ODOT WINTER SAFETY GUIDE | INSIDE
Wednesday, December 8, 2021
153rd Year • No. 49 • 16 Pages • $1.50
MyEagleNews.com
FOREVER YOUNG
Carrie Young
Carrie Young Memorial
comes back strong after
going virtual in 2020
Mateusz Perkowski/Capital Press
Kathryn and James Dunlap with their daughter, Eve-
lyn, at the family’s ranch near Baker City. The couple
has fi led a lawsuit over being excluded from a USDA
loan forgiveness program for minority farmers.
Baker ranchers
suing USDA
Couple claims race-based loan
forgiveness program discriminates
By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI
Capital Press
Bennett Hall/Blue Mountain Eagle
Laikyn Hammon, 3, at left, and Sadie Winegar, 4, admire the Christmas tree at the Carrie Young Memorial Dinner and Auction on Friday, Dec. 3,
at the John Day Elks Lodge. The annual event raised just under $50,000 to help the elderly in Grant County.
By BENNETT HALL
Blue Mountain Eagle
A
fter going virtual last
year due to COVID
concerns, the Car-
rie Young Memorial
Dinner and Auction
came back in a big way as sev-
eral hundred people fi lled the John
Day Elks Lodge on Friday, Dec. 3,
to eat, drink, socialize and support
one of Grant County’s most cher-
ished causes.
With the pandemic still lin-
gering, event organizer Lucie
Immoos wasn’t sure what kind of
a turnout to expect this year. But
on Friday night, as she watched
throngs of people browsing the
rows of festively displayed auc-
tion items, her eyes shone with
excitement.
“Isn’t this amazing?” she
asked.
Immoos started the Carrie
Young Memorial Drive for the
Elderly in 1993 to honor the mem-
ory of her older sister, who was
killed in a car wreck at age 32.
After Carrie Young’s untimely
Bennett Hall/Blue Mountain Eagle
Carrie Young Memorial organizer Lucie Immoos, left, with grand-
daughter Weslynn Hammon, 1½, and volunteer Stacy Fenton of Burns.
death, her family discovered she
had been quietly buying Christ-
mas presents for some of the res-
idents of the nursing home where
she worked, Blue Mountain Care
Center in Prairie City.
That fi rst year, Immoos raised
a little over $50 from her For-
est Service co-workers, enough
to buy gifts for a small number
of nursing home residents. But
the idea caught on. Fueled by
Immoos’ dedication and infec-
tious energy, the event has grown
steadily, with volunteers fl ock-
ing to the cause and businesses
and individuals donating valuable
items for auction.
Today the drive serves resi-
dents of four Grant County nurs-
ing homes and more than 200
homebound seniors throughout the
county.
“I come home sometimes and
there’s stuff dropped off in my car-
port,” Immoos told the Eagle in an
interview on the eve of this year’s
dinner and auction.
Auction items are collected
throughout the year and kept in
storage until around the fi rst week-
end in November, when they are
brought to Keerins Hall at the
Grant County Fairgrounds and
rough-sorted into themed gift bas-
kets by some of Immoos’ many
volunteers. Then Teri Bowden,
owner of A Flower Shop and More
in John Day, goes to work, put-
ting the fi nishing touches on each
basket to get it ready for the silent
auction.
“She puts it all together,”
Immoos said. “She just has an eye
for it and she makes it all pretty.”
For this year’s auction, 201 gift
baskets were assembled by the
crew and arrayed on tables at the
Elks Lodge, where attendees could
get a good look at the merchandise
and write down their bids.
Some baskets were fi lled with
children’s toys, others with adults-
only goodies such as beer, wine
or spirits. Some baskets were built
See Young, Page A14
Grant County renters getting help from state
By STEVEN MITCHELL
Blue Mountain Eagle
As Oregon’s program to help renters closed to new
applicants last week, local agencies processed the last
few applications from Grant County residents looking
to stave off eviction ahead of the winter months.
Rochelle Hamilton, the homeless program manager
with Community Connection of Northeast Oregon, said
that 124 Grant County households submitted applica-
tions for rental assistance and, as of Friday, Dec. 3, 121
had gone through processing.
So far, she said, 83 households in Grant County have
received rental assistance totaling $243,484.
