A16
News
Blue Mountain Eagle
FIRE
Continued from Page A1
fi re while it continues to
move south into the Malheur
National Forest. Crews will
begin to examine parts of the
northern edge of the fi re us-
ing hand-held infrared units
that allow them to detect
heat that would be otherwise
invisible.
The fi re is now staffed
by 849 people: 24 crews, 42
engines, seven dozers, 25
water tenders, four mastica-
tors, fi ve skidders and seven
helicopters.
The cause of the fi re,
which started July 31 about
10 miles southwest of Uni-
ty, is still under investiga-
tion.
Malheur National Forest
offi cials are imposing new
restrictions to prevent start-
ing any new fi res. These re-
strictions are part of Phase
C of Public Use Restric-
tions, which are put into
place when there is a fi re
danger rating of extreme
and the forest is at Industri-
al Fire Precaution Level 4.
These restrictions in-
clude bans on all camp-
fi res, allowing only liquid
and bottle gas stoves and
heaters, and prohibit all use
of chainsaws and internal
combustion engines with
the exception of motor ve-
hicles starting Wednesday,
Aug. 24.
Additionally, generators
are allowed only if they are
placed in the center of a
cleared area at least 10 feet
in diameter, or are in a truck
bed devoid of fl ammable
material. RVs with factory
installed generators must
have the exhaust discharge
centered in a 10 foot cleared
area.
Off-road vehicle trav-
el or travel on roads with
standing grass or other
fl ammable material is not
allowed. All roads identi-
fi ed in fi re closure orders
are closed. Smoking is only
allowed in vehicles, build-
ings and developed recre-
ation sites or when stopped
in an area cleared of all
fl ammable material.
In 2016 there have been
486 wildfi res caused by
humans with at least one
known case of arson. This is
an increase over the state’s
10-year year average, ac-
cording to The Oregon De-
partment of Forestry.
“While you and your
family are enjoying Ore-
gon’s great outdoors, I en-
courage you to not only be
fi re safe but be alert to any
suspicious behavior and re-
port it to local law enforce-
ment offi cials,” Gov. Kate
Brown said in a statement.
Fourteen fi res are cur-
rently being investigated as
arson, including the Withers
fi re north of Paisley that has
burned over 3,400 acres.
“Oregon continues to
experience extremely dry
conditions where any stray
spark could spell disaster in
any area of the state,” State
Fire Marshal Jim Walker
said in a statement.
For more information
on the restrictions, contact
any of the following forest
offi ces: Malheur National
Forest Supervisor and Blue
Mountain Ranger District
offi ce, 541-575-3000; Prai-
rie City Ranger District,
541-820-3800; Emigrant
Creek Ranger District, 541-
573-4300.
To report a wildfi re,
call John Day Interagency
Dispatch Center at 541-
575-1321 or the Burns In-
teragency Dispatch center
at 541-573-1000. Tips can
also be made by calling the
Oregon State Police at 503-
375-3555 or 911 in case of
an emergency.
For more information
about the pre-evacuation
notice, contact Grant Coun-
ty Emergency Management
Coordinator Ted Williams
at 541-575-4006.
- Thank You -
The fifth annual Brother’s Run was amazing. We had 69
runners participate this year. The community has
supported The Brother’s Run year after year. We are
extremely excited to give 4-6 $500.00 scholarships next
spring to graduating Grant County seniors, in Taner
Gilliam and AJ Dickens’ names.
We had a great group of volunteers; this race would not
have been possible without them. We would also like to
thank everyone who made donations, ordered apparel and
was a spectator. Support was given in so many ways and
that is what made the 2016 Walk/Run so successful. This
is a great community. I feel so blessed to live in such a
supportive and caring place. This community has reached
out for my two brothers on many occasions and it melts
my heart. It never fails to amaze me how many people
give their time, money and energy to honor
AJ and Taner’s memory.
I would like to thank all of our 2016 sponsors: Blue
Mountain Cutting, LBA Cutting, R&S Self-Stor, Baker
County Custom Meats, John Day Auto Parts NAPA,
Huffman’s Market, Oregon Telephone Corporation,
Land’s Inn, Outpost Pizza Pub and Grill, Bojen Inc, DP
Home Entertainment Radio Shack, T&H Automotive, Ace
Hardware, Tanni Wenger Photography, John Day Polaris,
Cloud 9, Pepsi and Grant County Building Supply.
Thank you,
The Brother’s Run Committee
Megan Workman
ANXIETY
‘Perfect fi t’
“With the district, it was a
perfect fi t,” he said.
