Image provided by: Morrow County Museum; Heppner, OR
About Heppner gazette-times. (Heppner, Or.) 1925-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 29, 2008)
Heppner Gazette-Times, Heppner, Oregon Wednesday, October 29, 2008 - THREE Chamber tours new Boardman sawmill ft i t 1 C-O .V r 1 Top Photo: Members o f the H eppner Cham ber o f Com merce and others toured the new sawmill and tree plantation in Boardman last week. Here standing in front of 12 year old Pacific Albus trees are L-R John Edmundson, Larry Mills, Larry and Kricket Micholson, Nancy Snider, Claire Sponseller, Sher- yll Bates, Doris Brosnan, David Sykes, J eff B ailey, C laudia Hughes, Ed Baker, Cliff Green and Merlyn Hughes. The trees are getting ready to be harvested as 12 years is considered mature and ready to cut for the sawmill. -Photo by David Sykes -Continuedfrom Page ONE plantation. The 25,000 acre plantation uses irrigation water from the Columbia to grow the trees until they are 12 years old. The trees will grow one inch per year until cut. The trees were previ ously owned by Potlatch and were first grown to be used for chips. A vast system of drip irrigation line w aters the trees. The irrigation system uses up to 180,000 o f water per minute and is also highly computerized to make sure the water gets where it is going. The trees are also trim m ed and cared for in special w ays to im prove the quality of the wood. The limbs are trimmed out from Heppner Chamber of Commerce Members (L-R) John Edmund- son, Larry Nicholson, Doris Brosnan and Jeff Baiiey look over inside of new sawmill in Boardman. -Photo by David Sykes the trees to reduce the limb size and the size and amount o f knots. Also limbs on the trees around the outside of each 40 acre plot are gener ally allowed to grow longer, thus blocking the amount o f sunlight that reaches the inside trees which reduces limb growth. Marty Britt contracts all the logging on the plantation. The company says a lot o f wildlife lives on the plantation including deer, elk, cougar and owls. The company builds owl houses to encourage the birds as they help decrease the ro dent population. Cattle truck overturns on Willow Creek Road The Morrow County Sheriff’s Office, along with Heppner Ambulance, Hep pner Fire Department, and ODOT responded to a call on Saturday afternoon, Oc tober 18, regarding cattle truck w ith approxim ately 40 head o f cattle that had overturned on Willow Creek Road. The driver, Dewey William Kennedy o f Con- don, did not sustain any in juries. The cattle were trans ported in personal trailers to a local rancher’s residence for tem porary placement. One the cows expired the following day. Damage to the guard rail resulted in several thou sand dollars, which ODOT is currently working to re place. Holly Rebekah Lodge to hold card party « Holly Rebekah Lodge will hold a card party on Saturday, November 1, at 7 p.m. The cost is $5. 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'----------------------------------------------------------------> C en jv r VJE l personal touch advanced com m unications» s___________________________________________ / www.centurytel.com liftiintOft NON SAU A fter the trees are cut new trees are planted in between the stumps o f the previous trees, and after 12 years the old stumps rot out so removal of the stumps is not required. There are 30 different breeds o f poplar trees on the plantation and in the long term the company says it will have 12 different breeds, which keeps pest lost to a minimum. M ill m anagem ent is also proud o f the fact they are FSC certified, hav ing met the conservation and environmental criteria o f the Forest Stewardship Council. M. C. Health District has donated over $883 thousand to Boardman health care facilities since 1999 -Continuedfrom Page ONE the patient refuses transport, as is often the case in the north end, the district does not receive payment. The district receives money only if the patient is transported and is able to pay through insurance or private pay. A lso discussed at the meeting M onday was the underlying reason for the concern over possibly not being able to pay the Boardman clinic’s subsidy- -the district’s financial situ ation. This year MCHD has been operating w ithout a levy. The earlier levy has expired, and the district has subsequently lost $63,985 so far this fiscal year, which amounts to a $21,328 aver age m onthly-year-to-date loss, according to Mahoney. “Can we justify giving them (CRHC) money, when we’re operating at a loss,” said Rea. Another issue of con cern voiced by the MCHD Board is CRHC B oard’s reluctance to provide finan cial data to MCHD. The CRHC Board has not been forthcoming with financial reports and has not indicated what MCHD’s $70,000 an nual paym ents to CRHC have been used for. Lan guage in the new contract with CRHC, which is cur rently being hammered out, also ties payment to report ing financial information “in a timely fashion.” Also at the meeting, Mahoney reported $487,091 in gross patient revenue for the M onth o f Septem ber with $31,399 in revenue deductions and $52,878 in tax monies for $511,815 in total operating revenue. An additional $50,904 (non operating net gain) brought the bottom line to a gain of $5,019. She said that the district saw $22,027 in bad debts for the month, which could be partially attributed to around 10 ambulance runs in the north end, which cost the district around $1,000 each, since transport was refused. In other business, the board: -learned from Vander Does that construction at Pioneer Memorial Hospital in Heppner is moving right along and a final punch list is expected the day before T h an k sg iv in g . The c o n struction will once again allow the MCHD to provide long-term care, similar to a nursing home. -heard that the PMH roof should be completed by Wednesday. -learned that Vander Does expects to have long term residents in the remod eled facility by Christmas. - le a r n e d fro m Vander Does that they are in the