According to Hamilton, the rental assistance pro-
gram allowed the agency to extend its emergency motel
vouchers to give families additional time to fi nd hous-
ing. As of Nov. 30, Hamilton said, 24 households in
Grant County had received emergency motel vouchers
for a total value of $57,391.
While roughly 9,000 people in the state are beyond
the “safe harbor” protection time frames in the rental
assistance program and are at imminent risk of eviction
as they wait for the state to work through the backlog of
applications, Hamilton said no Grant County applica-
tions came in outside the 60-day window.
Additionally, Hamilton said, even with the morato-
Oregon Capital Bureau fi le photo
With the state’s program to help renters now closed
to new applicants, 83 households in Grant County
have received a total of $243,484 in rental assistance.
The possibility that USDA would forgive their
farm loans seemed like a godsend for James and
Kathryn Dunlap.
But shortly after hearing of the agency’s new
program, the Dunlaps learned they didn’t qual-
ify — only farmers from racial minorities were
eligible.
“It kind of blew our minds,” James said.
The couple has taken out about $280,000 in
loans from USDA’s Farm Service Agency for
cows and equipment to expand their ranch busi-
ness near Baker City.
“Until that’s paid off , we’re just trying to sur-
vive,” James said. “The goal was to grow. Unfor-
tunately, while you’re growing, it’s very diffi cult.”
Though they wouldn’t have taken out debt
they couldn’t pay back, the Dunlaps found it trou-
bling they’d been excluded from the loan forgive-
ness program for being white.
“If they want to off er a program, it should be
available to everyone,” he said.
James said he was content to merely grumble
about the program but his wife convinced him to
take action.
“Don’t just complain about something unless
you’re doing something about it,” Kathryn said.
Is program constitutional?
With the help of the Pacifi c Legal Foundation,
a libertarian public interest law fi rm, the Dun-
laps have fi led a lawsuit challenging the USDA’s
minority loan forgiveness program as unconstitu-
tionally based on race.
“Righting past discrimination with more dis-
crimination is not the way to go about it,” she said.
“It should be based on individual circumstances.”
The couple’s lawsuit is one of 12 similar com-
plaints fi led across the nation that argue USDA’s
$4 billion loan forgiveness program violates the
Constitution’s promise of equal protection under
the law.
The litigation has been consolidated as a class
action lawsuit in federal court in Texas, where
U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor has issued a
preliminary injunction halting the program. Sim-
ilar orders against it have been entered in three
other states.
O’Connor wrote that “the government’s claim
that new race-based discrimination is needed to
remedy past race-based discrimination is unavail-
ing,” meaning that it is ineff ective.
Few topics are more sensitive or uncomfort-
able than race and money, especially in the cur-
rent politically tense atmosphere. The litigation
against USDA tackles both subjects head-on.
The allegations of prejudice against white
farmers may seem awkward, since the USDA
itself has admitted to “decades of discrimination”
against Blacks and other minorities.
The new loan forgiveness program is needed
because American growers haven’t equally bene-
fi ted from FSA’s lending practices in the past, the
agency said in court documents.
“In fact, the evidence indicates just the oppo-
site: that throughout USDA’s history and up to
present day, minority farmers have been ‘hurt’
more than helped due to discrimination in USDA’s
farm loan programs,” the agency said.
The federal government won’t comment on
the litigation beyond legal arguments fi led on
behalf of the USDA in court briefs, according to a
U.S. Department of Justice representative.
rium on evictions coming to an end, she is not aware of
any evictions in Grant County for nonpayment of rent.
Hamilton said the state tracks eviction proceedings
due to the tenant not making rent and will notify com-
munity action agencies, which can off er assistance to
prevent the tenants from being evicted.
The state’s decision to end the program comes as
Gov. Kate Brown ordered lawmakers to convene a Dec.
13 special session to discuss possible remedies. One of
those is a $190 million emergency funding package pro-
posed by Brown, which would include rental assistance
For minority farmers who stood to benefi t
from the loan forgiveness program before it was
blocked, the situation is personally frustrating.
The litigation represents “more greed from
white farmers in this country,” said John Boyd,
founder of the National Black Farmers Associa-
tion and a fourth-generation grower in Mecklen-
burg County, Va.
Boyd said that in the past he’d been spat on by
See Rent, Page A14
See Ranchers, Page A14
Frustrating situation