Public Transparency

The wife of Alfalfa Fire District Acting Board President Mark Laucks launched into a lengthy social media attack against critics of the embattled fire district this week, blaming residents raising concerns about its operations for the loss of emergency services and making several claims about Wednesday’s board meeting that do not appear to have actually happened.

Months after Oregon lawmakers approved $1 million for horse-racing facilities in Crook County, county officials still have not accepted the money and are now considering whether to ask the Legislature to change how the grant is awarded.

A company that supplied the Alfalfa Fire District with approximately $165,000 in new breathing equipment to protect firefighters says it has not been paid anything for the purchase more than half a year after the district publicly celebrated receiving the equipment that its former chief Chad LaVallee claimed was paid for through a federal FEMA grant.

Newly released Crook County Fair Board records are providing substantially more detail about a previously undisclosed Funding Committee that met privately to discuss how Crook County should spend $1 million in state funding for horse-racing facilities

A group of 16 Alfalfa Fire District electors delivered a sweeping six-page rebuke of the district's leadership this week during a public meeting that also saw two new directors appointed to the embattled board and raised new questions about the embattled former Fire Chief Chad LaVallee's returning role in district operations.

The Alfalfa Fire District Board publicly questioned its own actions during a recent meeting after board members appeared unable to recall a vote taken just weeks earlier to delay appointments to two vacant board seats

A Prineville Review investigation has identified what appears to be undocumented meetings by a Crook County Fair Board funding committee that discussed Fair Board busines

Last month, Oregon agreed to pay $49 million to COVID-afflicted state prison inmates. It’s the state’s biggest payout ever—and underscores an underlying liability that is far larger.

The Alfalfa Fire District Board of Directors adopted the district's 2026-27 budget on June 30th, following a Budget Committee meeting one week earlier in which a committee member raised concerns that the proposal may not comply with Oregon's Local Budget Law

The Crook County Board of Commissioners has approved a new public records policy, marking the second major phase of an ongoing transparency initiative championed by Commissioner Seth Crawford with unanimous support from other commissioners.