Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 16, 2016)
8A THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2016 Columbians sweep past Warriors Council seat: Candidates recognize By GARY HENLEY The Daily Astorian WARRENTON — Breana Edwards and the Rainier vol- leyball team set the tone early, then did just enough to hold off Warrenton in all three games Thursday as the Columbians scored a sweep over the War- riors, 25-18, 25-21, 25-9, in a Lewis & Clark League match at Warrenton. Edwards, Rainier’s big junior middle blocker/outside hitter, had blocks at the net for the irst three points of the match, spark- ing the Columbians to an 11-2 lead in Game 1. The Warriors kept it fairly even from there, at least for the irst two games. “Yeah, we lost in three, but I was proud of our girls for not backing off,” said Warrenton coach Jim Hackwith, whose team lost for the irst time in league play. Rainier improves to 3-0. “The way it started didn’t look good for us, but we didn’t get scared,” he said. “I was proud of the way we played. It was a good match to see where we’re at.” Even after falling behind 11-2, the Warriors battled back to within 20-18, off three kills by Landree Miethe, and a big block by Katelynn Blodgett on Raini- er’s Kyla Howell. But Howell came back with a couple of ace serves, and the Columbians scored the inal ive points of Game 1. Warrenton rallied from a 5-1 deicit in Game 2, and grabbed a brief 9-8 lead with the help of a kill by Claire Bussert off a set from Sierra Lyons, the only lead of the night for the Warriors. Rainier responded with three straight points, and never trailed again. Edwards blocked Miethe for a point, had a jump-serve ace and later added a kill from the back row. Game 3 was all Rainier, and most of it Edwards, who had more ace serves, more blocks, and back-to-back power kills that served as the exclamation points to close out the match. Lyons was 10-for-11 serving, Miethe had six kills and Bussert added 10 digs for the Warriors. Sophomore Morgan Blodgett inished with three blocks and Bussert had four kills for Warrenton, which takes part in the Vernonia Tournament Saturday. Elsewhere, Portland Chris- tian (3-1) defeated Oregon Epis- copal (3-1), putting the Colum- bians into irst place in the league standings. The Warriors won two of three games in the junior varsity match, 25-22, 25-18, 11-15. Oracle: ‘These settlements are very challenging to resolve’ Continued from Page 1A the Oregon Museum of Sci- ence and Industry in Portland, includes only $35 million in actual cash. Of that, $25 million will go to legal costs. The other $10 million will go toward sci- ence, technology, engineering and math education in public schools, to be branded as “Ora- cle STEM Education Grants.” The state’s $105 million val- uation of the settlement also includes $60 million in free cus- tomer service support for yet-to- be-obtained Oracle software. State oficials were expected to notify the federal government of the settlement Thursday, Brown said. Brown declined to answer a question about whether the state will be required to give any of the settlement money to the federal government. “We received a very limited amount of cash as you will see; the cash is $35 million,” Brown responded. “These settlements are very challenging to resolve, and all of the parties had to do some give and take in order to resolve the matter.” The federal government con- tributed $305 million for Cover Oregon. But federal oficials may ind it hard to recoup any part of the settlement’s osten- sible value. Not a penny of the amount will go to repay the state for the $240 million it paid Ora- cle in connection with the proj- ect, or reimburse the state for any of the related damages cited in the state’s lawsuit against Oracle. Kristen Grainger, a spokes- woman for Brown, said the set- tlement was “carefully” and “cre- atively” constructed to let Oregon keep as much of it as possible, hopefully the whole amount. “We are hopeful that (the federal government) will see that the needs of consumers are met,” she said. Sharing the blame Under the agreement, neither side admits liability or wrong- doing. It also calls for a close working relationship between the two sides. Besides the $35 million in cash and $60 million in cus- tomer support, the settlement also includes a six-year licens- ing agreement that would allow the state to get free software to upgrade some of its information technology systems. The expansion of the state’s relationship with Oracle rep- resents a major departure from state oficials’ past representa- tions that the company provided lawed software, did shoddy work and engaged in unethical, even criminal, business prac- tices. In fact, the state’s lawsuit had asked a judge to ban Oracle from ever doing business with the state again. Asked whether the state could entrust its IT systems to Oracle after the Cover Oregon failure, Brown said she was con- ident in the company’s exper- tise around business enterprise software. Oregon House Minority Leader Mike McLane, R-Pow- ell Butte, said Thursday that the settlement “marks the end of one of the most embarrassing chapters in Oregon’s history.” “While Oracle clearly made mistakes, there is