4A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2016
School: Open enrollment for academy could start by March 1
Continued from Page 1A
the academy’s board can move
forward and begin inaliz-
ing inancial details, apply for
grants, plan for enrollment,
prepare the school building
and start hiring staff, accord-
ing to board President Kel-
lye Dewey and board member
Barb Knop.
In October 2015, the dis-
trict’s board approved the
charter school’s application
with a set of conditions, such
as the school would serve at
least 44 kindergarten and irst-
grade students in its irst year.
In March, the district with-
drew conditional approval,
stating the academy fell short
on funding, enrollment and a
state-approved English Lan-
guage Development program
for English language learners.
“The bulk of their applica-
tion was very well done and
thorough, but there were a
few things that needed to be
addressed,” Superintendent
Sheila Roley said.
Roley, her staff, the dis-
trict’s attorney and the acade-
my’s board members worked
during the past six months to
address the issues that led to
the conditional approval being
revoked.
The academy’s board met
with the district’s Finance
Committee before the regular
district meeting Tuesday and
presented the strides the orga-
nization has made to meet the
requirements for a successful
application.
For example, the acad-
emy decided to use the same
English Language Devel-
opment program as the dis-
trict, as it already is state-ap-
proved. The academy clariied
certain aspects of its inancial
plan, with revenue to be gener-
ated primarily through district
funding, pledges, fundraising
and grants, Knop and Dewey
said. Other details of the inan-
cial plan will be determined
during negotiations over the
charter contract, Roley said.
Board member Tom Malt-
man, who is on the inance
committee, said the cohesion
between the two groups has
solidiied during the past few
months, allowing the process
to move forward eficiently
with clear communication.
“They understand where
we’re at, we understand where
they’re at,” he said.
Fellow committee mem-
bers Lynn Ulbricht and Patrick
Noield agreed.
The steps accomplished in
the process to this point are “a
testament to their board and
the people in Cannon Beach
that are sustaining this after all
the obstacles” they’ve encoun-
tered, as well as the prob-
lem-solving efforts of Roley
and her staff, Noield said.
The board unanimously
voted in favor of establishing
the charter and giving Roley
and her staff the authority to
negotiate the contract.
Moving forward, the acade-
my’s board will continue work-
ing with the district, with the
goal “to have a contract in place
by the end of the year,” Knop
said. Open enrollment could
start by March 1, in prepara-
tion for the academy to be oper-
ational for the 2017-18 school
year. The academy also now can
apply for Oregon Department
of Education charter school
implementation grants that will
be available in the spring.
Dewey said she is
“extremely excited to move
forward with the district” and
continue growing “a great
relationship.”
Dam: City Commission, water district could meet in work session
Continued from Page 1A
Blitz, who has threatened a
lawsuit against the water dis-
trict or the city’s seizure of the
dam, urged the water district to
voluntarily give up any own-
ership claim so the city would
have control and could work as
the local partner with the fed-
eral or state governments.
“What I have put in front of
you is a no risk, no liability way
to wash your hands of all of this
and go back to whatever other
ways you’d all be spending
your time,” Blitz said at a meet-
ing of the water district’s board
at the Paciic Grange.
The water district’s board
voted to seek legal counsel for
advice on how to respond to
the city. The board also sought
a work session with the City
Commission to discuss options
going forward.
The water district has con-
ceded that it holds no title to
the dam. But the federal gov-
ernment said in a 2014 letter
— after the dam’s 50-year use-
ful life had expired — that the
water district was the owner
and was free to operate or
remove the dam at its discre-
tion. Ownership, however, was
based on the city easement to
use the property as a dam.
The board also voted to
relock a barricade on a gravel
road over the dam that had
been unlocked by the city as a
precaution for last weekend’s
storms. The water district had
barricaded the road earlier this
year for liability reasons.
we’ve provided a nifty little
service to operate these things
carefully.”
Transferring the dam to the
city for $1, as Francis has sug-
gested in the past, is problem-
atic since the water district has
no proof of ownership.
