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News
Blue Mountain Eagle
POT
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is no commercial property
within the city limits that
is more than 1,000 feet
from the public school, said
City Manager and Recorder
Raamin Burrell.
As a result, recreational
marijuana businesses can-
not operate in Seneca, but
the city receives about $100
each quarter from statewide
marijuana taxes, which goes
into the city’s general fund,
she said.
Prairie City received
$2,706 in 2017 from the
statewide marijuana taxes
and put the money in the
city’s general fund, City
Recorder Bobbie Brown
said.
Canyon City received
$2,096, City Recorder Cor-
ry Rider said. The money
was put in the general fund
as miscellaneous funds in
the same way the city deals
with liquor and cigarette
taxes, he said.
Mt. Vernon received
$1,561 in 2017 from state-
wide marijuana taxes and
put the money in the city’s
general fund, City Recorder
Tami Kowing said.
Dayville received $446,
City Recorder Ruthie
Moore said. The money has
not been designated for any
specific purpose, she said.
Monument received $386
and Long Creek received
$580, Krawczyk said.
Awareness
programs
John Day, the largest
city in the county, received
$4,945 as its share of state-
wide marijuana taxes. The
John Day City Council
on Feb. 13 unanimously
approved providing the
money to the Community
Health Needs Assessment
Substance Abuse Commit-
tee to support education on
substance abuse issues.
Grant County received
$15,175 from the Depart-
ment of Revenue for its
share of the state mari-
juana tax. Blue Moun-
tain Hospital CEO Derek
Daly subsequently asked
the county to provide the
money to CHNA to fund
a variety of projects to in-
crease public awareness of
substance abuse.
LAWSUIT
Continued from Page A1
public records request,”
Sullivan said in the order.
“... This appears to be a
budget matter internal to
Grant County. In any event,
there are no facts pled as to
why the defendants would be
liable to the attorneys hired
by the Sheriff or why he hired
outside counsel, instead of
availing the County Counsel
for assistance, as would nor-
mally be done.”
After the judge’s order of
dismissal, attorney Benjamin
Boyd, on behalf of Palmer,
DeFord and the sheriff’s of-
fice, filed a motion to modify
the judge’s findings and to
enter substitute findings and
for leave to amend their orig-
inal complaint July 20.
County Judge Scott
Myers noted at the time
that the county wasn’t sure
how the money should be
spent, and the court unan-
imously approved the re-
quest. It has since been
determined that this mon-
ey was not earmarked for
treatment and prevention,
and the county could have
spent the funds for law
enforcement, roads or any
other county needs.
On April 4, the county
received $18,362 from the
Oregon Health Authori-
ty. According to Nicole
Corbin, an adult behav-
ioral health services man-
ager at the Oregon Health
Authority, that money was
earmarked for alcohol and
other drug treatment or
prevention services. The
money has not yet been
spent by the county.
Altogether, CHNA in
partnership with the Trau-
ma Informed Care Com-
munity Task Force re-
ceived $20,120 from John
Day and the county, about
43 percent of the total re-
ceived by the county and
its eight cities.
“The funding is being
used to create awareness
around both substance
abuse and trauma-in-
formed care through youth
engagement as well as
professional development
for youth-serving orga-
nizations and agencies,”
said Lisa Weigum, a drug
awareness coordinator at
Community Counseling
Solutions in John Day.
About $14,000 has
been allocated for youth
engagement and commu-
nity outreach, she said,
including the Teen Health
Fair in 2019.
“This
fall,
an
award-winning
global
speaker, Kevin Hines, is
scheduled to speak in our
community to both stu-
dents and the general pub-
lic,” Weigum said.
The remainder of the
funding, about $6,120,
will be used for profes-
sional development, in-
cluding a trauma-informed
care workshop for edu-
cators scheduled in Oc-
tober. Other professional
development opportuni-
ties, such as for substance
abuse and mental health,
are in the process of being
scheduled, she said.
“Normally, a county of-
ficial sued for an injunction
pursuant to Oregon’s Pub-
lic Records Law would be
able to avail him or herself
of County Counsel for legal
assistance,” Boyd said in
the motion. “In this highly
irregular case, Grant Coun-
ty refused to afford Sheriff
Palmer, Civil Deputy De-
Ford, and the Grant County
Sheriff’s Office such as-
sistance and instead deter-
mined that it would not en-
gage counsel to defend its
officers.”
Boyd also argued the
judge failed to consider the
full definition of a tort when
ruling on the matter.
A hearing was held on the
motion Aug. 10. The judge
said she would take it under
advisement and promptly
make a decision.
Wednesday, September 5, 2018
times as much fish as a nearby
control stream, and water-tem-
perature spiking eased. The
results made Bridge Creek the
poster child for BDA projects,
drawing international attention
and documentary filmmakers.
