A2
THE ASTORIAN • THURSDAY, DECEMBER 30, 2021
IN BRIEF
Nominees for state Senate seat
to be chosen at convention
The slate of nominees to replace s tate Sen. Betsy
Johnson will be chosen at a convention at the Sea-
side Civic and Convention Center at 6:30 p.m. on
Monday .
Johnson, a Scappoose Democrat, resigned earlier
this month from the Senate to focus on her indepen-
dent campaign for governor.
Precinct committee people for the Democratic
Party in Senate District 16 will convene to hear the
candidates speak, then vote on their preferences.
The list of candidates will be narrowed down to
three to fi ve names that the party will submit to the
Oregon Secretary of State on Tuesday .
State rules require that the names be submitted 20
days from the date of the senator’s resignation. John-
son stepped down on Dec. 15.
At a date and location to be determined, the county
commissioners of Senate District 16 will vote to
appoint the district’s new Democratic senator to fi n-
ish out Johnson’s term. The district includes Clatsop
and Columbia counties, as well as parts of Tillamook,
Washington and Multnomah counties.
The commissioners’ votes are weighted according
to the number of registered voters in their counties.
State rules say the appointment must be made
within 30 days of Johnson’s offi cial resignation — in
this case, by Jan. 14.
The deadline for candidates to fi le the required
paperwork with the Democratic Party of Oregon is
noon on Sunday .
New death, virus cases reported in county
Clatsop County has reported another death related
to COVID-19.
A 93-year-old woman died on Monday at a local
hospital, the county public health department said. She
had not been vaccinated against the virus.
No other information was immediately available.
The county has reported the number of virus deaths
at 36.
Four patients were hospitalized with COVID-19
as of Tuesday at Columbia Memorial Hospital, and
one patient is hospitalized with the virus at Provi-
dence Seaside Hospital, personnel from the hospitals
reported at a news conference on Wednesday.
The Oregon Health Authority also reported new
coronavirus cases for Clatsop County over the past
several days.
The health authority reported four new virus cases
on Tuesday and 10 cases over the weekend.
The state also reported nine cases on Dec. 23 and
nine on Dec. 22.
Since the pandemic began, the county had recorded
2,802 virus cases as of Tuesday.
Astoria accepting applications
for seats on local boards
Astoria is accepting applications for seats on sev-
eral local boards.
Volunteer positions are open on the city’s Design
Review Commission, Historic Landmarks Commis-
sion, Parks Board and budget committee.
Applicants for the Design Review Commission
must be design professionals.
Information about the boards, along with applica-
tions, can be found on the city’s website.
Applications can be submitted to the city manager’s
offi ce or online by 5 p.m. on Jan. 19. Appointments
will be made by the mayor.
— The Astorian
DEATHS
Dec. 28, 2021
In SHEPARD,
Brief
Jeff rey
Alan, 65, of Astoria, died
in Astoria. Caldwell’s
Deaths
Luce-Layton Mortuary of
Astoria is in charge of the
arrangements.
Dec. 26, 2021
CARLSON, Charles
Bernard, 83, of Seaside,
died in Seaside. Cald-
well’s Funeral & Crema-
tion Arrangement Center
of Seaside is in charge of
the arrangements.
Dec. 24, 2021
SUMMA, Zachariah
Paul, 37, of Warrenton,
died in Warrenton. Cald-
well’s Luce-Layton Mor-
tuary of Astoria is in charge
of the arrangements.
Dec. 23, 2021
SMITH, Jerry Alden,
74, of Aloha, died in Sea-
side. Caldwell’s Funeral
& Cremation Arrange-
ment Center of Sea-
side is in charge of the
arrangements.
ON THE RECORD
Prominent consultants
join Johnson’s campaign
By SHANE DIXON
KAVANAUGH
The Oregonian
Two of Oregon’s top polit-
ical consultants have offi -
cially signed on to help for-
mer state Sen. Betsy Johnson
launch an independent bid for
governor.
The pair, Dan Lavey and
Kevin Looper, more recently
worked together on People
for Portland, an anonymous,
well-funded advocacy cam-
paign pushing local elected
leaders to take urgent action
on crime, homelessness and
other livability issues that
have bedeviled the state’s
largest city.
Lavey told The Orego-
nian on Monday that he and
Looper will provide messag-
ing, strategy and advice to
Johnson, a moderate Dem-
ocrat who has garnered sub-
stantial fi nancial support
from an array of business,
civic and political backers.
Filings show she has
amassed more than $3.4 mil-
lion to date, an amount that
far outpaces any of her rivals.
