OPB’s First Look: Oak Creek salon teaches girls job skills

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Good morning, Northwest.

Oak Creek Youth Correctional Facility in Albany, Oregon, has a salon that looks much like any other. But it’s actually the setting for a transition program that helps incarcerated girls learn hair care skills for career opportunities after their release.

KLCC’s Natalie Pate spent time with girls and trainers at Oak Creek to see how the program is changing lives. The training focuses specifically on Black women’s hair care, providing participants with specialized skills while helping them build confidence and prepare for employment. Nearly half of the girls at the facility are people of color.

Here’s your First Look at Saturday’s news.

— Winston Szeto

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Chrystal Thompson, who owns her own salon in Corvallis, braids Aspen's hair at Oak Creek Youth Correctional Facility in Albany, Ore., on June 30, 2026. The natural hair care program at the facility allows students to get their natural hair care license, which they can use to get work once released.
*Saskia Hatvany / OPB*

Hair program at Oak Creek helps incarcerated girls build self-confidence, find future employment

Oak Creek Youth Correctional Facility houses roughly 50 girls and women ages 12-25 who were convicted of juvenile offenses before they were 18. For about three years, girls at the facility have had the option to pursue a state-approved license in natural hair care.

Participating girls and leaders at Oak Creek agree that the program provides both practical skills and future employment opportunities. But perhaps most importantly, it creates a space within the incarceration setting where the girls can foster community and embrace their creativity.

Every two weeks, professional hairdresser Christal Thompson visits the facility. Thompson owns Cali’s Hands Braiding Studio in Corvallis and has been working with the girls at Oak Creek for years.

Together, she and the trainees do the hair of the incarcerated youth who want it and have earned the privilege. (Natalie Pate, KLCC)

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3 things to know

Joined by state and local officials, Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek gives updates about the Akawa Butte Fire, burning just north of Sisters, Ore., at a press conference at the Sisters-Camp Sherman Rural Fire Protection District Fire Station 701 in Sisters, Ore., on July 24, 2026.
*Eli Imadali / OPB*

Residents in Central Oregon braced for high winds and more hot weather this weekend, as Gov. Tina Kotek arrived in the small town of Sisters yesterday to visit the frontlines of the Akawa Butte Fire, the nation’s top firefighting priority. (Jen Baires and Joni Auden Land)
Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery have agreed to delay closing their $81 billion merger well into next year, a stunning move that arrives as a judge continues to consider a challenge from 12 states, including Oregon, that are seeking to block the deal altogether. (Wyatte Grantham-Philips, Associated Press)
Oregon elections officials announced yesterday that Initiative Petition 28 — which would have outlawed hunting, fishing and slaughtering livestock, among other practices — didn’t get enough signatures to make the Nov. 3 ballot. (Dirk VanderHart)

Northwest headlines

Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin addresses the public during a tense Douglas County Commissioners meeting on July 22, 2026.
*Courtesy of Douglas County*

Oregon forges ahead with endangered species protections, despite federal changes (April Ehrlich)
Douglas County Commissioners pass resolution saying they aren’t a sanctuary county (Rebecca Hansen-White, KLCC)
Washington state’s clean-energy bottleneck leads to calls for reform (John Ryan, KUOW)
Oregon emergency alert system more popular in rural areas than metro area, study says (Shaanth Nanguneri, Oregon Capital Chronicle)
Businesses in Talent, Oregon, push back against proposed fee increases (Peyton Gast, JPR)

One more look

A bronze Marcus Whitman statue in the Washington State Capitol building weighs over 9,000 pounds with its stone base.
*Jacquelyn Jimenez Romero / Washington State Standard*

Marcus Whitman statue will soon have a new home in Washington Capitol

Visitors to the Washington State Capitol won’t be greeted by the towering figure of missionary Marcus Whitman much longer.

He’s getting moved from the north entryway down the hall in the next few months to make way for a statue of Native American leader Billy Frank Jr. seated on driftwood with jumping salmon.

Votes by a pair of state panels Thursday morning made the relocation official, ending a protracted conversation on where to put the 11-foot, 9,144-pound bronze statue of Whitman that’s been shaped by political, architectural and financial concerns.

Whitman, who settled near what is today Walla Walla in the 1830s, is one of two Washington figures to have a statue in the U.S. Capitol’s National Statuary Hall. The other is Mother Joseph. (Jerry Cornfield, Washington State Standard)