A10
News
Blue Mountain Eagle
Wednesday, December 7, 2016
FARM
PALMER
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The program focuses on
agricultural education on
many scales, from a home
garden to a commercial
ranch.
“The students are able to
connect with different peo-
ple in the community, from
ranchers to natural resource
personnel,” Delgado said.
Delgado, who has a
background in environmen-
tal education and youth de-
velopment, said that is what
she enjoys most about the
academy: seeing the stu-
dents meet and learn from
people in their field of work.
“They get to know the
time, effort and energy that
goes into getting food to
the table,” she said. “Stu-
dents learn where their food
comes from — that their
fruit doesn’t just come from
the store, and their beef
doesn’t just come from the
store.”
The program is open to
fifth- and sixth-grade stu-
dents and has events sched-
uled mainly on one Friday
each month, with 20-30
students participating. Some
in-class lessons are held
with all the fifth- and sixth-
grade students involved.
In October, students
took a field trip to Thom-
as Orchards in Kimberly.
Sixth-grader Ernie Shorts
said it was one of his favorite
activities so far. He said he
was most interested in how
they graft trees.
“They cut up some
branches from the kind of
tree they want and cut into
a stump,” he said. “They put
the branch in these and that’s
what kind of tree grows.”
Sixth-grader Destiny Pe-
layo also said she enjoyed
the trip to the orchards.
“My favorite part has
been being with friends and
learning so many things with
them in a fun way,” she said.
Delgado said the students
picked apples for one to two
hours, some picking their
body weight in fruit. She
added that some came away
deleting any public emails, in
response to a July request by
the plaintiffs.
“Defendants’ complete lack
of cooperation required Plain-
tiffs to initiate this suit to vin-
dicate the public’s basic right to
be informed of the conduct of
government officials,” Daniels
said in the Nov. 17 statement.
“Even after commencing this
litigation, Plaintiffs continued
to face delays and circumstanc-
es that required the expenditure
of significant resources, includ-
ing delays in production and
discovery, motion practice, and
most significantly, evidence
that suggested that public re-
cords had been destroyed.”
After a series of correspon-
dence between the parties re-
lated to the lawsuit, and depo-
sitions of Palmer and DeFord,
Daniels said in the statement
the plaintiffs obtained all the
non-exempt documents they re-
quested and, thus, were entitled
to reasonable attorney fees as
the prevailing party in the case.
Cramer had dismissed the
lawsuit Nov. 3 at the request
of the defendants’ attorney, D.
The Eagle/Angel Carpenter
Farm-to-School students scoop out pumpkin
seeds for roasting and make jack’o lanterns.
interested in planting their
own fruit trees, drying fruit
or learning more about mar-
keting or machinery.
Amelia Hall said she was
amazed at Jennifer and Lance
Barkers’ Morning Hill Forest
Farm, which the group visit-
ed in late September.
The Barkers live off grid
at a high elevation in Bear
Valley, where the tempera-
ture is known to dip down
to freezing, or below, several
months out of the year.
“I thought it was really
cool how they could use so-
lar energy, even when it was
cloudy,” Hall, a sixth-grader,
said.
She and her brother,
fifth-grader Grant Hall, were
so impressed by the Barkers’
handcrafted solar ovens, they
were interested in building
their own.
“Their greenhouse was
super hot — 90 degrees,”
Amelia added. “It was pretty
chilly outside.”
“It was a huge tem-
perature change,” said her
schoolmate, fifth-grader Ali-
ci Archibald.
Future planned field trips
include visits to area ranches
and a trip to observe bees and
taste honey.
Delgado said she and the
volunteers with the program
work to help the students
learn about food production
and healthy eating options.
She said she was par-
ticularly pleased with their
excitement after visiting the
orchards.
“I quizzed them, and the
students really remembered
the points they’d learned that
day,” Delgado said.
The
Farm-to-School
Academy is funded with a
grant from Oregon Farm to
School and School Gardens
through the Oregon Depart-
ment of Education, and op-
erates in partnership with the
South Fork John Day Water-
shed Council, OSU Exten-
sion office and Grant School
District No. 3.
Zachary Hostetter — after Dan-
iels admitted court intervention
was no longer necessary be-
cause the documents had been
released — but the dismissal
stated it did not preclude the
plaintiffs from seeking attorney
fees.
