WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2020
HermistonHerald.com
EasternOregonMarketplace.com
A YEAR OF
DISASTERS
Echo residents recover from
fl oods, pandemic, and smoke
By JADE MCDOWELL
NEWS EDITOR
WHAT A YEAR
When Echo residents began
2020, they probably didn’t realize
how much bleach they would be
using this year.
The cleaning substance has
been in demand since March
because of the pandemic, but
before that, Echo residents were
using it to battle mold in homes
that fl ooded during the worst fl ood
in the town’s 116-year history.
Mayor Jeanie Hampton remem-
bers bleach and other cleaning sup-
plies being dropped off at Echo
Community Church after February
7’s “500-year fl ood” hit.
“We had one side of the base-
ment full of logical things like
shovels and bleach and cleaning
supplies and gloves,” she said.
“You would think people knew we
were going into COVID.”
The church used food dona-
tions to hand out free meals to any-
one who needed them during the
week of the fl ood, and distributed
other supplies to anyone in need,
including some Stanfi eld residents.
Crews of volunteers, armed with
everything from wheelbarrows to
chain saws, showed up wherever
there was a need. When another
fl ood hit in May, people cleaned
out some of the same properties
again using supplies left over from
February.
Echo School was temporarily
turned into a shelter for displaced
residents during the fi rst day of
the fl oods, but Raymon Smith,
superintendent of Echo School
District, said since the fl ooding
happened on a Friday, students
didn’t have to miss any school at
the time.
“We were back in school Mon-
day morning,” he said. “We had
some areas that were completely
February: Flooding damages
homes and changes the course
of the Umatilla River
March: Schools and business
close because of COVID-19
pandemic
May: Umatilla River fl oods prop-
erties around Echo a second
time
September: Fires around Ore-
gon lead to air quality deemed
“hazardous”
Staff photo by Ben Lonergan
Debris clogs a Bureau of Reclamation dam on the Umatilla River along Ramos Lane near Echo.
cut off in the Reith Road area, so
we worked with those families, but
mostly kids still showed up Mon-
day morning even when we said
they didn’t need to.”
Those days of school became
even more important when class
was canceled a little over a month
later because of COVID-19. Then
the town saw more fl ooding in
May.
Smith said he was gratifi ed to
the way everyone from the fi re
department to the church to city
staff quickly banded together and
did an “amazing job” of taking
care of everyone. Hampton had
similar sentiments, and said Echo
residents have shown their resil-
ience throughout the year by sup-
porting each other and having a
good attitude.
“The second time the fl ood
came through, farmers were laugh-
ing and saying, ‘When you fi nd
this part, will you send it back
up to me because it came off my
wheel line,’” she said.
While residents may have been
able to keep their sense of humor,
the damage they suffered during
the fl ooding was very real, and so
are fears it will happen again.
“People are really concerned
about another event,” city admin-
Staff photo by Ben Lonergan
Farm equipment maneuvers through the fi elds outside of Echo under smoky skies on Friday, Sept. 11, 2020.
istrator David Slaght said.
He said the Umatilla River’s
fl ooding on Feb. 7 permanently
altered the course and shape of
the river around Echo, slicing new
paths through farmland.
The difference between aerial
photos taken years ago and ones
taken in 2020 are obvious, he said.
A high-water event in May brought
more fl ooding, and Slaght said he
— like many Echo residents —
believes that the changed land-
scape will make fl ooding in Echo
more common.
Slaght said the effects on
Echo’s 700 residents still linger
seven months later, even as the rest
of the world turned its attention to
the global pandemic that has also
hurt residents.
“A lot of people are still recov-
ering,” he said. “We still have a
couple of homes that are not liv-
able on the south side of town.
There’s just only so much money
to go around, and there was just so
much damage.”
See Echo, Page A10
Hermiston graduate rewarded for ‘grit’
By CASEY WHITE-ZOLLMAN
FOR THE HERMISTON HERALD
In a world full of divisive-
ness, Salma Anguiano feels
like a breath of fresh air — and
hope.
“We all function differently in
society because we all have dif-
ferent backgrounds and identities,
and we approach things with dif-
ferent lenses,” said the 20-year-
old Hermiston High School grad-
uate. “We need to step aside from
our biases and look at things dif-
ferently, through different lenses,
and really be open enough to lis-
ten to others’ perspectives. I hope
I can be that type of person who
can build different understand-
ings among different types of
communities.”
Anguiano, a junior at Whitman
College in Walla Walla, Wash-
ington, wrote about her experi-
ences as an Hispanic woman in
a predominantly white institution
where many students come from
wealthy backgrounds in an essay
that won her a $3,000 Workers’
Memorial Scholarship from the
Oregon Occupational Safety &
Health division (OSHA). This is
the third year in a row Anguiano
has been awarded the competitive
scholarship.
INSIDE
“I REALLY ENJOY LEARNING FROM
PEOPLE WHO HAVE A DIFFERENT
BACKGROUND FROM ME.
Salma Anguiano, scholarship winner
Anguiano qualifi ed for the
scholarship as the daughter of a
worker injured on the job. Her
father was severely injured in a
vehicle crash in 2014 when the
van he was riding in on his way to
his job at a Boardman dairy ran a
stop sign and rolled, ejecting him
from the vehicle. He was left a
quadriplegic.
At the time, Anguiano was
just 14 and in the eighth grade,
and her younger sister was just 6
months old. She served as a trans-
lator for her parents with medical
staff, and cared for her baby sis-
ter, all the while going to school
in Hermiston.
“It was a lot for me as a young
person. I was 14 and didn’t want
to be dealing with these types
of problems,” she said. “I just
wanted to be a normal teenager. I
couldn’t do the things other kids
my age were doing because I had
family responsibilities. I think,
while it was a diffi cult time, it
helped me prepare more for real
A3 City ordinance blocks pro-
posed Stepping Stones location
life, because in real life, things
don’t always go as smoothly as
you think they will go. It matured
me at a really diffi cult age.”
OSHA looks for students who
are resilient and want to pur-
sue higher education goals when
reviewing applicants for the
Workers’ Memorial Scholarship.
Anguiano is one of just seven
students statewide to receive the
honor, which was established
in 1991 by the Oregon Legisla-
ture. Award recommendations
are made by Oregon OSHA’s
Safe Employment Education and
Training Advisory Committee,
an advisory group with members
from business, organized labor,
and government.
Oregon OSHA presents the
awards annually to help in the
post-secondary education of
spouses or children of perma-
nently and totally disabled or
fatally injured workers.
See Graduate, Page A10
A6 Boardman food pantry going
strong six months after it began
Photo contributed by Salma Anguiano
Hermiston graduate Salma Anguiano won the Workers’ Memorial
Scholarship from the Oregon Occupational Safety & Health division for a
third year in a row in 2020.
A7 Wildhorse Resort & Casino
prepares to open new bowling alley,
arcade
A8 National Guard deploys from
Hermiston to battle wildfi res