PORTLAND — Oregon State University is taking over Portland.

That’s an exaggeration, of course. But OSU leased 39,509 square feet in downtown Portland, immediately upping its presence in the state’s largest city.

The university will take up the entire second floor of what old-time Portlanders still call the Meier & Frank Building. Visitors will recall: It’s that beautiful old building kitty-corner from Pioneer Courthouse Square. It opened in 1909, rises 15 stories and takes up an entire block. It was the Meier & Frank department store for decades, and a Macy’s after that. Both closed as the retail trade undergoes a sea change. Now a luxury hotel, The Nines, takes up the sixth through 15th floors.

And the state’s land grant university, still best known for its roots in agriculture, forestry and engineering, sets up highly visible shop in the city of hipsters, homeless, foodies, politicians, lawyers, activists, money and international business types.

The UO also has a considerable presence in Portland. Is OSU ratcheting up the competition between the universities?

OSU President Ed Ray doesn’t describe it that way.

“Serving the Portland region is part of OSU’s 149-year mission as Oregon’s statewide university,” Ray said in a prepared statement. “Our work in Portland complements Oregon State’s teaching, research and outreach and engagement mission and the work we do at our campuses in Corvallis and Bend — and major initiatives, such as the Marine Studies Initiative along Oregon’s coast and globally.”

Several existing Portland-based operations of the university will take up residence in August 2018. They include arms of the Extension Service, the OSU Foundation, the OSU Alumni Association and some athletic department representation. The OSU campus in Corvallis remains the center of each program, however.

The space also will house classrooms, meeting spaces and OSU Advantage, its partnership with private industries and other businesses.

OSU Vice President Steve Clark said the university signed a 10-year lease and will pay about $115,000 per month, or $1.38 million annually. The property owner is KBS and Sterling Bay; the real estate firm CBRE brokered the deal, according to OSU.

Clark, who oversees university oversees relations and marketing, downplayed any competition with UO or with Portland State University.

Instead, he said OSU recognizes the importance of having a “prominent central presence” in Portland. The university also has identified “thousands of adult learners” who are not served by any college or university, Clark said.

The space will better allow OSU to collaborate with local governments, other institutions, school districts, businesses and community groups, he said. About 1,000 students who take on-line courses from OSU live in the Portland area, many of them computer science students, Clark said. The central location gives on-line learners a a touchstone.

OSU’s College of Agricultural Sciences is perhaps best represented in Portland, with the well-regarded and busy Food Innovation Center at the edge of the Pearl District.

It’s essential that the state’s land-grant university collaborate with the food and drink industries that have blossomed in the Portland area, Clark said.

In addition, the College of Pharmacy does teaching and research in the Collaborative Life Sciences Building in the booming South Waterfront District, where the medical school, OHSU, has expanded. Extension programs operate in Multnomah, Washington and Clackamas counties, including the North Willamette Research and Extension Center near Aurora. OSU’s College of Business offers hybrid MBA programs in Portland, and the College of Veterinary Medicine collaborates with the Oregon Humane Society, which provides care and finds homes for hundreds of cats and dogs annually.

Idaho and Oregon ranchers have just recently started to resume grazing their cattle on some of the 279,000 acres of prime range land scorched two years ago by the Soda Fire.

The fire burned 84 pastures on 40 U.S. Bureau of Land Management grazing allotments. Most of the damage was done in Owyhee County southwest of Boise, with some of it occurring near Jordan Valley, Ore.

As part of BLM’s post-fire restoration plan, ranchers were not allowed to graze their animals on those allotments for at least two growing seasons following the blaze.

Grazing has resumed this fall on 48 affected pastures and BLM officials expect to make decisions on the remaining 36 pastures by the end of December, said Peter Torma, BLM’s Soda Fire project manager.

Ted Blackstock is one of many ranchers who lost large swaths of their traditional grazing land to the fire.

“It wiped out all of our feed for that year and the next year,” he said. “It’s been very expensive for our ranch, having to find all that feed.”

Blackstock was able to get back on one of his allotments this fall and will also be able to use some range this winter that was damaged by the fire.

“It’s good to be back home again,” he said. “The grass is coming back really well.”

The lightning-caused fire burned rapidly and it burned hot, Torma said.

“There really weren’t these unburned islands or pastures that were not burned,” he said. “Whatever it went across, it burned 100 percent of it.”

The fire also killed hundreds of cattle.

“It was a pretty devastating fire,” said BLM spokesman Michael Williamson. “A lot of ranchers had to drastically adjust what they were doing” because of it.”

BLM officials have undertaken a myriad of treatment efforts aimed at restoring the land and the agency’s restoration plan includes making the landscape more resilient to fire in the future.

That plan includes 30 miles of targeted grazing fuel breaks, which will begin this spring and will be accomplished using producers who graze cattle in those areas.

The idea is to create a 200-foot buffer on each side of roads, with the grass grazed down to a 2-inch stubble height, said Lance Okeson, a BLM fuels program coordinator.

With the fuel breaks, “The rate of a fires’ spread is going to be drastically reduced,” he said.

The targeted grazing fuel breaks are designed to prevent another big fire, said Lara Douglas, manager of the BLM’s Boise district office.

BLM has used this tactic before but never on this scale or without extensive fencing, Okeson said.

“We’re trying to develop these techniques with the operators on the landscape, without a bunch of extensive fencing,” he said. “We’ve done some small-scale stuff like this but we’re trying to take it a little farther than that.”

The grazing fuel breaks are part of the BLM’s plan to protect the millions of dollars of restoration work that has already been done, Okeson said.

“From day one of the plan, it was, we’re going to do all these restoration efforts and we’re also going to have a strategy to protect them,” he said.

The Trump administration has agreed to resume litigation over the expansion of Oregon’s Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument on Jan. 15 unless the dispute is resolved beforehand.

The monument’s size was increased from about 66,000 acres to 114,000 acres by the Obama administration in early 2017, spurring several lawsuits against the proclamation.

