Central Oregon

The Alfalfa Rural Fire District Board of Directors has placed former Fire Chief Chad LaValle on administrative leave following allegations of financial impropriety during his tenure. The board voted 3-1 to suspend LaValle, who has faced heightened scrutiny over district spending and hiring practices.

Newly obtained financial records from the Alfalfa Fire District spanning 2023 through 2025 are raising additional questions about former board president Nathan "Nate" Starr, including thousands of dollars in apparently unpaid facility usage fees involving a legally dissolved church, meals purchased with district funds, and financial transactions involving a family member.

Detectives with the Deschutes County Sheriff's Office (DCSO) seized 228 roosters on Wednesday, November 4th, during a search of a property northeast of Redmond, just outside Crook County, as part of a long-term investigation into an alleged large-scale cockfighting operation.

Newly obtained credit card records from the Alfalfa Fire District reveal extensive travel expenditures involving former Fire Chief Chad LaVallee, including trips across the country, repeated hotel stays, rental vehicles, vacation packages and airfare purchased for members of his family.

In the week since the mass shooting that claimed four lives at Silver Rail Elementary School in Bend, questions have proliferated about what led the 16-year-old shooter, Griffin J. John II, to his former elementary school with a loaded shotgun.

Newly obtained text messages between former Alfalfa Fire District Chief Chad LaVallee and two Central Oregon Community College (COCC) officials reveal that LaVallee claimed the district was already interviewing prospective replacements for his position weeks before its governing board formally authorized advertising the job.

Police released new details Friday of Thursday's tragic shooting at Bend's Silver Rail Elementary School, including the names of a teacher and one of three boys killed by the 16-year-old shooter who attended the school.

A suspected shooter is dead and multiple people, including children, have been injured following a reported shooting Thursday afternoon at Silver Rail Elementary School in Bend, approximately 35 miles southwest of Prineville.

The Alfalfa Fire District's sale of a taxpayer-owned ambulance to Central Oregon Community College (COCC) for $15,000 is facing new scrutiny after records obtained by the Prineville Review revealed the college had apparently already paid the district before the vehicle was offered through a public auction that ultimately drew no other bidders.

The Alfalfa Fire District has finally released some of its 2026 bank records to the Prineville Review following weeks of delays, revealing nearly $90,000 in checks, a $157,420 FEMA deposit and thousands in other spending — but significant records needed to determine where some of the money went remain missing.