Image provided by: Morrow County Museum; Heppner, OR
About Heppner gazette-times. (Heppner, Or.) 1925-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 21, 1980)
-V.--. ' ,- C pM - W"V- BESSIE WET2ELL U OF ORE NEWSPAPER LIB EUGENE OR 97403 lehool board approves field tiin to Troian nuclear plant A field trip to OMSI and the Trojan Nuclear Power Plant was approved for the physical science classes of Rod Fife of Columbia Jr. High at the regular Morrow County School Board meeting Monday at the Heppner Elementary School. The trip will require two buses and will take place March 28. A field trip to Seaside was also approved for the lone High School band. Instructor Gene Sartain learned recently that the band did not qualify to participate in the Great American festival near San Francisco so a trip to Seaside will take place in stead. The band parents club at the school has raised enough money so the trip will not cost the district anything. The band will have two performances enroute to Sea side on April 11 and 12. The school board approved the use of a district bus for Riverside for fans to use to go to the district basketball tournament in Pendleton Feb. 28 and 29. Marv Peterson, who has been chosen Oregon Industrial Arts Teacher of the Year, has expressed an interest in at tending the national conven- M. .EL tion in St. Louis for industrial arts teachers. The board decided to let him use $300 that is in the budget for adminis tration travel and $380 that is in the teacher travel fund to pay the $740 that the trip will cost. "It is rare that one of our teachers will be Oregon Teacher of the Year so I think we should allow him to attend to show that we appreciate his efforts," board member John Matthews said. The date that the school board must notify whether or not a teacher wil have a job with the district was changed from March 15 to April 1. The date teachers must notify the district whether or not tfiey want to accept a job in the district was changed from April 1 to April 15. The school board decided not to join the National Association of School Boards. The main factor, as it has been in the past, was the dues cost of $350. School superintendant Matt Doherty said he is looking into the possibilihy of changing . banks to hold the school district funds. He said most school districts in the state invest their money in the bank that will bid the highest interest. The board will make a decision in July on, what bank to put the district funds in. A committee of Irv Rauch, Pauline Winter and John Matthews was appointed to draft a concrete proposal on the board policy considering the school bus service in north Morrow County. The two new schools in the north end will be opening near March 10 and an open house and dedication ceremony is being planned by the school board with Doherty in charge. The open house for Sam Boardman Elementary will be April 5 at 1 p.m. at Columbia Junior High, it will be April 19. All the school board mem bers agreed that the citizens want an open house and Doherty said since the school board was involved so much with the two new schools that the members should be pre sent at a dedication. "Can you break champagne bottles on school houses," Matthews said jokingly. Students will be in the schools before the open house but part of the schools will be blocked because they will not be completely finished. Two new teachers were hired at Sam Boardman Elementary Monday so only one more teacher needs to be hired this year for the two new schools that being a home economics teacher at CJH. Doherty said hopefully all three teachers will begin working when the students move into the new schools. "Next fall additional staff will be hired but that is already included in the planned budget," Doherty said. No action was taken but the board discussed the current payment of 17 cents per mile for district employees when using their personal vehicles. The Baker district pays the lowest in the state at 15 cents a mile and Washington pays the highest at 23 cents a mile. "It is cheaper for us to use the old county vehicles so we should stretch their use as far as possible," Doherty said. The school board approved the hiring of Milton Reynolds as a first grade teacher at Sam Boardman and Jane Anderson as a fourth and fifth grade teacher at the same school. They also approved the hiring of Eileen Saling as a secretary at the district office, Bennie Reeves as a custodian at Columbia Junior High, Jerry Franke as a bus driver at A C. Houghton and Barbara Mathis as a custodian at A C. Houghton. The Heppner . 11 1 I I M t 1 I 11 t t v SO CSS9 Morrow County's Home-Owned Weekly Newspaper Tlll'RSDAV, FEBRUARY 21. 1!)S(I 20 CIATS i? r ;fs MKI'I'N'KH. OREGON' caw Rash of gun thefts hit city of Heppner A rash of gun thefts took place in Heppner last week on the 13th. but it was a Wednesday not a Friday. According to records of Police Chief Dean Gilman. four persons reported guns worth a total of $2,274 stolen from their pick-ups that night, all within the city limits of Heppner. William Dean Baker. " 360 Green St. in Heppner, re ported that his vehicle was broken into and two guns stolen. The culprit pried open a window to get in. Missing are a Winchester 30-06 bolt rifle valued at $265 and Remington 12 guage shotgun worth $260. Also missing was a $30 Tasco scope. Gary Lee Kemp, 620 Alfalfa St. in Heppner, reported to city police that his Ruger rifle worth $219 was taken. His truck was unlocked. Thomas J. Koehler, 170 Quaid St. in Heppner. reported two shotguns missing. They are valued at $1,150. His truck was also unlocked. One gun was a Remington 12 gauge shotgun worth $700 and the other a 12 gauge Browning shotgun worth $450. Gary David Patterson. 