FROM A1
A14 • HERMISTONHERALD.COM
WEDNESDAY, MAY 29, 2019
LAYOFFS
Continued from Page A1
Contributed photo by Craig Lockwood
Shawn Lockwood, left, and Erin Chowning work on the quilt that they created for Chowning’s
grandson Cole Smith.
QUILT
Continued from Page A1
help with the quilting part.
It was Lockwood who
taught Chowning how to
quilt. Neither of them had
ever tried to do a T-shirt
quilt before, but with the
skills they already had and
some hints from YouTube
tutorials they figured it out.
“It was so much easier
than I thought it would be,”
Chowning said.
The project, with 40 dif-
ferent squares, took about
three weeks to complete.
Lockwood said she has
been quilting her whole life,
but this was the most fun she
ever had with a quilt.
“I loved this project from
start to finish,” she said.
The two women joked
that they loved the quilt so
much they weren’t sure if
they were actually going to
let Smith have it.
Lockwood doesn’t do
the stitching for other peo-
ples’ quilts anymore, other
than for the Quilts of Valor
project for veterans. But she
relented on helping her good
friend, and was glad she did
it.
“I told Erin, even if he
didn’t appreciate it now, as
an adult he will look back
and cherish it, and he will
know what love his grandma
put into it,” she said.
In the center of the quilt
is a square of jersey with
Smith’s high school number
— 12 — in purple and gold.
It’s the inverse of his dad
Shane Smith, who wore the
number 21 when he played
for the Hermiston Bulldogs.
The squares tell the story
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of Smith’s basketball career,
but they also tell the story of
a close-knit team. The six
graduating seniors on Herm-
iston High Schools’ roster
grew up playing together,
most of them since third
grade. The team finished
their senior season with a
15-8 record.
Now, Smith said, they
will go their separate ways
after graduation on June 6.
Smith is still weighing his
options — he got accepted
to Eastern Oregon Univer-
sity, but is also considering
an electrician apprenticeship
with his dad.
Wherever he goes next,
he’ll have his quilt to remem-
ber his basketball days, and
the friends he made there.
“I enjoyed spending time
with my teammates, how
close we got,” he said.
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gress are pushing UP for
more answers about the
cuts.
Sens. Ron Wyden and
Jeff Merkley, both Demo-
crats, expressed their con-
cerns about the job cuts in
a page-and-half letter May
22 to Lance M. Fritz, chair-
man, president and CEO of
Union Pacific Corporation.
The decisions to reduce
jobs at Hinkle Yard, close
the supply warehouse and
the mechanical locomotive
shop, the senators stated,
“will devastate this rural
community by hamstring-
ing the economic opportu-
nities and stability of the
entire region.”
While the railroad’s
employees can relocate to
other yards, they worried
“the potential outmigra-
tion of much needed fami-
ly-wage jobs in rural East-
ern Oregon will do serious
long-term damage to the
local economy and tax
base.”
Paul Chalmers, direc-
tor of assessment and tax-
ation for Umatilla County,
said the total assessed value
of Union Pacific’s property
in the county is about $169
million, and the Hinkle
Yard accounts for about 32
percent of that, or roughly
$52 million.
The yard’s real market
value, he said, is closer to
$140 million.
What Union Pacific
decides to do with the yard
could affect the value and
thus the taxes on that prop-
erty. The railroad could
cut jobs, for example, in a
move to make Hinkle more
automated. That could
increase the property value.
But even major improve-
ments seem unlikely to
replace the economic loss
from the jobs.
Union Pacific offered
$25,000 signing bonuses
for electricians to work at
Hinkle in 2018, according
to reporting from The Wall
Street Journal, and the jobs
averaged $40,000 in pay
the first year and $60,000
the next. That pay, not
including the bonus, works
out to an average of $24 an
hour. Using that estimate,
the total payroll for the 195
jobs exceeds $9.7 million a
year.
Using the common eco-
nomic development trope
that every $1 in the local
economy goes through
seven trades, the payroll
from the 195 jobs mul-
tiplies to more than $68
million.
According to data in the
city of Hermiston’s annual
financial report issued in
June 2018, Union Pacific
was the city’s fifth-largest
employer at roughly 500
employees. At the top of the
list was Con-Agra Foods, at
1,600 employees, followed
by the Wal-Mart Distribu-
tion Center, Good Shep-
herd Medical Center and
Hermiston School District.
Assistant city man-
ager Mark Morgan said in
an email that Hermiston is
working on a “small indus-
trial lot project” with the
Port of Umatilla to bring
about 50 acres of industrial
parcels (one of 5 acres in
size) up to “shovel-ready”
status. The project will
extend roads and utilities to
the parcels and connect the
area on the southern edge
of town to Highway 395.
A summary of the proj-
ect lists the need for eco-
nomic diversity as a driver
behind the project, noting
that in the past when large
employers such as Hermis-
ton Foods have closed it has
been a “major blow” to the
economy. The city hopes
bringing in more options
for employment at smaller
operations will help.
“[Last
week’s]
announcement by UP only
underscores why the Mayor
and Council are committed
to diversifying our employ-
ment base through this
project,” Morgan said.
Union Pacific delivers
freight to the Port of Mor-
row in Boardman. Ryan
Neal, the port’s executive
director, said he did not
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anticipate the port would
sustain adverse effects from
the cuts at Hinkle. But like
others, he called the losses
devastating for the area,
particular because they are
family-wage jobs.
“We don’t ever want to
see those go away,” he said.
In response to Union
Pacific’s announcement,
Neal said, the port issued
one of its own showing a
total of 62 job openings at
businesses operating at the
port, including a physical
security manager for Ama-
zon, maintenance mechan-
ics for Pacific Ethanol Inc.
and Lamb Weston and
forklift operators at Lamb
Weston and Boardman
Foods Inc.
Union Pacific started
cutting jobs at Hinkle in
October 2018. Wyden
and Merkley stated in the
letter those layoffs hurt
agriculture
producers
and other shippers, who
reported “difficulties reach-
ing Union Pacific staff to
resolve problems, or even
reach a customer service
representative.”
Union Pacific’s “failure
to work with Oregon ship-
pers,” the senators con-
tinued, could create more
congestion on freeways
and undermine the state’s
transportation infrastruc-
ture. And the closure of the
Hinkle mechanical loco-
motive shop would reduce
oversight inspection of
trains carrying hazardous
loads through rural Oregon
communities
To better understand the
effects of eliminating the
jobs, Wyden and Merkley
asked Union Pacific a series
of questions about levels of
workers and investments at
Hinkle.
The senators asked
Union Pacific if the Fed-
eral Rail Administration
reviewed workers’ safety
concerns at Hinkle and
other Oregon facilities
since the company started
layoffs in October. The
Hermiston Herald reported
on those safety concerns in
late March.
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