149TH YEAR, NO. 139
WEEKEND EDITION // SATuRdAY, MAY 21, 2022
$1.50
Business leaders
press city for
creative solutions
on wastewater
Growth of breweries strains system
By NICOLE BALES
The Astorian
As Astoria finalizes its industrial pretreat-
ment program, business leaders are calling for
more creative solutions to increase capacity of
the city’s wastewater treatment facility.
The City Council adopted an ordinance this
week formalizing the program, which requires
all breweries, cideries and distilleries to have
industrial discharge permits that set the limits
on the sewage the businesses can release into
the city’s treatment lagoons.
In the coming weeks, the council will
review separate resolutions that will establish
waste allocations and detail a new rate struc-
ture that will classify different users based on
concentration of wastewater.
The city began working with the two larg-
est breweries — Fort George Brewery and
Buoy Beer Co. — about two years ago to
develop the program.
As the businesses, and others in the fer-
mentation sector, have grown over the past
decade, so has the strain on the city’s system.
The concentration of suspended sol-
ids from the hops, barley and yeast used in
the brewing process has been discharged
directly into the treatment lagoons for years,
impacting capacity and taxing the city’s abil-
ity to pump out treated wastewater into the
Columbia River clean enough for federal
standards.
With the boom of craft beer across the
county, the problem is not unique to Asto-
ria. Other cities and breweries have also been
forced to implement industrial pretreatment
programs and figure out other ways to address
the impact on municipal treatment systems.
Over the past two years, in addition to
implementing an industrial pretreatment pro-
gram, the city has planned and received fund-
ing for a $5 million project to expand capac-
ity of the treatment lagoons. Fort George and
Buoy Beer jointly hired a brewery waste-
water consultant, which led to developing a
side-streaming system, which removes the
heaviest effluent before the wastewater is dis-
charged into the city’s system.
Compete for capacity
With all the changes, Astoria expects the
treatment lagoons to last until 2045. But some
business leaders and brewery owners feel the
new regulations, costs and limits could stifle
growth or make it too expensive for new ven-
tures to enter the market. There are also con-
cerns that businesses will be left to compete for
capacity.
“In your deliberations, we respectfully ask
you to consider a couple of things,” Ayreann
Colombo, the executive director of Columbia
See Wastewater, Page A6
Lydia Ely/The Astorian
Monica Gibbs prepares lunch plates while working at Filling Empty Bellies.
LiFEBoat Services looks to
help the homeless find jobs
Transitional
employment can be a
bridge to the workforce
By NICOLE BALES
The Astorian
M
onica Gibbs had been out of
work for a while. She wanted
to find a job, but she was not
sure she could manage reentering the
workforce.
Gibbs was homeless for much of
her life, including after she moved
to Astoria with her daughter in 2011.
Her post-traumatic stress disorder
makes it difficult for her to be con-
sistent, which makes it hard for her to
find a good fit and an employer will-
ing to be patient.
“You mentally know yourself, and
you’re like, ‘OK, I can go work this
job until maybe two weeks when I
get a paycheck, but after that I don’t
know if I’m going to be able to go
back,’” she said. “McDonald’s don’t
want you to walk in and tell them that.
You’re wasting their time. There has
to be places that are equipped to give
people a chance.”
Gibbs said her life changed after
‘THERE ARE SO MANY DIFFERENT TYPES
OF MENTAL ILLNESS AND JUST BECAUSE
YOU HAVE MENTAL ILLNESS DOESN’T
MEAN THAT YOU CAN’T BE A PRODUCTIVE
MEMBER OF SOCIETY ... YOU MIGHT JUST
NEED A LITTLE BIT OF EXTRA HELP.’
Osarch Orak | director of Filling Empty Bellies
she became a member of Beacon
Clubhouse, a members-only center
that provides mental health support
and other services.
Beacon Clubhouse and Filling
Empty Bellies, a nonprofit that serves
meals to anyone in need and connects
homeless people with services, are
under the umbrella of LiFEBoat Ser-
vices, which opened on Commercial
Street downtown last August.
