DailyAstorian.com // TUESDAY, MAY 24, 2022
149TH YEAR, NO. 140
$1.50
Johnson
launches
‘Betsy
Brigades’
Her signature drive
intensifies after primaries
By GARY WARNER
Oregon Capital Bureau
Photos by Lydia Ely/The Astorian
The spillway of Fishhawk Lake near Birkenfeld.
Fishhawk Lake set to
upgrade infrastructure
Private community looks to turn the page after fish deaths
By ETHAN MYERS
The Astorian
B
IRKENFELD – Fishhawk Lake
Reserve and Community, which
was fined by the state over the
deaths of thousands of fish after its
reservoir was drained, is looking to
turn the page as it nears construction
of a new spillway and fish ladder at its
dam.
At a kickoff Friday to celebrate
the $6 million project, residents of
the private community invited stake-
holders and other influential fig-
ures to mark the occasion, includ-
ing Betsy Johnson, the former state
senator who is campaigning for gov-
ernor as an independent, and Clat-
sop County Commissioner Lianne
Thompson.
See Fishhawk Lake, Page A2
The “Betsy Brigades” are revving up to
move into the Oregon political scene, carry-
ing the message of the insurgent moderate
seeking to become just the second indepen-
dent governor in state history.
“We’re in full-court press,” Betsy John-
son said in an interview on Election Day
last week. “We’re going to have Betsy Bri-
gades teeing up to gather signatures in every
county.”
Johnson’s mixing of
basketball and golf meta-
phors is symbolic of what
she says Oregon needs in
politics: a variety.
“Take the best ideas
from Democrats and the
best ideas of Republicans Betsy Johnson
so Oregon can get its mojo
back,” she said.
Tina Kotek, a for-
mer state House speaker,
won the Democratic pri-
mary for governor. Chris-
tine Drazan, a former state House minority
leader, took the Republican primary.
With Democrats and Republicans
depleted by the primaries, Johnson is jump-
ing into the spotlight with the largest war
chest. Johnson has raised more than $8 mil-
lion and has $5.3 million in her campaign
fund. Her campaign has attracted large con-
tributions from what critics have called the
“bulldozer and buzzsaw” industries — tim-
ber and construction.
The largest amount — $1.75 million —
has come from Nike co-founder Phil Knight.
Johnson’s first campaign goal is to gather
at least 24,000 valid signatures to submit to
the secretary of state by Aug. 16 and qualify
for the November ballot.
“We’ll blow by that number,” she said.
Middle ground
Jeanne Scilley, the president of the Fishhawk Lake board, at a groundbreaking
ceremony for the new project on Friday.
Johnson has sought to stake out the mid-
dle ground between what she called “the
shrill voices of the left and right.” She’s
lined up endorsements from the moderate
wings of both the Democratic and Repub-
lican parties.
See Johnson, Page A6
‘It requires a lot Tenants raise alarm at Ilwaco RV park
surface
of flexibility and Complaints
under new owners
problem-solving’
By KATIE
FRANKOWICZ
KMUN
Emergency room
called to Berry
By ERICK BENGEL
The Astorian
hannon Berry, an emer-
gency physician at
Columbia Memorial Hos-
pital in Astoria, wondered
whether she could become
a doctor.
She was fascinated with
physics and astronomy but
realized in college that those
fields weren’t very social.
As a scientist, she wanted
to work with human beings
rather than in a lab.
At the University of
Washington, she applied to
the college’s nursing school,
nurse practitioner school
and medical school at the
same time, believing the last
one was out of reach.
“I just had a lot of self-
S
Shannon Berry is an
emergency physician at
Columbia Memorial Hospital.
doubt,” Berry recalled.
She got accepted to all
three programs.
After UW, Berry had
a residency in emergency
medicine at Oregon Health
& Science University
See Berry, Page A2
ILWACO, Wash. — The
City Council met last week
to discuss a proclamation to
declare a housing emergency
in the city. But some residents
say a very specific type of
housing emergency has been
unfolding for months only a
few blocks away.
Tenants of the Beacon
Charters and RV Park on
Elizabeth Avenue say the
new owners have threatened
them with evictions and tried
to intimidate them into leav-
ing, a possible displacement
that one business owner has
called “homelessness in the
making.”
The state and Pacific
County have intervened over
issues at the RV park, but ten-
ants and others concerned
about the situation are urging
city leaders and port commis-
sioners to take action as well.
The Port of Ilwaco owns the
land and leases it to the RV
park owners, while the park
itself, until recently, was
owned and operated by the
Katie Frankowicz/KMUN
Susan Gill rests in her trailer at Beacon Charters and RV Park in
Ilwaco. She has a place to go but says other neighbors aren’t as
fortunate as they feel pressure to move from the new owners.
mayor.
Beacon is home to some
of Ilwaco’s most vulnerable
residents, the Pacific County
Health and Human Services
Department noted in a let-
ter this month to city lead-
ers. Many of the tenants live
on fixed or very low incomes.
Many are elderly and dealing
with disabilities. Many have
lived at the RV park for years.
Displacing these people,
the county wrote, would “fur-
ther the housing crises we are
currently experiencing within
Pacific County.”
The county was more spe-
cific in a letter to the Wash-
ington Attorney General’s
Manufactured Housing Dis-
pute Resolution Program in
March: “Due to our lack of
affordable housing within
Pacific County and the sheer
number of low-income indi-
viduals being evicted, this
eviction would devastate
our community and these
families.”
‘Management’
Beacon Charters and RV
Park includes 60 sites for RVs
and, according to various esti-
mates, has been home to any-
where from 45 to 100 people
— a significant portion of the
city’s population, which hov-
ers at just over 1,000.
Up until April, Beacon
belonged to Mike Cassinelli,
who has served two terms as
mayor since 2009. He was
elected to the post for a third
time in November.
Cassinelli told port com-
missioners last year he was
looking to sell the RV park.
In early April, he finalized
the sale of the business and
his interest in the lease to
Michael and Denise Wer-
ner of Deer Point Meadows
Investments LLC for $1.5
million.
But issues with the park
were already in motion.
In February, before they
had ownership of Beacon,
the Werners began issuing
30-day notices to vacate the
property. Bruce Conklin, an
Olympia-based attorney who
represents around 10 of the
tenants, claimed the notices
were illegal. They had not
gone through the proper court
process, he said, and gave
tenants less time to move than
is allowed under state law.
See RV park, Page A6