Ribbon cut on transit center renovations Page A2
Manzanita council enacts dark sky ordinance Page A3
Headlight Herald
Tuesday, May 14, 2024 | Vol. 136, Issue 20
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Rockaway Beach chamber inaugurates wheelchair house and pavers WILL CHAPPELL Headlight Editor
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COURTESY PHOTO FROM TILLAMOOK SHERIFF’S OFFICE
Zavala Satalich immediately following his apprehension in 2021.
Sand Lake killer pleads guilty WILL CHAPPELL Headlight Editor
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n April 22, Brandon Jose Zavala Satalich, 21, pled guilty to one count of manslaughter in the first degree, a class A felony, and one count of unlawful use of a weapon, a class C felony, both relating to the shooting death of Jason Anderson on June 26, 2021. Zavala Satalich was sentenced to 20 years in prison on the manslaughter count and five years on the unlawful use of a weapon count, to be served concurrently, and his earliest release date is June 25, 2039. Tillamook County District Attorney Aubrey Olson said that she and victims in the case were satisfied with the plea deal. Olson explained that Zavala Satalich’s attorney had indicated his intention to claim that his client was under extreme emotional duress at the time of the crime. If found credible by the jury, that claim would have reduced any murder charge to manslaughter in the first degree and drawn a mandatory minimum sentence of just 10 years. “A case like that you never really know what a jury is going to do,” Olson said, “and if a jury were to find that he did intentionally commit the murder of Mr. Anderson but that he was under the influence of extreme emotional disturbance the it would have been a manslaughter in the first degree conviction and very likely he would have only been sentenced to the mandatory minimum of ten years.” The crime occurred on the last weekend in June 2021, when Zavala Satalich, then 18, and a large group of his extended family came to the Sand Lake Recreation Area to camp and recreate. Accompanying Zavala Satalich were his mother, her fiancé, Anderson, Zavala Satalich’s maternal grandmother, his 15-year-old girlfriend and three of his half siblings. See KILLER, Page A9
group of Rockaway Beach citizens gathered at the city’s wayside on May 9, to celebrate the completion of a project that added a new wheelchair house and more than 4,000 square feet of pavers around the Chamber of Commerce’s Red Caboose. The ceremony took place during the first farmer’s market of the year and celebrated the additional accessibility the project will afford those with limitations. At the ceremony, City Councilors Penny Cheek and Kristine Hayes spoke before Cheek cut the ribbon on the new facilities. Cheek shared the project’s history, which started when the chamber of commerce applied for a Travel Oregon grant in 2023 and were selected to receive $94,000 towards the work. Hayes, who is also the president of the chamber of commerce, estimated that the total cost of the project was just under $110,000, with the rest of the funding coming from private donations. Those donations came from the Marrick Family Trust, Builder’s First Source, Bob Kern, SAI Design & Build, Shane Hayes from Intrepid Construction, and Matt, Jim and Sue Vachter who donated $2,500 for the purchase of a new beach buggy wheelchair. Work began in early April on the installation of the new pavers, with 4,400 square feet installed, stretching from a terminus on North Miller Street up to the rail-
City Councilor Penny Cheek (left) cuts the ribbon in front of the new wheelchair house while Councilor Kristine Hayes (right) assists.
road tracks and continuing next to them to First Avenue and encircling the chamber caboose. The new wheelchair house is located at the north end of the caboose and will house the chamber’s fleet of beach wheelchairs. It is called Barb’s Beach Mobile House in honor of a longtime volunteer who helped to maintain the chamber’s first beach buggy for more than three decades.
The newly installed pavers as seen from near their terminus on Miller Street.
Tillamook Fire District seeks levy WILL CHAPPELL Headlight Editor
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he Tillamook Fire District is asking voters to approve a five-year levy to support district operations on the May primary ballot. If approved, the levy would add 84 cents per thousand dollars of assessed value to tax bills in the district to support equipment maintenance and the hiring of new staff.
Currently, the district relies mainly on a property tax rate of 69 cents per thousand dollars of assessed property value to support its operations. That figure is significantly lower than neighboring agencies, with Garibaldi Rural Fire District receiving $1.48 per thousand of assessed value, Nestucca Rural Fire District receiving $1.58 and Nehalem Bay Fire and Rescue getting $1.15.
The district was locked into that low taxation rate when voters approved Measure 50 in 1997, freezing the rate at the then-current level. Along with 1996’s Measure 7, which limited annual increases in assessed value to 3%, this has significantly hampered the district and other local governments from staying abreast of rising costs. Statistics compiled by the district show a cumulative price
increase of 94.6% since 1997, driven by inflation as well as everincreasing call volumes, with a 40% increase in just the last four years. The requested levy would alleviate the strain that is being caused by those factors by more than doubling the district’s revenues. Big ticket items for the levy funds would be the replacement of
Trails Coalition and approved an increase in solid waste disposal rates in Oceanside and unincorporated central Tillamook County. The approval of accessory dwelling units (ADU) came a week after the commissioners held a first public hearing on the ordinance update and signaled their intention to approve it.
Allowing ADUs on properties between two and ten acres in rural residential zones was made possible by by Oregon Senate Bill 644, which removed certain wildfire requirements for ADUs in those zones. The proposed update was put forward by the Tillamook County planning commission, which sup-
ported the measure at its April meeting. Property owners in the rural residential zone can now build ADUs within 100 feet of the property’s primary dwelling and they may be up to 900 square feet. Each property can only house one ADU
Commissioners approve rural ADUs WILL CHAPPELL Headlight Editor
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illamook’s Board of County Commissioners approved an ordinance update to allow accessory dwelling units in the county’s rural residential zones on May 8. Commissioners also entered the county into the Tillamook Bay
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IN THIS ISSUE News Opinion Obituaries Sports Classifieds
A2-4 A5-6 A7-8 A10 B11-16
See COMMISSIONERS, Page A9
Celebrating a Graduate in your family this year?
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See TILLAMOOK, Page A10
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