143rd YEAR, No. 15
TUESDAY, JULY 21, 2015
ONE DOLLAR
Music Festival directors resign in dispute
Artistic director
disagrees with
board’s statements
organization’s direction
ber board had been trying
and leadership structure.
to “professionalize” the
Managing Director Car-
festival, said Linda Ma-
ol Shepherd has also re-
gee, the former executive
signed.
director of Chamber Mu-
The shakeup comes af-
sic Northwest, a consul-
By ERICK BENGEL
ter the music festival had
tant for the festival.
The Daily Astorian
its most successful year
The board hired Magee
with a series of critically
to make the organization-
The Astoria Music Festival’s acclaimed classical music
al structure more like that
board of directors has resigned en concerts in June. The festi-
of other performing arts
Keith Clark
masse, citing “unresolved differenc- val hit the $100,000 mark
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ed hiring Shepherd as a year-round
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Over the past year, the eight-mem- managing director.
After the board implemented
these changes, Clark allegedly ex-
pressed an intention to separate from
the festival and form an alternative
program for 2016 with a new board
chosen by him and some of the mu-
sicians.
Clark, who co-founded the festi-
val in 2003, informed the board in a
letter he did not intend to make pub-
lic that he would continue the festi-
val “as a European-style artist-led
company, rather than one dominated
by a non-musician board.”
Fire danger closes Ecola Creek reserve
“This is not about who’s right and
who’s wrong, and the board under-
stands that Keith Clark wants to go
a different direction,” Magee said in
a statement Monday. “I think they
made the best decision, after looking
at the only options open to them.”
Rather than see Clark jump ship,
however, the board “felt instead it
was time to step aside and allow the
formation of a new team of leaders,
rather than let the organization try to
See MUSIC FEST, Page 10A
Seaside
aspires
to boost
boundaries
New school may
come with boundary
expansion
By KATHERINE LACAZE
EO Media Group
Joshua Bessex/The Daily Astorian
The Ecola Creek Forest Reserve is closed to the public because of high fire risk in the area. Signs hang from gates located on the property.
Cannon Beach isn’t taking chances with dry summer
By DANI PALMER
EO Media Group
C
ANNON BEACH —
Wanting to escape the
city, a hiker makes his
way to Ecola Creek Forest Re-
serve for a walk through the
woods, but instead finds the
entrance blocked. “Land closed
to public entry due to high fire
danger,” reads a posted sign, by
order of the city manager.
The Oregon Department
of Forestry may have Clatsop
County’s fire warning level set
at moderate, but Cannon Beach
isn’t taking any chances.
“We’ve always closed it down
at some point during the year be-
cause there’s definitely points in
time it gets dry,” City Manager
Brant Kucera said.
Cannon Beach purchased the
first 120 acres of the reserve in
1999, and the rest in 2009, ac-
cording to the North Coast Land
Conservancy.
This year, closure of the
1,040-acre forest reserve came
early — right around Indepen-
dence Day — following the ad-
‘In my opinion, we’re
very lucky to not have had
any forest fires yet.’
— Brant Kucera
Cannon Beach city manager
vice of the Oregon Department
of Forestry and Cannon Beach
Fire and Rescue.
Also closed is Cannon
Beach’s South Wind site, 58
acres reserved for “essential”
city facilities east of Highway
101.
Cannon Beach Fire Chief
Mike Balzer said his depart-
ment’s recommendation to close
the reserve early this month was
based on dry weather conditions
and the influx of Fourth of July
holiday visitors.
Fireworks and dangers from
campers or transients building
campfires in commercial timber
areas were also matters of con-
cern, Kucera said.
Typically, the Ecola Creek
Forest Reserve closure occurs in
August or September.
“It’s been very dry, very ear-
ly,” Kucera said. “It’s better to
be safe than sorry.”
Lack of rain
According to Clinton Rock-
ey, a meteorologist with the Na-
tional Weather Service in Port-
land, the Cannon Beach area has
only received about .02 inches
of rain this month, around .66
inches below normal. Rockey
based his estimate on Astoria
and Seaside data, and added that
Astoria had .73 inches of rain in
June, 1.82 inches below normal.