no escap- ing the fact that the state, too, shares blame for the failure of Cover Oregon,” McLane said. “From the very beginning, the project was mismanaged and wracked by the failures of our bureaucracy.” It appears that Attorney Gen- eral Ellen Rosenblum and her attorneys had felt the $6 billion lawsuit was worth much more than Oregon eventually settled for. Contract ledgers show the state has paid more than $15 mil- lion to outside lawyers in con- nection with the case, which does not include other state costs. Her side had obtained inter- nal Oracle emails that would not look good in court, or in the national media. One company employee said that the company had been “raping” the state. An expert Oracle troubleshooter said the company’s work in Oregon was so poor that the employees responsible should be publicly “logged.” The state’s lawyers in court said they’d obtained other doc- uments showing that Ora- cle knew its software products could not provide the services it had promised while trying to win the Oregon contract. David Friedman, a Willa- mette University College of Law professor who has been sympathetic to Oracle’s argu- ments in the case, said “I really do think this is a win-win. The state is getting a substantial amount of services and value from Oracle … and Oracle can say ‘Hey look, we’re not racke- teers, we’re not fraudsters.’” Tough talk is normal in a case like this, but, “They’re skipping off holding hands now through the wildlowers,” he said, “essentially back in busi- ness with one another.” lack of housing options is an issue Continued from Page 1A Students, he said, need “a place to work and study and have other activities to promote their education.” Jones, who also did not pick sides in the renovation versus rebuild issue, called himself “a big proponent of having a great library.” “If you’re an unemployed guy who doesn’t have a com- puter and can’t pay his phone bill so he can’t use it, and you need help with job hunting, you go to a good library and you can get someone to help you with writing a resume, and you can do online courses, cor- respondence courses, and you can apply for jobs,” he said. “And if you’re a child — of which there are many in this community that live in houses where there are no books and the parents don’t read — you can go to the library and develop literacy with people that are volunteers, that read to kids and help them with their reading if they’re behind,” he continued. “And literacy is an essential element of being pre- pared to enter the workforce eventually, and you doom peo- ple to remain in poverty for generation after generation if they don’t have literacy.” Housing Both candidates recognize that the lack of housing options on the North Coast is a pressing issue without easy ixes. “I think, at some point, you have to really decide: Is it a sig- niicant enough issue that we’re willing to go ahead and make some tough choices that will make some people unhappy?” Jones said. Though Jones said he needs to learn more about the prob- lem, “I kind of feel like there’s no solution that’s going to put more than a little dent in the housing situation that doesn’t involve adding some high-den- sity housing of some form, whether it’s duplexes of tri- plexes, or whether it’s apart- ment buildings or boarding houses or condos.” He is fully aware, however, that “you can’t propose build- ing anything in Astoria bigger than a cottage that doesn’t gen- erate some controversy.” Pederson believes council- ors must balance the need for “a healthy and growing town” with the need to maintain the charm. He wants the council to consider bringing more non- proits into discussions of the housing crunch. Earthquake preparedness On the topic of the Casca- dia Subduction Zone earth- quake, Pederson said the issue is “huge” and should be taken seriously. Emergency pre- paredness, particularly the measures recommended by the state, should be aggressively practiced and promoted, he said. “This is one area, if it were to get hit, it’s going to get hit really bad,” he said. Pederson said cities should be able to provide more oppor- tunities to learn what to do during and after a seismic event. Jones said local disas- ter readiness is a responsibil- ity shared among residents, schools, Columbia Memorial Hospital, local government agencies, the police and ire departments, the Coast Guard, major employers and, yes, the City Council. “What the City Council can do is just ensure all those groups are meeting (on) some sort of periodic basis, and set- ting some goals and objectives for preparedness,” Jones said, adding that “there’s no pot of money anywhere to do this.” “I don’t think we’re pre- OREGON CAPITAL INSIDER pared now,” he said. “And I don’t think that’s anyone’s fault. It’s just … It is what it is. And I think that we need to just keep the awareness level high and encourage people to go out and buy equipment.” Goals and qualiications Jones said he is not running for City Council because of any particular issue, or because he has an agenda to push. “I just think that I have qualities that would make me a very effective city councilor,” he said. “I’m very interested in the city and the city’s future. I’d like to be part of