When the Trump administration decided to reconsider the expansion, those lawsuits were stayed by a federal judge pending the potential reduction of the monument’s boundaries.

Roughly six months later, two plaintiffs — the Association of O&C Counties and the American Forest Resource Council — have grown impatient with the delay.

The groups recently attempted to revive the active litigation of their lawsuits but have now agreed to the Jan. 15 deadline as long as the Trump administration seeks no further postponements.

The American Forest Resource Council hopes the president takes executive action scaling back the monument before that date, said Travis Joseph, the group’s executive director.

However, AFRC won’t be easily satisfied: Unless the monument’s boundaries are revised to entirely exclude so-called O&C Lands, which are dedicated to timber production, the group won’t drop its lawsuit, he said.

Congress enacted the O&C Act to make those federal lands permanently available to logging, so the president’s authority to create national monuments under the Antiquities Act doesn’t override that statute, Joseph said.

“The O&C Act applies to all of the acres by the plain meaning of the law,” he said. “It’s not about the specifics of the designation. It’s about the law.”

If a president were allowed to wipe out such decisions made by Congress, it would have “extraordinary implications for land management in the Western U.S.,” Joseph said.

The prolonged interruption of the litigation has been frustrating because the plaintiffs want to delve into the merits of the case as soon as possible, said Rocky McVay, executive director of the Association of O&C Counties.

“Timber sales that were in the works in the expanded area have been canceled,” McVay said.

While commercial logging within the national monument is banned, the expanded designation is also troublesome for ranchers who fear grazing curtailments within its boundaries.

It’s unclear what the Trump administration’s drastic reduction of two Utah national monuments — Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante — may foreshadow for the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument, McVay said.

Environmental groups are already lining up to file lawsuits against over that action, he said. “There will be a lot of fallout from this decision.”

The circumstances surrounding each national monument under review by the Trump administration are unique, said Joseph.

That’s particularly true for the Cascade-Siskiyou, which is the only monument containing lands devoted to timber harvest by statute, he said. “That legal conflict doesn’t exist anywhere else in the country.”

PORTLAND — Gov. Kate Brown plans to propose tax overhaul and cost-containment measures in the coming months to address the state’s ongoing revenue deficit, she told the annual Oregon Leadership Summit Monday.

Without revealing details of the proposals, Brown said her office is developing policy options that could be presented in time for the Oregon legislative session in February.

Her office is examining “a handful of options to solve the structural deficit issues Oregon faces, not just for the short-term but for the long-term,” Brown said. “It is time that we quit kicking this can down the road.”

But the Legislature’s ability to consider such proposals could hinge on potential policy changes at the federal level, Brown said.

The federal tax reform bill being worked out by Republican lawmakers has Oregon revenue experts and state economists scrambling to come up with an analysis showing how the proposals could impact Oregonians’ finances and the state’s budget and services.

“Certainly, what is happening at the federal level makes it really hard for us to have a detailed conversation about (state) tax policy right now,” she said.

Also distracting from negotiations toward a state tax overhaul is a statewide referendum Jan. 23 to repeal a health care funding bill passed by state legislators earlier this year. The bill was intended to maintain health insurance for more than 350,000 low-income Oregonians. Its repeal would compel state leaders to come up with a way to offset the loss in revenue, including the possibility of reducing subsidies for health coverage.

Any state tax overhaul conversation likely would spark calls for the state to curtail employee benefit costs and up employee contributions to the Public Employees Retirement System to help offset a $21 billion unfunded liability in the system.

“I think the role of the state is to make sure that we are incenting local employers … on paying down their (unfunded actuarial liability) so the entire number comes down,” Brown said. “That will eventually reduce employer rates and enable us to put more money into classrooms … and services that vulnerable Oregonians need.”

She said she also could ask employees to “have some skin in the game.”

“We are looking at cost sharing/risk sharing,” she said.

Her staffers also are examining recommendations by a PERS task force to come up with policy proposals for February.

“I have asked my team to put together a handful of options and I look forward to working with the business community on what those look like,” Brown said.

The 15th annual summit — founded by U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden — drew more than 1,200 businesspeople, policy wonks, politicians and others to the Oregon Convention Center.

The event also serves as the vehicle for unveiling the annual Oregon Business Plan, a policy roadmap for stimulating the economy and supporting business in the state.

Wolves may very well be responsible for killing a 250-pound adult llama on a private forested pasture in Union County, though the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife stopped short of confirming the incident as a wolf attack.

Investigators instead ruled it a “probable” wolf attack, taking place just 10 miles away from where wolves with the Meacham pack preyed on cattle at Cunningham Sheep Company earlier this summer.

The landowner found the dead llama Friday, Nov. 24 about 200 yards from the residence. The carcass was mostly intact, except most of the hide and muscle tissue along the right rear leg above the hock and around the anus had been consumed.

ODFW arrived the next day, and according to the agency’s investigation report, the llama likely died sometime between late Wednesday, Nov. 22 and before dark Thursday, Nov. 23. At least two sets of wolf tracks were seen in the mud about 20 yards away, which were one to two days old. Investigators also documented trail camera photos taken about 300 yards from the carcass, showing a wolf moving toward the area on Nov. 23.

However, wounds to the llama were not consistent with extensive wolf-caused injuries, the report went on to state. Taking all evidence into consideration, the agency determined that “there was sufficient evidence to confirm predation on the llama by a large predator, but not enough evidence to confirm which predator.”

The same landowner also reported another dead llama earlier in the month, which had been largely consumed except for its neck, head and left shoulder. ODFW investigated Nov. 14, and determined there was no evidence of a predator attack at the scene. The cause of death is unknown.

Oregon’s work of managing wolves in balance with the varied interests of people takes another turn this month when the state wildlife commission meets Dec. 8 to review draft management plan.

Representatives of livestock, hunting and conservation groups get the first word when the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife Commission meets in Salem. The public can attend, but testimony won’t be taken until the commission meets again Jan. 19. Comments also may be made by email to odfw.commission@state.or.us.

