NEWS
Blue Mountain Eagle
Pool
Bullying
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Continued from Page A1
“I think it is vital for
the health of the commu-
nity and the safety of our
youth to have a place to
learn how to swim,” Beth
Spell told the Planning
Commission.
Haley Walker, chair of
the Grant School Board,
made a similar point
during the City Council
meeting.
“If the swimming pool
and swimming lessons
and the opportunity to
learn how to swim save
one life, it’s worth it,” she
said.
Arguments
against
tended to focus on the
cost of the project and the
city’s spending priorities.
John Morris raised
several questions about
costs associated with the
aquatic center and the
relationship between the
city and the parks and rec
district.
“Nothing has been
said about operation and
maintenance costs down
the road when it’s built,”
he told the Planning
Commission.
Also on the City
Council’s docket was a
determination from the
Oregon Department of
Environmental Quality
that Green said provides a
“permitting pathway” for
a new wastewater treat-
ment plant. He said the
DEQ decision clears the
way for the city to begin
fi nal design and construc-
tion of the new treatment
plant, which will include
a system for distribut-
ing reclaimed water to
industrial and agricultural
users.
In his remarks to the
City Council, Green
described the treatment
plant, aquatic center and
Kam Wah Chung proj-
ects as “once in a lifetime
investments” that would
pay benefi ts for the com-
munity for many years to
come.
“I call them once in
a lifetime because they
really are once in a life-
time,” Green said.
“We have benefi tted
tremendously from the
investments our parents
and grandparents made,
and it’s time for us to do
the same.”
real health consequences for
children and teens.
For example, the Centers
for Disease Control and Pre-
vention reports that kids who
are bullied are more likely to
go through depression and
anxiety and may see changes
in their diet and sleep pat-
terns. In addition, these issues
can persist into adulthood.
Bullying has the added
eff ect of hurting kids academ-
ically. Victims of bullying are
more likely to miss, skip or
drop out of school.
There are consequences
for the perpetrators as well.
Bullies are more likely to get
into fi ghts, abuse alcohol,
be sexually promiscuous in
their youth, become domes-
tic abusers and have criminal
records.
“It’s cliche to say (bul-
lying) is a rite of passage,”
said Grant County Educa-
tion Service District Super-
intendent Robert Walten-
burg. “But in today’s world,
we’re trying to change those
norms, to change those rites
of passage.”
Grant Union Principal
Ryan Gerry said the school
tries to combat bullying by
teaching students what it is,
how to spot it, and where and
how to report it when it hap-
pens. The school has harass-
ment/bullying report forms
available to all students and
staff .
Gerry said addressing bul-
lying in school is essential to
Tracers
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the county commissioners a
“wish list to take to Salem”
after the court session.
Lindsay asked the county
to seek out state funding for
wraparound services for peo-
ple who test positive for the
coronavirus and are asked to
quarantine or have had close
contact with someone who
tests positive for COVID-19.
The services could include
assistance with rent, mort-
gage payments, utility bills or
other basic needs.
Additionally, she asked
the commissioners about
funding for small businesses
to off set losses they incur
when they are forced to close
due to employees or custom-
A MAN
WAKES
UP in the
morning
after sleeping on...
an advertised bed, in advertised
pajamas.
Blue Mountain Eagle
MyEagleNews.com
Steven Mitchell/Blue Mountain Eagle
Grant Union High School senior Billy Radinovich poses for a pic-
ture on Tuesday, Nov. 9. She said she hopes the people who de-
faced her parking spot grow from the experience.
cially when people feel their
body can not meet social
standards.
Given that both sides of
her family are on the heavier
side, Radinovich said that
she expected to grow up to
be full-fi gured. But she’s
always been popular in
school, and people never
attacked her about her body
before now.
“I’ve always been a good
person,” Radinovich said,
“and my personality has spo-
ken more than my body.”
Nonetheless, Radinovich
said, she was self-conscious
about her weight and was
worried about how others
viewed her.
Lately, she said, she had
turned the corner on those
feelings and was beginning
to accept and love herself.
But when she pulled into
her parking spot early last
month and saw the hurtful
graffi ti, those old insecuri-
ties about her weight and
self-image came back with
renewed force.
“Seeing that kind of dam-
aged me,” Radinovich said,
“because it made me feel
like that’s how people see
me, and that’s the only way
people see me.”
a healthy, safe learning envi-
ronment. But what is poten-
tially even more essential is
what parents and commu-
nity members teach students
about how to properly treat
each other, whether in per-
son or on social media.
“Unfortunately,” Gerry
said, “when something like
this occurs, it truly puts into
perspective the value of
treating others the way you
want to be treated and being
kind to one another.”
Waltenburg said bully-
ing is a learned behavior, one
that kids can pick up by tak-
ing cues from society and
Body shaming, or the act
of mocking a person’s phys-
ical appearance, can lead
to severe depression, espe-
Radinovich said the graf-
fi ti story took a “huge plot
twist” when she found out
the students who defaced
the parking spot were close
friends of hers, people she
had vouched for in the weeks
after the incident.
