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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (June 13, 2020)
A2 THE ASTORIAN • SATURDAY, JUNE 13, 2020 IN BRIEF Roley honored with emotional send-off SEASIDE — Hundreds of well-wishers lined the road to the new middle and high school campus on Thursday to pay tribute to Seaside School District Superintendent Sheila Roley. Roley will retire at the end of June after three decades with the school district as teacher, principal and superintendent. Roley and assistant superintendent Susan Penrod, along with other administrators, attended a leadership meeting at Broadway Middle School when Penrod sug- gested they take a drive to the new campus. “She didn’t really know until we drove right up before here and saw the police escorts pull up,” Penrod said. Police were joined by the Seaside Fire Department, including the 100-foot tractor-drawn aerial quint. “I had no clue,” Roley said as she stepped from the yellow Jeep to a crowd of well-wishers and supporters. “One-hundred percent. I am grateful beyond words to have had the opportunity to have had this team, do this work, to be in this community, for the untold blessings of being able to serve the families and the kids and the staff and the community members in Seaside and our larger Seaside community. “No one could have it better.” — The Astorian DRIVE-BY TRIBUTE Hailey Hoff man/The Astorian Oregon Supreme Court backs Brown on emergency orders The Oregon Supreme Court ruled Friday against a group of churches and public offi cials from Eastern Oregon who challenged Gov. Kate Brown’s executive orders aimed at slowing the spread of COVID-19. In their ruling, the justices ordered a Baker County Cir- cuit Court judge to vacate his preliminary injunction dis- mantling emergency actions Brown has taken to address the pandemic, an order that the Supreme Court had put on hold. Despite that ruling, the case remains open. The churches conceded Brown has sweeping author- ity to limit public gathering and business functions but argued that this authority was limited to a total of 28 days — meaning restrictions in place since March would no longer be valid. — Oregon Public Broadcasting DEATHS June 11, 2020 NIKKILA, Norma M., 102, of Astoria, died in Astoria. Caldwell’s Luce-Layton Mortuary of Astoria is in charge of the arrangements. Deaths June 10, 2020 ANDERSON, Mari- lyn Jean, 85, of Astoria, died in Astoria. Caldwell’s Luce-Layton Mortuary of Astoria is in charge of the arrangements. MEMORIALS Wednesday, June 17 ANDERSON, Marilyn Jean — Graveside service at 1 p.m., Ocean View Cemetery, 575 18th St. in Warrenton. ON THE RECORD Assault session of a weapon with On the Record • Claressa Rene intent to use and reckless Durfee, 28, of Astoria, was arraigned Tuesday for assault in the fourth degree and harassment and disorderly conduct in the second degree. Theft • Andrew James Ben- son Oyler, 24, was arrested Thursday on Lief Erikson Drive in Astoria for theft in the third degree and giving false information to a police offi cer. Weapons • Garthe Alexan- der Miehe, 48, of Asto- ria, was arrested Thurs- day on Seventh Street in Astoria for unlawful pos- endangerment. Harassment • Gerald Glen Lutcav- ich, 61, of Pendleton, was arrested Friday on Wal- luski Loop in Astoria for harassment. Criminal trespass • Roy Douglas Hall, 44, of Astoria, was arrested Wednesday at Astoria Brewing Co. for crimi- nal trespass in the second degree. • Peyton Briar McDow, 21, of Astoria, was arrested Tuesday on 45th Street in Astoria for crim- inal trespass in the fi rst degree. PUBLIC MEETINGS MONDAY Knappa School District, 5:30 p.m., budget session, (elec- tronic meeting). Astoria City Council, 7 p.m., City Hall, 1095 Duane St. TUESDAY Union Health District of Clatsop County, 8 a.m., Provi- dence Seaside Hospital, Education Room A. Sunset Empire Park and Recreation District Board of Directors, 5:15 p.m., (electronic meeting). Astoria Historic Landmarks Commission, 5:15 p.m., City Hall, 1095 Duane St. Seaside School District Board of Directors, 6 p.m., 1801 S. Franklin. Shoreline Sanitary District Board, 7 p.m., Gearhart Her- tig Station, 33496 West Lake Lane, Warrenton. PUBLIC MEETINGS Established July 1, 1873 (USPS 035-000) Published Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday by EO Media Group, 949 Exchange St., PO Box 210, Astoria, OR 97103 Telephone 503-325-3211, 800-781-3211 or Fax 503-325-6573. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to The Astorian, PO Box 210, Astoria, OR 97103-0210 DailyAstorian.com Circulation phone number: 503-325-3211 Periodicals postage paid at Astoria, OR ADVERTISING OWNERSHIP All advertising copy and illustrations prepared by The Astorian become the property of The Astorian and may not be reproduced for any use without explicit prior approval. COPYRIGHT © Entire contents © Copyright, 2020 by The Astorian. MEMBER OF THE ASSOCIATED PRESS MEMBER CERTIFIED AUDIT OF CIRCULATIONS, INC. Printed on recycled paper Subscription rates Eff ective May 1, 2019 MAIL (IN COUNTY) EZpay (per month) ...............................................................................................................$11.25 13 weeks in advance ...........................................................................................................$37.00 26 weeks in advance ...........................................................................................................$71.00 52 weeks in advance ........................................................................................................ $135.00 Out of County Rates available at 800-781-3214 DIGITAL EZpay (per month) .................................................................................................................