GO! EASTERN OREGON MAGAZINE | INSIDE
Wednesday, May 18, 2022
154th Year • No. 20 • 14 Pages • $1.50
MyEagleNews.com
WOLF NUMBERS
ON THE RISE
Grant County had two
packs, 16 wolves in 2021
By STEVEN MITCHELL
Blue Mountain Eagle
hile the number of wolves in Oregon remained relatively fl at last year, four
more of the predators took up residence in Grant County, state wildlife
managers said in a recent report.
Oregon had 173 wolves at the end of 2020 and 175 at the end of 2021,
an increase of just two animals statewide. Meanwhile, Grant County’s wolf
population grew from 12 in 2020 to 16 in 2021.
The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife reported a very modest statewide
increase in wolves at the end of 2021 in its Oregon Wolf Conservation and Manage-
ment 2021 Annual Report.
According to the report, the population increase represents an annual growth
rate of 1.2% above last year’s numbers. The yearly growth rate for Oregon’s
wolves has averaged around 9.4% over the past fi ve years. The report
added that 2021 set a new low regarding overall growth.
In 2021, more wolves were killed than any other year on record
since they began returning to the state in 2009, according to ODFW’s
report.
There were 26 documented wolf deaths statewide last year,
up from 10 in 2020, the report states, with 21 of those deaths
caused by humans.
Meanwhile, the number of documented packs across the
state decreased to 21 from 22 after eight wolves were poi-
soned in Eastern Oregon, wiping out all fi ve members of the
Catherine Pack in Union County plus three wolves from
other packs.
At the same time, the number of livestock killed by wolves
W
See Wolf, Page A14
County budget comes up short
$800K ‘miscalculation’ adds up to fi scal
crisis; cuts, law enforcement levy possible
By STEVEN MITCHELL
Blue Mountain Eagle
CANYON CITY — Grant County
is in the grips of a fi nancial crisis and
faces looming cuts to submit a bal-
anced budget in a little over a month.
In a May 2 email to the county’s
budget committee members, County
Treasurer Julie Ellison wrote that when
reviewing budget fi gures, she came
across a miscalculation and substan-
tially reduced the county’s reserve
funds to off set a signifi cant shortfall.
“The path we are on is unsustain-
able,” Ellison wrote.
She continued in the email that she
could trim elsewhere in the budget but
asked the committee members to make
suggestions ahead of the Wednesday,
May 11, session.
“Next year will be heart-wrench-
ing if we do not take the opportunity to
make some changes now,” she added.
During a phone interview on Thurs-
day, May 12, Ellison said the miscalcu-
lation worked out to roughly $800,000.
In last year’s budget, Ellison said the
county, facing a major budget shortfall,
abolished two reserve accounts that
combined were just under $520,000.
This year, she said, the county appeared
to be in better fi nancial shape and so
she cut them.
In addition to the reserve accounts,
she said it appeared that American Res-
cue Plan Act funds, federal dollars allo-
cated to state and local governments
to respond to COVID-19, were added
twice in the proposed budget and left
the county’s contingency fund with just
$20,000 instead of $300,000.
Ellison said the calculation error is
forcing budget cuts that were antici-
pated last year.
Indeed, the county faced a similar
fi nancial crisis heading into last year’s
budgeting process.
Citizen budget committee members
Bob Quinton, Amy Kreger and Rob
Stewart pulled no punches in last year’s
budget committee meetings, saying the
county might have to cut jobs instead of
simply reducing hours and furloughing
certain positions as the committee had
discussed in earlier sessions.
In the end, however, the commit-
tee scrapped that idea and opted for
backfi lling budget holes with COVID-
19 relief funds and money from pro-
spective legislation in Congress that
could potentially increase the coun-
ty’s payment in lieu of taxes funding to
upwards of $900,000.
Quinton, who chairs this year’s pro-
ceedings, said the committee would
need to go back through each county
department and “fi gure out what stays
and what goes.”
