The latest news stories and stories of interest in the Willamette Valley from the digital home of Southern Oregon, from Wynne Broadcasting’s WillametteValleyMagazine.com
Wednesday, April 12, 2023
Willamette Valley Weather
Missing Albany Boy Located In Portland, Woman Arrested — Albany Police Case # 23-2074
On Monday, April 10, 2023, at 11:35 a.m., Albany Police received information from a citizen that Alyssa Thomas and Tryston Wade were currently at the Lloyd Center Mall in Portland, Oregon. Albany Police Detectives contacted the Portland Police Bureau requesting assistance in attempting to locate Tryston Wade and Alyssa Thomas.
Officers from the Portland Police Bureau located Wade and Thomas in the food court area inside the Lloyd Center Mall. Tryston Wade was taken into protective custody and Alyssa Thomas was taken into custody on an arrest warrant and probable cause for custodial interference.
Four Albany Police Detectives responded to the Portland Police Bureau North Precinct. Two Detectives took custody of Alyssa Thomas and transported her to the Albany Police Department to be interviewed. Two Albany Police Detectives took protective custody of Tryston Wade and transported him back to Albany. Tryston Wade was reunited with his mother at approximately 5:00 p.m.
Alyssa Thomas was interviewed by Albany Police Detectives and lodged in the Linn County Jail with the following charges:
- Custodial Interference II
- Rape in the 2nd Degree
- Sodomy in the 2nd Degree
Albany Police would like to thank the following for their assistance in this investigation:
- Community – for information and tips shared during this investigation which led to the location of Wade and Thomas.
- Portland Police Bureau – for their response to investigative requests over the past several days, and for successfully locating Wade and Thomas.
- Federal Bureau of Investigation for their assistance in this investigation and their Victim Assistance Liaison with helping reunite Tryston Wade and his mother.
Albany Police are continuing this investigation and no further information will be released at this time. Anyone with information relating to this case is asked to contact Albany Police Detectives at 541-917-7686.
Thurston High Teacher Pours Chemical On Student’s Hand To Wake Him Up
A Springfield father wants a Thurston High School teacher charged with a crime after an incident inside a chemistry classroom.
Sophomore Landon Navarro said it was 9:00 a.m. when his Chemistry teacher started pouring Hydrogen Peroxide on his hand as a way to wake him up. Landon says it quickly started to burn.
“I saw something dripping from my hand and I look up at him and he’s pouring hydrogen peroxide on my hand,” Landon said. “I saw my hand just starting to burn up and it started itching really bad.” After the confrontation, Landon took pictures of his hand and sent them to his father. Upon seeing the pictures and texts from his son, Shane Navarro called Springfield Police Department and went to the school to discuss the situation. Navarro said his first reaction was anger, as he couldn’t understand why the teacher had resorted to using chemicals to wake his son.
“There’s another way to wake up a child that’s sleeping in a classroom, give him a nudge or something like that. But a chemistry teacher using a chemical on my son’s hand is absurd.”
Landon said the whole situation was weird that a teacher would act so out of character in front of his students.
“It makes me feel uncomfortable. Like, what if I fall asleep again on accident and it happens to me again,” Landon said. “I was a little embarrassed because out of all people why did my teacher do that even if it was a joke. He’s supposed to be there as a teacher and someone we can trust, not be scared of.”
Navarro says that after speaking with police, he wished to proceed with charging the Chemistry teacher, and said that by his actions, he lost the trust of parents who have children at the school.
We trust these teachers with our children, and we’re supposed to allow our children to go to somebody they admire and have a mentor,” Navarro said. “This kind of situation is not okay, so this needs to be out for all teachers and anybody with our children to treat them with care and compassion.”
The Springfield Public Schools director of communications, Brian Richardson, said that they are working with Springfield Police in the following investigation assuring that student safety is most important.
“We want parents to know there was an alleged incident, we’re looking into that,” Richardson said. “We’re going to make sure that we take any corrective actions and we also want parents to be assured that their students are safe here-this is a safe place where students can come and learn and we’re focused on every student every day.” (SOURCE)
LCSO Case #23-1882 — Espresso Stand in Alvadore Burglarized
Deputies responded to the report of a burglary on Sunday morning at a coffee stand in the 27000blk of Clear Lake Rd.
Investigation reveals that an unknown male suspect broke a window and stole the cash register from inside shortly after 2:00am. An undisclosed amount of cash was taken. Surveillance video was able to capture images of both the suspect and his vehicle.
The suspect is described as a white male adult wearing blue jeans and a black hooded jacket. His vehicle appears to be a maroon sedan with faded paint spots and a US Army sticker on the lower-right corner of the rear window. The vehicle also had a temporary ‘donut’ tire mounted on the rear passenger side at the time of the burglary.
Anyone with information about this case is asked to contact the Lane County Sheriff’s Office at 541-682-4150 opt. 1.
Governor Tina Kotek has announced funding allocations for the Homelessness State of Emergency.
