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.
Every time they asked, she
would put them off.
“She would say, ‘Yeah, I’ll
come back on Wednesday,’ or
some other day,” Matthews
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