Larry Ojua, the district’s
manager, said not all proper-
ties match the district’s goals.
He has turned down four ease-
ment proposals.
One major consideration
is whether the district has the
resources to defend the ease-
ment. Gunderman, for exam-
ple, provided the district with
$8,000 for its future adminis-
tration.
“We look at it selectively,”
said Ojua. “We’re not really
prospecting for properties.”
Another factor is the pros-
pect of forever monitoring
to ensure the terms are being
met, said Tom Salzer, manag-
er of the Clackamas Soil and
Water Conservation District,
which is looking at the pos-
sibility of holding perpetual
easements.
“For us, it’s the overhead
of staff time to do the annual
monitoring and reporting,” he
said. “That’s staff time we’re
not spending serving our core
customer base.”
‘Not for everybody’
Woody Wolfe, a farmer
and rancher near Wallowa in
northeastern Oregon, shared
the same trepidations as Edi-
1.48 million
1.5 million
New U.S. conservation
easement acres,
1960-present
Continued from Page A1
Meanwhile, organizations
that are familiar to farmers,
such as local soil and water
conservation districts, are
hesitant to hold conservation
easements precisely because
they may someday be forced
to litigate against future land-
owners who violate the terms.
“If someone comes around
with the right amount of mon-
ey, they can keep you tied up
in court until you holler un-
cle,” Ediger said.
Soil and water conserva-
tion districts have a long his-
tory of working with growers,
so they’ve established a level
of trust that outside organiza-
tions often don’t have, said
Jim Johnson, land use special-
ist with the Oregon Depart-
ment of Agriculture.
“They’re a local govern-
ment with an elected board, so
they’re accountable to a local
constituency,” he said.
Lucien Gunderman, a
farmer near McMinnville,
also wanted to preserve his
family’s 720-acre property but
felt that land trusts — which
commonly hold easements —
had an environmental agenda
in their easement proposals.
“A lot of their stuff, I didn’t
like the way it was worded,”
Gunderman said.
For example, he wouldn’t
be allowed to continue operat-
ing a wood stove business on
the property, as it was consid-
ered a commercial use.
Instead, Gunderman struck
a deal with the Yamhill Soil
and Water Conservation Dis-
trict under which the ease-
ment prohibits subdivisions
and most construction while
setting limits on logging the
forested portion of the prop-
erty.
Wednesday, August 24, 2016
1.3
More than 4.9 million acres have
been placed in conservation
easements since 1876, according
to National Conservation
Easement Database records.
0.9
0.6
*As of July
Source: National Conservation
Easement Database
Alan Kenaga/Capital Press
0.3
187,469 acres in 2015:
Down 53% from 2014
47
0
1960
’70
ger and Gunderman but is
now satisfi ed with his deci-
sion to sell an easement to a
land trust.
“I can guarantee it’s not for
everybody,” he said. “There
has to be a fundamental de-
sire within the person to agree
with conservation.”
In 2011, Wolfe sold an
easement on roughly 200
acres to the Wallowa Land
Trust for $200,000 that al-
lows him to conduct common
farming practices on most of
the property, though he can’t
subdivide it, use it for com-
mercial purposes, or build
new roads without permis-
sion.
About 36 acres are re-
served for riparian habitat,
which means he can’t graze
cattle or travel in a motorized
vehicle on the land unless it
serves an ecological purpose.
Wolfe is all right with the
arrangement because a team
of specialists overseen by the
land trust monitors the 36-
acre parcel and conducts con-
servation projects on it, which
are funded with grants.
“I’m not responsible for
implementing them,” he said.
“All I have to do is let them
manage it.”
Conservation work is a key
aspect of the Wallowa Land
Trust’s mission that qualifi es
it as a charitable organization,
said Kathleen Ackley, its ex-
ecutive director.
“There has to be some lev-
el of conservation for us to be
able to work with a landown-
er,” she said.
Entities that pay for ease-
ments — such as the USDA
Natural Resources Conser-
vation Service — must also
ensure their money is helping
the environment, which is
why land management plans
are often tied to the funding,
Ackley said.
“Most easements are going
to reference some sort of man-
agement plan,” she said.
Mutually benefi cial
In return, landowners get
the benefi t of an income tax
deduction for the portion of
the easement’s value they
donate, Ackley said. “It’s a
mutually benefi cial strings at-
tached.”