All of Clatsop County has been
dry.
“The light showers we have
don’t really do anything,” Balzer
said, adding it would take signif-
icant rain to reopen the reserve.
“It could be awhile.”
Last year, Ecola Creek closed
for about three weeks, Public
Works Director Dan Grassick
said.
Kucera said Cannon Beach
would need at least half an inch
of precipitation in one rain event
to open Ecola Creek Forest Re-
serve back up this year.
“There’s not much chance of
that happening soon,” Rockey
said.
In the meantime, Kucera said
officials want to safeguard the
public and protect forestlands
and wildlife. There’s also the is-
sue of liability.
If a fire started in the city-
owned Ecola Creek Forest Re-
serve and spread to commercial
timberlands, Cannon Beach
could be held liable. The person
who started the fire, even if ac-
cidentally, could also be held ac-
countable for firefighting costs.
So any who pass that red sign
and are discovered on the prop-
erty will likely be fined for tres-
passing, Kucera said.
“In my opinion, we’re very
lucky to not have had any forest
fires yet,” he added.
See SEASIDE, Page 10A
‘Blight’
begone
Astoria council
hears Heritage
Square timeline
By DERRICK DePLEDGE
The Daily Astorian
The chamber’s consultants have
calculated there were 212 broadcast,
print and online media stories on the
See GOONIES, Page 3A
See SQUARE, Page 3A
30th anniversary
celebration brought
attention, hassles
By McKINLEY SMITH
The Daily Astorian
Joshua Bessex/The Daily Astorian
Participants bare their bellies and do the Truffle Shuffe during the Farewell
to John Warren Field concert and film screening event June 6.
Skip Hauke, the executive director
of the Astoria-Warrenton Area Cham-
ber of Commerce, told the City Coun-
cil the anniversary celebration generat-
ed worldwide media attention.
Managing growth
The process to expand Seaside’s
Contaminated soil piled in a pit
at Heritage Square should be hauled
away after Labor Day, but the time-
line for having the downtown prop-
erty ready for redevelopment is wob-
bly.
City staff tried to reassure the
Astoria City Council Monday night
that the assessment and cleanup of
the former Safeway lot is only a few
months behind and could still be
completed by the end of the year.
New samples being taken starting
today could decide how much soil
has to be trucked to a special-purpose
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waste disposal site in Arlington and
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ly. The tests could also determine
the extent of contamination under a
parking lot in the northeast corner of
the block.
The city has tried to keep the
assessment and cleanup under the
$400,000 received in a U.S. En-
vironmental Protection Agency
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“There’s still a lot of ifs and may-
bes,” City Councilor Cindy Price
said.
Price called the hole off Duane
Street a “tremendous blight” and
Good, bad,
Goonies
The success of the 30th anniversary
celebration of “The Goonies” in June
contrasted sharply with the reality of liv-
ing in the Uppertown neighborhood that
is home to the Goonies house, the Astoria
City Council heard Monday night.
An estimated 12,000 to 15,000 peo-
ple came to Astoria in June for the an-
niversary of the 1985 adventure com-
edy, a boon to brew pubs, restaurants,
shops and hotels.
SEASIDE — Adding four sites to
grow Seaside’s urban-growth boundary
by about 200 acres was a key topic of
the July 7 Planning Commission meet-
ing
Along with the other potential sites,
commissioners focused on the South
East Hills area, south and east of Sea-
side near Wahanna Road. The land is
considered suitable for development
because of easy access, potential for di-
verse land use and a location near about
30 acres that is suitable for a school site.
“We’re not ready to do that today,
but I certainly want to acknowledge the
idea of having school facilities and en-
abling them to grow up into that area,”
planner Don Hanson said.
Hanson is a principal and director
for HLB Otak, Inc., a Seaside-based
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by Weyerhaeuser, which owns much of
the land under consideration.
“Our City Council is very interested
in having that land,” City Planner Kev-
in Cupples said. “If you wait until you
run out and then you’re trying to scram-
ble in order to do that, then that’s not
good planning.”