FRIDAY, MAY 18

Fridays

An Oregon juice manufacturer has received a warning letter from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for inadequately controlling for patulin, a harmful fungal toxin.

The Hood River Juice Co., which sells apple juices and ciders under the “Ryan’s” brand, used a system of inspection and sorting that wouldn’t sufficiently limit patulin below 50 parts per billion, according to FDA.

When FDA officials inspected the company’s facility in Hood River, Ore., in late 2017, they noted that internal tests had identified three batches with patulin levels of 187, 92 and 67 parts per billion.

“Even a small percentage of rotten, moldy, and damaged apples may contain high levels of patulin to result in the finished product exceeding FDA’s action level for patulin of 50 ppb,” the warning letter said. “Any apples which are rotten, moldy, bruised or damaged should be trimmed or culled from production.”

Apples at the facility were stored “outside for extended periods without atmospheric or temperature controls in open, wooden bins,” increasing the likelihood they’d become contaminated with the toxin, the agency said.

The FDA said the Hood River Juice Co. had violated “hazard analysis and critical control points,” or HACCP, regulations by manufacturing an adulterated product.

While the company responded to the inspection by vowing to revise its HACCP plan to deal with the problem, the agency hasn’t yet received that update.

The agency also faulted the company for not properly monitoring cleanliness of food contact surfaces to prevent cross-contamination, such as leaving “clumps of apple mash on mesh press bags after cleaning” and “peeling paint with apparent black, mold-like growth on the ceiling above press bags.”

Hood River Juice Co. sent a response to FDA claiming to have corrected these problems but hasn’t provided documentation, the agency said.

Inspectors also found the company mixed batches of apple juice to lower patulin levels, which isn’t allowed under federal law and still renders the finished product adulterated, according to the warning letter.

Batches containing more than 50 parts per billion of patulin were diverted by Hood River Juice Co. for products intended to be fermented for vinegar or cider, the FDA said. The agency recommended the company get “written assurances” from clients that fermentation would occur.

David Ryan, the company’s president, did not reply to requests for comment.

State Rep. Knute Buehler, R-Bend, emerged victorious from a surprisingly tough Oregon Republican gubernatorial primary Tuesday and will now face Democratic Gov. Kate Brown in the general election.

Brown easily won a lightly contested Democratic primary as she readies for her second general-election campaign in two years. In 2016, she was elected to fill the last two years of the term of John Kitzhaber, who resigned amid a scandal involving his fiancee’s consulting work.

Buehler, a state representative and orthopedic surgeon from Bend, was the only GOP candidate with a large campaign fund. His opponents couldn’t match his heavy spending on TV ads and mailers.

But Buehler frequently found himself getting into hot water with party activists who didn’t think he was conservative enough. They particularly criticized him for refusing to embrace President Donald Trump and for describing himself as pro-choice on abortion. Buehler’s recent vote in favor of a gun-control bill related to domestic abuse also rankled many gun-rights activists.

Bend businessman Sam Carpenter and retired Naval aviator Greg Wooldridge mounted the toughest challenges to Buehler.

Carpenter tied himself closely to Trump, adopting the campaign slogan “Make Oregon Great Again” and proclaiming that he too was a take-charge CEO in the mold of the president.

Wooldridge, who led the Navy’s famed Blue Angels stunt team, won the endorsement of Oregon Right to Life, the state’s major anti-abortion group. He argued that his leadership of the Lemoore Naval Air Station in California showed that he knew how to manage complex organizations.

The low turnout in the race — fewer than half the state’s 700,000 Republican voters were expected to take part — added a big level of uncertainty as Tuesday’s election approached.

“We know the Republican Party is a collection of tribes,” that ranges from wealthy business people to anti-abortion evangelicals, said Greg Leo, a former executive director of the state GOP. “And who wins may depend on turnout.”

Buehler, describing himself as “fiercely independent,” pitched himself as someone who could also appeal well outside the Republican base — which he said was necessary given that the party’s nominees regularly fail to win statewide contests. In fact, no Republican has won an Oregon governor’s race since 1982.

Buehler’s advertising accused Brown of a series of management failures as governor, on issues as varied as the state’s troubled foster care system and the big financial problems facing the state’s public employee retirement system.

He drained most of his bank account in a $1.5 million advertising blitz. Buehler said his campaign always planned to spend big in the primary because it was a good time to communicate with voters.

But his rivals – and many others – took it as a sign of how worried the Buehler campaign was about making it through the primary. At one point, Buehler also released a radio ad and a mailer attacking Carpenter for having a series of personal and business tax liens.

Carpenter scoffed that Buehler exaggerated the extent of his tax problems and noted that he had always eventually paid all that he owed.

Buehler often skipped events featuring his rivals and didn’t agree to participate in a debate until the end of the campaign. On the Friday before Tuesday’s primary, the three top candidates appeared together for an hour on the Portland-based talk show hosted by conservative Lars Larson.

In that event, Buehler turned the tables on Carpenter, coming at him from the right. Buehler – and Wooldridge – both said they would refuse to enforce a proposed ballot measure that would ban military-style semi-automatic firearms.

Carpenter said he strongly opposed the initiative but that it would be his job as governor to enforce the law. The next day, he said he bungled the answer by failing to talk about how he would push hard to have the measure overturned by the courts, should it become law.

By the time election night rolled around, Buehler reported having about $450,000 left in his campaign bank account. Brown, meanwhile, is sitting on a $3.7 million campaign fund.

