Living Well, Winter 2018

A D D I N G L I F E TO YO U R YE A R S

Nov–Dec 2018

HOW BLUE ZONES PROJECT™ IS INSPIRING BETTER HEALTH AND WELL-BEING IN OUR COMMUNITY BROUGHT TO YOU IN PARTNERSHIP WITH

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Pickup: Thursdays 5-7 p.m. at 2701 Foothills Blvd.

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I N T RO DU C T I O N

BY Gerry O’Brien Editor for the Herald and News

Blue Zones making progress, inroads in Klamath County

As is appropriate, this edition is all about the harvest, reaping what you sow, not only on the farm and in community gardens, but in changing one’s lifestyle for the better.

For starters, the Blue Zones Project has passed its three-year mark. It has raised awareness of the myriad number of health issues facing Klamath County. Now is the time to take stock of that effort and to look at the results that are bearing fruit. Then, it’s time to look forward to the next three-year effort. Our health reporter, Sean Bassinger, takes a look at those issues as the Klamath Falls Blue Zones Projectcomes under new leadership.

Of note in this edition is a progress report on Blue Zones. Klamath County has long been at the bottom of healthy living choices when matched with the state statistics. Now, there is some solid data showing that the dial is moving in the right direction.

Since 2015, the city has fared better than the national average for overall well-being, according to the Gallup-Sharecare Well-Being Index. “Klamath Falls has demonstrated resiliency by holding steady during that same time period,” said Dan Witters, principal at Gallup. And since last year, Klamath Falls has statistically improved in three out of five elements of well-being, giving it strong momentum moving into 2019. That’s encouraging. See the full story inside.

Also, Blue Zones Project has moved out of downtown and into the west wing of the Herald & News building, 2701 Foothills Blvd., at the north end of Washburn Way. It’s an ideal location, plenty of parking, great handicapped access and less congestion for their patrons. It is also centrally located for the entire city, so patrons can be reached within a five-minute drive.

The Klamath Farmers Online Marketplace is also in the Herald and News building, and details about that are in this edition of Living Well.

Speaking of the KFOM, local farm, ranch and water expert Dan Keppen pens an informative column in these pages about the good work the online market is doing. And reporter Holly Dillemuth also takes a deep dive into the farm to table aspect of KFOM. And there is a touching story about Community Uplift, by reporter Tess Novotny.

Community Uplift is a referral program that connects families and expecting mothers with 27 free services ranging from health care to special education across Klamath, Douglas and Lake counties.

Plus some nice, informative features and graphics.

We hope you enjoy this edition and show a copy to friends and family. Getting the word out about what’s available to our community when it comes to making healthy choices is oh so important.

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W

elcome to the winter edition of Living Well, a publication of the Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project in collaboration with the Herald and News.

TA BL E OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION with Gerry O’Brien, Editor for the Herald and News

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BLUE ZONES PERSONAL PLEDGE

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INTRODUCING THE BLUE ZONES PROJECT®

Community Uplift helps families; on page 30

What are the Blue Zones?

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What is the Blue Zones Project®

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What are the Power 9 Principles

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KLAMATH BLUE ZONES LOOKS AHEAD

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RESULTS FROM HEALTH INVESTMENTS

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GROWING HEALTHY PARTNERSHIPS

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PLANNING FOR HEALTH IMPROVEMENT

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MAPPING HEALTH IN KLAMATH

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2018 CULTURE OF HEALTH PRIZE

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GETTING INVOLVED, FINDING PURPOSE

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CONNECTING FAMILIES WITH SERVICES

30

GROWING FOR THE LOCAL PLATE

34

VIRTUAL MARKET ‘SELLS OUT’

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COMMENTARY: FARMERS & COMMUNITY

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CONTENT FOR LIVING WELL MAGAZINE CONTRIBUTED BY: the Herald and News, Blue Zones Project® and Sky Lakes Medical Center

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18 GIS puts Klamath health on the map; on page 18

34 Supporting community agriculture; on page 34

WAYS TO LEARN MORE: BLUE ZONES PROJECT® Twitter BZPKFalls

SURVEY CARD

What do you enjoy most about the Living Well magazine?

A) Stories about local people and businesses B) Health tips and tricks C) Recipes Let us know what you enjoy, and what you would like to see in future editions, by posting on our Facebook: Blue Zones Project – Klamath Falls or send us an email at: BlueZonesProjectKlamathFalls@Sharecare.com.

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oregon.bluezonesproject.com bluezonesprojectklamathfalls@healthways.com

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BLUE ZONES PERSONAL PLEDGE Our community has a great opportunity to become healthier. The Blue Zones Project strives to increase the well-being of our community; the personal pledge is a great step in that direction.

Unhealthy messaging regularly influences us through our smartphones, TVs, and even while we are driving. However, we can be more thoughtful about making choices that lead to better well-being.

The Blue Zones Personal Pledge includes tips from the original Blue Zones areas and evidence-based best practices people can take to improve how we take care of our minds and bodies. These changes can help individuals become healthier, make lasting friendships and find meaning and purpose in life.

At the end of the day, the responsibility falls on each of us to take ownership of our own lives. By completing the personal pledge, each individual takes steps toward a better self and strengthening Klamath Falls.

Make the pledge today by sending in the form below.

Instagram heraldandnews

Questions? Visit bluezonesproject.com to learn more

www.heraldandnews.com

Your Pledge

Taking the personal pledge means committing to learn, measure, participate, and complete five or more actions from the personal checklist in the next six months. Tell us how you want to participate by checking the boxes below. Then sign the pledge! We will be in touch to let you know how you can get involved.

 Join a Blue Zones Project® Walking or Potluck Moai.  Attend a Purpose Workshop.

 Volunteer with Blue Zones Project or another community organization.  Join the Blue Zones Project Action Force.

By providing my contact information below, I acknowledge that I am at least 15. I accept that I am responsible for deciding, in consultation with my physician, how much I can safely do and how far I can go.

First Name: Last Name: Date: Email Address: Zip Code: If Applicable: Employer:

Faith-Based Organization: School:

Cut out and mail to: Blue Zones Project – Klamath Falls, 130 S 5th Street, Klamath Falls, OR 97601

WHAT ARE THE BLUE ZONES?

THE BLUE ZONES Sardinia, Italy

In 2004 National Geographic and Blue Zones founder Dan Buettner teamed up with longevity experts to study the geographic areas where people live the longest, and tried to establish common patterns of behavior among those cultures.

Okinawa, Japan

These hotspots of longevity were the Italian island of Sardinia, the Japanese island of Okinawa, the Californian town of Loma Linda, Costa Rica’s Nicoya Peninsula, and the Greek island of Ikaria.

Ikaria, Greece

Loma Linda, California Nicoya Peninsula, Costa Rica

WHAT IS THE BLUE ZONES PROJECT®? to your years, and, coincidently, it may also add years to your life.

LIVING WELL

- Cort Cox, Former Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project® engagement lead

What began as a New York Times bestseller by National Geographic Fellow Dan Buettner, has evolved into a global movement that’s inspiring people to live longer, more active lives.

Blue Zones Project® offers a unique opportunity for individuals, organizations, and communities to make permanent changes to the environments where they live, work and play, to make healthy choices easier.

The Blue Zones Project® encourages communities to make environmental, mental and social changes to improve well-being, health and longevity.

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The Blue Zones Project will add life

After Dan Buettner and National Geographic teams studied the Blue Zones community’s lifestyles, they found nine common characteristics that lead to a healthier and longer life, called the Power 9 Principles.

The Power 9 Principles focus on improving the wellbeing of communities around the nation through changing their environments rather than lifestyles.

MOVE NATURALLY

Find ways to move more!

You’ll burn calories without thinking about it.

PURPOSE

Wake up with purpose each day and add up to seven years to your life.

DOWN SHIFT

Reverse disease by finding a stress-relieving strategy that works for you.

80% RULE

Eat mindfully and stop when 80% full.

PLANT SLANT Put more fruits and vegetables on your plate.

WINE @ 5

If you have a healthy relationship with alcohol, enjoy a glass of wine with good friends each day.

BELONG

Belong to a faith-based community and attend services regularly to add up to 14 years to your life.

LOVED ONES FIRST

Invest time with family – and add up to six years to your life.

RIGHT TRIBE

Surround yourself with people who support positive behaviors – and who support you.

“It’s more a philosophy to change your lifestyle; To eat better, stress less, move more and to do it with love,” - Tom Hottman, Sky Lakes Medical Center

A Community-Wide Approach When communities participate in the Blue Zones Project®, everyone benefits.

Worksites: Workers feel better and more connected to their colleagues, so they’re more productive, miss less work, and have lower health care costs.

Schools: Encouraging better eating habits, implementing tobacco-free policies, and increasing physical activity from a young age creates life-long healthy habits.

Restaurants: Healthier local food options make healthy choices a breeze when eating out.

Grocery Stores: Easier access to healthful and tasty foods allows families to improve their nutrition choices.

Community Policy: Sidewalks, community gardens, farmers’ markets, and other community infrastructures affect a communities ability to move naturally, connect socially, and access healthy food.

Individuals: From moving naturally more often to finding individual purpose in our lives, making small changes in daily routines can lead to living happier and healthier lives.

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WHAT ARE THE POWER 9 PRINCIPLES?

Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project Director Merritt Driscoll Submitted photo

THREE MORE YEARS

Blue Zones Project director looks ahead

Preparing for project wrap-up phase, merging with Healthy Klamath initiative

By Sean Bassinger, H&N Staff Reporter

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t was a lofty goal to start, but one food policy stakeholders associated with the Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project wanted to aim for: Create a “food hub” in Klamath Falls.