“The conclusion I’ve come
to is that nobody has a title or
deed to the structure. So I don’t
think that’s a point we should
even discuss any further,” Fran-
cis said. “I think that now what
we need to do is concentrate on
each of us putting forward what
they would like to see happen
with the structure.”
Francis, the board’s vice
chairman, said he wants an
agreement with the city to
remove the dam and clarify the
water district’s boundaries. He
said the city should receive any
wetlands mitigation credits for
taking out the aging structure.
He said it “seems to me that
the structure has outlived its
Joshua Bessex/The Daily Astorian
The Skipanon Water Control District wants to remove the
Eighth Street Dam as obsolete and a hazard. Warrenton,
however, wants to take control of the structure over the
Skipanon River.
usefulness and that the system
needs to be decommissioned.”
Charles Switzer, another
water district board member,
said he is disappointed with
Warrenton. He said the water
district was blindsided by the
city’s about-face on the dam
and the legal threats “and, to
me, it’s almost a form of bul-
Tessa Scheller, the water
district’s chairwoman, repeated
her doubts that the dam ever
provided adequate lood con-
trol. She said the structure
is obsolete and should be
removed as a hazard. Tak-
ing out the dam, she believes,
would also improve water qual-
ity and salmon habitat on the
river.
Scheller stood by an engi-
neering plan approved by the
water district this year that
found that removing the dam
would not increase lood risk.
A city technical review ques-
tioned whether the engineer-
ing plan accurately modeled
the lood plain, while oppo-
nents of removing the dam —
including the Nygaard family,
which owns Warrenton Fiber,
and Mayor Mark Kujala’s fam-
ily, which owns property near
the dam — have warned of the
potential for looding.
“This is our intention,”
Scheller said. “To remove
an unsafe, obsolete dam that
causes problems with water
quality, ish passage, recreation
and more.”
No title
Levee system
Blitz said his understand-
ing now is that the Eighth
Street Dam is part of Warren-
ton’s levee system — an idea
disputed by the water district
seek to remove it later in return
for wetlands mitigation credits
on a development project.
The City Commission could
justify taking control of the
dam as potentially necessary
for levee certiication, which
has been a contentious issue
with the federal government.
But the city might also have to
explain the public-policy ratio-
nale for assuming legal respon-
sibility for a dam that could
be obsolete and a safety haz-
ard. If the dam were to fail, or
if a driver were to crash off the
gravel road into the river, the
city could be liable.
The city could also have to
pay to remove the dam in the
future. The federal Bonneville
Power Administration had pre-
viously agreed to inance the
$1.2 million deal to remove the
dam and install a single-lane
bridge as part of its com-
mitment to improve salmon
habitat.
OCT 19 – NOV 1, 2016*
Obsolete and a hazard
Scheller acknowledged pre-
viously that the water district
does not hold title to the dam,
but she has been skeptical about
the city’s aggressive move to
gain control after 53 years.
The water district, the Colum-
bia River Estuary Study Task-
force and the city had an agree-
ment to install a single-lane
bridge for the city over the river
after the dam was removed, but
it fell apart this year when the
City Commission declined to
renew the deal.
Two other water district
board members — Robert
Strickland and Bruce Francis
— said unequivocally Tuesday
that the water district does not
own the dam.
“We don’t own anything,
never have owned any land,”
Strickland said of the dam and
two other lood-control struc-
tures on the river built with the
federal government. “It hasn’t
been our function. For 50 years,
lying. And no transparency in
the city government. And those
things sort of bother me.”
and, at one point, Kurt Fritsch,
who resigned as city manager
in June amid questions over the
dam. Removing the tide gates
or taking out the structure, Blitz
argues, should fall under a more
stringent U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers permitting process.
The changes, he said, would
also require approval from the
city as the local sponsor of the
levee system.
Blitz, in a draft agreement
offered to the water district
Tuesday, claims the city has
“superior interest” in the dam
because of the levees. The lan-
guage is softer than a Sep-
tember letter where the attor-
ney asserted that the record
demonstrated the city owns the
dam.
The attorney has said the
city, if it takes control of the
dam, could install tide gates
and operate the dam for lood
control. The city could also pre-
serve the dam as an asset and
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