A4 The BulleTin • Friday, FeBruary 26, 2021
TODAY
— Associated Press
LOCAL, STATE & REGION
To retain teachers of color,
bill takes aim at ‘first in,
last out’ layoff policies
BY EDER CAMPUZANO
The Oregonian
A bill proposed by Oregon
House Speaker Tina Kotek
would address the demo-
graphic chasm between the
state’s diverse public K-12 stu-
dents and the overwhelmingly
white teachers who educate
them when making layoffs.
The agency that licenses Or-
egon educators estimates 40%
of Oregon students are “cultur-
ally or linguistically diverse”
while about 10% of the state’s
teachers hail from such back-
grounds.
Kotek’s solution would re-
write state rules that dictate
who’s on the chopping block
if and when school districts
face layoffs. House Bill 2001
would amend Oregon statutes
that prioritize seniority, Kotek
and the bill’s backers say, in an
effort to retain educators of
color who tend to be newer to
the profession than their white
co-workers.
The proposed legislation
would allow districts to retain
educators of color if doing so
helps maintain the school’s
ratio of teacher diversity. It
would also allow an adminis-
trator to retain educators who
have “more merit” than those
who qualify for seniority pro-
tections.
“We have tried over the
years to recruit and retain edu-
cators of color as our students
have become more diverse
over the decades,” Kotek told
the House Education Commit-
tee Tuesday. “What this bill is
about is protecting the prog-
ress we have made in the event
of layoffs.”
If enacted, the bill could
prove moot most of the time,
as layoffs of Oregon educators
are rare. Amid the pandemic,
Oregon turned to the sizeable
savings account it had built up
during good economic times
to protect schools in a down-
turn.
Even when positions are cut,
the shrinkage is usually han-
dled through retirements and
other forms of attrition, not by
showing employed educators
the door. The last time that
happened at scale in Oregon
was in 2010, when Oregon cut
school funding 9% in the wake
of the 2008 recession.
With a new tax on busi-
nesses kicking in this school
year and next, layoffs are un-
likely.
Still, Kotek’s testimony
kicked off a half hour’s worth
of public comment on the
proposed legislation during a
committee meeting, much of it
in support of the bill.
Bekah Sabzalian, the equita-
ble education program officer
at Meyer Memorial Trust, said
teachers of color she’s invited to
speak with the nonprofit’s lead-
ers almost universally say they
feel isolated when they work
in schools with largely white
workforces.
“They feel overburdened,
alone,” Sabzalian said.
Lake Oswego High School
sophomore Alexander Agh-
daei told the committee that in
all his years attending the city’s
public schools, he’s never had
a teacher of color. He told the
panel that recruiting and re-
taining such educators would
make students like him feel
more comfortable at school.
Aghdaei said students of
color sometimes feel as though
they can’t be themselves when
they don’t identify with their
peers or teachers. Seventy per-
cent of Lake Oswego students
are white, according to the
Oregon Department of Edu-
cation.
“It’s easy to abandon per-
sonal identity in service of fit-
ting in,” Aghdaei said.
Much of the testimony sup-
porting the proposed legis-
lation, both written pieces
submitted to the record and
in speeches by attendees of
Tuesday’s virtual hearing, fo-
cused on how important it is
that a school’s staff reflect the
makeup of its student body.
But some critics of the bill,
including educators of color,
say that although they agree
with House Bill 2001’s in-
tent, the legislation goes about
things the wrong way.
Hyung Nam, a social studies
teacher in Portland’s Wilson
High School, said he’s felt tar-
geted by previous administra-
tions for his self-proclaimed
rabble rousing. He was a long-
time and vocal advocate for
the school’s renaming before
such an effort earned broader
support and came to fruition
this year.
Nam told the House Educa-
tion Committee he fears alter-
ations to the state’s “first in, last
out” policy that directs how
schools conduct layoffs will
give administrators a tool to
oust vocal critics.
Herald and News file
Water returning in February to Upper Klamath Lake, pictured here in a 2020, is among the lowest in 40
years of study by the Bureau of Reclamation.
Klamath Lake forecast looks
dismal for fish and farms
BY ALEX SCHWARTZ
(Klamath Falls) Herald and News
Citing a dismal outlook on
water year 2021, the Klamath
Tribes have filed a notice of
intent, saying they will sue the
U.S. Bureau of Reclamation
for violating the Endangered
Species Act if Upper Klamath
Lake dips below levels outlined
in the 2020 biological opinion
this spring.
The letter, which will allow
the Tribes to file suit more
quickly if they decide to pur-
sue litigation, was sent to the
principal deputy commis-
sioner of the bureau and the
acting secretary of the Inte-
rior. It asserts that the bureau
violated the 2020 biological
opinion by diverting too much
of the lake’s water to Klamath
Project irrigators at the begin-
ning of last summer.
That opinion stipulated
maintaining lake levels at
certain times of the year to
provide adequate habitat for
ESA-listed C’waam, Lost River
suckers, and Koptu, shortnose
suckers, which are culturally
and spiritually important to
the Klamath Tribes and have
been declining in numbers for
decades.
“Because we went below the
lake levels required for spawn-
ing season last year, they’re not
allowed to do that this year,”
said Klamath Tribal Chairman
Don Gentry. “It’s kind of a
hard, fast requirement to be in
compliance with the biological
opinion.”
A news release from the
tribes said projected inflows to
Upper Klamath Lake are some
of the lowest they’ve been in 40
years, based on periodic brief-
ings from federal hydrologists.
Paul Simmons, executive
director of the Klamath Water
Users Association, said Upper
Klamath Lake is refilling at a
rate in the third percentile of
its period of record. Just bring-
ing it up to the required level
for sucker spawning will be
hard enough, to say nothing of
providing water for irrigation.