A “working copy” of the revised Oregon Wolf Conservation and Management Plan, which includes edits made by ODFW staff, is available at http://bit.ly/1OPoneb.

Wildlife issues in the West, especially those hinged to endangered species concerns, are a thicket of often-opposing points of view. In the case of Oregon’s wolves, the ODFW Commission’s complicated task is laid out in the plan’s straightforward language: “To ensure the conservation of gray wolves as required by Oregon law while protecting the social and economic interests of all Oregonians.”

Oregon adopted a wolf plan in 2005, updated it in 2010 and began the current revision in 2016 after taking wolves in Eastern Oregon off the endangered species list.

A few highlights from the current revision:

• The plan suggests 300 wolves as the “minimum population management threshold” through 2022. The figure is based on current data and computer modeling. Oregon had 112 documented wolves at the end of 2016, but wildlife officials believe Eastern Oregon could have 300 wolves as early as 2018, based on current population growth rates.

• Since being documented in Oregon in 2008, wolves have expanded in population and territory and now can be found within 6,674 square miles of the state.

• They primarily use forested habitat but follow prey to more open habitat in season, such as when elk move to lower elevation areas in winter. Tracking data from collared wolves showed they are on public land — primarily Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Forest Service land — 60 percent of the time, on private land 38 percent of the time, and on tribal land 2 percent of the time.

• Much of the state’s potential wolf habitat is used seasonally to graze cattle and sheep. “...(I)t is expected that depredation on livestock will continue to occur in places where wolves and livestock are closely associated.”

• The plan recognizes ranching and farming as “important components of the Oregon economy” and says addressing conflict between wolves and livestock is an essential element of the management plan.

• Oregon has approximately 1.3 million cattle and 215,000 sheep. From 2009 through 2016, ODFW confirmed 89 depredation incidents and the loss of 45 cattle, 89 sheep, three goats, one llama and one herd protection dog.

• “Natural dispersal,” in which young adult wolves leave their birth packs to find new territory and mates of their own, is providing “continued expansion and ongoing genetic connectivity” to wolves in other states. Continued dispersal from Idaho into Oregon is likely; Idaho had 786 wolves in 108 packs at the end of 2015.

• Oregon’s two-zone management protects wolves in Western Oregon, where packs are just getting started, while allowing the flexibility of “lethal control” of wolves in Eastern Oregon, where most of them live and livestock attacks are a major concern.

• “Variation in local conditions will likely cause some areas to be more prone to livestock depredations than others, and chronic conflict may preclude survival of some wolf packs in certain circumstances.” This past August, ODFW killed four wolves from the Harl Butte pack for repeated attacks on calves, and authorized a rancher to shoot a Meacham Pack wolf for the same reason.

• The draft document said classifying wolves as “special status game mammals” provides the most options for long-term management. Among other things, the status allows “responsive” hunting and trapping when required. Such action would require a permit, and hunters and trappers would have to be pre-certified by ODFW.

Tuesdays

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump plans to scale back two sprawling national monuments in Utah, responding to what he has condemned as a “massive federal land grab” and an important move for “state’s rights.”

Trump is traveling to Salt Lake City on Monday to outline his intention to shrink the Bears Ears and the Grand-Staircase Escalante national monuments spanning millions of acres in Utah. The two national monuments were among 27 that Trump ordered Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to review earlier this year.

Utah’s Republican leaders, including Sen. Orrin Hatch, pressed Trump to launch the review, saying the monuments declared by Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton locked up too much federal land.

Trump’s plans to curtail the strict protections on the sites have angered tribes and environmentalist groups who have vowed to sue to preserve the monuments.

In December, shortly before leaving office, Obama irritated Utah Republicans by creating the Bears Ears National Monument on 1.35 million acres of land sacred to Native Americans and home to tens of thousands of archaeological sites, including ancient cliff dwellings.

Trump signed an executive order in April directing Zinke to conduct a review of the protections. Trump is able to upend the protections under the 1906 Antiquities Act, which gives the president broad authority to declare federal lands as monuments and restrict their use.

The president said in April his order would end “another egregious abuse of federal power” and “give that power back to the states and to the people where it belongs.”

Trump said at the time that he had spoken to state and local leaders “who are gravely concerned about this massive federal land grab. And it’s gotten worse and worse and worse, and now we’re going to free it up, which is what should have happened in the first place. This should never have happened.”

The move marks the first time in a half century that a president has attempted to undo these types of land protections. And it could be the first of many changes to come.

Zinke also has recommended that Nevada’s Gold Butte and Oregon’s Cascade-Siskiyou monuments be reduced in size, although details remain unclear. The former Montana congressman’s plan would allow logging at a newly designated monument in Maine and more grazing, hunting and fishing at two sites in New Mexico.

Democrats and environmentalists have opposed the changes, accusing Trump and Zinke of engaging in a secretive process aimed at helping industry groups that have donated to Republican campaigns.

——

Associated Press writer Brady McCombs in Salt Lake City contributed to this report.

SALEM, Ore. (AP) — Two members of Congress — one an Oregon Democrat and the other a California Republican — are pushing to ensure that protections against federal intervention remain for another year for 46 states, Washington DC, Guam and Puerto Rico that allow some form of medical marijuana.

Rep. Earl Blumenauer of Oregon and Rep. Dana Rohrabacher of California have sent a letter with the signatures of 64 colleagues to congressional leaders supporting the Rohrabacher-Blumenauer Amendment that prevents federal officials using public funds to enforce federal laws against medical marijuana.

“The provision, which first became law in December 2014, has successfully protected patients, providers, and businesses against federal prosecution, so long as they act within the confines of their state’s medical marijuana laws,” they said in the letter that was sent this week.

It asked Republican and Democratic leaders of the House and Senate to include the provision in any final package as they negotiate a fiscal year 2018 appropriations bill to fund the government beyond Dec. 8.

