FORJournalism Lab

4 days ago | centraloregondaily.com | David Dudley |FORJournalism Lab

Andrew Couture sat on a lawn chair, puffing a cigarette, as rain clouds swirled over "the dirt," a growing encampment east of Redmond. Couture's dog, Octavia, a 5-year-old pitbull, bull mastiff, lay in the powdered dust at Couture's feet. The 57-year-old tilted his chin, gesturing toward a generator humming behind his fifth-wheel camper. "I can't turn that thing off," said Couture, a Redmond native. "It powers my oxygen machine.

1 month ago | centraloregondaily.com | David Dudley |FORJournalism Lab

(Editor's note: This article was first posted by "Real Stories, Real Solutions" on May 1, the day China Hat Road was closed for the Cabin Butte Vegetation Management Project.)A stroller stood abandoned among pine trees with scorched trunks. A pair of blue jeans with legs splayed lay atop a heap of pine needles and ash. An empty chrome dog bowl squatted before an abandoned RV.

2 months ago | centraloregondaily.com | David Dudley |FORJournalism Lab

Visitors to the woods surrounding China Hat Road may recognize Zachary "Zack" Polton's yellow school bus through the trees that line the road to the east. Polton has had the bus, which runs on propane, for more than three years. He bought it before he entered into a deal to buy a house from a friend in La Pine. That deal turned out to be an illusion, he said. "I thought the owners were paying the mortgage on the house with the payments I was making to them," Polton, 36, told FORJournalism.

2 months ago | bendsource.com | David Dudley |FORJournalism Lab

[ { "name": "Air - Ad - Rectangle - 2 pack - Inline Content - 1", "insertPoint": "1/2", "component": "16844684", "requiredCountToDisplay": "6" } ,{ "name": "Air - Ad - Rectangle - 2 pack - Inline Content - 2", "insertPoint": "1/4", "component": "16844686", "requiredCountToDisplay": "20" },{ "name": "Air - Ad - Rectangle - 2 pack - Inline Content - 3", "insertPoint": "3/4", "component": "16844687", "requiredCountToDisplay": "17" } ] Up until a few months ago, Mark Jenkins didn’t consider...

2 months ago | centraloregondaily.com | David Dudley |FORJournalism Lab

Up until a few months ago, Mark Jenkins didn't consider himself lucky. The seventh child born to Floyd and Willie Lee Jenkins, he was born on the seventh day of the seventh month. "And I was all of seven pounds when I was born," Jenkins told FORJournalism on a rainy afternoon in early March.