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Exchange students get a taste of the States PAGE A2
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Tillamook Fire Dept. responds to downtown fire TILLAMOOKHEADLIGHTHERALD.COM
Headlight Herald WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 2014
VOL. 125, NO. 6 • $1.00
TILLAMOOK, OREGON • WWW.TILLAMOOKHEADLIGHTHERALD.COM
Local ‘Act in Kindness Day’ gains momentum By Sayde Moser smoser@countrymedia.net Courtesy photo
Sand dollars in Netarts Bay.
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or three years running, Liesje Mizee-Riggert and daughter Josie have been reminding people to be kind to one another on Feb. 8, which has been labeled “Act in Kindness Day.” Begun as a way to cope with their grief over the loss of Mizee-Riggert’s 8-year-old niece and sister-in-law, Shelby and Wendy Mizee of Tillamook, the day has come to be rec-
Ryan Mizee holds one of the more than 2,000 “Act in Kindness” cards being distributed to Tillamook school children in memory of Ryan’s mother and sister, Wendy and Shelby Mizee, who died in a car accident Feb. 8, 2011.
Sand dollars safe – Seen any snowy plovers? for now See KINDNESS, Page A9
Photo by Liesja Mizee-Riggert
by Sayde Moser smoser@countrymedia.net
An application for another oyster plat on Netarts Bay, which resulted in more than 100 public comments sent to the Oregon Department of Agriculture, has been denied. The application, submitted by Shuckin’ Food Oyster Co., LLC, on June 12, was for a 32-acre plat atop a sand dollar bed. Hundreds of the little sea creatures live on the north end of the bay, which is unusual for low-salinity waters. Yet thanks to the area’s limited freshwater inlets, the sand dollar bed has been able to survive. It’s the only one like it in the entire bay. Not only that, the area is home to native eelgrass. Nearly 60 percent of the proposed oyster plat is covered in the grass, which provides cover for small fish as well as food for the black brant goose. It also helps stabilize the sediment from moving too much, said Lisa Phipps of the Tillamook Estuaries Partnership. The state Department of Agriculture accepted public comment on See OYSTER, Page A9
INDEX Classified Ads.........................B5-8 Crossword Puzzle...................... B2 Fenceposts.............................B3-4 Letters........................................A4 Obituaries..................................A6 Opinions....................................A4 Sports.................................A11-12
LONGEST-RUNNING BUSINESS IN TILLAMOOK COUNTY SINCE 1888
Photo courtesy of Gary Johnson
No. 1 candy-seller Trevor Johnson heads out to sell See’s candy bars during East Elementary School’s recent scholarship fundraiser.
East Elementary students earn nearly $20,000 Oregon Parks and Recreation Department in scholarships Courtesy image
A portion of Nehalem Bay State Park will be reserved for snowy plovers – should they come. The rare seabird hasn’t been spotted at the park since 1984.
to use 14 acres of Nehalem Bay State Park By Joe Wrabek jwrabek@countrymedia.net The snowy plover is a small, shortbilled seabird that lays its eggs in dry sand on the beach. This March, public access will be restricted in portions of Nehalem Bay State Park in hopes the snowy plovers will nest there. The restricted area of the park will amount to about 14 acres, including 3 miles of coastline, Oregon Parks and Recreation Department officials told the Tillamook County commissioners last week. The OPRD’s John Allen, Jim Morgan and Vanessa Blackstone said the restrictions are part of a habitat conservation plan agreed to in 2010 among State Parks, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, U.S.
ONLINE POLL Should the park provide space to protect the snowy plovers? Tell us your thoughts at tillamookheadlightherald.com Army Corps of Engineers, and Native American tribes. There are no snowy plovers on the Nehalem Bay spit to speak of. Yet there is a substantial nesting population of more than 270 of the birds on the south Oregon coast, where OPRD has had a snowy plover management area for several years, plus some further north in Washington state. The last snowy plover seen at Nehalem Bay Spit was in 1984. “The theory is, if we build it, they
By Sayde Moser smoser@countrymedia.net
will come,” Blackstone told the county commissioners. All of the restricted area will be south of the park’s campground and the horse concession. In that area, from March 15 through July 15, hikers and horseback riders will be asked to keep to the wet sand – below the tide line, in other words – and dogs will need to be on a leash. (As a tradeoff, dogs won’t have to be leashed elsewhere in the park, just “under control.”) Vehicular access also will be prohibited – not just motorized vehicles, but bicycles, too. “If birds come to nest, we’ll see them between March and July,” Blackstone said. If no plovers show up by July 15, the restrictions will
What began as a project to honor the memory of Martin Luther King, Jr., has given 16 students at East Elementary a jump-start on attending college. The brainchild of fourthgrade teacher Scott Rodman, students spent the MLK Day weekend selling boxes of See’s candy. They called it the “‘I Have a Dream’ College Scholarship Program.” The rules were simple. The student who sold the most candy would receive 40 percent of the school’s total candy sales as a college scholarship. The second- and third-place sellers would get 20 percent and
See PLOVER, Page A9
See STUDENTS, Page A9
Meet Jeff Warren, the ‘food geek’ at JW Merc had to create this picture for people. We had to bring it to people who lived in South Dakota and didn’t even know what the wine country looked As a self-proclaimed “food geek guy,” Jeff like… So we really had to learn how to romance Warren, the new owner of JW Merc, has brought things.” his knowledge of natural and local foods to After several years in California, Warren redowntown Tillamook. located to Portland in 2006 and began Warren has opened his store at merchandising at street markets. “I 1910 Second St. and stocked the Watch Jeff found what it was like to sit at a table small storefront with a variety of Warren across from people in a booth, just iconic products, such as honey from explain the me and the people. It was so cool.” Washington and Oregon, natural soda nuances that He said that niche proved particufrom Portland, hazelnut trail-mix make his larly successful at the Fremont Sunfrom the Willamette Valley, and highnatural foods day Market in Seattle, which is where quality maple syrup from Vermont. special at he met one of his current maple sup“I never bring things [into the tillamook pliers. store] that I wouldn’t eat myself, ” he headlight After several years as a street marsaid. herald.com ket vendor, Warren began looking for Warren was introduced to the food a bricks-and-mortar store. On a trip industry by his father, a chef. to the Oregon coast last summer, he Warren said he subsequently worked every met Ray Jacobs, who owns the building where job in the restaurant business before accepting Warren’s store now is located. He said he found a position in the California wine industry. “I Jacobs’s reasonable rent the break he needed. learned a lot in the wine business down there,” As the owner of a new business in Tillamook, he said. “And we had to sell on the telephone, so we See JW MERC, Page A10 by Chelsea Yarnell sports@orcoastnews.com
Photo by Chelsea Yarnell
Jeff Warren, owner of JW Merc, poses next to some of his organic honeys and syrups that are for sale at his shop on Second Street in downtown Tillamook.