275 E. Cannon St. "in ' Heppner. reported two guns taken from his unlocked pick-up. One was a Winchester rifle worth $250 and the other was a .22 rifle worth $50. Also taken was a Weaver scope worth $50. Gilman said he suspects the same thieves took a tool box and tools valued at $290 from the truck of James A. Pheg ley. Box 241 Blake Ranch, the tools were taken on the same night while Phegley's un locked truck was parked outside of Cal's Cafe. M ii liff I Jones disagrees Ad visory committee says no to combining justice courts Sheriffs deputy involved in two-car injury accident Morrow County Sheriff's Deputy Oakes was involved in a two-car injury accident last weekend in which he received facial cuts and two persons in the other automobile received facial cuts, fractures and bruises. The 1978 sheriff's car was totaled according to Sheriff Larry Fetsch. The accident occured Satur day night at 11:42 on Highway 730 one mile east of the bombing range junction. Oakes was driving with a runaway juvenile girl from Tacoma, Wash, he had appre hended. When he crossed a concrete bridge overpass with black ice the car swerved out of control. The car hit the guard rail and spun back in to the road when the other car, driven by Patrick Spithill of Umatilla, hit the sheriff's car head on. Officers had to use the jaws of life extrication equipment because the apprehended ju venile had her foot caught under the seat. Oregon State Police report that Spithill was not injured but Patricia Ann Spithill received facial cuts and fract ures and Patricia Bissinger had cuts and bruises. The juvenile received minor injuries. An advisory committee to the Morrow County Court has decided not to recommend combining the justice court positions in Heppner and Irrigon. After three public meetings, the committee decided that it could not find that combining the courts would save the county money. The eommitte presented its find ings in a report to the county court Feb. 15 and stated that another reason is because of the opposition to the combina tion in Boardman and Irrigon. Chairman Paul Jones said Tuesday he did not agree with the committee's findings but that as chairman, he did not have a vote in the decision. "I presented a minority report along with the majority report of the committee," Jones said. "My feeling is that it doesn't make any sense. I thought they should dispense with one of the courts. The average workload for a justice court in Oregon is 11,000 cases a year. Both of our justice courts combined han dle about 8,000 a year for an average of 4.000 each. The county is paying for two full-time justices to do the job of one." Jones said the voting mem bers of the committee agreed unanimously not to combine the courts. Opponents in the north end of the county said they felt they would have reduced services if the two courts were combined. The county court was sche duled to go over the majority and minority recommenda tions yesterday but Judge Don McElligott was not available Tuesday to comment on when a final decision will be made. The proposed combination would have combined the 5th and 6th District Courts. The terms for both justices expire this year so the court thought now would be the best time to study the possibility of having only one justice court. One judge would have traveled to Irrigon and Happner on differ ent days to handle all of the cases. A court clerk would be in the office when the judge was in the other city. The committee tried to consider the effect of the new district court that will be in the county one day a week beginning July 1. Jones said the new district court will reduce the workload of the justice courts making it even more feasible to combine them. iA pathy in industry9 French says beef re ferendum needed Kaiiy com m liters from lone to Heppner can catch a glimpse of this silmiette at sunrise. by county school board Hospital district ? area survey asks A questionnaire in a tri county health survey spon sored by Pioneer Memorial Hospital of Heppner seeks public reaction to the idea of forming a health district that would be independent of the Morrow County Court. A.K. Felt, hospital admini strator, said the questionnaire has been mailed to residents of Morrow, Gilliam and Wheeler counties, using the mailing list of Columbia Basin Electric Cooperative, Inc. The final question in the survey is in two parts that explains the present status of the hospital as a county-owned institution that is subject to the budgetary review of the court, and the fiscal indepen dence that would result if a health district were orga nized. Listed under these two parts are five multiple-choice op tions with check-off boxes for "Yes," "No," and "Don't Know," as follows: Would you be in favor of: 1. Leaving the hospital continued on paye 6 The Morrow County School Board agreed on a tax base to present to the voters at the May 20 election at its board meeting Monday. The tax base amount is $6,076,300. The old tax base amount is $588,510. Assistant school superinten dant John Edmundson said this is the first time in more than 20 years that a new tax base is being sought. "A new law requires us to try and pass a new tax base." Edmundson said. "People are used to voting on the school budget annually so I expect the new tax base will meet some resistance. But we don't have to pass the tax base. The law required only that we try." Superintendant Matt Do herty said the proposed tax base figure was composed by computing the average growth and inflation in the school district budget the past four years. In 1976-77. the school budget was $2,659,540. It increased the next year 15.3 percent to $3,066,218. In 1978-79 it in creased 25.3 percent to $3,840,487. The budget for this year increased 14.2 percent to $4,387,586. The average growth and inflation increase was therefore 18.3 percent. Nine percent of its inflation and nine percent growth. continued on p;ige 6 Riverside High School receives bomb threat Vic Marcheck, principal of Riverside High School, re ported a bomb threat last week at the school to the Morrow County Sheriff's Of fice. The school was evacuated and local police in Boardman and Oregon State Police officers searched the building. After 45 minutes, the police still did not give the students clearance to re-enter the building so the administration allowed them to go home because of the cold weather. Ray French, president of the Oregon Cattlemen's Asso ciation, spoke to the Heppner Morrow County Chamber of Commerce Monday about the National Beef Referendum that is being conducted today and tomorrow across the country. "There is apathy in the industry because we have not registered as many to vote (on (he referendum) as we had hoped." he said. "I hope all who registered will vote." French said the last time he spoke to the chamber was in 1977 when he gave a talk about the national beeferendum. In 1977. a two-thirds favorable vote was needed for the referendum issue to pass and it received 57 percent. This year's referendum needs only a simple majority to pass. "But our opposition is better organized this time so we will be fortunate if we get over 50 percent," he said. "It could be decided nationwide by a few hundred votes." French explained that it is a self-help program that will be financed and managed by the cattlemen. It is voluntary and refunds can be given so "I can't see why anyone would not vote for it because it could help the industry," he said. The money collected will go to a board consisting of 68 directors from all over the nation and they will decide on how to use it. Oregon will have one member on the board. "Cattlemen can be proud of the way we produce our product but not in the way we market it," he said. The collected money will be used to market the industry and research. "There is a saying that you have to sell it or smell it (beef) after three days," French said. "We don't like to smell it so some research will be done on how to preserve the meat." French said the reason the referendum needs to pass and the cattlemen need to market their product better is because of competition from other foods. Other meats, such as pork, that are in over supply now are competing for the meat dollar. The money will also be used to research how healthy beef is for consumption. "Questions about heart dis ease can't go unanswered," French said. "We have to have facts not theories." Money should also be used to study the Senate Committee Dietary Goals that are ques tioned by the cattlemen be cause the goals are anti red meat saying it has too much cholesterol. "They are politicians not dieticians," French said. The dietary goals recom mend a variety in the diet, ideal weight, avoiding salt and sugar, eating lean meat and poultry. The goals are going to be used in meals served in schools and in governemtn programs. "They are trying to force us to change our diets." he said. "The bureaucracy is trying to tell us what to do. They are interested in having power over America's agriculture." French said the Oregon Beef Council receives 20 cents for every head of cattle but it is not enough to have marketing and research just at the state level. "The national program will receive about $40 million a vear and that monev will be funneled everywhere." he said. "The Oregon Beef Coun cil funnels most of its money info the Portland area because that is where we can market to the most people." f f I p ,-'7 SivA will:. : IVrarras ? ' K " : y l I W;i. 1 V' Ijjr7 TTv:a Rav French Elks celebrate 83rd annual The 83rd Elks Annual will take place this Saturday with registration from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. at the Heppner Lodge No. 358 B.P.O.E. according to Hank Pointer, exalted ruler. Highlighting the day's acti vities is a Crab Feed dinner from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Dancing will follow from 9 p.m. to 2 a.m. with music played by the Leonings. A Ladies Tea will start off the activities at 1 p.m. Cost for attending the tea only is $1.50. Eighteen new candidates to become Elks will be initiated in a ceremony at 1:30 p.m. with other Lodge activities beginning at 2 p.m. Cost for the dinner and dancing is $10 a person with the new members initiated that afternoon getting in for half price. The Annual is open only to Elk members and out of town guests. s i(Pt-r5- 'V"- v-:--