“We know that we’re in a
very serious situation,” Gentry
said. “It looks like there’s going
to be very little water, if at all,
for irrigation.”
Despite snowpack accumu-
lation that seems to be improv-
ing as the winter progresses
— as of Feb. 18, the basin’s
snow-water equivalent was
at 80% of the median for this
time of year compared to 70%
at the beginning of the month,
according to the Natural Re-
sources Conservation Service
— Simmons said exceptionally
dry soils are absorbing precip-
itation that would normally
melt into Upper Klamath Lake
in the spring.
“You have a situation where
the ground in the upper wa-
tershed is just dry,” Simmons
said. “To the extent that you
have precipitation up there, a
lot of it is just soaking in. It’s a
dry year on top of a dry year.”
Simmons said that given
current conditions, the Bureau
of Reclamation is expecting an
even lower allocation for the
Klamath Project than last year.
Though February is too early
to say for sure what that num-
ber will be, Simons said the
current projection is 132,000
acre-feet.
“We would need a very, very
atypical February and March
to get out of the situation we’re
in,” he said.
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Today is Friday, Feb. 26, the 57th
day of 2021. There are 308 days
left in the year.
Today’s Highlight in History:
On Feb. 26, 1993, a truck bomb
built by Islamic extremists ex-
ploded in the parking garage of
the North Tower of New York’s
World Trade Center, killing six
people and injuring more than
1,000 others. (The bomb failed
to topple the North Tower into
the South Tower, as the terrorists
had hoped; both structures were
destroyed in the 9/11 attack eight
years later.)
In 1904, the United States and
Panama proclaimed a treaty
under which the U.S. agreed to
undertake efforts to build a ship
canal across the Panama isthmus.
In 1940, the United States Air De-
fense Command was created.
In 1942, “How Green Was My
Valley” won the Academy Award
for Best Picture of 1941, beating
out nine other films, including
“The Maltese Falcon” and “Citizen
Kane.”
In 1945, authorities ordered a
midnight curfew at nightclubs,
bars and other places of enter-
tainment across the nation.
In 1952, Prime Minister Winston
Churchill announced that Britain
had developed its own atomic
bomb.
In 1966, South Korean troops
sent to fight in the Vietnam War
massacred at least 380 civilians in
Go Dai hamlet.
In 1984, the last U.S. Marines
deployed to Beirut as part of an
international peacekeeping force
withdrew from the Lebanese
capital.
In 1994, a jury in San Antonio
acquitted 11 followers of David
Koresh of murder, rejecting
claims they had ambushed feder-
al agents; five were convicted of
voluntary manslaughter.
In 1998, a jury in Amarillo, Texas,
rejected an $11 million lawsuit
brought by Texas cattlemen
who blamed Oprah Winfrey’s
talk show for a price fall after a
segment on food safety that
included a discussion about mad
cow disease.
In 2014, Republican Arizona Gov.
Jan Brewer vetoed a bill pushed
by social conservatives that
would have allowed people with
sincerely held religious beliefs to
refuse to serve gays.
In 2017, at the 89th Academy
Awards, “Moonlight,” an LGBT
coming of age drama, won three
Oscars, including best picture of
2016 (in a startling gaffe, the mu-
sical “La La Land” was mistakenly
announced as the best picture
winner before the error was
corrected).
In 2019, after making his way
from Pyongyang in an armored
train, North Korean leader Kim
Jong Un arrived in Vietnam’s
capital ahead of a summit with
President Donald Trump, who
arrived later in the day aboard Air
Force One.
Ten years ago: In a statement,
President Barack Obama said
Moammar Gadhafi had lost his
legitimacy to rule and urged the
Libyan leader to leave power
immediately. Space shuttle
Discovery arrived at the Interna-
tional Space Station, making its
final visit before being parked at
a museum.
Five years ago: New Jersey Gov.
Chris Christie stunned the Repub-
lican establishment by endorsing
Donald Trump for president.
One year ago: President Donald
Trump declared that the U.S. was
“very, very ready” for whatever
threat the coronavirus would
bring; he put Vice President Mike
Pence in charge of overseeing
the country’s response. Facebook
said it was banning ads that
made false claims about prod-
ucts tied to the coronavirus.
Today’s Birthdays: Coun-
try-rock musician Paul Cotton
(Poco) is 78. Actor-director Bill
Duke is 78. Singer Mitch Ryder is
76. Actor Marta Kristen (TV: “Lost
in Space”) is 76. Rock musician
Jonathan Cain (Journey) is 71.
Singer Michael Bolton is 68. The
president of Turkey, Recep Tayyip
Erdogan, is 67. Actor Greg Ger-
mann is 63. Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va.,
is 63. Bandleader John McDaniel
is 60. Actor-martial artist Mark
Dacascos is 57. Actor Jennifer
Grant is 55. Rock musician Tim
Commerford (Audioslave) is 53.
Singer Erykah Badu) is 50. Actor
Maz Jobrani (TV: “Superior Do-
nuts”) is 49. R&B singer Rico Wade
(Society of Soul) is 49. Olympic
gold medal swimmer Jenny
Thompson is 48. R&B singer Kyle
Norman (Jagged Edge) is 46.
Actor Greg Rikaart is 44. Rock
musician Chris Culos (O.A.R.) is 42.
R&B singer Corinne Bailey Rae is
42. Pop singer Nate Ruess (fun.) is
39. Tennis player Li Na is 39. Latin
singer Natalia Lafourcade is 37.
Actor Teresa Palmer is 35.
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