A humpback whale makes an appearance
on the Astoria waterfront Monday. The
whales have been in the Columbia River
since late September, lured by abundant
food and possibly reacting to El Niño
conditions.
Edward Stratton/The Daily Astorian
143rd YEAR, No. 70
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 6, 2015
ONE DOLLAR
Move
the date
or
take
Local developer reimagines the Astor Hotel
a hike
FROM THE GROUND UP
T
By EDWARD STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
his summer, local developer Paul Caruana
became the sole owner of the John Jacob
Astor Hotel, the pre-eminent architectural
landmark in downtown Astoria.
The building, mostly used for sub-
sidized housing with businesses on the
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while Caruana imagines a
future mixed-use hotel and
apartment building, an-
chored by a public gather-
ing spot in the former hotel
lobby.
Caruana started in
spring repainting and wa-
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hired Pioneer Waterproof-
ing Co. Inc., whose em-
Paul
ployees can be seen raising
Caruana
and lowering themselves
on scaffolding, slowly painting the building’s fa-
cade a creamy Navajo white.
“We’re trying to keep the building from leak-
ing, so we’re caulking the window perimeters,”
said Mike Crawford, a project manager with
the company. “And we’re doing some concrete
patching on some areas that have deteriorated.
And then we’re adding a waterproof coating to
the walls.”
Caruana estimated the project is already more
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summer.
“I want it to look like a warm marshmallow
sitting on top of a shining emerald,” Caruana
said, explaining the dark green paint scheme he
hopes to start putting on the base of the Astor
Hotel next spring to make the building stand out
from the streets and sidewalk.
After the departures last year of Vintage Hard-
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Astor Hotel was largely vacant. But Caruana has
Hood to Coast:
At a crossroads
or an impasse?
By KATHERINE LACAZE
EO Media Group
Edward Stratton/The Daily Astorian
Since spring, owner Paul Caruana has been sprucing up the John Jacob Astor Hotel.
bulb-ringed John Jacob Astor Hotel sign, crum-
bling columns and a large staircase leading up to
a mezzanine.
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and hangs out at night, hired an interior designer
to turn the lobby into a public gathering place.
The rendering includes a lounging area, desks, a
coffee bar and a front desk for possible lodging
in the hotel.
“Everything from the columns in will be re-
Common Space
built,” Caruana said. “It’s all an idea right now, but
$WWKHKHDUWRIWKH¿UVWÀRRULVWKHGLODSLGDWHG it seems like there’s a big need for common space.”
yet still grandiose, lobby of the Astor Hotel, with
See ASTOR, Page 10A
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by Street 14 Coffee owners Jennifer and Mi-
cha Cameron-Lattek, Party Jesters party supply
store and 4 Seasons Clothing. The most recent
addition is Doe & Arrow, a men’s and women’s
clothing boutique and vinyl record store opened
two months ago by Chelsea Johnsen and Austen
Conn.
SEASIDE — Change the date or
look for another place to hold your
race, Seaside business owners told
representatives of Hood to Coast at a
city workshop
Monday night.
In response,
Hood to Coast
representatives
may be ready to
pull the popular
fundraiser and
internationally
renowned race.
“We’re not
trying to be ad-
Dan
versarial,” Hood
Floyd
to Coast Chief
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“We want this to work in Seaside. If it
cannot work for us and Seaside, I think
it’s fair to say we can move on. It’s
OK. It’s not a threat. We’re not playing
a poker game or anything. If it’s better
for the community, we can move on.”
A response to a petition
Seaside City Council held its sec-
ond public workshop regarding Hood
to Coast on Monday night. A group of
87 business owners — up from about
70 two weeks ago — wrote a letter to
See HOOD TO COAST, Page 10A
Still time to get Oregon LNG comments to FERC
Lawmakers,
city had asked
for extension on
today’s deadline
By ERICK BENGEL
and DERRICK
DePLEDGE
The Daily Astorian
The Federal Energy Regula-
tory Commission will not for-
mally extend today’s deadline
for public comment on the draft
environmental review of the
Oregon LNG project but will
consider late comments.
“For now, the deadline is
still set for today,” Tamara
Young-Allen, a commission
spokeswoman, said this morn-
ing.
However, the commis-
sion will accept and consider
comments submitted after the
deadline and urged the public
to submit comments as soon as
possible.
“Our staff will look at com-
ments submitted after the dead-
line date,” Young-Allen said.
“Our staff wants to hear from
the public, and it’s very import-
ant that you get your comments
in as soon as you possibly can.”
U.S. Sens. Ron Wyden and
Jeff Merkley and U.S. Rep.
Suzanne Bonamici asked the
federal agency in September
to extend the comment period
by 60 days so residents would
have more time to examine the
lengthy document.
The Astoria City Council
agreed Monday night to also
seek a 60-day extension, citing
the experience of Jennifer Rou-
da, an energy planner in Astoria
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ing hard copes of the draft envi-
ronmental impact statement and
supporting documents.
“Unfortunately, community
members that were expecting
to be able to get copies of these
materials at the public meetings
to take home to complete more
detailed reviews of the technical
information and FERC’s analy-
sis were not able to do so,” Asto-
ria Mayor Arline LaMear wrote
in a letter to the federal agency.
The draft environmental re-
view, released in August, found
that construction and operation
of the $6 billion terminal and
pipeline would adversely affect
the environment.
The draft statement con-
cluded, however, that the proj-
ect’s impacts to water quality,
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other areas of concern would be
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levels if Oregon LNG takes the
mitigation measures the energy
company has proposed, and ad-
ditional measures recommend-
ed by commission staff.
In September, the commis-
sion’s environmental staff held
two public comment meetings at
the Clatsop County Fair & Expo
Center where 77 concerned citi-
zens spoke out against the proj-
ect and three spoke in favor.
The Astoria City Council
voted in September to oppose
the project as a potential threat
to the environment and public
safety.
Oregon LNG wants to build
a terminal on the Skipanon
Peninsula and an 87-mile pipe-
line that would link up with a
natural gas pipeline in Wash-
ington state.
Warrenton is weighing de-
velopment permits for the proj-
ect, and several state and feder-
al agencies are also conducting
reviews.