ILWACO, Wash. — A Washington state judge has ordered that the owners of an RV park in Pacific County violated the customer protection act when they tried to illegally evict tenants last year. On Thursday, Judge Katherine Svoboda issued an order granting partial summary judgement in the lawsuit filed by the Washington Attorney General’s Office…
Local News
CANNON BEACH, Ore. — The puffins are early risers, but so is Tim Halloran. For the past 12 years, he has spent most summer mornings — and many sunsets — with his binoculars aimed at a tufted puffin colony on Cannon Beach’s Haystack Rock. Minute by minute, over a series of two hour shifts, Halloran…
ROCKAWAY BEACH, Ore. — The fatal shooting of a Rockaway Beach man by officers in September was justified according to findings released this week. In a lengthy statement, Tillamook County District Attorney Aubrey Olson detailed her review of the Clatsop County Major Crimes Team investigation into the incident, described the events leading up to the…
ASTORIA, Ore. — For years, kids in Astoria have known you get the really big candy bars at Coast Guard housing. The South Slope neighborhood attracts a truly astonishing crowd of trick-or-treaters to a relatively small area on Halloween: an actual sea of people surging together up and down the sidewalks. Often many families in…
ASTORIA, Ore. — One afternoon in July, motorists traveling on the Astoria Bridge from Washington to Oregon could have counted 13 dead cormorants on the roadside before they were halfway across. For several years now, the number of dead birds has acted as an informal indicator of the growing colony nesting on supporting structures below….
ROCKAWAY BEACH, Ore. — More details have been released about an officer-involved shooting in Rockaway Beach. The shooting on Sept. 7 left one Rockaway Beach man dead and the community with lingering questions. The two officers involved — a Tillamook County Sheriff’s Office deputy and an Oregon State Police trooper — have both been placed on…
SOUTH BEND, Wash. — Last week, the Pacific County Sheriff’s Office made a dramatic and unusual announcement. In a lengthy statement posted to Facebook, the sheriff’s office announced they would no longer work with the local newspaper, the Chinook Observer. “We understand that the media plays a crucial role in disseminating information to the public,…
CLATSOP COUNTY, Ore. — Jeff Carlsen and his wife thought they were ready to have the conversation. They’d been reading books about death and dying and thinking about how they wanted to approach this time of their life. They were older and the idea of their own mortality was becoming less abstract. They felt open…
CANNON BEACH, Ore. — Cannon Beach’s most famous landmark was closed all day Sunday after one stubborn and unusual visitor refused to leave. When Mylasia Miklas, the communications coordinator for the Haystack Rock Awareness Program, saw a picture of a cougar prowling around Haystack Rock, her first thought was that it couldn’t be real. She…
ASTORIA, Ore. — Nurses at Columbia Memorial Hospital are not on strike – at least not yet. But on Tuesday they held an informational picket in front of the Astoria hospital — a sort of prelude to a possible strike. The demonstration was an attempt to sway administration as the labor union, which represents around…
ASTORIA, Ore. — A year after a portion of Buoy Beer Co.’s waterfront facility collapsed over the Columbia River, the fate of the building remains in limbo. Buoy has no permits in front of city building officials for the structure located between Seventh and Eighth streets. “We’re waiting to hear from the property owners about…
ASTORIA, Ore. — A filing with the Oregon Health Authority has revealed the estimated price tag for major expansion plans at Astoria’s Columbia Memorial Hospital — and it’s big. In a letter of intent to the state, the hospital says the project is estimated to cost $175 million, not including interest. The 180,000-square feet of…
The last time Cannon Beach’s Haystack Rock Awareness Program recorded a sighting of a sunflower sea star was in 2019. They are one of the largest sea stars in the world, measuring up to one meter across, with as many as 20 arms. Voracious predators, they feed on urchins, fish and even birds. For visitors…
WARRENTON, Ore. — A massive, quick-moving fire destroyed a building at the High Life Adventures zip line facility in Warrenton early Thursday morning. The building included the High Life Zip N’ Sip Restaurant and a workshop. The Warrenton Fire Department responded to the fire just after 1 a.m. and had to call in the Astoria…
Astoria, Ore. — Winter hit Oregon’s North Coast especially hard in the last half of February. For homeless people in the Astoria area, the dip in temperatures and the snow, ice and windstorms came at a time when there were even fewer than usual options for shelter. The Astoria Warming Center, which would typically provide…
ASTORIA, Ore. — It is Astoria’s most-used park and one of its iconic attractions, but the Astoria Riverwalk along the Columbia River took a beating during storms this winter. Created in the mid-90s, the Riverwalk has never seen so much damage in terms of the number of locations affected. City staff met with officials from…
It was a dream season for Oregon’s Dungeness crab fishery last year. Fishing began on the traditional Dec. 1 opener for the first time in years. Domoic acid, a marine toxin that has hampered the valuable commercial fishery time and again in recent years, was almost nowhere to be seen in Oregon or Washington state waters….
