Oregon Health Authority statistics released on Thursday added five confirmed or presumptive COVID-19 cases in Wasco County and three in Hood River County.  Wasco County is now at 390 total cases, with 310 listed as recovered by the North Central Public Health District using a 30-day standard since the onset of symptoms and in stable medical condition.  Hood River County is now at 310 total cases for the pandemic, with the County Health Department indicating 287 are out of isolation.  Sherman County remains at 23 cases with 18 recovered, and Gilliam County at 17 with ten recovered.  The OHA reported 1,122 new COVID cases statewide on Thursday to move the pandemic total to 53,779.  There were four COVID-related deaths reported in Oregon on Thursday, moving the total to 746.  Klickitat County reported five new COVID cases on Thursday after not issuing an updated on Wednesday to move to a pandemic total of 242, but the number of active cases is only up by two to 16.  Skamania County added two cases over the last two days to move the total number for the pandemic to 80, with five currently active cases.  The Washington Department of Health reported over the past two days 3,345 new COVID cases for a total of 123,356, and 25 deaths to move that number to 2,507 deaths.

Hood River Shelter Services has placed 13 two-person shelters at Hood River Valley Christian Church, and will be open for those in need on Monday night.  With restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic forcing the shelter to abandon its congregate model, the easy to assemble shelters were acquired.  Sarah Kellems of Hood River Shelter Services says the number of structures they acquired should be able to accommodate those in need.  She said they averaged 19 guests per night last winter.  The shelters will be open each night in winter from 6 p.m. to 8 a.m., and will accept guest arrivals nightly from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.  There is a need for donations to help operate the shelters, go to hoodrivercares.org for more information.

Mid-Columbia Health Foundation’s annual Festival of Trees will take place this year in a different form.  The Foundation’s Cynthia Kortge says they will have a smaller number of trees than usual, and they won’t be having the open gala celebration on Friday, December 4 for their auction, but instead a small invitation-only dinner with the auction streamed online.  She adds they’ve been concentrating on offering a wide array of safe activities for their community day on December 5.  Proceeds will benefit the Celilo Cancer Center as the foundation begins a campaign to acquire a linear accelerator for the center’s radiation oncology department.

Klickitat County currently has 14 active COVID-19 cases, and County Public Health Director Erinn Quinn says coming out of Halloween and moving toward Thanksgiving the numbers are very concerning right now.  Quinn did say both hospitals in Klickitat County are currently in a good position, with no COVID patients at this time, and Skyline Hospital in White Salmon and Klickitat Valley Hospital in Goldendale both have plans and infrastructure ready for a surge.  But Quinn says they are watching the caseloads for Portland area hospitals, where some local patients could be sent.  Quinn added given what they saw with case counts after Halloween and what is possible with the oncoming holidays, she doesn’t foresee the Washington Governor’s office giving Klickitat County the opportunity to move to Phase 3 reopening anytime soon.

Hood River County Health Department Director Trish Elliott says Hood River County wasn’t that far away from being included among those that were put on a two-week pause of gatherings by the state.  Elliott said on Mid-Columbia Today that the number of sporadic COVID-19 cases they had been reporting was concerning, but some of that was related to errors in case reporting.  Those have now been corrected.  Elliott said increases in COVID cases in Hood River County have been consistent with state and national spikes.  She notes testing is up, but so is the positivity rate, which was 6.8 percent last week.

As health officials ask people to double down on efforts to stem the spread of COVID-19, they also advise that case numbers won’t drop right away.  Oregon Health Sciences University Health Chief Medical Officer Dr. Renee Edwards says that’s because when a person is infected with COVID, it can take two weeks for symptoms occur.  She says people should not be discouraged if they don’t see an immediate reduction in COVID numbers, and that it would probably take two or three weeks for them to come down if people increase their efforts to curb the spread.  Edwards was part of a press conference Tuesday of medical officials from around the state and Governor Kate Brown, asking Oregonians to use face coverings, maintain physical distancing, and refrain from social gatherings to reduce the spread of the virus and avoid overwhelming the health system.

The latest two-week average for COVID-19 cases and positive test rates still put the Hood River County School District as eligible to bring K-5 students back to classrooms in a hybrid of on-site and distance learning, but a number of parents and teachers told the district board they questioned bringing them back on November 30 as virus cases rise in Oregon.  District Superintendent Rich Polkinghorn said the metrics are trending in the wrong direction, but added that while distance learning has worked for some, it doesn’t meet the need of all students.  He also made an impassioned plea for the community to prioritize health and safety, and wear face coverings and practice social distancing.  Some elementary teachers told the board that reducing them from 20 hours of student contact in distance learning to eight hours of in-classroom contact is detrimental to their efforts.  Polkinghorn said the district has tentatively scheduled a community forum with Hood River County Health Officer Dr. Christopher Van Tilburg this Monday at 6 p.m. to talk about a school reopening.  

The new warming shelters in The Dalles went up late last week, and while they don’t have electricity yet they are being occupied.  City Councilor Darcy Long-Curtiss said during Monday night’s brief Council meeting that the pallet-style shelters placed on City right-of-way on Bargeway Road have occupants and will be fully inhabited soon.  They have six shelters that can be occupied by two people apiece.  Long-Curtiss says portable toilets have been installed, and electricity was to be hooked up on Tuesday for heaters, adding wet and cold conditions over the weekend led to the decision to allow the shelters to be used while waiting for the power.  The City is providing infrastructure but is not operating the shelters.  Long-Curtiss says procedures for the shelters are being developed.

The North Central Public Health District say there has been a 14th death as a result of the mid-September COVID-19 outbreak at Flagstone Senior Living in The Dalles.   A statement from the district on Monday said that one of the memory care residents that contracted COVID in the outbreak passed away on November 1.  Under Oregon Health Authority guidelines, a death is considered to be related to COVID-19 if it occurs within 60 days of exposure to a confirmed case, onset of symptoms, or date of a person’s first positive test.  The outbreak at Flagstone began in mid-September, involved 51 COVID cases, and was resolved late last month.  Outbreaks are considered resolved when two incubation periods have passed after the onset of symptoms in the last reported case.  For COVID-19, the time frame is 28 days.  The last case at Flagstone was reported on October 1.  Wasco County has had 17 deaths related to COVID-19 during the pandemic.

With revisions to Wasco County’s comprehensive land use plan having been finished, now work turns towards updating the County’s Land Use and Development Ordinance.  County Commissioner Scott Hege says the comprehensive plan sets general policies for land use planning that line up with state requirements.  But Hege says the LUDO ordinance sets the specific rules for land use in the County.  Work on the LUDO is expected to take two years.