It was no simple task, but after months of work, the Klamath Farmers Online Marketplace, or KFOM, a new online marketplace that lets residents buy directly from producers, was created.

“It’s just really neat to think we accomplished that goal,” said Merritt Driscoll, the new executive director for Blue Zones Project in Klamath Falls.

“It looks different from what we thought it might look like in the beginning but I’d say it’s been a really big success.”

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Though they’ll have less staff, Blue Zones Project plans to stick around Klamath Falls for another three years. Now they’ll attempt to reach residents and make a lasting impact on what has traditionally been known as one of the unhealthiest spots in Oregon.

Merritt Driscoll, Blue Zones Project director in Klamath Falls, prepares to snap a photo of Kyle Longo and Robert Smith, who both frequent Veterans Memorial Park, showing their support for tobacco free parks in Klamath Falls during a cigarette butt cleanup March 1.

H&N file photo by Sean Bassinger

“We are doing so much together to create this culture of health in Klamath Falls,” Driscoll said. “There’s so many entities working to make Klamath Falls a better place to live.”

GOALS, COMMUNITY CHOICES The Blue Zones Project first arrived in Klamath Falls three years ago, to encourage healthier living and promote longer life, and has been busy since with the help of more than 500 volunteers and less than a dozen full-time staff.

The project originates from former National Geographic journalist Dan Buettner, who explored the prevalence of longevity in “Blue Zones” sites across the world.

The five original “Blue Zones” include Loma Linda, Calif.; Nicoya, Costa Rica; Sardinia, Italy, Icaria, Greece and Okinawa, Japan. There are also more than 42 Blue Zones Project communities, not unlike the Klamath Basin, across the U.S. The first Blue Zones demonstration community in Oregon was Klamath Falls.

Today in Klamath Falls, the group often mentions accomplishments such as more than 4,000 personal pledges signed to make healthier lifestyle choice commitments, more than 500 local volunteers working with programs and 28 Blue Zones Project-approved schools and worksites.

These worksite changes impact nearly 8,500 adults and children, according to Driscoll.

Driscoll further described the metrics that go into personal pledges: they work with people to choose five areas to improve their own lives.

This could include anything from additional physical activity to healthier eating choices.

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That attitude seems to be shaping up, from the Klamath Falls Blue Zone Project’s own efforts to the county also being selected as a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Culture of Health Prize winner.

“If you know your purpose and you’re truly living your purpose, it adds seven years into your life.”

- Merritt Driscoll Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project director

One often described aspect of the Blue Zones Project’s principles includes the premise of “purpose.” Those who sign on for personal pledges further outline what best motivates them to get the most out of their daily activities.

“If you know your purpose and you’re truly living your purpose, it adds seven years into your life,” Driscoll said.

Even when approving a worksite or school, they’ll make soft recommendations that a kitchen or restaurant merely expand its offerings with healthier alternatives. One such example could be offering a side of fruit in place of fries and other high fat content items.

“We don’t say ‘oh, you need to take away the cheeseburger or the fries,’ ” Driscoll said.

One often-described aspect of the Blue Zones Project’s principles includes the premise of “purpose.” Those who sign on for personal pledges through the project further outline what best motivates them to get the most out of their daily activities.

LOOKING AHEAD Previous Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project staffers, Rhiannon Kerr and Jessie DuBose, have since moved on to pursue additional opportunities.

Kerr’s position, which involved community engagement and marketing, is in the process of being filled.

This also factor’s into the group’s efforts to widen its base and explore new avenues in terms of reaching others in Klamath Falls and Klamath County, according to Driscoll.

The Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project is also looking toward other community solution models: Driscoll describes the Mills Neighborhood Association, a local group that volunteers time and effort during clean-up and renovation events, as one such example they plan to suggest for other areas.

STOP BY AND CHAT:

LIVING WELL

The Klamath Falls Blue Zones office is open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Monday through Friday at their offices at 2701 Foothills Blvd., inside the Herald & News building.

“That’s just one idea, but I thought that was a really great strategy we could work to implement,” Driscoll said of neighborhood outreach efforts.

Driscoll described the group’s budget as “reduced” moving forward, but she said current groups and partnerships will allow the Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project to stay ahead of the game and do more with less.

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“We’re still going to be doing everything we were doing before, and more,” Driscoll added. sbassinger@heraldandnews.com

KLAMATH FALLS GETS WELL-BEING PROGRESS REPORT Community receives Gallup-Sharecare Well-Being Index results, visit by Blue Zones Project team From the Blue Zones Project team

K

lamath Falls’ investment in better well-being is beginning to show results, three years after the launch of Blue Zones Project, a community-led well-being improvement initiative.

Since 2015, the city has fared better than the national average for overall well-being, according to the Gallup-Sharecare Well-Being Index.

“Compared to the U.S., which has declined in overall well-being since 2015, Klamath Falls has demonstrated resiliency by holding steady during that same time period,” said Dan Witters, principal at Gallup. “Purpose and social wellbeing, both of which have significantly dropped nationally and across the state of Oregon, are unchanged in Klamath Falls. And since last year, Klamath Falls has statistically improved in three out of five elements of well-being, giving it strong momentum moving into 2019.”

               

OVERALL WELL-BEING DEMONSTRATING RESILIENCY INCREASE IN PURPOSE SOCIAL WELLBEING FINANCIAL & COMMUNITY HEALTH COMMUNITY PRIDE COMMUNITY FEELING OF SAFETY DECREASE IN SMOKING

Meanwhile since 2015, Klamath Falls has experienced other well-being improvements, including a 14.7 percent increase in community pride, a 14.5 percent increase in feeling safe in the community, and a 24.3 percent decrease in smoking.

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The 2018 Well-Being Index showed local increases in purpose, financial and community health over the previous year. Social and physical health remained unchanged.

ALL ABOUT ...

THE BLUE ZONES PROJECT The Blue Zones Project is a community-led well-being improvement initiative designed to make healthy choices easier through permanent changes to a city’s environment, policy and social networks. Established in 2010, Blue Zones Project inspired by research by Dan Buettner, a National Geographic Fellow and New York Times best-selling author who identified five regions of the world — or Blue Zones regions — with the highest concentration of people living to 100 years or older. Currently, 47 communities in 10 states have joined the Blue Zones Project, impacting more than 3.3 million Americans nationwide. The movement includes three beach cities in California; 15 cities in Iowa; Albert Lea, Minnesota; the city of Fort Worth; and communities in Southwest Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Oklahoma, Oregon and Wisconsin.

SKY LAKES Sky Lakes Medical Center is a communityowned, internationally accredited acute-care hospital in Klamath Falls. It is licensed for 176 beds and offers a full range of inpatient and outpatient services, a home health agency, and a variety of primary care and specialty physician clinics. The Sky Lakes family also includes the award-winning Sky Lakes Cancer Treatment Center and Cascades East Family Medicine Residency.

HEALTHIEST STATE Oregon Healthiest State is a privately led, publicly supported partnership to assist Oregon communities in achieving better health outcomes. More than 70 percent of our health is influenced by our behaviors and surroundings, while just 30 percent is influenced by genetics and access to health care. That 70 percent is where Oregon Healthiest State focuses its attention. This cross-sector, statewide movement addresses health and well-being on all levels — physical, mental, emotional, social, financial and sense of purpose. Oregon Healthiest State’s goal is that by 2020, Oregonians are healthy, health equity increases, and Oregon is the healthiest state. For more information, visit ORhealthieststate.org.

CAMBIA HEALTH

LIVING WELL

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Cambia Health Foundation is the corporate foundation of Cambia Health Solutions, a total health solutions company dedicated to transforming the way people experience the health care system. A 501(c)(3) grant-making organization, the Foundation invests and partners with organizations to advance palliative care quality, access, and understanding; improve the behavioral health of underserved children; and transform health care to a more personfocused and economically sustainable system.

Learn more at cambiahealthfoundation.org.

“We’re encouraged by the areas where we have upward movement in Klamath Falls’ Well-Being Index score,” said Merritt Driscoll, director of Blue Zones Project, Klamath Falls. “We believe in the years to come we’ll see even greater well-being as Blue Zones Project efforts become more established in the community.”

Blue Zones Project works with Klamath Falls community leaders, neighborhoods, employers, schools, restaurants, grocery stores and faith-based organizations to make healthy choices easier. More than 6,000 residents have taken the Blue Zones personal pledge for better well-being, and over 70 local businesses and organizations have made changes to support the health of their employees and customers. The community has implemented nearly two dozen policies and projects that optimize the environment for well-being.

For Klamath Falls residents engaged in Blue Zones Project activities — such as purpose workshops or moais, small groups that gather to walk or share healthy meals — Well-Being Index improvements were even more pronounced. The Gallup-Sharecare survey showed that those residents reported higher levels of produce consumption and exercise, as well as increased community pride and purpose.

“The survey shows Klamath Falls held more stable than the rest of the state, improving in some categories, and going down in fewer categories,” said Paul Stewart, president and chief executive officer at Sky Lakes Medical Center, local sponsor of Blue Zones Project, Klamath Falls. “I believe this relative stability is because of the sustained efforts of the community to improve well-being.”

The Blue Zones Project national team visited Klamath Falls in early November — assessing progress throughout the city and making recommendations to improve well-being into the future.