Radinovich said some
ers needing to quarantine.
Lastly, she asked if the
court could lobby for sup-
port funding for compassion
fatigue and burnout in health
care workers.
Lindsay said there are con-
sequences to the community
when people do not cooperate
with public health guidelines,
such as becoming severely
sick and being hospitalized.
“In addition to genuinely
caring,” Lindsay said, “we
are just doing our jobs.”
At last Wednesday’s
county court session, Prairie
City resident Frances Pres-
ton — a vocal critic of mask
mandates and pandemic pro-
tocols — said some people
are “mentally disturbed” in
responding to the pandemic.
But at the same time, she
said,“fear-mongering” about
the virus is also a factor.
Preston asked if the tracers
could have access to counsel-
ing after being on the other
end of a verbal tirade. She
also asked if there were legal
avenues the Health Depart-
ment could take.
County
Commissioner
Sam Palmer told Preston that
could run into medical pri-
vacy violations.
Lindsay said if the call
became threatening, it would
be a “game-changer.”
Some members of the
audience sidestepped Lind-
say’s concerns and peppered
her and Health Department
clinic manager Jessica Wine-
gar with questions about nat-
ural immunity to the virus.
Someone asked about
the total number of COVID-
19 deaths in the county and
how many of those who died
were fully immunized. Win-
egar said 14 people had died
from the virus and none were
fully vaccinated. However,
she said one person who died
had been given the fi rst dose
of the vaccine.
County Judge Scott Myers
asked if there was a hotline
or support network of men-
tal health providers for nurs-
ing staff .
Winegar said in addition
to working with Commu-
nity Counseling Solutions,
she has reached out to a fi rst
responder support network
and told them she needed
help.
Additionally, she told the
court she recently opened up
on a call with state staff and
made it her “personal coun-
seling session.”
In addition to reach-
ing out for support, Winegar
said the staff had been doing
team-building activities and
taking afternoons off from
time to time.
Winegar said she real-
izes taking the afternoons off
can be challenging for those
who need to get in touch
with someone at the Health
Department. However, if the
department loses more staff , it
risks fi nding itself in a much
worse situation.
“It’s like a traumatic event
that we’re doing every day.”
Winegar said.
She said the staff is work-
ing to combat compassion
fatigue. According to the
National Institutes of Health,
compassion fatigue is emo-
tional and physical distress
caused by treating and help-
ing patients in need, desen-
sitizing health care profes-
sionals leaving them with a
lack of empathy for future
patients.
Winegar said when peo-
ple get angry about needing
to quarantine due to being in
close contact with someone
with COVID-19, she explains
that the health department is
treating coronavirus like any
other infectious disease. For
instance, public health would
their communities.
“A lot of times,” Walten-
burg said, “kids just don’t
realize the impact of their
actions.”
Gerry said he did not con-
sider the vandalism to Radi-
novich’s parking space an act
of bullying because it was not
part of a pattern of behavior
repeated over time. Instead,
it was more a single targeted
incident of nastiness.
Body shaming
Hitting close to home
people were suspicious and
thought that one person in
the group could have graffi -
tied the parking spot, but she
consistently stood by that
person.
According to Radinovich,
she and one person from
the group had been having
“prank wars,” and the graf-
fi ti on the parking spot was
intended to be funny and a
comeback for a prank she
had played on that person.
Radinovich said that
while the students were try-
ing to play a prank, they did
not think through the full
impact of what they were
doing. Moreover, she added,
the group did not come clean
after the incident, which she
said was the worst thing they
could have done.
After Radinovich’s Face-
book post about the ugly
incident — which garnered
upwards of 100 shares and
reposts — friends and fel-
low students painted over the
ugly slur in red with a new
message.
This one said, “Beautiful.
We love you.”
Gerry declined to dis-
cuss potential consequences
for the individuals involved
in the incident due to pri-
vacy concerns, but he said
this is something the stu-
dents would have to learn
and grow from.
Radinovich had some
words for them as well.
“For everybody that was
involved in this,” she said, “I
just want the best for them.
I hope they succeed, and I
hope they grow.”
]
quarantine them if the county
were in the midst of a mea-
sles outbreak and they were
not immunized against the
disease.
She said she gives people
the opportunity to vent and
the, after a rough conversa-
tion, she will call Lindsay to
vent herself.
Lindsay said she does the
same.
“When I’m calling Jes-
sica after getting called the F
word about 53 times,” Lind-
say said, “that’s like a coun-
seling call for me to say, ‘All
right, well, that didn’t go so
well.’”
Preston suggested that
Health Department staff
hang up on people when they
become nasty.
Lindsay said it would be
one thing if people were civil
when they told contact trac-
ers that COVID-19 is a hoax
and that they would not quar-
antine and that they were end-
ing the call.
“While I might wish that
the call had a diff erent out-
come,” Lindsay said, “that is
very diff erent than interrupt-
ing, being called bad words,
bad words, over and over, and
told you’re out to ruin their
lives.”
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