HUTCHISON WINS GIRLS WRESTLING TITLE
The
PAGE A10
Blue Mountain
EAGLE
Grant County’s newspaper since 1868
Wednesday, February 27, 2019
151st Year • No. 9 • 18 Pages • $1.00
BlueMountainEagle.com
Former Monument resident nominated for an Oscar
Fitzgerald’s parents traveled from Grant County to award show
By Angel Carpenter
Blue Mountain Eagle
Former Monument resident
Skye Fitzgerald was nominated for
an Academy Award for his short
fi lm documentary “Lifeboat.”
Although it didn’t win the Oscar,
the 34 1/2 minute movie, fi lmed in
2016 as part of a trilogy, provides
a glimpse into rescue missions on
the Mediterranean Sea as volun-
teers with the nonprofi t Sea-Watch
group seek out migrants fl eeing
areas such as Libya and Tunisia via
wooden and infl atable boats.
Monument residents Mitch and
Jenny Mund know Fitzgerald and
remember when he was a young
man.
Fitzgerald’s parents, Fred and
Fanny Fitzgerald, still live in Mon-
ument, and Jenny said they trav-
eled to be with their son at the
award ceremony in Los Angeles.
When Mitch and Jenny moved
to Monument from John Day in
1986, the Fitzgeralds were living
in Monument.
Jenny said she remembers Skye,
48, as a hard-working young man.
She said the family lived in a
truck trailer in the early days that
she knew them and later built a
beautiful home.
She added that Fred, now
retired, was an air-traffi c con-
troller in Tri-Cities, Washington,
and Fanny played string instru-
ments with the Inland Northwest
Orchestra.
Mitch worked in fi re control
for the Oregon Department of For-
estry back then, and Skye worked
for him during the summer months
as a seasonal fi refi ghter.
“He was always willing to learn
and was always interested in fi nd-
ing out things that he didn’t know,”
Mitch said.
Skye interviewed Mitch for a
part of his 2018 documentary fi lm
“101 Seconds,” which was about
the Clackamas Towne Center
shooting in December 2012.
“I gave my views on the Sec-
ond Amendment and gun control,”
Mitch said. “That’s what I admire
in his documentaries. He tried to
give both sides of the issue, and
then let the person who views it
decide — not try to push any of his
thoughts or beliefs on people, but
let people make that choice.”
See Oscar, Page A18
Racial slur highlights
need for sportsmanship
The Eagle/Richard Hanners
Josh Walker, chairman of the Grant County Digital Network
Coalition board, addresses a town hall meeting in the John
Day Fire Hall on Dec. 18.
Broadband
coalition to
seek grants
Director says chances are better this year
By Richard Hanners
Blue Mountain Eagle
New federal grant appli-
cations, plans to run a fi ber
line to the northwest part
of Grant County and the
establishment of a state-
wide fi ber network partner-
ship are generating opti-
mism by the local agency
organized to improve inter-
net access in Grant County.
Second try
The Grant County Digi-
tal Network Coalition will
update last year’s applica-
tion for grant funding to
run a main fi ber line from
John Day to Seneca and try
again, the board decided at
its Feb. 19 meeting.
The coalition learned in
December they were not a
recipient of a $2.9 million
U.S. Department of Agri-
culture Community Con-
nect grant. A total of 124
project applications were
submitted, and 19 projects
were awarded.
The coalition had spent
$93,000 developing the
grant
application
and
planned to come up with
the $450,000 match using
the $1.8 million appropri-
ation the city of John Day
had received from the leg-
islature in 2017. The goal
was to leverage the appro-
priation into larger grant-
based funding.
The Community Con-
nect grant program this
year is expected to attract
hundreds of applicants
during the 60-day submis-
sion window, but the Agri-
culture Department will
only be able to fi nance
a small fraction of those
applicants,
said
Nick
Green, the coalition’s exec-
utive director.
Green said the coali-
tion’s chances for approval
are better this year because
the coalition is organized
and operating, the co-lo-
cation facility in the John
Day Fire Hall has been
constructed, T-Mobile has
proposed cell towers in the
project area and the coali-
tion has anticipated service
provider agreements with
Oregon Telephone Corpo-
ration and CenturyLink.
See Broadband, Page A18
The Eagle/Angel Carpenter
Referee Tim Boethin at the Feb. 16 High Desert League boys basketball championship game gathers Crane and
Prairie City players around him, warning that further negative comments would not be tolerated.
Prairie City rebounds from
unsportsmanlike incident
By Angel Carpenter
Blue Mountain Eagle
The Prairie City Pan-
thers overcame adversity
with a 66-49 win over
Dufur Friday to move
on to the 1A boys bas-
ketball
championship
tournament.
An unsportsmanlike
incident almost over-
shadowed the Panthers’
last-second victory over
the Crane Mustangs in
their previous game, the
district
championship
Feb. 16.
A Crane player was
suspended from play-
ing in the team’s next
game after what Prai-
rie City athletic director
Billy Colson described
as “serious trash talking”
during the game.
At one point, referee
Tim Boethin gathered
players from both teams
and said he wouldn’t tol-
erate any more negative
comments.
Prairie City’s Syd Hol-
man said he and a Crane
player were both in the
The Eagle/Angel Carpenter
Prairie City Panther starters Levi Burke, left, and Syd Holman show their excitement
after their team’s 46-45 win over the Crane Mustangs at the District 8 tournament in
John Day.
air and landed on
man said, but
each other. When
added he had no
they hit the fl oor,
respect for the
the Crane player
comment.
“used the ‘hard
Panther head
R’ (the N-word),”
coach Sam Work-
H o l m a n
man said Crane
said.
had played “rough
“ E m o t i o n s Syd Holman basketball” in pre-
were
running
vious games.
high. I’m not going to
“Every time we played
hold it against him,” Hol- Crane, their kids would
say stuff to try to intimi-
date with words,” Work-
man said. “There’s no
defense or offense that
has to do with running
your mouth on a basket-
ball court.”
Workman said sports-
manship leads to bet-
ter outcomes. He said,
See Slur, Page A18