North Coast
Citizen Serving North Tillamook County since 1996
Thursday, September 19, 2024 | Vol. 31, Issue 17
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www.northcoastcitizen.com
Sammy’s Place developing new vision for housing November ballot finalized WILL CHAPPELL Citizen Editor
Sammy’s Place, a Nehalem charity serving individuals with intellectual and developmental dis-abilities, recently received a $744,000 grant to design an affordable housing development for land it owns in Nehalem. Julie Chick, executive director of Sammy’s Place, said that the charity’s staff and board are working to develop a new model for the community, with both intellectually and developmen-tally disabled, and those without disabilities living side by side. Chick said that this plan, while still in its early stages, is part of a larger initiative by the organization to change the communi-ty’s perception of the capabilities of those with disabilities. “What we’re doing is integrated housing so that people with disabilities finally have an opportunity that they have not been afforded in the past to participate in the community of their choice alongside their peers,” Chick said. Kathy Jean Hrywnak founded Sammy’s Place in 2006 with a mission of giving people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) on the north coast opportunities for respite. In 2014, following encouragement from Hrywnak, Chick, whose son has Downs Syndrome, joined the nonprofit’s board of directors, on the condition that the organization expand its mission to include creating living and working opportunities for the community. In tandem with broadening its vision, the organization also assumed organizational responsi-
WILL CHAPPELL Citizen Editor
at the charity see the project as an opportunity to rethink the way that those with IDD live. In Oregon, throughout the 20th century, members of the community were institutionalized at Fairview Hospital, while in the last 20 years, since Fairview closed, people with IDD have been housed in group homes for five to seven people, according to Chick. While that approach is better than the institutional one that preceded it, Chick said that she and others at Sammy’s Place think it is time for a new paradigm. “Now, that’s 20 plus years old and we’re going
Candidates running for offices in the November election submitted nominating paperwork by September 5, and the Tillamook County clerk’s office submitted a final ballot on September 10. Voters will decide their representatives in Oregon’s first United States congressional district, 32nd state house district and at the city level and weigh in on five statewide ballot measures and one countywide bond. In Oregon’s first congressional district, incumbent Democrat Suzanne Bonamici is facing off against Republican Bob Todd and Libertarian Joseph Christman. Bonamici has served in con-gress since 2012 and became Tillamook County’s representative in 2022, after redistricting. Incumbent Republican Cyrus Javadi will face Democrat Astoria City Councilor Andy Davis in the race for the 32nd state house seat. Javadi was first elected in 2022. Statewide ballot measures up for consideration this year include giving the state legislature the ability to impeach executive branch officials, establishing an independent public service compensation commission to determine salaries for top state officials, transitioning to ranked-choice voting, issuing residents rebates from a tax increase on large corporations and requiring marijuana producers and retailers to sign labor-peace agreements with unions trying to represent their employees.
See HOUSING, Page A5
See BALLOT, Page A3
PHOTO BY WILL CHAPPELL
The three-acre property in Nehalem’s urban growth boundary is ready for future devel-opment after $250,000 in work by the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality and the United States Environmental Protection Agency.
bil-ities for Buddy Walk in Seaside and turned the event into a fundraiser that generated over $100,000 in three years. The organization used that money to develop a strategic plan for fu-ture programs for those with IDD and their families. Around that same time, in 2018, Chick was involved in the county’s housing committee, with then-Commissioner Bill Baertlein, when he brought the property in Nehalem’s urban growth boundary to her attention. Formerly owned by a logging truck driver, the three-acre property went into foreclosure follow-ing nonpayment of property taxes and fell into county ownership after nobody bid on it at
auc-tion. Baertlein offered to deed the property to Sammy’s Place, under an Oregon law that al-lows counties to give property to nonprofits for specific uses, including developing affordable housing. At that point, the property was overgrown with blackberries and other plants and the dilapi-dated house and soil had extensive hazardous material concerns. But, luckily for the charity, the property’s condition and planned use came to the attention of officials at Oregon’s Department of Environmental Quality and the United States Environmental Protection Agency, who volun-teered to donate staff time to remediate those concerns. The two agencies
spent more than $250,000 on the clean-up over the course of several years, and today the property is clear save a small storage shed, firepit and the concrete pad from the old house. With that work completed earlier this year, the organization applied for a grant from the Fairview Trust, established when the state’s mental hospital shuttered in 2000, and was awarded $744,000 to pay for the project’s soft costs. Now, Chick, who became the organization’s executive director in 2021, will work with the char-ity’s board and housing commission to develop a plan for the site. Chick said that those
Rockaway Council seeks legal fees in balloting case WILL CHAPPELL Citizen Editor
PHOTO BY WILL CHAPPEL
A view from the recently purchased parcel over much of Cape Meares’ watershed that will be added to the Cape Meares National Wildlife Refuge. l
Cape Meares community conserves watershed WILL CHAPPELL Citizen Editor
Members of the Cape Meares Community Asso-
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ciation have come together over the past three years to coordinate the protection of 107 acres of forest, which was recently purchased by the Conservation Fund. Now, staff at the fund are working with officials at the United States Fish and Wildlife Service to coordinate the purchase of that parcel and another 106-acre parcel previously donated to the association for inclusion in the Cape Meares National Wildlife Refuge. Should the
sale materi-alize, the forest will be protected in perpetuity, securing Cape Meares’ drinking water source and more than doubling the size of the wildlife refuge. Cape Meares Community Association President Bev Stein said that the project had been built on volunteer effort and that she hoped it would inspire other communities on the coast who are trying to protect their drinking water sources. “It’s a great example for
other communities,” Stein said, “because a lot of communities on the coast now are struggling with these issues and the fact that we, a little community, can put this together, with you now practically nothing and just persistence is a great example for oth-er communities.” Progress towards the purchase began in 2021, when a member of the community See WATERSHED, Page A6
Rockaway Beach’s City Council voted on September 11 to seek to recover legal fees from the realtors in the recent legal challenge to the city’s balloting methodology. Council also approved a new administrative warrant procedure that will allow city staff to seek warrants and enter properties with code violations to remediate those. The decision to seek legal fees of over $20,000 from Justin McMahan and Daniel Howlett was made by a 4-0 vote, with Councilor Kristine Hayes abstaining. Council discussed the decision during an executive session with the city’s counsel for over an hour before returning briefly to regular session to make the decision past 9 p.m. In a petition for a writ of mandamus filed in early August, McMahan and Howlett challenged the city’s use of position numbers in elec-
tions for city council seats. The petition contended that the city’s charter had been violated when position numbers were added to the ballot in 2014 without a council vote. After a daylong hearing, Tillamook Circuit Court Judge Jonathan Hill ruled that an ordinance passed in February updating the nominating process for council seats had codified the posi-tional voting approach and that the city could proceed with that methodology in this year’s election. Oregon statute relating to writs of mandamus allows for the prevailing party to recover attor-ney’s fees when certain conditions are met, with a judge reviewing the case to determine whether to make the award unless both parties agree to it. Tim Volpert, McMahan and Howlett’s attorney, said that he would be advising his clients to defend the attempt to recover the fees and to appeal any fee award forward.