The
Columbia
Press
Celebrating
our
100th year
• 1922-2022
1
50 ¢
February 4, 2022
503-861-3331
Vol. 6, Issue 5
Ready for rescues in any terrain
By Cindy Yingst
The Columbia Press
Getting around town after a major tsu-
nami or earthquake could be all but im-
possible for residents and rescue person-
nel.
Imagine a huge wave of water filling
in the low pockets of land, leaving some
houses on miniature islands with no exit
to safety. Perhaps it’s easier to imagine
after last month’s trifecta of rain, high
tides, and snowmelt caused wide-scale
flooding.
Enter HARV, Warrenton’s new High
Axle Rescue Vehicle. The city of War-
renton received the vehicle through Or-
egon’s Office of Emergency Management
via a preparedness grant.
The city applied for the grant in 2019,
hoping to reduce its vulnerability during
high-water events and natural disasters.
“It’s pretty exciting,” Fire Chief Brian
Alsbury said. “We were lucky to get it.
We’d applied two years ago and were de-
nied at first and then the state realized
they’d awarded two vehicles to the same
department and that wasn’t the intent.
We were the next in line.”
The state purchased six HARV vehi-
cles and two of them are now in Clatsop
County. The second one went to the city
The Hoxseys
win annual
AWACC award
The Columbia Press
Spruce Up Warrenton founders
Brenda and Norm Hoxsey won the
Richard Ford Distinguished Service
Award at the Astoria-Warrenton
Area Chamber of Commerce annual
banquet on Saturday.
“(It) goes to a couple who under-
stand the true meaning of service,”
Mayor Henry Balensifer said in an-
nouncing the winners. “Our com-
munity’s own Spruce Up Warrenton
committee owes much of its existence
and early success to them and their
community spirit.”
Brenda Hoxsey is a “master or-
ganizer of people,” Balensifer said.
Norm Hoxsey is a “driving force for
property cleanups.”
Together the couple have rounded
up a posse of volunteers responsible
for turning blighted areas of down-
town into nice places for gathering,
eating and shopping. Spruce Up
Warrenton has sponsored communi-
Warrenton Fire
Department’s new
high-axle rescue
vehicle maneuvers
through a flooded
area of Strawberry
Knoll, above, and
over a bluff on the
beach.
Lenard Hansen
Warrenton Fire Department
See ‘Awards’ on Page 4
See ‘HARV’ on Page 6
Life wasn’t easy for Carl Jackson
By Cindy Yingst
The Columbia Press
Courtesy Dennis Dunn
Carl Jackson, right, enjoys coffee with Le-
Roy Dunn in this 2014 photo.
One of Warrenton’s most famil-
iar faces, Carl Armani Jackson, has
died of COVID-19.
Jackson, 68, had been living in
Warrenton as a homeless per-
son since about 2007. The 6-foot,
1-inch, black man was a downtown
presence for many years, sleeping
in local parks or churches.
More recently, he’d been staying
at the Alder Creek Village home
of LeRoy Dunn, who’d befriended
him.
“Carl mostly keeps to himself,”
wrote Dunn’s son, Dennis, in a
2014 profile of Jackson. “He listens
to K-Love, a Christian radio sta-
tion, to keep his thoughts positive.
He sits on a park bench to avoid
bothering others and goes for long
walks.”
Jackson had no criminal record
See ‘Jackson’ on Page 8
Don Frank Photography
Norm and Brenda Hoxsey received
the Ford Award from Warrenton Mayor
Henry Balensifer.