DailyAstorian.com // TUESDAY, JUNE 29, 2021
148TH YEAR, NO. 156
$1.50
‘I just wonder
what the story is’
Mystery boat at Fort Stevens may tell many tales
By KATIE FRANKOWICZ
The Astorian
T
he thing sunk in the muck and
sand at Trestle Bay looked like
the lower jaw and teeth of a giant
monster — like dragon’s teeth from a
story, Aaron Trotter thought .
But as he walked across the
water-emptied b ay in Fort Stevens
State Park at low tide, he suddenly
realized what he was looking at: a
wooden boat, tilted to one side, planks
crusted in a layer of marine plants and
barnacles.
Caspian terns screamed and
swooped over the fl ats. Back across
the bay, people wandered with the
curve of the beach. Beyond them,
large trucks rumbled down a side
road carrying massive rocks to repair
the nearby South Jetty. Everyone was
oblivious to the discovery, the real
life shipwrecks-and-buried-treasure
delight Trotter was experiencing.
The boat, Trotter thought, could be
anything.
Maybe it was a life boat from an old
shipwreck. Maybe it was used in the
making of South Jetty, built more than
Photos by Hailey Hoff man/The Astorian
TOP: The remains of a boat in Trestle Bay. ABOVE: Aaron Trotter points to the boat he
encountered.
100 years ago — railroad trestles from
the rail line that ferried large rocks to
the jetty still border one edge of the
bay. Maybe it’s an old fi shing boat.
Trotter, a Portland artist who sells
his illustrated playing card decks at
the Astoria Sunday Market, prefers his
shipwreck theory.
“I just wonder what the story is,”
Trotter said.
It’s a mystery, but there are some
clues. For instance, it seems clear what
the boat is not.
First, it isn’t a new discovery.
Mark Schacher, who operates
Arrow Tugboat and Tour Co. out of
See Mystery boat, Page A8
College nursing program
receives a fi nancial boost
By KATIE
FRANKOWICZ
The Astorian
A new nursing instructor
position at Clatsop Commu-
nity College will be funded,
in large part, by Columbia
Memorial Hospital.
Under an agreement for-
mally signed Friday, the hos-
pital will provide $80,000
annually to support the posi-
tion. A starting salary for
a nursing instructor can be
around $70,000 before ben-
efi ts. The hit to the college’s
budget for these types of
positions can be more than
$100,000, said Chris Breit-
meyer, the c ollege president.
“This will free up other
money for the nursing pro-
gram,” he said of the hospi-
tal’s donation.
Nursing programs, and
the equipment and supplies
they require, are among the
more expensive programs
to run, Breitmeyer noted.
Meanwhile, enrollment —
and related tuition dollars —
dipped at the college due to
the coronavirus pandemic.
The budget is in a good
place, Breitmeyer said, “but
every dollar at a community
college is important.”
The donation will also help
in retaining staff by allow-
ing the college to off er a good
wage, Breitmeyer hopes.
Someone with the level of
Viviana Matthews
Josh Davis is the county’s new veterans service offi cer.
Hailey Hoff man/The Astorian
Clatsop Community College signed an agreement Friday with Columbia Memorial Hospital
that will fund a new nursing instructor at the college.
‘WE RELY ON THIS PROGRAM TO
BE A PIPELINE IN ORDER FOR US
TO CONTINUE TO PROVIDE CARE
TO OUR COMMUNITY.’
Erik Thorsen | Columbia Memorial CEO
education necessary to be a
nursing instructor could make
more money outside of the
academic world, he noted.
“We’re looking to reward
the folks that made that deci-
sion and that commitment,”
he said.
A career in nursing edu-
cation pays less, agreed
Judy Geiger , the hospital’s
vice president of patient care
services.
“You have to be very dedi-
cated,” she said.
She is glad Columbia
Memorial can help support
paying someone a living wage
to teach in the college’s nurs-
ing program because the pro-
gram acts as a pipeline to the
hospital.
Numbers vary from year
to year, but Geiger estimates
that the hospital hires fi ve to
10 of the college’s nursing
program graduates each year.
Without the program, she
said, “we’d be in trouble.”
The coast is isolated, more
rural and it can be hard to
attract job candidates from
outside the area. College nurs-
ing students are often already
very familiar with the area or
grew up here. Many are inter-
ested in staying.
For the hospital, the pres-
ence of a nursing program in the
community is of huge impor-
tance, said Erik Thorsen, the
CEO at Columbia Memorial.
“We rely on this program
to be a pipeline in order for us
to continue to provide care to
our community,” he said.
Veterans service
offi cer focuses
on community
Davis served
in the Army
By NICOLE BALES
The Astorian
latsop
Community
Action has a new vet-
erans service offi cer.
Josh Davis, a U.S.
Army veteran and former
veterans service offi cer for
Multnomah County, has
been on the job since early
June. He replaces Ste-
phen Bobian, a U.S. Coast
Guard veteran, who was
hired last year after Clatsop
C ounty shifted the contract
for the position from Luke
Thomas, a Coast Guard
C
veteran, to Clatsop Com-
munity Action.
The nonprofi t operates
the regional food bank and
provides housing, energy
assistance and other crit-
ical services to low-in-
come people. The goal was
to expand outreach to the
county’s more than 3,600
veterans and help make the
agency’s social services
more accessible.
See Davis, Page A8