U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions in May told congressional leaders in a letter that it would be “unwise” to renew the Rohrabacher-Blumenauer Amendment, saying marijuana is harmful and is banned by federal law.

Blumenauer, in a message to marijuana stakeholders and supporters, said that despite bipartisan support for the provision, the leadership of the House didn’t allow a vote on it or any other marijuana-related amendments. But the Senate Appropriations Committee included the provision in its bill.

“I’m working hard to ensure Rohrabacher-Blumenauer remains in effect to protect individuals in 46 states and thousands of state-legal businesses from federal intervention,” the Oregon congressman said in his message, emailed to The Associated Press by the Oregon Cannabis Business Council.

Blumenauer, in a telephone interview with AP last summer, said Sessions is “out of step” with most members of Congress, who have become more supportive “of ending the failed prohibition on marijuana.”

PORTLAND — Representatives of Oregon agriculture say they are wary of a proposal to reduce the state’s carbon emissions. While farmers could attract new revenue under the system, they could also face higher costs for fuel, electricity and other inputs, they say.

Oregon lawmakers in the House and Senate are currently devising carbon emission “cap-and-invest” bills to be introduced during the 2018 legislative session. The goal is to mitigate climate change by reducing the amount of “greenhouse gases” such as carbon dioxide that gets into the atmosphere.

The basic idea of the legislation is to cap the amount of carbon emissions by certain companies, with the greatest impact falling on those consuming or importing significant amounts of fossil fuels.

Facilities that fall below the cap would earn credits that can be sold to offset the emissions of companies that exceed that level.

“It harnesses market incentives by putting a price on carbon,” said Kristen Sheeran, carbon policy adviser for Oregon Gov. Kate Brown.

The State of Oregon would also sell emission allowances to regulated firms, generating money that will be used for highway improvements and to relieve the effects of higher electricity or natural gas prices, said Sheeran.

“Governor Brown wants to decarbonize the Oregon economy,” she said during the Nov. 30 meeting of the Oregon Board of Agriculture in Portland.

Some of the funds generated by the system would also fund projects that decrease or offset carbon emissions, which would benefit agriculture, she said.

“If people don’t want to do it, they don’t have to participate,” Sheeran said of the role that would be played by farmers and ranchers, who wouldn’t be regulated as emitters under the current proposals.

However, related industries, such as large food processors and pulp mills, would fall under the regulatory scheme.

For farmers, the proposal is concerning because it would raise the cost of doing business for manufacturers of fertilizer, fuel and energy — major inputs in agricultural production.

About 80 percent of Oregon’s farm goods are shipped out of state, so growers here can’t afford to have higher production costs than farmers elsewhere, said Mary Anne Cooper, public policy counsel for the Oregon Farm Bureau.

“It will make Oregon agriculture less competitive,” said Cooper.

Growers could potentially sell carbon credits they earned by turning dairy emissions into energy with anaerobic digesters, for example, or by growing crops that sequester carbon.

In California, though, farmers have often found the paperwork and verification process for generating carbon credits too cumbersome to be worthwhile, she said.

Also, growers who have already invested in reducing carbon emissions with energy efficient equipment and no-till cropping systems would likely not be compensated for past investments.

In effect, the policy would penalize early adopters of technology, Cooper said.

“We’re looking at it as a net loss for agriculture,” she said.

California and British Columbia have already implemented such carbon regulation systems, but there still isn’t enough information available to learn from those experiments, said Jeff Stone, executive director of the Oregon Association of Nurseries.

“We just don’t know its impacts,” he said.

There are opportunities for agriculture, such as investing money in planting trees along roads to absorb carbon, Stone said.

However, these possibilities must be studied more thoroughly, he said.

For example, it’s too early to know exactly how much carbon is “sequestered” through the production, sale and planting of Japanese maples or rhododendrons, Stone said.

“It needs to be part of the conversation,” he said.

Another issue is ensuring the cap-and-invest system would not drive emitting industries from Oregon to other states, which would hurt the economy without reducing emissions.

To this end, the government would probably offer free or discounted emission allowances to companies that are prone to flee, said Sheeran.

“We will provide some sort of differential treatment under the cap,” she said.

HERMISTON, Ore. — Heading into its second year at the Eastern Oregon Trade and Event Center, the Hermiston Farm Fair continues to add new lectures and seminars highlighting previously overlooked aspects of Columbia Basin agriculture.

Historically speaking, the Farm Fair has focused on the latest and greatest developments in potato production — the signature crop supported by Oregon State University’s Hermiston Agricultural Research and Extension Center.

The 44th annual event, however, introduced a number of new presentations Thursday covering topics such as organic crops, precision irrigation and pollinators.

Phil Hamm, station director at HAREC, said he did not know the exact attendance, but estimated it was in the hundreds.

“What we’re trying to do is (reach) as many of our stakeholders as possible in our region,” Hamm said.

Last year’s move to EOTEC from the Hermiston Conference Center has certainly helped, Hamm said, providing a larger venue to bring in more presenters and hold more sessions. This year’s trade show featured 48 different vendors, including multiple farm suppliers, Energy Trust of Oregon and the U.S. Department of Agriculture Farm Service Agency.

Attendees filled the room for a morning seminar on pollinators, which discussed the importance of bees and bee habitat in agricultural systems. Andony Melathopoulos, with OSU’s Pollinator Health Extension Program, said Oregon is home to more species of bees than there are east of the Mississippi River.

“It’s a hotbed of diversity,” Melathopoulos said. “People are just amazed by them.”

Melathopoulos went on to explain how farmers can treat their crops for weeds and pests while taking care not to harm pollinators. He ran through a litany of available products, demonstrating how to properly read labels and determine if and when a grower should apply certain chemicals in the field.

“Without a doubt, pollination is very important for the production of many crops,” Melathopoulos said. “I hope people came out of this session knowing pest control is possible and compatible with pollinators.”

For the first time, the Hermiston Farm Fair also organized a seminar dedicated specifically to growing organic crops. It takes three years before a farm can be certified organic, and growers must adapt to a very strict set of approved standards.