“Our work in Klamath County has just begun, and our progress points to a real and positive impact,” said Klamath County Commissioner Kelley Minty Morris. “We are looking forward to more fully realizing our goal of better health and well-being for every resident.”

With leadership funding from Cambia Health Foundation, Blue Zones Project came to Oregon in support of the Oregon Healthiest State initiative. Klamath Falls was Oregon’s first Blue Zones Project demonstration site. When well-being goals are achieved throughout the city, Klamath Falls will be certified as a Blue Zones Community.

The positive changes enacted through Blue Zones Project helped Klamath Falls earn the 2018 Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Culture of Health Prize, which honors communities making strides in their journey to better health.

“We have great momentum in Klamath County and are energized for the work to come,” said Morris. “With Blue Zones Project bringing together partners across our community, we expect continued improvement in our health and quality of life.”

Healthy

Klamath

Healthy Klamath Partnership continues to grow as Blue Zones Project merges

By SEAN BASSINGER H&N Staff Reporter

M

any residents are likely aware of the Blue Zones Project following the health initiative’s community outreach efforts after first coming to Klamath Falls three years back.

But behind the scenes and emerging with more plans is another collection of local health groups that helped set the foundation: the Healthy Klamath partnership.

As it moves into its next three-year phase, the Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project has also settled into the Healthy Klamath umbrella, which combines several local health care stakeholders.

Jennifer Little, who is preparing to step in as the Klamath County’s new public health director, has helped spearhead many of the Healthy Klamath initiatives in the past few years. Now she’s preparing to pass the torch to Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project Executive Director Merritt Driscoll.

“We’ll probably keep a lot of that same structure because we know that it works,” Little said. “We have people engaged and we don’t want to lose that.

GEARS TURNING FOR HEALTH OUTCOMES The Klamath Basin continues to recover from what many describe as a “self-esteem” crisis in terms of health. In previous years, Klamath County had few resources to address health outcome concerns and routinely ranked last in Oregon on the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s own County Health Rankings and Roadmaps.

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BUILDING BRIDGES IN THE HEALTH COMMUNITY

Community Health Improvement Plan Priorities

Physical health

Maternal & Infant Health

Modifiable Health Risks

Social Determinants

Jennifer Little, far left, guides community members and out-of-town visitors on a tour of downtown Klamath Falls during a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Culture of Health Prize site visit May 2.

H&N file photo by Sean Bassinger

The rank itself is still second to last to Jefferson County, but many regional health experts say that the numbers take time to adjust. The actual culture in terms of resources, programs offered and initiatives to jump start community action have grown exponentially in the past three years.

Attempts to create community health initiatives were less successful in the past, according to Little. But everything soon came together after Oregon required counties to file annual community health assessments and community health improvement plans, or “CHIPs.”

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Knowing that they needed to file some of the same information on health outcomes and expectations, Little said many groups joined forces. Those involved include stakeholders with Sky Lakes Medical Center, Cascade Health Alliance, the Klamath Health Partnership and Klamath County Public Health.

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“That really strengthened the bond of Healthy Klamath,” Little said. “That’s also when we said we want a dedicated website presence for it.”

CONTINUING THE PUSH Charts on the Healthy Klamath website outline eight priority areas of health and living standards that further lead to programs tied to the group’s outcome goals.

The website also has several links to documents, statistics and other data sets to further offer a snapshot of what works well in the Klamath Basin and what needs to change.

Much of this discussion also led to Klamath Falls being chosen by the Blue Zones Project three years back, in addition to the more recent Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Culture of Health Prize.

Overall, Little described their role as more of a “storyteller” as opposed to those who take direct action within other individual groups.

“Because Healthy Klamath is not the one doing the work – it’s the partners within,” Little added.

More information and local data on the Healthy Klamath initiatives, including the full community health assessment and CHIP, can be found online at healthyklamath.org. sbassinger@heraldandnews.com

♥

“If we can look at health equity and those social determinants, we can try to break down those barriers because everyone deserves a fair and just opportunity to be healthy” - Jennifer Little incoming Klamath County Public Health director

DIGGING DEEPER FOR HEALTH & HEALTH OUTCOMES

By SEAN BASSINGER, H&N Staff Reporter

These are just some of the questions that many local healthy advocacy groups ask as part of the Community Health Improvement Plan, or CHIP, an annual effort to bring vital area health metrics together in one spot.

As a partnership between Healthy Klamath, Sky Lakes Medical Center, Cascade Health Alliance and others, the annual reports help better highlight what must be done most to continually improve health outcomes in Klamath Falls and Klamath County.

The next CHIP may be a bit different than prior reports: community health care partners say they want to focus more on specific outcomes as opposed to a broad scope, in addition to tying in a recent $25,000 grant prize.

Klamath County was recently selected for a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Culture of Health prize, a nationally recognized award that also opens new avenues in terms of networking.

“What we’d like to do is tie what we fund back in with the CHIP,” said Jennifer Little, incoming Klamath County Public Health director. “We make sure that we’re funding things that the community sees as a priority.”

FACTORS, OUTCOMES The Klamath County CHIP, like many other counties in Oregon, comes out annually. It focuses on several highlighted plans related to physical, mental and community health.

In summary, the 2016 report focuses on priority health issues within a broad range of topics. Some examples include cancer, obesity, low birth weights and food insecurity to name a few.

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What makes for better health outcomes? What drives people to do better on their own? What keeps people from reaching the goals they need to?

Klamath County Community Health Improvement Plan

PRIORITY HEALTH ISSUES Physical Health • Chronic Disease • Cancer • Obesity

Maternal and Infant Health

• Low Birth Weight and Prenatal Care • Breastfeeding

Modifiable Health Risks • Tobacco • Pregnancy and Tobacco

Social Determinants of Health • Food Insecurity

That last one is part of a growing trend in such reports: Little said more health care advocates and groups are seeking out information on “social determinants.”

These are factors that do not necessarily indicate an immediate health problem but do increase risks of poorer health outcomes in the long run.

“That’s where all the trends are going,” Little said.

Many of these topics fall into socioeconomic categories such as race, poverty, home environment and other factors that could lead to more unfavorable pathways.

Groups such as those involved with the Healthy Klamath Partnership make it their goal to closer examine these factors and intervene for the sake of health equity: they want everyone to have as many choices as possible, according to Little.

That’s also where the CHIP really comes into play.

“If we can look at health equity and those social determinants, we can try to break down those barriers because everyone deserves a fair and just opportunity to be healthy,” Little said.

Areas of focus for Klamath County continue to include social factors such as poverty and living environment, in addition to more direct outcomes such as maternal and infant health, obesity and diabetes.

WHAT’S IN A CHIP? Areas of focus for Klamath County continue to include social factors such as poverty and living environment, in addition to more direct outcomes such as maternal and infant health, obesity and diabetes.

Childhood obesity continues to be one of the more alarming trends, with the rate increasing from 65.7 percent to 71.2 percent among adolescents age 12 to 19. Sexually transmitted infections also increased from 337 cases to 382 cases from 2014 to 2017.

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Adolescent alcohol use, however, had a steady decrease from 16.2 percent in 2015 to 11.1 percent in 2017. These numbers were based on eighth and 11th grade students who reported use of alcohol or any other drugs in the past 30 days during an Oregon Healthy Teens survey.

Living Well with Chronic Conditions

To further address needs, Healthy Klamath also assembles a committee that further examines local priorities. One such example used was the continued opioid crisis facing the U.S., which Little describes as a “multi-pronged approach” for outcomes and solutions.

Living Well, a locally offered chronic disease self-management workshop, helps you live healthier and happier with a chronic disease.

Progress reports released in 2017 say that an opioid prevention task force was started late in the year to better rally community partners.

Common chronic conditions include: diabetes, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), depression, arthritis, chronic pain, congestive heart failure, fibromyalgia, asthma, or any other chronic condition you may be living with.

Free 2 1/2-hour Living Well workshops are offered in Klamath Falls each week for six weeks. Workshops are fun and interactive! Learn from trained volunteer leaders who are living with chronic conditions themselves. Connect with peers who are also living with chronic conditions.

You will learn how to: Manage symptoms and medications 



Work with your health care

team 

Set weekly goals

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Problem-solve effectively



Improve communication

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Relax



Handle difficult emotions

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Eat well, and exercise safely

A schedule of upcoming classes is available on the Healthy Klamath website at https://bit.ly/2zBZhgf.

To sign up contact Valerie Franklin at 541-274-7250.

CONCRETE, ‘STRATEGIC’ FOCUS The goals outlined in the CHIP’s latest progress report get quite specific: to combat growing obesity and diabetes trends, Sky Lakes has since started four diabetes and chronic disease self-management classes, in addition to extending diabetes prevention programs.

Other goals listed under overweight and obesity targets include a partnership with Oregon Health & Science University, which also has a rural health campus under construction in Klamath Falls. The hospital’s downtown wellness center also has several weight management courses in place.

Blue Zones Project Executive Director Merritt Driscoll says the CHIP has helped her own staff become more informed on the issues facing residents in Klamath Falls and Klamath County. This has led to drives and programs such as Wednesday Walking Moais, which aims to encourage more physical activity and social interaction.

“It’s kind of like a big picture of Klamath Falls,” Driscoll said of the CHIP. Local CHIP assessments have not been without their own challenges: two increasingly difficult factors that could hinder local health outcome goals include finding the money to keep certain initiatives going and focusing on too many topics at once.

But Little said that working with other Culture of Health Prize winners, past and present, would only continue to help them further reach their own goals in the end.

