WEDNESDAY, APRIL 6, 2016
HERMISTONHERALD.COM • A3
COMMUNITY
Depot land transfer delayed until 2017
By JADE McDOWELL
Staff Writer
The Army’s latest
schedule has the former
Umatilla Chemical Depot
land in local control by
May 2017.
The Columbia Devel-
opment Authority was
supposed to receive the
land in 2015, but it has
twice been delayed —
first until Nov. 2016, and
now until the May 2017
date.
On Monday, the au-
thority’s executive direc-
tor and board agreed that
progress was still being
made, but also expressed
frustration that it has tak-
en so much longer than
promised.
“The length of time
in the transfer is costing
us opportunities,” board
chair and Umatilla Coun-
ty commissioner Bill Elf-
ering said.
After the Army con-
veys the former depot
land along Interstate 84
east of Boardman, part
of it will be used as a
National Guard training
facility. But the rest will
fall under the control of
the development author-
ity for a wildlife refuge
and industrial develop-
ment.
The authority has re-
peatedly stated that it is
not taking the land off the
Army’s hands unless it is
“free, clean and has wa-
ter.”
FILE PHOTO
Some structures involved in the destruction of chemical
agents at the Umatilla Army Deport remain after the
destruction of the incinerating facility.
In October executive
director Greg Smith said
that the Army’s initial
proposal to give the au-
thority approximately 25
percent of the site’s wa-
ter was not nearly enough
to support the scale of
economic development
needed to make the site
worthwhile to acquire.
On Monday he said water
rights negotiations were
slowly moving along,
with the Army agreeing
to give two wells to the
Columbia Development
Authority, three to the
National Guard and have
two wells split between
entities.
“It comes down to well
number one,” Smith said.
He said the Pentagon
insists it needs the water
rights to that well, but
has also said it is open
to leasing most of those
rights to the authority if
they worked together to
put in infrastructure need-
ed to get the defunct well
working again.
“I genuinely think they
want to reach a good res-
olution,” Smith said. “But
their dilemma — and I
think they’re sincere on
this — is that they have
a national security issue.”
That issue is wanting to
make sure they have the
infrastructure in place,
should the water be need-
ed once again to support
a war effort. They also
want to have the water on
hand for fire suppression.
Those issues were
discussed when Smith
and board members Kim
Puzey (Port of Umatilla)
and Gary Neal (Port of
Morrow) met with De-
fense Base Closure and
Realignment
Commis-
sion (BRAC) officials
in Washington, D.C. in
March. Puzey said the at-
mosphere of the meeting
started off “bristly” and
“prickly” but Smith did
a good job of practicing
the principle “seek first
to understand, then to be
understood” and the ten-
sion in the room lowered
considerably as things
went on.
Puzey said even though
the water discussion was
taking a long time, he be-
lieved that taking the time
to negotiate was, in the
end, going to be mutually
beneficial for both the de-
velopment authority and
the National Guard.
Smith said he felt that
another trip to Washing-
ton, D.C., in the next cou-
ple of weeks while Con-
gress is going through the
appropriations
process
would be highly produc-
tive for moving things
along. The board agreed.
At the beginning of
the meeting the board
heard from a potential
client. Taylor Steele said
her employer, One Ener-
gy Renewables, a Seat-
tle-based company spe-
cializing in utility-scale
solar farms, was inter-
ested in leasing a section
of depot land for a solar
panel installation.
Puzey said he thought
One Energy Renewables
would be a good example
to take to the federal gov-
ernment and show them
the types of projects that
are being held up because
the conveyance process
was taking so long.
The Columbia De-
velopment Authority is
a partnership between
Umatilla County, Morrow
County, Port of Umatilla,
Port of Morrow and the
Confederated Tribes of
the Umatilla Indian Res-
ervation.
April 7th
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Two died Sunday in
wrong-way crash
sodomy,
third-degree
rape and contributing to
the sexual delinquency of
a minor. Naillon was ar-
rested March 28.
Deputy James En-
glish began investigating
the case on Feb. 29 after
the 14-year-old victim’s
mother reported that she
discovered
suspicious
content on her daughter’s
cell phone, which indicat-
ed alleged sexual activ-
ity between Naillon and
the girl. Detective Kacey
Ward gathered evidence
from the victim who con-
firmed there was unlaw-
ful sexual activity. Dep-
uty English interviewed
Naillon, who admitted
that he had sexual contact
with the girl.
Naillon was arrested
and lodged in the Umatil-
la County Jail. The case
will be forwarded to the
Umatilla County District
Attorney’s Office.
A Hermiston man driv-
ing the wrong way on In-
terstate 84 died along with
the driver of another driv-
er in a head-on crash.
Shane R. Ware, 48, and
Mary A. Padilla, 47, of
Homedale, Idaho, died in
the collision Sunday about
1:30 a.m. near Pendleton,
according to Oregon State
Police.
Ware drove a 1999 Sat-
urn SL westbound in the
eastbound lanes of Inter-
state 84 several miles east
of Pendleton, according to
a report from state police.
He struck the Chevrolet
minivan near milepost
214. A 10-year-old pas-
senger in Padilla’s vehicle
suffered non-life threaten-
ing injuries, and an ambu-
lance took the child to St.
Anthony Hospital, Pend-
leton.
Ware forced anoth-
er vehicle off the road a
few miles before the fa-
tal crash. Sherry Marie
Anderson, 24, of Rainier,
Oregon, suffered non-
A 44-year-old inmate
life threatening injuries of Two Rivers Correc-
after she wrecked trying tional Institution died
to avoid the wrong-way unexpectedly
Monday,
driver. An ambulance also
took her to St. Anthony
Hospital.
State police did not
know yet if drugs or al-
cohol were a factor in the
crashes.
The Oregon Depart-
ment of Transportation,
Umatilla Tribal Fire and
Ambulance,
Pendleton
Fire and Ambulance,
Umatilla County Sheriff’s
Department,
Pendleton
Police Department and the
Umatilla Tribal Police De-
partment responded to the
scenes.
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vestigating the fatal crash,
a 1994 Ford Ranger drove
through the closed scene.
Tribal police stopped the
pickup and arrested Josh-
ua Haynie, 32, of Pendle-
ton, for driving under the
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He later provided a breath
sample with a blood-alco-
hol level of .16 percent,
twice the legal limit.
Third inmate in six
weeks dies at TRCI
the Oregon Department
of Corrections has an-
nounced.
Inmate Shawn McMil-
lian, 44, was transport-
ed to a local hospital for
medical care at 2:30 p.m.
on April 3. He was pro-
nounced dead on Monday,
April 4, at 10:12 a.m.
McMillian
entered
DOC custody Aug. 25,
2015, on five counts of
child sex abuse in the
first degree out of Lane
County. His earliest re-
lease date was 2020. Next
of kin have been notified.
No other details are avail-
able at this time.
McMillian is the third
TRCI inmate to die with-
in the past six weeks.
On March 20, inmate
Ronald Marcus, 60, was
found unresponsive in
his cell. On Feb. 27, Joel
Abbot, also 60, was found
unresponsive in his cell
and flown to a Portland
hospital where he died.
Marcus was incarcer-
ated out of Multnomah
County on one count of
first-degree manslaugh-
ter.
Abbot was serving a
life sentence for first-de-
gree murder.
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A 19-year-old Hermis-
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minor.
The Umatilla County
Sheriff’s Office arrest-
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charges of third-degree
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