GRANT UNION VOLLEYBALL STARTS SEASON STRONG | PAGE A9
Wednesday, September 1, 2021
153rd Year • No. 35 • 14 Pages • $1.50
MyEagleNews.com
COVID-19 claims another Grant County life
64-year-old woman marks
eighth death in county
By Steven Mitchell
Blue Mountain Eagle
COVID-19 has now claimed eight
lives in Grant County.
The Grant County Health Depart-
ment reported that a 64-year-old
Grant County woman with no known
medical conditions died on COVID-
19 Aug. 28 at St. Charles Medical
Center in Bend.
The health department said it
encourages people to be respectful as
a family in the community grieves.
Since Aug. 16, Grant County has
reported 106 cases of COVID-19.
According to the press release,
the health department continues to
encourage people to take the follow-
ing precautions:
• Wear a mask indoors and wear
a mask outdoors if 6 feet of dis-
tancing cannot be maintained.
• Wash your hands often with
soap and water for at least 20
seconds.
• Avoid touching your eyes,
nose, or mouth with unwashed
hands.
• Cover your mouth and nose
when you cough or sneeze.
• Stay home if you feel ill.
The health department said after
someone contracts COVID-19 if they
develop symptoms, they will usually
appear within 14 days. Symptoms
include:
• Fever or chills
• Cough
• Shortness of breath or diffi cul-
ty breathing
• Fatigue
• Muscle or body aches
• Headache
• New loss of taste or smell
• Sore throat
• Congestion or runny nose
• Nausea or vomiting
• Diarrhea
The health department said they
encouraged people with these symp-
toms to call 211 or the Grant County
Health Department at 541-575-0429.
Eagle fi le photo
MUTILATIONS
CONTINUE
Eagle fi le photo
From left, Grant School District board members Jake Taylor,
Aaron Lieuallen, Haley Walker and Superintendent Bret Uptmor
listen to community feedback during an Aug. 3 board meeting.
Mysterious circumstances surround
deaths of multiple cattle in Eastern Oregon
School board faces
backlash for meeting, letter
Questionable
closed-door session,
‘letter of attack’
criticized by parents
By Steven Mitchell
Blue Mountain Eagle
Tensions boiled over during
the Grant School Board’s Aug.
25 meeting after the board
appeared to violate Ore-
gon public meetings law in a
closed-door executive session
and the district superintendent
sent a letter warning parents
that students refusing to wear
masks would be referred to
online learning.
A frustrated congregation
of parents asked the board why
they shut the public out of the
Aug. 19 meeting that parents
had requested by holding an
executive session instead of an
open meeting.
School board chair Haley
Walker told the parents the
board was not prepared to
discuss Gov. Kate Brown’s
then-recent order that all edu-
cators, school staff and volun-
teers get vaccinated.
She said parents also
wanted an answer about
whether the district would fol-
low the mask mandate, but
after consulting with the dis-
trict’s legal counsel, Walker
said, the board came to the
conclusion they did not have a
decision to make.
“There wasn’t a decision to
be made,” she said, “because
we took an oath to uphold the
law.”
Parents said, had they
known the district intended to
comply with the mask man-
date, they would have pulled
their children out of in-person
classes and home-schooled
them.
“It’s like you’re locked up
behind closed doors, and you
don’t want us to know what’s
going on,” one parent told the
board members. “And that’s
awful as a parent.”
During the closed-door
meeting, the board discussed
local staffi ng and state poli-
cies and made a fi nal decision
to send a statement to parents
and press regarding opening
school, which are typically not
allowed in executive session.
The Eagle attended the session
but is currently withholding the
details of what was discussed
at the behest of Superintendent
Bret Uptmor.
Uptmor’s letter
In addition to the executive
session, the audience said Upt-
mor’s Aug. 20 letter to parents
was, in their opinion, “a let-
ter of attack.” (Uptmor’s let-
ter was separate from a state-
ment released by the board that
was published in the Aug. 25
edition.)
In the letter, Uptmor writes
that following Brown’s mask
mandate would allow schools
to remain open for in-person
learning.
He said students who do
not want to wear a mask, or
refuse to wear one because
their parents told them not to
wear one, would be referred to
online learning.
He said students unwilling
to wear a mask would have
their parents contacted, and the
district would make arrange-
ments to enroll the student into
an online school. The online
component, Uptmor states, is
a requirement as part of the
Contributed photo/Deputy Jeremiah Holmes
This bull, in Wheeler County, was found this August with its nose, tongue, left cheek, ear, eye, reproductive system and part
of its tail removed.
“IT’S KIND OF A STRANGE THING. IT’S UNFORTUNATE, BUT I THINK
THERE ARE OTHER PEOPLE IN THE SAME SPOT I’M IN.”
—Tanner Brown, bull owner
O
regon
authorities
are investigating the
mysterious death and
mutilation of two
bulls whose carcasses
were found this summer: one in
Harney County, the other in nearby
Wheeler County.
In the most recent case, a Black
Angus bull, out of the Thomas
Angus Ranch purebred line and
worth about $4,500, was found dead
and mutilated Aug. 14 at Greenbar
Ranch in Wheeler County.
Bodie Brown, whose brother
Tanner owned the bull, and a
friend were the fi rst to fi nd the car-
cass near a watering hole. Its nose,
tongue, left cheek, ear, eye, repro-
ductive organs and part of its tail
were removed with clean cuts.
The cause of death is unknown.
The bull, when found, had likely
been dead a few days and was
already decomposing. The 24-hour
window during which a necropsy
could have been performed on the
body had passed.
Deputy Jeremiah Holmes of the
Wheeler County Sheriff ’s Offi ce is
on the case.
“It’s kind of a strange thing,”
said Tanner Brown, who owned
the bull and runs about 300 pair on
9,000 acres. “It’s unfortunate, but I
think there are other people in the
same spot I’m in.”
Brown was right; he isn’t alone.
See Mutilations, Page A14
See Board, Page A14
A cow, a
missing tongue
and a mystery
By Sierra Dawn McClain
EO Media Group
Baker County livestock
death confounds
investigators
By Jayson Jacoby
EO Media Group
Contributed photo/Clancy Roth
A cow was found dead and mutilated
at Bar DR Land and Cattle, a Deschutes
County ranch in Hampton in early 2020.
Brian Ratliff has sliced open and
probed the innards of quite a number
of cows, but he’s never come across
a case as confounding as the missing
tongue.
“This is a stumper,” Ratliff said on
Thursday. “I don’t have an answer.”
The mystery started the day before
for Ratliff , the district wildlife biolo-
gist at the Oregon Department of Fish
and Wildlife’s Baker City offi ce.
A ranch manager found the car-
cass of a 3-year-old cow that morning
on a public grazing allotment near the
head of Fox Creek. That’s near Look-
out Mountain, about 14 miles north of
Huntington.
Ratliff investigated the case as a
possible wolf attack.
Wolves from the Lookout Moun-
tain pack have killed three head of
cattle, and injured three others, this
summer several miles to the west.
Wolves didn’t kill the cow at Fox
Creek — Ratliff is sure about that.
He’s also confi dent in his
See Mystery, Page A14