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Wednesday, March 8, 2023

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$2.1M in illegally grown marijuana seized JEREMY C. RUARK Country Media, Inc.

olumbia County Sheriff’s deputies have confiscated 6,611 marijuana plants and 133.5 pounds of processed marijuana with a street value of approximately $2,181,011, in the agency’s latest enforcement. Search and seizure In a release, the CCSO said the operation was conducted on March 1, with deputies serving search warrants for illegal marijuana grows in Scappoose, Deer Island, and Clatskanie. During the service of these search warrants, CCSO deputies also recovered over $69,000 in cash. Specific details about suspects have yet to be released following the search operation. Columbia County Sheriff Brian Pixley told The Chronicle that all suspects were referred to the Columbia County District Attorney’s Office for charges. Specific details were also not immediately available about what led to the search and seizure operations. “These are the first of many search warrants that our Street Crimes team will serve over the next few years,” Pixley said. “We appreciate the participation of our partner agencies, including the Scappoose Police Department, Yamhill County Sheriff’s Office, the Oregon State Police, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.” The Illegal Marijuana Market Grant, awarded to CCSO in 2022, funded this latest investigation. Background In July 2022, The Chronicle reported that the CCSO was seeking new manpower to establish an illegal marijuana enforcement team. In that published story, Pixley told The Chronicle his agency was seeking three enforcement deputies and three corrections deputies.

“We recently received a $940,000 grant from the Criminal Justice Commission (CJC) to put together an illegal marijuana enforcement team,” Pixley said. “So, we are hiring to back fill spaces for this team and also for an open position.” Public safety concerns Pixley said this specialized enforcement team has been needed for quite some time and the concern is twofold. “The first is the human trafficking component,” he said. “Often times these illegal grows are tied to organized crime from either a Mexican or Chinese cartel. As such, they often will use “indentured servants” to work these grows to pay off some form of debt owed to the cartel. In my opinion, this is the biggest reason for our team.” Pixley said the location of the illegal marijuana grows is his second concern. “The fact they grow in rural areas across Oregon, then ship the marijuana to the East Coast where they can sell the marijuana on the streets,” he said. In 2021, the CCSO worked with the United States Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and Oregon State Police (OSP) wrapping up a year-long investigation culminated in 26 search warrants served across the state of Oregon and one in Texas over a two-day period. As a result of the search warrants, Pixley said the following was recovered statewide:

The CCSO released this photo of one of the grow rooms found during the search operation.

Courtesy from the CCSO

• 32,999 total marijuana plants • 1504 lbs of bulk marijuana • 23 firearms • $353,000 in cash Follow this developing story at thechronicleonline.com and in the Wednesday print editions of The Chronicle.

Courtesy from the CCSO

This tray of processed marijuana was also seized in the searches.

Courtesy from the CCSO

A total of over $69,000 was confiscated during the enforcement operation.

Is Oregon’s COVID pandemic over? WILL LOHRE Country Media, Inc.

eb. 28, 2020, was the date of the first COVID diagnosis in Oregon. Three years later, we are still navigating the waters of the pandemic, but the storm has calmed considerably. After three years of uncertainty, lockdowns, masks, and immunizations, a return to normalcy seems within grasp. To find out the state of the pandemic and where we go from here, The Chronicle spoke with Kaiser Permanente Northwest Chief of Infectious Disease Dr. Katie Sharff. “COVID is never really over. I mean, we’re anticipating that this virus will be here, circulating for the next several years, decades; it just may not be at the forefront,” Sharff said. Public health regulations rolling back On Jan. 30, 2023, the Biden Administration announced its intent to end the national emergency and public health emergency declarations on May 11, 2023, related to the COVID-19 pandemic. This cessation of the state of emergency does

