10A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • MONDAY, MAY 30, 2016
Clerk: ‘He called into question the core of my being’
Continued from Page 1A
Ms. Grimes to include me in
that decision-making process, as
well as county counsel.”
Somers quickly placed Ken-
nedy Grimes on paid admin-
istrative leave. He ired her in
December 2014.
Kennedy Grimes, who trav-
eled from her new home in Ire-
land for the trial, testiied she
felt worthless when she was
ired.
“He called into ques-
tion the core of my being as
a county clerk and as a public
employee,” she said. “He said
things about me that were not
true and I couldn’t say anything
about that.”
During the three-day trial
in Clatsop County Circuit
Court, multiple witnesses
were called to testify. The
witnesses included Clatsop
County Board of Commis-
sioners Chairman Scott Lee,
Clatsop County Clerk Val-
erie Crafard, Clatsop County
elections technician Sheryl
Holcom and former Clatsop
County Juvenile Department
Director Janet Evans.
Jim Williams, the direc-
tor of elections for the Sec-
retary of State’s Ofice, also
testiied.
Continued from Page 1A
to end.
“Whole pods are killed,
from the matriarch to the
unborn fetuses,” she said. “It’s
very brutal.”
Videos of Faroe Islands’
“grinds,” as the whale killings
are called, show water turning
red from blood. Although some
still view the killings as tradi-
tion, many kill the whales for
sport.
“There are awesome things
about their culture that they can
hold onto,” Holtman said. “But
I think at this point, it’s better
something like that is left in the
history books.”
Holtman helped save whales
and dolphins with other Sea
Shepherd Conservation Society
volunteers. In 2014, the organi-
zation saved 1,500 pilot whales.
When she isn’t standing up
for marine mammals and coor-
dinating Haystack Rock volun-
teers, Holtman enjoys explor-
ing the Paciic Northwest
through doing research and
hiking.
Moving forward, Holtman
said she hopes to study engi-
neering and further her marine
conservation work.
“My goal is to build a life that
you don’t need a vacation from,”
she said, “so I feel really happy
with the work that I’m doing.”
— Lyra Fontaine
them know that the best wild-
life views might be on the other
side of the rock.
“To have one interpreter
telling people that can pre-
vent hundreds of people from
trampling the marine garden,”
she said. “It just makes a better
experience for everyone.”
The marine garden is
always changing, Holtman
said. In a negative tide, visitors
can walk farther out to the nee-
dles and see different views.
Black oystercatchers will soon
establish their nests on one side
of the rock.
Dolphins and whales
Holtman’s passion for dol-
phins and whales led her to do
ield work in both the north
Atlantic Ocean and the Paciic
Northwest, as well as support
dolphin and whale conser-
vation efforts throughout the
world, such as in Antarctica and
Japan. Some whales are “apex
predators that have a signiicant
impact on all the other species
in the ecosystem,” she said.
For months, Holtman
worked in the Faroe Islands
to address the mass slaughter
of pilot whales and dolphins
during hunts, which she said is
an outdated tradition that needs
with distractions and multitask-
ing. Proofreaders worked indi-
vidually rather than reading out
loud while another proofreader
reads along, Somers said.
Andrew Altschul, Kennedy
Grimes’ attorney, countered
that there is no oficial protocol
to follow.
The county’s insurance
agency will cover the nearly
$440,000 in damages and
attorney’s fees. The county is
reviewing the possibility of
appealing the decision.
the trial. In the video, Somers
was asked why he wanted to
leave Clatsop County for Col-
lege Park. He admitted he was
only planning on living in Asto-
ria for three to ive years before
moving to a more metropolitan
area.
“I really enjoy being in the
city much more than the coun-
try,” he said.
An independent review of
county leadership released last
July found that the county was
operating effectively under
Somers, but that some man-
agement decisions should have
been better explained. Several
department directors left the
‘Trashing his campsite’
A videotaped deposition
of Somers was played during
county during Somers’ tenure,
and his management style was
questioned in anonymous letters
to the Board of Commissioners
and The Daily Astorian.
In closing arguments at the
trial, Altschul said there was
nothing wrong with Somers
using Clatsop County as a step-
ping stone along his career
path. The attorney compared it
to backcountry hiking, where
someone pitches their tent for a
time, but should leave the camp-
site pristine for the next camper.
“I do not fault Mr. Somers for
temporarily pitching his tent in
Astoria,” Altschul said. “I fault
him for trashing his campsite.”
