News

Its no secret that irrigation withdrawals have a major impact on stream flows in the Deschutes Basin. From Wickiup Reservoir in the pine forested Cascade foothills south of Bend to the Juniper dotted canyons outside Terrebonne, the rise and fall of the river is dictated less by snow and rain than the opening and closing of steel gates that meter out water to the legions of farmers on the High Desert.
Over the past decade, irrigators, conservation groups, cities and other stakeholders have made major strides in restoring some of the diminished flows. This past summer, flows in the middle Deschutes were as much as four times the summer average recorded for much of the 20th century when water-thirsty crops and inefficient irrigation methods left little for the river. Much of that restored flow has come as the result of piping projects that allow irrigators to leave some of their conserved water in the river without curtailing their own usage.

Almost two dozen rural post offices slated for closure by the United States Postal Service will remain open, including postal facilities in Brothers, Post, Paulina and Fort Rock.
Sen. Jeff Merkley announced late last week that the Postal Service has agreed that closing the facilities would place undue hardship on rural residents who rely on the post offices for personal and professional purposes.
The Source wrote this past year about how the proposed closing would impact people living around Brothers for whom the facility serves both as a means of communication and community. At the time, the postal service was mulling the closure of more than 3,600 post offices around the country, primarily in rural areas. More than 40 of those were located in Oregon.

If you live outside of the magnet school zones and want your child to attend one of the four alternative schools, be prepared to wait in line.
Last Tuesday, despite protest from a number of concerned parents and teachers over the past few months, the members of the Bend-La Pine school board chose to keep in place the current rules that determine how children are admitted to Amity Creek, Highland, Westside Village and east side magnet, Juniper Elementary School.
At the December 13 meeting, board member Beth Bagley made a motion to amend the magnet school zone policy, but her fellow board members failed to second the motion effectively killing any possibility of revising the magnet school admission policy.