Rugby rookies romp Bend Blues to play for state title in 2nd year • SPORTS, D1
Also in Sports: Local golfers contend at state
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• May 18, 2010 50¢
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Builders association protests plan to raise fees as premature
LOCAL SOLDIERS RETURN
A colonel in Iraq, back as Prineville’s top cop
By Hillary Borrud The Bulletin
A local builders association came out in opposition to Deschutes County’s and Bend’s plans to raise building and planning fees Monday, saying it is too early for the county to predict the beginning of recovery in the housing market. In a letter to the county, the Central Oregon Builders Association Inside suggested the • Permit fees county close compared, satellite offices Page A4 in Redmond and La Pine, lay off more staff or spend more tax revenue and other money instead of raising fees. But some county officials, who are in the midst of budget meetings this week, said more layoffs will reduce service levels, which could force builders to wait up to two or three days for inspections, instead of the current 24hour turnaround. Four rounds of layoffs at the county’s Community Development Department have already reduced staffing to about half what it was two years ago. The 15 percent fee increase would contribute $362,447 in additional revenue to the department, according to the county’s proposed budget. See Permits / A4
Why are we here? Lab has new clue By Dennis Overbye New York Times News Service
Physicists at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory are reporting that they have discovered a new clue that could help unravel one of the biggest mysteries of cosmology: Why the universe is composed of matter and not its evil-twin opposite, antimatter. If confirmed, the finding portends fundamental discoveries at the Large Hadron Collider outside Geneva, as well as a possible explanation for our own existence. In a mathematically perfect universe, we would be less than dead; we would never have existed. According to the basic precepts of Einsteinian relativity and quantum mechanics, equal amounts of matter and antimatter should have been created in the Big Bang and then immediately annihilated each other, leaving no us. See Matter / A5
Wyden pushes inquiry into claims that proper treatment was lacking By Erin Golden The Bulletin
Rob Kerr / The Bulletin
Prineville Police Chief Eric Bush returned to work Monday after being deployed in Iraq, where he served for about 14 months as the second-in-command of the 41st Infantry Brigade Combat Team of the Oregon National Guard.
By Lauren Dake The Bulletin
PRINEVILLE — n Iraq, the middle-of-the-night calls signaled an enemy attack, rockets flying, possibly casualties. Jarred from sleep, Col. Eric Bush regularly received briefings on what was happening at the largest U.S. base in Iraq, outside Baghdad, known as the Victory Base Complex, where he was second-in-command of the Tigardbased 41st Infantry Brigade Combat Team of the Oregon National Guard. The calls will still come. But they won’t be as frequent and will likely indicate a robbery or standoff. On Monday, Bush was back in his crisp navy blue uniform for the first time in 14 months, resuming his role as the chief of the Prineville Police Department. And these days, he is getting used to sleeping through the night. “It’s nice being home,” Chief Bush said. “It’s so different from Iraq. In Iraq, you learn to notice the nice things, and there are nice things. Initially you get there, your first take is the air smells bad, it’s dusty, it’s hot. But over time, you can come to appreciate it. … But coming home, to (use) Dorothy’s phrase, there is no place like home.” See Chief / A4
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Photo courtesy Eric Bush
“In Iraq, you learn to notice the nice things, and there are nice things. Initially you get there, your first take is the air smells bad, it’s dusty, it’s hot. But over time, you can come to appreciate it.” — Eric Bush
Rare lion success story breeds possessive populace, predicament By Rama Lakshmi
TOP NEWS INSIDE
Military to check on care of Guard troops
GIR, India — With their paws and mouths bloodied from a feast, three sandy-brown lionesses sauntered toward a water hole as the setting sun pierced the trees and the birds grew quiet. The forest ranger turned down his walkie-talkie and whispered, “They are fresh from a kill.” The sprawling, deciduous Gir forest is the only habitat in the world for the free-
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Vol. 107, No. 138, 42 pages, 7 sections
Officials at a Washington military base that served as a transition point for thousands of Oregon National Guard soldiers returning from Iraq are investigating claims that some soldiers did not receive proper medical care and were released from active duty before receiving all of their benefits. Last month, about 2,700 Oregon troops who served with the Guard’s 41st Infantry Brigade Combat Team on a year-long deployment spent several days at Joint Base LewisMcChord, south of Seattle. The stop was an important part of the demobilization process, in which soldiers filled out paperwork and received medical treatment and information about benefits. But as the soldiers began returning home, some stated concerns about the demobilization process with their lawmakers. U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., said he heard from troops — including some he met on a trip to the base last week — who felt they’d been pushed out early and treated as if they were less important than active duty soldiers. Now, Wyden and U.S. Rep. Kurt Schrader, D-Canby, are asking Army officials to investigate all transition programs for National Guard soldiers returning home from wartime deployments. “What disturbs me the most is my concern that the brave men and women who were in the National Guard are still not being treated like members of the Army and the standing military,” Wyden said. “They are being subjected to a different standard even though they make many of the same sacrifices and dodge the same bullets. They deserve the same respect.” In a May 13 letter to Army Secretary John McHugh, Wyden outlined a series of concerns about the process at Lewis-McChord. See Guard / A4
WHIRLWIND LESSON
ranging Asiatic lions, a species similar to its well-known African cousin. At one time, the Asiatic lions spread from the Tigris River valley to the Indian subcontinent, but now they are found in the wild only in Gir, in the Indian state of Gujarat. That fact is a point of pride in Gujarat, where the lions were once close to extinction and today number more than 400. See Lions / A5
Andy Tullis / The Bulletin
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C4
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C6
Members of AirLink staff talk to students, parents and staff of Mudpies & Lullabies Preschool about the AirLink Critical Care Transport helicopter after landing Monday in one of the fields at the Skyline Sports Complex in Bend. The preschool contingent walked over from the nearby school, with half of the students watching the helicopter land and the other half sticking around to watch as the specialized medical copter took off to return to its base at St. Charles Bend.