Klamath County health officials have even met with others from the Columbia Gorge and the Shoalwater Bay Tribe areas, two prize winners. This could even lead to a consortium that allows them each to apply for funding together as they search for more options.

“That’s a really cool possibility that could happen, and I hope it happens,” Little said. sbassinger@heraldandnews.com

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You can benefit from this workshop if you have any type of chronic condition.

GIS study

Project provides insight to problem areas in Klamath County

Mapping health

By KURT LIEDTKE, H&N Staff Reporter

A

lot can be determined by a point on a map. Where to go, where someone has been, or through GIS health maps determining cluster areas of disease patterns to help address community needs.

LIVING WELL

One of several GIS health maps available online through Healthy Klamath identifies proximity of tobacco retailers to schools in Klamath Falls.

Map via healthyklamath.org

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IMPROVE YOUR HEALTH AND INCREASE YOUR SENSE OF BELONGING WITH THESE SERVICES

Lakeview Gardens

Assisted Living Facility

H&N file photo by Kurt Liedtke

A recently completed collaborative project between Oregon Tech and Sky Lakes Medical Center is providing important answers of where to best target resources to aid in community wellness through Geographic Information Systems (GIS), a method that applies data comparative to an environment to highlight areas of concentration.

FAMILIAR TERRITORY The process of GIS is one that Dr. John Ritter, who has taught environmental sciences at Oregon Tech for 24 years and was formerly employed

by NASA, is all too familiar. Ritter launched the environmental sciences program with a focus on geo-mapping data, which has grown into a minor and now a major available to students.

Classroom walls are filled with statistical analysis maps covering everything from walking distance to parks to craft breweries available per county in Oregon, each taking statistical data and applying it to geographic areas to develop a better visual of information to address needs.

Sky Lakes’ interest in GIS began when Dr. Stephanie Van Dyke and Katherine Pope came to the Klamath Basin, spearheading the effort behind the Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project. Both were familiar with GIS in presenting data, and soon found Ritter as the local expert able to interpret thousands of health records into tangible maps to identity at-risk health factors in different areas of the Klamath Basin.

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Dr. John Ritter of Oregon Tech’s Environmental Sciences program reviews GIS health maps he helped develop, which are being utilized to analyze health issues in the Klamath Basin.

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Dr. John Ritter, a professor of environmental sciences at Oregon Tech for over 20 years, has collaborated with Sky Lakes Medical Center to create GIS health maps applying various health factors environmentally to identify areas of high-risk to problems such as diabetes, high cholesterol and heart disease.

H&N photo by Kurt Liedtke

“GIS maps give us a way to visualize situations in our environment. It tells us where things are and where they aren’t, where conditions exist and where they don’t.”

- Dr. John Ritter, Oregon Tech environmental sciences professor

It wasn’t the first health-associated project Ritter had developed, having already worked with Klamath County Public Health to develop maps indicating proximity of tobacco retailers to schools in Klamath County and income, which was used for a tobacco retail licensing program.

LIVING WELL

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Van Dyke and Pope approached Ritter with the idea of using GIS to analyze approximately 60,000 patient health records based on criteria such as obesity, diabetes, high cholesterol, stroke, high blood pressure and smoking in relation to environmental location.

“GIS maps give us a way to visualize situations in our environment,” said Ritter.

“It tells us where things are and where they aren’t, where conditions exist and where they don’t. In this case we located incidents of disease with locations, and once plotted on a map we began to see pockets where certain things were happening.”

Careful steps were taken to protect patient record privacy. After HIPPA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) agreements were approved guaranteeing privacy, data was encrypted on hard drives and entered into a computer program based on health factors and address.

Once pinpointed any personal information was removed so that individuals couldn’t be identified, reduced to a number on a map to help identify if clusters exist in certain areas of people suffering from similar issues, and if so – why?

The GIS mapping took several years of data entry before tangible pockets of disease were identifiable, but almost immediately an area of need was located.

Along Oregon Avenue in Klamath Falls it was observed that obesity among younger populations was an issue – data crucial toward determining where to provide additional exercise opportunities. As a result, a bike lane was built, connecting downtown to Moore Park, initiated by identification of statistical information through GIS mapping.

POCKETS OF HEALTH ISSUES

“We try to analyze high values and low values with many demographic variables,” said Ritter. “What we learned is that there are pockets of different health issues, some neighborhoods that had higher rates of diabetes and other concerns through a confluence of factors. In this case the data determines where the bike lane should be, the thought being if you give people another opportunity for safe exercise maybe we can short-circuit the path from obesity to diabetes to heart disease.”

While GIS mapping is used for a variety of analyses, such as how 9-1-1 determines which vehicles to dispatch to an emergency for fastest response or how UPS determines routes for its delivery trucks, the Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project utilizing GIS mapping was unique to the Klamath Basin, according to Ritter. Though a few of the maps have been made public and available online through Healthy Klamath’s website, most of the data remains secured for only an authorized few to analyze for future action.

data is out and they can plan diabetes prevention targeted to specific neighborhoods where it is most needed rather than canvas the entire town,” said Ritter. “The obvious next step is to redo the analysis in a few years to see if there are any changes as a result of the wellness efforts being made, we need to let those percolate and have an effect before we go through a sample again.”

PLOTTING AHEAD While the health study continues to be analyzed,’ Ritter’s students are active in plotting out GIS maps of their own to further benefit the area. Students have done studies considering walking distance to parks that indicate where a new park should be built, recording blight in neighborhoods, an app where people can volunteer their feeling of safety in different areas when doing activities such as biking or jogging to determine public safety needs and how to mitigate it, and more.

According to Ritter, the process is something we all collectively do in daily decision-making, GIS simply maps it all out.

“Everyone uses GIS every day,” added Ritter. “It is analysis of information associated with locations.

What route to drive to work, or where McDonald’s should build their next restaurant – all of that is GIS.” Several GIS health maps for the Klamath Basin are available to view on www.healthyklamath.org – including chronic condition hotspots, walkability in comparison to chronic conditions, and tobacco retailer proximity to schools. kliedtke@heraldandnews.com

“I think Sky Lakes is now in the phase where the

ANALYZING THE KLAMATH ENVIRONS: Oregon Tech and Sky Lakes Medical Center show the analysis of 60,000 de-identified (as per HIPPA requirements) patient records. Data provided representative conditions for stroke, heart disease, diabetes, obesity, high blood pressure, smoking, high cholesterol and total cost of care.

Available maps include:  Analysis of chronic conditions  Walkability compared with chronic conditions  Proximity of schools to tobacco retailers

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 GIS web maps at healthyklamath.org, a collaborative project between

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation 2018 Culture of Health Prize

nt vale

Vthe equi

of

Winning an Oscar

By LEE JUILLERAT, For the Herald & News

E

xcited? You bet!

For people involved with the Healthy Klamath Coalition, winning the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation 2018 Culture of Health Prize was the equivalent of taking home an Oscar at the Academy Awards.

“It’s the Oscars of public health,” said Healthy Klamath co-chair Erin Schulten, one of six Klamath County people who attended the awards ceremony in early October in Princeton, N.J. The Foundation is the nation’s largest health-focused philanthropy organization.

LIVING WELL

Klamath County was one of four communities to win the 2018 award, one that began with a field of 191 applicants and was steadily trimmed through an evaluation process. Also chosen were Cicero, Ill., Eatonville, Fla., and San Antonio, Texas. While the honor includes a $25,000 community health award, Schulten said it more importantly lends credibility to ongoing efforts to improve community health.

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“It’s about the name recognition and being part of the network,” Schulten said, noting the award gathering was attended by representatives from the 39 communities selected since the prize was initiated in 2013.

For more than 45 years the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has worked to improve health and health care.

As their website notes, “We are working alongside others to build a national Culture of Health that provides everyone in America a fair and just opportunity for health and wellbeing.” For more information visit www.rwjf.org. Follow the Foundation on Twitter at www. rwjf.org/twitter or on Facebook at www.rwjf.org/facebook. More information on the RWJF prize and previous winners can be found online at rwjf.org/prize.

ABOUT THE HEALTHY KLAMATH COALITION The Healthy Klamath Coalition is a multi-sector partnership comprised of dedicated community members and agencies focused on community health improvement efforts in Klamath County.

Since being formed in 2012, the coalition has implemented several policy, systems and environmental changes to improve the health and wellbeing of “our community members where we live, work and play.” For information visit www.healthyklamath.org.

It also means the Healthy Klamath Coalition, a group formed five years ago to improve community health, capitalizes on receiving the award. Coalition members are studying ways to use the prize with potential matching grants and show how community nonprofit groups can use the award as evidence that their grant or other funding requests are strongly supported.

“We’re still at the beginning stages of deciding what we do next,” Schulten said.

Among to-dos is a Bringing Home the Prize celebration, something she envisions as an event to celebrate “the collective momentum of what everyone is doing and building.” The celebration, which may not be done for several months, Schulten said, will be a time to recognize people involved and re-energize efforts to keep community health efforts moving forward.

CELEBRATING SUCCESS Schulten, health promotion and disease prevention administrator at Klamath County Public Health, was joined at the New Jersey celebration by co-chair Jennifer Little, Robyn Pheifer, Klamath Falls Police Chief Dave Henslee, and Monica YellowOwl, Klamath Tribal Health & Family Service Behavioral Health manager.

Although the Healthy Klamath Coalition was notified it was selected in July, the official announcement was delayed until September. The joyous celebration at the Ross Ragland Theater included representatives from the Blue Zones Project, Klamath County Public Health, Sky Lakes Medical Center, Klamath Tribes, Klamath-Lake Counties Food Bank and many other support groups.

