A18
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Blue Mountain Eagle
HAMSHER
Continued from Page A1
cost estimates and a market
analysis conducted ahead of
time.
He is particularly concerned
that the county, John Day and
Seneca each have one vote
on the coalition board, but the
county is responsible for 60
percent of the network’s oper-
ating costs.
“It needed more discus-
sion,” he said.
Hamsher said the problem
with outsourcing emergency
dispatch to Frontier Regional
911 is that Grant County would
not have a vote on the board.
He was willing to look at keep-
ing 911 dispatch local under a
special district to avoid high
payments to the state retirement
system. He also was “optimis-
tic” the 911 dispatch problem
will be solved and that the 911
phone tax will be increased to
support local dispatch.
Hamsher said he supports
creation of a natural resource
adviser position to research is-
sues, communicate with state
and federal agencies and ad-
vise the county court. He said
it wouldn’t be hard to bring
$50,000 in benefits to the coun-
ty to offset the cost of the posi-
tion, which he noted would be
hourly, not salaried.
“The court could use the
adviser as much as it wanted
or needed,” he said. “There are
lots of complex issues coming
down the pike — water, fish,
timber and grazing.”
Hamsher said he offers
years of experience in govern-
ment as a lifelong resident and
“a good dose of common sense
not seen elsewhere in govern-
ment.” He also wants to mend
the divide in Grant County.
“Regardless of where you
are on the political spectrum,
we can all agree that we love
this county,” Hamsher said. “If
we can set aside our differenc-
es, we can solve our problems
— I saw that immediately after
the Canyon Creek Complex
fire.”
Wednesday, April 11, 2018
MYERS
Continued from Page A1
— including outsourc-
ing the service to Frontier
Regional 911 in Condon.
Myers said he would sup-
port the decision of the 911
User Board.
“If it’s not Frontier, then
I’d like to see the hybrid
cost-sharing formula used
to pay for a local dispatch,”
he said. “It would be nice
to retain payroll in Grant
County.”
Myers has concerns
about establishing a new
natural resource adviser
position for the county —
including its role and fund-
ing.
“We have a lot of eyes
looking at natural resourc-
es for us already,” he said,
citing the Eastern Oregon
Counties Association and
the Association of Oregon
Counties.
He said the new posi-
tion was not sustainable
for more than a year, and
if the county turned to fed-
eral Secure Rural Schools
or payment-in-lieu of taxes
funding, that might not be
available two years from
now.
Myers has a straightfor-
ward vision for the area’s
economy.
“We need to sustain jobs
that we have while attempt-
ing to attract new ones,” he
said. “Tourism does not
bring family-wage jobs —
industry does.”
Bringing broadband ac-
cess to the county could
help by encouraging home
businesses that the area
doesn’t have now, he not-
ed.
In addition to common
sense and patience, Myers
said he’s bringing legacy
knowledge to the job.
“I have experience —
there’s no substitute for
institutional experience,”
he said. “I’ve been here a
long time.”
POND
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By 2009, the Oregon Wa-
tershed Enhancement Board
had invested more than $6
million in fisheries projects
over 10 years in Grant Coun-
ty. Much of that money had
been spent on the Middle Fork
of the John Day River, which
flows past Bates.
The concern was protec-
tion for two native fish —
spring chinook salmon and
summer steelhead. The latter
are listed under the Endan-
gered Species Act. The Mo-
lalla-based Native Fish So-
ciety sought funding in 2009
to conduct a comprehensive
and independent review of the
benefits of removing the Bates
dam as opposed to OPRD’s
approach of saving the dam
and mitigating damage to fish
and the watershed.
Collaborative
meetings
By June 2011, construc-
tion of the park was under-
way, which included planting
4,000 trees and shrubs and
restoring a riparian area with
a meandering stream where
Bridge Creek enters the Mid-
dle Fork. The park opened
three months later and was
soon seeing 20,000 day visi-
tors a year.
But the issue of the dam
and pond was not settled. The
the
HOT
The Eagle/Sean Hart
Grant County Judge Scott Myers describes a plan to
retain Bates Pond while improving fish passage.
