The BulleTin • Thursday, april 1, 2021 A3
LOCAL, STATE & REGION
Legislature
again considers
funding for
Wallowa dam
Reblooming & Reopening
Closed for over a year,
many Oregon lands
managed by The
Nature Conservancy
are back just in time
for spring
BY BILL BRADSHAW
Wallowa County Chieftain
WALLOWA LAKE — Al-
though sales for bonds to fund
refurbishment of the Wallowa
Lake Dam were supposed to
begin this month, the Oregon
Legislature had to put that on
hold for a year because the
COVID-19 pandemic caused a
sharp drop in Oregon Lottery
revenue.
But lawmakers are opti-
mistic the funding will come
through this year.
“What they have decided to
do is include those in discus-
sion for this year’s funding cy-
cle. Because they were in the
governor’s, that gives us some
options,” state Sen. Bill Hansell,
R-Athena, said recently.
He said that although the
lottery funding is “trending
in the right direction,” it may
not be necessary to rely on the
bonds and the funding could
come out of the general fund
or another fund.
“We won’t need to go to lot-
tery bonds in that case,” he said.
The plan was to raise $14
million through sale of bonds
from lottery revenue and begin
selling them this month, with
work on the dam to begin after
irrigation season ends Sept. 30.
Another $2 million of the $16
million project will be raised
from “other sources,” said Dan
Butterfield, president of the
Wallowa Lake Irrigation Dis-
trict, which owns the dam.
He said the project is wait-
ing for the state money to be
assured before seeking the ad-
ditional funds. “That has to
be solidified before we break
ground,” he said.
BY JAMIE HALE
The Oregonian
W
hat do a grassy headland on
the Oregon Coast, a lake in
the High Desert and a wild-
flower paradise in the Columbia River
Gorge all have in common?
All are owned and managed by in-
ternational environmental nonprofit
The Nature Conservancy, and all have
been closed for more than a year due
to the coronavirus pandemic.
Most of those spaces reopen to
the public Thursday, the nonprofit
announced recently, just in time for
spring wildflower blooms and the re-
turn of sunny weather to the Pacific
Northwest.
That includes places such as the
Tom McCall Nature Preserve in the
Gorge, the Zumwalt Prairie near the
Wallowa Mountains and Table Rocks
in Southern Oregon. Two locations
will not reopen right away: Cascade
Head on the Oregon Coast and the
Camassia Nature Preserve in West
Linn — both require naturalists on
hand, which the organization is not
staffing at the moment.
Allie Gardner, marketing director
for The Nature Conservancy in Or-
egon, said the nonprofit is looking
forward to reopening the areas but
could not say why its lands remained
closed so much longer than almost all
other outdoor recreation areas in the
region — including most of the places
owned by The Nature Conservancy in
Jamie Hale/The Oregonian file
Fields of yellow balsamroot and purple lupine flowers greet hikers on the McCall Point Trail, part of the Tom McCall Nature Preserve
at Rowena Crest in the Columbia River Gorge, in May 2019. The preserve and other lands managed by The Nature Conservancy are re-
opening to the public.
neighboring states.
“We just felt like it was worth err-
ing on the side of safety,” Gardner
said. “It was a judgment call. We
didn’t want people getting sick. As
much as we wanted people to get
back out into nature, it felt like the
safest thing do.”
The Nature Conservancy initially
closed its 15 public spaces in Ore-
gon on March 23, 2020, as virtually
all public lands in Oregon became
off-limits for recreational use during
the initial spread of COVID-19.
State and federal lands began re-
opening in May, with most open by
the summer as public health officials
acknowledged the relatively low risk
of spreading the virus at outdoor rec-
reation areas — as long as people fol-
low requirements for social distancing
and face masks.
Despite new decisions by other
land managers, as of the start of this
spring the Nature Conservancy still
cited Gov. Kate Brown’s original year-
old executive order as the reason for
its lands remaining closed.
Now that the wait is over, however,
people may return in large numbers
— as they have to other outdoor rec-
reation areas around Oregon. The Na-
Online
To see a full list of lands managed
by The Nature Conservancy, their
locations and their current reopening
status, visit nature.org
ture Conservancy hopes visitors will
continue to play by the rules, Gardner
said, including staying on trails and
not bringing dogs.
“We really do appreciate everyone’s
patience,” she said. “We’re all very ex-
cited to get back out there too.”
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