Democrat Jaime McLeod-Skinner triumphed over six rivals to win the party’s nomination to take on GOP Rep. Greg Walden in Oregon’s vast — and conservative — Second Congressional District.

Walden, a Republican from Hood River, easily won his GOP primary contest against two others. The congressman chairs the House Energy & Commerce Committee and has handily been re-elected ever since he first won Oregon’s Second Congressional District in 1998.

The district, which covers all of eastern Oregon and a chunk of southern Oregon, is by far the most conservative of the state’s five congressional districts. In years past, Democratic strategists have generally conceded the district. The party’s nomination could often be had for the asking.

Not this year.

Large and angry crowds besieged Walden at a series of town halls he held around his district in the spring. They criticized him for helping write a bill to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act.

Activists began regularly protesting at Walden’s district offices. And no fewer than seven Democrats signed up to run for his seat.

McLeod-Skinner was one of the first to get in the race and said she has logged more than 30,000 miles traversing the district, which is larger than any state east of the Mississippi River. She’s had a varied career, working overseas on reconstruction in war-torn Bosnia and as a planner in California, where she served on the Santa Clara City Council.

Back in Oregon, McLeod-Skinner was the Phoenix city manager for just four months before being fired in 2017. She blamed it on a dysfunctional City Council.

Following her victory Tuesday, McLeod-Skinner praised her fellow Democrats and expressed confidence that she could win in November.

She said she’s heard from rural Oregonians who are dissatisfied with Walden.

“Regardless of political affiliation, we all care about our families. We all care about our communities. And we want good representation, someone who shows up, listens and cares about our community,” McLeod-Skinner told OPB. “And that’s what I have to offer, and that’s what Greg Walden’s not offering.”

Physician Jenni Neahring came in behind McLeod-Skinner, while Jim Crary — a retired lawyer who has challenged Walden before and lost in 2016 — came in third.

The other candidates were: retired Chrysler executive Tim White, teacher Raz Mason, retired maritime official Eric Burnette and stonemason Michael Byrne.

The seven held a series of joint candidate forums around the district. They focused their criticism on Walden and spoke positively of each other.

The district is still considered safely Republican by national handicappers. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has released an ambitious list of 101 Republican seats it is targeting. Oregon’s Second Congressional seat is not among them.

But Democrats are hoping they can give Walden a tougher race this time. The Oregon Democratic Party has set up a website — titled “repeal Walden” — to collect contributions for the primary victor.

“The political winds are shifting and Republicans like Greg Walden will face serious challenges to their re-election in November,” said state Democratic chairwoman Jeanne Atkins in announcing the website.

The owner of a controversial Oregon dairy wants to sell the facility and cattle rather than immediately liquidate the herd as sought by a major creditor.

Greg te Velde, owner of Lost Valley Farm in Boardman, Ore., has asked a bankruptcy judge for permission hire a real estate broker to sell the dairy and nearly 7,300 acres for $95 million.

Roughly 8,750 milk and dry cows and 3,380 heifers would be listed for $14 million under the proposed agreement with Schuil & Associates, a brokerage firm specializing in agriculture in Visalia, Calif.

A potential investor may already be interested in the dairy.

During a recent court hearing, an attorney for Washington Agri Investments, a limited liability company based in Spokane, Wash., said the firm is looking at buying the property.

However, Rabobank — which loaned more than $60 million to te Velde — still wants to hold an auction as soon as possible to sell off Lost Valley Farm’s cattle, arguing the herd is losing its worth.

An auction was scheduled for April 27 but was canceled when te Velde filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, which automatically stayed all foreclosure actions while he restructures debt.

Rabobank claims that Lost Valley Farm hasn’t kept pace with replacing older cows and is producing less milk than other comparable herds partly due to its “shoestring budget.”

“My collateral goes down in value every day,” said Richard Rogan, attorney for the bank, during a recent court hearing.

The dairy lacks fresh water or bathrooms for employees and has lost its milk contract with the Tillamook County Creamery Association, which will stop accepting milk from the facility at the end of May, he said.

The facility is out of compliance with its court judgment with the Oregon Department of Agriculture over wastewater management and its general manager and animal waste engineer have both resigned, said Rogan.

Meanwhile, te Velde’s own budget projects the dairy will continue losing money, he said. “There’s absolutely no way this dairy can continue.”

For these reasons, Rabobank is asking the bankruptcy court to lift the automatic stay against foreclosure actions as to the Lost Valley Farm dairy.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Fredrick Clement, who is overseeing the case, will accept further written arguments on the matter and has scheduled a hearing for May 30 at which he expects to make a decision.

Te Velde owns two other dairies in California that would still be protected against foreclosure under the bankruptcy proceedings — one in Tipton valued at $40 million and another in Corcoran valued at $36 million.

According to his most recently filed financial schedules, te Velde owns $249 million in assets and owes $162 million in debt.

Emmett Earl Pryor, a former chairman of the Oregon Wheat Commission and past president of the National Association of Wheat Growers, died May 11, 2018, at his home in Salem, Ore. He was 92.

Blake Rowe, current CEO of the Oregon Wheat Growers League and Oregon Wheat Commission, said Pryor was a strong advocate for Oregon agriculture.

“Oregon Wheat notes with sadness the passing of one of its most respected grower leaders,” Rowe said. “We extend our deep appreciation for his service and our condolences to his family.”

