145TH YEAR, NO. 249
ONE DOLLAR
WEEKEND EDITION // FRIDAY, JUNE 15, 2018
Warrenton
schools
eye master
campus sites
Three sites under review
By EDWARD STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
J.C. PENNEY SPACE
TO BECOME A MARKET
Tap house,
restaurants
planned
By EDWARD STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
S
ean Fitzpatrick, the owner of
Astoria’s Illahee Apartments, and
Chris Holen, the chef and co-
owner at Baked Alaska, were playing
poker one night, lamenting the loss of
the J.C. Penney Co. store on Commer-
cial Street last year, when they had an
epiphany.
“I don’t think anyone else had any
idea what we were talking about, but
it was like, ‘OK, you know; let’s do
it,’” said Fitzpatrick, who recently pur-
chased the building after four months of
negotiations.
He and Holen are reimagining the
6,500-square-foot main floor of the
department store as the Astoria Oregon
Marketplace, a high-end indoor food
court and tap house connecting the retail
corridors along Commercial and Duane
streets.
A drawback of opening a retail store
or restaurant in Astoria is biting off too
large a space, Holen said. He started
Baked Alaska in a trailer, before mov-
ing to a small slot of a storefront on 14th
Street and later opening a larger space
on Pier 12.
Fitzpatrick and Holen have divided
the main floor of the former J.C. Penney
into several blocks, each approximately
15-by-15-feet, the size of the kitchen in
an annex of Baked Alaska. The spaces
will be built out into fully functional
kitchens for three new restaurants to
customize and quickly open.
Photos by Colin Murphey/The Daily Astorian
TOP: Plans for the former J.C. Penney in Astoria include restaurants. ABOVE:
From left, Chris Holen, Sean Fitzpatrick and Shannon Fitzpatrick discuss the po-
tential for the basement floor of the former J.C. Penney store in downtown Astoria.
The partners are also looking several
other vendors, such as a sandwich shop,
coffee stand or ice cream station, that
require a kitchen.
“It’s an opportunity to see if their
business works,” Holen said.
He envisions a diverse lineup of cui-
sines, different from surrounding restau-
rants, each with their own customized
facade. Anchoring the restaurants will
be a tap house Holen is planning with
more than 50 beers, wines and ciders
on draft, focusing on Astoria and Pacific
Northwest producers.
In the middle of the court will be
communal seating at long tables. While
restaurants will have control over what
they offer, the market will try to be as
close to zero-waste as possible, Holen
said, with compostable silverware and
glasses instead of bottles and cans.
Contractors brought in by Fitzpat-
rick are ripping out carpet and linoleum,
revealing the fir floor beneath. They are
taking out walls and uncovering win-
dows on Commercial and Duane streets,
turning J.C. Penney’s former display
cases into seating areas.
WARRENTON — The Warrenton-Ham-
mond School District has narrowed its possi-
ble master campuses to three sites southeast
of U.S. Highway 101.
Superintendent Mark Jeffery has been
looking for a site between 50 and 70 acres
outside the tsunami inundation zone to even-
tually place all the school district’s campuses.
The first step was to overlay the city and
school district boundaries with the tsunami
inundation zone. “It knocks out probably
90 percent of the land inside city limits,” he
said.
The first potential site would be at the
northeast corner of Ensign Lane and 19th
Street in Clatsop County’s North Coast Busi-
ness Park on industrial-zoned land. There are
multiple areas in the business park that could
accommodate the campus, Jeffery said.
The second site is on Warrenton Fiber-
owned land zoned agricultural forest along
U.S. Highway 101 Business near Trails End
Recovery, in an area known as Airport Hill.
The third site, a mix of high-density res-
idential and industrial land also owned by
Warrenton Fiber, is near Dolphin Avenue,
south of Walmart and Astoria Ford.
Each of the properties present challenges
and will likely require mitigation of wetland
impacts, Jeffery said. The school district is
performing due diligence on the properties,
looking for any fatal flaws for development,
and will likely decide by this month or next
month.
The Warrenton-Hammond School Board
recently decided to float a $32.4 million
bond in November to buy a master campus
and build a middle school to relieve over-
crowding at Warrenton Grade School, a K-8
campus serving more than 700 students. A
facilities committee recommended a 2022
bond to move the high school, and a 2032
bond to move the elementary school.
The city has experienced rapid growth in
recent years as one of the region’s foremost
affordable housing markets. As a result, the
school district has grown as well, recently
becoming the third largest in the county with
more than 1,000 students, after Astoria and
Seaside.
The Warrenton bond will likely join a $70
million bond being considered by the Astoria
School Board to rebuild and modernize the
classroom wing of Astoria Middle School,
while improving overall district security.
Clatsop County will ask voters to pay for a
$23.8 million remodel of the former North
Coast Youth Correctional Facility in Warren-
ton into a new county jail.
See MARKET, Page 7A
‘WE WOULD LOVE TO HAVE SOMETHING
KIND OF LIKE WHAT J.C. PENNEY DID, MAYBE
MORE ALONG A BOUTIQUE LEVEL.’
Sean Fitzpatrick | owner of Illahee Apartments
The Daily Astorian
The Warrenton-Hammond School Dis-
trict is considering several possible
sites for a master campus, including
property owned by Warrenton Fiber
near Dolphin Ave.
After snub, tall ships set sail toward Astoria
Permit revoked
after complaints
in Newport
By KATIE
FRANKOWICZ
The Daily Astorian
Tall ships plan to split time
between Astoria and Coos Bay
in July after they were unable
to find moorage at the Port of
Newport.
Port commissioners in
Newport revoked a permit for
the Lady Washington and the
Hawaiian Chieftain to use a
dock in the city’s busy historic
bayfront at the end of July.
Fishermen and businesses said
the vessels’ presence during
the height of the summer tour-
ism season would hurt their
business and create a parking
nightmare.
Grays Harbor Histori-
cal Seaport, the Aberdeen,
Washington-based nonprofit
behind the tall ships, now
has moorage plans with Asto-
ria for the 17th Street Dock
and with the Port of Astoria
for a spot in the East Mooring
Basin.
Both vessels are regu-
lar visitors to the area. Fort
George Brewery hosted a ben-
efit night for Grays Harbor
Historical Seaport in late May
— the same night port com-
missioners in Newport decided
to revoke the ships’ permit.
An agreement with the Port
of Newport had provided the
ships with moorage in April
and included dates in July.
But bayfront merchants and
fishermen were concerned
about parking and the extra
crowds that come with a visit
from the tall ships. They sub-
mitted a petition, calling for
commissioners to revoke the
permit.
Newport’s bayfront is a
popular tourist destination and
See TALL SHIPS, Page 7A
The Lady Washington, right, and the Hawaiian Chieftain
will be in Astoria in July.