Quinton said that by fi guring out
John Day greenhouse
goes to private operator
City approves library land swap, sells Gateway
parcel and dissolves police department
By JUSTIN DAVIS
Blue Mountain Eagle
Steven Mitchell/Blue Mountain Eagle
Citizen Budget Committee chair Bob
Quinton listens during Grant County’s
budget session on Wednesday, May
11, 2022. Grant County is facing a bud-
get crisis after the county’s treasurer
found a miscalculation amounting to
hundreds of thousands of dollars.
where they could make cuts, the com-
mittee could have department heads
that had hired more employees in the
past four years go back to their 2018
staffi ng levels.
Quinton said that was just one idea,
but added the consensus last year was
that the department heads did not want
to lay anyone off or cut anything.
“So here we are about a year later,”
Quinton said, “having to talk about
this.”
County Judge Scott Myers said one
option the county could look at would
be to reduce the cost-of-living increase
for county employees.
Kreger asked what the savings
would be if the county cut the increase
across the board to make it fair.
Ellison said the increase this year
See Budget, Page A14
JOHN DAY — Multiple reso-
lutions with long-lasting ramifi-
cations for the city of John Day
were approved at the May 10
City Council meeting.
The greenhouse will no lon-
ger be run by the city and is tran-
sitioning to private operators.
The council also approved the
purchase of the Grant County
Library Foundation’s plot of
land near the Kam Wah Chung
Heritage Site, voted to dissolve
the John Day Police Department
and approved the sale of 2.8
acres on the Innovation Gate-
way property.
The city will officially stop
operating the greenhouse on
June 30. An agreement with
CYA Holdings LLC of Hunting-
ton will put the greenhouse in
private hands starting July 1.
The agreement is a five-year
lease that has an option for CYA
Holdings LLC to purchase the
greenhouse at any time during
the length of the contract for the
value of the loan on the property.
Other terms of the contract
are the greenhouse being parti-
tioned into its own taxable lot
and the city providing two stor-
age facilities to store equip-
ment. The city will also provide
facility startup training for the
staff set to take over operating
ELECTION NEWS ONLINE
For the latest news on local election
results, see our website, www.blue-
mountaineagle.com.
You’ll find a special tab for election
stories in the navigation bar at the top of
our home page.
Blue Mountain Eagle reporters were
scheduled to be on hand at the Grant
County Clerk’s Office on Election Night
as the first results were announced and
planned to file their stories online as
soon as possible after the polls closed at
8 p.m. Tuesday, May 17.
Because of our Tuesday afternoon
press deadline, we were not able to get
election results in our Wednesday, May
18, print edition.
However, we will continue to update
election stories online in the coming
days as late returns come in and results
are certified.
Full stories on local elections will be
published in next week’s print edition.
the greenhouse.
The lease-to-own contract
will expire in June 2027 and is
priced at $24,000 a year.
Shawn McKay of CYA Hold-
ings said he’s “known about the
greenhouse for a while” and this
opportunity came up in talks
with John Day City Manager
Nick Green about things that are
happening in town.
Shawn McKay and his wife,
Robyn, were previously associ-
ated with Burnt River Farms in
Ontario. The company’s website
describes Burnt River Farms as
a farm to market cannabis com-
pany located in Eastern Oregon.
Echoing earlier statements
by Green at the May 10 meet-
ing, Councilor Dave Hol-
land stressed that the plan was
always to have a private entity
operate the greenhouse.
The greenhouse going to pri-
vate operation now means the
city’s only financial obliga-
tion to the facility is an insur-
ance bill of $2,500 a year plus
the initial cost of staff time to
train the new greenhouse staff.
The City Council voted unan-
imously to enter into the lease
agreement with CYA Holdings
LLC. The agreement will take
effect once it has cleared final
approval by the city manager
and city attorney.
See Greenhouse, Page A14