A tip of the hat to Blue Mountain Wildlife for its continued dedication to the welfare of our feathered friends, especially during the recent extreme heat that blanketed much of the Pacific Northwest.

As temperatures soared north of 100 degrees the last weekend of June, dozens of baby hawks, desperate to escape the blast of early summer heat, bailed from their nests and plummeted to the ground, prompting calls to flood into the wildlife center. In her 30 years as director of the wildlife rehabilitation center outside of Pendleton, Lynn Tompkins had not seen anything like it.

“They had no choice,” said Tompkins, 68. “It was just too bloody hot to survive.”

In all, the center took in nearly 50 nestling Swainson’s and Cooper’s hawks after they leaped from their nests in the extreme heat wave. Thirteen of the raptors suffered injuries severe enough they had to be euthanized.

It saddens us to hear about what happened to these birds, but we are happy that the dedicated professionals of Blue Mountain Wildlife were there to help those they could.

A tip of the hat to two Pilot Rock city councilors who surprised their community by quitting the council in the middle of a meeting after a vote in which they were the dissenters.

The abrupt exits of Jackie Carey and Robbie Young came, as Young explained it, because the duo refused to go against Oregon law.

The council in June considered passing a ban on residents living in recreational vehicles. That raised concerns from community members, including some who said a ban on RV living would leave them homeless.

Harland Bacus, the husband of Pilot Rock City Recorder Teri Bacus, talked with a number of residents and found the move to limit living in recreational vehicles as drawing a line between the haves and the have-nots. He presented the committee’s proposal and support for it to the council July 6.

“Our recommendation was that we made it legal to live in an RV on private property, and we had a petition with 228 signatures,” he said, which is about 14% of the town’s population. “And the second recommendation was to put it on the ballot for a vote of the citizens.”

That raised red flags for Carey and Young.

“We have a state law that says you can’t live in an RV in a residential zone, but we have people in town who think they should be allowed to do that,” Carey said. “And the council was told that.”

After a 3-2 vote, with Carey and Young voting against, the council accepted the proposal, prompting the duo to quit the council.

Whether the state law is overreach or overly onerous is not the point. What is the point is Carey and Young’s courage to stand up for what they believed was right, and for that we applaud them.