HEADLINES & HISTORY SINCE 1879 Goldendale, Washington
WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 9, 2024
A business about to open on Main Street in Goldendale needs employees, so it naturally turned to its most valuable resource: social media. Why advertise in the newspaper? Nobody reads newspapers anymore, and Facebook is free. It’s easy to equate Facebook with significance in today’s cultural atmosphere. Social media is where you find all the hot new information about things that matter. Like Bigfoot. They finally found him! They think. They’re pretty sure. The notions of irrelevant newspapers and dominance of social media are related. They’re both inaccurate. Local newspapers— meaning the print and online combinations, which overall still outweigh local online-only “newspapers” in terms of readership and influence—retain a wide advantage over social media in almost every metric. This is according to new studies, including one this year by Coda Ventures. There is no denying that print
media in general have been in decline in recent years. But what is typically overlooked is the fact that the surviving media tend to come out stronger, especially if they’re smart in how they manage their content. One key finding points out that boring content means slow death; the more interesting the content, the better the paper does. People want material that is interesting to them, and they’ll pay to get it. “Interesting” doesn’t mean only articles. It includes visual appeal and headlines that serve as readbait. No less significant are metrics on readership engagement by local newspapers, many of which defy common perception. For example, many assume local newspapers are consumed chiefly by older people with their AARP magazines. Not so, the studies reveal. Fifty-five percent of readers of local newspapers across the country are between the ages of 35 and 64. They’re not going to pick up the tweens and Swifties necessarily, but they certainly reach their parents. Fifty-seven percent of newspaper readers own their own
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Tort action filed against Christopher
Newspapers don’t matter—and they found Bigfoot! LOU MARZELES EDITOR
Vol. 145 No. 41
LOU MARZELES EDITOR
homes. Fifty-eight percent have household incomes of $50,000 or more. Sixty-one percent have children at home, making that audience the key purchasing and financial influence in households. And while public trust in major media has eroded over years—that primarily means big newspapers and electronic outlets—actually, the reverse is true for local newspapers. The studies show that a whopping 78% of readers believe their local newspaper, out of all the possible information venues in their area, is their most trusted source. Moreover, according to the studies, local newspapers are considered the best source over other media for information on local communities and events, schools, business, announcements, and churches. Social media has an erroneous aura of omnipresence—because of its sheer ubiquity at the touch of a computer mouse, people tend to think it reaches all audiences equally. The reality is quite different, according to several studies, especially on the local com-
In an act a legal source is calling outright intimidation, Klickitat County Commissioner Dan Christopher suggested to a critic he might use what he thought to be dirt on him to dissuade the critic from further negative comment. Tuesday Mark Jobe—who has identified himself as the critic in question—filed a tort action against Christopher. In a Klickitat County Claim Form filed with Klickitat County Risk Management, Jobe’s attorney, Justin Leigh, itemized several acts by Christopher in his official capacity as District 3 County Commissioner. “The Defendant [Christopher] engaged in the following unlawful conduct,” the claim stated, including that Christopher: • Violated Mr. Jobe’s First Amendment rights, in violation of the United States Constitution, by retaliating against his efforts to speak about matters of public concern; • Committed the common law tort of invasion of privacy in violation of Article I, Section 7 of the Washington State Constitution; • Committed the common law
tort of slander per se; and • With malice committed the common law tort of intentional or negligent infliction of emotional damages. The claim cited the backstory of Jobe’s interaction with Christopher, stating Jobe suspected Christopher publicly misrepresented his position on two key issues. One was the loss of municipal contracts related to the county’s landfill, and the other was regarding the then-potential closing of the county jail. Jobe requested public records from the county on the matters and, upon receiving and reviewing them, took to social media about what he concluded to be inconsistencies in Christopher’s positions. In the face of Jobe’s criticism, a supporter of Christopher texted him documents purporting to reveal a criminal case against Jobe, specifically an arrest from 1983 for a charge that was subsequently dismissed in court. The tort claim against Christopher states, as The Sentinel reported September 25, Christopher sent the text to Jobe. Jobe asked Christopher if Christopher was threatening him, to which Christopher replied, “I haven’t decided what I am going
See Tort page B1
See Papers page B1
Commissioners complete business in seven minutes RODGER NICHOLS FOR THE SENTINEL