In the Nov. 17 statement,
Daniels said the suit was filed
under Oregon Revised Stat-
ute 192.450(2) and that ORS
192.490 applies to such ac-
tions. The latter states, in part,
“If a person seeking the right to
inspect or to receive a copy of
a public record prevails in the
suit, the person shall be award-
ed costs and disbursements and
reasonable attorney fees.”
Daniels said in the state-
ment the plaintiff is the pre-
vailing party when records are
disclosed after a lawsuit has
been filed, and he cited several
similar Oregon cases in which
the plaintiffs were awarded at-
torney fees.
“Disallowing all fees in this
case would simply reward re-
calcitrance, encourage games-
manship on the part of public
bodies, and undermine the very
goals of transparency and open
government that the Public
Records Law and its one-way
attorney fee provision intend to
foster,” Daniels said in the Nov.
17 statement.
As of Dec. 5, the defendants
have not filed a response to
the plaintiffs’ request for fees
in circuit court. Hostetter did,
however, file a brief request for
attorney fees on behalf of De-
Ford.
In an exhibit submitted with
a Nov. 18 statement for attor-
ney fees, Hostetter said DeFord
is entitled to $19,106 because
“there was no objectively rea-
sonable basis for plaintiffs to
sue” her. Hostetter said ORS
192.490(1) allows a person to
file a claim only against a “pub-
lic body,” which DeFord is not.
He said DeFord is not a custo-
dian of public records, nor an
elected official who has custo-
dy of public records, as defined
by the previously mentioned
law.
Daniels filed an objection
Nov. 30 to DeFord’s attorney
fee request, stating it should be
denied because there was a rea-
sonable basis for naming her in
the suit and that she was not the
prevailing party, in addition to
procedural errors.
Neither Palmer nor The
Oregonian have responded to
emailed questions about the
lawsuit.
HEART
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The visits help solidify re-
lationships between the med-
ical communities, he said. He
typically travels with a small
team of professionals and of-
fers echo-tech services, such
as the test Kevin received, ev-
ery other visit.
Kevin underwent a more-
than-five-hour surgery where
his heart valve was replaced
with a mechanical valve. Of-
tentimes a valve from a pig or
cow is used, but because Kev-
in was so young, a mechan-
ical valve was used because
it wouldn’t need replacing.
However, he will be on blood
thinners the rest of his life.
To fix the aneurysm, they
removed part of his aorta and
replaced it with an artificial
graft.
Dr. Matt Slater, the surgeon
performing the operation, did
not sugarcoat the danger of the
procedure, Haley said. They
were told multiple times that
Kevin might not survive the
surgery.
“I think we heard he could
die at least three times in five
minutes,” she said.
The procedure involved
cutting open Kevin’s chest to
repair the valve and the aor-
ta. Before going under, Kevin
said his goodbyes, just in case.
“I was scared,” he said,
knowing his heart would lit-
The Eagle/Rylan Boggs
Haley and Kevin Walker outside their home in
Grant County. A cardiologist who regularly visits
John Day diagnosed Kevin’s heart problems that
required emergency open-heart surgery.
erally be in the doctors’ hands.
The surgery was Kevin’s
first, and he had never had
never been under anesthesia
before.
“It was nice when I woke
up,” he said.
The recovery was painful,
but the most severe danger
had passed. After a week in the
hospital, he was able to return
home.
The Walkers were greeted
by a wave of support that has
carried them into the holiday
season. Friends, family mem-
bers and coworkers have all
helped the family and facilitat-
ed Kevin’s recovery.
“The outpouring of support
from so many members of our
community has reconfirmed
why this will be our forev-
er home,” Haley wrote in an
email.
Kevin will be unable to
work until at least February,
so his mother set up a Go-
FundMe account to help with
medical and recovery expens-
es in the interim. So far, the
page has raised $2,895 for the
family.
Kevin is lucky to be alive,
but it’s only by chance he re-
ceived the echocardiogram
that detected the heart prob-
lems. As fire season was wrap-
ping up, Kevin was presented
with the option to extend his
employment to fight fire in
Colorado for two weeks.
Instead, he chose to stay
behind at the last minute and
was able to receive the test that
saved his life.
“I was right on the fence,”
he said. “If I would have done
that, I probably wouldn’t be
here.”
This holiday season,
please join us in donating to
our food bank. We are not
accepting food items this year.
We are accepting monetary
donations. Please drop off at
the Blue Mountain Eagle for
the Grant County Food Bank.
Accepting donations until
Dec. 30, 2016
OPEN HOUSE
Dec 17th 11am to 5pm
04905