That diversity of supporters was a factor in why Klamath County was chosen. In making the selection, the Foundation noted: “Collaboration is in the fabric of Klamath County, the fourth largest county in the state of Oregon which spans 6,135 square miles. Partners come together to improve high school graduation rates for all students, build a strong cadre of local, skilled workers through job training, and attract new businesses. Leaders from law enforcement and mental health agencies have teamed up to provide alternatives to incarceration and build stronger police-community relations by increasing positive interactions with residents.

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ABOUT THE ROBERT WOOD JOHNSON FOUNDATION

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation President and CEO Dr. Richard Besser, left, joins 2018 Culture of Health Prize winner Klamath County, Oregon’s Monica YellowOwl, David Henslee, Jennifer Little, Erin Schulten, Robyn Pfeifer, and John Ritter, along with RWJF Culture of Health Prize Director Julie Willems Van Dijk, second from right, at the RWJF Culture of Health Prize Celebration and Learning Event in Princeton, N.J., on Oct. 10.

Photo courtesy of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

“Bilingual community health workers and a rural health care residency program are working to remove barriers to health care,” the statement continued. “Community leaders and organizations address housing challenges by incentivizing exterior home improvement through mini grants to residents in low-income neighborhoods. Local leaders also drive the development of trails and green space through geographic information system mapping.”

NATIONAL HONOR

LIVING WELL

Likewise, in including Klamath County as one of four communities nationally to receive the 2018 Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Culture of Health Prize, Richard Besser, Foundation president and CEO, noted Klamath and other award winners share a common theme.

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“The 2018 RWJF Culture of Health Prize winners understand good health requires far

more than access to good health care. It requires a thriving community with access to quality education, good jobs, and safe, affordable housing,” Besser said. “These inspiring places are engaging community members in decision-making to give all residents the opportunity to live well, no matter where they live, how much money they make, or the color of their skin.”

The selection process took a year, with Klamath County’s bid moving ahead as the field of applicants narrowed. A community visit was made

by Foundation representatives in March after the candidate communities narrowed to 10. “We knew as soon as they could meet people in the community that would be it,” Schulten said, noting there were site visits to the Mills Addition neighborhood, Sherm’s Thunderbird Market, the Klamath Works human services campus along with conversations with community leaders from education, health care and local government groups.

COMMUNITY ...

CAMERA ...

ACTION! Community videos and essays were an important part of the application process for the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation award.

Some of those can be viewed at www.rwjf.org/en/library/features/ culture-of-health-prize/2018-winnerklamath-county-ore.html.

Schulten said efforts to improve community health, which Foundation representatives verified during their visit, met those goals.

Although Klamath County previously ranked below other areas in the state, she said continued efforts such as the Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project, the Healthy Klamath Coalition and the Klamath Farmers Online Marketplace showed progress. During the visit, Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project Community Program Manager Jessie DuBose discussed that group’s ongoing efforts, noting more than 3,400 people have pledged to improve their health.

A belief those and ongoing steps to improve community health was expressed at the formal celebration at the Ross Ragland Theater by Brooke Van Roekel, an Oregon native who is the Foundation’s director of audience engagement and marketing.

STANDING OUT

While many people were involved in the successful effort that led to Klamath County receiving a 2018 Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Culture of Health Prize, Erin Schulten, co-chair of the Healthy Klamath Coalition, said several people were instrumental in doing health equity work.

They include Monica YellowOwl, Behavioral Health manager at Klamath Tribal Health & Family Services; Valeree Lane, Health Equity Program coordinator at Klamath County Public Health; Dora Hoffmeister, co-chair of the Lutheran Community Services Hispanic Advisory Board; and Sergio Cisneros, business teacher at Mazama High School.

“Building a culture of health is a central focus of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation,” Van Roekel said. “What this means is the idea that everyone — no matter who you are, no matter your skin color, where you live or how much money you make — everyone has the fair and just opportunity to live the healthiest life possible. You are bringing this vision to life. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is committed to learning from you, but also providing opportunities for you. We are so honored and privileged to learn from Klamath County, and we know that with all you have accomplished so far the best is yet to come.”

Schulten shares that optimism.

“Essentially this helps us to change our health culture,” Schulten said of the award and what’s next. “Everyone knows there’s so much work to do.”

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BEHIND THE SCENES OF SUCCESS

“On behalf of the Foundation it is my honor and personal pride to be in my home state to celebrate and recognize all the impressive work Klamath County is doing to become a 2018 Culture of Health prize winner. The process began long before you applied, it is because of all the work of the people in this room who made you stand out,” he said, noting Klamath County is only the second Oregon group to win the award.

WIDENING

YOUR CIRCLE

Volunteers find purpose in giving back to the community

Most weeks, Elaine Deutschman spends two days giving dogs at the Klamath Animal Shelter a chance to be outside.

Photo by Lee Juillerat

I

t’s a Tuesday morning and, as usual, Bill and Elaine Deutschman are at the Klamath Animal Shelter spending time in the Freedom Dog Park letting groups of dogs leave their kennels to run and romp — and nibble treats.

“I needed my dog fix,” Elaine says, noting she and her husband are wrapping up their 12th year of volunteering at the animal shelter, something they do most Tuesdays and Thursdays.

LIVING WELL

“Our old dog died and we travel too much to have a dog, so we get our fix here,” Bill elaborates.

“Satisfaction. We like to help the dogs. We talked long and hard before we volunteered, promising not to get another dog.”

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By LEE JUILLERAT, For the Herald & News

Why volunteer? “Some of it is exercise, some of it is giving back to the community,” he adds.

Elaine, who also volunteers at the downtown branch of the Klamath County Library, echoes Bill, adding that if she wasn’t at the dog park or the library, “I’d probably just sit and read books.”

The Deutschmans are just two of hundreds of people who volunteer for various Klamath Basin groups and organizations. Crystal Gagnon, the animal shelter’s manager, estimates a cadre of volunteers donate upward of 30 hours a week while others add another 10 hours. Another regular, Vicki Strickland, spend times with cats and kittens, sometimes three or four hours a day just being available to help them socialize by letting them sit on their laps.

JoAnne Carson, who led the seven-year effort to raise money for the 18,000-square-foot shelter that was built in 2012, says her original intent was limited — “I was only going to do it for a year.” That year has turned into a decade-plus because, “It’s such a great experience watching the pets being adopted.”

SENSE OF PURPOSE

Photo by Lee Juillerat

“You meet a lot of people and you realize you have the same goals. Instead of isolating yourself — and I think that’s a mistake — you’re doing something positive.”

- Glenn Gailis, retired physician and community volunteer

“I think it gives you a sense of purpose, especially being retired,” Gailis explains. “You meet a lot of people and you realize you have the same goals. Instead of isolating yourself — and I think that’s a mistake — you’re doing something positive.”

Gailis says working with the Trails Alliance, a group that’s developing hiking and biking trails at Spence Mountain, allows him to work with people he might otherwise not develop friendships with, including people outside his age group. “That’s another thing, getting older people involved with younger people.”

Whether volunteering for one group or several, Gailis believes the social interaction helps connect people and, even more, helps develop a sense of community pride.

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Bill Deutschman enjoys time with dogs while volunteering at the Klamath Animal Shelter.

Glenn Gailis, a supposedly retired family practice doctor, is a volunteer who can’t say no. He’s still actively involved with the Klamath Wellness Center and spends many hours a week with other groups, including a Blue Zones walking group that meets at his house three mornings a week. He’s also active with Klamath Promise, Klamath Tree League, Winter Wings Festival and Klamath Trails Alliance.

“Why don’t we work together and take pride in our neighborhoods,” he rhetorically asks, praising Dawn Albright and others involved in projects aimed at improving the Mills area, Terry Wagstaff and her crew that organizes the Link River Festival, and Drew Honzel and a core of others with the Klamath Trails Alliance. “It makes us more proud of the community instead of putting it down. There’s just tons of good things being done by different groups.”

He’s especially devoted to assisting with the Winter Wings Festival, the Presidents Day weekend event that he routinely missed because of work conflicts. As he tells himself, “You dummy, you were missing out on interesting stuff.” He enjoys interacting with others, learning about otherwise unfamiliar topics — “It’s an education about the Klamath Basin, even if you’re not a birder.”

PART OF SOMETHING BIGGER Diana Samuels, coordinator for the annual Winter Wings Festival, appreciates efforts by Gailis and more than 120 volunteers. For herself, “Volunteering with the Winter Wings Festival allows me to be part of something bigger than myself that I can feel good about — continuing a 40-year tradition, working with a group of volunteers who are talented beyond words, sharing common values about nature, birds and the natural beauty of the Klamath Basin, and supporting many of the Klamath Basin Audubon Society’s conservation and outreach activities through our fundraising.”

Samuels says those donated volunteer hours make the festival possible and help keep it fresh, explaining, “We love recruiting those who are new to the area or who are just retired to get involved and bring new ideas and improvements. Some volunteers return year after year to continue their role and share in the Festival’s success.” (And because there’s always a need for more help, people interested in volunteering for the 2019 Festival can request information at info@ WinterWingsFest.org.)

LIVING WELL

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For Garwin Carlson, his involvement with the Klamath Rock & Arrowhead Club of Klamath Falls dates back to 1976. It’s a group he’s remained involved with because, “You get to go out and see things in the woods and desert. Then you get to create and make things,” including an array of items offered for sale at the club’s annual Fall Arts and Crafts Fair, held in early November at the Klamath County Fairgrounds.

