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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 1, 2020)
A6 THE ASTORIAN • SATURDAY, AUGUST 1, 2020 Public works: ‘The neighbors are absolutely against this’ Continued from Page A1 The county believes the property is strategi- cally located. I t would pro- vide greater access to S outh C ounty and is next to the Lewis and Clark Mainline, which the county hopes to seismically retrofi t and use as an alternate and evacua- tion route. The county also obtained a letter of interest for a 30-acre property known as Crown Camp south of the intersection of the Lewis and Clark Mainline and Lewis and Clark Road near Seaside. The property, which most recently served as the com- pany offi ces for GreenW ood Resources, could be used as a combined rock stock- pile, construction equipment storage area, police fi ring range, emergency commu- nication or supply stockpil- ing site. The county said the site could also be utilized by Seaside and Gearhart for emergency services. During a work session in late July , the county insisted that the relocation — known as the “Resiliency P roj- ect” — is still in the early phases and residents will be included in the process. “The letter of intent is just saying, ‘OK, we agree on Nicole Bales/The Astorian The Lewis and Clark Mainline is a private logging road. these terms, now we’re going to go ahead and enter into a purchase sale agreement, ’” Assistant County Manager Monica Steele said. “And in all of these purchase and sale agreements, we have at a minimum 180 days to do our due diligence process. Because while we’ve identi- fi ed these properties as being potentially feasible, to do the project, it doesn’t mean that in the end it is going to be feasible. ” “But fi rst we have to enter into that agreement so that way the work that we’re doing is able to be deter- mined because we don’t want to start the process, get the work done, and then real- ize that we can’t even buy this property.” County Manager Don Bohn said staff is committed to community engagement and input. The county has arranged a meeting to dis- cuss the project with prop- erty owners on Aug. 13, which the county says will be the fi rst of many. “We are going to have a transparent process,” he said. “From staff’s per- spective, no decisions have been made. We really are approaching this in an objec- tive way. ” A surprise Some residents received a letter from the county P ublic W orks D epartment in July explaining the project, along with a timeline and survey to gauge support . Residents say the letter came as a surprise , leaving them to feel like a decision has already been made without them. Wev said she believes the county could have commu- nicated better with residents . “And we certainly will in the future,” she said. Lam Quang, the owner of HiiH Lights, who lives off of Lewis and Clark Road, was recently appointed to the county Planning Commission. “Having a big road like that going through the area is really going to change the area completely,” he said. “The citizens are not being acknowledged and it’s just kind of being pushed through with the powers that be.” He believes constructing an alternate route or bypass is a veiled attempt to attract more development . “We’re not going down without a fi ght on this,” Quang said. “The neighbors are absolutely against this.” Shelly Keely bought her property near the Lewis and Clark Mainline 10 years ago after her husband retired from the U.S. Coast Guard. “We couldn’t fi nd a house on a property that we liked and we found the property and we built the house. And it’s just been a great place to live,” she said. “We have a little farm and we have horses. We ride up and down the Mainline. I use the Main- line to deliver fresh eggs and milk to my neighbors. It’s kind of a connection for all of us in this little commu- nity that we use. And it’s just been great.” She said the county’s plan has come as a surprise for a lot of neighbors. She is not encouraged by the upcoming meetings with the county. “We didn’t buy a house on the side of the highway because we didn’t want a house on the side of a high- way,” Keely said. “I don’t feel we’re being asked. I kind of feel like our hands are tied,” she said. “I don’t feel that we as a com- munity out here really have a choice in this. I kind of feel like the decisions have already been made without us getting a chance to say, ‘H ey, no, no, we don’t want this.’” Although residents are supportive of the county moving essential buildings out of the tsunami inunda- tion zone, many do not want a relocation and construction of a bypass to initiate more development in Lewis and Clark . “Progress is inevitable, we all know that,” Suzette Bergeson, a resident, said in an email. “What we also know is that once you rezone for- estry and agricultural land, you can’t get it back. We just want to keep Clatsop County Clatsop County, not Hill- sboro. We’ve all seen that land slowly slip away.” Berney: ‘Bruce understood the true meaning of history and its role in our lives’ Continued from Page A1 During his time in Asto- ria, Berney was active in numerous community orga- nizations, including the Clatsop County Historical Society and the Kiwanis Club. With his mother, Vera Gault, and his wife, Kristina, he restored several Victorian houses and encouraged the preservation of others. He served as the city’s historic preservation offi cer and also founded the Friends of Mac- Donald, an international organization honoring Ran- ald MacDonald, the Asto- ria man who was the fi rst English teacher in Japan. As library director, Ber- ney grew the library’s col- lection of historic books and documents. One tri- umph was securing fi rst edi- tion copies of the Lewis and Clark journals. Berney played a major role in developing, refi ning and expanding a variety of archives, indexes and inven- tories that today allow peo- ple to delve into Astoria’s history. “There isn’t anyone who has done more for preserv- ing local history and awak- ening the public’s aware- ness of the history in our houses,” Liisa Penner, the historical society’s archivist, wrote in a letter to Berney’s son, Steven. “There were people inter- ested in different aspects of our history, but he was the one who put it all together in the newspaper index and the historical society’s archives that made it possible for ‘THERE ISN’T ANYONE WHO HAS DONE MORE FOR PRESERVING LOCAL HISTORY AND AWAKENING THE PUBLIC’S AWARENESS OF THE HISTORY IN OUR HOUSES.’ “But we used (Berney’s inventories) as the basis,” Goodenberger said. “We’d probably still be working if Bruce hadn’t done that.” Liisa Penner | Clatsop County Historical Society’s archivist ‘A dry, Lutheran humor’ anyone with an interest in history to be able to fi nd the sources they need.” Berney’s expanded index of newspaper archives — housed at the library and completed with the help of volunteers — remains “the single most important resource for doing any his- tory or family research in Clatsop County,” Penner told The Astorian. He preserved letters from prominent families and legal documents that describe Astoria over the decades — items that were stored in the library basement and are now being sorted and cat- alogued by local historian and preservationist John Goodenberger. Though Berney was born in Walla Walla, Washington , his passion for Astoria’s his- tory “just seemed like it was in his blood,” said Gooden- berger, who, as a child, lived across the street from the Berney family. Goodenberger later helped Berney as he devel- oped an inventory of many historic homes on Astoria’s North Slope. Today, Goodenberger is a go-to resource for histor- ical information and con- text about Astoria’s past. But Berney and his mother were the people who helped him begin to understand the city’s story when he was a boy and, later, take what he was learning as a col- lege student in architecture school to another level. Berney and his mother restored a Victorian home together in Astoria. Berney would go on to restore two more houses with his family while Gault wrote a walking tour guide to the city’s his- toric homes. Berney’s daughter, Laura Boughton, remembers being enlisted as child to assist with tours. She would be assigned a room or an area of the house to give a talk about when people came by. “It was just part of the water we were swimming in,” she said. She and her brothers, Mark and Steven, believe their father saw the potential to delve deeper into Asto- ria’s history before many others did — an interest and a foresight that helped grow the city’s tourism industry. “It became bigger than anybody could have imag- ined,” Boughton said. Love of history In the years before he came to Astoria, Berney served in the U.S. Army Medical Corps, pursued a m aster’s degree in education and taught English for two years in Japan before earning a m aster’s degree in librar- ianship. He became direc- tor of the Astoria Library in 1967. “Bruce understood the true meaning of history and its role in our lives,” said Jimmy Pearson, the library director, who shares Berney’s love of history. “Understanding our past pro- vides us with the foundation to create a better present and future for ourselves and gen- erations yet to come.” The Astoria L ibrary is particularly rich in local his- tory resources thanks to Ber- ney, Pearson said. In 2018, Pearson advocated for the library’s collection of Asto- ria-specifi c books and his- torical documents, the Asto- riana Collection, to be renamed the Bruce Berney Archives. Berney visited McAn- drew Burns, the executive director of the h istorical s oci- ety, during Burns’ fi rst week on the job 17 years ago and drove him around town. It was Burns’ introduction to the history of Astoria. Burns said the older man’s knowl- edge and passion helped build his own confi dence in making decisions about what was important to Astorians. When city offi cials pur- sued a campaign to tear down many of Astoria’s old buildings and homes in the 1960s and ’70s, Berney was critical to stopping them, Goodenberger said. He con- tinued this work into the fol- lowing decades, as well. Goodenberger remem- bers nighttime journeys with Berney when they went “like missionaries” to houses that had been put on the city’s demolition list. Ber- ney wanted to speak with the owners, make sure they realized the house was on the list, talk to them about the historic signifi cance of the house and ask if they had plans to fi x it up. Berney convinced the city to reverse course in several instances. He also had a way of slowing down diffi cult or fraught discussions. “That slowness would allow people to cool off and they realized what they were upset about was maybe not really worth it and he’ll take care of it,” Goodenberger recalled. “He was willing to stand up for what he believed in.” Goodenberger was among the volunteers Ber- ney assembled to work on an inventory of property data. They photographed historic homes, wrote architectural descriptions and recorded what they could discover about the people who had lived there. Years later, Goodenberger and others would refi ne and further fl esh out these narra- tives to help establish Asto- ria’s historic districts. TO YOUR MORTGAGE PURCHASE • REFINANCE • BUILD waunafcu.org | 800-773-3236 | 24/7 Lending Individuals Welcome NMLS 421867 Every Individual is welcome to apply for a Mortgage. Membership is not required to submit an application. People also remem- ber Berney for his thought- fulness and his humor — “a dry, Lutheran humor,” Goodenberger said. “He loved words and he loved wordplay.” At one point, Pearson acquired several items that had belonged to Berney in an estate sale, including a pen set that appeared in pho- tos of Berney at his desk. When Berney happened to stop by the library one day, Pearson asked if he wanted the pen set back. No, Berney said, then added, “Do you want my shoes, too?” Berney’s children say he was an engaged and positive father. “The fact that he was able to be director of the library, restore all those homes, par- ticipate in all these events and meetings while still making time to give his kids attention … being a father myself now, I have no idea how he was able to juggle all those different things,” Ste- ven Berney said. Mark Berney hopes his father will be remembered as a man committed to ser- vice, community and family. “He wasn’t just chasing a career,” Mark Berney said. His sister agreed. “He truly believed and lived his belief in service to the community,” she said.
