Elected through Terror

Untitled Part 38

Our second to the last meeting of the principles of the 9-1-1 Center was held at the Rajneesh Ranch; it was not a pleasant meeting. It was intended to be the last one before acceptance by all entities. The consultant would draw it all up and the two of us would go to each entity to get signatures.

The District Attorney for Jefferson County attended the meeting with a Federal Mediator from Seattle. The DA had requested assistance from the Federal mediation program to help resolve issues between the Rajneesh and the rest of the citizens.

I had no idea that this was happening I am not sure who did, as it seemed to be a surprise to all of us there. But it definitely put an interesting twist to things.

I later learned he had been onboard for quite some time, mainly working with the state and federal agencies.

One of the people on the committee made a reference to the 'guard shacks' on the road. He was rudely and abruptly informed those were not 'GUARD SHACKS' but information booths! He was then given the standard lecture as to why they were there and how much better the Rajneesh operated things than anyone else.

It went down-hill from there.

Prior to the meeting we had pretty much agreed on everything.

When the state law was passed there was a time limit on how the cities would handle 9-1-1 calls to their entities. All but two of our cities had agreed to work with Wasco County to come up with a plan to answer the calls at the Wasco County Center.

During that time frame Shaniko and Antelope wanted their 9-1-1 calls to go to Jefferson County and their councils had passed a resolution to that effect. Those exchanges, like The Dalles exchanges, were also used by citizens outside the city limits.

I didn't have a problem with that, most of the calls from that area were ambulance related and it would be quicker to get an ambulance there from Madras (Jefferson County) – although Maupin's ambulance (Wasco County) was the one most used and was about equal distance.

The main concern of the residents was that the Madras hospital was about 20-30 minutes away and The Dalles hospital was an hour. It made them feel better to have the closer medical facility and an ambulance from that area.

The Jefferson County Center would route all law enforcement and fire calls to us. The few seconds to do that wouldn't make a difference to our operation. We would have to pay them for any and all calls to their center, but the cost was negligible.

In a matter-of-fact tone, the Rajneesh declared that they no longer wanted the Antelope 9-1-1 calls to go to Madras, since they had a 24 hour dispatching service at the ranch they wanted it to go there. (Of course, now they were in charge of the City of Antelope. They also had a city on the Ranch and both those cities, along with their Police and Fire chiefs had to approve of the plan.)

The mediator thought that was a great idea. I didn't. I also knew that if we didn't include their wishes we would not have a county plan.

I didn't discuss it with the other entities. I knew that I would not sign off on a plan that would allow the Rajneesh to decide if they wanted to let my Office know of any 9-1-1 calls and I also knew the citizens living outside Antelope's city limits would be placed at risk from Rajneesh shenanigans.

I am sure I was not the only member thinking I would refuse to sign off on that part of the plan.

Because this was a new wrinkle everyone agreed that it would have to be discussed with each agency's board or governing body and we would meet at a later date.

At first I wasn't sure how I was going to address this issue – on its surface this appeared fine. But it wasn't the surface that concerned me; I knew that if we agreed to this we were placing people at risk. People I had sworn to protect.

As I pondered the problem, it occurred to me that the Oregon Attorney General had instituted a lawsuit contending that the two cities, Antelope and the one on the ranch, were illegal – they were run by a religious organization.

THAT would be one of my reasons for not signing off on having their '24 hour dispatch' be a 9-1-1 center for Wasco County.

In the end, it wasn't necessary to discuss it – there was a more pressing issue that came off and derailed their bid for the center. All participants signed off on the plan – the Rajneesh were no longer involved.

We moved forward purchasing the equipment with the remaining entities' 9-1-1 funds and setting it up in the phone company's building.

Eventually, as a cost saving and more efficient use of manpower, the Center was placed under the Sheriff's Office.

The Board still met and discussed issues and directed the SO in modifications, but it was no longer a separate entity.