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Downtown Baker City during a less-extreme winter in 2010. The city has faced an unprecedented cold snap since December. (File/The Oregonian)

In Baker City, bitterly cold winter weather is so unremarkable that the city manager says he still wears a baseball cap when it's zero out.

Fred Warner says he'll sometimes wear a stocking cap. But not until temperatures are down near -20.

Warner has had plenty of occasions to bundle up this winter, as record-breaking cold weather set in across the rural eastern Oregon outpost in December - and hasn't let up.

The temperature made it above freezing just six days last month, the coldest December since records started being kept in 1943. January has been no better. Just three days have reached above freezing, the National Weather Service said.

Unlike paralyzed Portlanders, who have seen their schools close for nine days and their road crews struggle to keep up, Baker City residents want you to know they're doing fine.

"We're taking it in stride," said Kim Mosier, the former mayor. "We expect it - we just don't expect this much."

How hardy are Baker City's nearly 10,000 residents? Consider this: School recess is held outdoors as long as it's 10 degrees.

"There was one day when it got to 9 and I was thrilled they sent my kid out to play in the snow," Mosier said. "It gets a little crazy when a kid hasn't been outside for two weeks."

The National Weather Service doesn't track snow accumulation in Baker City, but residents say it's been arriving 8 inches to a foot at a time. That alone isn't unusual. But the weather hasn't gotten warm enough to melt what's on the ground. Mark Witty, the Baker City schools superintendent, said he's built 4-foot-tall snow berms just from shoveling his sidewalks.

"I've never seen this much snow in my lifetime," he said.

Yet residents are soldiering on. Schools have closed with unusual frequency in Baker City this winter. Twice. Once in December and once last week. "Two days is kind of a record," said Warner, the Baker City manager.

Warner, a lifelong resident, said the winter is one of the toughest he's ever seen. He listed off the recent lows: -11, -17, -1. "Once it's down below 10 - it's just cold," he said.

The city spent its $90,000 snow-removal budget before Christmas, Warner said, and it's most of the way through a $100,000 contingency. That's kept the city's four backhoes and two graders busy. (No, Portland, you can't borrow them.)

More snow is on the way. The temperature isn't expected to get beyond freezing for the next 10 days, Warner said, and the city is currently under a winter storm warning.

Forecasters say another round of snow could blanket the city. Because it's in a sheltered valley, National Weather Service meteorologist Dave Groenert said, cold air can linger in Baker City, even as surrounding areas warm up.

Witty, the superintendent, said transportation officials will once more awaken at 1 a.m. and 3 a.m. to check the roads. A third snow day may not be likely, but it remains a possibility if the roads aren't safe.

"We're bracing," he said.

-- Rob Davis

rdavis@oregonian.com

503.294.7657