BEAVER
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Even if BDAs don’t at-
tract beavers to an area, they
mimic the action of natural
beaver dams — slowing stream
flow, improving groundwater
connectivity to the surrounding
area and building up sediment
to improve riparian areas. Juve-
nile fish can swim through gaps
in BDAs, and the minimum
fish-jumping height for older
fish can be achieved by install-
ing multiple BDAs.
Beaver dam analogs can
also help reduce stream water
temperature, according to Ste-
phen Bennett, an adjunct pro-
fessor in watershed sciences at
Utah State University. BDAs
can increase groundwater con-
nectivity through annual spring
flooding and by the hydraulic
action of the standing water be-
hind the dams.
The temperature under-
ground is about 50 degrees,
Bennett said. The log structures
also provide some shade, and
scouring around BDAs can cre-
ate deeper pools, but the goal is
to improve riparian areas, al-
lowing hardwoods to grow and
provide much needed shade.
Support for this new tech-
nique does not always extend to
government agencies — many
officials don’t know how to
regulate the structures. Some
agencies have cited flood risks
in denying permits for BDA
projects.
In many cases, streams cho-
sen for BDA projects provide
habitat for endangered species,
which adds to the bureaucratic
hurdles, and installing struc-
tures that completely span a
stream deemed navigable could
trigger an Army Corps of Engi-
neers review. Post-project mon-
itoring might also be required.
The Oregon Department of
State Lands attempted to draft
new rules to expedite imple-
mentation of BDAs, but the
process bogged down over
statewide versus regional re-
quirements and has been de-
layed.
Professionals
gather
Getting the word out on
beaver dam analogs was the
goal of a workshop held in
ROAD
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in Grant County to the coun-
ty, was passed Nov. 5, 2002,
by 1,796-1,436 with 76 percent
turnout.
Ordinance 2013-01, which
the county court passed unani-
mously May 23, 2013, ordained
that all roads, trails, stock drive-
ways and by-ways crossing
public lands be kept open to the
public for historic and custom-
ary uses unless authorized for
closure by the county court and
the county sheriff.
According to County Judge
Scott Myers, an Access Com-
mittee established by the court
had promoted the road ordi-
nance, and Yockim had recom-
mended it be passed as a resolu-
tion, not an ordinance.
The complaint
Webb requested a declara-
tion by the court that the mea-
sures and the ordinance are
invalid due to procedural errors
ThermaFan Kit!
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This STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and
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If you miss the Farmers Market, you can order your fan online.
Camp Creek
project
The Eagle/Richard Hanners
Thirty-five stream restoration professionals traveled to
Camp Creek in the Middle Fork John Day River drainage
July 26 to study beaver dam analogs installed by the
Forest Service in 2016. The fencing was installed to
protect willows planted in the sedge meadow to provide
food for beavers.
Grant County this summer with
35 stream restoration profes-
sionals.
The purpose of the work-
shop was not just instructing
people on how to build beaver
dam analogs or persuading
them to use the technique, but
also to release new information
on what’s been accomplished,
said Elise Delgado, project
manager for the South Fork
John Day Watershed Council.
“Not everyone will leave a
believer,” she said.
The workshop was spon-
sored by the John Day Basin
Partnership, which represents
groups from Prairie City to the
Columbia River. Herb Winters,
a project manager at the Gil-
liam Soil and Water Conserva-
tion District, sits on the partner-
ship’s steering committee.
“There’s lots of angst about
BDAs,” he said.
Winters said he hopes to
see the practice used across the
basin, employing best manage-
ment practices and completing
quality projects.
“We don’t want failures that
will give BDAs a bad name,”
he said, calling them a potential
game-changer.
Winters said he believes
all the group’s partners sup-
port BDAs, but they need to
take the low-hanging fruit first
and take it slow. He noted that
many opinions exist on fund-
ing sources and permitting, but
both state and federal agencies
are taking a serious look at this
new technology.
The goal should be low-im-
pact construction with no heavy
equipment and not to anger
in adoption and because they
conflict with paramount state
law and the state and U.S. con-
stitutions.
In his Aug. 21 complaint,
Webb noted that the United
States ratified the U.N. Char-
ter as a treaty, and the U.S.
Constitution prohibits states
and counties from making
or changing treaties. He also
noted that Measure 12-37 did
not address a matter of county
concern, as required by state
law for citizen initiatives, and
the measure conflicts with and
is preempted by the U.S. Con-
stitution.
By petitioning Congress,
Measure 12-40 was an admin-
istrative act, not a legislative
act, and therefore was outside
the scope of the state’s refer-
endum or initiative process,
Webb said in his complaint.
He also noted that the measure
did not approve or reject an or-
dinance previously enacted by
the county court or propose a
new ordinance.