Local organic production is on the rise, said Alexandra Stone, a former organic farmer and cropping system specialist for OSU. In eastern Washington, Stone said organic sales grew sixfold at the farm gate between 2005 and 2015, from $100 million to $600 million.

“There’s already a lot of organic production out here,” she said.

Yet demand for organics is still outpacing production in the U.S., with imports exceeding exports by $1.1 billion, Stone said. With that in mind, she led a survey among 20 farmers in the room to determine what they want and need from the university to tap into the organic marketplace.

Of those polled, 79 percent said they expect demand for organics will continue to increase, yet 40 percent said they did not have the tools to control pests and disease. The vast majority of farmers said they would benefit from some kind of technical training through OSU, with more than half favoring a hybrid online undergraduate and professional development certificate program.

Later in the afternoon, Clinton Shock with the OSU Malheur Experiment Station detailed how precision irrigation can optimize yields and save farmers money, all while protecting the environment.

“We really want high and stable production of horticulture and crops,” Shock said. “Precision irrigation is really the key.”

Shock said researchers are working to determine a set of criteria known as the soil-water tension for different crops, which essentially describes the amount of energy a plant must expend to suck up water in the ground. If the tension is too high, a plant may shut down. If the tension is too low, water may leach away nutrients, leading to waste.

But if a grower knows the soil property, Shock said they can find the sweet spot. That means healthier crops for less money. Plus, as a side benefit, he said the more efficiently nitrogen is used, the more it protects groundwater quality.

“A lot of the public thinks growers are not innovative, or stuck in the mud,” Shock said. “That just isn’t so.”

The Hermiston Farm Fair will continue Friday at 8 a.m. at EOTEC before coming to a close at noon.

Oregon State University’s veterinary hospital resumed normal operations Nov. 29, ending a three-week quarantine instituted as it treated a horse with a contagious and potentially deadly neurotropic illness.

Erica McKenzie, professor of large animal internal medicine at OSU’s College of Veterinary Medicine, said no other horses got sick during the quarantine period. “The college thanks everyone for their patience and assistance during the quarantine period,” McKenzie said in a news release. The horse recovered and was taken home.

The horse became severely ill Nov. 4 at its owner’s property in Coos Bay, Ore., and was taken to OSU’s Lois Bates Acheson Veterinary Teaching Hospital for treatment.

The horse developed a mutated form of Equine Herpes Virus-1, or EHV-1, which is a common sickness in horses. It usually causes minor respiratory problems and is something like a cold is to humans, but in its mutated form the virus attacks the nervous system.

The illness often first shows up as weakness in the hind quarters, with animals stumbling or developing an unusual gait. Other signs include weak tail tone, nasal discharge, fever, and difficulty urinating. Geldings and stallions may be unable to retract their penis. Pregnant mares may abort. In rare cases, EHV-1 can cause blindness and central nervous system damage in alpacas and llamas.

Because the virus is contagious, OSU suspended elective procedures on horses, alpacas and llamas. The virus doesn’t harm humans, but people can spread it to animals after picking it up by hand or clothing contact with sick horses.

A vaccine for EHV-1 can ease symptoms of the common form of the virus, but it does not prevent animals from developing the more serious nervous system illness.

More information about EHV-1 and biosecurity recommendations are available from the American Association of Equine Practitioners at https://aaep.org/guidelines/infectious-disease-control/equine-herpesvirus-resources.

PENDLETON, Ore. — While few people attended Tuesday’s public hearing in Pendleton about proposed regulations for industrial air polluters, one industry in particular was on hand to express its displeasure with Cleaner Air Oregon: food processing.

According to the state employment department, food processing makes up 6 percent of overall employment in Umatilla County and a whopping 28 percent in neighboring Morrow County. Food processors accounted for 3,426 jobs between the two counties in 2016, along with $143 million in combined payroll.

But Craig Smith, director of government affairs for the Northwest Food Processors Association, said those companies face another layer of burdensome regulations under the Cleaner Air Oregon rules, spearheaded by Gov. Kate Brown to lower health risks posed by industrial air emissions.

“We don’t like this rule at all,” Smith said. “It’s way too broad, and the cost of the program will be enormous for very little benefit.”

Smith was one of 14 people who attended the hearing Tuesday at the Pendleton Public Library, and half of those were employees of the Oregon Health Authority and Department of Environmental Quality, which are working to develop the rules. Similar meetings were held Nov. 15 in Medford, Nov. 16 in Coos Bay and Nov. 20 in Corvallis, with future dates scheduled in Portland, Eugene, Salem and The Dalles.

Debbie Radie, vice president of operations at Boardman Foods and chairwoman of the Northwest Food Processors Association Board of Directors, was the only person to testify Tuesday, saying the proposed rules are “poorly designed and unworkable.”

Cleaner Air Oregon was established last year in response to toxic air emissions in 2016 Bullseye Glass in southeast Portland. Yet rather than address sources of emissions that DEQ knows to be an issue, Radie said the agency is targeting companies like hers that are already subject to regulation.

“There is no plan in this rule to identify sources of emissions that are not currently permitted,” Radie said. “The only way this rule will reduce emissions is to force companies to curtail or stop production. The level of uncertainty does not create an environment where businesses and communities thrive.”

The draft rules, released Oct. 20, would require companies to report their use of 600 chemicals, including heavy metals and other air pollutants. Facilities would then need to calculate potential health risks to nearby communities, considering what if any health problems may be caused by short- and long-term exposure.

From there, DEQ may require additional steps — such as a risk reduction plan or conditional permit — to mitigate the risk. Keith Johnson, who serves as special assistant to the director of Cleaner Air Oregon, said the goal is to use health-based standards for reducing harmful air toxics.

“A facility that’s in a remote location would be much less risky than a similar one located in the middle of a city or town,” Johnson explained. “Smaller facilities would likely not be impacted because of low risk and low emissions.”

Out of 2,500 businesses with DEQ air quality permits, Johnson said only the 80 highest-risk facilities would be regulated by the program in the first five years.

But in her testimony, Radie said the rule would not be based on verified science and data, but rather by asking already permitted facilities to submit data that would be entered into a “very crude, inaccurate and misleading formula to determine theoretical risk.”

Cleaner Air Oregon also factors the cumulative effects of industrial emissions in a given area, which Radie said may cause some companies with minimal emissions to be dragged into a full-blown risk assessment process just by being near an industrial location.

Boardman Foods, an onion processing plant, is located at the Port of Morrow’s East Beach Industrial Park near Boardman, which includes other value-added processors such as Lamb Weston and Tillamook Cheese.

Smith said the added cost of complying with the program might not force food processors to close their doors, but could make them less competitive moving forward.

“That’s a huge deal,” he said. “Right now, there is a lot of investment being made both by the processors and our suppliers.”

The Oregon Legislature is expected to consider a fee structure for Cleaner Air Oregon in the coming session, and the Environmental Quality Commission may decide to adopt all or part of the rule as early as July 2018.

PORTLAND — Solar power development on farmland is increasingly raising alarm, potentially leading to new land use restrictions in two Oregon counties.

A growing “cluster” of solar energy sites in Oregon’s Willamette Valley has prompted Yamhill and Marion county governments to consider barring such development on several higher-quality farmland soil classes, said Jim Johnson, land use specialist with the Oregon Department of Agriculture.

The restrictions would go beyond the current rules established by Oregon’s Land Conservation and Development Commission, which limit solar development on prime farmland to 12 acres.

“We’ve got enough concern for two counties to take this on their own and not wait for LCDC,” Johnson said during a Nov. 28 meeting of the Oregon Board of Agriculture, which advises ODA.

New statewide rules for solar development on farmland are also being considered by LCDC, though the agency is reluctant to announce a time frame for taking action, he said.

If LCDC set a deadline to enact stricter regulations for solar power facilities on farmland, it could result in a “land rush” among developers to seek new sites under the more lenient current rules, Johnson said.

With the upcoming 2018 legislative session, the agency also likely feels that it can’t devote resources to new solar rules in the short term, he said.

Wetlands on farmland are also controversial in Oregon agriculture, with Tillamook County considering a new regulatory approach to such developments.

Oregon lawmakers have allowed Tillamook County to require wetland developments to obtain conditional use permits, whereas conversion of farmland to wetlands is allowed outright elsewhere in the state.

As part of this pilot project, the county may also devise a system to steer wetland development toward certain areas while preserving farmland elsewhere.

Representatives of the agricultural and environmental communities appear to be rethinking their original approach to the problem, said Johnson.

The initial idea was to create a map of areas where wetland development is appropriate, but that concept appears to be falling out of favor, he said.

Tillamook County has some of the best grazing land in the state, so it’s difficult to prioritize certain areas over others, Johnson said.

“It’s just not that clear-cut,” he said.

Instead, stakeholders are moving toward a checklist of factors that would help determine whether a site is appropriate for wetland development on a case-by-case basis, Johnson said.

A potential electrical transmission line in Tillamook County is also worrisome to dairy farmers whose properties it may traverse, he said.

Stray voltage of electricity can be damaging to cattle health, but dairies are also concerned about impediments to aerial spraying and “big gun” field applications of manure, he said.

Short-term rentals of homes through popular online websites such as Airbnb are often blamed for aggravating housing shortages in cities, but the issue is cropping up on farmland as well.

Popular Oregon tourist destinations such as the Hood River Valley and Sauvie Island are increasingly seeing farm dwellings devoted to short-term rentals, Johnson said.

Arguably, such rentals deviate from the approved use of farm dwellings, which are meant to provide housing to farmers and farm workers, not tourists, he said.

While such rentals may encourage agritourism, growers worry about the “tail wagging the dog” — a situation where surrounding agriculture basically provides an excuse for rentals, Johnson said.

The issue has gained enough prominence that it’s likely to spur legislation in 2018 or 2019, he said.

In other board business:

• A year since a state audit criticized the Oregon Department of Agriculture’s backlog of food safety inspections, the agency has reported a major reduction in those overdue inspections.

The backlog has been cut from 2,841 overdue inspections to 739, in part due to an electronic inspection timing system and a reduction of ODA staff time dedicated to federal regulations, according to Alexis Taylor, the agency’s director.

• The board has recommended five farmers to serve on the 12-member commission of the Oregon Agricultural Heritage Program, which is aimed at preserving farmland with easements:

• Doug Krahmer, a blueberry farmer with several operations in Western and Central Oregon.

• Woody Wolfe, a farmer and rancher in Wallowa County who has has established two easements.

• Ken Bailey, a farmer who manages 2,500 acres of fruit orchards in the Columbia Gorge.

• Chad Allen, a dairy farmer from Tillamook County who serves on the Oregon Dairy Farmers Association board.

• Lois Loop, a retired USDA employee who produces grass seed, small grains and clover in Polk County, will serve in a position specializing in agricultural water.

The commission’s remaining seven members will be chosen by Oregon State University, the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission, the Land Conservation and Development Commission and the Oregon Watershed Enhancement Board.

HERMISTON, Ore. — Hermiston High School sophomore Jenna Wallace stood Tuesday morning in front of a class of third-graders at West Park Elementary School, unfazed by her sudden role reversal from student to teacher, and enthusiastically launched into a carefully planned lesson about the life cycle of a pumpkin.

It all starts with a seed, Wallace explained, which later grows into a sprout and then a vine. The vine produces bright yellow flowers, which eventually become small green pumpkins and, finally, the big orange pumpkins everyone knows and loves to carve into jack-o’-lanterns at Halloween. The kids followed along by drawing pictures of each life stage on their worksheets, and numbered them one through six in order.

