PENDLETON — Umatilla County is taking advantage of reduced foot traffic at the Umatilla County Courthouse in Pendleton during the pandemic to make some security improvements.

Starting last week, every person who enters the building will go through a security checkpoint and be screened at the first floor entrance.

“With the building basically being shut down, it’s been a lot easier for our maintenance guys to make a bunch of noise right now,” said Umatilla County Commissioner John Shafer, noting other maintenance planned for later in the year has been streamlined recently with the county’s employees now alternating work weeks and most court cases postponed.

The courthouse previously stationed its security checkpoint at the entrance to the county courts on the second floor. This left the county’s departmental offices on the first floor and below open to the public, and the district attorney’s offices on the third floor open could be accessed by taking the elevator and bypassing security.

“Anyone was subject to having a firearm, knife or another weapon of some kind,” Shafer said.

While thankfully this never directly led to a dangerous situation at the courthouse, there were a couple of troubling incidents that pushed Shafer to prioritize the improvements.

In one instance, Shafer said a man who was visiting the planning department became upset and threatened to walk out to his vehicle and return with a gun. In another, a man who was yelling with staff at the district attorney’s office left, went to his vehicle, and then returned to continue the confrontation without having gone through any security.

Neither incident led to anybody being hurt or staff being directly put in danger, but the risk alone was enough to convince Shafer reconfiguring the security was needed.

“They were without protection, and we realized that needed to change,” he said.

The change comes after the county updated its building security and access systems earlier in the year, which reduced the number of keys needed by county employees.

Due to the changes, which includes the building’s side doors now being locked to the public, this week the county is finishing its construction of a wheelchair ramp to the courthouse’s front entrance so that it’s handicap accessible.