MOXEE, Wash. — U.S. hop production jumped by 11 percent this year on top of a 3 percent increase in 2014.

Production totaled 78.8 million pounds this year compared with 71 million pounds a year ago, according to a Dec. 17 report by the USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service.

The preliminary value of the crop is $345.4 million, up 33 percent from the revised value of $260.6 million for the 2014 crop, NASS said. Growers received record high prices as more production shifted from alpha varieties to higher-value aroma varieties in response to aroma demand from craft breweries, the report said.

The average price per pound was $4.38 compared with $3.67 in 2014 and $3.35 in 2013, NASS said.

Washington produced 75 percent of the 2015 crop at 59.4 million pounds. The rest came from Oregon and Idaho. Oregon grew 10.6 million pounds, Idaho 8.7 million pounds. The three states produce about one-third of the world supply. Oil from hop cones is used for flavoring and stabilizing beer.

Production and acreage increased in all three states. Washington had its highest number of acres harvested on record going back to 1915. Idaho also had its highest production and acres harvested on record going back to 1944.

Extreme heat in Washington early in the growing season during crucial cone development and drought from a low winter snowpack in the Cascade Mountains created concern about this year’s crop, said Ann George, executive director of Hop Growers of America and the Washington Hop Commission in Moxee.

Some aroma varieties yielded poorly because of those factors, but late-season bitter hops were a bright spot with above-average yields, George said.

“Considering those challenges and the amount of first-year plants in the ground which have smaller yield, we are pleased with the final count and looking forward to next year,” she said. Acreage is expected to continue growing, she said.

Meanwhile, European producers, relying almost entirely on rainfall rather than irrigation, had one of their toughest years in more than a decade due to drought, George said. Production is 23.8 percent lower than a year ago, she said. Germany, which produces about one-third of the world crop, is down 26 percent.

While some new and proprietary varieties are expected to be tight due to increased popularity and limited production, it appears most of the 2015 world decrease is in high-alpha bittering hops, which have some carryover in storage, she said.

Growth of small, craft breweries has driven demand for aroma varieties “to a level that has challenged the industry to continue to expand production at an equivalent rate,” George has said.

Craft breweries have projected 20 percent annual growth through 2020, which has resulted in Pacific Northwest hop growers expanding aroma acreage and converting alpha acreage to aroma.

There’s been a 48 percent increase in PNW hop acreage in the past three years, she has said.

SALEM, Ore. (AP) — Four dozen entities have expressed formal interest in purchasing the Elliott State Forest near Coos Bay.

The Statesman Journal reports that prospective buyers of the 84,000-acre property include timber companies, conservation groups, local governments as well as several individuals. They have until November 2016 to submit an ownership plan.

The forest was designated in 1930 to provide funding for the State School Fund, but has recently lost money with the drop in timber harvests.

The property has not yet had an official appraisal, but is likely valued at up to $400 million.

KLAMATH FALLS, Ore. — While Congress dithers over the Klamath Basin’s water agreements, the parties to the nearly 6-year-old deals are becoming resigned to their likely collapse at the year’s end.

A panel of federal and state officials, tribal members, environmentalists and other participants in the 2010 accords has set a conference call for Dec. 28 to discuss termination of the Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement — an ominous date for the deals’ proponents and a light at the end of a long tunnel for their detractors.

PacifiCorp, whose plan to remove its four hydroelectric dams from the Klamath River sparked much of the controversy, is now resuming its effort to relicense the dams, company spokesman Bob Gravely said.

With the Karuk Tribe — a key water right holder on the Klamath River — already having walked away from the pacts and the Klamath Tribes signaling their intention to do so, some of the irrigation districts that had signed on are also ready to walk away, said Greg Addington, the Klamath Water Users Association’s executive director.

The result could be what many growers and others in the basin have been dreading — a return to drastic irrigation shutoffs and cutbacks and protracted court battles over water rights.

“Our members have made it clear,” said tribal chairman Don Gentry, whose Klamath Tribes have the most senior of water rights in the Upper Klamath Basin. “We’ve been honoring the KBRA since 2010. It’s been five years, and our native fisheries and Lost River and shortnose suckers are in worse condition now than when we signed the agreements.

“We agreed to provide water at certain levels with the idea that legislation would move forward,” he said.

Bills to authorize removal of the dams have languished in Congress since 2011. Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., a longtime opponent of dam removal, unveiled an eleventh-hour draft bill on Dec. 3 to move forward on other aspects of the agreements while putting approval of dam removal in the lap of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

Walden’s bill won praise from Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, who said proposed federal land transfers to the Klamath Tribes in exchange for waiving senior water rights “are ideas I could strongly support in order to move forward.”

However, the bill received a cool reaction from proponents of the Klamath agreements, who have warned that water-sharing components of the pacts could crumble if Congress doesn’t authorize the package — including dam removal — before the end of the year.

So far, no efforts have been made to merge Walden’s bill with one by Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., which includes dam removal but has failed to advance beyond the upper chamber’s Energy and Natural Resources Committee. And lawmakers don’t appear to be in any hurry to get a bill passed.

“We had hoped people would agree to remain at the table” into 2016, Walden spokesman Andrew Malcolm said. “We’re hoping that what will work for people on Dec. 31 will still work on Jan. 1 or Jan. 2.”

House Speaker Paul Ryan’s office did not return a call from the Capital Press seeking comment about a timeline for moving Walden’s bill forward.

The 42 signatories of the pacts that included the dam removals as well as water-sharing and numerous conservation efforts in the basin already renewed the agreements once, in late 2012. However, looming deadlines lend more of a sense of urgency this time, proponents say.

“I think this time is different,” said Glen Spain, northwest regional director for the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations. “We’re a short period of time … from deadlines when this is all supposed to happen. We’ve done everything that’s been required in this, including finding non-federal money for dam removal.”