CANNON BEACH — Someone is stealing mussels off the iconic Haystack Rock. Bald patches on the rock and nearby boulders have appeared after nighttime and evening low tides — after staff and volunteers with the city-run Haystack Rock Awareness Program have gone home. In addition to the bare spots, volunteers and city staff have found…
ASTORIA, Ore. — Salmon caught in Youngs Bay in the spring are among the first fresh salmon of the year to land in front of Pacific Northwest consumers — and fetch a high price per pound for local fishermen. But commercial gillnetters worry that a damaged gangway at one of the few remaining docks close…
KMUN’s Jacob Lewin recently spoke with each of the four candidates running for positions on the Astoria City Council in this November’s election. Below are the interviews in their entirety: Council Ward 1: Andrew Davis: Geoff Gunn: Council Ward 3: Elisabeth Adams: Kris Haefker: Andrew Davis is a research analyst for the Oregon Health…
The high cost of housing is often identified as the top issue in Clatsop County. Concerned about its impact on recruiting staff, one school district has been confronting the problem directly. KMUN’s Jacob Lewin reports: The Jewell school district is small—151 students, 44 staff—and remote: the campus is 35 miles east of Seaside. So housing…
OREGON COAST — This is what it is like to descend into a kelp forest Underwater, the swaying bull kelp is a color that is hard to describe and light and color bounce off of everything around you. There are bright pinks from coral, purples from algae. Down near the bottom, the kelp’s rootlike holdfast…
OLNEY, Ore — A fish passage project outside of Astoria aims to reconnect key wild fish species with prime habitat that has long been difficult — if not impossible — for them to reach without human help. The North Fork Klaskanine River is the first major watershed that salmonids and lamprey returning from the ocean…
ASTORIA, Ore — Breakside Brewery, one of the dominant player’s in Oregon’s craft beer industry, plans to open a location in Astoria. The city confirmed the Portland-based business is discussing the logistics with city staff of opening an eating and drinking establishment — not a brewery — in a building that formerly housed the Astoria Co+op grocery…
HAMMOND, Ore. — State fishery managers abruptly closed the lower Columbia River to all salmon and steelhead fishing Thursday night, saying a popular recreational fishery was having too big an impact on threatened Chinook salmon. On Friday morning, Marvin Henkel sat at a picnic table in the Hammond Marina near Warrenton and scrolled through…
ILWACO, Wash. — The state has filed a lawsuit against the new owners of Beacon RV park, alleging the owners are ignoring their tenants’ legal protections. The filing by the Washington Attorney General’s Office for a preliminary injunction comes on the heels of a cease and desist order issued in late July. Only a few…
The U.S. Coast Guard says it still isn’t clear what caused the sinking of a historic river ferry near downtown Astoria last week. The Tourist No. 2 capsized at a floating dock west of the Sixth Street viewing platform where the vessel had been moored for some time. No one was onboard the ferry when…
ASTORIA — The Tourist No. 2, a former Columbia River ferry boat built in the 1920s, capsized at a dock near downtown Astoria Thursday afternoon. Good Samaritan boats arrived to try to contain some fuel spilled from the vessel as the smell of diesel filled the air. Donald Anderson, chief marine science technician with…
PACIFIC COUNTY — The new owners of an RV park in Ilwaco, Wash., have violated multiple provisions of Washington’s landlord tenant laws, according to the state In a cease and desist order and a notice of violation issued last week, the Attorney General’s Manufactured Housing Dispute Resolution Program found that Michael and Denise Werner used…
ASTORIA — Jennifer Crockett, executive director for the Liberty Theatre in downtown Astoria, says she will not run for a seat on the Astoria City Council in November. Crockett announced her candidacy for the downtown Ward 3 seat earlier this year. City Councilor Joan Herman, who currently occupies that seat, has said she will not…