Myers said creating a di-
version around the pond,
deepening the pond and im-
proving the fish ladder were
on the table.
“I don’t see a win-win if
we have to compromise and
allow the pond to be perma-
nently drained,” he said at the
time. “I think we will fight
that option.”
Breaking the
deadlock
Contributed photo
The community of Bates, the Oregon Lumber Co. mill and the mill pond are shown
in this historic aerial photo taken before the buildings were removed. Located at the
terminus of the Sumpter Valley Railroad, the mill operated from 1917 to 1975. The
Edward Hines Lumber Co. operated the mill from 1960 to 1975.
dam was constructed in the
late 1940s, and a fish ladder
was built with public money in
2001 — a quarter century after
the mill shut down for good.
Water flowing from Bridge
Creek warmed up several de-
grees while stored behind the
dam before discharging into
the Middle Fork, a violation
corner’s
SH T
of state water quality stan-
dards. In addition, the fish
ladder did not meet current
fish-passage standards.
A collaborative meeting
led by a hired facilitator met
for the first time in July 2016
to review options for the site.
Lined up in support of fish and
water quality were the Native
Fish Society, the North Fork
John Day Watershed Coun-
cil, the Confederated Tribes
of the Umatilla Indian Res-
ervation, the Warm Springs
Tribe, the Oregon Department
of Environmental Quality, the
National Oceanic and Atmo-
spheric Administration and
the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service.
Grant County Judge Scott
Myers said in advance of the
meeting that he didn’t believe
removing the dam was in the
county’s best interest.
“It has recreational po-
tential for kayakers, boaters,
swimmers, fishermen,” he
said at the time. “It has a very
strong sense of place for past
generations and future gener-
ations of families from Bates
and Austin.”
EEK
OF THE W
SYDNEY BROCKWAY
The group met in Septem-
ber 2016 for what was expect-
ed to be the third and final
meeting, but the group failed
to reach a consensus. Myers
said all but one member had
agreed to not challenge one of
the six proposed options.
A fourth meeting was
held in March. During the
intervening year and a half, a
stronger consensus developed
and sideboards were estab-
lished for the meeting.
“For purposes of discuss-
ing the options and devel-
oping a path forward, doing
nothing was not an option,”
Nebeker told the Eagle. “Nei-
ther was dam removal.”
In the end, consensus was
reached to allow OPRD to
move forward in developing
Option A into a more detailed
design. Option A calls for
constructing a bypass channel
on the west side of the pond
so most of the streamflow
from Bridge Creek can flow
to the Middle Fork without
warming up.
Option A also calls for
shrinking the pond’s footprint
while deepening the pond by
dredging as much as six feet
of silt — and any remain-
ing logs called “sinkers” that
might be buried in the silt.
The dredged material would
be used to erect a berm to
form the bypass channel.
In addition, Option A calls
for improving fish passage
around the dam by either fix-
ing the existing fish ladder
or replacing it with one that
could include natural features
in its design.
“Some fish passage is oc-
curring now,” Nebeker said.
OPRD has lined up
$200,000 of its own funding
to work on planning, prelim-
inary design and permitting
for the project. A dam integ-
rity study will be conducted
in the next year, which “could
potentially affect Option A
depending on study results,”
Nebeker said.
OPRD will hold a public
informational meeting on the
plans this summer and then
present the complete design
to the public in spring 2019.
The construction contract
would be awarded in summer
or fall 2019, with construction
starting in spring or summer
2020. Nebeker said this time-
line was optimistic, and he
expected everything could be
pushed back a year.
School: Grant Union
Grade: 11
Parent: Jodi & Kyle Myers
Sport: Track and Field
Position: 100-meter hurdles,
long jump, triple jump, 4x100 relay
What I like best about my sport: “I like
the individual competition — you’re working
against yourself to improve for the season.”
Coach’s Comment: “Sydney is a hard worker
and does everything she is asked. In her first
two meets, she has shown she is
picking up right where she left
off last year. I expect her to be a
major contributor to our team all
season long.”
-Coach Sonna Smith
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