WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 24, 2022
3
HERMISTONHERALD.COM • A3
LOCAL NEWS
Housing developments
booming in Umatilla
Umatilla County
board approves new
position, equipment
requests
BY JOHN TILLMAN
Hermiston Herald
Umatilla County is getting a
new service coordinator posi-
tion for the county’s develop-
mental disabilities program.
The county board of com-
missioner at its meeting Aug.
17 approved the new position,
which is to create consistency
with monitoring require-
ments of foster and residential
homes and employment sites.
The county estimated the an-
nual costs of the position is
about $110,000, and carryover
dollars from the 2021-22 de-
velopmental disabilities bud-
get will cover that.
The expenditure was one of
several the county board ap-
proved at the meeting.
The board gave the OK
for a new concrete vault toi-
let for Harris Park. The cost
of delivering the unit in 2023
to Harris Park comes to
$30,355.20.
Commissioner John Sha-
fer serves on the Wildhorse
Foundation board. A grant
from the foundation is to pay
$14,000 of the cost, leaving a
remainder of $16,355.20. The
county applied for an Oregon
Parks and Recreation De-
partment grant to cover some
or all of that amount. If that
grant were to fail, the county’s
public works department still
has money in the budget to
cover the tab.
The board also authorized
public works to buy a new
power broom from Papé Ma-
chinery, Pasco, for $62,397.
BY MARCO GRAMACHO
Hermiston Herald
This 2021 broom is to re-
place an older model in the
fleet, which the department
planned on selling at auction
later this year.
The board gave the sher-
iff’s office the go-ahead to buy
new restraint systems by Safe
Restraints Inc. for patrol vehi-
cles. The cost of four WRAP
systems and 20 associated an-
kle straps is $7,602.37. Federal
program funds will cover the
expense.
County commissioners also
approved the reclassification
of a medical assistant to an
office assistant II position to
work almost full time in Pend-
leton’s school-based health
centers.
Umatilla County Health
sponsors and staffs the cen-
ters. Alisha Lundgren, the
heath department’s deputy di-
rector, in a memo to the board
explained the county for more
than a year has tried to fill a
vacant medical assistant po-
sition while the nurse practi-
tioner and two counselors in
the centers need office assis-
tant support rather than med-
ical assistant support.
In other business, the
county board presented the
first reading to update the
county department organiza-
tion ordinance and organiza-
tional chart and set a second
reading for its next meeting.
And the board approved con-
tracting with Michael Berg-
strom of AgriNorthwest, Ken-
newick, as a consultant on the
central pipeline project.
The city of Umatilla contin-
ues to experience a boom of
major housing developments.
Several large housing projects
completed have added close to
200 homes off Powerline Road.
Work recently started on a ma-
jor project that will add 326
houses by the end of the year on
an 81-acre site on Grant Avenue
just west of the Latter-day Saints
church.
Jacob Foutz, senior planner
for Umatilla, credited the ex-
pansion to lower taxes for home
builders compared to surround-
ing cities. The development of
the city’s infrastructure also is
part of the reason for the con-
struction boom.
“Most of the new develop-
ment is going on Umatilla’s
south hill, which is zoned for
residential use and still has
plenty of room for growth,”
Foutz said. “As developers build
out the area, they are required
to pay for the needed improve-
ments and extensions to roads
and utilities, then hand those
investments over to the city.”
Steven Wilson, chief sales of-
ficer at MonteVista Homes, ex-
plained the new development in
Umatilla has 20 acres dedicated
Lexington voters join the
leagues of local communities
voting on whether to ban psi-
locybin-related businesses and
manufacturing.
The town council on Friday,
Aug. 19 adopted a resolution
referring the ban to the ballot
in the November general elec-
tion, Town Recorder Veronica
Hess reported.
Oregon voted in 2020 to
allow manufacturing, distrib-
Phil Wright/
Hermiston Herald
to the city for parks and future
trail expansion.
“We are working on the cre-
ation of streets and will be able
to invite home buyers by Octo-
ber,” Wilson said.