As president of the National Association of Wheat Growers, Pryor was featured in the April 1984 cover story of Oregon Business magazine, detailing his role lobbying for the industry in the face of record surpluses, low prices and export difficulties caused by a strong dollar.

In the article, Pryor was described by one agricultural expert as “very dogged. ... He’ll be in there fighting and scratching and clawing for his members.”

Pryor was born in Condon, Ore., July 12, 1925. His mother, Julia Jones Pryor, preceded him in death when he was three years old. He was raised by his father, Emmet Pryor, and his step-mother, Jean Law Pryor.

He graduated in 1943 from Condon High School, where he was student body president and senior class president. He enlisted in the U.S. Navy immediately after graduation. After attending Oklahoma University, he served on the USS Merrimack as engineering officer.

After World War II, Pryor returned to Condon and began farming. He believed deeply in public service and advocacy for agriculture and specifically the wheat industry, according to his family. He once said in a speech that “Every man worth his salt should give back to his community and industry at least 10 percent.”

He was as good as his word.

He served on numerous community and industry commissions and boards, including the Gilliam County Assessor Advisory Committee, Gilliam County Board of Equalization, Gilliam County Budget Board, Gilliam County School District 25, the Budget Advisory Board, Gilliam County Board of Review, chairman, Gilliam County Grain Growers as chairman, Mid-Columbia Production Credit Association, Oregon Highway Federation and the Oregon State Extension Advisory Board.

He was also on the Oregon Agricultural Research and Extension Project Advisory Board, Committee for Senate Bill 100/LCDC Citizen Advisory Committee, Oregonians for Food and Shelter as a founding member, Agriculture Political Action League as a founding member, Oregon Wheat League as president, Agriculture Recovery Council as a founder and chairman, Oregon Wheat Commission as chairman, Council for Economic Development in Oregon as founder and chairman, Oregon Economic Development Commission, National Association of Wheat Growers as president and the U.S. Commission on Agriculture Trade and Export Policy.

Pryor was preceded in death by his wife of 30 years, Bernice “Peetie” Petroff of The Dalles, Ore.

He is survived by his wife, Laura Pryor of Salem; son, Marc and Paula Pryor of Torrance, Calif.; son, Ty Pryor of Condon; grandchildren, Damon Pryor of Damascus, Brittany Pryor Lodge of Boise, Idaho, and Stephanie Moore of Maryland; and great-grandchildren, Maggie and Grant Pryor of Damascus; nieces and nephews that he was always very close to, Rod and Jean Pryor of Olympia, Wash.; Joyce and Mike Allen of Brewster, Wash.; Scott Pryor of Spokane, Wash.; Larry and Kay Lear of Condon, David and Marlene Johnson of Bend, and Julie Johnson of Florida.

Memorial contributions may be made to the Condon Scholarship Foundation, P.O. Box 385, Condon, Oregon 97823.

A celebration of life will be held at the Condon Elks Lodge at noon Saturday, May 19, for family and friends; lunch will be served.

Sign the condolence book at sweeneymortuary.com

LANGLOIS — During last year’s state track meet, few people saw Pacific coming.

Capital Press

ONTARIO, Ore. — Idaho State Department of Agriculture efforts to administer the new federal Produce Safety Rule will work well if the agency sets clear expectations, makes the system practical for multi-state growers and can easily adapt to future changes in federal standards.

Those sentiments emerged as clear themes at an ISDA-hosted meeting May 15 in Ontario, Ore., part of a key produce-growing region that includes neighboring communities in southwest Idaho. ISDA is developing administrative rules tied to a new Idaho law.

“It just brings a little more awareness about what we have got to do with our growers on being up to par on this subject,” said Jeff Robins, operations manager with Champion Produce, a packing shed in Parma, Idaho. Champion already has a food-safety program.

“We’ve got improvements to be made,” said Jackie Williams, owner of Williams Fruit Ranch in Emmett, Idaho. For example, the orchard will evaluate its apple juicing, which is contracted to a third party.

Produce-industry representatives said ISDA farm inspections could cause problems where growers are based in Idaho but have fields in Oregon.

ISDA said the standards are the same no matter which agency administers the rule and inspects farms, and that an Idaho-Oregon operator would not need separate inspections.

The Produce Safety Rule establishes science-based minimum standards for growing, harvesting, packing and holding produce generally consumed raw. It currently applies to hops and wine grapes as well.

In a law passed March 20 to take effect July 1, the Idaho Legislature authorized ISDA to administer and enforce the federal rule and conduct on-farm inspections. The department has said the state’s agriculture industry requested this due largely to existing relationships with ISDA. Federal grants are covering the effort so far.

At the May 15 meeting, industry representatives speculated about how packing sheds would be covered, and expressed concern about the rule’s water-quality standards changing unexpectedly.

ISDA Chief of Staff Pamm Juker said the rule covers packing sheds that share ownership with a farm. As for water quality, any proposed change would involve its own comment period and compliance deadlines.

ISDA’s draft administrative rule includes procedures by which the state could request the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to grant a variance, such as when a local growing condition interferes with standard compliance. A variance would be granted only to a grower who scientifically demonstrates safety would not be reduced and produce would not be adulterated, Juker said.

The Produce Safety Rule is in effect for large farms. Mid-sized farms must comply by next Jan. 28. Small farms have until January 2020, but those averaging less than $25,000 in annual revenue for three years are exempt.

