SERVING CURRY COUNTY SINCE 1946
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FRIDAY, OCTOBER 30, 2020
Brookings, Oregon
Police seize $204,000 worth of meth THE PILOT Curry County Sheriff’s Detectives obtained a search warrant on Oct. 21 for the home of fiftyone-year-old Charles Author Killian and forty-four-year-old Tamara Rachelle Gastonguay. The warrant affidavit was based on a several months long investigation into drug trafficking activity originating from their residence in Harbor Oregon. At approximately 1 p.m., the warrant was served by the Sheriff’s Office Patrol, Detective and K9 division as well as a member of the South Coast Interagency Narcotics Team (SCINT). Utilizing all three Sheriff’s Office K9s (Axel, Stryker and Nero) the search team was able
Charles Killian
Tamara Gastonguay
to quickly identify areas of the home and property that contained hidden narcotics. The search team was able to locate 2.5 pounds of methamphetamine (over 10,000 user doses) with an approximate street value of $204,000. Along with the methamphetamine, the search team seized a large amount of processed marijuana, cash, pack-
aging material, scales, suspected stolen items and a 2006 Harley Davidson Motorcycle suspected to have been used to transport the narcotics. Charles Killian and Tamara Gastonguay were not home at the time of the warrant service and are still outstanding. Probable cause exists for their arrest and arrest warrants are forthcoming. Members of the public with information on the whereabouts of Charles Killian or Tamara Gastonguay are encouraged to contact the Curry County Sheriff’s Office. The Sheriff’s Office would like to thank Cal-Ore Life flight for supplying a paramedic unit to More Drugs, Page A2
Photo courtesy of Curry County Sheriff’s Office
Law enforcement officers and canine crew pose with confiscated drug materials.
CHN finally receives funds
$2 million grant will pay for emergency department in Brookings THE PILOT
Ann Bacin shows off some of the whimsical seashore pottery painted by customers.
GOLD BEACH - Curry Health Network (CHN) announced Oct. 23 that after more than one year, the organization has received the $2 million grant funds that Oregon’s Governor signed into law as HB5050 in Aug. 2019 to help open an emergency department in Brookings, Oregon. The funds were made available to the CHN for expenses directly related to the 24/7/365 Curry Medical Center-Emergen- Ginny Williams cy Care that opened in December. In mid2019, Curry Health Network’s CEO Ginny Williams and its Board of Directors were thrilled to David Brock learn the Smith organization was going to be the recipient of funds that would provide emergency life-saving care to residents of one of the largest communities in the state that had no hospital and no emergency department, while at the same time providing jobs and bolstering
Linda Pinkham, The Pilot
More Grant, Page A8
Linda Pinkham, The Pilot
Staff and volunteers prepare the net pen at Ferry Creek Reservoir to receive another load of Chinook smolt.
Little fish that grow into big fish LINDA PINKHAM The Pilot
Volunteers carefully prepare a floating net pen on a beautiful sunny morning on Oct. 27 at the reservoir on Ferry Creek, which empties into the Chetco River. The pen will serve as a temporary home to some of the 35,000 hatchery salmon smolt each year that use the pen to acclimate before their final release into the river.
The smolt soon arrived on a large tanker truck and were flowed through a tube into the quiet pond where they can become familiar with their ancestral watershed. Once the fish arrived in the pen, it was towed out to the middle of the reservoir and fastened to piers. They are fed daily by volunteers with a higher quality food that contains more protein and fats. It takes about 300 pounds of food over the season to keep the
fish in the net pen. After about two weeks they are recaptured and released into the estuary of the river in several smaller batches. The ODFW and the South Coast Fishermen started the Ferry Creek net pen some eight or nine years ago, according to John Weber, ODFW Salmon and Trout Enhancement Program (STEP) biologist. “Because there is not a hatchery on the river that the
took over the Gold Beach shop in early August. She quit her job and sold her house in Redding and then had to live in her RV for a couple months, but finally closed escrow on a house. Now she is moving into her home and shaping the business into her vision at the same time. A new sign, “Creative Soul, Paint Your Own Pottery, Local Artisan Gifts,” has just been installed at the spruced up building located at 29401 Ellensburg Ave. in Gold Beach. When the shop opened four
years ago, the original owner set it up as a ceramic painting studio. “It’s a very community-oriented art space and gathering space,” Bacin said. “Regular customers were concerned when the business sold that it wouldn’t stay a “community creative space.”
fish return to, we were trying to put together some type of effort that might focalize the fish in an area where the fishermen could get them (when returning to spawn in about four or five years), so we decided to try some acclimation,” Weber said. Oregon South Coast Fishermen applied for a grant that they used to purchase the net pen to try it. More Fish, Page A3
Creative Soul: Making community art in a pandemic LINDA PINKHAM The Pilot
Creative Soul’s brand new owner Ann Bacin is juggling the challenges of being new to the business, a new resident in the area, moving into a newly purchased home and operating a community-oriented art space that she just purchased while meeting required social distancing and masking requirements due to COVID-19. She started negotiating with the previous owner in May and
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