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THE ASTORIAN • THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2021
Gary Peterson Photography
People use wheelchairs to navigate Fort Stevens State Park.
Accessibility: A huge fi rst step to
showing people what accessibility and
inclusivity in recreation can look like
Continued from Page A1
trails, but they are often little more
than a short paved path from a park-
ing lot to a viewpoint, said Jennifer
Wilde, the director of outreach and
development at Adventures With-
out Limits .
“Some people want to go for a
longer hike than that, especially
if you’re going to drive a couple
hours to a place,” she said.
“If people go to Fort Stevens,
they want to see the shipwreck,
they want to see the b attery, they
want to get on the water at Coff en-
bury Lake. The trails in the park are
nice and extensive, but extending
that to identifying the other activ-
ities that people are doing in the
park and the small steps that can be
taken to make those more accessi-
ble for people that may face barri-
ers otherwise.”
One of those small steps, accord-
ing to Wilde, is to improve imag-
ery and visual descriptions of sites
and trails rather than labeling them
as accessible under the Americans
with Disabilities Act. More elab-
orate descriptions that display a
broader understanding of the spec-
trum of comfort that many with
disabilities have, she said, can give
people a better understanding of
what to expect from a recreational
experience.
Events like the one at Fort Ste-
vens are a huge fi rst step to show-
ing people what accessibility and
inclusivity in recreation can look
like, García Fullana said.
“This particular event is allow-
ing for the word to spread and state
that there is a need for activities like
this, because there is an interest in
participating,” she said. “Especially
living in Oregon.”
‘THIS PARTICULAR EVENT IS ALLOWING FOR THE WORD TO SPREAD AND
STATE THAT THERE IS A NEED FOR ACTIVITIES LIKE THIS, BECAUSE THERE
IS AN INTEREST IN PARTICIPATING. ESPECIALLY LIVING IN OREGON.’
Inés García Fullana | Person who has spent her life using a wheelchair, living with spina bifi da, a congenital defect in the spinal column
Firehouse: Vote set for the November ballot
Dix: ‘I would
give anything if
this didn’t happen’
Continued from Page A1
Continued from Page A1
Hartmann,
who
placed her mother with
Hughes-Ransom Mortu-
ary & Crematory in Asto-
ria, describes the day her
mother died as the worst
of her life.
“I spent the entire
weekend with my mother.
She struggled for two
days until she fi nally
passed,” said Hartmann,
who lives in Warrenton
and works as a night audi-
tor. “I just wanted every-
thing to go smoothly and
have everything taken
care of so I didn’t have
to feel at loose ends. And
she just made it feel like it
was no big deal.
“I would give anything
if this didn’t happen,” she
said.
Dix fi ts the descrip-
tion of Clatsop County’s
13th virus death of the
pandemic.
The Astorian is aware
of other potential virus
deaths based on informa-
tion from families and
indicators from funeral
homes during the surge
linked to the delta vari-
ant. While some virus
deaths have been publicly
reported soon after they
happen, there have been
lags of days, weeks and
even months for others.
Columbia
Memo-
rial Hospital in Asto-
ria has also said that sev-
eral patients who did not
have the virus have died
because they were unable
to be transferred to other
hospitals for specialized
care due to the number of
virus patients.
Local
deaths
—
whether linked to the virus
or not — have put pres-
sure on funeral homes.
Hughes-Ransom, for
example, shared 18 death
notices with The Astorian
over the weekend cover-
ing Aug. 16 to Saturday.
formal contracts subject to
bond approval,” Zimmerman
wrote in response to ques-
tions from the newspaper.
The City Council turned
to Highlands Lane after
potential obstacles for the
project at the High Point
location.
The city is working with
planners to bring the 30-acre
Cottages at Gearhart subdi-
vision off Highlands Lane
into the city’s urban growth
boundary in a land swap
for acreage in the city’s
“no-build” zone near the
ocean.
The developers, Cot-
tages at Gearhart LLC, must
also receive city approval
for a subdivision containing
four units per acre, twice as
many as permitted by the
county.
If the 20-year bond mea-
sure is approved by vot-
ers, the fi rehouse could see
a four- to six-month design
process in 2022 with con-
struction starting in 2023.
The city estimates the bonds
would cost property own-
ers $1.052 per $1,000 of
assessed value per year.
At this point in the pro-
Hailey Hoff man/The Astorian
Gearhart is considering a new fi rehouse off Highlands Lane.
cess, a city likely wouldn’t
have fi nal architectural
drawings, geotechnical data
or other details for such a
project, City Attorney Peter
Watts said .
“All of that work would
only occur after voters have
authorized the bonds neces-
sary to build the building,”
he said. “I have never seen
the kind of information they
are requesting included in a
ballot title.”
Normally in a ballot
title challenge, Watts said,
the challengers provide an
alternate ballot title to the
court that they want the
court to adopt. The judge
can confi rm the city’s bal-
lot title, order the alternate
to be used or a combination
of the two.
Because of the word
limit of the ballot summary,
it is impossible for the city
to address every possible
issue, Watts said.
The idea is to inform
voters of what the bonds
are going to be used for and
how much is authorized .
“Those are the items that
would inform a voter so
they could decide whether
to vote ‘yes’ or ‘no,’” Watts
said. “My goal as the city
attorney is simply to inform
the voters so they can make
an informed decision on the
question.”