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not mean COVID will resolve itself completely, but it marks a new stage for dealing with the virus. “I think the ending of the public health emergency is more a signal that we will start to treat COVID like a routine illness, such as Influenza or RSV,” Sharff said. “I think that what will happen is that this pandemic will transition to what we call the ‘endemic phase,’ which means that the infection will impact a stable number of individuals but not be causing substantial illness across the globe all at the same time. It’s going to be a respiratory virus that we manage along with all of the other respiratory viral infections that we’re already currently managing.” Oregon is seeing policy changes that also reflect the decreasing threat of COVID. On Mar. 3, the Oregon Health Authority announced that it would rescind the mandate that requires workers in healthcare settings to wear masks. The requirement had been in place since August 2021. In some ways, Dr. Sharff feels that these official changes reflect the sentiments of the public. “I think the U.S. population has kind of declared COVID over just by our own behavior. We’re focusing our attention on other risks, other things, and accepting a certain level of disease and risk within the com-

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“If you haven’t been infected, you will probably get infected at some point, and if you’ve already been infected, there’s a very high likelihood that in the future, you will get reinfected; that’s just the nature of this virus. But the tools we have through vaccination and anti-virals do work,” ~ Dr. Katie Sharff, Chief of Infectious Disease for Kaiser Permanente Northwest

munity,” Sharff said. “So, I think the U.S. population has already moved on, and the end of the public health emergency is really just catching up with the current opinion of the U.S. population.” The current scope of COVID Currently, the most common variant is the XBB1.5 Omicron variant. According to Sharff, the CDC is actually reporting that transmission numbers are up through their detection of wastewater and case

counts. However, case count data is not as reliable as it was earlier in the pandemic. “In the beginning of the pandemic, we really paid such close attention to case counts, but as people are testing at home, or not even testing, or not reporting, those case counts have really lost accuracy,” Sharff said. “But based on wastewater and what is being reported, it appears that case counts have gone up, but I guess the silver lining is that hospitalizations have been very stable; they’ve plateaued at about 250 per day and

are forecasted to stay at this rate.” Sharff attributed this drop in hospitalization rates to the increased immunity to COVID through vaccination or prior infection. Sharff said that experts are not sure what the future of the virus will look like. One of the concerns would be a variant that evades immunity from immunization or prior infection. However, Sharff said this has not happened yet, and so the next steps are difficult to predict. Sharff said what health officials expect will be handling COVID on a more seasonal basis. Like a seasonal Influenza vaccine, an updated shot may be administered to help address the ebbs and flows of illness. In the future In terms of vaccines, there’s this shift toward an annual COVID vaccination, similar to an annual Flu shot. [The advisory committee] are actually evaluating this right now,” Sharff said. “I think for high-risk populations, so those who are elderly, or those who are immunocompromised, or those who have significant medical conditions, it makes sense to have that boost in immunity each year with an updated COVID shot.

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Several escape house fire, 1 dog dies JEREMY C. RUARK Country Media, Inc.

everal people and one dog have escaped a burning house in Scappoose, the other family pet could not be saved. At 11:08 p.m. March 2, Scappoose Fire was dispatched to a reported structure fire in the 5200 block of 3rd Street. Initial reports stated that people were evacuating, and animals were still trapped in the structure, according to a release from the fire agency. The first fire engine crew arrived in five minutes from the time of dispatch and reported the fire was moving through the house and burning outside of several windows. The initial report was that 30% of the home was on fire. Smoke was down to within one foot of the floor.

Courtesy from Scappoose Fire

Scappoose Fire on the scene of the blaze in the 5200 block of 3rd Street.

There were two occupants and three animals in the structure at the time of the fire. When the fire crews first arrived, the occupants were just leaving. The first dog was located and removed within 10 minutes. A second dog was located two minutes later. Scappoose Fire medical

equipment, Scappoose Police, an Oregon State Police trooper and a good Samaritan assisted with resuscitation efforts on the animals while firefighters were bringing the fire under control. According to media reports, one dog perished following the fire.

The fire was knocked down quickly by the crews and was under control in 15 minutes. The fire displaced several people, however, they were assisted by the local American Red Cross. One person was treated for smoke inhalation. The cause of the fire remained under investigation at press time. The initial response included volunteers and career staff bringing two fire engines, an ambulance, and a chief officer. Columbia River Fire & Rescue, Oregon State Police, Columbia River PUD, Scappoose Police, and Columbia 9-1-1 Communications District assisted. Scappoose Fire encourages everyone to always have a safety plan. “Planning and prevention are the keys to preventing fires,” the release states. “Constant vigilance to fire safety makes most fires preventable.”