OFF PAGE ONE
WEDNESDAY, MAY 11, 2022
ABORTION
Continued from Page A1
Kathy Aney/Hermiston Herald
Morrow County Commissioner Jim Doherty fi lls out a questionnaire on Monday, May 9, 2022,
as Boardman homeowner Tiff any Baldock provides the answers. Afterwards he collected a
water sample from her fi ltered water to determine if the water is contaminated with nitrates.
NITRATES
Continued from Page A1
sample kits in hand, knock-
ing and walking.
“I was hopeful as the fi rst
small set of samples were
sent off to Kuo Testing Labs
in Umatilla,” he recalled.
The testing company
reported it would email the
results in the ensuing days,
he said, so a call from the
lab to his cellphone was a
bit of a surprise. He said
the lab technician explained
Kuo Testing is duty bound
to warn people to suspend
using any water if test results
show there is an extreme and
immediate health concern.
“I sadly have received
that dreaded call for every
sample submitted,” Doherty
said.
The maximum level for
nitrates in water is 7 parts
per million, he said, and
shared the result of 25 sam-
ples. One sample was .33
ppm. The second lowest was
8.24. The highest of that lot
was 51.22 ppm. The average
was 30.77.
The majority of the
homes tested had nitrate fi l-
ters, he said, albeit not gen-
erally the more expensive
ones that work, but instead
the more disposable, more
aff ordable variety.
More alarming, he said, is
what the residents reported
on a questionnaire asking if
they had experienced any of
a short list of nitrate-related
health concerns.
“For a small sample, 70
tests to date, I was quite
taken aback by the prev-
alence of persistent head-
aches, devastating cancers
and failed pregnancies,”
Doherty said. “This weighs
incredibly heavy on my
heart as I search my soul and
wonder if I had only started
earlier, could I have made a
diff erence in these things.”
A hill worth dying on
Correlating
responses
to the question with the
extremely high nitrate
results is almost impossible.
But Doherty said he thinks
it is “abundantly fair to sug-
gest that in those numbers,
the responses we got could
certainly be attributed to
the increasing prevalence of
high nitrates.”
Policy making is about
assessing what issues to
address and how serious
they are, Doherty said. And
in this case, he said, it’s
about making a stand.
“This certainly is, ‘a
hill I am willing to die on,’
Doherty said, “if only that
my friends and neighbors
don’t face that literal peril.”
Doherty also touched on
environmental justice. He
said the very people who
provide the labor force for
the region are the same peo-
ple bearing the brunt of the
nitrate problem, yet they
have been “discarded” from
the environmental discus-
sions, and they must have a
voice in this.
“This is the missing
community,” Doherty said.
“This is a barrier that we
must eliminate.”
a lawsuit to the Idaho
Supreme Court, temporar-
ily blocking the bill before
it could take eff ect in April.
Little in a letter to the
Idaho Senate acknowledged
this was a likely outcome: “I
fear the novel civil enforce-
ment mechanism will in
short order be proven uncon-
stitutional and unwise.”
Eastern Oregon will be
the most accessible place
for Idahoans to receive
care. Planned Parenthood
offi cials made it clear that
by doing so they would be
taxing an already taxed sys-
tem. Providing a brick-and-
mortar location in Eastern
Oregon would take service
providers that Planned Par-
enthood doesn’t have.
Eastern Oregon also has
the most dissent to abortion
laws inside of Oregon.
Father Daniel Maxwell
of the Hermiston’s Our
Lady of Angels Catholic
Church expressed nothing
but support for the possible
Supreme Court ruling.
“We Catholics will be
overjoyed because it will
make abortion unthinkable
by many people,” he said.
Maxwell emphasized
that abortion is prohib-
ited by the Didache, a text
the Catholic Church holds
sacred, and the church’s
stance on abortion has not
changed in hundreds of
years.
“The Catholic Church
has stood in opposition to
abortion since the 15th cen-
tury.” Maxwell continued.
“It’s a mortal evil, you can’t
change what’s true.”
HERMISTONHERALD.COM • A11
“They can call it what-
ever they want, but it’s still
taking another person’s
life,’’ said
John Herman, a member
of the parish of Our Lady of
the Valley Catholic Church
in La Grande, echoed that
sentiment.
“They can call it what-
ever they want, but it’s still
taking another person’s
life,’’ he said.
Maxwell and his church
parish are not alone.
Anti-abortion protests are
not uncommon in Eastern
Oregon, and in fact, it was
a major concern Planned
Parenthood addressed in
a press conference May 3.
Several questions revolved
around security measures
at the soon-to-be Ontario
Clinic and how the Orga-
nization would address sus-
pected protesters.
Offi cials gave assur-
ances they have been dil-
igently planning for this
for a while, but refused to
make an affi rmative state-
ment to the question.
Oregon’s senior U.S. sen-
ator, Ron Wyden, in a state-
ment blasted the Republican
Party and the draft.
“The Republican party
has set the stage for a total
erosion of Americans’ con-
stitutional rights,” Wyden
said. “They have made
clear they won’t stop at gut-
ting the right for a woman
to make decisions about
her own body. Republi-
cans know that the major-
ity of Americans don’t
support eroding fundamen-
tal rights like privacy, so
instead, they packed the
Supreme Court with right-
wing extremists willing to
do their dirty work behind
— East Oregonian news editor Phil
Wright and The Observer reporter
Dick Mason contributed to this report.
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Something powerful and beautiful is rising from the ashes across our
state. Our communal hardship has rekindled in us one of our greatest
and most unifying strengths — kindness. So elemental, yet so brave.
Awakened by an urgent need for connection and compassion. Kindness
has inspired us to listen. To learn. To lend a hand. To take care of each
other. Now we have the opportunity to keep it lit. Let's not let it smolder.
Let's fan the embers in our hearts. Let's keep kindness at the forefront
of our lives, and live as open examples of it. Kindness inspires kindness.
And here, in our Oregon, that is what makes us —
NeighbORly
[ INSPIRING KINDNESS ACROSS OREGON ]
L E A R N | CO N N EC T | D O N AT E | G E T I N S P I R E D
O R E G O N C F.O R G /N E I G H B O R LY
closed doors.”
Wyden said if this was a
fi nal draft, the United States
will be one of a handful of
countries moving back-
wards on women’s rights
and mark a “devastat-
ing loss of constitutionally
guaranteed bodily auton-
omy and privacy for more
than half of America.”
He stated abortion is
health care.
“Ending this protected
and established right — a
right generations of women
have now known and that
the overwhelming major-
ity of Americans support
— would harm the health,
safety and lives of millions
of women and families,”
Wyden said. “This is going
to be the fi ght of our lives,
and we must use every tool
at our disposal to stop this
attack on constitutionally
guaranteed rights.”
According to Politico,
Chief Justice John Roberts
confi rmed the authenticity of
the draft but stressed the doc-
ument “does not represent a
decision by the Court or the
fi nal position of any member
on the issues in the case.”
Politico also noted, the
draft opinion includes “a
31-page appendix of his-
torical state abortion laws
... is replete with citations
to previous court decisions,
books and other author-
ities, and includes 118
footnotes.”
And the “appearances
and timing of this draft,”
according to Politico,
“are consistent with court
practice.”