DailyAstorian.com // MONDAY, JULY 17, 2017
145TH YEAR, NO. 11
ONE DOLLAR
Aquatic Center may close if park funds not found
Adult and youth
sports programs
could also end
By KATIE FRANKOWICZ
The Daily Astorian
Astoria could close the Aquatic
Center and eliminate all youth and
adult athletic programs by the end
of August unless the City Council
approves new fees and tax increases
to finance park operations and
maintenance.
City staff is recommending a $3
parks and recreation fee on water
customers and an increase in the
lodging tax from 9 percent to 11 per-
cent to generate $563,540 a year
for parks. The Parks and Recre-
ation Department says it requires
a minimum of $425,004 to imple-
ment “the life raft scenario.” As the
term implies, the life raft is an emer-
gency solution, a way to stay afloat
for now on a turbulent budgetary
ocean.
The City Council will hear the
staff recommendation at a meeting
tonight.
“Coming to that conclusion was
one of the most challenging parts
of this process,” Angela Cosby, the
director of the Parks and Recreation
Department, said of potentially clos-
ing the Aquatic Center and eliminat-
ing sports programs.
The Aquatic Center, financed by
a voter-approved bond and fundrais-
ing in 1996, was part of the redevel-
opment of the city’s eastern gateway.
The pools are popular with recre-
ational swimmers from across the
region and are used by swim teams
for training, but maintenance costs
are significant. Youth and adult ath-
letic programs place demands on
city staff time and resources.
City staff cautioned that clos-
ing the Aquatic Center and eliminat-
SHOP THE DOCK
TOURS IN WARRENTON SHOWCASE SEAFOOD
ing the sports programs should not
be viewed as a temporary fix, but a
decision that would have long-term
effects financially if the city ever
tried to revive the services in the
future.
“Ideally, council will approve a
funding-mechanism scenario that
will provide the needed resources to
continue sustaining all service lev-
els,” Cosby said.
See PARK FUNDS, Page 7A
Uniontown’s
Mary Todd’s
Workers Bar
finds a buyer
Astoria author Kirk to
take over in September
By ERICK BENGEL
The Daily Astorian
Colin Murphey/The Daily Astorian
Community members participate in the first “Shop the Dock” tour in Warrenton on Friday put on by Oregon Sea Grant.
The event, which included a visit to the Warrenton Marina followed by a tour of the Skipanon Brand Seafood processing
facility, was created as a way to let residents know what the local industry has to offer the consumer.
Mary Todd, the owner of Mary Todd’s
Workers Bar & Grill, said she has agreed to
sell the Uniontown business and property to
Diana Kirk, an Astoria resi-
dent and author.
Kirk wrote on Facebook
that she signed the papers
Friday afternoon. Todd will
remain the owner until Sept.
13.
Todd, who put the prop-
Mary
erty up for sale last year,
Todd
originally listed it for
$595,000 but ended up
dropping the price, she said.
The tavern — a land-
mark of the Uniontown His-
toric District — is an iconic
watering hole and gather-
ing place known for camp-
fires, barbecues, homestyle
Diana
food, “yuccas” (a regionally
Kirk
famous vodka drink with
lemon juice and simple syrup) and “Meat
Bingo,” where customers can win hunks of
packaged meat to prepare at home.
The ‘Workers Tavern’
SHOP
THE DOCK
By KATIE FRANKOWICZ
The Daily Astorian
W
ARRENTON — The first
ever “Shop the Dock” tours
in Clatsop County high-
lighted Warrenton’s seafood offerings.
Despite the area’s long history
of fishing and seafood processing
— and even though the Columbia
River and the Pacific Ocean are right
there — how to actually lay hands on
freshly caught seafood can be a mys-
tery for many residents without ties
to the commercial fishing industry.
The tour Friday was intended to
show people what’s available and
where.
“I’m glad to know that we can do
it,” said Lisa Reid, owner of Lucy’s
Books in downtown Astoria. She
and her husband can their own tuna,
but have long been interested in buy-
ing directly from fishermen.
