INSIDE 45TH ANNUAL HERMISTON FARM FAIR ISSUE
INSIDE
POSTPONED
The Hermiston City Council
delayed their vote on raising
electric rates for Hermiston
Energy Services customers.
PAGE A3
TREE SALE
COMMITTED
TO ADVOCACY
Umatilla firefighters aren’t
selling Christmas trees this
year, but Encore Wellness 4
Life has stepped up to fill the
need.
PAGE A4
TALL ORDER
At 6-4, Hermiston girls
basketball player Jordan
Thomas towers over the
competition.
PAGE A10
BY THE WAY
Journey to
Bethlehem canceled
Hermiston will be
missing a holiday tradition
this year after the Hermis-
ton Seventh-Day Adven-
tist Church announced it
will not be holding its live
nativity Journey to Beth-
lehem this year.
The church at 855 W
Highland Avenue was gut-
ted by a fire in June, and
an announcement on the
church’s Facebook page
stated that the event would
be canceled this year as a
result.
• • •
The annual holiday
concert of the Inland
Northwest
Musicians
is Saturday, Dec. 8 at the
Echo Community Cen-
ter. “The Carols of Christ-
mas” features the orches-
tra and chorale performing
holiday music, including
traditional and contempo-
rary songs.
Although there is no
admission charge, due to
the popularity of past hol-
iday concerts, it is highly
recommended that peo-
ple make reservations.
Contact 541-289-4696 or
inwm@machmedia.net.
See next week’s Herm-
iston Herald for a story
about the event.
• • •
Representatives from
the Harkenrider Senior
See BTW, Page A6
STAFF PHOTO BY E.J. HARRIS
New CASA volunteers holds their right hands in the air while being sworn in Monday in the courtroom of Umatilla County Circuit Court
Judge Eva Temple in Hermiston.
New CASAs prepare to
advocate for local foster
children
By JADE MCDOWELL
STAFF WRITER
When the situation at home gets so
bad a child is removed from their par-
ents, having someone in their corner
can make a big difference.
More children will have that oppor-
tunity after 10 new court-appointed
special advocates were sworn in
Monday.
Known as CASAs, the special-
ly-trained volunteers are assigned to
be a child’s advocate as they move
through the court system. They visit
with the child at least once a month,
attend supervised visits and court hear-
ings, meet the foster parents and bio-
logical parents, study the details of the
case and submit reports to the judge
about what they believe is in the child’s
best interest. In October, 73 foster chil-
dren in Umatilla and Morrow counties
had a court-appointed special advocate,
but 106 did not.
“Since we got these ones sworn in,
STAFF PHOTO BY E.J. HARRIS
Umatilla County Circuit Court Judge Eva Temple signs a certificate of completion
for a new CASA volunteer after a swearing in ceremony Monday in Hermiston.
we can probably get another 15 to 20
kids CASAs,” said Jesus Rome, the
CASA manager.
At age 23, Meagan Duncan-Osborn
is younger than most CASAs, but she
didn’t want to wait to give back. Dun-
can-Osborn was adopted out of foster
care when she was young, and wants to
be an example and a source of hope for
future generations of foster children.
Duncan-Osborn said she was
removed from her mother’s care when
she was “very young” and placed with
strangers for a while before her father’s
See CASA, Page A16
A Meal for All
Volunteers work
overtime to make
Fellowship Dinner
By JAYATI RAMAKRISHNAN
STAFF WRITER
The first volunteers for the Com-
munity Fellowship Dinner got to the
kitchen at 6 a.m. Thursday and got to
work sterilizing pans, carving turkey
and putting food in the ovens for the
hundreds of people that would soon
gather at Hermiston High School for
a Thanksgiving meal.
Not 24 hours earlier, they’d been
staring at a problem: clogged drains,
which stopped them from washing
dishes and prepping turkeys.
With 40 birds to prepare for the
next day’s Community Fellow-
ship Dinner, they didn’t miss a beat,
instead working ahead on other parts
of the meal until plumbers arrived.
Despite the hiccup, things were
running smoothly again the next
morning, with volunteers bustling in
the kitchen and finding things to do.
“We are so far ahead it’s scary,”
said co-kitchen manager Jan Cassens.
Cassens and co-kitchen manager
Heather Smart have worked to make
sure the event is a well-oiled machine
for volunteers. They start meeting in
September to figure out what they
already have and what they’ll need
for the year’s event.
See MEAL, Page A16
STAFF PHOTO BY E.J. HARRIS
Geri McMullen and Connie Jorgensen, both of Hermiston, plate food during
the Community Fellowship Dinner Thanksgiving meal on Thursday in
Hermiston. For more Thanksgiving images, see A15