Bulletin Daily Paper 7-17-13

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Serving Central Oregon sjnce1903 75g

WEDNESDAY July17,2013

no someess-visie 8 lesSturgeonfishing OUTDOORS• D1

OUTDOORS• D1

bendbulletin.com TODAY'S READERBOARD

LOCAL GOVERNMENTS

savin s oin i oreserves

Dementia —The rate has declined, according to two

studies, as people's health has improved generally.A4

Plus: Prevention —Retiring later may help prevent the onset of dementia, as well as an active mind.A3

• Some funds maybespent, but city, countieshaveeyeon2015rate hikes By Shelby R. King The Bulletin

LettuCe BOt —A robot can thin a field of lettuce in the same time it takes 20 workers to do the job.A3

The rates public employers in Oregon pay into their employees' retirement fund will be lower than anticipated fol-

lowing the passage of a bill by the Oregon Legislature aimed at reforming the public pension system. Senate Bill 822 means employers may pay more into the

Public Employees Retirement System starting in 2015 than they'd originally planned. Plus, a legal challenge to the bill in the state Supreme Court — by the American Federation

of State, County and Municipal Employees and the PERS Coalition on the grounds that the bill is an unconstitutional breach of contract — may wipe out any savings at all. But for now, the bill's passage means savings for several local government entities.

"We had already budgeted the increase in for this year," said Deschutes Public Library Director Todd Dunkelberg. "In the short term we'll be setting that money aside to make sure the bill doesn't get knocked out in court." See PERS/A6

Yearly SaVmgS These CentralOregon governments will save this much per year until PERS rates rise:

Bend: $1.3 million• Deschutes County: $1.3 million• Crook County: $45,000• Jefferson County: $177000• Deschutes Public Library system: $104,000

Mirror Pond's fateSi UP to panel

China in picturesTossed out negatives chronicle daily life in the country in a new exhibit.AS

LOCcil neWS —Clerical error leaves Jefferson schools owing the state $2.5 million.B1

In SpurtS —Stage1 of the Cascade Cycling Classic.C1

By Hillary Borrud The Bulletin

U.S. Senate —Acompromise on Obamanominees leaves the filibuster intact.A2

And a Web exclusive-

The time of year for lightning-sparked fires is just starting, but local blazes — including those sparked

Bend city councilors

and park board mem-

over the past week at a homeless camp in the Bend area, a campsite near Sisters, the climbers' trail on

bers voted unanimously on Tuesday to form a new committee that will select a final plan for the future of Mirror Pond. They also viewed the resultsofa recent community survey on four options for the pond. But officials said before they can reach a decision they need to know Pacific Power's plans for the Newport Avenue Dam, which created the pond. "Certainly we should move forward and form a committee," City Councilor Sally Russell said. See Pond/A6

South Sister, and likely at La Pine State Park — serve as a reminder that humans are the biggest culprits.

As the U.S. prepares to with-

draw, Afghanistan's military is

FIRE UPDATE

still struggling.

Ballag

of hackers target U.S. universities By Richard Perez-Pena New York Times News Service

America's research universities, among the most open and robust centers of information exchange in the world, are increasingly coming undercyberattack, most of it thought to be from China, with millions of hacking attempts week-

ly. Campuses are being forced to tighten security, constrict their culture of openness and try to determine what has been stolen. University officials concede that some of the hacking attempts have succeeded. But they have declined to reveal specifics, other than those involving the theft of personal data like Social Security numbers. They acknowledge that they often do not learn of break-ins until much later, if ever, and that even after discovering the breaches they may not be able to tell what was taken. "The attacks are increasing exponentially, and so is the sophistication, and I think it's outpaced our ability to respond," said Rodney Petersen, who heads the cybersecurityprogram at Educause, a nonprofit alliance of schools and technology companies. "So everyone's investing a lotmore resources in detecting this, so we learn of evenmore incidents we wouldn't have known about before." SeeHackers/A4

Prevention

Wildfires can becaused bynature — most likely

benddulletin.com/axtras

EDITOR'5CHOICE

Thefacts

By Branden Andersen

by lightning — but 9 out of 10 in the U.S.