Portland and Multnomah County will get 18-million dollars; Hillsboro, Beaverton and Washington County will get eight-million and Clackamas County will get four-million dollars. Eugene and Lane County will get 15-million dollars; Central Oregon will receive 14 million; Salem, Marion, and Polk counties will receive 10-million dollars and Medford and Jackson County will get nearly nine-million dollars. The money will be used to rehouse families and create
new shelter beds.
OHCS awards funding to reduce unsheltered homelessness in emergency areas included in Governor Kotek’s state of emergency
Oregon Housing and Community Services (OHCS) has approved grant agreements to award funding to regions declared emergency areas in Governor Kotek’s homelessness state of emergency. The regions known as Continuum of Care (CoC) are areas or counties where unsheltered homelessness has increased by 50% or more since 2017.
The emergency areas are tasked to achieve Governor Kotek’s goals to reduce unsheltered homelessness by January 2024. The initiative will work to prevent 8,750 households from becoming homeless statewide, add at least 600 low-barrier shelter beds in emergency areas, and rehouse at least 1,200 unsheltered households in emergency areas.
“These goals set by our Governor are bold, but it is the urgent response needed to tackle a crisis that has been destabilizing our neighbors, families and friends for far too long,” said OHCS Director Andrea Bell. “The work ahead will require the galvanization of every community—large and small—for us to achieve these shared goals. All people of Oregon are worth fighting for. To that end, we will be relentless through the lens of humanity in supporting our local partners in the pursuit for meaningful progress.”
Last month, Governor Kotek signed legislation passed by the Oregon Legislature to address the state’s housing and homelessness crisis, including $155 million the Governor proposed to reduce homelessness in all regions of the state. The funding will be used for homelessness prevention programs, more shelter capacity, rehousing services and more.
House Bill 5019 appropriated $85.2 million for local homelessness emergency plans. OHCS will reserve $3 million to ensure the goals of the emergency order are achieved. An additional $3 million will be used for a statewide landlord incentive, available to landlords participating in local rehousing efforts. In addition, the early funding package included $33.6 million to help prevent homelessness for an estimated 8,750 households. This funding will be distributed statewide through existing eviction prevention programs.
The requests from all regions within the emergency order totaled $98.8 million, so there were not enough funds to provide each region with its full funding request. OHCS in coordination with the Oregon Department of Emergency Management (ODEM) will be offering ongoing technical assistance to MAC groups as they implement their plans. Below is the breakdown of funding allocated to each Continuum of Care included in the emergency declaration, which totals $79.2 million.
- Portland/Gresham/Multnomah County: $18.2 million to rehouse 275 households and create 138 shelter beds
- Eugene/Springfield/Lane County: $15.5 million to rehouse 247 households and create 230 shelter beds
- Central Oregon: $13.9 million to rehouse 161 households and create 111 shelter beds
- Salem/Marion, Polk Counties: $10.4 million to rehouse 158 households and create 79 shelter beds
- Medford, Ashland/Jackson County: $8.8 million to rehouse 133 households and create 67 shelter beds
- Hillsboro/Beaverton/Washington County: $8.0 million to rehouse 121 households and create 61 shelter beds
- Clackamas County: $4.4 million to rehouse 130 households.
Recognizing that unsheltered homelessness impacts communities in every part of Oregon, the legislature also approved $26 million to address homelessness in the counties that did not meet the threshold of the emergency order when the Governor issued it on January 10, 2023. Counties not in the original declared emergency areas will receive funding in July to create new shelter beds and rehouse people experiencing unsheltered homelessness.
Frequently asked questions about the grant agreements can be found in the OHCS website here.
| About Oregon Housing and Community Services – Oregon Housing and Community Services provides resources for Oregonians to reduce poverty and increase access to stable housing. Our intentional focus on both housing and community services allows us to serve Oregonians holistically across the housing continuum, including preventing and ending homelessness, assisting with utilities, providing housing stability support, financing multifamily affordable housing and encouraging homeownership. |
UPDATE: Deadline extended and available funding increased to $18.75 million for community-based organizations to support youth experiencing homelessness
(Salem) – The Oregon Department of Human Services (ODHS), Self-Sufficiency Programs, Youth Experiencing Homelessness Program is inviting community partners to apply for a portion of $18.75 million in grant funding that is now available to provide services and housing supports to youth experiencing homelessness.
Previously announced in March, the available grant funding has increased to $18.75 million thanks to the passage and signing of House Bill 5019 (HB 5019). HB 5019 includes a suite of policy changes and investments intended to address Oregon’s housing needs and provides funding to expand and strengthen the ODHS Youth Experiencing Homelessness Program
The deadline to apply for this grant funding has been extended from April 7 to April 21 and the application can be found online.
Community-based organizations who provide, or desire to provide, services to youth experiencing homelessness are eligible to apply for the grant funding.
