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News
Blue Mountain Eagle
PALMER
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the electronic copy of the
incident report was delet-
ed, Sheriff Palmer retained
hard copies of the initial re-
port and inal report in the
records of Grant County
Sheriff’s Ofice, where these
public records have always
been available for inspection
and copying by the public,
representatives of the press,
the Department of Justice,
and the (police licensing
agency), as required by Or-
egon’s public records laws.”
The statement did not
respond to the remainder
of Gray’s complaint or the
complaints iled with the li-
censing agency by at least
seven others.
The police licensing
agency forwarded com-
plaints to the Oregon Depart-
ment of Justice for further
investigation in February. A
DOJ investigation into an
unspeciied complaint is on-
going.
Also on Friday, the Port-
land newspaper The Or-
egonian and its reporter
Les Zaitz iled a complaint
against Grant County Sher-
iff’s Ofice, Palmer and
civil deputy Sally DeFord
in Grant County Circuit
Court, seeking “to declare
certain records to be ‘public
records’ and to obtain disclo-
sure of certain records.”
“For the past two months,
Plaintiffs have made routine
public records requests from
Defendants,” the complaint
states. “... At nearly every
turn, however, Plaintiffs
have met a stone wall of re-
sistance.”
Oregon law requires pub-
lic records to be disclosed,
with the exception of certain
records that are exempt.
The lawsuit seeks pub-
lic email, phone and social
media records; information
about the number of con-
cealed handgun licenses is-
sued, crimes reported and
arrests; arrest reports where
Palmer was the primary ar-
resting oficer; communi-
cations with Salvatore Cas-
cuccio, Fred Grant Kelly and
the Oregon Firearms Fed-
eration; reports concerning
the investigation and arrest
of Scott Willingham; and
reports about the 2015 haz-
ardous materials response to
a possible contaminated en-
velope received by Palmer.
Palmer, DeFord and
county counsel Ron Yockim
did not respond to requests
for comment. Boyd said
Hostetter Law Group is not
representing Palmer in this
lawsuit.
Palmer submitted a
lengthy public records re-
quest to the city of John Day
before serving the city with
a tort claim notice, which
serves as notice of his intent
to sue and protects his right
to do so in the future.
City Manager Peggy
Gray said as of Monday the
city had not been notiied
that the sheriff had iled the
actual lawsuit in court.
County foster statistics
Here’s a snapshot look
at the numbers in Grant
County, and statewide in
Oregon during Federal
Fiscal Year 2015 — Oc-
tober 2014-September
2015 — from the Oregon
Department of Human
Services “Child Welfare
Data Book”:
• A total of 17 chil-
dren experienced at least
one day in foster care in
Grant County — eight,
from ages 0-5, three ages
6-12, five ages 13-17 and
one age 18 and older.
Statewide, there were
11,238 children in foster
care for at least one
day.
• Grant County’s rate
of children in foster care
fluctuated the past three
years in comparison to
the statewide rate. In
Grant County, the rate per
1,000 children in 2015
was 10.6, in 2014 was 5.1
and in 2013 was 8.6 per-
cent. Statewide for those
years, the rate was 8.8 in
2015, 8.9 in 2014 and 9.6
in 2013.
• The average num-
ber of months in care
in Grant County was 12
months in 2015, and 9.5
in 2014. Statewide, the
number was higher: 19
months in both 2015 and
2014.
• In 2015, seven
children entered into the
foster care program and
three left. Statewide,
3,793 children came in
and 3,885 left.
These numbers do not
include Title IV-E eligi-
ble children served by
Tribes.
Wednesday, May 25, 2016
OYSTER FEED 2016
ESD
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increases in these attacks.
These attacks must be invit-
ed into a system by a user,
he said, often by “well-dis-
guised emails designed to
get the end user to click on
an infected attachment or to
go to an infected website.”
Once the malicious com-
puter code runs, it begins
encrypting iles, he said, and
without a key, it is almost
impossible to decrypt. He
said the ESD is trying to de-
termine where the ransom-
ware was introduced into
the system.
“Because we have a
heightened sense of paranoia,
we are proceeding quite cau-
tiously to bring servers back
online,” he said. “It’s a slow
process. We can’t always pro-
tect the end user from them-
selves, and that’s why ran-
somware is as successful as
it is — human nature makes
us curious and we oftentimes
click on links or open emails
that we shouldn’t.”
