I want to share an inspiring story of a miracle that meant a lot to our family. This miracle happened while we were visiting family in the area and involved one of your local vets, Marc Omann at the Country Animal Clinic by Wal-Mart in Island City.

My then 8-year-old daughter received a Shih Tzu puppy from my sister who lives in the area. Dr. Marc has been the vet for my sister and brother-in-law’s farm for many years and had given Luke (the puppy) his shots and check-up. So when we were in town during the summer, I called ahead and scheduled to get Luke fixed while we were helping family move.

Even before the outcome of the school bond measure was decided, I knew our school district and our community would be better for the experience.

As part of our bond communication efforts, we engaged groups and individuals to a degree that we have not seen in recent years. We re-established and strengthened the lines of communication between all of the parties and opened a positive dialogue that will continue regardless of the results of the school bond measure.

ELGIN — A health district is a municipal corporation. It exists with the specific purpose of providing some type of health service. Like other local governments, health districts have legal and ethical obligations.

Health districts receive tax revenues based on the voter-approved permanent rate per $1,000 in assessed property value within the defined geographic area. Most importantly, a health district is governed by a publicly elected board. The decisions regarding services and community accessibility come from local decisions. The board makes and maintains local control over the clinic.

If having a medical clinic in Elgin is truly important to the residents, they will have to vote for the district and have it pass. This will provide a baseline of funding that would be enough to keep the clinic stable. The other revenue from billing would be enough to keep someone interested in running the clinic here and the doors open more often.

Kramer, Addison, Loomis, Hays

This year’s Union County Fair was blessed with good weather, attracting large crowds all four days of the fair. As part of our efforts to engage citizens in discussion on public policy issues, the Union County Democrats hosted an informal “vote your issues” poll at our fair booth using colorful glass stones.

Each voter could use six stones, singly or in multiples, to drop into six glass jars labeled: Economy, Education, End War, Energy, Health Care and Veterans. We told the fairgoers that we would report on the results following the fair.

In the Aug. 20 edition of The Observer is a story of the latest attempt by the Forest Service to hold one of its famous “controlled” burns in weather judged to be extremely high for fire danger and held in an area that had large amounts of private property.

In typical arrogant fashion, the regional spokesman for the Forest Service said, and I quote, “This happens all the time. You burn up someone’s fence post or pasture and they file a claim.”

The start of any school year brings with it a fair amount of emotion. Believe me, it’s not just the students who wake up on that first day of school to a mixture of excitement and apprehension. 

For me, the honor of beginning the new school year as superintendent of La Grande Public Schools is especially rewarding. This community has been my home for a long time and the challenges and opportunities in our school system are well known to me. That’s where the excitement and challenge come together.

One of the true gems in the La Grande downtown is the F. Maxine and Thomas W. Cook Memorial Library. I would encourage everyone to take time to stop in and see what we have to offer.

We have fresh, up-to-date collections of books, audio books, video/DVD formats for children and adults, and 125 subscriptions to magazines and newspapers. The Colleen F. Johnson Community Room is available for a variety of uses and is an ideal location for meetings and activities at no cost.

Wondering how to close out a summer season of record high gas prices? How about a last “staycation”?  Why not stay home, enjoy the beauty of the Grande Ronde Valley and all of the delights of the brand new Crossing the Blues Festival in downtown La Grande.

 The first Crossing the Blues Festival, set for Friday and Saturday, promises to keep everyone entertained, fed and watered. The festival kicks off Friday evening with a repeat of the Third Thursday Art Walk beginning at 5:30 p.m. featuring many local galleries and artists including The Potter’s House, Back to Nature Gallery and the Mitre’s Touch. Satellite Gallery will premiere the Visual Arts Invitational featuring 24 regional artists.

While we endure the “dog days” of August in our air conditioned homes and vehicles, I sometimes think back to our Continental Congress who endured the hot, humid stuffiness of five months to hammer out our Constitution and Bill of Rights at Independence Hall in Philadelphia. It brings a literal meaning to the term “heated arguments” when you consider how uncomfortable they must have been long before the days of air conditioning.

We tend to think that our freedoms were secured by the Declaration of Independence on the Fourth of July in 1776. Not so. The newly founded colonies had to fight a long, bloody war before they finally met and adopted our form of government 11 years later on Sept. 17, 1787.