LEARN SOMETHING NEW, JOIN IN, EXPLORE Here are a few activity groups to consider in the Klamath Falls area:  Basin Outdoor Group: This group of hiking enthusiasts meets on the third Tuesday of each month at The Ledge outdoor store, 369 S. Sixth St. Members are encouraged to volunteer to lead outings. For information, visit the group’s Facebook page at facebook.com/KlamathBOG.  Rock & Arrowhead Club of Klamath Falls: Monthly meetings are held at 7 p.m. on the second Monday of each month, with the exception of December, in the Klamath County Museum meeting room, Spring Street entrance. For more information, visit klamathrockclub.org.  Klamath Basin Pickleball: This sport combines elements of tennis, badminton and pingpong. It’s played indoors or outdoors on a small court with a paddle and a plastic ball with holes.

The group promotes growth and development of the sport in the Klamath Basin. For a list of places to play in Klamath Falls, and information on the group, visit www.kbpickleball.com.  Heart of the Basin Quilt and Needle Arts Guild: Meets at 4:30 p.m. on the second Monday of the month at the Baptist Church on Homedale.

Meetings include socializing, project sharing and a light potluck. For more information, visit heartofthebasin.com.  Pelican Piecemakers Quilt Guild: Meets from 9 a.m. to noon on Wednesdays at 4849 S. Sixth St.  Klamath Spinners & Weavers Guild: All fiber enthusiasts are invited to their monthly meetings, which are from 10 a.m. to noon on the second Wednesday of each month in the Washington Federal Conference Center at 5215 S. Sixth St. Meetings include demonstrations, followed by a project hour from noon to 1 p.m. Attendees are encouraged to bring their spinning wheels, spindles, looms and fiber projects. For more information, visit their page on Facebook.  Wood carving: A group geared for wood carvers of all ability levels meets weekly from 1 to 3 p.m. Tuesdays at 5907 Alva Ave. For information, call Bryan at 541-892-2777.  Chess: (The new) Klamath Falls Chess Club meets at 1 p.m. in the downtown Klamath County Library at 126 S. Third St. For more information, call Sherry Perry at 541-882-1980.  Klamath Rocks: Klamath Rocks is a local Facebook group where members paint, hide and find rocks throughout the area. The group exists to perform random acts of kindness to unexpectedly brighten someone else’s day, one rock at a time.

For more information, visit the Klamath Rocks Facebook page.

Here are a few volunteer opportunities to consider in the Klamath Falls area:  KLAMATH ANIMAL SHELTER: For information about volunteering, call 541-8847387, visit the shelter at 4240 Washburn Way, or visit klamathanimalshelter.org.  KLAMATH ANIMAL SHELTER — LARGE ANIMAL DIVISION: Help feed and care for animals at the Miller Island rescue, mend fences, pick up and deliver feed, assist with fundraising.

Contact barn Manager Tammy Moore at 541-6783108.  KLAMATH FALLS GOSPEL MISSION: Volunteers help in the kitchen, thrift store, in ministry opportunities, perform office tasks, provide information technology service, construction and maintenance tasks. For more information call 541-882-4895 ext. 13, or email volunteer@kfallsgospelmissionorg.  START MAKING A READER TODAY: This program pairs adult volunteers with children in need of reading support for one hour per week.

For information, call 541-273-2424, email hstork@ getsmartoregon.org, or visit getsmartoregon.org.  KLAMATH COUNTY SHERIFF’S OFFICE: Several volunteer opportunities are available.

Volunteer application forms can be found at klamathcounty.org/600/Volunteers, by visiting the sheriff’s office at 3300 Vandenberg Road.  KLAMATH FALLS CITY POLICE: Volunteers In Police Service help perform radar checks, vacation house checks, clerical tasks and deliver patrol cars for maintenance. For more information, visit the department at 2501 Shasta Way, or call 541-883-5336.  KLAMATH TRAILS ALLIANCE: Volunteers participate in trail maintenance days, staff tables at local fairs and events, explore and survey potential new trails and more. For more information, email info@klamathtrails.org, or write to Klamath Trails Alliance, P.O. Box 347, Klamath Falls OR 97601.  SKY LAKES MEDICAL CENTER: Volunteers greet patients and visitors, assist with the Red Cross Bloodmobile, deliver books and magazines to patients, work in the facility’s gift shops and more. For more information, call Reid Kennedy at 541-274-2038.  KLAMATH COUNTY LIBRARY: For information about volunteer opportunities, call 541-882-8894, ext. 26, or stop by the downtown library at 126 S. Third St.

Mike Reeder, vice president of the board that oversees Steen Sports Park, echoes some of Carlson’s thoughts. Although he’s often made plans to retire, Reeder finds reasons to stay involved. He’s helped locate grants for ongoing improvements, including the recently overhauled all-weather 1-1/2 mile Outback Trail that loops around the complex.

The park also has a newly opened Fit Trail with 20 stations where people can stretch, work on balance and have strength workouts. Four times a week the lights are turned on at Mike’s Fieldhouse to encourage walking and other fitness activities.

And, while improved physical fitness is a goal, Reeder also emphasizes the value of socializing with others.

“The idea is to encourage people to walk together. It’s harder to do that by yourself. It’s more fun when you’re with others,” he says of park’s various walking programs. “Socializing, I think, is definitely a healthy thing, an important part of life that people ignore. When you’re with a group times goes more quickly.”

COMING TOGETHER Being with others, according to studies, is especially important as people age. While younger people more naturally come together through school-related, sports and a realm of other activities, it’s less common as people age.

There’s often a limited awareness of the many possibilities, including — but not limited to — the Klamath Basin Senior Center, Klamath County Search and Rescue, Friends of the Library, Klamath County Museum, Klamath Wingwatchers, Shaw Historical Library, Klamath Spinners and Weavers Guild, Native Plant Society, Friends of Crater Lake, Favell Museum, SMART, Pelican Piecemakers, Gospel Mission, an ever-growing number of pickleball groups and many, many more.

Whether searching for sunstones, strolling the neighborhood or playing with dogs, the array of every imaginable community group is endless.

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RAISE YOUR HAND, VOLUNTEER & MAKE A DIFFERENCE

Carlson also says being in the group offers other benefits. “Kids generally enjoy what you’re doing,” he says of participating on field trips and crafting stones in jewelry items. And, whether with people his age or younger, “You get around others and you’re not isolated.”

COMMUNITY UpLiFT

Filling a need

Referral system connects expecting parents and young families with agencies, services

By TESS NOVOTNY, H&N Staff Reporter

M

ariah Lance, 23, smiled as her 5-year-old son Chance ran laps around their warmly decorated, carefully maintained mobile home’s living room. Lance is not always sure where her next child care session, diaper pack or meal will come from for Chance or her 3-month-old Collby, but she knows one local organization will help her figure it out: Community Uplift.

Community Uplift is a referral program that connects families and expecting mothers with 27 free services ranging from health care to special education across Klamath, Douglas and Lake counties.

Watching Chance shriek with uncontained laughter, trekking small toy snakes and stuffed animals across the room, Lance described how Community Uplift has helped her and her 24-yearold partner, Brian Shirts, support their family.

Shirts is the financial provider for the family; he spends days, sometimes weeks working his solar panel material handling job away from home.

And Lance is the stay-at-home super-mom — she handles everything from meals, to appointments for Chance’s delayed speech development therapy on her own. And with the help of Community Uplift’s partners like CaCoon, Women Infants and Children (WIC) and Head Start, she’s making the best of it.

UPLIFT’S BEGINNINGS

LIVING WELL

Molly Hamilton, left, a Community Uplift organizer and employee of Klamath Basin Behavioral Health and Healthy Families, visits with Mariah Lance and her son, Collby.

Photo by Tess Novotny

In 2016, director Vanessa Pingleton kicked off Community Uplift, funded through a Ford Family Foundation grant and housed in the Douglas Education Service District South-Central Early Learning Hub. Pingleton said the goal of the program is simple: using one easy, readily available form to connect needy families with as many free and helpful alreadyexistent programs as possible.

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“Every early childhood program continues to keep their own method of getting families referred to them, and Community Uplift is an addition to help families who fall through the cracks,” Pingleton said.

Brian Shirts and Mariah Lance, along with their sons, 5-year-old Chance and 3-month-old Collby, received guidance finding local services through Community Uplift.

Photo by Tess Novotny

Community Uplift, funded through a two-year grant that was recently renewed through 2018, works on the premise that families with children up to age 5 should only need to complete one form detailing their needs — food, paying utility bills, counseling, etc. — in order to get connected with free resources.

Community Uplift places forms in health provider offices and community hubs like Klamath Basin Behavior Health, WIC clinics and Cascade East Family Medicine Center.

Doctors and nurses can also personally recommend the organization to needy families.

When they get a form, families indicate what they need

help with, and within 48 hours, they get a call from their region’s resource facilitator (there is one for each county) who tells them exactly which services they qualify for: maybe Head Start, Maternity Case Management and Healthy Families.

ABILITY TO CHOOSE Molly Hamilton, a Community Uplift organizer and employee of two of their partners Klamath Basin Behavioral Health and Healthy Families, said the choice of services was in the hands of families.

“It’s no pressure,” Hamilton said. “Just because they’ve been referred to something doesn’t mean they have to take those services.”

Then, the family tells the facilitator which services they want to connect with, and the facilitator calls those organizations to refer the family.

