Benny Westcott
By Benny Westcott
Of The New Era
A top Sweet Home Fire and Ambulance District volunteer has taken a six-month leave of absence in response to the state’s requirement that he be vaccinated to serve as a firefighter or medic.
Cascadia Station No. 24 Capt. Wes Strubhar told the SHFAD Board of Directors last week that he had a moral problem with Gov. Kate Brown’s edict that all K-12 educators and health-care workers would be required to present COVID-19 vaccination documentation or otherwise submit a medical or religious exemption by Monday, Oct. 18.
The mandate was issued in response to an increase in coronavirus cases and hospitalizations over the summer (many attributable to the more contagious delta variant). As of Thursday, Oct. 21, some 1,517 new cases were reported statewide, with 537 patients hospitalized and 10 deaths, bringing overall totals since March 2020 to 357,526 and 4,284, respectively.
Linn County has recorded 134 new cases and one death as of Oct. 21, with 12,911 cumulative cases and 131 deaths. The Sweet Home/Crawfordsville area has a 43.1% vaccination rate.
At the Sweet Home School District, all but one staff member turned in such documentation, District Business Manager Kevin Strong said. The district still awaits submissions from “a handful” of substitutes and currently inactive seasonal workers.
Of the district’s 339 employees, 102 submitted religious exemptions, five handed in medical exemptions, and 232 presented proofs of vaccination.
At Samaritan-affiliated clinics in east Linn County, including Samaritan Lebanon Community Hospital, 85% of employees are vaccinated against COVID-19. Across all Samaritan entities the rate is 90%.
Only .4% of Samaritan employees across all Samaritan locations in Benton, Lincoln and Linn counties either resigned or were placed on suspension as a result of the vaccination mandate, according to Gail Worden-Acree, vice president of Human Resources for Samaritan Health Services.
The Sweet Home Fire District, whose employees are considered health-care workers by the state, received 27 proofs of vaccination and 28 exemptions, according to Fire Chief Dave Barringer. It maintained full retention through the mandate with one exception: Strubhar, a 20-year district veteran.
Although fully vaccinated, Strubhar requested the six-month leave of absence because he didn’t want to enforce Brown’s mandate, citing moral reasons at the fire district’s Oct. 19 board meeting.
He received his vaccinations in January and February, treating them “like the flu shot,” he said, but grew displeased when the mandate became a “political issue.”
“Knowing the history of the [1917-23] Russian Revolution, and some of the mechanisms that caused that to happen, other people were put in a position to have to enforce things,” he explained. “In my perspective, that’s tyranny. The only way it stops is if people say no.”
Strubhar considered retiring because he “didn’t want to put the chief through having to let me go. That’s not where he wanted to be at all.”
Chief Barringer consulted legal counsel and learned that a leave of absence “meets legal requirements,” Strubhar told the board. “I really appreciate how this district has chosen to handle this. I have nothing against anyone here.”
Board member Rob Younger replied, “I’ve always respected you, and I’m going to leave today with even more respect for you. My prayers and hope is that it’s not over.”
“We appreciate you taking a leave of absence rather than leaving us, because we don’t want to lose anyone,” board president Dawn Mitchell said. “We don’t have super-deep pockets where we can give the proverbial bird to the mandates and take the fines.”
“None of us have dealt with this before,” member Charlene Adams added.
“It’s a learning curve. It’s been hard on everyone. How do you fight this type of thing? It’s not something any of us are pleased with. You’ve just got to do the best you can with the information you have at this moment.”
Of the departure, Barringer said, “I lost one and it’s really going to cause me issues. My concerns are that I’m losing somebody who keeps people safe.”
He added that Strubhar knows the Cascadia area “like the back of his hand.”
Strubhar’s leave of absence took effect on the morning of Oct. 18.