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SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2014
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COQUILLE — The candidates have been certified and the November ballot is ready. Take a look at the local races and ballot measures Coos County residents will see on their ballot in the general election: Coos County Commissioner John Sweet will face Don Gurney. Gurney snagged 42 percent of the vote in the May primary; Sweet captured 41 percent. While five area mayors are running unopposed (Bandon Mayor Mary Schamehorn, Coos Bay Mayor Crystal Shoji, Coquille Mayor Matt Rowe, Myrtle Point Mayor Barbara Carter and North Bend Mayor Rick Wetherell), there are challengers for Lakeside and Powers: ■ Lakeside Mayor Dean Warner will go up against former Lakeside councilor Naomi Parker. ■ Powers Mayor Ed Hamlett will face Bill Holland. There are three seats opening up on the Bandon City Council: incumbents Mike Claassen and Chris Powell are running, though Councilor Nancy Drew will not. Peter Braun and Madeline Seymour are vying for the third open seat. Four people are running for three seats on the Coquille City Council: Robert Lantz will go up against incumbents Dennis
Rocks with deep channels cut out by moving waters are high and dry in the Millicoma River on Thursday afternoon at Nesika County Park. Farmers and ranchers are looking at deadlines to apply for drought relief that are approaching fast.
What is the deal with this weather? COOS BAY — To be sure,there are other areas out West that would change places with us in a heartbeat. California is even discussing whether another year of drought is really part of something called a Mega-drought (someone has been watching too muchSharknado). Thatdoesn’tchangethefactthattheSouthCoast is seeing its weather in a whole new light. The Northwest, in general, has been trending in a new direction. Even the academics have taken notice, making theweatherahot-buttonissueinarecentstudyconducted by Oregon State University and the University of Idaho. It found that the annual mean temperatureinthePacificNorthwesthaswarmedby 1.3 degreessince theearly20th century.
Adifference of degree
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The study is one of the first to isolate the role of greenhousegasesassociatedwithregionalwarming, the authors say. It was published in a recent issue of theJournalofClimate,apublicationoftheAmerican MeteorologicalSociety. “The amount of warming may not sound like a lot
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BY GOSIA WOZNIACKA The Associated Press
to the casual observer, but we already are starting to see some of the impacts and what is particularly significantisthattherateofwarmingisincreasing,”said Philip Mote, director of the Oregon Climate Change Research Institute at Oregon State University and a co-authoronthestudy. Researchers looked at temperatures and precipitation from 1901 to 2012 in the Northwest,including Washington, Oregon, Idaho, western Montana and the northwestern tip of Wyoming. They examined four different factors to determine the influence of human activities, including greenhouse gases and aerosols;solarcycles;volcaniceruptions;andnaturally occurring phenomena, including El Niño events and the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (something NOAA refers to as“a climate index based upon patterns of variation in sea surface temperature of theNorthPacificfrom1900tothepresent”). Using what is called a “multilinear regression” approach, they were able to tease out the influences of the different factors. Volcanic activity, for example, led to cooler temperatures in 1961, 1982 and 1991. Likewise, El Niño events led to warming in numerousyears. The study was funded by the U.S. Department of
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Lillian Clausen, Coos Bay Lorraine Miller, Albany Hildegard Friedrich, Coquille William Wallace Jr., Coos Bay Margaret Coplen, North Bend
PORTLAND — Hundreds of thousands of salmon are making their way from the ocean up the Columbia River this month, a windfall for salmon eaters, and for tribal and recreational fishermen in the Pacific Northwest. It’s one of the largest runs since dam construction blocked fishes’ river passage. The run is forecast at 1.5 million adult and young adult salmon by year’s end, although fish managers say the final number may turn out to be lower. “It’s a huge run of fish. It’s been a really good fishing season,” said Rex Zack, a tribal fisherman from the Yakama Nation who has fished the Columbia for 25 years and was hauling in fish near the Bonneville Dam on Friday. Zack, who runs three boats with the help of his wife, nieces and nephews, said he’s averaging two to three totes of salmon per boat a day — which translates to several thousand pounds of fish. His family keeps some of the salmon to feed themselves and sells the rest. “It’s really good to see fish coming back,” Zack said.
Joseph Shorb, Powers Lori Martin, Coos Bay Robert Shibles, Allegany
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Graham, Linda Short and Loran Wiese. Lakeside Councilor Robert Dietrick will go up against Genie Gannon for an open two-year seat. There are three four-year seats opening up on the Lakeside City Council: Elaine Armstrong, Michael Smith and James Edwards will face incumbents Shauleen Higgins and Eilene Seets for the positions. Lakeside Councilor Bert Guin is not running. Pat Goll hopes to take one of the three open North Bend City Council positions. He’ll face incumbents Bill Richardson, Barry Hayes and Larry Garboden. Four people are also running for three vacancies on the Powers City Council: Patty McDaniel and Benjamin Bedwell will go up against incumbents Jack McDaniel and Joseph George. Councilor Guy Shorb is not running. Coos Bay Councilors Stephanie Kramer, Jennifer Groth and Tom Leahy hope to retain their seats, while Councilor Brian Bowers will not run. The incumbents don’t face any challengers. Three are vying for four open Myrtle Point City Council positions: Anthony Strain and incumbents Daniel Martin and Jamie Myers. Councilor Alden Hamlin is not running to retain his seat. Voters will also see a countywide SEE BALLOT | A8
Large number of salmon return to Columbia River
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BY TIM NOVOTNY
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Coos County fall ballot is finalized THE WORLD
By Lou Sennick, The World
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Millions of salmon once returned to the Columbia. For millennia, the fish were central to Native American culture, sustenance and trade, but the runs were decimated by overfishing, logging, mining, agriculture and hydroelectric dams, which cut off passage to upriver spawning areas in native streams. Fish hatcheries have been used to help rebuild dwindling fish populations, with mixed results, and millions of dollars have been spent on habitat and on dam passage improvements such as fish ladders. Thirteen species of salmon and steelhead are now listed as endangered or threatened under the Endangered Species Act in the Columbia River basin. Some of the fish populations — notably the fall chinook salmon — have increased in recent years. Last year’s record run consisted of nearly 1.2 million adult and young adult Chinook. By comparison, in 1938, a little over 200,000 fall chinook came back to the river. Historically, the runs have seen spikes in numbers every 10 to 15 years. So far this year, more than SEE SALMON | A8
Sunny 73/53 Weather | A8
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