Wallace was joined at the head of the class by fellow HHS students Logan Sinor, Garrett Hills, Maleena Moore, Jayda Hoston, Ellen Jakobsen and Diana Egerer as part of the high school’s annual fall Agriculture in the Classroom tour. More than 50 high-schoolers participated in the event, visiting every elementary school in the Hermiston School District and giving agriculture-themed lessons to 946 first, second and third grade students.

Once the kids finished coloring their perfect pumpkins, Wallace and the rest of the group helped to serve a tasty snack of graham crackers topped with pumpkin pie filling.

“This is something I look forward to each season we do it,” Wallace said. “It’s fun to see their faces light up when we walk in.”

As a statewide nonprofit organization, Oregon Agriculture in the Classroom strives to educate students on the importance of farming and natural resources by providing lesson plans to K-12 teachers that highlight agriculture, while also promoting skills in math, science, history and nutrition.

Jessica Jansen, the group’s executive director, said they are supported through grants and donations from the agricultural community. Their mission is to work with local partners — such as Hermiston FFA — to improve agricultural literacy, provide a basic understanding of farming and help to bridge the urban-rural divide.

“It’s a small portion of Oregonians involved in the actual growing and producing of food and other agricultural products,” Jansen said. “We want students to think of agriculture as an opportunity for them in the future.”

Last school year, Oregon Agriculture in the Classroom reached more than 190,000 students in all 36 counties across the state, according to stats provided by the organization. Jansen said she is always impressed with the level of involvement in Hermiston.

“Hermiston does a fantastic job, and they have an ability to reach so many students with so many elementary schools in the district,” she said.

Brianna Smith, agriculture teacher at HHS, developed Tuesday’s pumpkin lesson through tools provided by Agriculture in the Classroom. She watched from the back of the classroom with a wide grin as her pupils took charge, leading the discussion and calling on kids to answer questions.

“It makes me so proud,” Smith said. “I just get butterflies inside, and I can’t stop smiling.”

Smith, who taught second and third grade at Rocky Heights Elementary before moving to the high school earlier this year, said Agriculture in the Classroom literacy programs are about the only science some of these younger students will receive as teachers are constrained by other required standards.

As for the high school kids, Smith said they too gain valuable educational skills and experience.

“I want them to walk away with just the importance of teaching and advocating for agriculture,” she said.

Smith said HHS will do an Agriculture in the Classroom tour this spring as well for fourth-graders, only this time it will be entirely up to the high-schoolers to plan, prepare and conduct their own lesson plans.

Sinor, a sophomore at HHS, was quick to point out that Hermiston is an agricultural community, and said it is important for kids to understand from an early age where their food comes from and why farmers are so necessary.

“The world wouldn’t survive without agriculture, and it’s important for kids to know how much work it is and how much we need it,” Sinor said.

Hills, a fellow sophomore, said Agriculture in the Classroom allows kids to be creative, while possibly planting a seed for the next generation of agricultural leaders.

“Helping kids to learn about agriculture, it could spark some ideas in their head,” Hills said. “They could help feed the world, and make the world a better place.”

Agriculture in the Classroom is another way, too, to show kids that modern agriculture is more than just sows, cows and plows, Wallace added.

“Really, agriculture can branch out to these students as well,” she said. “Anyone can be involved in that.”

BANDON - Several Bandon businesses are holding open houses and customer appreciation days. A few are listed below:

U.S. District Court Judge Anna Brown sentenced defendant Darryl Thorn on Tuesday to a year and a half in federal prison followed by three years supervised release for his role in last year’s occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge.

Following prison time, Brown ordered Thorn be released to a halfway house for up to 90 days.

In March, a jury found Thorn guilty of conspiracy to impede federal officers as well as carrying a firearm in a federal facility. Both are felonies. Brown also found Thorn guilty of two misdemeanors: trespassing and tampering with vehicles and equipment.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Ethan Knight asked Brown to sentence Thorn to 27 months in prison. Thorn’s defense attorney, Jay Nelson, asked for a sentence of supervised release.

“Mr. Thorn, this doesn’t get any easier, the more I look at the issue,” Brown said in handing down her sentence.

Prior to his trial, prosecutors offered Thorn a deal: He could plead guilty to trespassing, a misdemeanor, and they would dismiss the other charges. Thorn instead decided to go to trial.

During the trial, prosecutors presented evidence of Thorn holding firearms on the refuge and performing what they described as guard duty from inside a refuge fire tower.

During one video shown at trial, Thorn is seen in the refuge bunkhouse, sitting on a bar stool smoking a cigarette. The video was taken just after police shot and killed occupation spokesman LaVoy Finicium, after he fled police. The remaining occupiers were fearful, trying to decide whether to stay or leave.

“All I see is a bunch of salty motherf------,” Thorn said in the video. “We came here for one reason and that’s to fight.”

Another occupation leader, Blaine Cooper, suggests in the video leaving the refuge in a firetruck and heading for Idaho to regroup. Cooper said they could put five armed people on the truck and “if they try and follow us, lay lead down.”

Thorn is heard disagreeing with the plan.

Prior to Thorn’s sentencing hearing, Nelson provided the judge with a detailed mental health evaluation. While the report wasn’t released publicly, aspects of it were discussed in court.

Nelson described Thorn’s childhood as “appalling” as well as “hard to listen to” and “hard to read.” Several times, he said that Thorn had no one to teach him right from wrong.

Nelson said Thorn suffers from “cognitive issue” and has a history of substance abuse.

Judge Brown said she took those factors into account in handing down her sentence. But she added that while it helped explain his conduct at the refuge, his background did not justify his actions. 

“I’m giving you the benefit, Mr. Thorn, of every favorable inference,” she said, adding that if he had future run-ins with the law, other judges likely wouldn’t be as lenient.

Thorn’s pretrial release was revoked in April after he threatened to hang himself on Facebook and also threatened his then girlfriend.

“This has been a two years of hell,” Thorn said in court Tuesday. “I have a life. I have a family that I would like to get back to ... If you determine you want to impose more time on me, I accept that.”

