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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 21, 2019)
A5 THE ASTORIAN • SATURDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2019 ‘MAYBE BEFORE YOU COULD KIND OF SET YOUR CLOCK A LITTLE BIT ON THAT EARLY START AND HOW YOU GO ABOUT MARKETING THAT EARLY START. NOW YOU HAVE TO PLAY A LITTLE BIT OF A GUESSING GAME.’ Tim Novotny | spokesman for the Oregon Dungeness Crab Commission Crab season: Uncertainty makes it more diffi cult to plan marketing strategies Continued from Page A1 The 2017-18 season faced initial delays due to low meat yield, but also ended up setting a record in ex-vessel value. Total landings came to 20 mil- lion pounds. Increased uncertainty about when the season will open has made it more diffi cult for entities like the c rab c ommission to plan a marketing strat- egy, however. “Maybe before you could kind of set your clock a little bit on that early start and how you go about marketing that early start,” Novotny said. “Now you have to play a little bit of a guessing game.” Colin Murphey/The Astorian The commercial crab fi shery is set to open on Dec. 31. Death: ‘I loved her with all my heart’ Continued from Page A1 they needed it. “No matter what she did, she always made me smile later,” McDaniel said. “I can’t not love Gail, even though she would have her mood swings.” City offi cials seeking to address homelessness are not sure what to make of Griffey’s death. Mayor Bruce Jones, along with Police Chief Geoff Spal- ding, leads a task force inves- tigating potential solutions to problems experienced by the homeless. The fact that an unshel- tered woman in her 70s died on the streets of Asto- ria is very troubling, Jones said. But he isn’t sure that any of the tools or resources being developed by the task force — including a possible homeless liaison — would have been useful to Griffey. She visited Clatsop Com- munity Action often, tak- ing advantage of certain ser- vices but resisting others that may have provided her with long-term solutions to her homelessness. For Jones, the question is: Was her death preventable, or was it just her time regardless of her living conditions? “Was that a preventable death? Could anything be done to change that outcome and what, if anything, could we do to prevent that situa- tion in the future?” the mayor said. “There’s a lot we don’t know.” Research shows peo- ple who are homeless often have a shorter life expectancy than people who are housed, Spalding noted, but he also wonders if her death was preventable. “Everything that I’m hear- ing points to the fact that she didn’t want the services, she was happy with her way of life. A nd minus any mental health concerns, I’m not sure what people could have done for her that she would have 2019-2020 | 30TH SEASON COLUMBIAFORUM Tuesday, January 21, 2020 said. “She would not do the assessment.” ‘I did not deserve this’ Roger Hayes, an Astoria artist who has worked as an alcohol and drug counselor, interviewed Griffey in a video he uploaded to YouTube in January. In the video, Griffey talks about living in Pendleton and Florence. She exudes posi- tivity, even as she leans on a grocery cart that contains her possessions. “I’ve got a real good sleep- ing bag and I’m just fi ne,” she tells Hayes, emphasizing that she doesn’t need that much to get by. It is her fi rst time being homeless, she says, but people have been giving her food and money. “How content are you on a scale of 1 to 10,” Hayes asks. “3,000!” Griffey replies. “Nothing ever gets me down,” she adds. “I don’t worry … I take it one day at a time. Forward march.” But in a video Hayes uploaded several months later, Griffey was in a less-positive mood. “I feel fi ne,” she says, “but I’m pissed off, period. I did not deserve this.” “I’m 71 years old,” she says, “and I shouldn’t be out here wandering around in the dark.” The day after Griffey died, two Astoria police offi cers stopped to check in with her boyfriend outside of the Asto- ria Library. McKenzie told them he didn’t know what to do — he felt lost. He talked about Griffey. “Everybody counts,” he said urgently. Yes, the offi cers repeated, everybody counts. “She was probably the sweetest person I’ve ever known,” McKenzie said Friday. They stuck together even after becoming homeless. “I’m not going to let any- thing happen to Gail,” he said, “but I guess I don’t have to worry about that anymore. I loved her with all my heart.” Colin Murphey/The Astorian The Astoria Warming Center is an emergency shelter for the homeless on cold and rainy nights. wanted,” the p olice c hief said. ‘Community failed her’ For others, the situation is more clear-cut. “I think we as a commu- nity failed her,” said Mary Docherty, the director of Riv- erfolk, a nonprofi t that works with the homeless to secure state identifi cation cards. Docherty had known Griffey for a number of years. Like many others in the com- munity, she knew about her eviction when it happened. For a while, Griffey and McKenzie slept in building alcoves on Duane Street. Though Griffey never asked Docherty for help, Docherty wishes now that she had done more. “They’re saying you can’t force them into housing, but, yeah, I still think we dropped the ball,” Docherty said. “I’d run into her downtown and we’d trade hugs and we’d talk and then I’d go home. I don’t feel good about that anymore.” “I think we just assumed she’d take care of it.” A tenant supervisor at the Astor Building was unable to confi rm when or why Griffey and her boy- friend were evicted. Griffey told people they had been evicted for smoking inside the apartment. According to Viviana Mat- thews, the executive direc- tor of Clatsop Community Action, the agency provided Griffey with rental assistance up until April 2018. Griffey appears to have become homeless in May 2018. After Griffey was evicted, she couldn’t get back on her feet. In some ways, it was like she didn’t fully realize what had happened, McDan- iel said. “She didn’t understand the situation she was in,” he said. “She was so optimistic that everything was OK.” When people asked her if she needed help fi nding a place to live, Griffey would assure them that something was on the horizon, and that she was going to be inside again soon. McDaniel and his mother were trying to convince Griffey and McKenzie to fi ll out an application for hous- ing, but couldn’t get the cou- ple to follow through. Griffey would have qual- ifi ed for housing offered through Clatsop Commu- nity Action and had a small income through S ocial S ecu- rity, according to Matthews. But though Griffey visited the agency daily, even twice a day, to get coffee or other supplies or just to talk, she would not sit down and com- plete the necessary assess- ment with caseworkers. 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