process o f ramping up staffing for the long-term care facility. D irector o f Nursing Molly Rhea told the board that the hospital will need five full-time CNAs (certified nursing assistants) to staff the facility, but pro viding training so that the nursing assistants can be certified has been difficult. She said that she had not received a good response from Blue Mountain Com munity College which has offered classes in the past. Two CNAs, three cooks and a housekeeper have been hired. Mahoney said three o f the staff who were laid off when the former nurs ing home closed have been rehired. -learned from Rhea that five “scopes” have been co m p leted -fo u r co lo n o s copies and one endoscopy. This is a new service w hich is provided by recently hired physician, Dr. Nichols. -learned that due to a error in calculating Med icaid paym ent rates, that Mahoney attributed to ac counting firm Mike Bell, the district w ill have to pay an additional $70,000 back to the government on top o f $70,000 that was antici pated. -receiv ed the fo l low ing reports: H eppner A mbulance had 11 page outs in September with 11 tran sp o rts for $8,935 in revenue; Boardman Ambu lance had 24 page-outs with 18 transports for $20,015 in revenue; Irrigon A m bulance had 13 page-outs with seven transports for $$6,550 in revenue; there was one flight; Pioneer Me morial Hospital had three admissions, five swing bed admissions, 10 admitted for observation, one admitted for respite care, 474 total outpatients, 72 emergency room encounters, 1389 lab tests, 129 x-ray procedures; 29 CT scans, 18 EKG tests and five respiratory therapy procedures; Home Health had 154 patient visits; Hos pice had three admissions; pharmacy had 1466 drug doses for $69,363 in drug revenue; Irrigon Clinic had 213 patients with 40 new patients, 39 seen by a nurse and 18 no-shows (Vander Does attributed the increase in patients to closure o f a clinic in H erm iston and more use by the g reater ; Hermiston-area residents); - Pioneer M emorial Clinic had 476 patients with 41 . new patients, 51 seen by .a nurse and four no-shows.' lone schools get exceptional rating for second year in a row By David Sykes The lo n e S chool District received an excep tional rating from the state for the second year in a row; it was announced at last Monday’s board meet ing. Only 11 percent of the schools in the state receive the exceptional rating and only four percent receive it for two consecutive years, the board was told by Super intendent Karl Ostheller. In other business at the October 20 meeting, the board learned that there are 173 students enrolled in the all grades in the district. It has been projected earlier that there would only be 154 stu d en ts. The n u m ber included seven foreign exchange students, which caused the board to vote on a new policy authorizing that amount as the old policy only allowed four exchange students. In other business, the board discussed a let ter for the W illow Creek Park D istrict w hich said there would probably not be enough m oney in the park budget to give lone the requested $10,000 for pool maintenance. The park district was unable to give funds last year either and as Park District President Skip M atthews explained in a letter to the superintendent: “ ...if the money is avail able, the Willow Creek park District is more than willing to help out the lone Pool op erations..... expenses are up and revenue, including tax collections, are decidedly dow n,” M atthew s wrote. “Last year was the start of Electric Co-Op Annual Meeting Thursday, November 6th The Annual Dinner meeting of Columbia Basin Electric Cooperative, Inc. is planned for Thursday, Nov. 6th at the American Legion Hall in lone. Registration starts at 4:30 p.m. with dinner served at 5:15 p.m. The annual meeting and election of Directors will follow the dinner. Multiple door prizes will be awarded and results of the annual Fourth Grade Electrical Safety Poster contest and the Annual Pho tography contest will be announced, with winning entries on display. Again this year will be a special section of door prizes de voted just for youth when accompanied to the meeting by their parents. MP3 Players, iTune Cards, and other prizes for students will be given out. A ll members are welcome to come and learn about their electric co-op. I Financial shortfall for the district, including reduced revenue at the RV Park due to fuel prices and health advisories for the reservoir. Those difficulties continue this year with the added bur den o f propane costs for our pool operations. You must agree that with these hard economic times, a surplus of funds is just not as available as it has been in the past,” Matthews wrote. In other action the board accepted the resigna tion of board member John Rietmann with Lisa Riet- mann abstaining. T h e b o a rd a ls o heard a report from Beth O ’H anlon, the d is tric t’s Chief fiscal Officer. She said the district received basic school support for Septem ber of$129,268 and proper ty taxes of $3,887. She said the Oregon Department of Education billed the district $16,751 for previous years’ receipt o f the small high school grant. Since lone School District is a charter school, it is not eligible for the grant and will have to repay the money. She said the district has requested that they pay the state back in four equal installments. She also reported that she was projecting an unappropriated ending fund balance o f $370,000. The board also heard a report that the d istrict would be exploring the pos sibility o f heating the pool with solar power. Part o f the money from the wind mill projects in the district is earmarked for renewable energy. The board voted to hold its November meeting on Nov. 10. There will be a work session starting at 5:30 p.m. with the meeting to follow. The board will interview and appoint a new board member at that time. M ost p eop le have m ortgage questions in these difficult times... 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