Already, regulatory agencies are resuming the task of reviewing PacifiCorp’s dam-relicensing application, which the company has estimated would cost at least $300 million and leave the company exposed to other costs from litigation and added water quality regulations. Under the Klamath Hydroelectric Settlement Agreement, the cost to PacifiCorp’s ratepayers would be capped at $200 million.

Trust funds from surcharges to PacifiCorps customers for dam removal have amassed more than $100 million, which will either be refunded or used to meet relicensing conditions if the Klamath agreements die, Gravely said.

The Karuk Tribe and other proponents of removing the dams have vowed to urge the state water boards to deny PacifiCorp’s relicensing applications under the Clean Water Act, which would force the dams to be removed anyway. But such a denial would be unprecedented, Gravely said.

Meanwhile, local opposition to dam removal has become more entrenched in the Klamath Basin as opponents have been elected to majorities on the Klamath County Board of Commissioners and several irrigation district boards.

“I’d like more time,” said Addington, whose KWUA represents irrigation districts in the Klamath Reclamation Project. “I for one and my organization would say we want to salvage this thing, and we’d be ready to have a conversation about that. But the Yurok Tribe has made it clear that it wants to move in a different direction … and the Klamath Tribes have made a similar statement.

“I just think we risk a harder-line element saying collaboration didn’t work” if the parties try to keep the agreements together, he said.

Without the water pacts in place, growers in the Upper Klamath Basin could face another water crisis this spring like the one they encountered in 2013, when a total shutoff of irrigation water prompted landowners to begrudgingly work out their own water-sharing agreement with the tribes that was also contingent on the dams being removed.

While project irrigators have a stipulated settlement with the tribes that will remain even if the KBRA dies, the lack of an agreement could put more pressure on those growers’ water supplies, too, as more water for fish is sought under the Endangered Species Act, Addington said.

As to whether any future agreement could be salvaged from the wreckage, Addington said he’s unsure.

“Either … the KBRA is going to be a footnote in the interesting history of water in the Klamath Basin, or it’ll be the next step to something bigger,” Addington said. “I think it’s too early to say.

“I hate football analogies, but I feel like we got to the goal line and were just not able to punch it in,” he said. “We’ve got a House bill out there and a Senate bill out there … I just wish the folks in Congress would do what all the parties did, which is to lock themselves in a room and get it done. It’s the season of miracles, so who knows?”

PORTLAND — Organic acreage has surged in Oregon even as the number of organic farmers has shrunk in recent years, according to federal data.

The total number of organic farms in the state decreased 18 percent, from 657 to 525, between 2008 and 2014, according to the USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service.

Meanwhile, organic acreage nearly doubled in Oregon, from 105,600 to 204,000, the NASS report said.

The agency found a sharp decline in the number of farmers who earn less than $25,000 in annual revenue, while the number of those with sales of more than $250,000 grew, said Dave Losh, Oregon’s state statistician for NASS.

“The smaller folks are having a harder time and the larger operations are getting bigger,” Losh said, noting that the trend is occurring in overall agriculture as well.

In some cases, organic farms may not have gone out of business but opted to drop their organic certification for financial reasons, said Chris Schreiner, executive director of Oregon Tilth, an organic certifier.

At the time of the survey, a USDA cost-share program that helped pay for certification costs had lapsed, so some growers decide the organic label was no longer financially feasible, he said.

That program has since been restored with funding from the 2014 Farm Bill.

Even so, the 2008 survey was conducted shortly before the financial crisis, so some farms might have shut down during the ensuing economic downturn, said Ivan Maluski, policy director of Friends of Family Farmers, a nonprofit group.

“I think the recession during that five-year window had a lot to do with it,” he said.

Oregon’s acreage growth has bucked a national trend, as overall U.S. organic acreage contracted nearly 10 percent, to 3.7 million acres, between 2008 and 2014.

The state has the fifth highest number of organic acres in the country, following California, Montana, Wisconsin and New York.

Oregon is also near the top of the list in sales of organic farm products, with $237 million in 2014.

Nationally, crops represent 60 percent of organic sales, livestock products such as milk and eggs represent 28 percent and livestock represents 12 percent.

PORTLAND — Oregon farm regulators plan to spray more than 8,000 acres in Portland next spring to prevent the establishment of the Asian gypsy moth, a destructive pest found in the area this year.

The Oregon Department of Agriculture plans to first conduct extensive outreach before applying Bacillus thuringiensis, a biological pesticide that destroys the insect’s ability to digest.

“This is a pretty significant deal for us, especially since we will have to apply the Bt aerially around Portland,” said Katy Coba, ODA’s director, during a Dec. 16 meeting of the Oregon Board of Agriculture in Portland.

The treatment is sensitive as it could provoke a negative public reaction in the populated urban area that would interfere with the ability to fight the pest, said Clint Burfitt, manager of OFA’s insect pest prevention program.

“There’s a short opportunity to mitigate the AGM threat before it spreads,” he said.

The cost of spraying will likely involve several aircraft and the Oregon portion of the project is expected to cost $2.5 million, Burfitt said.

Spraying will also occur in southwest Washington at a cost of $3 million, he said.

This year the moths were found on the Washington and Oregon sides of the Columbia River.

In Oregon, eradication will likely begin in mid-April and involve three treatments one week apart, pending an environmental assessment and public outreach, Burfitt said.

Oregon has asked the federal government to fully pay for the spraying, but ODA will also request funding from the state legislature early next year in case the federal funds don’t cover the entire expense, said Coba.

The eradication project is the third largest in Oregon’s history, said Helmuth Rogg, director of Oregon’s plant program area.

Asian gypsy moths have previously been intercepted in Oregon in 1992, 2000 and 2006 along the Columbia River, likely due to Asian imports at the nearby Port of Vancouver, he said.

The Asian gypsy moth is more of a danger to agriculture and the environment than the European gypsy moth, whose females are incapable of flight, Burfitt said.

Asian gypsy moth females can fly and produce up to 1,000 eggs each, so the species can become established more rapidly, he said.