Plus, she added: “It’s a field trip,
and I’m always up for a field trip.”
See SEAFOOD, Page 7A
The next tours
will occur on
Sept. 15 at 9 a.m.
and 11 a.m. Each
tour lasts about
90 minutes. Space
is limited. Sea
Grant asks those
planning to attend
to call the Oregon
Sea Grant office
at 503-325-8573
to register at least
three days in
advance.
Colin Murphey/The Daily Astorian
Participants in the Shop the Dock event in Warrenton on Friday
tour the Skipanon Seafood Brand processing facility after a
visit to the local marina. The event was held to inform the pub-
lic about how to purchase local seafood from local merchants.
The tours meet
in the Warrenton
Marina at 550
N.E. Harbor Place.
Organizers recom-
mend attendees
wear comfortable
walking shoes and
arrive 15 minutes
early.
In addition to the tavern, the historic
building houses five apartments and boasts a
backyard beer garden.
“Workers was the very first place I started
hanging out in Astoria when I first came
here,” said Kirk, who moved to Astoria from
Portland within the last couple of years. “I
hung out there a lot, and I just kind of lis-
tened to people’s stories, and I got to know a
lot of people that work here.”
She loves that the bar is called a work-
ers tavern, she said, because “there’s really
hard-working people in this town, and they
all hang out there, and I have a deep respect
for that.”
That is why “I really want to keep the bar
exactly the way it is,” she said. She plans to
keep the ambiance but change the name to
“Workers Tavern.”
Her contract with Todd stipulates that
Kirk will keep the staff, a provision very
important to Todd, who said the employees
have “been so loyal, and they’re family to
me.”
Changes
Kirk plans to hand over the apartment
See BAR, Page 7A
A visit to Nell’s house in south Seaside
Meeting with a
style maven
EASIDE — “I’ve been told
that in 1938 this building
was a grocery store that sup-
plied the guest cabins in the
neighborhood,” Nell Hutchi-
son said, speaking of her
charming home in south Sea-
side where she’s lived since
1998.
Hutchison, who arrived in
Seaside by way of Sacramento
and who grew up in Minne-
sota, has been a well-dressed
figure in the neighborhood
for 20 years. She is a regular
patron of the Pacific Way Bak-
ery, known for her droll humor,
S
her poetry, and her head-turn-
ing outfits.
“I worked for the Depart-
ment of Justice from 1955
to 1992,” Hutchison said. “I
was an administrator in crim-
inal-justice record keeping. I
had between 50 and 80 people,
including supervisors, report-
ing to me.”
While at the Department
of Justice, she took her col-
lege degree, first falling in love
with the poetry of T.S. Eliot
and then majoring in English
and writing poetry. She said
it was the tumultuous ’70s
that inspired her to write. She
wrote about family, her frus-
trations as a woman, and the
concept of vulnerability. In
1996, the Sacramento pub-
lisher Laverne Frith published
her memoir, “When I Was A
Child in Minnesota.”
Collections
These days Hutchison
occupies herself taking pic-
tures, writing haiku and play-
ing pinochle.
Her house is full of collec-
tions. She is a great collector
of ceramics, china, dolls, fig-
urines and cut glass. An entire
blue-painted room has been
given over to things remind-
ing her of Seaside: shells, sand
dollars, images of sea birds and
African violets. “The secret to
keeping them is light, but not
too much heat,” she said.
Her
color-coordinated
wardrobe draws people in.
Hutchison has a wall of
caps and handbags in her tidy
bedroom, as well as color-co-
ordinated drawers of gloves
and socks and little purses. A
large box of delicious vintage
costume jewelry is arranged
by brooches, earrings and
bangles. Her closet is turned
over seasonally. Purple is her
See HUTCHISON, Page 7A
Eve Marx/For The Daily Astorian
Nell Hutchison
Seaside home.
at
her