143RD YEAR, NO. 255
DailyAstorian.com // WEDNESDAY, JUNE 29, 2016
ONE DOLLAR
POYER CAMP STILL GOING
STRONG IN ITS THIRD YEAR
SPORTS • 7A
INSIDE
Board backs new library at Heritage Square
Top pick goes to Astoria City Council in July
By DERRICK DePLEDGE
The Daily Astorian
The Astoria Library Board on
Tuesday night recommended the city
build a new, modern library at Heri-
tage Square, describing the project
as a “cultural, social and economic
benefi t to Astoria for generations to
come.”
An 18,000-square-foot library
east of the Garden of Surging Waves
could cost between $8.7 million and
$10.1 million. The board found that a
new library would be more economi-
cal than renovating the aging library
on 10th Street and could be a more
enticing project to private donors.
The recommendation will be
heard at a special meeting of the City
Council in July. The board’s advice
could help the council make a deci-
sion after 18 months of uncertainty
over a library project.
Kate Summers, the chairwoman
of the Library Board, said there are
few better investments than a library.
“That’s what I hope that Astorians
will see. That a library will be expen-
sive to build,” she said, “but we’ll get
that money back in what it means to
the city.”
Six options
The City Council had supported a
plan to renovate the existing library,
which was built in the 1960s and is
suffering from age and structural defi -
ciencies, and expand into the vacant
Waldorf Hotel. But after Mayor
Arline LaMear and two new council-
ors took power last year, the council
agreed to consider a new library with
housing at Heritage Square.
Consultants have outlined six
options that involve renovating the
existing library, expanding the library
See LIBRARY, Page 10A
Warrenton role model gets his due
Paris Achen/Pamplin Media Group
Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum
and Gov. Kate Brown announce two set-
tlements with Volkswagen over an emis-
sions-cheating scandal.
VW to pay
Oregonians
$85 million
About 13,000 diesel
vehicle owners will
get $5,100 each
By PARIS ACHEN and
KEVIN HARDEN
Capital Bureau
Danny Miller/The Daily Astorian
tila has been to so many students
throughout the decades. Along
with coaching, Mattila taught for
more than 30 years .
Morrow said the hope is to
gather players, coaches and other
people from Mattila’s past for a
dedication party Sept. 2, when the
Warriors open the season against
rival Knappa High School.
PORTLAND — The state and federal
government have settled two lawsuits with
Volkswagen related to the company misrep-
resenting the amount of emissions its die-
sel-powered vehicles produced.
The federal settlement, which has yet to
receive fi nal approval, requires Volkswagen
to pay more than $68.2 million into a trust to
support diesel-emission reduction programs
in Oregon and to make cash payments of
$5,100 each to 13,000 Oregonians who pur-
chased the falsely-marketed vehicles. Volk-
swagen also has agreed to buy back or fi x
certain VW and Audi diesel vehicles. Other
states will receive similarly funded emission
reductions programs.
In a separate multistate settlement
reached by Oregon Attorney General Ellen
Rosenblum and 37 other attorneys general,
Volkswagen has agreed to pay $570 million
for violating state laws prohibiting unfair or
deceptive trade practices. Oregon receives
$17 million of that payment.
Oregon was among six states that led
the investigation into the company’s decep-
tive trade practices, in part because Oregon
has the highest per-capita ownership of the
affected VW vehicles in the nation, Rosen-
blum said.
The attorneys general investigation con-
fi rmed that VW and Porsche sold more than
See MATTILA, Page 10A
See VW, Page 5A
John Mattila, f ormer Warrenton High School football coach , poses for a portrait Tuesday at Warrenton High School. The football
field will be dedicated to Mattila in September.
School honors
coach Mattila’s
dedication on
gridiron, court
‘The man
has given
a lot to the
school, and
he won a lot
of games
along the
way.’
By EDWARD STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
W
ARRENTON — With
38 years and more than
500 career wins coach-
ing football and basketball, John
Mattila has left an indelible mark
on youth sports in Warrenton.
The
Warrenton-Hammond
School Board returned the favor
last week, voting to name War-
renton High School’s gridiron
Mattila Field in his honor.
“I appreciate it,” said Mat-
tila, who retired from teaching in
2003 and coaching in 2011. “Not
many people get that honor.”
The Mattila name is omni-
present for anyone talking War-
renton football or taking in a
Rod Heyen
Gary Henley/The Daily Astorian
Warrenton coach John Mattila talks over strategies with Nate Mc-
Bride (10), Andy Forney (41) and Nick Smith (23) during the War-
riors’ first-round win over Weston-McEwen in November 2002.
game at the high school, where
a scoreboard donated by retired
Warrenton businessman Dennis
Bjork is dedicated to him.
The idea of naming the high
school’s fi eld after Mattila, 69, is
more than a decade old. Principal
Rod Heyen and baseball coach
Lenny Wolfe recently brought the
idea back up to the s chool b oard.
“The man has given a lot to the
school, and he won a lot of games
along the way,” Heyen said.
More than just honoring his
coaching career, Debbie Mor-
row, the board chairwoman, said
naming the fi eld is a way to honor
what a positive role model Mat-
principal,
Warrenton High School
‘Not a Ban’ aims to tame rowdy Long Beach Fourth
Collaborators
team up to tackle
consistent rules
enforcement
By NATALIE ST. JOHN
EO Media Group
LONG BEACH, Wash.
— After a year of meetings,
workshops, negotiations and
plans, members of the “Not a
Ban, a Better Plan” group are
cautiously hopeful that this
year’s Fourth of July celebra-
tion will be more orderly than
the raucous 2015 holiday.
Though county commis-
sioners would not consider
changing the county fi reworks
ordinance, residents and rep-
resentatives from numerous
state and local bodies that have
jurisdiction over the beach
worked together well and
made a solid effort to prevent
another chaotic holiday, “Not
a Ban” member Bonnie Lou
Cozby said Tuesday .
Collaborators
in
the
“Beach-friendly Fourth” cam-
paign include Washington
Department of Fish and Wild-
life, State Parks, Long Beach
Police, Pacifi c County Sher-
iff’s Offi ce, as well as local fi re
departments, business leaders,
tourism experts and city and
county offi cials, according to
State Parks press release.
Steep “learning curve”
The Not a Ban group
formed last July after the enor-
mous, wild celebration left
many locals feeling angry and
frightened.
According to the release,
an estimated 100,000 people
spent their holiday in the area,
and many of them illegally
camped on the beach. On July
4, Jeffery Beach, a 36-year-old
Auburn man, was killed in an
apparent assault on the beach.
Some jurisdictions, including
the city of Long Beach,
allowed
beach
bonfi res,
See ‘NOT A BAN’, Page 5A
Natalie St. John/EO Media Group
One beachgoer climbed on top of his truck to record the
deafening spectacle of hundreds of fireworks exploding
simultaneously in 2014. The peninsula-wide fireworks
free-for-all kicked off around sunset on the Fourth, and
continued well into the early hours of the next day.