Ohio just says
‘No’ to pot
Tigers, Gulls take
game to overtime
ELECTIONS • 7A
SPORTS • 4A
143rd YEAR, No. 91
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2015
ONE DOLLAR
LEARNING HAPPENS
BEHIND THESE WALLS
Spurned
hotelier
sues Port
over bias
Riverwalk Inn suitor
claims family ties
thwarted deal
By EDWARD STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
Photos by Joshua Bessex/The Daily Astorian
Inmates do classwork in the computer lab at the South Jetty High School Monday. More photos on www.dailyastorian.com
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By EDWARD STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
W
ARRENTON — From the outside, the North
Coast Youth Correctional Facility looks fair-
ly nondescript, a secluded, walled-in green
and beige complex in the woods near Costco. The facility
houses a continually rotating population of up to 50 young
inmates between the ages of 14 and 21, mostly invisible to
local residents.
But inside the walls, employees
are engaged on the front lines of
trying to prevent some of Oregon’s
most troubled youths from a fur-
ther life of crime through drug and
alcohol treatment, education and
job training.
“We do great work with tough
kids,” said James Sapper, an Or-
egon Youth Authority employee
who helped start the facility in
barracks at Camp Rilea nearly 20
years ago and took over as director
in December.
More than two-thirds of the
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from Portland and Salem, Sapper
said, and many have dealt with
substance abuse, been taken ad-
vantage of by adults and largely
lacked role models. His group life
coordinators, guards for the youth
offenders, handle their daily living
needs.
Joining Sapper Monday for an
interview and tour of the facility
was Richard Glinert, principal of
the South Jetty High School, oper-
ated by the Warrenton-Hammond
School District within the prison.
Glinert oversees the three teachers
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help the high-school-age inmates
toward a diploma or GED exam.
The two spoke with pride about
the 25 students who, after coming
into South Jetty with varying stag-
es of a high school education and
personal issues, have earned their
diplomas since January.
La’Braye Franklin speaks during an interview with The Daily Astorian.
Franklin came to South Jetty in May as a high school junior needing
12 credits to graduate. He has earned those credits over the last six
months and plans to graduate with his diploma in the coming weeks.
See SCHOOL, Page 10A
Kathy Merritt, a librarian at Warrenton Grade School, holds up a
children’s book during a presentation about how to read out loud
to children. The presentation is part of a program that allows the
prisoners to record themselves reading children’s books to give to
younger members of their family.
Family pursues legal
action over suicide
County, CBH failed to
protect woman from
harm, claim alleges
By DERRICK DePLEDGE
The Daily Astorian
The family of the woman who
jumped from the Astoria Bridge in
April is preparing a lawsuit against
Clatsop County and Clatsop Behav-
ioral Healthcare, alleging her suicide
was preventable and that the county
and the private mental health provid-
er failed statutory and moral obliga-
tions to protect her from harm.
Carrie Barnhart, a 54-year-old
mother of six, had chronic men-
tal illness and committed suicide
a week after Astoria Police pulled
her from the bridge after midnight
and took her to Columbia Memorial
Hospital, where she was evaluated
by Clatsop Behavioral Healthcare
and released after two hours.
Astoria Police had responded to
suicide threats from Barnhart four
times between January and April,
and her family disclosed several
other instances over the previous
year where she had threatened to
kill herself.
See SUICIDE, Page 10A
Submitted Photo
A makeshift memorial under the As-
toria Bridge honors Carrie Barnhart,
who committed suicide in April.
Ganesh Sonpatki, the Portland
hotelier who has long tried and been
spurned in his attempts to assume
the lease of the Astoria Riverwalk
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Astoria, which owns the hotel, and
the hotel’s current operators, Astoria
Hospitality Ventures LLC.
Sonpatki’s lawyer, Colin Hunter,
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County Circuit Court on behalf of
the Param Hotel Group, which op-
erates several budget hotels in the
Portland metro area. The suit names
the Port and Executive Director Jim
Knight as defendants, along with
Hospitality Ventures owners Chester
Trabucco and William Orr. Param
seeks relief for the alleged violation
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contract, fraud and intentional inter-
ference with economic relations.
See HOTELIER, Page 10A
Seaside
schools
score a
solid YES
‘An exciting
time for students
and staff,’ says
superintendent
By KATHERINE LACAZE
EO Media Group
SEASIDE — Nearly 70 percent
of voters in Seaside School District
10 passed a ballot measure to renew
a local option tax to help fund oper-
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starting 2016 .
$FFRUGLQJWRWKHWKLUGXQRI¿FLDO
results from the Clatsop County
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cast, with 2,127, or about 70 per-
FHQW VXSSRUWLQJ WKH PHDVXUH
voters voted no.
“What an exciting time for our
students and staff!” Seaside School
District 10 Superintendent Dr. Doug
Dougherty said in an email shortly
after the numbers were in. “Our
FRPPXQLW\KDVSDVVHGLWV¿IWKFRQ
secutive local
option levy for
Seaside School
District.
I’m
very grateful to
everyone who
supported the
students in the
election.”
Steve Phil-
lips, chairman
Doug
of the district’s
Dougherty
board of direc-
tors, said the
local option tax renewal was im-
portant because it “allows everyone
to move forward in a positive man-
ner.”
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investment in our students will con-
tinue to directly support the classes
and the variety of program offer-
ings our students access on a daily
basis,” Dougherty added.
See ELECTION, Page 7A