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WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 31, 2016
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Hermiston Herald
STAFF PHOTO BY E.J. HARRIS
Hermiston Police Sgt. Bill Osborne talks about mass shooters during a CRASE training Thursday in Hermiston.
CRASE trains civilians to respond to active shooters
By JADE McDOWELL
Staff Writer
It’s one of the most
high-stress situations a
person can be in: A gun-
man enters a building,
opening fi re on everyone
in sight as crowds attempt
to fl ee or hide.
In the panic, it’s easy for
people to freeze, or do oth-
er things that increase their
chance of being harmed.
The Civilian Response
to Active Shooter Events
course offered for free
by the Hermiston Police
Department gives people
tools to reduce their chanc-
es of being harmed.
“Nobody in here is help-
less,” Sgt. Bill Osborne
told
Umatilla-Morrow
Head Start staff members
during a training on Thurs-
day.
The message shared
over and over again during
the three-hour course: In
an emergency situation
your actions matter.
The CRASE training,
offered by law enforce-
ment agencies around the
country, focuses on help-
ing people train their brain
to act on three steps: avoid,
deny and defend.
The best-case scenario
is for people to avoid the
danger. Osborne said they
can do that by being aware
of their surroundings and
taking threats seriously. If
it sounds like maybe there
are gunshots coming from
another part of the build-
ing, he said, assume those
are gunshots and act ac-
cordingly until you know
otherwise. Don’t assume
a fi re alarm or lockdown
is just a drill. Often people
waste precious time they
could have used to get to
safety telling themselves
nothing is wrong.
“Take things seriously,”
Osborne said. “If you treat
it as if it’s real until you’re
sure it’s not, you increase
your chances of survival.”
Osborne said making
note of all available exits
when entering a building
and not just following the
crowd can help people get
out of harm’s way more
quickly in situations rang-
ing from active shooters
to fi res. He also said often
people ignore secondary
exits like windows because
society has ingrained in
them that it’s not OK to
break things.
“Don’t look at things as
barriers, look at things and
think, ‘How do I defeat
this barrier?’” he said.
If people don’t have
time to get out or the shoot-
er is blocking the only exit,
the next step is to deny
them access to victims.
The training included vari-
ous methods for doing that,
including locking doors,
turning off lights, barri-
cading entrances with fur-
niture, wedging doorstops
under the door or tying it
shut. One method partici-
pants used during a hands-
on practice was wrapping a
belt around the large hinge
found on the top of many
doors in offi ces, schools or
churches.
If that fails, Osborne
said, people have a moral
and legal right to defend
themselves. They can use
everyday objects as weap-
ons, they can disorient the
shooter by throwing things
and they can fi ght dirty.
After volunteers prac-
ticed barricading the door
Osborne had them practice
defending it. As he came
through it, wielding a Nerf
gun, the participants wait-
ing on either side of the
door tackled him, threw
things and grabbed the gun
before he managed to fi re a
single shot.
“There is a mental com-
ponent to this,” he said.
“People do not have the
right to hurt you. They do
not have the right to kill
you. If they’re trying to
do that it should make you
mad. You can use that.”
The training used vid-
eos throughout, showing
in some cases re-enact-
ments and in other cases
real-life footage of inci-
dents such as a man who
pulled a gun at a school
board meeting. Osborne
used the videos to point
out actions that saved lives
or put them in danger.
Proactive decisions peo-
ple make to avoid, deny or
defend can help buy time
for people to call 9-1-1 and
for law enforcement to ar-
rive, he said. Once they do
people should be careful
to keep their empty hands
visible, make no sudden
movements and follow in-
structions.
The CRASE training
helps give people tools to
respond decisively in an
emergency, but at the end
of the day, Osborne said,
people can make their own
moral choices, like the
staff of a hospital in Seat-
tle where a mass shooting
took place.
“Some of the nurses ran,
some of the nurses fought
back and some of them
covered their patients,” he
said. “None of them made
the wrong choice.”
Good Shepherd welcomes two new doctors
Good Shepherd Health Coast natives we knew that
Care System has welcomed eventually, we’d return,”
two new doctors recently.
she said in a news release.
