News from around the Rogue Valley from reporters of Rogue Valley Magazine…
MONDAY, OCTOBER 28, 2019
Rogue Valley Weather
Today
Sunny, with a high near 61. Calm wind. Overnight, clear with a low around 30 degrees.
Tuesday
Sunny, with a high near 55.
Wednesday
Sunny, with a high near 60. Light east wind.
Thursday
Sunny, with a high near 64.
Today’s Headlines…
The Oregon Department of Forestry are battling a small fire near Quartz Creek, Oregon, north of Hugo which is now at 11 acres. The fire is burning on private industrial land.
Saturday night, ODF and Rural Metro Fire were able to line the main body of the fire, but the windy conditions on Sunday sparked several spot fires outside of the perimeter.
No evacuations have been issued and there are no road closures.The cause of the fire is still under investigation.
Jackson County open burn window has begun and today is a burn day.
Officials remind you to use extreme caution due to sustained winds. Have a hose, tools and pay close attention to your burn piles! It only takes a second for your burn pile to escape leading to a brush fire. If you can, please wait for more burning conditions.
Call the open/barrel burn advisory at 541-776-7007 to hear the daily burn status.
The Oregon Office of State Fire Marshal (OSFM) is mobilizing 15 strike teams to assist with the response to California wildfires.
Using its emergency mobilization plan, and following a request made through the Emergency Management Assistance Compact (EMAC), the OSFM has activated its Agency Operations Center and is sending the 15 strike teams today with equipment and personnel to join firefighting efforts. Teams will be arriving at staging areas by the end of day today.
The mobilized strike teams, comprising nearly 300 personnel total, will be sent from the following counties: Klamath, Yamhill, Linn, Columbia, Clatsop, Benton, Multnomah, Marion, Washington, Clackamas, Lincoln, Jackson, Josephine, and Lane Counties.
“The Oregon Fire Service is ready to provide assistance to California,” said Chief Deputy State Fire Marshal Mariana Ruiz-Temple. “The Oregon Fire Mutual Aid System (OFMAS) is robust and prepared to respond quickly when these formal requests are received.”
California made the request through the EMAC, a national state-to-state mutual aid system. The EMAC request is sent directly to the Oregon Office of Emergency Management. The requests allow for the OSFM to mobilize resources through the OFMAS. The teams are comprised of Oregon’s structural firefighting agencies, which provide structural firefighting and all-hazards assistance.
Oregon’s structural firefighters mobilized by the OSFM were last sent to California to respond to the Camp Fire in Paradise in November 2018.
Around the state
Despite a 4-month-old city ordinance Eugene restaurants still are adjusting to asking questions like, “Do you need a straw?” or “Would you like a fork?” when providing customers single-use items.
Questions like those are required by the city code before a customer is offered certain items with their drink or meal. A city ordinance that went into effect June 17 says that retail food and drink establishments must ask and a customer must reply with consent to the items for them to be provided.
Reusable items are not included in the ordinance, and it applies to all single-use straws, utensils, stirrers and condiment packets, no matter what material they’re made of. Though it’s been active for four months, there’s still plenty of confusion about the ordinance’s specifics.