T-WOLVES DOMINATE IN HERMISTON, EXTEND LEAD IN NORTHWEST REGION
INSIDE SPORTS
Hermiston
Herald
HermistonHerald.com
WEDNESDAY, MAY 3, 2017
$1.00
INSIDE
3 MINUTES
WITH...
MEET ROSIE SALINAS,
THE ASSISTANT
MANAGER OF THE HERMISTON
BRANCH OF WASHINGTON
FEDERAL BANK.
PAGE A2
PROMOTION
JUDGE DANIEL J. HILL TO BE
PROMOTED IN JUNE TO NEW
ROLE WITH
NATIONAL GUARD.
PAGE A3
TWO-DAY
CELEBRATION
CINCO DE MAYO EXPANDS TO
A TWO-DAY EVENT IN A NEW
LOCATION THIS WEEKEND.
PAGE A4
HARKENRIDER
CENTER TO
BRING SENIORS
COLLEGE BOUND
ATHLETES FROM HERMISTON,
STANFIELD SIGN LETTERS TO
PLAY ON IN COLLEGE.
PAGES A8-A9
DOWNTOWN
BRIEFLY
By JADE McDOWELL
Staff Writer
onstruction is now under way on a new
and long-awaited senior center in Herm-
iston to be known as the Harkenrider
Center.
Ground was broken in a ceremony
last Wednesday for the new center. The Herm-
iston Senior Center board and city haven’t al-
ways seen eye to eye on design and future use
of the building. It will be the exclusive home
of the senior center for its first five years and
in 2022 will expand to some community use in
the evenings. But Kathy English, a prep cook
for the center’s twice-a-week meals for seniors,
said there was a lot to look forward to about the
new building.
“I actually think it’s going to be wonderful,”
she said. “It’s going to be bigger and better for
us.”
Mayor David Drotzmann called the ground-
breaking a “historic event” taking place amid
major changes to Hermiston. Those changes in-
clude a new trade and event center being built
south of town and the sale of the former Umatil-
la County Fairgrounds, where the current senior
center sits, to Hermiston School District.
“There is a lot of change going on, but this
community does as it always does and rallies
around a cause,” he said.
Drotzmann said the Harkenrider Center
wouldn’t be possible without collaboration from
a number of entities, including the “guidance
and leadership” of the senior center board, a
50-year lease of the site from Hermiston School
District, a $2 million Community Development
Block Grant from the federal government and
$750,000 from the city of Hermiston.
STAFF PHOTOS BY KATHY ANEY
Above: Frank Harkenrider (right) stands with Hermiston Mayor David Drotzmann at
the offi cial groundbreaking of the Harkenrider Center in Hermiston on Wednesday.
Top: Hermiston Mayor David Drotzmann speaks to a crowd gathered at the site of
the future Harkenrider Center on Wednesday at the offi cial groundbreaking. Frank
Harkenrider, for whom the center is named, listens on.
“IT’S KIND OF FULL CIRCLE. IT’S JUST KIND OF CRAZY,
SO MUCH HAS CHANGED. BUT THIS IS HOME, AND TO HELP
OUT WITH THE SENIORS, IT’S A BLESSING FOR ME.”
See SENIORS, A14
KAREN BLAIR – SENIOR CENTER COOK
Neighbors take issue with EOTEC noise
Residents and business
owners opposed to
changing the name
By JADE MCDOWELL
Staff Writer
Construction of the Eastern Or-
egon Trade and Event Center will
provide a bigger, better venue for
events like the Umatilla County
Fair, but that community benefi t has
come with a price for the project’s
neighbors.
Property owners in the area have
banded together to form the Herm-
iston Airport Road Neighborhood
Association to address nuisance
complaints and to fi ght a proposal
to change the name of Airport Road
which they share with the project.
The city of Hermiston has peti-
tioned Umatilla County to change
the name of the road where EOTEC
is located in order to mitigate con-
fusion with Airport Way, which also
branches off of North Highway 395
but dead ends into the parking lot of
the Hermiston Municipal Airport.
City manager Byron Smith said
delivery trucks and visitors fre-
quently turn down the wrong road
and have to turn around in the air-
port parking lot and make a left turn
back onto Highway 395. People in
town may eventually get used to
turning onto the right road, he said,
but one of the goals of EOTEC is to
bring in events that will attract out-
of-town visitors too.
“We want to make it easy to
fi nd,” he said.
The city chose to pursue a name
change for Airport Road instead of
Airport Way because they believed
the word “airport” should stay with
the road actually leading to an air-
port.
Airport Road residents and busi-
ness owners, however, said the in-
convenience of an address change
for them would be signifi cant. Gary
Culp of Gary Culp Machine said it
would be an “absolute nightmare”
for his business.
“I’m 100 percent against it,” he
said.
He said Gary Culp Machine and
his secondary business Gear Tec,
which manufactures and sells tool
kits nationally, would be hurt when
mail from customers and suppliers
was lost in the confusion. There
would also be a cost for updating
everything from legal paperwork to
See EOTEC, A14
Activities off ered
during Screen
Free Week
People are encouraged
to read, play, think, cre-
ate, get active and spend
more time with family and
friends during Screen Free
Week.
Organized
by
the
Healthy Communities Co-
alition Children’s Health
Committee, some free ac-
tivities are planned:
• Monday, May 8 from
6-7 p.m. at Sunset Ele-
mentary School, 300 E.
Catherine Ave., Hermiston.
People can play disc golf,
participate in early child-
hood activities, engage in
parachute play and Food
Hero recipe tasting. Free
dental kits will be distrib-
uted to kids.
• Thursday, May 11 at
5:30 p.m. at Lovin’ Spade-
fuls Community Garden
at Good Shepherd Medi-
cal Center, 610 N.W. 11th
St., Hermiston. A walk and
bike event for all ages. It
includes Food Hero recipe
tasting, a planting activi-
ty and free dental kits for
kids.
For more information,
contact Angie Treadwell
at 541-567-8321 or ange-
la.treadwell@oregonstate.
edu.