The Oregon Watershed
Enhancement Board, a gov-
ernment agency funded with
state lottery dollars, is con-
’80
’90
2000
stitutionally mandated to
use those funds for projects
that conserve wildlife habitat
and water quality, said Meta
Loftsgaarden, its executive
director.
“We have an obligation to
meet that bar,” she said.
For the same reason, the
agency must perform its own
periodic monitoring of con-
servation easements — in
addition to the easement hold-
er’s monitoring — and advise
landowners when they fall
short of complying with its
terms.
Loftsgaarden said this dual
monitoring may cause land-
owners to ask, “Why are you
coming back here?”
Before 2012, when OWEB
overhauled its regulations to
make the easement program
more transparent and ac-
countable, the answer to that
question often wasn’t com-
municated clearly enough,
she said.
“It’s a permanent invest-
ment of public dollars, so
the agency has to continue to
track them,” she said.
OWEB is also devising an
“Oregon Agricultural Her-
itage Program” that would
emphasize protecting actively
farmed properties.
The program would not be
funded with OWEB’s lottery
dollars, so it wouldn’t have
to focus on habitat and water
quality issues, Loftsgaarden
said. It’s possible the Oregon
Legislature will be asked to
fund the program separately
to prioritize agriculture.
“It can’t come into the
door unless it’s a working
land,” she said.
A big advantage of hav-
ing a conservation easement
funded by OWEB is that the
agency can rely on attorneys
from the Oregon Department
of Justice to enforce its terms.
So far, the agency hasn’t
had to take legal action, but
the potential for such cases
causes a lot of consternation
among easement holders,
even though they’re relatively
rare.
“When it does occur, it can
take up a lot of your resourc-
es,” said Johnson of ODA.
Oregon law restricts land-
owners from partitioning
property within “exclusive
farm use” zones into parcels
smaller than 80 acres for
’10
2016*
farmland and 160 acres for
ranchland.
However, even such rela-
tively large parcels can under-
mine a region’s agricultural
character if they’re not active-
ly farmed, Johnson said.
“They may be marginally
farming but it’s really just a
large rural estate,” he said.
‘Money battles’
The fear is that someone
with lots of money — a brash
and litigious billionaire, per-
haps — will be willing to out-
spend an easement holder in
court to violate an easement.
“I’ve got more money than
you, so what are you going to
do?” said Fritz Paulus, an at-
torney specializing in conser-
vation easements. “It some-
times turns into these money
battles.”
Easements are written to
have “teeth” by requiring
landowners to pay the hold-
er’s attorney fees if they lose
a case, Paulus said. However,
winning a judgment in court
isn’t the same thing as cash.
“Can you collect on that?
It’s a whole other issue,” he
said.
To deal with the problem
of looming litigation, the
Land Trust Alliance, which
represents land trusts, found-
ed the Terrafi rma risk reten-
tion group.
Land trusts pay premiums
into the program, pooling
their money for the eventual-
ity that a lawsuit must be fi led
to defend an easement.
Terrafi rma handled 79
claims in 2015, up from 57
claims in 2014 and 38 claims
in 2013, when the program
was created.
“It usually involves a
change in ownership, and
someone who has not bought
into the concept of a conser-
vation easement,” said Russ
Shay, public policy director
for the Land Trust Alliance.
Having such insurance can
help discourage landowners
from violating easements,
since they know it will entail
a legal battle, he said.
As government entities,
soil and water conservation
districts can’t take part in Ter-
rafi rma, but Shay advises they
set aside money for litigation
for the same reason.
“Being prepared is half the
battle,” he said.
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A MAN
WAKES
UP in the
morning
after sleeping on...
an advertised bed, in advertised
pajamas.
He will bathe in an ADVERTISED TUB, shave with an ADVERTISED RAZOR,
have a breakfast of ADVERTISED JUICE, cereal and toast, toasted in an
ADVERTISED TOASTER, put on ADVERTISED CLOTHES and glance at his
ADVERTISED WATCH. He’ll ride to work in his ADVERTISED CAR, sit at an
ADVERTISED DESK and write with an ADVERTISED PEN. Yet this person
hesitates to advertise, saying that advertising doesn’t pay. Finally, when his
non-advertised business is going under, HE’LL ADVERTISE IT FOR SALE.
Then it’s too late.
AND THEY SAY ADVERTISING DOESN’T WORK?
DON’T MAKE THIS SAME MISTAKE
Advertising is an investment, not an expense. Think about it!
Blue Mountain Eagle
MyEagleNews.com
Don’t get left behind, call today! Kim Kell 541-575-0710