The 2013 road ordinance
also does not address a matter
of county concern, Webb said
in his complaint. As a result
of the U.S. Constitution, the
Federal Land Policy and Man-
agement Act and the National
Forest Management Act, Grant
people, Winters said. He noted
that over time BDAs disappear
as sediment builds up behind
the structure and vegetation
grows over them.
Light on the land
Two BDA projects last year
in Grant County took dramat-
ically different approaches.
While a project on private land
on the South Fork John Day
River near Izee was low-tech,
with posts pounded in by hand
and willows found at the site
weaved in between, a Forest
Service project on East Fork
Beech Creek north of Mt. Ver-
non utilized heavy equipment,
with excavators brought in to
drive posts into the stream bed.
Nick Bouwes, a professor
at the College of Natural Re-
sources at Utah State Universi-
ty, advised workshop members
to be efficient in how they build
BDAs because a project might
require a lot of them.
Bouwes was a leader in
the largest beaver dam analog
project in the United States, on
Bridge Creek near Mitchell,
where a powerful stream had
gouged a 6- to 10-foot-deep
incision. About 2.5 miles was
treated to improve habitat for
steelhead starting in 2005.
Bouwes and his team built
121 BDAs from 2009 to 2012.
By 2013, beavers had fortified
60 of the BDAs and built 115
new dams. The stream bed
gradually filled with sediment
and rose back to the top of the
trench, and the submerged area
tripled.
Monitoring showed Bridge
Creek produced nearly three
County is preempted from reg-
ulating federally owned roads,
he said.
The exception were roads
authorized by Revised Statute
2477 of the 1866 Mining Act
and other rights-of-way estab-
lished on federal public lands
before the creation of the Na-
tional Forest System, Webb
said.
The road ordinance was
also preempted by and con-
flicted with the 1859 Oregon
Admission Acts, which stated
that Oregon “shall not inter-
fere with the primary disposal
of the soil within the same by
the United States, or with any
regulations Congress may find
necessary for securing title in
said soil to bona fide purchas-
ers thereof,” Webb said in his
complaint.
Past challenges
Webb, a former county
judge, has been successful in
challenging county actions in
the past. Most recently, he chal-
lenged Measure 12-72, the Sec-
ond Amendment Preservation
Ordinance. On June 29, Grant
County Circuit Court Judge
William D. Cramer Jr. ruled that
the measure was preempted by
state law and that the measure’s
language would have confused
A four-mile section of Camp
Creek in the Middle Fork John
Day River drainage has seen
significant improvement since
Malheur National Forest fish-
eries biologist Dan Armichardy
headed up a BDA project there
in 2016. The goal was to pro-
tect mid-Columbia River steel-
head, he said.
There’s no beaver sign now
at the three meadows on the
project site, but Long Creek
rancher Sharon Livingston re-
calls a large beaver dam at the
site when she was a child. The
Forest Service blew it up, she
said, causing her to wonder why
the government has changed its
mind about beavers.
The science at the time
called for removing beavers,
Delgado said. But the science
keeps changing. For years, the
Forest Service built thousands
of check dams across the West
to slow stream flow. Made of
rocks and intended to be per-
manent, many failed causing
even more damage. The For-
est Service also tried log weir
dams, but 45 weir dams were
removed at the Camp Creek
site in 2011.
A five-foot high natural bea-
ver dam exists on Camp Creek
about three miles downstream
from the project site at Pepper
Creek, but the degraded ripari-
an habitat at the project site was
not good for fish or cattle. An
8-degree temperature rise had
been recorded between the up-
stream and downstream ends
of the 4-mile reach before the
project.
The Forest Service installed
70 BDAs and numerous wood
jams. About 3,500 cottonwoods
and 1,500 willows were planted
in the floodplain, but deer and
elk ate them and fencing is
now needed. Excavators were
brought onto the sedge mead-
ows to drive in large wooden
posts for the BDAs, but no
signs of the heavy equipment
were visible to workshop mem-
bers two years later.
voters. As a result, the measure
will not appear on the Novem-
ber ballot.
Webb also challenged the
establishment of a Grant Coun-
ty Public Forest Commission,
which was created following a
1,634-1,579 vote in favor of the
commission on Nov. 5, 2002.
The initiative stated that “the
people of Grant County ... shall
assume responsibility to man-
age public lands within Grant
County by creating a commis-
sion ... to create and administer
policies for lands and natural
resources in the public domain
within Grant County.”
Webb requested a judicial
review of the commission in
March 2016. Cramer informed
the county clerk in September
that he intended to nullify the
commission and issued his full
opinion in November.
Cramer said the county was
free to pass a measure to es-
tablish a forest commission to
develop plans to manage pub-
lic lands if and when the lands
were owned by the county, or
to advise the county so long as
the measure clearly stated the
commission’s limits. He also
ruled that the measure must
meet procedural requirements
and not violate other “superior
or paramount laws.”