HAPPY NEW YEAR FROM ALL OF US AT THE HEADLIGHT HERALD
Headlight Herald WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 1, 2014
VOL. 125, NO. 1 • $1.00
TILLAMOOK, OREGON • WWW.TILLAMOOKHEADLIGHTHERALD.COM
Looking Back
2013: A year of ups and downs By Joe Wrabek jwrabek@countrymedia.net As Charles Dickens wrote, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” We saw some new faces in the news in 2013 – new city councilors, a new county commissioner and late in the year, four new faces on the Til-
Rider terrorizes Tillamook County bus-goers The Washington County Sheriff’s Office said deputies recently arrested a passenger on the Tillamook County public bus. The depuOliver ties said they Powell responded the afternoon of Dec. 28 to a report of an intoxicated passenger who was threatening the bus’s passengers and driver. They said the driver had parked at the Banks Fire Department parking lot and asked the transportation dispatcher to call for help. It was reported the man was threatening passengers with a firearm. Deputies arrested Oliver
See BUS, Page A5
INDEX Classified Ads....................... B5-8 Crossword Puzzle.................... A7 Fenceposts........................... B3-4 Letters...................................... A4 Obituaries................................ A6 Opinions.................................. A4 Sports................................. A7-10
LONGEST-RUNNING BUSINESS IN TILLAMOOK COUNTY SINCE 1888
Back By Sayde Moser smoser@countrymedia.net In 1963, Rich Riley hung up his boxing gloves. A bout with Ron Marsh, who later was named Ring magazine’s fighter of the year and listed in the top three heavyweight challengers, left Riley shaking – literally. He and Marsh fought to a six-round draw, but it took Riley months to recover. A career that began at age 13 and lasted a decade, taking him nationwide, was at an end. Riley had won tournaments in the Golden Gloves featherweight, bantamweight, lightweight and welterweight divisions. Now residing in Rockaway Beach, he still holds a handful of records. In 1959, Riley joined the U.S. Air Force and boxed his way through the service, participating in at least 45 bouts at the Golden Gloves level. After his two-year military tour was up, he was offered a professional contract, but turned it down. At about that time, following his bout with Marsh, Riley said he developed symptoms of pugilistic parkinson’s syndrome, also known as boxer’s disease. Doctors told him that if he continued to fight, the shaking would only get worse. So he quit.
lamook County Fair Board. By year’s end, unemployment reportedly was down and local taxes were up (because of a road bond that voters approved in May). Flood insurance premiums for the county’s residents were going way up, while no one was sure if the real estate
YOU RATED Your top 10 online stories for 2013, Page A6
See REVIEW, Page A6
2 boys in the ring, want to 50 years later help by buying a farm By Sayde Moser smoser@countrymedia.net
Photos by Sayde Moser
For the first time in five decades, Golden Gloves champ Rich Riley returns to the ring, this time to tutor 16-year-old Chris Henley.
See BOXER, Page A3
For two Tillamook boys, the spirit of giving didn’t stop once the Christmas presents were unwrapped. Samuel and Nicholas Smith, with help from their parents, have been busy the last month and a half collecting pop cans and selling candy bars to raise money to buy a farm in a Third World country. “It will help 10 families,” explained Nicholas, 6. “And then more, because [the farm] will keep producing.” The brothers learned about the opportunity to purchase a farm through World Vision while reading a magazine in their church. World Vision is a Christian humanitarian organization with roots in nearly 100 countries. Its primary mission is to help the children of the world. “They asked me why these families needed a farm,” recalled their mom, Briar Smith. “So I said some families would die without it. And that was very disturbing to them.” One farm costs $2,300. The Smiths won’t know what country it’s in until after they have purchased it.
See BROTHERS, Page A2
Second-worst bridge in state to get makeover By Dave Fisher The Headlight Herald
A long-awaited replacement of the aging Lommen Bridge, which spans the Nehalem River on Miami-Foley Road, will get underway in the spring of 2015 and be completed by the fall of 2016. Tillamook County Public Works Director Liane Welch, speaking to the Manzanita City Council, said the 382-foot bridge, which dates to 1955, shifted on its foundation as much as 3 inches during the severe December 2007 storm when debris carried by the river stacked up against the base of the bridge. Welch said the bridge has been rated the second-worst in the state in terms of safety, one notch behind Portland’s Sellwood Bridge, which currently is being replaced. During phase one of constructing the new bridge, the existing one, located 40 feet to the west, will remain in place. At least one lane will remain open for travel at all times. The following year, after the completion of the new bridge, the old
Photo by Dave Fisher
The Lommen Bridge, which spans the Nehalem River and dates back to 1955, will be replaced starting next year. span will be removed. Now that project surveys have completed and the design and permitting process is underway, Welch said, she expects to go out for bids in March 2015. Miami-Foley Road serves as an
alternate route for a portion of U.S. Highway 101, Welch said, linking north Tillamook County to its neighbors to the south in the event the main coastal highway is closed. “If the existing bridge were to fail, we no longer would have this vital link during
an emergency,” she said. Incorporated in the plan for the new bridge is a relief bridge about 200 feet from the main bridge above the flood plain of the Nehalem River, to take pressure off the main structure during high water and allow water and woody debris to pass underneath, keeping the road from being washed out. Of the $10 million awarded for the project, 90 percent is federally funded with the remaining 10 percent requiring a local “match.” One early estimate has the project coming in at $12.5 million, Welch said, in which case there are contingency funds to cover the added cost. While the structural design has been approved, Welch is seeking public input on the “artistic treatment” of the north and south ends of the bridge. “I really don’t want to build ugly bridges,” she said. Among the treatments for the ends of the bridge are three options – a pillar with a pole adorned by a sculpture of a fish or perhaps a bird; a long, gradual upward curve to the pillars; and a vertical, slab-like pillar.