NOVEMBER 27, 2019 • PAGE 1 • SMALL BUSINESS SATURDAY • A PUBLICATION OF
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Community gathers around CCMH Thanksgiving meal JULIE THOMPSON chronicle1@countrymedia.net
Multiple businesses, non-profits and volunteers came together last week to serve over 400 members of the community a Thanksgiving meal for Columbia Community Mental Health’s (CCMH) 23rd Annual Thanksgiving Dinner.
Judges, commissioners, business owners, CCMH clients and their families, and citizens gathered at the Moose Lodge on Thursday, Nov. 21 to “celebrate this amazing community we all live in.” It took some work preparing for the big day. First there was a massive amount of potatoes to contend with. The Columbia Pacific Food
Bank offered a portion of their large freezer to store the potatoes until they were ready to be peeled. Warren Community Fellowship hosted a “peeling party” and, according to CCMH PR and Director of Development Hope Wirta, employees from the St. Helens Recreation Center “peeled potatoes until their fingers fell off.” Our local Safeway donated
$1,000 towards the dinner, and St. Helens Market Fresh donated 17 turkeys that weighed in at over 25 lbs. a piece. Employees with St. Helens Wauna Credit Union served and bussed tables all day. CCMH added approximately 70 volunteers to the effort, and, with the exception of the pies and rolls, the entire meal was prepared from scratch. Wirta said there were many oth-
ers that contributed to the success of the event, and she loves working for a place that allows her to do something like this and call it a job. “It was just so cool to see the community be like a family having Thanksgiving dinner together,” Wirta said. “There were tears in lots of people’s eyes. It was beautiful.”
Jail sergeant retires amid ongoing personnel investigations JULIE THOMPSON chronicle1@countrymedia.net
A Columbia County jail sergeant has retired from the sheriff’s office amid personnel investigations prompted by an internal complaint. Sgt. Carolyn Townsend was placed on administrative leave in late October. Around that same time, jail commander Capt. Tony Weaver was also placed on leave for a separate complaint. Sheriff Brian Pixley said the two complaints were unrelated and do not involve criminal accusations of their conduct, though he would not elaborate on the nature of the complaints. The investigation into the complaint made against Weaver is still ongoing, and the sheriff said he is in the process of determining if the investigation into the complaint against Townsend will proceed in the wake of her retirement. According to Pixley, the sheriff’s office handles their own personnel investigations when they are not of a criminal nature. The investigation into Weaver is being conducted by former chief deputy Steve Salle, who was appointed to that position in an interim capacity following former Sheriff Jeff Dickerson’s retirement in mid-2018 until Pixley took office. “He’s one of the most impartial and thorough people I know,” Pixley said. “If there’s something to uncover, he’ll find it. He’ll leave no stone unturned.” Pixley said the sheriff’s office
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would be wrapping up that investigation as soon as they could, but Salle still had several more interviews to conduct. When asked how seriously he was taking the investigation, Pixley said action was taken to ensure that accountability measures were being met within 24 hours of the received complaints. “I ran on a campaign of keeping my staff accountable, and this is how I do that. I’m not trying to sweep anything under the rug. Appropriate measures will be taken depending on the seriousness of the offense,” Pixley said. “I don’t play around when it comes to any allegations.” Since Weaver was placed on administrative leave, Lt. Brooke McDowall has taken over as the interim jail commander. Pixley admitted having two staff members on leave has resulted in additional overtime for staff in an already woefully understaffed jail. The Chronicle received a tip that members of the jail had been “jumping ship,” but Pixley said that was untrue. “No one has jumped ship. The only people who have left the jail that I can think of in the past year are people that have taken patrol positions,” Pixley said. Pixley said he’s been asked why he doesn’t lower his standards to hire people more quickly, but he said the hiring standards are as high as they are to ensure he amasses a top-notch staff capable of handling the work. However, according to Pixley, it’s been a slow and difficult search while competing with surrounding law enforcement agencies – the majority of whom offer better pay during a time when the state’s unemployment rate sits at low of 4.1 percent. Pixley said he does currently have three potential hires in the process of background checks for the positions of control tech, transport deputy and corrections deputy. He also has two open positions for both an entry-level corrections deputy and a lateral, which can be found on Columbia County’s website. The Chronicle will continue to follow-up on the personnel investigations as they wrap up and new information becomes available.
Christine Menges/The Chronicle
Drake’s Towing, which the city currently has an exclusive use towing contract, will no longer be used at the end of this year.
St. Helens ends exclusive towing contract with Drake’s Towing, resolves lawsuit CHRISTINE MENGES chronicle2@countrymedia.net
In order to resolve a legal battle between Grumpy’s Towing, LLC and the City of St. Helens, city leaders motioned Wednesday, Nov. 20 to end the exclusive towing contract with Drake’s Towing & Recovery, which is now set to expire at the end of this year. The city will now return to its rotational system with varied towing providers that it has used in previous years, Walsh noted at the meeting. “It hasn’t been a very highdollar contract, it’s probably going to cause more legal expenses for the city than the contract’s been worth,” Walsh said at the work session on Wednesday. The exclusive use contract, which the city entered into with Drake’s on Dec. 5 of 2018, made it so that any towing needs by the city would automatically go to Drake’s. However, that exclusive use contract has been under question since Jan. 18, when Grumpy’s issued a protest letter to St. Helens City Council and Matt Brown, Finance Director, alleging the council violated an Oregon statutory law when
it failed to provide proper notice of their search for contract proposals to provide exclusive towing services, according to a lawsuit filed July 5 in Columbia County Circuit Court. In that protest letter, Grumpy’s made three requests of the City of St. Helens, the lawsuit notes. According to the lawsuit, those requests were to cancel its procurement of exclusive contract for towing services, to re-instate a new procurement process that complied with the public notice requirements of the statutory law and to halt the current agreement for exclusive towing services between the City and Drake’s. The City then agreed to receive a proposal from Grumpy’s if it was delivered by Jan. 25, which Grumpy’s then delivered on Jan. 24. The lawsuit then notes that the City Review Panel evaluated proposals from both Drake’s and Grumpy’s and determined Drake’s to have a higher score of 47, compared with Grumpy’s scoring of 43. The lawsuit states the panel’s evaluation was “biased and bad faith,” resulting in Grumpy’s not being awarded the contract for exclusive use of towing services for the City of St. Helens.
Since then, the City and Grumpy’s have been involved in a legal battle regarding whether or not the City had the right to enter into the exclusive use contract. The lawsuit makes several allegations surrounding what it terms “unethical, biased and bad-faith treatment by government officials in the contract procurement process.” The first allegation is that the City failed to give proper notice for a Request for Proposals to invite companies to submit contract proposals in order to provide exclusive towing services. It also alleges the city did not submit public notice in at least one newspaper of general circulation in the area. Further, the lawsuit alleges that Grumpy’s was not directly invited to submit a proposal. Court records indicate that the City and Grumpy’s have been working to reach an agreement over the past few months. The City issued its final reply, filed on Oct. 28 in Columbia County Circuit Court. The reply concluded that the original petition would be “dismissed with prejudice,” a legal term that means the case has been dismissed permanently.
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