response.
First, most people in our
community are good, smart,
hard-working, and welcom-
ing. I come from a family of
Montana homesteaders, so I
cringe at the outlandish rural
stereotypes in the July 26th
letter.
They are just not OK.
They don’t apply to our com-
munity. They make people
feel “less than” and “othered.”
They dig deeper partisan
trenches in a time that we
need to be making peace.
Second, the train horn
quiet zone is non-partisan.
It is not in anyone’s parti-
san circle. But even if it was,
I think it would be labeled
conservative, not liberal.
Train horns are imposed by
the federal government, yet
they have been proven harm-
ful and unnecessary. There-
fore, the quiet zone process
allows Baker City to take
local control over an over-
reaching federal mandate.
That is why hundreds of
towns have established quiet
zones across the country, in-
cluding our neighbors in La
Grande. (By the way, if you
like the horns, that’s OK. You
will still hear them in the
distance and even in town
when the train engineer
thinks they are necessary.)
Exercising our local rights,
we will exceed the safety
standards for the quiet zone;
we will make our children
safer at South Baker School
by reducing the painful
110-decibel horns in the
playground; and we will im-
prove the quality of life for
everyone who lives, works
or plays in earshot of the
train horns. The Baker City
Council decided to pursue
the quiet zone in 2019, and
twice in 2022. Over 50 busi-
nesses and over 400 residents
signed a letter of support.
Citizens and schools have
raised $70,000 for the proj-
ect, and we will keep at it un-
til the project is fully funded.
This summer, City staff are
completing steps toward the
final notice of intent and for-
mal application. We are all
making strong progress.
Baker City is a great com-
munity full of good and
smart people, and the train
horn quiet zone is a good
and smart project. We can
do this together, so let’s fin-
ish what we started.
Peter Fargo
Baker City
Lamenting the problems
caused by an
overcrowded planet
I must ask — by what
metric do you conclude the
Earth is underpopulated?
When I was a young boy,
1940s to 50s, we had about 2
billion people (est.). Now we
seem to be up to around 8
billion. Results:
1. Pollution beyond na-
ture’s ability to compensate.
2. Societal ills due to over-
crowding (compare rural vs
major metro perspectives on
what’s important to life).
3. Lack of consideration
for social dynamics as a fac-
tor in community identity
and the effects of overcrowd-
ing.
4. Lack/decline of essential
natural resources such as wa-
ter, fish stocks, grazing land
for meat animals (do you re-
ally want to eat insects?).
These comprise a short
but observable list of con-
cepts that seem to be left out
of the discussions relating
to the population question.
The frightening aspect is hu-
manity’s ability to procreate
and the observable prob-
lems we are now experienc-
ing. These issues lead to the
globalization of society. It is
an “all your eggs in one bas-
ket” structure that actually
puts us as a species at greater
peril.
Rick Rienks
Baker City