The Bulletin

areman-made.AsofTuesdaymorning,86 percent of Oregon's 348 fires so far this year

A fire in a remote corner of Jefferson County nearly doubled in size Tuesday, sending smoke into Prineville 24 miles away, while in Deschutes County firefighters quickly doused a flareup in La Pine State Park. The Box Springs Fire, still burning after three

days, grew from approximately 340 acres to 500 acres, according to the OregonDepartment of Forestry. Assistant District Forester Tracy Wrolson said that fire lines surround the fire and he expects it will

stop growing.

"We're thinking in the next day or so, we'll have this thing wrapped up," he said. Smoke drifted into Prineville on Monday evening, and while visibility improved afterward, Wrolson said smoke density is at its worst in the early mornings and evenings. "If the smoke starts settling again, we ask the public to be cautious about driving," he said. Fire broke out around 10:45 a.m. Tuesday in La Pine State Park near the camping areas. The fire burned a fifth of an acre and was contained within an hour by firefighters from the La Pine Fire Department, the Department ofForestry and the U.S. Forest Service, said Forest Service incident commander Che Perez. Because no lightning occurred in the area, Perez assumed the fire was human-started. See Fire/A4

TODAY'S WEATHER Sunny 4

High 87, Low 54

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have been started by humans. Most human-caused wildfires result from:

• Unattended campfires

S moldering campfires that are left unattended or left behind are to blame for many a wildfire. When you're ready to put out your fire and call it a night,

follow these guidelines from SmokeyBear: • Allow the wood to burn completely to ash. • Pour lots of water on the fire, drowning all

embers (not just the red ones). Pour until the hissing sound stops.

• Debris burning • Discarded cigarettes

• If you do not have water, use dirt or sand, mixed with the embers. Continue adding and stirring until all material is cool. Do not bury the fire; it will continue to smolder and could catch

• Discarded fireplace ash or charcoal • Fireworks

• Cook stoves • Arson Lightning is the predominant natural culprit, but earthquakes, which rupture gas lines or

trigger volcanic activity (and lava flows), can also start fires.

roots on fire. • Stir the ashes and embers with a shovel.

• Scrape the sticks and logs to remove anyembers. • Stir and make sure everything is wet and cold to the touch. (If it's too hot to touch, it's too hot to leave.)

N. I(orean Ship seized in Panama

2013 fireseasonsofar Below are the number of areawildland fires to date, listed by cause andtotal acreage. LIGHTNING

HUMANS

TOTAL

DeschutesNational Forest .......................14 (2.1 acres) .............38 (14.2 acres) ..................52 (16.3 acres) OchocoNational Forest.............................. 5 (28.8 acres)...............8 (1.2 acres).......................13 (30 acres) Crooked River National Grassland............ None .............................2 (0.2 acres) ......................2 (0.2 acres) BLM land(Prineville district) ..................... 2 (0.4 acres) .................25 (4,779.9 acres) .............27 (4,780.3 acres) OregonDepartment ofForestry land........ 3 (240.3 acres).............16 (175 acres)....................19 (415.3 acres)

By RickGladstone and David E. Sanger New York Times News Service

It started with a tip: that a rusty North Korean freighter, which had not plied the Caribbean in years, was carrying drugs or arms amid morethan 200,000 sacks of Cuban sugar. It ended with a fiveday, eventually violent standoff between Panamanian marines and 35 North Korean crew members, armed largely with sticks, who were subdued and arrested while their captain tried to kill himself. Underneath the sugar, it turned out, were parts for what appeared to be elements of an antiquated Soviet-era missile radar system that was headed, evidently, to North Korea — a country that usually exports missile technology. See Panama/A4

The total acreage ofburned land reported on local BLMland, which appears unusually large, includes theGordon Butte Fire that scorched 3,300acres along the Deschutes River. Thefire was started by a knocked-over camp stove in June. Another note: The local ODF acreage doesn't include the latest size of the Box Springs Fire. Sources: Bulletin reporting, National Park Service, Central Oregon Interagency Dispatch Center, smokeybear.com, ehow.com, National Geographic

Deschutes National Forest crews cut a line around the wildfire at La Pine State Park on Tuesday. Because no lightning was reported in the area, it's suspected that the fire was humancaused. Rob Kerr The Bulletin

4 P Weijse recycled newsprint

INDEX Busines s/Stocks C5-6 Comics/Puzzles E2-3 Horoscope D6 Outdoors Calendar B2 Crosswords E 3 Lo c al/State B1-6 Sports Classified E1 - 6 D ear Abby D6 Ob i tuaries B5 TV/Movies

AnIndependent

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