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The INDEPENDENT, December 4, 2003
The
INDEPENDENT
Serving the upper Nehalem River valley. Published twice
monthly, on the first and third Thursdays of each month, by
Public Opinion Laboratory Ltd., 725 Bridge Street, Vernonia,
OR 97064, as a free newspaper. Publishers, Dirk & Noni An-
dersen. Editor, Noni Andersen. Phone/Fax: 503-429-9410,
e-mail: noni@vernonia.com Display Advertising, Clark Mc-
Gaugh, 503-429-9410, e-mail: clark@vernonia.com
Opinion
City, Museum dropped from
Historical Society law suit
The Columbia County Historical Society got one thing right:
It was unreasonable to sue either the City of Vernonia or the
Vernonia Pioneer Museum for wanting to keep donations from
Vernonia residents in the Vernonia museum. The historical so-
ciety wants to fight Columbia County over who has ownership
of the collections, but neither the City nor the Museum organ-
ization claims ownership. The City owns the building that
houses the museum, not the artifacts. The museum associa-
tion acts as caretakers.
City Attorney Julie Coontz-Steffen was right on the mark
when she wrote:
“This lawsuit does a terrible disservice to the members of
our community who donated their cherished items as histori-
cal artifacts to be viewed in Vernonia and appreciated by the
members of this community. To attempt to remove them…is a
malicious and malevolent ripping away of the heritage of Ver-
nonia’s citizens…”
Of course, none of this has answered the question about
what happened to the native American artifacts that disap-
peared from the Vernonia museum when it was locked up at
the behest of the society. Those irreplaceable items are still
missing.
Santa, tree lighting event are missing
In years past, the Vernonia Chamber of Commerce sched-
uled a visit from Santa Claus for all the kids (and parents) who
wanted to whisper in Santa’s ear. Then, a few years ago, one
merchant said he could do a better job, so the chamber ac-
quiesced. Now that merchant has dropped it, but didn’t bother
to mention to anyone in the chamber. So, parents who want to
get a picture of their children with Santa should take them to
the Christmas Bazaar at Washington Grade School, either
Saturday or Sunday, Dec.6-7.
Also missing is a tree lighting ceremony with a choir and
sing-along. Vernonia Pride took over that event from the
chamber a few years ago, also, but have dropped it this year
because attendance declined. There will be a tree lighting, but
no music to accompany it. There are plenty of musicians in
Vernonia so next year, perhaps, another old-fashioned sing-
along can be arranged.
Probable rescheduling for Town Hall
It isn’t definite, but the second phase of the Town Hall for
economic development will probably be postponed until Janu-
ary. Too many participants will be unable to attend in Decemb
er. Watch for future announcements.
Ike Says…
By Dale E. Webb, Member
Nehalem Valley Chapter, Izaak Walton League
This year’s hunting sea-
son in the local area was
both a bust and a blast.
The Blacktailed deer sea-
son was the bust and the
Roosevelt elk season was
the blast.
Deer hunting in the Sad-
dle Mountain and sur-
rounding units has been on
a steady decline. I finally got my hands on some
data from the Oregon Department of Fish and
Wildlife regarding hunting in the Saddle Moun-
tain unit for 2001 and 2002. Rifle harvest has
declined from 712 bucks in 1999 to 374 bucks
during the general season in 2002. Reports from
local hunters indicate that this year’s harvest
was low, again. Small bucks were also scarce in
the harvest this year, this bodes lower buck har-
vests in the future. Some real nice bucks were
taken, as has been happening in the last few
years, but I get the sense that we are just har-
vesting the last remaining mature bucks. Future
years will almost certainly get leaner as long as
the Hair Loss Syndrome continues to raise hav-
oc with deer herds. While hunting elk this year, I
noticed that deer numbers were real spotty, with
some areas having a lot of sign and other areas
having very little sign.
Elk season this year was very good for rifle
hunters, with the second season seeing a lot of
bulls taken. Archery hunters suffered with a hot
and mostly locked out season this year, although
it seems that a fair number of bulls were taken,
regardless. The first rifle season saw normal har-
vests, but the second season really caught on
fire with arrival of wet, windy and snowy weath-
er.
The rifle elk season in the Saddle Mountain
unit has had some major changes in recent
years and this may have led up to the big second
season harvest. In 2000, hunter numbers in
each season were limited to 1500 tags, which
resulted in nearly 1000 fewer tags sold in the two
seasons, combined. The following year, the sea-
son length was shortened to the old four-day first
season and seven-day second season. The re-
sults of fewer tags and shorter seasons were
clearly observed in the harvest. In 1999, 465
bulls were harvested during the two seasons. In
2000, the first year of tag reductions, the harvest
fell to 309 bulls and in 2001, the first year of
shorter seasons, the harvest was 299. The har-
vest climbed slightly in 2002 to 321. This year,
my guess is that we will see a harvest close to
500 bulls. While cutting hunter numbers and
season length will reduce harvest under normal
circumstances, as the bull population rises, the
odds of bagging a bull increase and, with this
year’s weather during the second season, the
odds went up even further.
I learned a lesson this year while elk hunting.
A hunter’s boots are one of his most relied upon
assets. I have two sets of boots that I use, a set
of caulks and a set of knobbys. Both are the
leather-upper and rubber-lower type of boot.
They have served me well and I usually come
home each night with dry feet. This year I hap-
pened to grab hold of my son’s boots, which look
just like mine. I even thought they might be his
but, since we both wear size 10, I didn’t worry.
Please see page 21