Waltenburg said the ESD
has tightened security on its
email servers, implemented
domain-wide ad blocking on
browsers and disabled the
ability to run executable iles
from removable media.
He also encouraged peo-
ple using the ESD’s services
not to allow macros to run
in Microsoft documents re-
ceived via email or the inter-
net and to back up iles on an
external drive weekly.
An added attraction to keep
youngsters entertained at
this year’s Oyster Feed was
a bounce house at Seneca
Park.
Chad Holliday unloads another batch of
oysters to be cooked up for the hungry crowd.
Eagle photos/Cheryl Hoefler
A muddy softball game
was among the many
activities at the 25th
annual Seneca Oyster
Feed.
NEED
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“Being a foster parent is
the only stability some of
these kids will ever see,” she
said.
She said there are so many
kids out there in need and
wishes more people would
step up and foster. She hears
many people say it would be
too hard to let the kids go,
but Copenhaver said people
should also take into consid-
eration “all the love, joy and
laughter.”
She said their own bio-
logical children realize how
blessed and how wonderful
their lives are, too, from the
experience.
“It’s a family choice,” Co-
penhaver said.
Local foster parents will be
recognized at an appreciation
barbecue on May 31.
For more information
about child welfare data, visit
http://www.oregon.gov/dhs/
children/child-abuse/Pages/
Data-Publications.aspx.
For information about be-
coming a foster parent, visit
http://www.oregon.gov/DHS/
CHILDREN/FOSTERCARE/
Pages/become-fosterparent.
aspx.
The Oregon Department
of Human Services ofice in
John Day is at 725 W. Main
St., Suite C. For more infor-
mation, call 541-575-0728,
ext 248.
Thank you, Grant County
for your support and
kind words.
A life of public service is as
much a gift to the person
who serves as it
is to those he is
serving.
Chris Labhart
Paid for by the Committee to Elect Chris Labhart
X-MEN: APOCALYPSE PG-13
We would like to thank everyone who
attended the spaghetti feed and auction
that was held for Curt Pereira.
It was a great success!
A special thank you goes to the Mennonite
ladies for their generous donation of desserts.
We also want to thank all of the businesses
and individuals who donated.
Sincerely,
Curt & Lisa Pereira
T H
A N K Y O U
The Seneca Oyster Feed
Committee would like to give a
big “THANK YOU” to everyone
who helped make the 25th
Annual Seneca Oyster Feed
such a Big Success. All the
donations, hard work and
donated time were greatly
appreciated. This year was
wonderful because of you.
Thank you,
City of Seneca
FRI & SAT
(12:45) (3:30) 6:30 9:30
SUN & MON (1:10) (3:30) 6:30
TUES-THURS (12:45) (4:20) 6:60
ALICE THROUGH THE
LOOKING GLASS PG
Alice returns to the whimsical world of Wonderland
and travels back in time to save the Mad Hatter.
Robbins Farm Equipment
FRI & SAT
(12:45) (4:00) 7:00 9:35
SUN & MON (1:10) (4:00) 7:00
TUES-THURS (12:45) (4:20) 7:00
ANGRY BIRDS PG
Animation. Comedy. Find out why the birds are
so angry.
FRI & SAT
(12:45) (4:10) 7:10 9:40
SUN & MON (1:10) (4:10) 7:10
TUES-THURS (12:45) (4:20) 7:10
$9 Adult, $7 Senior (60+), Youth
03945
T hank Y ou
With the emergence of the world’s first mutant,
Apocalypse, the X-Men must unite to defeat his
extinction level plan.
3850 10th St.
Baker City
10218 Wallowa Lake Hwy.
La Grande
1160 S Egan
Burns
86812 Christmas Valley Hwy.
Christmas Valley
541-523-6377
541-963-6577
541-573-6377
541-523-6377
N EVE R F O R G ET
We salute our nation’s
fallen veterans and all
the brave soldiers of our
military who have
served and continue to
serve in our defense
G RANT C OUNTY V ETERANS S ERVICES
A heart of caring in the heart of the city .
Located at the Grant County Courthouse • 541-575-1631
Open Mon, Wed & Fri - 10 a.m. - 4 p.m.