COAST WEEKEND: NORTH COAST BREWERIES GIVE BACK INSIDE
DailyAstorian.com // THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 2016
144TH YEAR, NO. 100
ONE DOLLAR
Port sues
Smithart
over inn
deficits
Suit claims hotelier
did not pay rent
By EDWARD STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
The Port of Astoria has filed suit against
former hotelier Brad Smithart and his com-
pany Hospitality Masters LLC for breach of
contract, seeking more than $400,000.
The Port claims Hospitality Masters,
which operated the Astoria Riverwalk Inn
from March 2012 to September 2015, failed
to pay more than $130,000 in rent, along
with $191,600 from the 10 percent of gross
revenues the company was required to hand
over to the Port.
The Secretary of State’s Department of
Corporations administratively dissolved
Hospitality Masters in March 2015, after
Smithart did not pay an annual fee. The Port
claims Smithart then inappropriately contin-
ued to operate the hotel by himself.
See PORT, Page 7A
Danny Miller/The Daily Astorian
David Huynh, center, an actor and teaching artist with the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, leads Seaside High School students in
a workshop on Wednesday at Seaside High School. The thespians were there for the annual School Visit Program.
Performances,
workshops blend
the Bard with
modern topics
Oregon
job growth
cooling off
State’s revenue falls
as employment slows
By ANDREW SELSKY
Associated Press
EASIDE — In a nod to election-year
tensions, the Oregon Shakespeare Fes-
tival workshop at Seaside High School
tackled a play with divisive political themes.
During Oregon Shakespeare Festival’s
annual School Visit Program, six teams of two
teaching artists perform and lead interactive
workshops in Oregon, Washington, California
and Kansas. This year, the program combined
Shakespeare’s work with modern scenes to
mark the 400th anniversary of the Bard’s death.
Gathered in the wrestling room Wednes-
day morning, senior students in an honors
English class delved into “Julius Caesar,” in
which conspiring senators kill an increasingly
powerful politician. Oregon Shakespeare Fes-
tival professional actors David Huynh and
Kristin Hammargren, returning to the school
for a second year in a row, led the workshop.
“Julius Caesar takes place during a very
contentious and polarized time in ancient
Rome,” Huynh said.
Danny Miller/The Daily Astorian
SALEM — Oregon’s job growth has
cooled down, and as a consequence growth
in personal income taxes the state collects
has also slowed, the state said Wednesday in
its economic and revenue forecast.
Even if the job growth had continued at
its former red-hot pace, Oregon would have
faced a large budget
shortfall. And that’s
what Gov. Kate Brown
focused on in her
response to the reve-
nue forecast.
“On the positive
side, job growth is
higher and unemploy-
ment is lower than the
national average and
Gov.
Oregon’s
economy
Kate Brown
remains stable over-
all,” Brown said in a
statement. “However, our obligations to fund
important services such as public education
and health care still exceed available reve-
nues, and, looking ahead, there will be some
very tough budget choices to make.”
Brown’s communications director,
Kristen Grainger, said the governor will
See SHAKESPEARE, Page 7A
Kristin Hammargren, right, and David Huynh, actors and teachers with the Oregon Shake-
speare Festival, act out a sword fight in front of Seaside High School students Wednesday.
See JOB GROWTH, Page 7A
By LYRA FONTAINE
The Daily Astorian
S
Oregon timber interests welcome Trump victory
Environmentalists worry about policy shift
By DYLAN DARLING
The Register-Guard
EUGENE — When he visited
Eugene last spring, Donald Trump
promised to revive Oregon’s timber
industry, which for decades has been
hamstrung by severe curbs against log-
ging in federal forests west of the Cas-
cades summit.
“Timber jobs (in Oregon) have been
cut in half since 1990,” he said during
his May stump speech to a revved-up
crowd at the Lane Events Center. “We
are going to bring them up, folks, we
are going to do it really right, we are
going to bring them up, OK?”
Trump didn’t offer specifics as to
how — or how much — he would revive
logging and milling, but he alluded to
loosening federal restrictions.
Now, Trump supporters and critics
in Oregon will see if he can live up to
his promise.
Trump’s election as president brings
optimism to the state timber industry
and acute uneasiness to environmen-
tal groups that have fought for decades
to ensure that logging on federal lands
complies with federal environmental
law.
Both sides now wonder if and how
Trump’s administration and Republi-
can lawmakers might seek to weaken
AP Photo/Ted S. Warren
See TIMBER, Page 5A
Supporters of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump seek au-
tographs during a campaign rally in Eugene last spring.