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148TH YEAR, NO. 151
DailyAstorian.com // THURSDAY, JUNE 17, 2021
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CORONAVIRUS
County
to stay at
lower risk
for virus
State approaches
vaccination target
By NICOLE BALES
The Astorian
Photos by Hailey Hoff man/The Astorian
Clatsop County is looking to expand aff ordable housing options.
County aff ordable housing
strategy starts to take shape
Little progress
since housing study
By NICOLE BALES
The Astorian
Clatsop County will remain at lower
risk for the coronavirus as the state nears
its target for lifting virus restrictions.
“We are incredibly close to achieving
a 70% statewide adult vaccination rate,
bringing us closer to returning to a sense
of normalcy and lifting health and safety
restrictions,” Gov. Kate Brown said in a
statement Tuesday. “Vaccines are the best
way for Oregonians to protect themselves,
their families and communities against
COVID-19. Because so many Oregonians
have stepped up to get vaccinated, Ore-
gon’s case rates and hospitalizations have
continued to decline.
“But, if you are not vaccinated,
COVID-19 remains just as dangerous as
before. If you have been waiting to get
vaccinated, go get your shot today. It’s
never been easier to get vaccinated, and
you may just win $1 million through the
Take Your Shot, Oregon campaign.”
The governor has said that when 70%
of adults statewide receive at least one
dose of vaccine, Oregon will lift risk-level
restrictions.
Counties that have vaccinated at least
65% of adults can move to lower risk —
an option to move more counties back to
normal operations quicker.
Nearly 62% of people 16 and older in
See Risk, Page A6
C
latsop County is moving for-
ward with a strategy to support
new aff ordable housing projects.
The county and cities completed
a housing study in 2019 that recom-
mended the county address an aff ord-
able housing shortage by doing more
to support diverse housing at higher
densities and control vacation rentals.
Since then, the county and cities
have grappled with how to balance
the growth in vacation rentals as the
North Coast becomes a more popular
tourist destination, but little progress
has been made. Meanwhile, home-
buying has surged during the corona-
virus pandemic as more people have
fl ocked to the coast, further intensify-
ing the issue.
“As staff has been discussing this
topic, we’ve really been refl ecting
upon a role for the county that would
be timely, that would be eff ective and
then ultimately would be successful
in facilitating new aff ordable housing
stock in the county,” County Man-
ager Don Bohn said during a work
session of the Board of Commission-
ers on Tuesday.
“Here in Clatsop County, as you
know, the county does not have any
New apartments are planned near Safeway in Astoria.
aff ordable housing staff , we don’t
develop housing, we don’t main-
tain aff ordable housing. And if you
look at the full range of 36 counties,
counties do it diff erently. Sometimes
housing authorities fall within coun-
ties and then they also have housing
departments that do more discretion-
ary public housing development with
nonprofi t and private partners,” he
said.
“You have some where the hous-
ing authority is the only housing
resource. And what we have here
is we have a consortium of multi-
ple counties through NOHA (North-
west Oregon Housing Authority)
who is providing federal housing pro-
grams and also owning and maintain-
ing a housing stock over those three
counties.”
Consultant hired
The county hired Angelo Plan-
ning Group, a Portland consulting
company, in December to facilitate
meetings with housing stakeholders ,
including cities and non profi t hous-
ing developers.
Bohn said the purpose of the meet-
ings was to identify a set of high-pri-
ority action items .
See Housing, Page A6
Mental health agency expands in South County
Purchases buildings for transitional housing
By R.J. MARX
The Astorian
SEASIDE — Clatsop
Behavioral Healthcare has
purchased two buildings to
provide transitional housing
for people with mental health
issues and those trying to get
into recovery.
The multiuse property
on Broadway, purchased for
$650,000, consists of two
structures, including three
renovated apartments, two
retail commercial spaces and
private parking. Construc-
tion started last week and
is expected to be ready for
move-in by September.
“We’ve had great suc-
cess with getting folks into
detox,” Amy Baker, the
executive director of Clat-
sop Behavioral Healthcare,
told the City Council at Mon-
day’s meeting. “But if they
don’t have a home to step out
of, their chance of relapse is
really, really high.”
Baker acknowledged the
Oregonians struggling to
fi nd aff ordable housing and
noted the growing number of
homeless people in Clatsop
County.
The agency, the c oun-
ty’s mental health contractor,
Hailey Hoff man/The Astorian
See Agency, Page A6
Clatsop Behavioral Healthcare purchased buildings on
Broadway to turn into transitional housing.
Astoria
plans full
return to
school
Students back in classrooms
full time by September
By KATIE FRANKOWICZ
The Astorian
The Astoria School District is plan-
ning a return to normal this September.
Students will return to school build-
ings full time next school year — a sig-
nifi cant change after they began the prior
school year entirely online because of the
coronavirus pandemic. Even when they
did begin to return in February, younger
students were only at school for sev-
eral hours a day while high school stu-
dents saw even less time back in physi-
cal classrooms.
Teachers, students and other school
district staff will likely have to continue
to wear masks when together inside
buildings, though not outside.
The school district expects to get
updated guidance from the state next
month. But buses will go back to trans-
porting students by geographical area
with mixed grades aboard rather than
by class and cohort, a precaution that
last school year meant sparsely-fi lled
buses were on the road almost constantly
with little wiggle room to accommodate
changes in the limited classroom hours.
See School, Page A6