Jennifer Poste, M.D., an “So we began our search
internal medicine and
in Oregon and Wash-
endocrinology phy-
ington and visited
sician, is taking new
several places in each
patients after moving
state.”
to Hermiston from
As an internal
New York City. She
medicine and endo-
said she and her hus-
crinologist
doctor
band were looking
Poste’s focuses will
for a simpler, more Dr.
include chronic dis-
Allison
rural life and imme- Khavkin ease management,
diately felt at home
diabetes, and thy-
when visiting Herm-
roid and glandular
iston and meeting the Good issues.
Shepherd staff.
Good Shepherd also
“Both of us being West welcomed obstetrician and
gynecologist (OB/GYN) town outside of Vancouver,
Allison Khavkin, M.D. to Canada, and said after com-
its Women’s Center team. pleting her training she was
Khavkin joins the team looking for an opportunity
just as the hospi-
to return to the Pacifi c
tal begins work on
Northwest.
an expansion of its
“I love the outdoors,
north wing that will
fresh food, and beauti-
greatly increase the
ful weather — and for
size of the Good
me, Hermiston has
Shepherd Women’s
plenty of everything,”
Center.
she said in a news re-
Khavkin recently Dr.
lease.
Jennifer
completed her resi- Poste
The new doctors
dency in obstetrics
are now taking pa-
and gynecology at
tients. Khavkin can be
the State University of New reached at 541-667-3801.
York at Buffalo. She spent Poste can be reached at
her childhood in a small 541-667-3801.
Hermiston’s new cen-
ter for recycling cans
and bottles is now open.
The BottleDrop Re-
demption Center, op-
erated by the Oregon
Beverage
Recycling
Cooperative, is locat-
ed at the former Good-
will building at 740 W.
Hermiston Avenue. It
will be staffed and open
seven days a week from
9 a.m. to 7 p.m.
As members of the
recycling cooperative,
Wal-Mart, Safeway, Fi-
esta Foods, Rite Aid,
Bi-Mart and Big Lots in
Hermiston will no lon-
ger be required by the
state to take bottles and
cans at their stores after
Sept. 9.
Customers will be
offered three different
ways to redeem depos-
its. The center’s self-
serve machines will
accept up to 350 con-
tainers per customer per
day. Staff can accept
and hand-count up to 50
containers per person.
And regular customers
can open a BottleDrop
Account.
The account offers
pre-labeled bags that
customers can drop off
at the center 24 hours a
day for staff to count.
Within 48 hours the
deposit money will be
available in the custom-
er’s account, which they
can redeem for cash at
participating
grocery
stores or use it to pay for
groceries.
The Oregon Beverage
Recycling Cooperative
said in a news release
that the Hermiston cen-
ter will be the state’s
16th BottleDrop center
after the legislature ap-
proved a statewide roll-
out in 2013.
“You really have to
experience one of our
clean, spacious Bot-
tleDrop
Redemption
Centers to appreciate
this whole new level of
returning bottles and
cans,” John Andersen,
President of OBRC, said
in a statement. “We are
excited for Hermiston
residents to see how fast
and convenient collect-
ing your refund can be.”
H&R Block offering tax
preparation courses
Eastern Oregon resi-
dents interested in mak-
ing extra money as a tax
preparer can learn more
about training oppor-
tunities during two re-
cruiting events at H&R
Block.
The Hermiston open
house will be Sept. 9 from
1-3 p.m. at the Hermis-
ton WorkSource offi ce,
950 S.E. Columbia Drive,
Suite B.
The Pendleton open
house will be Sept. 1 from
10 a.m. to noon at the
Pendleton
WorkSource
offi ce, 408 S.E. Seventh
St.
Interested parties will
be able to visit with tax
professionals and learn
about the H&R Block In-
come Tax Course that can
teach them to prepare tax-
es and develop tax-saving
strategies.
For more information
call Melissa Gorham at
509-579-9976 or visit hr-
block.com/class.
Printed on
recycled
newsprint
VOLUME 110 ● NUMBER 34
Gary L. West | Editor • gwest@hermistonherald.com • 541-564-4532
Tammy Malgesini | Community Editor • tmalgesini@eastoregonian.com • 541-564-4539
Jade McDowell | Reporter • jmcdowell@eastoregonian.com • 541-564-4536
Jeanne Jewett | Multi-Media consultant • jjewett@hermistonherald.com • 541-564-4531
Shannon Paxton | Offi ce coordinator • spaxton@hermistonherald.com • 541-564-4530
Audra Workman | Multi-Media consultant • aworkman@eastoregonian.com • 541-564-4538
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