The increasingly crowded
fi eld include Democrats such
as House Speaker Tina Kotek,
state Treasurer Tobias Read
and former New York Times
columnist Nicholas Kristof,
State Sen. Betsy Johnson is
running for governor as an
independent.
while House Minority Leader
Christine Drazan, physician
Bud Pierce and Sandy Mayor
Stan Pulliam are among the
Republican contenders.
Johnson resigned earlier
this month from the Legis-
lature to focus full-time on
her statewide run as an unaf-
fi liated candidate. She rep-
resented a swath of North-
west Oregon since 2001 that
included Clatsop, Tillamook,
Columbia, Multnomah and
Washington counties.
Johnson’s campaign last
week listed payments of
$25,000 to Gallatin Public
Aff airs and $50,000 to Wheel-
house Northwest, fi rms oper-
ated by Lavey and Looper,
state fi lings show. The expen-
ditures were fi rst reported by
The Oregon Way, a website
focused on state politics.
Lavey
and
Looper
co-founded People for Port-
land, which placed ads on
TV and online and directed
a mass emailing campaign
to members of the Portland
City Council, Multnomah
County Board of Commis-
sioners, Metro Council and
state lawmakers who repre-
sent Portland.
The dark money group
disclosed it spent more than
$500,000 in the three months
ending Sept. 30, city lobby-
ing reports show.
Lavey has previously
worked for i ndependents and
Republicans including Chris
Dudley and former state and
U.S. Sen. Gordon Smith.
Looper has worked for pro-
gressive causes and Demo-
cratic candidates including
Gov. Kate Brown.
Lavey said he and Looper
offi cially signed on with the
Johnson campaign about
mid-October, though he also
admitted the pair did exten-
sive polling and consulting
work for her over the sum-
mer as she weighed whether
or not to run for governor.
While neither consultant
nor their companies appear in
campaign fi nance fi lings for
Johnson prior to this month,
Lavey said the pair received
$200,000 through seven large
donations to Johnson listed
as “in-kind” contributions
in October.
State records show those
donors were: Alexia dePot-
tere-Smith, general counsel
for the San Francisco-based
Center for Resource Solu-
tions, a nonprofi t that claims
to promote renewable energy
($100,000); Pacifi c Seafood,
whose president and CEO,
Frank Dulcich, is a longtime
Republican donor ($40,000);
Tim Boyle, CEO of Colum-
bia Sportswear ($25,000);
Greg Goodman, one of Port-
land’s largest real estate
developers ($10,000); Jor-
dan Schnitzer, the Portland
philanthropist and business-
man ($10,000); Global Com-
panies LLC, a Massachu-
setts-based energy company
($10,000); and Columbia
Investments Ltd, a Portland
real estate fi rm ($5,000).
Two of those contribu-
tors, Boyle and Schnitzer,
are also People for Portland
backers, the only individuals
thus far to have publicly dis-
closed their affi liation with
the group.
Lavey, however, said his
and Looper’s work for John-
son is completely separate
from their People for Port-
land eff ort. “The work we do
for our clients is always inde-
pendent, 100% of the time,”
he said.
Rideout: Former Astorian reporter will step in
Continued from Page A1
Rideout’s tenure at the
community radio station
began with a conversation
between neighbors.
Before moving to Asto-
ria in 2002, she worked as
a freelance journalist for the
Associated Press, national
publications and local news-
papers in Arizona. She also
worked as a high school
teacher.
When she came to the
coast, her new neighbor hap-
pened to be Carol Newman,
who works for KMUN and
told Rideout she might enjoy
volunteering at the station.
Rideout thought it would be
a good opportunity to meet
people.
“At the time, they just
happened to need someone
— desperately — to do a
show that they have called
‘ Bedtime Stories’ where you
read children’s stories on the
air. So I could read, and I was
alive,” she said. “And they
put me down in the seat and
trained me a little bit, and
then I started reading on the
air. It was truly terrifying.”
She eventually got used
to hearing her own voice,
and successfully vaulted the
transition between written
and spoken journalism. She
joined KMUN’s staff within
the year.
Rideout worked as a host
for “Morning Edition,” and
later for “All Things Consid-
ered.” Eventually, she was
hired as a reporter.
Hailey Hoff man/The Astorian
Katie Frankowicz will serve as the news director at KMUN.
“It was always really
fun,” she said. “That kind of
work is just very fun stuff .”
After developing an inter-
est in the Columbia River
Bar Pilots, she began to talk
about ship traffi c during
Morning Edition. That even-
tually turned into “The Ship
Report,” which she started
in 2003.
“It just sort of grew into
the segment that it is now,
where I was interview-
ing people and just shar-
ing marine weather, talking
about the maritime environ-
ment. I really didn’t know
whether people were gonna
like it or not, but people
really did like it,” she said.
“They really connected with
it because we’re such a river
town here and such a river
environment.”
Though she is retiring
from the news, Rideout will
still be producing The Ship
Report .