With about 600 host plants, the Asian gypsy moth also has more habitat available, he said.

The pest can greatly defoliate wild-growing plants, negatively affecting stream temperatures, Burfitt said.

For agricultural products, such as nursery stock, the pest’s establishment would cause increased pesticide use and may impede shipments to other states and countries, he said.

In 2000, the Washington State Department of Agriculture sprayed for the insects on 725 acres in the Ballard and Magnolia neighborhoods of Seattle.

In 1992, WSDA sprayed 116,457 acres for the Asian gypsy moths in Pierce and King counties.

BOISE — Weed scientists believe the number of glyphosate-resistant kochia weeds in the Treasure Valley area is small enough that growers can prevent their spread with the right management strategies.

Oregon State University and University of Idaho weed scientists last year confirmed the presence of kochia weeds that are resistant to glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, the popular weed killer produced by Monsanto Co.

The weeds were found in sugar beet fields in Southwestern Idaho and Eastern Oregon. Virtually all of the 180,000 acres of sugar beets grown in this region are genetically engineered by Monsanto to resist glyphosate.

“If we can convince growers who use Roundup Ready sugar beets and corn to implement some resistance management strategies, our feeling is we can keep these herbicide-resistant weeds at bay,” said UI weed scientist Don Morishita.

OSU weed scientist Joel Felix said weeds don’t develop resistance to an herbicide. Rather, a tiny population of weeds in each plant variety is naturally resistant and the herbicide kills off its competitors and allows them to flourish.

The best way to prevent the spread of glyphosate-resistant kochia, he said, is to use other herbicides along with Roundup.

“We need more than one mode of action so weeds not killed by Roundup will not spread,” he said.

This can be accomplished by using different herbicides either throughout the season or on other crops included in a field’s rotation in following years and also through “tank mixing,” which is mixing one or more modes of action in with glyphosate and applying them at the same time.

Felix said studies, including a recent one by University of Illinois, have shown tank mixing to be more effective than alternating herbicides but some growers are reluctant to do that because they believe it will injure their beets.

Felix and Morishita have conducted studies on tank mixing and Felix said growers can talk to either of them to find the proper rates to use.

According to Felix, glyphosate-resistant kochia has been found in 10 states: Idaho, Oregon, Wyoming, Montana, Kansas, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Colorado and Oklahoma.

In the Treasure Valley, it has been found near Ontario, Vale and the Oregon Slope area in Eastern Oregon and near Wilder in Southwestern Idaho.

Morishita and Felix conducted drive-by surveys of sugar beet fields in the region this year and collected seed from any kochia plants that survived initial and follow-up applications of Roundup.

Morishita said they did not detect any spread of resistant weeds beyond the areas where they have already been confirmed. Agronomists thought they found some near sugar beet pilings in Idaho’s Magic Valley area but tests determined they were not resistant.

BEND, Ore. (AP) — Another lone wolf recently passed through Central Oregon, following a path similar to the one blazed by OR-7, a wolf made famous by his wandering.

But like OR-7 and three other wolves tracked by collar in the past five years, OR-28 appears to not be interested in establishing a territory in Central Oregon.

Since coming from northeast Oregon last month, she is so far sticking south of Silver Lake — the dry lake, not the town — in Lake County, said Russ Morgan, state wolf coordinator for the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife in La Grande.

Why collared wolves have only passed through Central Oregon so far and not stayed is unknown, he said. “Collar data only tells, ‘The wolf was here at this point in time.”’

And the data is from a small sample size. Oregon has at least 81 wolves, according to a Department of Fish and Wildlife tally from the end of 2014. Most are found in the northeast corner of the state. Less than 20 percent of the wolves have tracking collars, estimated John Stephenson, Oregon wolf coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. He said people should not read too much into the collar data showing wolves passing up on Central Oregon territories.

“We also know there are other wolves that don’t have (GPS or) radio collars running around, and we don’t know their paths,” he said.

The collar data do show that wolves seem to avoid the population centers of Central Oregon, such as Bend, Redmond and Madras. Drawn on a map, the paths of OR-7 and OR-28 show the wolves turning south when they came close to Pine Mountain, about 30 miles southeast of Bend.

Both wolves were likely dissuaded from staying in Central Oregon by human activity and bright city lights at night, Stephenson said. That’s not to say other wolves might not eventually find a home here, though, particularly in the forested mountains.

“I think the Cascades of Central Oregon are good wolf habitat and they will occupy that area, but they have to get around Bend and Redmond to do that,” he said.

So far, at least one wolf, OR-25, is known to have passed though the Central Oregon Cascades earlier this year, although he kept going south.

Of the collared wolves to disperse, or leave their packs, from northeast Oregon, OR-25 is the only one so far to find trouble. In early November, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife confirmed he attacked three calves, killing one and wounding two others, on private land near the Upper Williamson River.

Efforts to keep him away from cattle since have been effective, Stephenson said Wednesday. They include lights and noise boxes as well as electrified fladry — flagging designed to deter wolves from going over a fence line. And state wildlife managers have fired cracker shotgun shells, which make a loud noise designed to spook animals.

OR-25 is spending less time near the pasture. “We’re hoping he’ll move somewhere else entirely, but he hasn’t done that yet,” Stephenson said.

While OR-25 and OR-28’s collars still are sending signals, the collars of OR-3 and OR-7 have blinked out.

Since September 2011, state and federal wildlife managers did not know what had become of OR-3, until a private trail camera captured a photo of him this July in the Cascades of northern Klamath County. The photo shows a wolf in the lower right corner of the frame. The black animal has a tracking color and an ear tag.

State officials used the color and location of the ear tag to determine the identity of the wolf.

“The only wolf that can be (is) OR-3,” Morgan said.

Farther south and west in the Cascades, OR-7 found a mate, a female who also dispersed from northeast Oregon and now is raising his second litter of pups.

