Milestones
2025
Celebrating the longevity of local businesses and services in Tillamook County
Milestones Special Section
Rose Valley Creamery
St. Mary by the Sea Catholic Church
Tillamook Ford
Stop by and Wish these Businesses and Organizations Happy Anniversary!
Tillamook Christian Center
Zwald Transport
Headlight Herald
Citizen North Coast
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Tillamook Farmer’s Co-op Adventist Health Tillamook Ford King Real Estate Tillamook Christian Center Tillamook Bay Community College Rose Valley Creamery Oregon Coast Dance Center St. Mary By the Sea Zwald Transport TLC Fibre Federal
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North Coast
Citizen Serving North Tillamook County since 1996
Thursday, February 6, 2025 | Vol. 32, Issue 3
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Commissioners to reduce TLT increase ask WILL CHAPPELL Citizen Editor
The section of the manmade dune at Cape Lookout State Park that has experienced the most sloughing because of wave and storm action and that will be repaired as part of the coming work.
Cape Lookout prepares for work to start in fall of 2025 WILL CHAPPELL Citizen Editor
Rangers at Cape Lookout State Park are preparing for work to upgrade utilities and rehabilitate their beach’s revetment this fall with an expected completion date of spring or summer 2026. Work was originally planned for this summer, but with designs for the $3-5-million project incomplete, work was delayed in mid-January, and reservations reopened for this spring and summer. Funding for the project is coming from general obligation bonds that were approved by the Oregon legislature in See CAPE LOOKOUT, Page A3
A view towards Cape Lookout with still-intact dune on the left.
See TLT, Page A3
Shelters assembled at CARE WILL CHAPPELL Citizen Editor
Installation of nine low-barrier shelters for homeless residents and three accompanying bathrooms took place last week at Community Action Resource Enterprises in downtown Tillamook.
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In response to concerns raised by hoteliers and short-term rental owners at a public hearing on January 29, Tillamook County commissioners agreed to reduce a requested transient lodging tax increase from 5% to 4%. Commissioners also agreed that, if approved by voters, the 4% increase would be phased in over two years, with 2% annual raises. The public hearing on the proposed transient lodging tax (TLT) rate increase was split into two parts, one in the morning at the Tillamook County Courthouse and one in the evening at the Port of Tillamook Bay. At both meetings, Tillamook County Chief Administrative Officer Rachel Hagerty kicked proceedings off with a presentation on the TLT and proposed increase. Tillamook County’s transient lodging tax (TLT) was approved by voters in 2013 at a rate of 10% and went into effect in 2014. 70% of the funds raised by the tax, assessed on all overnight stays in the county, go towards supporting tourism promotion or tourism-related facilities, in accordance with state law, with the remaining 30% dedicated to road maintenance. The idea of increasing the rate of the TLT started to percolate to the surface last spring, according to Hagerty, in the face of declining revenues from state forests. The budget group that met beginning last summer to look at ways to address this year’s $1 million shortfall and projected shortfalls of $3-4 million in future fiscal years identified a list of more than 50 possible solutions, among which was the TLT increase. The proposed 5% increase is projected to bring in $3-3.5 million annually, with $1 million (30%) available to the county government for any purpose and the remainder obligated to fund tourism promotion or projects. Hagerty said that the proposed increase would include a funding allocation structure for the additional $1 million in unrestricted revenues, with 80% being earmarked to support the sheriff’s office, 10% to the county’s emergency management department and 10% to maintenance of the county’s new emergency radio system, which will be constructed soon following voter approval of a bond to support it last November. Hagerty clarified that the additional funds directed to the sheriff’s office would not be
With the shelters erected, the project enters its final stages, with connecting electricity and building pathways and a fence around the site the largest remaining tasks. Once complete, Community Action Resource Enterprises (CARE) Executive Director Jeff Blackford said that the organization is planning an open house for the site to show the community what their support has made possible. “Tillamook stepped up and helped support this too,” Blackford said, “so we want to make sure the entire community can come and take a look at what they supported to show them that this is going to be a place where people can come and get housed and get a new start.” Work towards the grouping of shel-
ters on a county owned piece of property adjacent to CARE’s downtown Tillamook headquarters is being paid for by $266,000 appropriated by the state legislature in 2023 from Measure 110 behavioral health network funds. After working with the county to secure a lease on the site in summer 2023, the project ran into repeated snags, with original designs not meeting fire code, and the team finding that a French drain needed to be installed to prevent flooding, as well as a power vault to provide sufficient electricity. By September of last year, the French drain was in place and See SHELTERS, Page A2
As of midday Wednesday, workers had completed installation of three toilets and one four-person shelter (not visible behind the last toilet).
Power shortages, continued rate increases loom as electrical system modernizes WILL CHAPPELL Citizen Editor
Power generation in Oregon needs to increase by 30% by 2033 or be offset by increased appliance efficiency to meet the increased demand from new technologies that require greater amounts of electricity, according to a forecast conducted by the Pacific Northwest Utilities Conference Committee. Tillamook Peoples’ Utility District (TPUD) General Manager Todd Simmons discussed the shortfall and its implications for both supply reliability and customer rates with the Tillamook County board of commissioners on January 22. Simmons said that the projected shortfall was being caused by increasing demands from business customers that are expanding server farms in the region and electrifying their vehicle fleets, as well as residential customers who are also adopting electric vehicles and increasing electric appliance usage in their homes. This increase is being matched by complicating factors on the generation side of the equation, as the Bonneville Power Administration, from which TPUD buys its power, and other regional power companies incorporate new generation methods. In the past decade, Oregon has completely transitioned away from coal-powered genSee POWER SHORTAGE, Page A5