November 30, 2018 | Cannon Beach Gazette | cannonbeachgazette.com • 7A
County study gets public hearing in Seaside
A harder line
on short-term
rentals?
By R.J. Marx
Cannon Beach Gazette
COLIN MURPHEY PHOTO
Performers portraying the Munchkins react to seeing
the Wicked Witch of the West on the set of “The Wizard
of Oz” at the Coaster Theatre.
Coaster Theatre hosts
‘Wizard of Oz’ onstage
Wiz from Page 1A
Ellen Jensen, who plays
Glinda the Good Witch of
the North and Aunt Em,
said she went as Glinda four
times for Halloween and is
excited to wear the iconic
costume.
For Kelsie Peterson, who
plays a tree, Winkie and
Ozian, this is her first time be-
ing part of a large production.
Rosalie Ennis, who plays
a Winkie and Ozian, is get-
ting back into theater. En-
nis grew up in Astoria and
earned degrees in theater but
hasn’t acted for many years.
“I wanted to get back into it
because it was a huge part of
my life since I was really lit-
tle,” she said.
Coaster regulars David
Sweeney and Sue Neuer
play the Tinman and Hicko-
ry and the Wicked Witch of
the West and Miss Gulch.
Lathrop said he’s playing
the characters as not really
women or men but just as
their character: “They’re farm
hands, and then they’re a lion
and scarecrow,” he said.
Allison Johnson plays
the Cowardly Lion and Zek,
and Katherine Lacaze plays
the Scarecrow and Hunk.
Lacaze, a Coast Weekend
contributor, said she audi-
tioned specifically for the
role of the Scarecrow.
“I’ve always wanted to
play this role since perform-
ing arts camp in high school.
I thought it would be really
cool to do it as a woman,”
she said.
Magic moments
The Coaster has never
staged “Oz” before.
“I think we wanted to
challenge ourselves and see
how we could do with it,”
Lathrop said.
The show is a Royal
Shakespeare Company pro-
duction and is based on a
stage that is four times the
size of the Coaster, Lathrop
said.
The show will have a set
that changes from Munch-
kinland to the Poppy Field,
Emerald City and the Wiz-
ard’s Chamber. Other scenes
will utilize wagons to rep-
resent the corn field and the
Tinman’s house. Costumes
are designed by Judith Light.
The show is using pre-re-
corded music to accompa-
ny the cast. Choreographer
Lisa Fergus, who also di-
rects shows at the Coaster,
said she wants to honor the
choreography from the film
while still being original.
Fergus said it’s exciting
to see the actors master the
movements.
“There’s just a magic mo-
ment where all of a sudden
their bodies know what to do
without thinking about it,”
she said. “That’s the best part
of choreography to me is
when you see that moment,
when it becomes easy.”
Authors of a new county
housing study came to Seaside
to unveil results from the report.
“This process is not over,”
announced project manager
Brendan Buckley of Johnson
Economics, a co-author of the
study.
Buckley and Jamin Kimmell
of Angelo Planning Group pre-
sented two hours of numbers
confirming what many in the
audience already knew: there’s
not enough workforce housing
and for too many, housing is
completely out of reach.
Kimmell said a key strategy
should be to keep higher-den-
sity development at a high-
er-density level, to make sure
that land is used for multifam-
ily or town-homes. For coastal
cities that are more constrained
like Cannon Beach, Seaside
and Gearhart, existing lots
that can be developed, acces-
sory dwelling units and other
approaches could be used to
increase availability.
While there seems to be
enough supply of land and
housing in terms of numbers,
much of the supply is serving
the short-term rental market,
leaving not enough for year-
round and workforce housing
— “the missing middle: town-
homes, cottage clusters and
other types of homes that can
attract first-time home buyers,”
Buckley said. “Where will local
housing go that won’t just be
used as vacation houses?”
Freeing up properties used
as short-term rentals or vacation
rental dwellings was considered
a driving force in promoting
housing availability.
“You might want to think
about it as putting commer-
cial uses in a residential area,”
Buckley said.
Renting out homes is a com-
mercial use, like a hotel room,
he added. “Thinking of it in
those terms can help frame it
and differentiate it from some-
one’s second home.”
R.J. MARX
City Councilors Tom Horning (left) and Steve Wright re-
view findings from the county housing study.
Members of the audience at
the mid-November forum, in-
cluding South County officials,
businesspeople and residents,
picked up on this theme.
“Looking at the ages of the
people in my residential neigh-
borhood here in Seaside and
looking at many of them and
realizing they won’t be here af-
ter two or three more years, and
they’ll be selling their houses,”
an audience member comment-
ed. “The trend I see is people
from outside saying, ‘I’m going
to make a big buck, I’m going
to buy a house and turn it into
a vacation rental.’ I’ve seen that
happen. It seems there’s a rub-
ber stamp that goes on top of all
those. I’m seeing our neighbor-
hood become a VRD.”
Others pointed to homeown-
ers who, they said, rented their
homes “under the table.”
The Clatsop County Hous-
ing Study, taken with the partic-
ipation of the five county cities
of Warrenton, Seaside, Cannon
Beach, Astoria and Gearhart,
with the unincorporated town-
ships around the county.
The study profiles and an-
alyzes the current countywide
housing supply, housing and
demographic trends.
Using this information, the
authors intend to review exist-
ing plans and develop projec-
tions based on data and policies.
Meeting the county’s need
for housing of all types is the
goal of the study.
The study, available at the
county website, provides details
on population growth, house-
hold characteristics and avail-
able land.
While the study says that
there is “ample buildable
land” throughout the county
to fill need for the past two
decades. Seaside is the most
constrained compared to its
20-year housing need. War-
renton, Astoria and unincor-
porated areas have the most
buildable land.
County growth is about 1
percent since 2000. Warren-
ton and Seaside are the fasting
growing cities; Cannon Beach
and Gearhart have been show-
ing “slow and steady growth,”
Buckley said.
Planners used the indus-
try standard of 30 percent of
gross income to determine
how much a person can afford,
Buckley said, a measure used
by banks and government
agencies.
Residents shared concerns
that those figures don’t really
reflect affordability.
“Could we say the numbers
don’t translate into actual cost?”
asked an audience member, add-
ing that utilities, taxes and other
necessities are not figured in.
Future studies could consider
residential possibilities for soon-
to-be vacated school properties
in the Seaside School District,
not included as available acre-
age in the study. Residents have
the opportunity to comment on
the document, with findings
posted on the county’s website.
The completed document
will include proposals for ini-
tiatives that may encourage
more production of needed
housing types, as well as rec-
ommendations on forming
partnerships and “capaci-
ty-building” strategies.
Seaside Mayor Jay Barber
shared the theme of regional
collaboration, and like resi-
dents, recognized the need to
address short-term rentals.
”The solutions to the issues
we’ve seen on the screen is a
regional, five-city solution,”
he said.
“The mayors of these five
cities are meeting soon to grap-
ple with these,” Barber added.
“One of the major issues clearly
is that we need to revisit vaca-
tion rental policies. That will be
high on my list and I think that’s
true of the other councilors and
other jurisdictions as well.”
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