Only time will tell whether more wolves follow OR-3 and OR-7 to the southern Cascades or decide to blaze their own paths to Central Oregon. In May 2014, another male wolf, OR-24, wandered into Central Oregon only to turn back and return to northeastern Oregon.

“We just have to be patient and wait for the wolves to tell us where they will be,” Morgan said.

The U.S. Forest Service could finalize its revised land management plans for the Blue Mountains National Forests by early 2017, following a year-long re-engagement process with the public.

The plans will essentially guide management decisions on the Umatilla, Wallowa-Whitman and Malheur national forests for the next 10-15 years. While the documents do not approve any site-specific projects, they do set goals and desired conditions on approximately 4.9 million acres of public land.

Forest plans are supposed to be updated every 15 years to reflect changes in the landscape and science, though the current Blue Mountains Forest Plan is from 1990. Forest supervisors unveiled a draft version of the revised plan last year, which was met with criticism.

The negative feedback was so overwhelming that regional forester Jim Peña allowed more time in January to meet with stakeholders and find common ground on issues including road access, wilderness and commercial logging. Since then, the Forest Service has held public workshops across Eastern Oregon to hear new ideas and solutions.

Despite some continued rumblings, the supervisors say the input they’ve gathered has led them in a positive direction.

“Overall, the engagement process has helped us to better understand our public,” said Tom Montoya, supervisor on the Wallowa-Whitman National Forest. “There’s been folks on all sides of the issue who have provided really good comments to find some balance.”

However, Montoya admitted he was frustrated during a meeting Nov. 2 in La Grande, where nearly 200 people packed the Blue Mountain Conference Center. Tempers flared, and Montoya said he later heard from people who told him they felt threatened.

Norm Cimon, a retired Forest Service employee of 26 years, said the discussion was not closely moderated and broke down into a free-for-all.

“Given the anger that’s built up from the rhetoric that’s been thrown around, there’s going to have to be better management of these meetings,” Cimon said.

Cimon, who serves on the board of directors for Oregon Rural Action, a La Grande-based environmental nonprofit, said the tone was set by a letter from state Rep. Greg Barreto, R-Cove, accusing the Forest Service of “bureaucratic ineptness.”

Re-engaging with the public is absolutely worthwhile, Cimon said, but he felt Barreto’s letter didn’t help the situation.

“I hate that kind of talk. I really do,” Cimon said.

In his letter, Barreto says, “The overreaching heavy hand of government continues to pursue its stranglehold on the rural parts of the state, our way of life and our pursuit of happiness.” He also wrote “The preservationists along with you, the federal government, are teaming up to keep local people from our public lands.”

In a separate interview, Barreto said he was unable to attend the meeting in person and was asked by his constituents in the forest access movement to write a letter. Barreto said he intentionally worded the letter the way he did to make a point about people’s distrust in the current administration.

Barreto did credit the Forest Service for re-engaging with the public, and said people need to speak passionately to make sure they are heard.

“If everyone goes to these meetings and speaks in blasé language, probably nothing comes out of it,” he said. “If there’s no passion in what you’re saying, then what you’re saying falls on deaf ears.”

Montoya said the feedback is heard, and will be used to evaluate potential changes to the proposed forest plans. But, he added, people need to make sure they are providing substantive comments backed by evidence.

“It’s really not a venting process. It’s about addressing issues,” Montoya said. “I think we’re making positive momentum, definitely.”

Montoya said the Nov. 2 meeting was an anomaly, and they could have done a better job facilitating such a large group.

Steve Beverlin, supervisor on the Malheur National Forest, said he has been happy with the turnout at meetings he attended. He said the passion in people’s arguments comes through much stronger in person than just reading them on paper.

“Some people want more wilderness, some people want less; some people want more timber harvest, some people want less; some people want more access, some people want less,” Beverlin said. “The key for me is providing a safe environment for people to voice those opinions.”

After the new year, Beverlin said there will be a meeting of the minds to evaluate what potential changes could be made to the proposed plan. Of course, there are legal sideboards, he said, and not all suggestions will be feasible.

The supervisors said they hope to have a final Environmental Impact Statement completed by the end of September. Barring any other setbacks, a final Record of Decision could be done by April 2017.

Two more public meetings are scheduled from 6-9 p.m., one on Monday, Dec. 14 in Clarkston, Washington, and one on Tuesday, Dec. 15 in North Powder.

“We need the public’s engagement and help for managing the public forests. That’s the bottom line,” Beverlin said.

A Baker County, Ore., cattle ranching couple who helped forge sage grouse habitat conservation agreements was honored during the Oregon Cattlemen’s Association annual conference Dec. 5-6.

Mark and Patti Bennett, of Unity, were given the 2015 Riley Freeman Award, named for a past OCA wildlife committee chairman who saw the need for cooperation between private landowners and the state and federal agencies that regulate wildlife and natural resources.

The award was jointly established and is presented annually by the OCA and ODFW.

In honoring the Bennetts, ODFW Director Curt Melcher praised them as “model stewards” of their cattle ranch. Like many other Eastern Oregon ranchers, the Bennetts signed a voluntary conservation agreement to maintain or improve habitat for greater sage grouse. Mark Bennett served on a rules advisory group that worked to balance the interests of landowners and regulatory officials.

“Bennett pushed for a reasonable approach to protecting sage grouse habitat while also protecting the economic viability of eastern Oregon and working lands,” ODFW said in a news release.

The voluntary agreements in Oregon were a model for other states, and were a key factor in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s decision in September to keep Greater sage-grouse off the endangered species list.

NEWTON, Kan. (AP) — Kansas authorities say an Oregon man was urged to head home after he was spotted taking pictures of a wheat field wearing nothing “but a hat and a smile.”

The Harvey County sheriff’s office in Central Kansas says the man was first spotted Wednesday afternoon.

Sheriff T. Walton says authorities found the man four hours later — wearing boxers.

Walton said on the office’s Facebook page that an officer told the man and his friend that “Kansas is not as liberal as Oregon” and “suggested they continue their travels” back home.

