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COAST WEEKEND: SINGING A MESSAGE OF PEACE AND UNITY INSIDE coast w eekend Every Thursday • March 9, 2017 • coastweekend.co m arts & entertainment DailyAstorian.com // THURSDAY, MARCH 9, 2017 144TH YEAR, NO. 180 WOMEN OF THE WORLD: SINGING ONE DOLLAR A MESSAGE OF PEACE AND UNITY PAGE 7 ICE criticizes county on immigration holds County sheriff wants to help but wary of lawsuits By ERICK BENGEL and JACK HEFFERNAN The Daily Astorian U.S. Immigration and Cus- toms Enforcement has criticized Clatsop County for not cooper- ating with the federal agency’s requests to detain undocumented immigrants. On Tuesday, federal deporta- tion offi cers arrested a Mexican national with prior criminal con- victions, including two for driv- ing under the infl uence of intox- icants , outside Clatsop County Circuit Court after the man had appeared for a matter related to a criminal charge. Explaining the incident to The Daily Astorian, which had asked about the arrest, Immi- gration and Customs Enforce- ment said in a statement: “Since A taste of the Mo’s to come Clatsop County does not honor ICE detainers and releases crim- inal aliens who pose a potential public safety threat, and because many of the agency’s arrest tar- gets provide false address infor- mation, locating these individ- uals at a courthouse is, in some instances, the agency’s only See ICE, Page 7A Body washes ashore in Chinook EO Media Group CHINOOK, Wash. — A woman discovered a human body while walk- ing on a beach in Chinook Tuesday. According to a Pacifi c County Sheriff’s Offi ce press release, the woman found the body washed up on a rocky beach near the end of Third Street at about 7 p.m. Deputies responded a short time later, and confi rmed that the remains were those of a person that appeared to have washed up with the tide. Due to the state of deterioration, deputies believe the body may have been in the water for an extended period of time. Danny Miller/The Daily Astorian Bob Scull, Regional Manager at Mo’s Restaurants, looks out on the Mo’s Restaurant’s view on Monday in Astoria. The new Mo’s Restaurant located at Vintage Hardware’s old building is currently under construction. New restaurant opens in Astoria this summer By EDWARD STRATTON The Daily Astorian Astoria may get charter school Gray School to change designation C ustomers can g rab a taste of clam chowder while Mo’s builds out a new restaurant in Astoria. The company has opened a chowder truck on the weekends in front of its new location off the Columbia River at the foot of 15th Street, expected to open in the summer. Bob Scull, a regional manager for Mo’s, said the cart is open from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Satur- days and Sundays, with expanding hours as the weather improves. “This is the biggest project we’ve taken on,” Scull said of the 12,000-square-foot location, split between a 160-seat restaurant and a new chowder production kitchen. About 50 workers under general contrac- tor Randy Stemper have torn back 8,000 square feet of the Englund Marine & Industrial Sup- ply Building — the former home of Vintage Danny Miller/The Daily Astorian The Astoria School District is planning to make its Gray School c ampus a lternative e ducation p ro- gram a separate charter school start- ing next year. During a study session of the Asto- ria School Board, Superintendent Craig Hoppes said he started thinking about charter schools during the pres- idential election and a charter school seminar at the Oregon School Boards Association conference. “I strongly feel there’s going to be a lot of resources out there for charter See RESTAURANT, Page 7A Construction workers make progress on Mo’s Restaurant near 15th Street and Marine Drive in Astoria. New building will house a restaurant and a chowder production kitchen. See CHARTER SCHOOL, Page 7A By EDWARD STRATTON The Daily Astorian Cathlamet is the place for mail-order divorces Wahkiakum’s divorce rate 56 times the state average By NATALIE ST. JOHN EO Media Group CATHLAMET, Wash. — With remote bed-and-break- fasts, kayak tours, wildlife and picturesque dairies and farms, Wahkiakum County is full of possibilities for happy couples looking for a roman- tic getaway. The tiny county also offers something special for unhappy couples: quick, cheap, discreet divorces by mail. The snail-mail divorces have gotten so popular since they fi rst became available about four years ago that Wah- kiakum County’s divorce rate is now about 56 times higher than the state average rate of 3.4 divorces for every 1,000 people, according to state Department of Health data. It’s second only to Lincoln County, the other place where Washington residents send away for a divorce. “I just feel like it’s a ser- vice,” Wahkiakum County Clerk Kay Holland said . She pushed the county to offer long-distance dissolutions after she became the clerk in 2009, because she believed they would provide a wel- come new source of income for the perpetually cash- strapped county, as well as a unique service for citizens. “It’s income for the county, but divorce is hard,” Holland explained. “I think this makes it a little bit easier on people.” Splitting up by snail mail Washington divorces usu- ally take between four and 18 months, according to a guide from the Northwest Jus- tice Project. If there are kids See DIVORCES, Page 5A Joe Mabel/Creative Commons A hilltop view of Cathlamet, Wash. Wahkiakum County has the second highest rate of divorce in the state despite be- ing 38 out of 3 9 counties in population size.