- Happy Thanksgiving - Strong winds knock out
power to CBEC members
HEPPNER
G T
50¢
azette
imes
VOL. 134
NO. 45
8 Pages
Wednesday, November 25, 2015
A windstorm blew
into the area last Tuesday,
knocking out power to con-
sumers all over the Paciic
Northwest. Locally, Colum-
bia Basin Electric Coopera-
tive experienced two major
outage events that knocked
out power to approximately
2,500 members.
The first outage call
was reported at 4:30 p.m.
Tuesday in the Olex area.
CBEC crews dispatched
to the area were met with
winds in the 60-75 mph
range and zero visibility.
While patrolling the line,
CBEC crews found a stretch
of eight transmission/distri-
bution poles on the ground
near Baseline Rd.
The crews would even-
tually ind 13 more broken
transmission/distribution
poles near Weatherford
Rd. and one distribution
pole on Lower Rock Creek
that a wind-blown tree had
taken out. After switching
feeds, power was eventu-
ally restored to most mem-
bers served out of CBEC’s
Alkali and Olex Substation
at 2:30 a.m. Wednesday
morning. The remaining
ive or six houses on Base-
line Rd. were re-energized
Morrow County, Heppner, Oregon
New facility planned Mustangs slaughter Rams in
at Port of Morrow
semiinals, aim for state title
Organix, Incorporated
of Walla Walla, WA an-
nounced last week that it
is planning to construct
and operate an in-vessel,
organic residuals process-
ing facility near Boardman.
This project is pro-
posed on a 26-acre portion
of property owned by the
Port of Morrow, on the west
side of Tower Road about a
mile off Interstate 84.
Organix is an organic
residuals management com-
pany specializing in the
management, production,
utilization, marketing and
sales of organic-based soil
amendments—primarily
those generated by conined
animal feeding operations
(CAFOs) and municipali-
ties.
The purpose of the
Boardman site will be to re-
cycle by-products from an-
aerobically digested dairy
residuals into soil amend-
ments. Organix partners
with 22 dairies in Oregon
and Washington to assist
in upscaling residuals into
marketable products for
horticultural, agricultural
and landscape supply cus-
tomers.
The company expects
to annually create about
40,000 yards of organi-
cally certiied, high end soil
amendments for the north-
west horticultural mar-
kets at this location. Soil
amendments are products
designed to improve either
the soil structure, nutrients
or pH of soil.
“We have been mak-
ing dairy-based products
since 2001 and have found
the market is strong for re-
cycled dairy products—par-
ticularly those coming from
renewable energy projects,”
says Russ Davis, Organix
-See NEW BUILDING AT
PORT/PAGE SEVEN
Gazette
closed for
Thanksgiving
Nominations open
for Town & Country
Have you filled out
your community award
nomination for Heppner
chamber’s annual Town
and Country community
awards dinner on Thursday,
Jan. 14?
Nominations are open
until Friday, Dec. 11. Any-
one who hasn’t done so
still has time to nominate
a community member for
Woman of the Year, Man
of the Year, Business of
the Year, Citizen-Educa-
tor of the Year, Lifetime
Achievement and Youth
Award. Nomination forms
are available at the Bank of
Eastern Oregon, Heppner
Chamber of Commerce
ofice, Community Bank,
Kuhn Law Ofice and the
post ofice.
The forms need to be
completed and turned into
the Kuhn Law or chamber
ofices no later than close
of business on Friday, Dec.
11. To get a form sent elec-
tronically, please contact
the chamber ofice at 676-
5536 and leave your email
address or email the cham-
ber at heppnerchamber@
centurytel.net.
The theme for this year
will be “An Evening with
the Stars,” and the event
will be held at the Morrow
County Fairgrounds. Ca-
tering will be provided by
Pudding on the Ritz. The
Town and Country tickets
can be purchased for $20
starting Monday, Jan. 4, at
Bank of Eastern Oregon,
Community Bank, Hep-
pner chamber and Murray’s
Drug. Tickets are limited.
Parade of Lights,
merchant activities kick
off Christmas season
On Thursday, Dec. 3,
several Heppner merchants
will have special activities
and will offer extended
hours to kick off the Christ-
mas holiday season and
help people “shop local” for
Christmas.
Bank of Eastern Ore-
gon will serve refreshments
from 10 a.m.-4 p.m.; Com-
munity Bank will also be
serving refreshments.
Heppner Family Foods
will offer free Home Town
coffee for customers all
day and will have Santa set
up in the store for pictures
from 6-7 p.m. with hot
chocolate and candy canes;
make sure you bring your
camera to take pictures.
Murray’s will be hav-
ing hourly door prizes,
cookies and punch, and
the wish list treasure hunt.
From 5-7 p.m. there will be
a mini wine tasting.
Peterson’s Jewelers
will be open until 7 p.m., so
stop by and check out some-
thing “shiny” for someone
special on your Christmas
list.