ISDA is taking comments on proposed administrative rules until May 31. Meetings are scheduled at 10 a.m. Pacific time on May 22 at Fairfield Inn and Suites, Moscow, and at 10 a.m. May 29 at Best Western Plus Burley Inn, Burley.

Oregon is getting better at identifying and rectifying water quality problems but conditions are still far from “rainbows and unicorns,” according to the state’s top environmental regulators.

Traditionally, Oregon has implemented projects aimed at improving water quality without sufficiently monitoring how those efforts were working, said Richard Whitman, director of Oregon’s Department of Environmental Quality.

Over the past five years or so, however, the state’s approach to preventing “non-point” pollution from agriculture has strengthened the government’s ability to analyze on-the-ground data over time, he said.

“Without that, we’re flying blind,” Whitman said. “We haven’t had that historically in Oregon until recently.”

Officials from DEQ and members of the Environmental Quality Commission — which oversees the agency — recently toured streams near The Dalles that had garnered additional scrutiny under the state’s agricultural water quality program.

The Oregon Department of Agriculture is charged with enforcing the agricultural water quality program but DEQ sets the standards for water quality and reviews conditions.

“We are the regulatory function and they are the science function,” said John Byers, manager of ODA’s agricultural water quality program. “We work in tandem.”

According to DEQ’s most recent water quality index for Oregon’s rivers, about 49 percent of sites were “excellent or good,” 18 percent were “fair” and 33 percent were “poor or very poor.”

In 2017, about 34 percent of sites were considered to be “improving,” 8 percent were “declining” and the rest showed no trend. To compare, 24 percent were improving and 6 percent were declining in 2016.

Forests had the largest proportion of good and excellent sites, at about 75 percent, and the smallest proportion of poor and very poor sites, at less than 10 percent.

More than 40 percent of the river sites in cities were of “very poor” water quality, the highest level of any other land use.

“Urban areas, as we might suspect, have some of the worst water quality problems in the state,” said Whitman.

Roughly 25 percent of the river sites on agricultural lands were rated “very poor” and 35 percent were rated “poor.” About 30 percent were considered “good” or “excellent,” while remaining sites on farmland were “fair.”

Since 2013, the ODA has focused on water quality in “strategic implementation areas” in which the agency relies on aerial photos and other data to find problems, rather than depend solely on complaints.

Wasco County has had three SIAs in Mill Creek, Threemile Creek and Eightmile Creek, partly because the county’s soil and water conservation district was eager to participate in the new approach. Byers said.

“Initially, it seemed a little scary to invite the regulators in,” said Shilah Olson, district manager of the Wasco SWCD.

Landowners identified as having water quality problems have sought help from local soil and water conservation districts without ODA having to issue penalties, said Byers.

“It’s not about enforcement, it’s about compliance,” he said.

Mary Sandoz, a farmer near The Dalles, built a roof over a hog pen to prevent runoff into nearby Mill Creek as part of the SIA program.

Because they were in one of the earliest SIAs, farmers near the waterway wanted to set a good precedent, she said.

“Are we being made an example of? Because that’s almost what it felt like,” Sandoz said.

Once landowners meet with ODA and learn about the SIA process, their concerns are usually dispelled, Byers said.

At the end of those meetings, farmers are asked, “Does this scare you?” he said. “Typically the answer is no.”

ONTARIO, Ore. (AP) — Major repairs are in store for the Malheur Siphon, a steel pipe that carries irrigation water to farmers from the Malheur Reservoir.

The siphon that’s about 80 years old stretches for more than four miles across the valley between Vale and Ontario.

The Ontario Argus-Observer reports the work is needed because of unstable, shifting soil around Malheur Butte, which has destabilized support structures on which the siphon rests. Moreover, the outer skin of the siphon has wrinkled because of the expansion and contraction caused by changes in temperatures.

The Owyhee Irrigation District recently accepted a bid on the repair work for $656,000. That’s about $200,000 less than a previous bid that was rejected for being over budget.

The project is slated to begin at the end of the irrigation season this fall. The work should be done by April.

Wednesdays

Deck Family Farm, a small, organic livestock producer in the Mid-Willamette Valley, has started selling pasture-raised pork to a craft meat distributor based in Seattle that specializes in doorstep deliveries.

Crowd Cow, launched in 2015 by startup entrepreneurs Ethan Lowry and Joe Heitzeberg, announced in April the company would add pork to its line of meat products, including bacon, sausage, chorizo, ribs and pork chops.

Customers on the West Coast will get their orders from Deck Family Farm, of Junction City, Ore. The farm, run by John and Christine Deck, raises Wattle-Berkshire crossbreed pigs on more than 300 acres of certified organic pastures, along with beef cows, chickens and lambs.

In addition to raising livestock, Christine Deck said the operation focuses heavily on environmental stewardship. Over the last 15 years, Deck Family Farm has planted 60,000 trees and restored more than a mile of riparian corridors in the Long Tom River watershed.

“We’re pretty serious about doing things right,” Deck said.

Deck Family Farm typically sells direct to consumers at farmers markets, or through the farm’s own community-supported agriculture model. While their products are more expensive than buying meat at the grocery store, Deck said their customers are “voting with their dollar to make a difference in the environment, and their ecosystem.”

“We don’t sell to consumers. We sell to citizen eaters,” she said. “Our buyers and us work together to do the right thing.”

The deal with Crowd Cow allows them to focus more time on farming and less on marketing, Deck said.