Rideout said that some
career highlights have been
her recent reporting on rural
broadband, which she said
has been especially chal-
lenging for families during
the pandemic. She also
learned a lot from a collab-
oration with National Public
Radio on a segment about
the bar pilots. Another story
that sticks with her is an
in-depth interview she did
with a homeless woman who
shared her experience with
social services in Astoria.
“I feel very fortunate to
have had these 20 years of
time that I’ve been involved
with the place,” Rideout
said. “It’s a wonderful orga-
nization, and I’m so happy
that Katie wants that job
because she will do a great
job.”
Frankowicz will step in
on Jan. 17 , but is training
to make the transition from
print to audio with the help
of her predecessor.
Frankowicz worked as a
reporter at T he Astorian for
the past 4 1/2 years, cover-
ing a range of topics from
the environment and natural
resources to local govern-
ment and education.
She fi rst stepped into The
Astorian’s newsroom over
a decade ago as a Snowden
intern from the University of
Oregon. She spent the fol-
lowing years doing stints at
The Astorian and the Chi-
nook Observer and work-
ing in freelance for publi-
cations on the coast and in
Portland before returning to
the paper.
“I’ve been in journalism
for a pretty long time now,”
Frankowicz said. “In some
aspects it’s the same job I’ve
always done, but with new
technicalities in terms of
how stories are delivered.”
Frankowicz said she is
happy to stick with report-
ing locally.
“That’s what I’m proud
of. It’s not any one story.
It’s the consistent and reli-
able coverage of things that
people care about out here,
and that I care about because
I also live here,” s he said.
“That has always felt incred-
ibly valuable to me and it’s
been one of the reasons that
I’ve stuck around at small
papers.”
At KMUN, she plans on
prioritizing original report-
ing and hopes to expand
the station’s community
coverage .
Assault
Astoria for driving under
On
the
Record
• Bradley
Scott Minder,
the infl uence of intoxi-
Child care: Options in the county remain scarce
42, of Astoria, was arrested cants and reckless driving.
on Dec. 23 on Exchange
Street in Astoria for assault
in the fourth degree.
DUII
• Christine June Law-
ler, 54, of Astoria, was
arrested on Saturday in the
area of Nimitz Drive in
• David Allen Hale, 34,
of Astoria, was arrested on
Sunday at his residence on
Pleasant Avenue in Astoria
for an earlier report of him
driving under the infl uence
of intoxicants at the Astoria
Mini Mart on Marine Drive.
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The Astorian, PO Box 210, Astoria, OR
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Continued from Page A1
“There’s no way child
care is ever going to be prof-
itable,” Citovic said. But she
views the service as a util-
ity, similar to a library. It’s
“never going to be profi t-
able, but it’s the right thing to
have in your city,” she said.
The group behind the
idea has grown, Citovic said,
and while the concept is still
in development, the non-
profi t hopes to have a pro-
posal to the city by the end
of January.
The day care, run by
the Astoria Parks and Rec-
reation Department at the
Astoria Recreation Center,
has become increasingly tax-
ing on department staff .
The center relies heav-
ily on lower-paid, part-time
labor, which has been espe-
cially challenging to hire and
retain during the coronavirus
pandemic.
In November, the day
care closed its prekinder-
garten classroom due to a
lack of staff , impacting nine
children.
Jonah Dart-McLean, the
city’s parks director, said he
is curious to see the proposal
from Clatsop Promise. But
even if the city does not fi nd
a partnership, there are no
plans to discontinue the ser-
vice, he said.
“We’re just trying to look
at ways that we can con-
Subscription rates
Eff ective January 12, 2021
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tinue to support child care
resources in the area, and
then also be able to do the
other obligations and items
the parks department also
off ers to the community,”
Dart-McLean said.
The center opened nearly
a decade ago because of the
need for child care in the
community. The day care
still serves as a vital resource
as child care options in the
county remain scarce. It is
also one of the few centers
of its size on the North Coast
that provides care for infants.
T hrough a partnership,
Dart-McLean hopes the city
can support a child care ser-
vice by removing common
burdens like the cost of rent.
He said the city will work
with an entity on whatever
other support is needed to
start and maintain longevity.
“Because that’s really
important,” Dart-McLean
said. “We don’t want to start
anything that then falls apart
and results with people los-
ing care suddenly.”
GAME MEAT PROCESSING
Debbie D’s will be at Cash &
Carry in Warrenton 10:00
a.m. every Saturday (except
Christmas and New Years Day)
to pick up and deliver meat for
processing. The last pick up
will be January 8th.
Please call Mon-Fri between
10-4 so we know to expect you.
DEBBIE D’S Jerky & Sausage Factory
2210 Main Avenue N. • Tillamook, OR • 503-842-2622