Family and local citizens gathered at the National Guard Armory in Ontario on Monday, Aug. 8, to send off 16 guardsmen for their year-long deployment to Kuwait. A motorcycle escort, plus vehicles from local fire and ambulance departments, led the way out of the armory grounds as soldiers waved from[Read More…]
Author: Cynthia Liu
PHOTO GALLERY: Move-in day at Malheur County Fairgrounds
Cables were carried, rides bolted, and lemons squeezed on move-in day at the Malheur County Fairgrounds. Just before the start of the week-long fair on Tuesday, Aug. 2, workers, vendors, and contest entrants flocked to the Desert Sage Event Center in Ontario to set the stage on Monday. A last-minute[Read More…]
PHOTO GALLERY: Summer spirits, temperatures high at Ontario Family Fiesta
ONTARIO – Over 500 people gathered on the green field of Ontario Middle School on Thursday evening for Family Fiesta, a celebration of Latinx art, culture, and the end to four weeks of summer school. Students and families endured the 102-degree heat with energizing dance performances, artwork, and ice-cold refreshments[Read More…]
PHOTO GALLERY: City Councilor Eddie Melendrez on mentees, boxing
A busted jaw in a professional boxing match ended a career in the ring for Ontario’s Eddie Melendrez. Now, he pushes to see that young people in Malheur County to get a chance to advance and learn. He serves now on both the Ontario City Council and the Ontario School[Read More…]
PHOTO GALLERY: Lights, fins, action! Behind the sea-nes at Ontario theater camp
The Missoula Children’s Theatre made a stop in Ontario for the first time in two years, helping local kids put on a production of The Little Mermaid in a weeklong summer camp at the Four Rivers Cultural Center. Two Missoula instructors directed the show and workshops for the week, while[Read More…]
Behind the scenes, under the sea at Ontario theater camp
ONTARIO – An ocean-patterned set stretches across the stage of the Four Rivers Cultural Center. Stuffed fish, tails, and tridents lay in wait as a chant echoes from the darkness: “Rouse! Pillage! Plunder!” This year, 60 local kids participated in the Missoula Children’s Theatre summer camp in Ontario, a weeklong[Read More…]
Life dream? No, but family’s RV home is furnished with love
ONTARIO – Every morning, Tiana Gutierrez-Costante wakes up at home, in a 32-foot travel trailer. She takes her five dogs outside, fills the water tank, and prepares breakfast – pancakes, eggs, a strawberry or banana smoothie. Outside, her children play in a dip of green grass, and beyond that, 166[Read More…]
PHOTO GALLERY: Tone of life in an RV Park
Like any community, River Point RV Park in Ontario is a patchwork of family, identity, and background – though its cast is likely more diverse than what you’d find in a typical neighborhood. Travelers come and go, families take a respite from an increasingly unaffordable housing market, and others are[Read More…]
Home, sweet RV home: RV living new solution to rising costs, tight housing market
RV parks are cropping up across Malheur County, and they can’t be built fast enough. As housing costs and shortages rise across the nation, residents of Malheur County and beyond have turned to RV living as a means of affordable housing. New RV parks are currently slated for Nyssa, Vale,[Read More…]
Vale, Nyssa fire agencies getting extra summer help
A state grant is adding three seasonal firefighters each to the Vale and Nyssa fire departments. Both agencies received money through the Oregon State Fire Marshal’s 2022 wildfire season staffing grant. It gives local fire departments up to $35,000 for personnel costs. The Vale Fire Department added three seasonal firefighters[Read More…]