TAKE A LOOK AT THE UMATILLA COUNTY FAIR PARADE | PAGE A11
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 7, 2019
HermistonHerald.com
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INSIDE
SHOOTING
One teen is in jail and
two took a trip to the
hospital after a shooting
in Hermiston on Monday
night.
PAGE A3
BIG FISH
Hermiston teacher Josh
Walker is using his
summer away from the
classroom to try to catch
100 fi sh.
PAGE A7
HOT DAYS
FFA and 4-H kids gear
up for a hot week at the
Umatilla County Fair
PAGE A10
BY THE WAY
First Melon
Fest coming to
Hermiston
With watermelons roll-
ing off the shelves, the
Hermiston Downtown
District is gearing up to
host the inaugural Melon
Fest. The event is Satur-
day, Aug. 17 in downtown
Hermiston. People are
invited to register as ven-
dors (applications avail-
able at Lucky Endz Gifts,
239 E. Main St.) and as
participants in Splash and
Dash 2019, an obstacle
course bathtub race (forms
at Hermiston City Hall or
the Hermiston Commu-
nity Center). The regis-
tration deadline is Thurs-
day, Aug. 15. See next
week’s Hermiston Her-
ald for a full story about
Melon Fest.
• • •
Those traveling across
town this week may want
to skip Hermiston Ave-
nue in favor of Highland,
Orchard or Elm avenues
as the road goes down to
one lane while crews work
on repaving it. After this
week most of the road will
reopen, but between Aug.
11 and the end of Septem-
ber, Hermiston Avenue
will be closed between
First Street and Third
Street. Businesses there
will still be open, however.
See BTW, Page A12
HH fi le photo
A young exhibitor
and his cow, Aug. 10,
1999.
The Umatilla County Fair
today looks diff erent from
the fairs of yesterday, but
some things never change
By JESSICA POLLARD
STAFF WRITER
I
n the fall of 1918, prepa-
rations for the sixth
annual Hog and Dairy
show in Umatilla County
were put to a screeching
halt by the Spanish Infl uenza
pandemic.
The Hermiston Herald at the
time wrote that the fair was set
to be far more attractive and stu-
pendous than any of the other
preceding shows.
“The withering hand of a
widespread infectious disease
had to step in at an inopportune
time and put a stop to these well
laid plans that meant so much
to the dairymen, hog raisers, and
agricultural people of this com-
munity, who have yearly taken
pride in exhibiting the products
of their farms.” wrote the Herald
that October.
Today, the Hog and Dairy
Show is a county fair — the
Umatilla County Fair, to be exact
Staff photo by Ben Lonergan
Blair Bracher, 13, ties up his cow in the livestock barn during the Umatilla County Fair on Tuesday afternoon.
The Umatilla County Fair continues daily through Saturday.
— and its growth shows no sign
of slowing. Its attendance, said
this year’s grand marshal Dan
Dorran, has blossomed over the
decades as the week’s attendance
reaches up to 100,000 people.
While hogs, dairy, and other
farm products still star in the fair
each year, the passing of time
represents a change in the way
See AGES, Page A12
Aspen Springs project could open by end of year
By JADE MCDOWELL
NEWS EDITOR
A
8
08805 93294
2
n acute psychiatric care
facility being built in
Hermiston could accept its
fi rst patient by the end of 2019.
Lifeways broke ground on
Aspen Springs Psychiatric Hos-
pital, a secure 16-bed facility for
patients with an acute mental
health disorder, in 2016. Micaela
Cathey, Lifeways’ executive direc-
tor for Umatilla County, said the
project recently passed its initial
site review with the state and is
moving forward with the review
for the state licensing process, fol-
lowed by Centers for Medicare and
Medicaid Services certifi cation.
“We’re very excited to bring
this to the community,” she said.
“We’re as anxious for this to open
as the community is.”
As part of the CMS process,
Lifeways anticipates a “soft open-
ing” of about six beds in Novem-
ber or December, before transi-
tioning into full 16-bed service at
the beginning of 2020. Cathey said
they will hire between 35 and 40
employees, from social workers to
nurses, to fully staff the facility.
When Lifeways broke ground
in summer 2016 they expected to
open in about a year, but Cathey
said meeting all of the regulations
in place for such a secure facility
“has led to some lengthening of the
timeline, much to our chagrin.”
Elizabeth Johnsen, executive
director of business excellence,
said an acute psychiatric care facil-
ity has to meet higher standards
Staff photo by Jade McDowell
See ASPEN, Page A12
Aspen Springs Psychiatric Hospital is going through the review process to
receive the neccesary certifi cations for operation.