In handing down her sentence, Brown noted things Thorn did not say.

“I haven’t heard you say you’re sorry for being engaged at the refuge,” Brown said. “I’m not asking you to say those things. I’m just noting what wasn’t said.”

Prior to the start of the hearing, defendant Duane Ehmer, who Brown sentenced to 12 months and one day behind bars, rode his horse Hellboy along the sidewalk outside the Mark O. Hatfield Courthouse in downtown Portland in support of Thorn.

“Tell Darryl I love him,” Ehmer said.

Andrew Kohlmetz, the defense attorney for Jason Patrick, relayed the message inside in the courtroom.

“Duane is outside,” Kohlmetz told Thorn in court prior to the hearing. “He says he loves you.”

“Does he have Hellboy out there?” Thorn asked.

Kohlmetz nodded yes.

“Yeah!” Thorn said. “That’s what I’m talking about.”

Lawmakers are under more pressure to act after a wildfire season that was particularly harrowing. Nearly 9 million acres – an area about the size of New Jersey and Connecticut combined – burned. Intense smoke hit many of the West’s major cities, including Denver, the San Francisco Bay Area and Portland.

The devastating California wine country fire, which killed 43 and destroyed nearly 9,000 homes and other buildings, competed for national attention with the hurricanes that hit Houston, Florida and Puerto Rico.

“What’s made it different this year is that it’s now clear that the fires are bigger and hotter and more powerful,” said Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Oregon. He’s a central figure in the congressional fight over wildfire funding and forest policy.

Decades of suppressing fire has left Western forests choked with dense stands of smaller trees and brush. Combine that with hotter, drier weather driven by climate change and it’s produced a crisis as real as the flooding in Houston.

And here’s what’s making the problem worse: The U.S. Forest Service now spends more than half its budget fighting fires, up from just 16 percent in 1995. That means it is running out of money to work on fire prevention, particularly in the wildfire-prone communities where some 120 million Americans now live.

Wyden has fought for years to offload the cost of fighting big fires from the Forest Service onto the nation’s disaster agencies. That would put it more in line with how the U.S. handles hurricanes and earthquakes.

“The big fires ought to be treated for what they are, which are natural disasters,” Wyden said. “And you don’t raid the prevention fund to put them out.”

The Democratic senator’s so-called “wildfire funding fix” has gained wide support in Congress. But Republicans say it’s not enough. They insist Forest Service funding be tied to what they see as the real solution: A return to robust commercial logging on federal lands.

“I tell people I think we’ve loved our trees to death, and we’ve swung the pendulum way too far on trying to preserve timber instead of conserve timber,” said Rep. Bruce Westerman, R-Arkansas. “You know, preservation is what you do with art in a museum.”

Westerman, the only trained forester in Congress, is chief sponsor of the Resilient Federal Forests Act.

That measure, which passed the House on a 232-188 vote on Nov. 1, would override many of the environmental restrictions that dramatically shrunk federal timber harvests. Westerman says that more intensively managed forests are less likely to face catastrophic burns.

One of his chief allies is Rep. Greg Walden, R-Oregon, who adds that more logging helps reduce fuel loads while boosting the Forest Service budget.

“When the country changed and said, ‘We’re not going to do that anymore. We’re not going to engage in active harvests,’ you lost that revenue stream that used to pay for those things,” Walden said. “I’d like to see us get back partially.”

Similar bills died in the Senate in past years as Democrats sided with environmental groups. This year, Republicans control both chambers and the White House. But they can’t overcome a Senate filibuster. Democrats say the crisis is too big to get hung up fighting over environmental laws.

“Why go to the timber wars of the past if we have the solutions sitting right in front of us,” said Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Oregon.

He noted that the Forest Service has a backlog of 1.6 million acres of thinning projects in Oregon that’s already cleared environmental reviews. The agency just keeps having to put off the work as it spends more money fighting fires.

Mark Webb, a former Grant County commissioner in eastern Oregon now involved in forest restoration efforts, has an on-the-ground appreciation of that. 

He said the 2015 Canyon Creek fire, which destroyed 43 homes and consumed 110,000 acres, came after the Forest Service wasn’t able to afford all of the thinning work planned for the area.

“It wouldn’t have done near the damage if we had been able to implement those treatments,” said Webb, who heads the Blue Mountains Forest Partners. That group works to develop broad agreement on forest restoration projects, and Webb said there is a lot of work that can be done without changing environmental laws. 

Randi Spivak, public lands director for of the Center for Biological Diversity, is fighting the Westerman bill. She said past commercial logging has already contributed to the growing wildfire risk.

“National Service lands were heavily logged,” Spivak said, “so we have changed these forests tremendously because of commercial timber production, taking out the large fire-resistant trees.”

Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue, whose agency oversees the Forest Service, has been an ally of Wyden in trying to get a permanent wildfire funding fix. 

“I do think the momentum this year is greater than it has been in the past,” said Perdue, adding that forcing the Forest Service to borrow from prevention programs to pay for fighting fires is no way to run an agency.

There are also several attempts at a compromise. For example, Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Washington, has authored a bill that includes provisions sought by both the timber industry and environmentalists.

“I think there’s a deal to be had here,” Walden said in an early November interview.

But since then, the Trump administration has come out with its latest disaster relief request, which does not include any wildfire provisions. Several lawmakers have looked at the next disaster-aid legislation as a possible vehicle for dealing with wildfire.

Merkley, who serves on the Senate Appropriations Committee, has also been trying to pump more money into the Forest Service budget to work on forest restoration. But he expressed disappointment at a package drafted by the committee that he says is inadequate.

Anything that Congress does is likely to be just a start.

John Bailey, a professor at Oregon State University’s School of Forestry, said previous generations were wrong to think they could stamp out every wildfire with no consequences.

Bailey said it’s going to take more money, more use of controlled burns and many years to get on top of the problem. 

“Smoke in the air in the interior West,” he said, “is as much a reality as rain during the winter.”