Walton says it’s technically not illegal to be publicly naked in the county, as long as one is not trying to arouse oneself or others.

Walton added, “You know folks, you just can’t make this stuff up!”

The largest mountain snowfall of the season is expected to hit Western Oregon during the next six days, dropping snow on pass levels and bringing 20 to 40 inches of powder to the Cascade Range.

A system of cold air should transform the heavy rain into heavy snow above 4,000 feet, forecasters with the National Weather Service in Portland said, in a winter storm projected to last through the weekend.

Snow is expected to slam Willamette and Santiam passes with up to 10 inches of snow by Thursday evening. By Friday, the snow level is expected to drop to around 3,700 feet.

“This should be the biggest snow accumulation for the Cascades so far this year,” said Gerald Macke, a metrological technician with the NOAA. “We’re going to see wave after wave of moisture that’s not going to stop until next week, and above 4,000 feet, that should all fall as snow.”

The projected numbers — always to be taken with a grain of salt — are eye-popping.

Timberline Lodge on Mount Hood and Willamette Pass in the Central Cascades could see 20 to 40 inches, while Crater Lake National Park could get upwards of 50 inches by early next week.

PORTLAND — For the record, it is possible to find a job where you do your work while sitting in a yurt with a laptop and a sandwich. The yurt, it should be said, is on the third floor of a 100-year-old building in Portland’s Old Town, where street people provide rambling commentary and futilely shake parking pay stations for loose change.

Inside the old building, up to 400 employees of AirBNB, the international online vacation rental hub whose other offices are in San Francisco and Dublin, Ireland, take calls and emails from all around the world while perched in cubby holes, arranged in themed mini-offices or, yes, occupying the yurt.

But let’s talk about the sandwich.

The greens are from Portland’s Sauvie Island Organics. The ham is from Olympia Provisions, also of Portland, and the chutney was made in-house by AirBNB’s food team. The bread is from Pirate Bread, a North Portland startup.

All of which is intentional. AirBNB provides free breakfast, lunch and all-day snacks to its call center workers five days a week. As much as possible — bananas, orange juice, coffee and chocolate are among the few exceptions — the food is locally sourced. The baked kabocha squash? From Sauvie Island again. The portabella mushrooms? From Hood River, Ore. The maple-cashew-miso cream cheese? Made in-house. Craft beer and wine are available after work shifts, beginning at 5 p.m.

That’s just the casual soup, salad and sandwich bar. Four blocks away, behind an unmarked door along busy Burnside Street, AirBNB operates a full-blown restaurant for its employees. They’re encouraged to take a walk, grab a table and eat family style from shared platters. Again, free.

The employees, of course, eat it up.

Darcy Boles said free, healthy food is an “added, incredible bonus.” Her lunch table mate, Jeralyn Fix, said it’s the best perk of the job. The relaxed work atmosphere is somewhat like home, she said, and she feels free to get up and get a bowl of cereal anytime she likes.

Then there is James Evans Harvey, who on a recent day found a couch in the yurt to her liking. Evans Harvey worked one season for a CSA farmer and gained an appreciation for local food.

“I’m a new mom,” she said, “and for me it’s profoundly important to know the food going into my body and my baby’s body was grown, produced and made with a whole lot of love.”

AirBNB’s food service has a ripple effect, she said. The way she and other call takers interact with customers is “impacted by the way we’re treated here.” The work is “greatly enhanced by feeling we are home.”

The bigger ripple effect may be in the regional food system, especially among small producers and processors who operate relatively close to urban areas.

Kristin Arychuk, AirBNB’s culinary product and vendor lead in Portland, seeks out local farms and processors that can supply the greens, grains and finished goods needed to feed workers. She finds leads at farmers’ markets, looking for partners to provide ingredients and food that is seasonal and sustainable. AirBNB’s corporate culture encourages support of the local economy, she said.

“One of my main emphases is to make sure we ethically and wisely spend our money,” Arychuk said.

It’s a job that requires menu flexibility. “Yes we plan but no we don’t,” Arychuk said. “It’s dictated by what is great right now.”

The Portland center stresses sustainability in other ways as well. It eliminated canned beverages and the food team makes many drinks in-house. It employs re-usable totes, and snacks are delivered in bulk to avoid packaging. Leftover food is re-purposed, if possible, or donated to area missions that feed the homeless. “I feel pretty good about our waste structure,” Arychuk said.

Corporate cafes apparently started as a perk offered by high-tech firms that were competing for talented employees. A 2014 article online at Business Insider said Google had become the “gold standard of dining in Silicon Valley” by operating more than 30 free cafes for the estimated 20,000 employees at its headquarters in Mountain View, Calif. Each cafe focused on using local ingredients, according to the article.

Big buyers such as AirBNB have the power to change the nature of the food system, said Amanda Oborne, vice president of food and farms for Ecotrust, a Portland nonprofit. Oborne was lead author of a report that examined how small to mid-size farms and processors can find success in Oregon’s regional food systems. The report noted that institutions such as schools, hospitals, care centers and jails serve 40 million meals annually, and that “ag of the middle” producers could find expanded markets if they can solve some transportation, warehousing, cold storage and aggregation problems.

Corporate cafes such as AirBNB’s have more money to spend than public institutions, and likewise can have a big impact by seeking out locally produced food and ingredients and “really putting their money where their mouth is,” Oborne said.

AirBNB’s action in Portland is a significant commitment to sourcing within the region, she said.

Buying from local producers requires give-and-take from both sides, she said. Corporate cafes have to work harder and be more flexible to find everything they need, and accept the seasonal ups and downs of supplies. For their part, small farmers and processors accustomed to being paid on delivery have to realize their payment will be delayed as it cycles through a company’s accounting system.

“There isn’t any way around it,” Oborne said. “They get paid, but not that day or the next day, but a couple weeks down the road.”