The Parade of Lights
will begin from Green Feed
about 5:30 p.m., so ind a
spot on Main Street (be-
tween Center and May)
to enjoy the lighted en-
tries; the entries will come
through twice.
Finally, Home Health
and Hospice will hold a
Lights of Hope ceremony at
St. Patrick’s Senior Center
in memory of loved ones
who have passed away.
Lights of Hope will begin
around 6 p.m., following
the Parade of Lights.
later Wednesday night after
enduring a 29-hour outage,
during which CBEC crews
diligently rebuilt the eight-
pole stretch near Baseline
Rd.
Meanwhile, CBEC was
again flooded with calls
shortly after 7 p.m. Tues-
day night from consumers
throughout the east side
of the service territory.
Bonneville Power had a
fault approximately nine
miles from their Boardman
substation on Bombing
Range Road. The Bonnev-
ille Power outage knocked
out power to 2,279 CBEC
members for nearly six
hours.
Brian Kollman, Man-
ager of Operations at
CBEC, said, “If we didn’t
have the 20 transmission/
distribution poles on the
ground around Olex, CBEC
would have been able to
loop the transmission feed,
making the BPA outage
much shorter in duration.”
Coupled with that
was the fact that Bonn-
eville Power crews were
shorthanded because of
the widespread outages,
which forced CBEC and its
members to wait for a crew
from BPA to respond. Koll-
man praised CBEC crews
for their hard work and
diligence while maintaining
safe work practices in poor
working conditions.
Tom Wolff, CEO and
General Manager at CBEC,
praised all CBEC employ-
ees for their efforts and
teamwork, and thanked Co-
lumbia Basin members for
their patience and under-
standing during the outages.
Mustang CJ Kindle stops a Regis player in his tracks during last Saturday’s 2A semiinal
game in Hillsboro. After a commanding 26-3 victory over the rival team, the Mustangs are
now set to take on the Kennedy Trojans this Saturday in Hermiston. -Photo by Sandra Putman
-See full story PAGE EIGHT
The Heppner Gazette-
Times will be closed in ob-
servance of the Thanksgiv-
ing Day holiday Thursday,
Nov. 26, and Friday, Nov.
27. Normal business hours
will resume Monday, Nov.
30. We wish everyone a safe
and happy Thanksgiving
weekend.
Citizenship class offers students timely
wisdom for online safety
By Andrea Di Salvo
teach the students about
Eighth-graders at Hep- their civic duty.
pner High School are ind-
“We want them to be
ing out what it takes to be civic minded and make
good citizens, both at home good decisions,” she says.
and in the virtual world of
To that end, Payne says
technology.
she brings in speakers such
HHS teacher Petra as State Rep. Greg Smith, as
Payne teaches the nine- well as other speakers who
week elective, “Junior High are involved in the commu-
Citizenship.” The class is nity. The class also covers
one of a rotation of elec- the right and responsibility
tives designed to introduce to vote, as well as current
the students to all
events—Payne says
the high school has
the students are re-
to offer.
quired to bring in a
Payne says
current news article State Rep. Greg Smith was one recent speaker in Heppner High
the idea irst came
every other week, School’s Junior High Citizenship class. –Photo by David Sykes
across HHS Head
which they class opportunities for students uses a curriculum from
Te a c h e r G r e g
to engage in community commonsensemedia.org.
then discusses.
Grant’s desk last Petra Payne
“It teaches them to be
“It might spark service and, hopefully, a
year, but the school
discussion or it trip to a Heppner Chamber smart online,” she says.
didn’t implement it
While the topics of citi-
might not,” she says, of Commerce meeting.
as a complete class until adding that it keeps students
While the need for zenship and online safety
this year. Payne adds that involved and aware of cur- good citizenship is an en- might not seem to be con-
the class isn’t being taught rent events and issues.
during topic, five of the nected at irst glance, Payne
in response to an existing
The class also learns nine weeks covers issues says the overarching theme
problem; rather, it’s a pro- what might be considered of a more modern nature, is good citizenship wher-
active effort to arm students basic life skills, such as speciically the need to be ever you are.
with the information they learning to write thank-you smart and safe in today’s
“We want to show them
need to stay safe.
notes. On the docket for internet-dominated world.
-See ONLINE CITIZEN-
“There’s no major the future, Payne says, are To do that, Payne says she
SHIP/PAGE EIGHT
problem here,” says Payne,
“but kids need to learn to
be safe online. It’s a scary
world out there.
CLOSED:
“Like it or not, they’re
using media,” she adds.
NOVEMBER 26TH, 27,
“We thought, an eighth
AND 28TH
grader, as they’re becoming
OPEN: MONDAY
high school students, they
need to be aware.”
NOVEMBER 30
That awareness covers
Morrow County Grain Growers Green Feed & Seed
a variety of facets. First,
242 W. Linden Way, Heppner • 676-9422 • 989-8221 (MCGG main ofice)
Payne says, she tries to
MCGG THANKSGIVING HOURS: