NEWS
A10 • HERMISTONHERALD.COM
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 14, 2021
Rocky Heights murals have watched
over generations of students
By JADE MCDOWELL
NEWS EDITOR
Hermiston Herald, File
Customers place orders at the Hermiston Lions Club food cart
on at the Eastern Oregon Trade and Event Center during the
2017 Umatilla County Fair.
Advisory committee
agrees on long-term
plan for EOTEC
By JADE MCDOWELL
NEWS EDITOR
The Eastern Oregon
Trade and Event Center
could look much different
20 years from now.
During the Monday,
April 12, Hermiston City
Council meeting, the coun-
cil approved a 20-year mas-
ter plan for the complex.
The plan was crafted with
the city’s advisory board for
EOTEC, with the help of
Architects West.
The map lays out a foot-
print for improvements that
will be added to the site
over time. Some of those
improvements include turn-
ing the current overflow
parking into grassy sports
fields, expanding the cur-
rent event center building,
adding an indoor area, cre-
ating an improved outdoor
concert venue, and forging
agreements with the neigh-
boring airport to use some
space for overflow parking
during fair week.
City Manager Byron
Smith said the timing of
those improvements over
the next two decades
will depend on funding
availability.
“We don’t plan to go and
build everything on this map
tomorrow,” he said.
Mike Kay, a member of
the Farm-City Pro Rodeo
Board representing the
rodeo on the EOTEC advi-
sory committee, thanked
the city council for being
willing to slow down the
planning process when
stakeholders were unhappy
with the direction it was
taking.
Since then, he said,
there had been a significant
amount of additional discus-
sion and compromise, creat-
ing a collaborative plan that
everyone, not just the city,
was satisfied with.
“I think we’ve got a great
plan here,” he said.
Mayor David Drotzmann
agreed, saying while the pro-
cess was long and involved
some “pretty strong wills,”
the end result was a better
plan that everyone was in
unanimous support.
“It’s hard to believe
we’re fighting over 95 acres
when we used to exist on
7,” he said, referencing the
old fairgrounds on Orchard
Avenue.
He described the plan for
EOTEC as one that will cre-
ate a resource for the com-
munity for decades to come,
not only for the fair and
rodeo but for many other
events and activities.
In other business during
the April 12 city coun-
cil meeting, the council
approved a contract with
Sineco Construction to
replace nearly 2,000 feet
of sewer main on South-
east Seventh Street between
Newport Avenue and High-
land Avenue.
Assistant City Manager
Mark Morgan said the proj-
ect is part of a larger effort
to replace undersized sewer
mains in that part of town
that have been overbur-
dened as the city continues
to grow, and will present
further problems with con-
tinued development of the
South Hermiston Industrial
Park if not replaced.
Sineco was the low bidder
on the project at $596,485,
which Morgan said was in
line with estimates from city
engineers at Anderson Perry.
State budget hearings
offer virtual participation
By GARY A. WARNER
OREGON CAPITAL BUREAU
Oregon residents can tes-
tify about the state’s upcom-
ing two-year budget during
online hearings that begin
this week.
The Oregon Legislature’s
Joint Ways & Means Com-
mittee will take virtual and
written testimony for the
state’s revenue and spending
plans for 2021-22 that must
be finalized by June 28.
The committee of House
and Senate members will
take testimony, then vote
on the budget in commit-
tee work sessions still to be
scheduled. The state budget
is usually among the last
set of bills passed during
the odd-numbered year
session.
The budget-writing com-
mittee will hold five regional
hearings, with congressio-
nal districts used to group
testimony.
The first hearing is
Wednesday, April 14, at
5:30 p.m. for the 1st Con-
gressional District, which
includes Northwest Oregon.
Congressional District 2,
which covers most of Ore-
gon east of the Cascades,
including Umatilla and Mor-
row counties, will be Satur-
day, April 17, at 1:30 p.m.
Other hearings are:
CD3: Wednesday, April
21, at 5:30 p.m., CD4:
Thursday, April 22, at
5:30 p.m., CD5: Saturday,
April 24, at 1 p.m..
To find your congres-
sional district: go to www.
oregonlegislature.gov/find-
yourlegislator/leg-districts.
html or call your county
clerk’s office.
The hearings cover
the 2021-22 state budget,
which would go into effect
July 1. The budget will be
in Senate Bill 5555, which
currently is a mostly blank
framework.
An overview of the com-
mittee’s plans are at bit.ly/
ORbudget and Senate Bill
5555 as it now looks can be
found at bit.ly/SB5555.
The hearings will be
streamed live, and available
for later viewing, at bit.ly/
ORbudgetlive.
Written testimony can
be submitted at any time,
but for specific regional
issues, will be taken up to
24 hours before a hearing.
To submit testimony elec-
tronically, go to: bit.ly/
ORbudgettestimony.
To submit testimony by
mail, send to: Joint Ways
and Means Committee,
900 State Street NE, Room
H-178, Salem OR 97301
Registration is required
to testify by phone or video
link. Registration closes
at the time the meeting is
scheduled to begin.
Those who sign up to
speak online to the commit-
tee will be limited to two
minutes each.
To
register
elec-
tronically, go to: bit.ly/
ORbudgettestify.
For
assistance,
call
833-698-1371.
While the groundbreak-
ing of a new Rocky Heights
Elementary School means
more room and nicer facil-
ities for students and staff,
when the time comes to
tear down the old building,
Linda Hagemann and Paula
Jennings will be a little sad.
The women worked
together in the summer of
1984 to paint a series of
murals in the breezeway
of Rocky Heights, which
still stand today. The build-
ing was originally built in
1962.
Jennings said she and
Hagemann both had chil-
dren in the school at the
time, and were part of the
parent group supporting the
school. Both are “artsy,”
she said, they and wanted
to do something nice for
the students.
“We’re both creative
people, so it was kind of
serendipity,” she said.
In fact, the “Serendip-
ity” books, by Stephen
Cosgrove and illustrated
by Robin James, were what
inspired them. Hagemann
said she liked the short sto-
ries in the series, and the
lessons they taught about
topics, such as friendship,
and based the murals on
imagining scenes from the
books.
One mural, for example,
features Berry the Huckle-
bug, a young bug who runs
away so he can play all
day and not do any chores.
Once he sees how difficult
the world can be, however,
Ben Lonergan/Hermiston Herald
Students at Rocky Heights Elementary School walk past a series of murals, painted by Paula
Jennings and Linda Hagemann, on April 13, 2021.
“THEY’VE REALLY
STOOD THE TEST
OF TIME.”
Paula Jennings, who with Linda Hagemann
painted a series of murals at Rocky Heights
Elementary School in 1984
he learns gratitude for his
home and returns, prom-
ising to do his part to help
out.
“They were such neat
books,” Hagemann said.
Jennings said she hasn’t
seen the murals in 20 years,
but plans to visit the school
sometime in the next year
before the new Rocky
Heights is finished and
the old one is demolished.
Friends have sent her pic-
tures, and she said she is
amazed that the murals still
have such vibrant colors
after so many years.
“They’ve really stood
the test of time,” she said.
Hagemann also said
she is also happy to see
how well the murals have
held up, and like Jennings,
wishes there was some way
to preserve them for use in
the new building.
She said she enjoyed
the experience of painting
them at the time and likes
the idea that so many gen-
erations of students have
enjoyed them. Recently
she was a substitute at
Rocky Heights, and said
she enjoyed sharing the
history and meaning of the
murals with Princpal Ste-
fani Wyant and other staff
there.
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