The farm began talking with Crowd Cow about four years ago, though purchases only started within the last six months.

Crowd Cow, as its name suggests, got its start in beef, buying cows from small, independent farms. Animals are bought one at a time, individually crowd-funded by buyers, with cuts of meat shipped to their homes.

The company announced in April it would add pork to its line of products — expanding into “Crowd Sow.” In a prepared statement, Heitzeberg, CEO and co-founder of Crowd Cow, said they are looking forward to partnering with small-scale producers who are preserving heritage breeds and brining their flavors to American eaters.

“We’re excited to be part of the transformation away from traditionally raised American meat and into ethically minded consumerism,” Heitzeberg said.

West Coast buyers will receive pork from Deck Family Farm, while those from east of the Rocky Mountains will receive purebred Berkshire pork from Autumn’s Harvest Farm in Upstate New York.

For more information, visit www.crowdcow.com.

An out-of-state bank is asking a federal appeals court to overturn the legal victory of Oregon farmers who won a lawsuit over radish seed two years ago.

Northwest Bank of Warren, Pa., recently argued before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that growers were wrongly allowed to keep the seed, which the bank hoped to seize as collateral for a loan.

More than 40 Oregon farms produced the radish seed in 2014 under contract with Cover Crops Solutions, a company that went out of business without paying for the crop.

Cover Crop Solutions owed about $7 million to Northwest Bank, which filed a lawsuit against the growers arguing the seed should be sold to repay that debt.

In 2016, U.S. District Judge Michael Mosman ruled the bank did not have collateral in the seed, which the company challenged before the 9th Circuit.

During oral arguments in Portland on May 11, Northwest Bank claimed to have a security interest in all the goods owned by Cover Crop Solutions, including the radish seed.

“The district court made a mistake. CCS clearly owned the seed,” said Thomas Sondag, attorney for the bank.

Northwest Bank also argued the growers liens — which would provide the top security interest in the seed — did not “attach” to the crop because it hadn’t been delivered to a buyer, Sondag said.

Seed cleaners had accepted some of the radish seed but the judge found they weren’t agents of Cover Crop Solutions, which meant the crop wasn’t part of the defunct company’s inventory.

“They themselves proved the warehouse was not the agent of the purchaser,” Sondag said.

Paul Conable, attorney for the farmers, countered that Cover Crop Solutions had turned over its rights to the radish seed contracts to Blue Moon, a company that owns the seed variety patent. The growers were allowed to sell the seed, as long as they made royalty payments to Blue Moon.

Apart from that issue, the farmers also had liens providing them with a superior security interest in the radish seed, Conable said.

Agricultural liens would have attached if the bank had taken possession or sold the seed, according to the farmers. They also had possessory liens which were not lost by moving the crop to a seed cleaner.

The farmers also argue that Northwest Bank has essentially admitted that it lacks any security interest in the radish seed in a malpractice lawsuit against attorneys who devised its agreement with Cover Crop Solutions.

Jennifer Uranga has been helping farmers sign up guestworkers under the federal H-2A visa program since before the recent surge in demand.

She kept books and oversaw safety for an onion and hop grower near Parma, Idaho, for several years. One day, her boss asked her to figure out how to bring guestworkers to the farm through H-2A. She did, and a couple of major fruit growers in the area subsequently asked her to do the same.

Ultimately she started Mountain West Ag Consulting, which acts as an H-2A agent and provides human-resources and food and worker safety compliance services. She has now been working with the H-2A program for nearly five years.

“This is my dream job. I love what I do and I cannot imagine doing anything else,” said Uranga, who splits time between in the Wilder, Idaho, and Yakima, Wash., areas.

The Immigration and Nationality Act authorizes the H-2A visa program, which allows a U.S. employer to hire foreign workers temporarily — normally for 10 months or less — for agricultural work when sufficient numbers of U.S. workers are not available.

Demand for H-2A workers is rising.

An Idaho Department of Labor report on agriculture’s contribution to the state’s economy said the recently shrinking supply of workers prompted agriculture employers to offer benefits, incentives and higher wages, or use the H-2A program.

The total number of certified H-2A positions in Idaho has nearly doubled from 2013 to 2017 — from 1,539 to 2,994 — and these temporary workers are “on pace to becoming a dominant share of the migrant worker demographic,” the report said.

Strong demand keeps Uranga busy, as does the significant paperwork the application process entails.

Before the Department of Homeland Security’s U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services can approve a visa petition for H‐2A workers, the employer must receive a temporary labor certification from the U.S. Department of Labor.

A Department of Labor handbook says the prospective employer starts by filing a job order with his or her state’s workforce agency 60 to 75 days before the work start date. The Office of Foreign Labor Certification, within the federal Labor Department’s Employment and Training Administration, then requires the employer to file an H-2A application with its national processing center in Chicago at least 45 days before the work start date and submit any additional required documentation by at least 30 days before the work start date. The employer recruits workers, subject to advertising and reporting requirements, after receiving an acceptance notice from the processing center.

“I do not recruit workers,” Uranga said. “Rather, in the West, usually the employers contact a recruiter in Mexico or border U.S. states.”

She instead focuses on the H-2A application process after exploring the employer’s operations thoroughly.

“I visit them, and we talk about their farm and their labor needs,” Uranga said. “We ask a lot of questions about their existing work force, and we vet them — their payroll records, HR systems, et cetera.”

