Season's Greetings
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New Year bringing new city councilors to St. Helens WILL LOHRE Country Media, Inc.
The New Year often marks a time for a change, and this January, the St. Helens City Council will welcome two new faces to the table: Mark Gundersen and Brandon Sundeen. The new councilors Sundeen and Gundersen are longtime St. Helens residents, and while neither has been a part of city government before, both are excited to get to work for their town. After winning their appointments on November 8, both look forward to serving the community they have long called home. Both candidates garnered more than 30% of votes in the 2022 Election. Sundeen and Gundersen will join Mayor Rick Scholl, Councilor Patrick Birkle, and Councilor Jessica Chilton on the St. Helens City Council effective January 1, 2023. Brandon Sundeen grew up in St. Helens and decided to run for office to help create an environment that his family and all of St. Helens can be proud of. In an interview with the Chronicle, Sundeen said, “My main goal is just to make St. Helens the best place that it can be. It was a good place to grow up and I want my kids to have a good place to grow up.” Mark Gundersen has been in the St. Helens area for 28 years and is ready to start making changes from the inside. Rather than sit by, Gundersen wants to be directly involved, “I want to get my hands dirty.” The issues Currently, there are several issues
Brandon Sundeen
that both Sundeen and Gundersen want to address in St. Helens. “The top priority for me is public safety,” Gundersen said. “Making sure the St. Helens police department is fully funded and has all the deputies that the chief needs.” Both candidates noted issues with the St. Helens crime rate and a need for the community to work together to solve these problems. “I think teamwork will be key,” Sundeen said. “Partnering with the County, School District, law enforce-
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ment, and other local agencies to make sure we cover all the bases and bring in the best ideas from everyone involved.” While both councilors have ideas on the direction of the town, they also recognize that communication and problem-solving among different viewpoints will be necessary. “I like the collaboration aspect of it, I like working with people,” Gundersen said. “I like to be able to see both sides of the coin. There’s going to be disagreements, people
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Mark Gundersen
on the City Council are going bring different view points to the table, and I want to see what those are.” Gundersen and Sundeen also agreed on the potential of the development projects along the Columbia River. The Streets and Utilities Extension Project will help address infrastructure issues in St. Helens’ historic Riverfront District, hoping to create a more connected and accessible waterfront. “Making St. Helens a livable community, somewhere where people
can find jobs and provide for their families without having to go to Portland or other places, is going to be big,” Sundeen said. Once a bustling lumber town, the riverfront has become underutilized as the lumber industry has faded in St. Helens. There will also be a Riverwalk Project that will provide residents with riverfront access and open opportunities for new businesses to
See COUNCILORS Page A5
Toy N Joy launches online, in-person auctions
Metro Creative Connection
The Toy N Joy drive provides funds for toys and Christmas baskets for local families.
The Merchants’ Toy N Joy Auction is celebrating 40-years of helping the community by hosting a Ruby Jubilee Celebration. Organizers are offering a hybrid event this year with an online auction leading up to the live event with dinner with silent, live auctions and more Saturday, Dec. 3 at the Columbia County Fairgrounds at 58892 Saulser Road in St. Helens. Ticket sales for the Dec. 3 event at the fairgrounds are closed and sold out. The funds raised by The Merchants’ Toy N Joy Auction benefit many organizations in Columbia County who provide toys and food baskets to local kids and families who could use assistance during the Christmas season. Supported organizations include, The Toy N Joy and Holiday Hope 2022 Programs, sponsored by the Columbia River Fire & Rescue (CRFR) Volunteer Firefighters Association, and the St.
Helens Kiwanis Club, Scappoose Fire Department Share & Care, Community Action Team, and the Columbia Pacific Food Bank. Items up for auction include gift certificates from Waste Management, Family Fun RV, Bayport RV, Anytime Fitness, Residential ReKey Service and Columbia Pacific Food Bank. “This year we’re celebrating 40 years of Merchants’ Toy N Joy, a Ruby Jubilee by bringing you our first ever hybrid event, this means that whether you’re attending in person or only able to join us online, there is something for everyone,” a release from the organizers start. “Many fabulous gift certificates are only available during the online event and will not be a part of the in-person auction on Dec. 3. As an online participant, you can purchase raffle tickets online from now until Dec. 3 for various raffle prizes.” Participants may register to bid online by using personals links.