AirBNB employees, meanwhile, say the free, healthy and locally sourced food they’re being served is a more immediate reward.

Employee Phil Davis said he’s paid less at AirBNB than at a previous job, but the food helps bridge the gap.

“It’s like a hidden benefit in your paycheck,” he said.

Medford resident David Miles grumbles every year about having to turn his clocks forward in the spring and back again in the fall.

This year, Miles decided to respond differently by launching a ballot initiative Nov. 12 to end daylight-saving time in Oregon.

“I complain almost every time there is a time change and do nothing about it, and I didn’t want to be that guy anymore,” he said.

A month later, Miles has 20 volunteers in 15 Oregon towns and cities who have gathered nearly 1,000 signatures — a first step toward placing an initiative on the ballot. He said he expects to hit the 1,000-signature mark by mid-December.

Once the volunteers pass that hurdle, they’ll need to round up a total of 117,578 signatures to send the measure to voters in November.

The proposal abolishes daylight-saving in 2018 and allows voters in individual counties to opt out through an election. Miles added that provision with Malheur County in mind. That county already follows Mountain time to be uniform with neighboring Idaho.

“The fringe benefit is other counties can decide to stay on daylight-saving time, through general county election,” Miles said.

Changing clocks back and forth is disruptive to internal body clocks, sleep patterns and can even be dangerous, he said.

A 2014 study by University of Colorado at Boulder found that fatal traffic accidents spike by 17 percent on the Monday after clocks spring forward.

Daylight-saving began in the United States in 1918 to conserve electricity during the final days of World War I. It became a permanent ritual in 1966 with passage of the Uniform Time Act. The federal legislation was designed to end a confusing patchwork of different time zones in the country but allowed individual states to opt out. Arizona, Hawaii and some U.S. territories have chosen to stay on standard time.

Nowadays, the time change fails to accomplish the goal of saving energy, Miles said.

A University of California Berkeley study found that a two-month extension of daylight-saving time in Australia during the Sydney Olympic Games in 2000 failed to curtail electricity demand.

Earlier this year, there were proposals in several states to end time changes by either remaining on daylight saving or adhering to standard time year-round, according to the Washington Post.

Oregon Sen. Kim Thatcher, R-Keizer, introduced a bill in January that would have let voters to decide whether to abolish daylight saving in 2021.

Dozens of Oregonians testified in favor of the proposal.

Joanne DeWitt, one of those who submitted testimony, said daylight saving causes hazards while serving no purpose.

“I would like to see it go the way of other old dinosaurs,” DeWitt said.

The legislation stalled in the Senate Rules Committee. Some lawmakers were concerned about being out of sync with Washington and California, according to Thatcher’s office.

“I think once one state does it, the others will follow, and honestly, it isn’t that big of a deal,” Miles said “I have never heard people in Arizona say, ‘I hate being off time with Utah.’ They always laugh at the rest of the country at daylight-saving time.”

Albany resident Carrie Davis, one of the volunteer petitioners, said she has always hated daylight-saving time. Her opposition compounded when she had children.

“Now that I have kids, it is apparent to me when we try to change our daily schedule even by an hour, it is so impactful to our whole success through the day,” Davis said. “Trying to get a toddler to go to sleep an hour later or an hour earlier is just challenging, for a superficial social agreement we don’t need.”

The irrigation company that owns the dam at Northeast Oregon’s Wallowa Lake has temporarily withdrawn a water right application that is part of its plan to pay for rehabilitating the structure by selling some of the water from its increased storage capacity.

Associated Ditch Companies Inc., formed by five irrigation ditch companies that originally built the dam nearly 100 years ago, will renew its application to the state Water Resources Department in 2016, project manager Dave Hockett said.

The decision is another detour in a long-running community argument. Federal inspectors, citing the possibility of a breach, have restricted the dam operators to storing about 72 percent of the water it could potentially hold. Associated Ditch Companies, or ADC, maintains that rehab work will allow it to reach the dam’s previously authorized storage capacity, an estimated 12,000 acre feet more than is currently being stored.

The problem has been how to pay for the work, estimated to cost $15 million. ADC has proposed selling about 4,200 acre feet annually of the renewed storage capacity to downstream users. Buyers might include other irrigation outfits, industrial users or community water systems, Hockett said.

Farmers and others in the Umatilla Basin are pursuing ways to recharge aquifers and have expressed interest in drawing water from the Columbia River for that purpose. In the past, they’ve mentioned increased flow that might come from the Wallowa River if the dam is repaired. The Wallowa flows into the Minam River, which joins the Grand Ronde River, then into the Snake and finally the Columbia.

ADC’s plan to finance the repairs by selling water is opposed by community members who believe the water should be retained for local benefit.

The discovery of a bacterial disease, Xylella fastidiosa, has convinced Oregon’s farm regulators to order a quarantine restricting shipments of susceptible plants from nine counties.

The pathogen causes symptoms similar to drought stress and often kills affected plants, as no treatments are available, said Helmuth Rogg, director of the Oregon Department of Agriculture’s plant program area.

A pear nursery in Hood River County first reported disease symptoms earlier this year, which researchers from Washington State University found were caused by Xylella fastidiosa, he said.

The Oregon Department of Agriculture was initially unable to replicate these results but eventually confirmed the bacteria’s presence after refining its test procedures, Rogg said.

The agency then found that pear trees from the National Clonal Germplasm Depository in Corvallis, Ore., were infected with the bacteria and that pear scion wood from that facility had been sent to 22 sites in the state, he said.

ODA is now trying to trace the disease’s source and where else infected plant material may have been shipped.

It’s also issued an emergency quarantine for the nine counties where the pear tree scions were shipped: Benton, Hood River, Jackson, Lane, Linn, Marion, Multnomah, Washington and Yamhill. Violating the quarantine is punishable by fines of up to $10,000.

While the bacteria has so far been associated with pear trees, the quarantine prohibits shipments of any host plant material, including oak, maple, blackberry, caneberry, blueberry and stone fruit, said Rogg.

