146TH YEAR, NO. 141
Probe of
mental health
director was
over on-call
responsibility
ONE DOLLAR
DailyAstorian.com // TUESDAY, JANUARY 15, 2019
Coast Guard misses fi rst
paycheck amid shutdown
Baker was cleared by
the agency’s board
By DERRICK DePLEDGE
The Daily Astorian
The internal investigation of Clatsop
Behavioral Healthcare’s executive direc-
tor involved her on-call responsibility at
the crisis respite center in Warrenton.
Amy Baker was the on-call adminis-
trator on a night in December when two
patients at the respite center got into a
fi ght and one was arrested by Warrenton
police. After video footage showed the
wrong patient was arrested, the program
manager at the respite center reached
Baker and asked whether police should
be called back to look at the video.
Baker was in Portland, and instructed
the program manager to “sit on it and we
will deal with it tomorrow,” according to
the investigator’s report.
Uncomfortable, the program man-
ager reached out to Baker again by text
about an hour and half later, shared the
video and said she would prefer police
view the footage as soon as possible.
In a phone conversation, Baker again
asked why the situation “could not be
handled in the morning,” but ultimately
authorized the program manager to have
police look at the video, according to the
report.
After seeing the footage, police
agreed that it appeared the other patient
instigated the fi ght.
‘WE WANT TO LEARN
FROM THIS INCIDENT.’
Lt. Kristen Hanthorn
acting board chairwoman
The investigation — requested by the
mental health agency’s board, and con-
ducted by Lake Oswego employment
law fi rm Peck Rubanoff & Hatfi eld —
concluded Baker did not violate policy
regarding her availability that night as
on-call administrator. The agency has no
policy that requires on-call administra-
tors be physically present near the crisis
respite center, and staff was able to reach
her in Portland.
But the investigation determined it
was poor judgment for Baker not to
advise the program manager she would
be out of town while she was on call.
The investigation also concluded
Baker did not respond appropriately
when the program manager told her
what the video of the fi ght showed or
after Baker saw the video herself.
“If the program manager had not
insisted on having the police view the
video, (the patient) — a resident with a
signifi cant mental health condition —
would have spent the night in jail for a
suspected crime that he did not commit,”
the investigator wrote.
The mental health agency’s board
weighed the investigator’s report and
cleared Baker of wrongdoing. The board
chairwoman and another board mem-
ber resigned, citing concerns about the
board and the agency’s direction.
Photos by Edward Stratton/The Daily Astorian
Coast Guard spouses, from left, Amanda Gibbs, Jennifer Siems and Stacey Benson, interviewed Monday by
news station KGW, said they have tried to remain upbeat and grateful for the community support during
the government shutdown.
Families start
to feel the strain
By EDWARD STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
T
he sole breadwinner in Amanda Gibbs’
family of seven is her husband, an infor-
mation technology specialist with the
Coast Guard based at North Tongue
Point.
Her husband is one of an estimated 1,500
Coast Guard personnel locally who today will
miss their fi rst paycheck because of the longest
government shutdown in U.S. history.
“It’s devastating for us,” Gibbs said. “He
works all day, and I have fi ve kids, and getting
day care for fi ve kids is ridiculously expensive.
We live below the poverty line, according to
America. We don’t make a lot of money.”
The Coast Guard, part of the U.S. Depart-
ment of Homeland Security, is the only branch
of the military not being paid during the par-
tial shutdown. Other branches fall under
the U.S. Department of Defense, which has
already secured funding this fi scal year from
Congress .
See Shutdown, Page A5
An estimated 1,500 local
Coast Guard missed their fi rst
paycheck today because of a
government shutdown.
See Probe, Page A5
Boone behind bill to tighten records requests
By EDWARD STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
Tiff any Butler
Outgoing state Rep. Deborah Boone,
D-Cannon Beach, left, was honored by state
Sen. Betsy Johnson, D-Scappoose, during a
Clatsop Economic Development Resources
business awards ceremony last year.
In one of her last legisla-
tive actions before retiring , state
Rep. Deborah Boone recom-
mended a bill that would tighten
requirements for public records
requests.
State Sen. Betsy Johnson,
D-Scappoose, introduced Senate
Bill 609 on Monday on Boone’s
behalf.
Under state law, public records
r equests can be broad, covering
an entire topic rather than a spe-
cifi c piece of information.
The bill Boone supports seeks
to tighten the process, requir-
ing people requesting records
to specify “with particularity” a
description of the records being
sought and how they will be
used .
“It’s to hopefully winnow out
the fi shing expeditions and allow
the legitimate (requests) to move
forward,” said Boone, a Dem-
ocrat who represented Cannon
Beach in the House for 14 years.
Boone didn’t point to a spe-
cifi c example that made her
want to introduce the legislation.
There have been multiple pub-
lic records requests made of pub-
lic offi cials over the p ast several
years, and they can take a great
deal of time and money, she said.
Senate Bill 609 does not spec-
ify how much particularity would
be needed to describe records or
how they will be used. Boone
said she will travel to Salem at
the end of the month to work on
clarifying the language .
While she understands that
journalists often need to capture
a breadth of information, maybe
they wouldn’t have to be so
broad if they “would just be hon-
est and say, ‘T his is what I’m try-
ing to get at,’” Boone said. “I get
that they want to be vague to cap-
ture everything, but maybe they
don’t have to.”
Ginger McCall, Oregon’s
public records advocate, released
a report last year that found gov-
ernments often unreasonably
delay releasing public records or
charge too much for access.
See Bill, Page A5