Klickitat County Commissioners set a new record for an afternoon session at their October 1 meeting. They were able to open the meeting, vote on a noncontroversial boundary adjustment and close it again, all in just seven minutes. The morning session also took care of business in a tidy fashion, opening at 9 a.m. and closing before 11 a.m. In response to a comment about short-term rentals, Planning Department Director Scott Edelman said that Klickitat County did not have an ordinance regarding them. Though he prefaced his remarks by saying he had not consulted the prosecuting attorney for a legal opinion, he understood that if short-term rentals are not addressed in the county code, they are considered a residential use. “Our code does not address
them,” he said. “Without an ordinance in place, I don’t know that we have any basis to enforce on those at this point.” He did support creating an ordinance. “Not just for revenue,” he said, “but because that revenue would probably go toward a part-timer position to monitor those standards to make sure the neighborhoods are protected from the potential adverse impact, as well as safety concerns.” In response to a question about budgeting for the transition of the jail from the Sheriff’s Department to a new Department of Corrections, HR Director Robb Van Cleave said the new department has already been assigned a department number for the 2025 budget. As for this year, he said a date for the transfer has not yet been set. “The transfer of property, vehicles, budget, authority, contracts, forms, collective bargaining—all of that happens in the
final resolution. That would be the point at where the budget would officially be moved from under the sheriff to the Department of Corrections for 2025.” Commissioner Dan Christopher expressed a concern that, if members of the Sheriff’s Office posse had been transporting prisoners for appearances in court, would the county have the resources to carry out that activity after the transfer. Van Cleave replied that the posse had only been used occasionally for longer trips and that jail staff had been taking care of transportation. But he did add that any functions the posse had been performing in regard to the jail would indeed cease with any transfer. He said that he’d had a very positive talk with the sheriff and undersheriff on the county receiving a second $5,000 grant from the insurance pool to purchase suicide liability reducing
COOL CARS: Saturday’s Car Show at Maryhill Museum drew a crowd of enthusiasts.
See County page B1
LOU MARZELES
LOU MARZELES
AT YOUR SERVICE: Rob Blevins, left, and Larry Gourley are the newly appointed lay pastors at the Goldendale United Methodist Church.
Tag-team pastors now at Goldendale UMC LOU MARZELES EDITOR When the last pastor of the Goldendale United Methodist Church left in June, the congregation was left pastorless. The Powers That Be in the denomination couldn’t find a new ordained one to come live in Goldendale and work parttime, so they elected to appoint two laymen as co-pastors. They are Larry Gourley, a longtime Methodist member who for a year pastored a church in The Dalles and now serves as a chaplain at Klickitat Valley Health; and Rob Blevins, a retired Presbyterian minister who has frequented Goldendale since 1996. The two will alternate preaching on three Sundays a month. Did Blevins defect from the Presbyterians? He hasn’t been an active pastor for some time, but he finds the Methodist Church well within his comfort zone. “When I came here, I visited several churches,” he recalls. “The Methodists were the closest to what I was familiar with, and theologically I could live in that camp.” Gourley points out the Methodists are a non-creed church. “Meaning we don’t have a set system of beliefs that you have to believe in,” he states. “For example, and maybe this isn’t the best example, the virgin birth—was Jesus really born of a virgin? It says that in the Apostles Creed, and, of course, the Apostles Creed is not part of the Bible.” Though the Bible references the virgin
Mary, there is no direct biblical reference to a virgin birth. “I think most Christians believe that Jesus was born of a virgin,” Gourley continues. “But what I’m saying is the United Methodist Church doesn’t make that a requirement for your membership in the United Methodist Church because there are a lot of Methodists who believe it, maybe even a majority of Methodists who believe that. And then there are other people who say, ‘Well, I don’t know.’ My sense of things is that it’s pretty irrelevant in terms of the mission and the message of Jesus. You can still be a good Christian, and you can still believe in Jesus’ great commandment and those things.” Blevins gives a look that suggests he’s not entirely on board with Gourley’s statement. “But, you know, that’s one of the reasons I’ve been in this church,” he says. “It’s a big-tent church.” For the last two years, the previous pastor, Kendra-Behn Smith, split her time between Goldendale and White Salmon. The Methodist Church could not find someone able to take on a similar role. “So they said, ‘Well, it’s up to you guys to figure out how you’re going to get people into the pulpit,” Gourley recalls. “Rob, bless his heart, agreed to do two sermons a month, and I agreed to do one on the third and some or the fourth and sometimes the fifth Sunday of the month. And it’s worked out really well. The Lutherans here in town have invited us to their
See Pastors page B1