That restriction remains in place until either the counties are found free of the disease or the bacteria’s presence is determined not to exist at a particular nursery production site, he said.

If ODA nursery inspectors do detect the bacteria, affected plants must be destroyed and the surrounding 10 meters around them will be surveyed for further evidence of the pathogen.

Insects that suck sap from plants, such as the glassy-winged sharpshooter in California, are known vectors for the bacteria’s spread, Rogg said.

Disease caused by Xylella fastidiosa has devastated olive orchards in Italy and threatens California wine producers, he said.

Oregon’s climate has traditionally been considered too cold to harbor the bacteria, which is likely why it hasn’t been found in the state until now, he said. With the prospect of warming temperatures, however, the concern is that Xylella fastidiosa will be able to survive here.

The recent discovery will postpone shipments of plant material to Europe until ODA and the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service are able to demonstrate the existence of pest-free areas or production sites, Rogg said.

Cort Brazelton, whose family runs the Fall Creek Farm & Nursery near Lowell, Ore., said he’s optimistic that ODA’s efforts will allow his company to ship blueberry plants to Europe next year.

“We feel confident we’ll be able to comply with all the requirements,” he said.

Brazelton said he’s happy to follow additional steps to ensure that Xylella fastidiosa doesn’t spread to customers in Europe.

“You’d always rather have no barriers but it’s important that individual counties that don’t want pathogens have reasonable protocols so that they don’t come in,” he said. “We do have to comply with the higher global standards because we ship all over the world.”

BEND, Ore. (AP) — As Oregon conservationists turn their attention to the monarch butterfly, field research has found that there are more of the colorful insects in the state than once thought.

The field research last summer by the U.S. Forest Service and volunteers found that Central Oregon is dotted with butterflies, The Bulletin reports. Researchers found 125 adult monarchs and more than 300 caterpillars. Before the data was collected, there were only four or five known spots for monarchs. The survey found about 30 sites.

“We basically put Central Oregon on the map for monarch butterfly conservation,” said Matt Horning, a geneticist with the U.S. Forest Service in Bend.

The new findings could help efforts to revive the species, which is being considered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for protection under the Endangered Species Act.

Monarchs are known for their massive migrations, with the trip south for winter taking multiple generations. Some butterflies have been known to fly as far as from Mexico to the Midwest. The butterflies eventually make their way to coastal California before a new generation returns north.

Monarchs are found in Oregon from May to October.

Horning said he plans to further study monarchs in Central Oregon, potentially marking some to learn more about where they migrate.

Katya Spiecker, founder of the Monarch Advocates of Central Oregon, said monarchs are important because they are a good poster child for pollinators, such as bumblebees and wasps, and the problems they face.

“A lot of pollinators, their populations are dropping,” Spiecker said.

A federal agency has twice faulted the longshoremen’s union for unfair labor practices at the Port of Portland, but such rulings won’t directly restore container service at the facility, experts say.

Ocean carriers responsible for the majority of container traffic at the port, Hanjin and Hapag-Lloyd, stopped servicing the facility earlier this year due to low productivity.

The disruption has affected farmers who relied on Portland’s container terminal to export crops to Asia and now face higher shipping costs.

The National Labor Relations Board has found that since September 2012, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union operated cranes and trucks in a “slow and nonproductive manner,” among other actions, to force ocean carriers and the terminal operator to “cease doing business with the port.”

In a previous ruling, the NLRB also found that the union also engaged in earlier work slowdowns and stoppages during a dispute with the terminal operator, ICTSI Oregon.

These findings allow the agency to seek contempt sanctions against the union in federal court.

Capital Press was unable to reach an ILWU spokersperson for comment. Elvis Ganda, CEO of ICTSI Oregon, released a statement saying the union should “accept the validity” of the ruling and agree to restore productivity at the container terminal.

While the terminal operator has prevailed in these NLRB disputes, using these legal victories to actually bring ocean carriers back to Portland is a more complicated matter, experts say.

That’s because the NLRB has ruled that ILWU cannot engage in work slowdowns, but there’s currently almost no work with which to interfere at the container terminal.

“This is a very unusual scenario when it raises the point of enforcing the law,” said Michael LeRoy, a law professor specializing in labor relations at the University of Illinois.

For ICTSI, the NLRB rulings are more likely to serve as bargaining chips in its overall negotiations with the longshoremen’s union, LeRoy said.

The union, the port and the container terminal are also engaged in other litigation in federal court.

It’s possible that ICTSI will use legal victories as part of a public “tit for tat” with the longshoremen’s union but later “wipe the slate clean” so the terminal can again become operational, LeRoy said.

Terminal operators have not traditionally enforced such NLRB rulings to win monetary awards due to fear of creating “lifelong ill will” with the longshoremen’s union, said Jim Tessier, a labor relations consultant and former employee of the Pacific Maritime Association, which represents terminals.

“They use it as a negotiating tool,” he said.

ICTSI would be wiser to drop the case against the union as a show of good faith rather than press for penalties, Tessier said. “That would mean the kiss of death for that company, in my humble opinion.”

Ocean carriers won’t return to the port unless they’re convinced the union and terminal operator have reconciled, he said.

ICTSI Oregon has a 25-year lease for the container terminal, so unless the company is willing to make amends with ILWU to restore service, it “will have a nice parking lot,” Tessier said.

Whether the NLRB is willing to seek financial damages or simply regards the legal victories as symbolic is a “wild card,” said LeRoy.

The agency has won major awards in the past, such as a $64 million against a miner’s union for staging illegal pickets, he said.

In that case, however, the pickets were directly preventing the movement of trucks, LeRoy said. At the Port of Portland, the agency would have to prove that ILWU’s actions drove ocean carriers away.

“That is harder to demonstrate,” he said.

The prohibition against genetically engineered crops in Jackson County, Ore., will be allowed to stand if a proposed settlement is finalized, barring a new legal challenge to the ordinance.