She said her clients, who pay a consulting fee, are “all over,” including Oregon, central Washington and southwest Idaho.

“This year, I picked up some smaller farms needing a couple of workers, but I deal with 20 to 200 workers often,” Uranga said.

Workers are contracted for a specified period, such as February through November or August through October. Uranga said it’s possible for a grower to write an additional contract and ask for more workers for a known and documented date of need up to a documented end date.

Recently, she and some larger clients have aimed to transfer workers from one contract to another, “which can keep workers here in the U.S. and help another grower,” she said.

Uranga also has been involved in efforts to address a recent housing shortage for H-2A workers.

“My phone rings every day with people inquiring about H-2A,” she said. More farmers are inquiring about the program, and “a lot are surprised by all of the rules and regulations that go with it.”

Uranga studied ag economics at the University of Idaho and worked for several food companies before staying home for a while, then returning to work in agriculture.

“I love agriculture. I love being able to spend my time on farms with farmers,” she said. “They are my friends and I get to help them.”

ELMIRA, Ore. — Ian Conners had zero farming experience before joining Elmira High School’s Interact Club, which constructed a greenhouse and is working toward offering an agricultural training program at the school.

Conners, a senior at EHS, said he always wanted to start a garden at home, but it wasn’t financially viable for his family.

“This experience has been wonderful for me as it has afforded an opportunity to practice something I’ve always had an interest in while helping my community,” he said.

The Interact club, which is the high school equivalent of Rotary Club, grew vegetable starts that the students sold at a spring bazaar.

The greenhouse at Elmira is just one example of interactive agriculture sprouting up at Oregon schools. For many years, FFA programs have taught agriculture in schools, but now other efforts at the high school and college level are also taking root.

At the University of Oregon, the Urban Farm has integrated itself into course studies, and the School Garden Project in Eugene brings farming into the 4J School District.

“(Students) are learning farm skills and agriculture,” Emily Edwards, development coordinator of the School Garden Project, said. “Part of that for us is not just the opportunity (students have) to grow things themselves, but to taste the various things they’re growing. For kids in Eugene, we have these types of opportunities, but it’s also significant for kids who aren’t having these opportunities often.”

Edwards said the garden serves as a hands-on experience when teaching the students about science.

Harper Keeler, director of the Urban Farm Program at UO, said the skillset the students have is varied.

“Some kids grew up on a farm and they know more than I do; they’re real farmers,” he said. “Then there’s kids who never touched a shovel before in their life. It’s connecting those people to an agrarian community.”

The Urban Farm has been at the school since 1975, but it wasn’t until the 1990s that it merged with educational programs. The 1.5-acred farm is L-shaped, and students grow food year-round. Keeler went through the program as a student in 1992, and became the director in 2008.

Keeler said the course is popular, hosting over 300 students a year. He said he’d like to include more students, but the space isn’t big enough to accommodate everyone. Also, unlike most programs, the students eat all the food in the garden to help combat food insecurity on college campuses.

After graduation, Keeler said he has had students continue by creating farms of their own, Moondog’s Farm in Mabel, Ore., being one example.

Richard Hackett loaned his 15-by-50-foot greenhouse to the EHS Interact Club for a year to support the project. Hackett was former president of the Veneta Rotary Club and president of Sea Mercy, an organization that develops self-sustaining farming and other programs in the South Pacific.

He said the most rewarding aspect of his involvement is helping to restore what has been forgotten by most — growing food.

“There’s hands-on and heads-on learning, and this is both,” Hackett said. “It’s an experience to learn and understand but also to apply (hands-on experience). Agriculture gets a bad name. People will say only ‘dumb people are farmers,’ and that’s not true. They’re brilliant and amazing people. When you understand what they know, and how they’re feeding the world, we don’t want to lose that.”

SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) — The eruption of a Hawaii volcano has people warily eyeing volcanic peaks on America’s West Coast.

The West Coast is home to an 800-mile chain of 13 volcanoes from Washington state’s Mount Baker to California’s Lassen Peak. They include Mount St. Helens, whose spectacular 1980 eruption in the Pacific Northwest killed dozens of people and sent volcanic ash across the country, and massive Mount Rainier, which towers above the Seattle metro area. The peaks are part of the “Ring of Fire,” volcanoes that sit on tectonic plates. Hawaii is not part of the Ring of Fire.

“There’s lots of anxiety out there,” said Liz Westby, geologist at the U.S. Geological Survey Cascades Volcano Observatory in Vancouver, Washington, in the shadow of Mount St. Helens. “They see destruction, and people get nervous.”

Kilauea, on Hawaii’s Big Island, is threatening to blow its top in coming days or weeks after sputtering lava for a week, forcing about 2,000 people to evacuate, destroying two dozen homes and threatening a geothermal plant. Experts fear the volcano could hurl ash and boulders the size of refrigerators miles into the air.

Here are some key things to know:

Roughly 450 volcanoes make up this horseshoe-shaped belt. The belt follows the coasts of South America, North America, eastern Asia, Australia and New Zealand. It’s known for frequent volcanic and seismic activity caused by the colliding of crustal plates.

Outside of Hawaii, America’s most dangerous volcanoes are all part of the Ring of Fire, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. They include: Mount St. Helens and Mount Rainier in Washington; Mount Hood and South Sister in Oregon; and Mount Shasta and Lassen Volcanic Center in California.

Images of lava flowing from the ground and homes going up in flames in Hawaii have stoked unease among residents. But experts say an eruption in Hawaii doesn’t necessarily signal danger on the West Coast.