Organizations may express interest in supporting more than one of the following service areas that funding is available to support:
- Prevention Services including youth outreach and drop-in services
- Early and crisis intervention housing such as shelter and host home programming
- Medium-term housing such as transitional living and host home programming
- Other Services such as culturally-specific programming, mental health and substance use supports
The ODHS Youth Experiencing Homelessness Program is tasked with coordinating statewide planning for delivery of services to youth experiencing homelessness under the age of 25. It partners with impacted youth, community organizations and other state agencies to support and fund initiatives and programs within the youth homelessness system. More information can be found online.
About the Oregon Department of Human Services – The mission of the Oregon Department of Human Services is to help Oregonians in their own communities achieve wellbeing and independence through opportunities that protect, empower, respect choice and preserve dignity.
Federal Complaint Filed in Medford Against BLM to Stop Timber Harvest Plan
An Oregon-based group have a complaint filed against the U.S. Bureau of Land Management about some of its plans to allow timber harvest.
Monday a coalition of conservation groups filed a legal complaint challenging the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) “Integrated Vegetation Management” (IVM) program that they say, “would aggressively log forest stands located within Late Successional Reserves, areas purportedly set aside for forest conservation.”
The groups include Klamath-Siskiyou Wildlands (KS Wild), Cascadia Wildlands and Oregon Wild. They said the IVM authorizes forest “gap creation” and “open seral” logging prescriptions within mature and old-growth forests that are fire-resilient and provide important habitat at risk wildlife species.
In February, BLM said two Josephine County communities were getting federal attention to improve wildfire resilience when it issued its project plan near Murphy and Williams, Oregon, both south of Grants Pass. BLM’s said its decision was intended to promote safe wildfire response, develop fire resilient lands and create habitat for special status species.
The BLM project is called Late Mungers Integrated Vegetation Management Project. It includes prescribed fire, fire fuel thinning and selection harvest actions. BLM said during the next decade it expects wildfire fuels reduction work on about 7,500 acres.
BLM said the project work will start at strategic locations where fire managers have the best chance to catch and contain wildfires.
They also said the project includes 830 acres of proposed harvests split into two timber sales, with selection harvest methods increasing diversity of forest stands.
BLM said a more complex habitat is important for the northern spotted owl, the marbled murrelet and Pacific marten as federally – species listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.
KS Wild Conservation Director George Sexton says, “BLM timber planners can dance around it all they want, but it’s crystal clear that gap creation logging creates clearcuts that remove habitat and increase fire hazard.”
Protesters have picketed BLM’s Medford office at least twice this year to challenge BLM’s plans to allow the timber harvest south of Grants Pass.
The plaintiff’s group said the first commercial IVM logging project called Penn Butte is scheduled to be auctioned in late May, saying, “Penn Butte is located in the Williams Late Successional Reserve and would remove over 400-acres of old-growth habitat through ‘open seral’ logging and another 51 acres through ‘gap creation’ clearcutting.”
Crag Law Center, which is part of the plaintiffs’ action, attorney Meriel Darzen said, “The BLM sidestepped its procedural duties and cut the public out of the process when it decided to approve thousands of acres of large tree logging without explaining where the logging will occur and how it would affect existing forests in the short and long-term. This is particularly egregious where these particular forests were set aside by the agency itself as reserve lands with the goal of protecting habitat.”
The group U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Biological Opinion for Penn Butte concluded that the proposed old growth logging is “likely to adversely affect” spotted owls and their designated critical habitat.
Oregon Wild Conservation and Restoration Coordinator Doug Heiken said, “The forests targeted for removal in Penn Butte are resilient, healthy, and most important they are designated as reserves for conservation, not timber supply. If we want to store carbon and provide habitat this is the place for careful conservation, not aggressive logging.”
Cascadia Wildlands Legal Director Nick Cady says, “If the BLM is interested in real fire-focused restoration, we would be fully supportive, but aggressively logging wildlife habitat in the Late Successional Reserves that will increase fire hazard for the surrounding community is ridiculous. It demonstrates that this agency does not care what this community has been through and is only concerned with producing timber volume.” (SOURCE)
You can also find more on this story at OPB t: https://www.opb.org/article/2023/03/08/think-out-loud-southwest-oregon-forest-management-plan-draws-backlash/
A portion of I-5 near Salem closed Monday morning for several hours, following an officer-involved shooting.
Oregon State Police say a trooper stopped to help what he thought was a disabled motorist just before 9 a-m … and discovered the driver of a semi was being held at gunpoint. There was an exchange of gunfire and the suspect – identified as 31-year-old Felipe Manzo – ran into tall grass along the interstate.
When officers reached him, authorities say they provided medical attention, but Manzo died at the scene. Trooper Andrew Tuttle suffered minor injuries and was placed on administrative leave for his role in the shooting, pending the outcome of the investigation.
The Oregon Zoo has welcomed a new rare African bontebok calf. He was born to eight-year-old “Winter” in the Zoo’s Africa Savanna area.
The bontebok, which is related to the antelope, is arguably the first African animal saved from human-caused extinction after it was hunted almost to extinction in the 18th and 19th centuries. The calf, now weighing about 18 pounds, won’t venture outside to greet visitors until he’s a little older. and the weather gets a little warmer.