Change: Timmons has more than 5,200 hours of lying
Holtman: The marine
garden is always changing
Continued from Page 1A
Communication
Karen Vickers, the county’s
attorney, described the case as a
matter of authority. She pointed
out that the clerk is appointed
in Clatsop County and reports
to the county manager.
Kennedy Grimes was an
“at-will” employee who could
be ired at any time.
After placing Kennedy
Grimes on paid administrative
leave, Somers completed an
internal investigation, which
concluded that the clerk’s ofice
did not follow established pro-
tocol for proofreading the draft
ballots before the election.
His indings detailed issues
The sector includes Air Sta-
tion Astoria, which lies res-
cue missions into the Paciic
Ocean to the Cascade Moun-
tains. The station received
the 2015 Aviation Standard-
ization Excellence Award for
those using the MH-60 Jay-
hawk helicopters.
On Friday, Timmons and
Travers walked past friends
and family in the hangar
to inspect their command,
assembled near the bay
doors, in front of a collection
of helicopters and boats. The
sector has performed more
than 1,700 search and res-
cue missions and saved more
than 3,000 people during Tra-
vers’ tenure. Timmons said
Travers had set the bar very
high and left the sector ready
to do great things, and that it
was icing on the cake to be
receiving his irst command
from his former compatriot.
rity and strategic studies from
the U.S. Naval War College
in 2013 and served two years
as chief of the future oper-
ations branch of the Coast
Guard’s Paciic Area Com-
mand in California before
coming back to Astoria.
He served as executive
oficer for the Sector Colum-
bia River under Capt. Bruce
Jones.
In the front row below
the stage sat Travers’ fam-
ily on the left and Timmons’
family on the right. Tim-
mons and his wife, Laura,
have 18-year-old triplets. His
daughters Audrey and Eliza-
beth are going away to col-
lege, while his son Patrick is
headed to the U.S. Air Force
Academy.
After thanking his family
and Travers, Timmons gave
his irst commands to the sec-
tor: work hard, be nice and do
the right thing.
Rear
Adm.
Richard
Gromlich, the soon-retiring
commander of the Paciic
Northwest’s District 13 over-
seeing Sector Columbia
River, helped change com-
mand and say goodbye to
Travers.
Gromlich said Travers
had overseen high-pro-
file cases such as the ves-
sel Sparna, which grounded
in the Columbia River, to
close misses such as a ves-
sel that nearly crashed at
the entrance to Grays Har-
bor, Washington, in foul
weather.
Most notable was clear-
ing “kayaktivists” from the
Willamette River after they
and others hanging from the
St. Johns Bridge in Port-
land tried to block the Royal
Dutch Shell icebreaker Fen-
nica from leaving Portland
to support an oil rig explor-
ing the Arctic National
Wildlife Refuge in Alaska.
Throughout it all, he said,
his men and women showed
the utmost professionalism.
“We caught lightning in a
bottle the last two years,” he
said. “It was fun.”
Upon his retirement, Tra-
vers received a shadow box
full of military mementos
from throughout his career,
a meritorious service award
All about people
Career aviator
Timmons has been an ofi-
cer in the Coast Guard since
1992 and an aviator since
1994. He has more than 5,200
hours lying out of stations
in Florida, Massachusetts,
Alaska, Alabama and most
recently Astoria. He earned
his master’s in national secu-
While the things he’s done
will fade over time, Travers
said, he’ll always remember the
people he worked with, from
the high school nurse who irst
told him about the Coast Guard
to the men and women of Sec-
tor Columbia River, who he has
repeatedly called his greatest
command ever.
for his time with the sector,
a letter of appreciation from
President Barack Obama
and a triangularly-folded
American flag. He gave his
son, Benjamin, an incoming
senior at the University of
Michigan readying for med-
ical school, his first hat in
the Coast Guard, along with
flowers to his wife C.C.
and daughters Kirsten and
Jenna.
Here for advice
Travers reminded Tim-
mons that he has three pre-
decessors nearby to seek
advice. Gromlich joked that
the Coast Guard should stop
sending its best and bright-
est to Astoria, where Travers
is the third successive sec-
tor commander to retire, after
Jones and Capt. Doug Kaup.
Adm. Edward Nelson, who
commanded the sector from
1971 to 1974, also retired
locally.
Jones started choppering
ship pilots to passing ves-
sels for Brim Aviation, which
is located a few hundred feet
from the Coast Guard at the
Astoria Regional Airport.
Travers will work next door
to Jones, managing the War-
renton base and lying for
air medevac company Life
Flight Network.
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