$8.00 Teachers and staff from the Astoria School District drove through neighborhoods on Wednesday — what would have been the last day of school — to say goodbye to students. Big money bought the forests Communities now paying the price By TONY SCHICK Oregon Public Broadcasting By ROB DAVIS The Oregonian By LYLLA YOUNES ProPublica FALLS CITY — A few hundred feet past this Ore- gon timber town, a curtain of Douglas fi r trees opens to an expanse of skinny stumps. The hillside has been clear cut, with thousands of trees leveled at once. Around the bend is another clear- cut nearly twice its size, then another, patches of desert brown carved into the forest for miles. Logging is booming around Falls City, a town of about 1,000 residents in the Oregon Coast Range. More trees are cut in the county today than decades ago when a sawmill hummed on Main Street and timber workers and their families fi lled the now- closed cafes, grocery stores and shops selling home appli- ances, sporting goods and feed for livestock. But the jobs and services have dried up, and the town is going broke. The library closed two years ago. And as many as half of the families in Falls City live on weekly food deliveries from the Mountain Gospel Fellowship. “You’re left still with these companies that have reaped these benefi ts, but those small cities that have supported them over the years are left in the dust,” Mac Corthell, the city manager, said. For decades, politicians, suit-and-tie timber executives and caulk-booted tree fallers alike have blamed the fed- eral government and urban environmental advocates for kneecapping the state’s most important industry. Timber sales plummeted in the 1990s after the fed- eral government dramatically reduced logging in national forests in response to pro- tests and lawsuits to pro- tect the northern spotted owl under the Endangered Spe- cies Act and other conserva- tion laws. The drop left thou- sands of Oregonians without jobs, and counties lost hun- dreds of millions of dollars in annual revenue. But the singularly focused Beth Nakamura/The Oregonian Top left: The Boondocks, a restaurant in Falls City; top right: Frink’s General Store, a market in town; bottom: a truck carrying logs rolls through Falls City. narrative, the only one most Oregonians know, masked another devastating shift for towns like Falls City. Wall Street real estate trusts and investment funds began gaining control over the state’s private forestlands. They profi ted at the expense of rural communities by log- ging more aggressively with fewer environmental pro- tections than in neighboring states, while reaping the ben- efi ts of timber tax cuts that have cost counties at least $3 billion in the past three decades, an investigation by Oregon Public Broadcast- ing, The Oregonian and Pro- Publica found. Half of the 18 counties in Oregon’s timber-dominant region lost more money from tax cuts on private forests than from the reduction of logging on federal lands, the investi- gation shows. Private timber owners used to pay what was known as a severance tax, which was based on the value of the trees they logged. But the tax, which helped fund schools and local govern- ments, was eliminated for all but the smallest timber own- FINNISH BROTHERHOOD LODGE AUXILIARY RICE PUDDING/ FRUIT SOUP “TO GO” Pick up Saturday, June 20, 10-2 behind Suomi Hall 244 W. Marine Dr. Astoria, Oregon ers, who can choose to pay it as a means to further reduce annual property taxes. The total value of tim- ber logged on private lands since 1991 is approximately $67 billion when adjusted for infl ation, according to an analysis of data from Ore- gon’s Department of For- estry. If the state’s severance tax had not been phased out, companies would have paid an estimated $3 billion during the same period. Instead, cit- ies and counties collected less than a third of that amount, or roughly $871 million. Polk County, home to Falls City, has lost approximately $29 million in revenue from timber sales on federal land. By comparison, the elimina- tion of the severance tax and lower property taxes for pri- vate timber companies have cost the county at least $100 million. “You have that tension between this industry that still employs people, but we’re losing some of the benefi ts of that relationship,” Falls City Mayor Jeremy Gordon said. “As those jobs diminish, there’s less and less support to subsidize that industry in the community.” ‘A completely different business model’ Oregon’s connection to the timber industry is so tightly knit that casinos, high school mascots and coffee roasters take their names from mills, loggers and stumps. The state Capitol is domed by a golden pioneer carrying an ax, and its House chamber carpeting is adorned with trees. The mas- cot of the Portland Timbers, a Major League Soccer team, is a logger who revs a chainsaw and cuts a round off a Douglas fi r tree after every home goal. While the industry today still rakes in billions of dollars annually, it’s starkly different from the one that helped build and enrich the state. Oregon lowered taxes and maintained weaker environ- mental protections on private forestlands than neighboring states in exchange for jobs and economic investment from the timber industry. Despite such concessions, the country’s top lumber-pro- ducing state has fewer for- est-sector jobs per acre and See Forests, Page A3 Please ADOPT A PET! STUBBS Adult American Shorthair male In a hard world, find softness, innocence, and fidelity in a trusting and steady friend. See more on Petfinder.com CLATSOP COUNTY ANIMAL SHELTER • 861-PETS 1315 SE 19th St. • Warrenton | Tues-Sat 12-4pm www.dogsncats.org THIS SPACE SPONSORED BY BAY BREEZE BOARDING