Gibbs was the first person to com-
plete Beacon Clubhouse’s transi-
tional employment program, which
helps connect members to jobs and
provides support during the first 90
days, whether it be assisting with
transportation, job training or provid-
ing clothes and shoes. After 90 days,
members may be hired on perma-
nently or use the experience to find
another job.
Gibbs was hired by Filling Empty
Bellies to help in the kitchen for 90
days, and she said the work was a good
fit and gave her something to focus
on. Afterward, she took on a perma-
nent position in the organization.
“With the transitional employment,
I got a shot,” said Gibbs, who has since
also found housing. “I wasn’t trying to
prove to them I could do the job. I’m
working hard to prove to myself that I
could do it. And I did it.”
See LiFEBoat, Page A6
Popular downtown coffee shop to change hands Commissioners move
closer to consensus
Cross stepping away
from The Rusty Cup
on vacation rentals
By ABBEY McDONALD
The Astorian
From behind the counter at The Rusty
Cup, Brian Medford greeted customers
and their dogs by name and juggled cof-
fee orders. He’s still working on know-
ing what a regular will want as soon as
they walk through the door.
When Medford takes over the beloved
cafe on Commercial Street downtown,
he will be inheriting much more than the
business itself.
Kristy Cross, owner of the cafe
and voted best barista by Coast Week-
end’s readers 10 years in a row, said she
couldn’t have sold the business to any-
one with more enthusiasm.
Medford, originally from the Appala-
chians in North Carolina, learned baking
professionally in Seattle. He moved to
Astoria in 2019, where he owns Idlewild
Biscuits and Bakes and works at Peter
Pan Market & Deli.
“I have a pastry background, and I
had wanted to have a spot here in town.
Then the pandemic occurred, and this
was always a place where I would come
Vote would
make rentals a
recognized use
MORE INSIDE
County, city leaders
discuss housing • A2
By ERICK BENGEL
The Astorian
Lydia Ely/The Astorian
Kristy Cross and Brian Medford stand in the doorway of The Rusty Cup.
and get my coffee,” Medford said. “So
I just thought, maybe I should just ask
her what she’s thinking about with the
shop and see if she’s interested in maybe
doing something together.”
The two began meeting earlier this
year to discuss his interest in the busi-
ness. Cross realized she’d found the per-
son with the right energy to own and
operate The Rusty Cup.
“We just started talking and it was
very natural, and I could tell that he was
going to have that same care for it that
I have. I just felt good about it,” Cross
said.
For the next month, Medford is work-
ing at the cafe three days a week to learn
from Cross and get to know the busi-
ness more before taking over at the end
of June.
“I feel a little daunted about it. I
mean, it’s such a hub for folks and
they love it here and they love Kristy.
It’s the coffee, it’s the food. It’s such a
sense of fun here, and everybody’s wel-
come,” he said. “Kristy knows everyone,
See Coffee shop, Page A6
Clatsop County com-
missioners have signaled
they are ready to approve
a change to the county’s
development code that
would make vacation rent-
als a recognized use in unin-
corporated areas.
Commissioner
Mark
Kujala, Commissioner John
Toyooka, Commissioner
Courtney Bangs and Com-
missioner Lianne Thomp-
son indicated they favor a
county staff recommenda-
tion, crafted on board direc-
tion, to allow vacation rent-
als in all commercial and
residential zones, where
more than 170 already
operate.
The four commissioners
said at a Wednesday work
session that they were pre-
pared to vote on the issue
after county staff presented
an in-house report that did
not find a direct causal link
between the growth of the
local vacation rental indus-
try and the rise in home
prices. Homes throughout
the county are appreciating
in value, likely driven by
high demand facing a con-
stricted supply, the report
said.
The report also found
that the vacation rental
industry is not eating into
affordable housing. Most
homes used as rentals of 30
or fewer days fall outside
a price range considered
affordable.
A 2019 study that looked
at the local housing crisis
See Vacation rentals, Page A6