“These are isolated systems,” Westby said.

No eruption seems imminent, experts say.

The Cascades Volcano Observatory monitors volcanoes in the Pacific Northwest and posts weekly status reports. All currently register “normal.”

But the situation can change fast.

“All our mountains are considered active and, geologically speaking, things seem to happen in the Northwest about every 100 years,” said John Ufford, preparedness manager for the Washington Emergency Management Division. “It’s an inexact timeline.”

Some geologists believe Mount St. Helens is the most likely to erupt.

But six other Cascade volcanoes have been active in the past 300 years, including steam eruptions at Mount Rainier and Glacier Peak and a 1915 blast at Lassen Peak that destroyed nearby ranches.

The Big Island scenes of rivers of lava snaking through neighborhoods and sprouting fountains are unlikely in the Pacific Northwest.

“Lava is not the hazard, per se, like in Hawaii,” said Ian Lange, a retired University of Montana geology professor. Cascade volcanos produce a thicker, more viscous type of lava than Hawaiian volcanoes, so it doesn’t run as far, Lange said.

The Cascade volcanoes can produce huge clouds of choking ash and send deadly mudslides into rivers and streams. Two of the most potentially destructive are Mount St. Helens, north of the Portland, Oregon, metro area, and 14,000-foot Mount Rainier, which is visible from the cities of Seattle and Tacoma.

Mount Rainier eruptions in the distant past have caused destruction as far west as Puget Sound, some 50 miles away.

The volcano hasn’t produced a significant eruption in the past 500 years. But it remains dangerous because of its great height, frequent earthquakes, active hydrothermal system, and 26 glaciers, experts said.

An eruption on Mount Rainier could rapidly melt glaciers, triggering huge mudflows — called lahars — that could reach the densely populated surrounding lowlands, Westby said.

Another major danger from a Cascade volcano eruption would be large amounts of ash thrown into the air, where it could foul aircraft engines.

The closest settlement to a West Coast volcano may be Government Camp, on Oregon’s Mount Hood. Lava could conceivably reach the town, but the greater threat is an eruption triggering a so-called pyroclastic flow, which is a fast-moving cloud of hot ash and gas, experts said.

But Lange believes California’s Mount Shasta is the most dangerous, in part because it is surrounded by towns.

The town of Mt. Shasta has numerous response plans for emergencies, including a volcano eruption, Police Chief Parish Cross said. But the plan for a volcano is pretty fluid, he said.

“We don’t know the size or scope of the event,” Cross said, including which direction the eruption would occur.

This is not an issue in Orting, Washington, about 20 miles west of Mount Rainier. Orting would be directly in the path of a lahar, and local officials each year conduct drills in which children move from school to higher ground to escape the flow.

Students usually take about 45 minutes to walk the 2 miles to higher ground, which should be fast enough to escape, officials said.

“Our concern is ice and snow melting rapidly on Mount Rainier,” said Chuck Morrison, a resident of the town of 7,600 who has long been involved in evacuation planning. “We need a quick way off the valley floor.”

Orting is the town most vulnerable to lahar damage from Mount Rainier, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

Scientists say that in the worst case, a 30-foot-high lahar with the consistency of wet concrete could rumble through Orting at 50 mph if volcanic activity suddenly melted snow and ice on Rainier.

SPRINGFIELD, Ore. (AP) — A glut of legal marijuana has driven Oregon pot prices to rock-bottom levels, prompting some nervous growers to start pivoting to another type of cannabis to make ends meet — one that doesn’t come with a high.

Applications for state licenses to grow hemp — marijuana’s non-intoxicating cousin — have increased more than twentyfold since 2015, and Oregon now ranks No. 2 behind Colorado among the 19 states with active hemp cultivation. The rapidly evolving market comes amid skyrocketing demand for a hemp-derived extract called cannabidiol, or CBD, seen by many as a health aid.

In its purified distilled form, CBD oil commands thousands of dollars per kilogram, and farmers can make more than $100,000 an acre growing hemp plants to produce it. That distillate can also be converted into a crystallized form or powder.

“Word on the street is everybody thinks hemp’s the new gold rush,” said Jerrad McCord, who grows marijuana in southern Oregon and just added 12 acres of hemp. “This is a business. You’ve got to adapt, and you’ve got to be a problem-solver.”

It’s a problem few predicted when Oregon voters opened the door to legal marijuana four years ago.

The state’s climate is perfect for growing marijuana, and growers produced bumper crops. Under state law, none of it can leave Oregon. That, coupled with a decision to not cap the number of licenses for growers, has created a surplus.

Oregon’s inventory of marijuana is staggering for a state its size. There are nearly 1 million pounds of usable flower in the system, and an additional 350,000 pounds of marijuana extracts, edibles and tinctures.

The Oregon Liquor Control Commission, which regulates the industry, says some of the inventory of flower goes into extracts, oils and tinctures — which have increased in popularity — but the agency can’t say how much. A comprehensive market study is underway.

Yet the retail price for a gram of pot has fallen about 50 percent since 2015, from $14 to $7, according to a report by the Oregon Office of Economic Analysis. Growers and retailers alike have felt the sting.

“Now we’re starting to look at drastic means, like destroying product. At some point, there’s no more storage for it,” said Trey Willison, who switched his operation from marijuana to hemp this season. “Whoever would have thought we’d get to the point of destroying pounds of marijuana?”