In turn, the organization swiftly contacts the family, and then reconnects with the Community Uplift resource facilitator once the family is enrolled in their system and receiving care.

Since its inception in 2016, Pingleton said Community Uplift has received 167 family referrals.

For Lance, the simplified connection services of Community Uplift helped her in two ways: less time filling out paperwork and traveling to visit various organizations, and finding new services she was unaware of.

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UPLIFT IN ACTION

“It was just a lot more foot work and a lot more phone tag,” Lance said of her efforts to seek services prior to Community Uplift. “Waiting for calls back, leaving messages and hoping they call back soon, driving here and there … it was better being able to fill out one form and not having to drag my kids with me to get those resources.”

As a stay-at-home mom caring for two young children on her own, Lance said she appreciates the ease of having someone call her to offer help instead of the other way around.

INTERLOCKING ORGANIZATIONS To Pingleton, one of the key strengths of Community Uplift is its ability to help early childhood and family programs “share” the care of struggling families.

“When you look at how big each county is and how rural we are, we need to find ways to support these programs to reach those farthest outlying areas,” Pingleton said. “It’s building those alliances and finding ways to better serve the families.”

Hamilton described how there used to be a competitive relationship between care providers in the community because they did not know or work closely with each other. Now, with Community Uplift’s network and regular meetings between leaders of their partners, collaboration has increased.

“Before there was such a wall: ‘This is my family, I don’t want you touching my family,’ ” Hamilton said. “Now it’s: ‘I can take care of the education part, can you take care of the mental health part?’ ” LIVING WELL

AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE

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Klamath Basin families like Brian Shirts’ can receive guidance through Community Uplift, a coordinated referral system connecting expecting parents and families with children through 5 years old to early childhood service providers.

Photo by Tess Novotny

Hamilton said that Community Uplift is working hard to connect as many families as possible with helpful resources, but there are limitations to the program.

Molly Hamilton, left, a Community Uplift organizer and employee of Klamath Basin Behavioral Health and Healthy Families, visits with Mariah Lance and her son, Collby.

Photo by Tess Novotny

As of right now, they only serve families with children aged 0 to 5. Hamilton said that if a family has a child slightly older who needs care, they may make an exception — but for the most part, they focus on early childhood care.

no one could ever cover it,” Hamilton said. “But for a family that couldn’t ever get into anything, even if they’re connected once a month, we try to look at the more positive spin of it: at least they got that once-amonth connection.”

Also, since Community Uplift is made from support of their partners — some of whom have waitlists or more demand than resources to respond — families may not have every one of their needs met.

SUPPORT THROUGH STRUGGLES

For example, Lance described how she was connected with free KBBH counseling for depression, but since they could only offer her sessions once per month, it just wasn’t worth it.

“So many people are needing counseling and it’s hard to get in and be seen regularly,” Lance said. “I think that’s why I stopped going: it was just once a month and it wasn’t helping that much. I wanted to be seen once a week.”

Hamilton, a KBBH employee, was empathetic to Lance’s situation. Community Uplift can do what it can, she said, but low access to free counseling is connected to the larger lack of psychiatrists and doctors in the area, and an inability to keep many health professionals in the area past a one-year contract.

“There’s so much need in Klamath County and

In her living room, surrounded by elaborate colorful dream catchers, family photos and the happy shrieking of her 5-year-old son, Lance reflected on how Community Uplift has supported her family.

When Shirts is away providing financial support for their family, Lance feels she must do her part in her own way to help out. As of right now, she cannot get a job because childcare is too33 expensive and difficult to come by.

Lance said she has some family in Klamath Falls, but for the most part, she shoulders the day-to-day care and wellbeing of her boys. With the stress of her partner being gone and her own struggles with depression, Community Uplift’s partners have taken care of some of her stress.

“I love spending time with my kids and seeing them laugh and do silly things,” Lance said. “I have my two wonderful boys and I’m trying to do my part.” tnovotny@heraldandnews.com

COMMUNITY SUPPORTED AGRICULTURE CSA SPRING UP IN KLAMATH SUBURBS

By HOLLY DILLEMUTH, H&N Staff Reporter

Kent Simons inspects budding crops in one of his three greenhouses at Simple Gifts Farm.

Photo by Holly Dillemuth

K

ent Simons has the makings for a really tasty salad growing right in his backyard, and he wants to share the fruits — and vegetables — of his labor.

LIVING WELL

Simons farms more than 30 vegetable varieties in a market garden in the suburbs of Klamath Falls and through at least the summer months, sells fresh, organic produce directly to customers who sign up to his Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) project, through the Klamath Falls Online Market, and in-person at the Klamath Falls Farmers Market.

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For those unfamiliar with the concept, CSAs are basically farms supported by individuals who buy a share of the farm as a member, and then receive access to the products it produces.

“Here in the Klamath Basin there are still a lot of people who’ve never heard of it,” Simons said.

The 62-year-old Simons, a transplant from the Salt Lake City area, started his CSA through “Simple Gifts Farm” in 2017 after moving to the Klamath Basin with his wife, Kay, in 2015.

A retired computer software engineer, Simons never exactly saw himself being a full-fledged farmer, but he grew up gardening with his dad and continued the passion in small doses as an adult.

“Most of my adult life, even back in my childhood, I’ve gardened,” he said.

“I’ve always enjoyed that,” he added.

After a long day spent as a computer software engineer earlier in his career, his escape came at quitting time. It was then he would go home, put on a pair of jeans, a T-shirt and boots, and dig his hands into the dirt.

Now that he’s switched gears to farming full-time, he likes to joke that he retired into the industry.

“And they look at me, like, ‘What? You’re nuts,’ ” Simons said with a laugh.

It’s not an endeavor undertaken without a lot of risk, sweat and concern whether it’s even worth it.

Simons said he dabbles in construction, engineering, and soil sciences, to name a few, as he goes about his farming duties each day.

But there are also successes and joys and variety that each new crop brings with it.

“It’s a whole mind and body experience,” Simons said. “You have to be a jack-of-alltrades.”

His work started by converting fields overgrown with weeds, to cleared vegetable beds, and building three greenhouses on the property that houses the farm.

Although he is a market gardener, the

Kent Simons showcases the end of the season for his tomatoes on a warm afternoon in October.

Photo by Holly Dillemuth

way in which he plans his crops and operates the farm by all definitions makes him a farmer.

Simons wouldn’t call himself an urban farmer, even though he, Kay, and their trusty golden retriever, Harley, live outside the Klamath Falls city limits.

And what the small operation — about one-third of an acre — lacks in size it makes up for in variety of crops, which are ever-changing as Simons discovers the nuances of all the vegetables and fruits he raises, and each of their specific needs.

Simons grows a wide variety of produce: beans (both green and purple), broccoli, corn, carrots, cucumbers, garlic, a variety of cabbages, lettuces and spring mixes perfect for salads; eggplant, peas, pie pumpkins, summer squash, peppers, radishes and spinach.

He specializes in growing spinach and carries multiple varieties.

“I would term it a high-end, gourmet spinach product,” Simons said. “I come along and I pinch off each leaf by hand … and I gather these and wash them and bag ‘em. What’s wonderful about it is there are no stems, and they’re super fresh and super flavorful.”

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“It’s very, in a way, kind of relaxing — it’s a complete change of pace,” Simons said.

Kent Simons inspects a bed of salad greens in one of his three greenhouses at Simple Gifts Farms.

Photo by Holly Dillemuth

He just planted seeds for a French winter salad green known as corn, salad or mâche, one not widely known about in the United States, Simons said.

“I don’t know why it’s called that, it has nothing to do with corn,” Simons said.

“What’s especially great about this crop is that it’s very cold tolerant — it can freeze and continue to grow.

It grows into a little rosette about that big around,” he added, gesturing with his fingers. “It’s not really lettuce, but it makes these spoon-shaped leaves ... and the spoon-shaped leaves come out from the center.”

Simons said it will be a month or two before he’ll have any to sell through KFOM’s website, but he assures it’s worth the wait.

“And they are green and succulent and crunchy and slightly sweet,” Simons said. “People do grow it here but it’s not real well known, it’s not common.”

He also grows cantaloupe and edible flowers, with the expectation that more new crops are in store.

Simons right now is considering more root crops for the winter, such as beets, more carrots, and green onions.

LIVING WELL

“There’s always an element of experimental to it,” he said.“I’m planting a lot more broccoli now than I did before. Is that a good idea? Are we going to sell it all?

I don’t know. The type of growing I do — the difficulty in it is the variety of crops. The more different kinds of crops you grow, the more complicated it all gets, because they all have their own special requirements.”

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The irony of it is, he loves the variety, and the variety makes it all the more hard to do and maintain.

“It divides my attention, and the more different crops I do, the more my head spins around trying to get it all organized and do it as efficiently as possible,” Simons said.

“It’s hard, it’s really is hard, but I like the challenge of doing the variety of crops.”

His crops change throughout the year, depending on the season, and he rotates them around to different soil beds on the farm as well.

“A little farm like this is always in a state of transition,” Simons said.

Crops also change due to their ability to grow in the climate or to changes in climate such as multiple days of wildfire smoke this summer. In order to protect many of his crops from the changing weather, Simons built three greenhouses since buying his property in 2015. One of the greenhouses is a seedling nursery built in 2015, powered by auxiliary heat.

“I used it to start seeds in flats and get them ready to transplant them into the field,” Simons said of the seedling nursery. “In the spring is when this is most active, but I do have a few things going now,” Simons said, pointing to two varieties of cabbages.