Wilson explained that sev-
eral families are moving to the
region from the Tri-Cities area
for work.
“They are looking for quality
housing with affordable prices.
We are also seeing a market for
retirees who are looking for a
place closer to nature. Or fami-
lies buying a second home,” he
said.
The McClannahan Summit
offers options of housing
with three or four bedrooms,
two or three baths in 1,470-
2,500 square feet in single
and two tiers.
BY ANTONIO ARREDONDO
Hermiston Herald
Donna Nagely of Richland,
Washington, said the reason
she and a
friend es-
caped a re-
cent house
fire in Uma-
tilla is be-
cause of a
neighbor.
Journot
Nagely and
friend Steve Townsend, were
winding down for the night
on July 31 at Townsend’s Rio
Senda Street house in Uma-
tilla. Then a neighbor rushed
in the door.
The grill in the yard had
caught fire. The propane tank
was shooting flames at the
house.
Conner Journot, 18, had
been outside cleaning his fish-
ing line, Nagely said. When he
saw a plume of smoke com-
ing from his neighbor’s house,
he at first assumed they were
having a barbecue. Once he
looked over the fence, how-
uting and possession of psi-
locybin and psilocin, psyche-
delic chemicals found in some
mushrooms. State law pro-
vides that a city council may
adopt an ordinance to give
local voters the say in prohib-
iting the establishment of any
of those registered or licensed
activities.
Approval of this referendum
would prohibit the establish-
ment of psilocybin product
manufacturers and psilocybin
service center operators within
Lexington.
— Hermiston Herald
ever, he understood the grav-
ity of the situation.
Nagely said Journot rushed
into the house to warn the oc-
cupants. Townsend was sound
asleep at the time, and Nagely
was reading. Alerted, the two
quickly got ready to leave. By
the time they were exiting the
house, flames were nipping at
the walls.
“Steve was a firefighter,”
Nagely said, “and even he said
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“The houses can be custom-
ized in multiple tiers, which is
also a way to attract buyers in
the luxury market,” he said.
The McClannahan Summit,
he said, is tapping right into
the growing need of houses
in Northeastern Oregon from
families moving to the region
to work for companies such as
Google and Walmart and for
smaller businesses, as well as
that segment of elders looking
for single-level homes.
The view of the Columbia
River also is attractive to home
buyers, he said, as in close prox-
imity to shopping, medical,
schools and parks.
“We are also seeing families
moving to the area to follow
their kids going to college,”
Wilson said.
Umatilla has been developing
its infrastructure, and the new
home developments brings rev-
enue through property taxes,
enterprise zone agreements,
system development charges
and other sources to help the
city provide for the needs new
homes and businesses create.
The city continues to make
improvements in the water and
wastewater systems, as well as
creating better parks with play-
ground equipment, lighting and
new restrooms.
“We are building up in mo-
mentum of this huge growth
in South Hill, and there are
even waiting lists to buy homes
there,” Foutz. said. “We said yes
to development and it is paying
off in the last three years, and
there is still great potential.”
Neighbor saves two in recent Umatilla house fire
NEWS BRIEFS
Lexington residents to
vote in November on
psilocybin businesses
An 81-acre site for
housing off Grant Av-
enue, Umatilla, re-
mains under devel-
opment Saturday,
Aug. 20, 2022. Uma-
tilla continues to ex-
periences a boom
in housing develop-
ments.
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that fire moved fast.”
As soon as it started, Nagely
said the fire was over; the
two walked over to Journot’s
house and saw the house go
up in flames. It still stands two
weeks later, a hollow shell of
what it once was. In the whirl-
wind of flames, several pic-
tures and memories were lost.
“You always think, ‘if the
house burns this is what I’m
going to take,’” Nagely said.
“You just don’t have that time.”
Nagely and Townsend have
relocated to Nagely’s residence
but neither of them will forget
the hero that saved them. Just
three days after the fire, Nagely
wrote a letter detailing the
events and showing her grati-
tude for Journot’s heroism.
“Thank you for your
valiant effort, Connor,” she
wrote. “We are alive because
you cared.”