looking at all of these complex issues and fairly assessing them, listening to community input, working with my fellow city councilors and city staff to come up with balanced solutions that’ll make improvements and make Asto- ria a better place to live.” Admitting that he is a bit of a policy wonk, Jones — the former chief of strategic anal- ysis for the Coast Guard in Washington, D.C. — said, “I like looking into the future and developing strategies and try- ing to take complex pieces that aren’t necessarily itting well together and igure out how we can make something happen productively.” Pederson said his experi- ence in negotiating his union’s contracts, and his history of building orchestras on the North Coast from the ground up, will translate well to the City Council. He wrote in a statement: “The future of the city demands community leadership that is cognizant of the challenges we face, understands the choices that are made which directly affect our assets and opportu- nities, and of this being done with an ambience of respect and consideration towards a shared goal.” We’re investing in Salem coverage when other news organizations are cutting back. Get the inside scoop on state government and politics! Flagpole: Old one was rotten Continued from Page 1A operations during the slow win- ter months. To recoup the cost, the group has launched a public fundraiser on YouCaring.com. The Northwest Civil War Council, which uses the fort for its annual re-enactment over Labor Day weekend, has already pledged $1,000 toward the lagpole replacement. Park ranger John Koch said the old lagpole was rotten and broken when a crew took it down last week. Over the past few years, park rangers would only ly a much smaller lag on the aging pole. “It was just a matter of time until a stiff breeze would knock it over,” Koch said. Along with being too weak, the old lagpole was built in the late 1990s with guy-wires, com- monly used on ship masts to steady the pole. The wires often damaged lags as they lapped in the wind. The new lagpole, the third to be built at the Civil War-era earthen fort, stands straight up with no wires sticking out on the top. “We did not go for the mast idea because there is always danger of the lag getting tan- gled in it,” Lindstrom said. In addition, the park does not plan to ly the Garrison lag in the winter to keep it pristine. The lag, valued at more than $2,000, was donated years ago. Park ranger Roger Stone — one of the rangers who raises the lag in the morning, and takes it down in the afternoon — said he has been impressed all week seeing the massive lag up at the fort. He stood in awe when the Stars and Stripes went back up for the irst time last week. “I think you could probably go across the river to Washing- ton, some place along the shore and actually see this thing,” Stone said. School: Building is in tsunami zone Continued from Page 1A Coaster Construction general contractor John Nelson quickly walked through the gymnasium on behalf of the city to roughly estimate the cost of making it habitable and up to code. The cost of interior and exterior ren- ovations, including a 25 percent contingency, would be about $371,000. “We know very roughly what it would potentially cost,” Kucera said. “It’s yet another thing for you to consider as we move forward with this.” The $450,000 cost to purchase the property, and $250,000 to demolish the build- ing and restore the lawn, were included as placeholders in the city budget. Instead of demoli- tion, restoring the gymnasium could be an option. The estimate does not include other costs, such as operating the building, adding restrooms and making aesthetic improvements. Operating costs could be about $50,000 a year. “For this project, I would envision probably spending the contingency plus,” Public Works Director Dan Grassick said. Despite costs and the build- ing’s location in the tsunami zone, Kucera said there might be value in investing in the space for the community. Mayor Sam Steidel said the city could decide what to do with the gymnasium after pur- chasing the property. Councilors, who should decide by the end of the year, discussed how the building could become a viable asset for the city and the possibility of residents raising funds for a project. “Once it becomes occupia- ble, then you have the potential for fundraising,” Steidel said. Making Healthcare Work for You Get the tools you need to navigate the healthcare system better. Join us for a community health literacy fair for all ages! September 19, 2016 2-5pm, Astoria Senior Center (1111 Exchange Street, Astoria, OR) Get tools for: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Talking with your doctor. Getting the most out of your insurance. Managing your medical costs. Reading your bill and insurance statement. Making end-of-life decisions. Finding community assistance. Schedule of events: 2pm Opening Remarks, City Councilor Zetty Nemlowill 3pm “Making the Most of Your Medical Appointment” by Foot & Ankle Surgeon Dr. Michael Murdock 4pm “Health Coaching: Put your plans into action” by Venus Fromwiller, Health Coach 2111 Exchange St., Astoria, Oregon • 503-325-4321 www.columbiamemorial.org • A Planetree-Designated Hospital