That stark prospect is driving more of Oregon’s marijuana entrepreneurs toward hemp, a crop that already has a foothold in states like Colorado and Kentucky and a lot of buzz in the cannabis industry. In Oregon, the number of hemp licenses increased from 12 in 2015 to 353 as of last week, and the state now ranks No. 2 nationally in licensed acreage.

Colorado, which is No. 1 in hemp production, and Washington were the first states to broadly legalize marijuana. Both have seen price drops for marijuana but not as significant as Oregon.

Like marijuana, the hemp plant is a cannabis plant, but it contains less than 0.3 percent of THC, the compound that gives pot its high. Growing industrial hemp is legal under federal law, and the plant can be sold for use in things like fabric, food, seed and building materials.

But the increasing focus in Oregon is the gold-colored CBD oil that has soared in popularity among cannabis connoisseurs and is rapidly going mainstream. At least 50 percent of hemp nationwide is being grown for CBD extraction, and Oregon is riding the crest of that wave, said Eric Steenstra, president of Vote Hemp, a nonpartisan organization that advocates for pro-hemp legislation.

“There are a lot of growers who already have experience growing cannabis, and when you’re growing for CBD, there are a lot of the same techniques that you use for growing marijuana,” he said. “Oregon is definitely a hotbed of activity around this.”

CBD is popping up in everything from cosmetics to chocolate bars to bottled water to pet treats. One Los Angeles bar sells drinks containing the oil, massage therapists use creams containing CBD, and juice bars offer the stuff in smoothies. Dozens of online sites sell endless iterations of CBD oils, tinctures, capsules, transdermal patches, infused chocolates and creams with no oversight.

Proponents say CBD offers a plethora of health benefits, from relieving pain to taming anxiety. Scientists caution, however, that there have been very few comprehensive clinical studies of how CBD affects humans — mostly because the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration still considers cannabidiol a Schedule 1 drug, and the government requires special dispensation to study it.

Pre-clinical studies have shown promise for treatment of chronic pain, neuro-inflammation, anxiety, addiction and anti-psychotic effects in animals, mostly rodents, said Ziva Cooper, an associate professor of clinical neurobiology at Columbia University who focuses her research on the therapeutic potential of cannabis and cannabinoids.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration next month could approve the first drug derived from CBD. It’s used to treat forms of epilepsy.

Christina Sasser, co-founder of Vital Leaf, isn’t waiting for government action to market CBD products in stores and online. She sells about 500 bottles of Oregon-sourced CBD oil a month and ships only to customers living in states with state-run hemp pilot programs, to better avoid the possibility that federal agents will go after her for selling something the U.S. government considers illicit.

“Everybody in the CBD world has recognized the risks involved, and I would say the vast majority of us really believe in the power of the plant and are willing to operate in this, sort of, gray area,” she said.

Willison was selling marijuana clones to pot startups when he realized last spring he was selling way more clones than Oregon’s market could support. The two-story building where he grew 200 pounds of weed a month sits nearly empty, and a greenhouse built to expand his pot business is packed with hemp plants instead.

He breeds hemp plants genetically selected for their strong CBD concentration, harvests the seeds and extracts CBD from the remaining plants that can fetch up to $13,000 per kilogram. His future looks bright again.

“The (marijuana) market is stuck within the borders of Oregon — it’s locked within the state,” he said, as he took a break from collecting tiny grains of pollen from his plants. “But hemp is an international commodity now.”

Sept. 9, 1932 - May 8, 2018

Jacob Valentine, a fifth-generation sheep shearer from Crabtree Ore., sells the fleeces almost as fast as they come off the animals.

He does it by shearing live online as prospective wool buyers watch, bid and buy.

With a cell phone for a camera and Facebook for a platform, Valentine is able to show the potential customer the animal in full fleece, the wool as it comes off and a close-up of the fleece as it is skirted.

The bidding goes quickly — if you snooze, you lose because it’s on to the next shearing. At least half of the online auction customers live in the Midwest and East Coast.

Born in Gold Beach on the Oregon Coast and raised in the tiny town of Langlois, Valentine learned to shear from his family members. His natural ability to think outside the box was evident in high school when he gutted a school bus, added lights and held a dance in it. It’s not a surprise to those who know him hear that he is shearing and auctioning fleeces live online.

“I started live on Facebook with a group of approximately 3,000 fleece lovers and the sales started pouring in,” Valentine said. “When a grower decides to participate in the auction, I cut them a check for more than market price for the wool and keep the auction receipts to cover the cost of my crew.”

Valentine, who shears throughout the Pacific Northwest, works out of his three shearing trailers and sometimes brings along his wool press when he shears close to home.

“I may shear one weekend on Whidbey Island, Washington, and the next in Willows, California, and when that’s the case I use the customers’ facilities,” Valentine said. “I try to shear my customers’ sheep as if they were my own and I know that animals that have injuries aren’t productive.”

When asked about the name of his business, Darkside Shearing, Valentine laughed and admitted that he was known among his fellow shearers for being hard to please when things didn’t live up to his standards.

“I heard that one of my buddies commented when they were coming to the valley to help me shear that they were going to the dark side and it stuck,” Valentine said. “I’m a Pink Floyd fan so I decided to run with the ‘Darkside of the Moon’ theme and it worked.”

Contact him at Facebook.com/DarkSideShearing or email at jacob_valentine88@yahoo.com