“Whether you’re one of our many generous donors, participating online this week, and/ or attending our in-person event at the Columbia County Fairgrounds on Dec. 3, together we’re making the season brighter for many local families this holiday season and we thank you for making Merchants’ Toy N Joy 40th Annual Auction our best one yet,” the release states. Families in need Columbia River Fire & Rescue’s Toy N Joy applications are now live on the association’s website and available to residents within Columbia River Fire & Rescue’s district boundaries. If you are a family in the Warren, St. Helens, Columbia City, Deer Island, Goble, Prescott or Rainier and need food, toys or clothing for your children this holiday season you can apply online using the following link: https:// www.crfr.com/toynjoy.
Paper applications are available at our St. Helens and Rainier Fire stations. Forms must be filled out and or returned by 5 p.m. Dec. 5, to the St. Helens station at 105 S. Columbia Boulevard or Rainier Fire station at 211 West 2nd Street. The CRFR administration building is under construction so that location is not available. “The sooner your application is turned in, the better chances we have of fulfilling holiday requests,” a CRFR Volunteer Association Facebook states. Columbia River Fire & Rescue’s Toy N Joy program is supported by the Merchants Toy N Joy Auction, Kiwanis Holiday Hope, Columbia Pacific Food Bank, HOPE of Rainier along with other local businesses and private donors. “We can’t thank the community enough for their support the children and families in our community,” the CRFR Facebook post states.
COVID-19 impacts on Oregon’s breweries, pubs ERIK KNODER Chronicle Guest Article
The COVID-19 pandemic dramatically altered the way we engage the economy.
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Vol. 140, No. 48
The year 2020 was difficult for many types of businesses. Breweries and brewpubs had been posting slower rates of growth before the onset of the pandemic, but the closure of in-person dining dealt a blow to demand for kegs and employment within the pubs themselves. In the summer of 2019, there were nearly 9,090 jobs in brewing establishments across the state of Oregon. A brewing establishment is any location that brews beer. A portion of these are manufacturing facilities that produce their beer to be distributed to retailers or restaurants. However, many of the state’s brewing establishments are brewpubs that both brew beer and serve that beer onsite in a more typical restaurant environment. The dramatic impacts of the pandemic were first seen in April 2020 when covered employment dropped by a staggering 3,700 jobs (-50%) from the month before. The drop is even more shocking when you consider the highly seasonal nature of the industry. Typically, the spring is a time of hiring for breweries and pubs, which means the loss of half of total employment in one month understates the true impact to the industry.
Metro Creative Connection
Some local breweries and pubs in Columbia County and across the state were forced to close or limit operations during the COVID-19 pandemic’s Extreme High-Risk classifications.
As with the economy more broadly, there was an initial Vshaped recovery to employment during summer 2020 in Oregon’s brewing industry. Pubs and brewer-
ies added back around 2,700 of the 3,700 jobs lost in April. Even with this sharp rebound, by August 2020 employment in breweries still remained down by around 27% from
August 2019. As you might expect, the COVID impacts to the brewing industry were much more significant than to the overall economy, but job losses were also more significant than the loss in food services and drinking places, where employment was down by 23% over the year. For the overall economy, employment remained down only 8% in August 2020 compared with the previous year. Employment fell again in the winter of 2021, as it usually does in seasonal industries. The overall trend, however, was, and is, for continued recovery. The most recent data are from June 2022 and they show that employment in Oregon’s breweries and brewpubs was down only 14% below the level of August 2019. With normal seasonal growth it’s likely the employment in brewing returned to near its pre-pandemic level during the summer of 2022. Behind these higher level numbers we see some interesting trends. There were 263 establishments that reported employment the summer before the pandemic
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