»INSIDE
WEEKLY
RTAINMENT
ARTS & ENTE
THURSDAY
SEPT. 16
2021
A WORLD
OF COLOR
NATURAL DYE
WORKSHOPS IEW
COMING TO SEAV
PAGE 8
CALLING
ALL POETS
PAGE 5
WONDER
WOMAN OF
KITE WORLD
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WILD SALMON
RECIPE
149TH YEAR, NO. 34
DailyAstorian.com // THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2021
$1.50
Hospitals
see decline
in virus
patients
Health care providers
hopeful after summer peak
By ERICK BENGEL
The Astorian
Dean Guernsey/The Bulletin
MacKenzee Scott, manager of Tuesday Morning in Bend, stands with a sign stating reduced hours of operation due to a lack of
workers. Scott can’t keep the store open for the chain’s dedicated hours. The Bend store closes each night at 6 p.m. instead of
8 p.m. because there’s not enough managers to staff the shifts, Scott said.
Getting creative to
lure back workers
Companies look to
incentives and training
By SUZANNE ROIG
The Bulletin
B
END — Filling vacant positions
and fi guring out future growth
will take creative thinking at St.
Charles Health System.
Hiring managers at c entral Ore-
gon’s four-hospital system are reach-
ing out to schools, colleges and medi-
cal associations looking for workers to
fi ll the 691 vacant positions. The hospi-
tal system is off ering signing bonuses,
free education for those already work-
ing but who want to become a front-
line caregiver and referral bonuses,
said Rebecca Berry, St. Charles Health
System’s vice president of human
resources.
The fallout of the hiring crisis in
Oregon is that employers have dramat-
ically changed how they do business:
Doctors have delayed elective surger-
ies, retailers have reduced business
hours and companies have increased
wages and embraced aggressive hiring
practices.
And companies have been forced to
think about growth at a time when it’s
diffi cult to maintain the status quo.
Not only is St. Charles trying to
fi ll vacant positions created by work-
ers leaving or retiring, but it’s trying
to anticipate future growth and hire to
accommodate that, Berry said. With
more than 2,000 elective surgeries
postponed because they may require
an overnight stay at the regional hospi-
tal, and a patient load running at 85%
on average, the hospital system has to
anticipate where the growth might be.
“Now we run new employee ori-
entations twice a month,” Berry said.
“Some of our hiring needs are because
of anticipated growth and the high
level of patient census. So we need
more workers. We’re trying to grow
with a plan in place.”
St. Charles is just one example of
how the worker shortage has changed
workplace culture.
The staffi ng situation has gotten so
dire at Tuesday Morning, a houseware
retailer at the Bend Factory Stores,
that MacKenzee Scott can’t keep
the store open for the chain’s dedi-
cated hours. The Bend store closes
each night at 6 p.m. instead of 8 p.m.
because there’s not enough managers
to staff the shifts, Scott said.
“We don’t have enough managers
to cover all the days,” Scott said. “No
one is applying . I’ve had multiple ads
up. Before this COVID-19 stuff I’d
have no problem fi nding help.”
See Workers, Page A6
Port feels the strain of labor shortage
Agency has struggled
to fi nd workers
By ETHAN MYERS
The Astorian
The labor shortage crushing
the hospitality, service and trans-
portation industries has worked
its way to the Port of Astoria.
“We’re still operating with a
shorter maintenance staff than
we have had in years past, and,
additionally, we found it diffi cult
to fi ll part-time and on-call posi-
tions, whether that be airport
fueling or Port security,” Will
Isom, the Port’s executive direc-
tor, said. “So we have had folks
who had to put in extra time.”
The fi nancial blow of the
coronavirus pandemic, mainly
from the absence of cruise
ships, has left the Port’s budget
for temporary employees much
Hailey Hoff man/The Astorian
The Seven Seas Mariner docked at the Port of Astoria in 2019.
lower, Isom said.
Since much of the Port’s
business comes during the tour-
ism season, the agency relies on
those workers to get by.
“What becomes a challenge is
when we have these short stints
where we get really busy, like
when the Buoy 10 fi shery opens,
and you need added staff on a
Hospitals
in
Clatsop
County
have experienced an ebb in the
number of patients admitted for the
coronavirus.
After about the fi rst week of August,
Columbia Memorial Hospital began to
see a rise in COVID-related hospitaliza-
tions, reaching a peak of 11 virus patients,
Judy Geiger, the hospital’s vice president
of patient care services,
said at a news confer-
ence Wednesday.
MORE
For a few weeks,
INSIDE
the 25-bed Astoria hos-
County
pital averaged between
reports
six and seven virus
25th virus
patients a day. Within
death •
the p ast few days, how-
A3
ever, the number fell
to three or four virus
patients a day .
Providence Seaside Hospital saw a
peak of about six virus patients, “which
is a lot when you’ve got just 25 beds,”
Jason Plamondon, the hospital’s chief
nursing offi cer, said.
Providence Seaside has since been
averaging three to four virus patients
a day, he said, but over the p ast several
days that number has dropped to between
zero and two. “I don’t want to jinx any-
thing. Right now things are looking
good,” he said.
Geiger and Plamondon said the recent
COVID patients are, on average, getting
sicker than patients in the past and are
requiring more specialized care.
See Hospitals, Page A3
Low-oxygen
levels off
West Coast
a concern
Climate change a factor
By KATIE FRANKOWICZ
The Astorian
Low-oxygen levels off the coast of
Oregon and Washington state hit earlier
than usual this spring and have lasted lon-
ger than any other hypoxic event recorded
on the West Coast in the p ast 35 years.
Exacerbated by human-caused climate
change, it has led scientists and fi shermen
to worry about the formation of a mas-
sive “dead zone” and fed concerns about
the unknown long-term impacts on ocean
ecosystems and valuable fi sheries like
Dungeness crab.
The Pacifi c Northwest has experi-
enced hypoxia seasons regularly for two
decades. Winds initiate seasonal upwell-
ing, pushing warmer surface water off
from shore and drawing up colder, nutri-
ent-rich but low-oxygen water from
below. Hypoxia events occur as organ-
isms in the water die and sink, removing
even more oxygen.
While fi sh and crab often fl ee hypoxic
zones, some organisms and animals can
become trapped in the middle of these
low-oxygen areas and die.
Francis Chan, a marine ecologist with
Oregon State University, said scientists
expected a bad hypoxia season this year
based on weather conditions in April, but
they had not expected the low-oxygen
levels to persist for so long.
See Port, Page A6
See Hypoxia, Page A6