“These are bok chois and Swiss chard and for the first time, I’m starting onions from seed,” he said.

“These are about four different varieties of onions,” Simons added, and bending in close to the flats, added, “if you look closely, you can see that they’re just popping up.”

Simons also has chickens, which produce eggs for the Klamath Falls Farmers Market, his CSA, and currently Klamath Falls Online Market (KFOM).

While the CSA has ended for the year, customers can still order herbs and vegetables from him online through KFOM

by Tuesday nights and pick them up on Thursday evenings at 2701 Foothills Blvd (a building shared by Herald and News and the Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project).

Sometimes it feels, too, that farmers of market gardens like his are overlooked for larger farms, he said.

“When people talk the agricultural life of the Basin, they don’t think about something like this,” Simons said. “They’re thinking about the big farms down there growing potatoes or hay or (rearing) cattle … I don’t make a lot of money. I wonder all the time if it’s worth it. There’s only a handful in the area like me doing this kind of diversified vegetable farming and selling online.”

He’s his own boss and employee, and that means his work is never quite finished.

For instance, weeds.

“There’s no way to keep up with all the weeds,” Simons said.

He hopes to keep expanding its variety of vegetables, fruit, eggs, and other products he sells locally throughout the year to consumers both in town and as far away as Chiloquin and Keno.

“There are ways I can be more efficient and there are things I learn that help me to do better,” Simons said.

Kneeling down to plant a broccoli transplant inside one of the greenhouses on his property, it’s evident he enjoys his new devotion, despite its difficulties.

“There are always new things happening, old things have to be cleaned out,” Simons said. “And right now, particularly at the end of the summer growing season and getting into fall and winter, there are lots of dead plants that I have to get cleaned out.

“The learning never stops – there are always things to learn and figure out,” Simons added.

“What we’re hoping for is it will continue to grow.”

To learn more about the farm, visit www.facebook.com/ simplegiftsfarmklamathfalls. hdillemuth@heraldandnews.com

VIRTUAL MARKET ‘SELLS OUT’ WEEKLY

By HOLLY DILLEMUTH, H&N Staff Reporter

K

lamath Falls area resident Clinton Garner opened up a bag of fresh vegetables he just picked up from the Klamath Farmers Online Marketplace on a Thursday evening in October, his first visit to the market.

“We’ve got parsley, we’ve got onions, radish — I don’t think I’ve ever seen a black radish — it’s really exciting,” Garner said.

Garner is one of some 300 registered customers of the online marketplace, according to Katie Swanson, manager of KFOM as part of her role as food systems manager of Blue Zones Project in Klamath Falls. The marketplace celebrates its one year anniversary this month.

“KFOM is basically a virtual farmers market where a bunch of farmers are able to list their products as if they’re making a Craigslist ad, and then coordinate to have a centralized pickup location,” Swanson said.

The selection changes weekly depending on what’s available, from beets to ground beef, and customers can buy as often or as little as they want with no subscription.

Consumers can select their order by 10 p.m. on Tuesday, and then pick it up between 5 and 7 p.m. on Thursday.

Orders must be paid for separately to each vendor. The marketplace also accepts SNAP benefits, which Swanson hopes to publicize as much as possible.

“We’re the only place you can use your Oregon Trail card to buy local food year-round,” Swanson said. “That was the main incentive for even starting KFOM in the first place.”

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A sensor monitors the temperature of the soil in the flats, ensuring seedlings are adequately warmed to around 40 degrees to make sure the seeds will germinate.

KLAMATH FARMERS ONLINE MARKETPLACE

Reconnect farmers and ranchers to the urban community

By DAN KEPPEN Dan Keppen is executive director of the Family Farm Alliance, a nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving and enhancing water supplies for irrigators in 17 Western states.

He has served on the Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project food policy committee since its inception.

A

ll Westerners, like all Americans, prefer healthy food and they like to know where it is produced.

Klamath Falls resident Clinton Garner is new to the area and recently discovered a vegetable haven at Klamath Farmers Online Marketplace.

Photo by Holly Dillemuth

Swanson plans to present the marketplace offerings to Department of Human Services this winter to spread awareness.

Looking back on the inception of the marketplace, she said it has grown into a much more popular service than she ever thought possible.

LIVING WELL

“It was kind of an ambitious project and I think it’s been really successful,” Swanson said, of its first year in operation. “We’ve developed a group of really loyal customers and then we’ve also developed a strong group of local producers that are stepping up and taking leadership in KFOM. That’s what’s exciting to me because that means it’s going to be sustainable.”

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Swanson said the concept has been in the works since 2015, starting with focus groups held in the community.

Farmers and ranchers produce food that meets this need. Likewise, agriculturists need to acknowledge the importance of cities — home to their customers. There is a real need to emphasize the virtues of farming and ranching in the West, building upon the growing public appreciation for farmers markets, interest in local food, and the rapidly growing interest in “local, sustainable, organic, etc.” foods.

In the last decade, farmers markets have become a favorite marketing option for many farmers throughout the U.S., and a weekly ritual for many shoppers. The number of farmers markets is doubling every 10 years. There are now more than 8,500 farmers markets in the U.S. According to the USDA, growers selling locally not only help increase access to fresh food, but they also create 13 full-time jobs for every $1 million in revenue earned.

The farm-to-fork revolution is on.

It has been one of my pleasures in the past few years to serve on the Klamath Falls Blue Zones Project Food Systems committee. Blue Zones Project is a national initiative, and Klamath Falls is the first community launched in the state as part of Oregon’s Healthiest State Initiative. As part of a broader effort to improve access to healthy food, the Food Systems committee is also helping to reconnect agriculture and the community. By increasing local food production and local consumption through vehicles like farmers markets, Blue Zones Project seeks to increase community health and reconnect agriculture producers to the community and improve the economy.

One initiative generated from the Blue Zones Project Food Systems committee is the Klamath Farmers Online

Marketplace (KFOM), which derived from the Blue Zones Project’s goal to establish a place where Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, obtained using the Oregon Trail card, could be used to purchase local food, year-round. KFOM’s website (www.KFOM.org) offers a place where local farmers and ranchers can post their products on a week-to-week basis. Customers can then view what is available and make an order direct from the farmer. All orders are due by Tuesday at 10 p.m. and are picked up at the Blue Zones Project office at 2701 Foothills Blvd. (in the Herald & News office) every Thursday evening between 5 to 7 p.m.

“One of the priorities identified in those groups was a food hub, so from the very beginning, three years ago, they started conversations about what does that look like,” Swanson said. “It went through a lot of different phases.

KFOM provides direct, year-round access to local food. It’s a great way to continue buying great locally grown food — produce, eggs, micro greens, honey, beef, pork, lamb, garlic and fresh herbs — through the winter. It also provides an alternative, flexible sales outlet for local producers.

Farmers and producers desired more of an automated, organized system for food pickup than originally anticipated, and the outcome is the current userfriendly website.

Although it was started less than a year ago, nearly $10,000 in locally produced food has already been purchased through KFOM, where almost 300 buyers and sellers are registered on the website.

“I realized pretty quickly, we need a more legitimate website to handle more complexity,” she said.

In the big picture, the economic reality is that the efforts of farmers and ranchers to produce food and fiber are increasingly placed at risk by our global economy, by increasing regulation, and by cheap — and questionably safe — food from offshore.

In my travels throughout the Western U.S., I work with agricultural producers who are always seeking to strengthen “connections” between rural and urban communities, using food production in their messaging. Here in my own hometown, KFOM provides an encouraging example and takes an important step toward overcoming the rift between the West’s rural and urban societies.

We need more projects like these, which help both sectors better appreciate what each contributes to our collective quality of life and the natural inter-dependencies that bind us.

To learn more about KFOM, contact Katie Swanson at 541-827-9442, or email info@kfom.org.

“The beginning idea was very different from what we ended up with,” she added.

SIMILAR ROOTS Swanson emphasized the marketplace is separate from Community Supported Agriculture, though both share similarities. “(CSAs) — It’s just one of many business models that a farm can have to sell a product,” Swanson said.

Despite a new location for the marketplace in the west wing of the Herald & News building, vendors said the marketplace continues to sell out each week.

Among Garner’s favorites from the marketplace so far are kale, beets, garlic and delicata squash.

“You cut it into slices and roast it — it’s phenomenal,” he said, of the squash.

He expressed similar enthusiasm for the garlic and kale offered at the market.

“We’re big smoothie people — kale is great for smoothies,” Garner said.

VEGETABLE HAVEN Garner and his wife and family moved to the Basin from the Bend area in May. After being busy finding a place for the family to live over the summer, he recently discovered the vegetable haven at KFOM in October.

Dru Vandenburgh, who lives in the Falcon Heights neighborhood, has been shopping KFOM since the beginning of summer.

Vandenburgh, who found out about the online market through the Sky Lakes Wellness Center, said she’s fond of the bok choi selection, among others.

“Her garlic is superb,” Vandenburgh said on a recent visit to the online market in midOctober.

“And lovely tomatoes,” she added.

Garner said he and his family love buying local and supporting small, urban farms.

“A lot of people have a really negative attitude about Klamath Falls, but for us it was like …

I think we can make a life out here.”

Consumers can learn more about buying and selling produce, meat and other fresh products at www.kfom.org. hdillemuth@heraldandnews.com

KEEP MOVING KLAMATH FALLS

WE’RE INVESTING IN COMMUNITY WELLNESS PROJECTS ALL AROUND THE KLAMATH BASIN.

KIT CARSON PARK

SkyLakes.org/parks