Voters in the county approved the ban last year, which prompted alfalfa growers Schulz Family Farms and James and Marilyn Frink to file a lawsuit claiming the ordinance violated Oregon’s “right to farm” law.

In May, U.S. Magistrate Judge Mark Clarke rejected their argument, finding that the “right to farm” statute is intended to protect growers from lawsuits and ordinances against common farming practices, but it exempts farmers who want to avoid damage to their crops.

“While farming practices may not be limited by a suburbanite’s sensitivities, they may be limited if they cause damage to another farm’s crops,” Clarke said in the ruling.

While the plaintiffs lost this argument, they still sought more than $4 million for the lost value of the biotech alfalfa crops they’d have to destroy when the ordinance went into effect.

Also, the growers would eventually be able to challenge Clarke’s “right to farm” ruling before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals once the original lawsuit was closed.

They’ve now agreed to give up that right and drop their other claims against Jackson County under a proposed settlement that would in turn allow their alfalfa to stay in the ground, but for no longer than eight years.

While other farmers are not bound by the agreement, which must still be approved by the judge, any future lawsuits would have to “grapple” with the finding that the ordinance complies with Oregon’s “right to farm” law, said George Kimbrell, senior attorney with the Center for Food Safety, which was involved in the litigation.

“This settlement preserves their victory,” he said.

It’s unclear whether the biotech industry would want to pursue a new challenge against the ordinance, Kimbrell said.

Shannon Armstrong, attorney for the plaintiffs, said they decided to agree to the proposed settlement because it would safeguard their investment in biotech alfalfa.

Altogether, the two farms planted more than 300 acres of alfalfa that’s resistant to glyphosate herbicides, which makes weed control easier.

“For us, it lifts a cloud of uncertainty,” said Armstrong.

Most local governments in Oregon are pre-empted from regulating biotech crops under a law passed in 2013 that exempted Jackson County because its proposed ban had already been approved for the ballot.

However, litigation is also pending over a similar prohibition passed in neighboring Josephine County in 2014.

Proponents of that ordinance plan to argue that Oregon’s biotech pre-emption statute is unconstitutional, according to court documents.

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — The Portland area was in line for a second soaking Tuesday after heavy rains turned streets into creeks, wreaked havoc on mass transit and forced the evacuation of at least one neighborhood.

Monday’s flooding caused the closure of numerous roads, and heavy rains triggered landslides.

The 24-hour accumulation at Portland International Airport set a record for December. More than 3.3 inches of rain fell in the 24-hour span that ended Monday at 2 p.m. Parts of the Coast Range got even more.

Light rain fell early Tuesday and forecasters expect the region to get soaked later in the day and again Wednesday night.

The National Weather Service has issued a flood watch for much of northwest Oregon and southwest Washington. It’s in effect through Thursday afternoon, but rain likely won’t stop until the week’s end.

The rains are caused by several low-pressure systems moving through the region, one after the other, forecasters said.

The downpours had officials evacuating a neighborhood in Clackamas County, and the American Red Cross opened a shelter there. Several school districts sent students home early Monday and the Oregon Zoo also closed.

A big sinkhole developed in a street in Gresham, a Portland suburb, where crews were also pumping water from an elementary school in Gresham.

The parking lot at Multnomah Falls, a popular tourist stop in the Columbia River Gorge east of Portland, was closed after a creek overflowed its banks.

In Lake Oswego, just south of Portland, several cars were stranded in high water.

The rain also caused Portland’s sewer system to overflow into the Willamette River. Officials said people should avoid contact with the river for at least 48 hours because of bacteria in the water.

Officials say residents should avoid traveling and should watch for flash floods, mudslides, falling trees and power outages. They are also advised to keep children and pets away from floodwaters and avoid walking and driving through high water. Residents whose property is at risk for flooding should use sandbags.

SALEM, Ore. (AP) — Opponents of Nestlé’s proposed water bottling plant in the Columbia River Gorge have turned in three times the number of signatures required to qualify a local ballot measure blocking the deal.

The citizen measure is being watched around the country, as other communities ponder whether publicly owned water should be given or sold to for-profit corporations, said Julia DeGraw, Northwest organizer for Food & Water Watch.

The measure would prohibit any bottled water exports from Hood River County. The Local Water Alliance, which is leading the campaign, believes it’s the first measure of its kind nationwide.

The deal to build a bottling plant in economically depressed Cascade Locks has been in the works for more than six years. It centers on state-owned water rights at nearby Oxbow Springs.

Cascade Locks had proposed trading its city well water gallon-for-gallon with the state’s Oxbow Springs water, then planned to sell the spring water to Nestlé. The plan faced an extensive review to determine whether it served the public interest.

In April 2015, the city and state decided to pursue a new agreement that would permanently trade water rights instead of just water, eliminating the need for a public interest review.

The decision drew complaints, protests and a formal letter from nine legislators urging Gov. Kate Brown to intervene.

Last month, Brown ordered the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife to withdraw its cross transfer application and return to the original water exchange process, which will require a public-interest review.

Nestlé officials said they were disappointed with the decision.

“This will likely further delay much needed economic development in Cascade Locks that our project would bring,” said Dave Palais, natural resource manager for Nestlé Waters North America.

The plant is expected to provide about 50 jobs. The company also is asking for tax breaks.

The plant’s opponents say it doesn’t make sense to send 200 million gallons a year out of a county that has been in a serious drought.

“This project would set a dangerous precedent that Hood River County is a county willing to give away the future of our water security,” said Aurora del Val, campaign director for the Local Water Alliance. “That precedent puts at risk our entire economy, which heavily relies on water, and it is not worth the small number of jobs Nestlé could create at a highly automated bottling plant.”

Nestlé sells 64 brands of water in 43 countries. It taps 50 springs across the United States, but doesn’t have a source of spring water in the Pacific Northwest. Instead, it trucks bottled water here from Sacramento.