Closure set for filming on ferry

Wahkiakum County commissioners approved the hiring of a new public health nurse and a contract for a film company's use of the ferry Wahkiakum when they met Tuesday.

In a busy session, commissioners also discussed preferred solutions to repairing the eroding Steamboat Slough dike, and they approved a contract to support the Cathlamet municipal swimming pool and the purchase of a new patrol car for the sheriff's office.

The county ferry will be out of service for six hours on June 6 for the filming of a television commercial for an insurance company. Bob Industries of Santa Moncia, Calif., will pay $7,000 to the county for use of the ferry.

The closure time, said Public Works Director Pete Ringen, will be 9:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. This should not affect commuters to the paper mill at Wauna, he said.

Commissioners approved Ringen's recommendation to award the contract to repair East Valley Road to Thompson Brothers Excavating, the second low bidder.

Ringen said that after bids were opened last week, the low bidder, Goodfellow Brothers, discovered they had used outdated information from a supplier in calculating their bid; the supplier had raised his prices, but the information hadn't reached the firm in time to adjust the bid.

The board and Ringen met in executive session with Prosecuting Attorney Dan Bigelow, and afterwards, Ringen said the county could end up in court if it tried to make Goodfellow Brothers honor their bid, and the project would probably not get started this year.

Goodfellow Brothers had bid $424,000 for the project; Thompson Brothers bid $494,702, and other bidders were above $500,000. The engineer's estimate, Ringen said, was $764,000.

The road was severely damaged in freshets several years ago. The project calls for removing unstable soil and replacing it with rock and rebuilding the road.

Commissioners discussed possible options for repairing the eroding Steamboat Slough dike along the Julia Butler Hansen National Wildlife Refuge for the White-tailed Deer.

The Columbia is eroding the dike, which supports a county road. Neither the US Fish and Wildlife Service nor the diking district in the area have funds for repairing it, and county commissioners have been working with other officials to find a solution. A USFWS consulting engineer suggested five possible solutions, and at a recent meeting, state legislators said it would be helpful to them to know which the county commissioners preferred.

Commissioners posed the question to Ringen.

"At this time, I prefer none of the alternatives," Ringen said in a report dated May 22. He added that there hasn't been sufficient engineering to show that any one will stabilize the bank.

The first, rebuilding a rock revetment, would be expensive and difficult, he said.

Two proposals call for a new setback levy, one with 60-foot deep sheet piles to protect the bank. These would be more easily permitted he said, but they would have a 4:1 slope that may or may not withstand the force of the river at that point.

Another proposal calls for a new levy set far back from the river with no sheet pile; this incorporates the 4:1 slope and could be subject to erosion.

The final proposal calls for driving sheet pile along the dike but not maintaining the road. This option would be feasible, he said, "but if we're going to spend that type of money, why not make sure the road is preserved?"

Rough estimates for the projects range from $2.75 to $4.5 million.

Commissioners approved a recommendation from acting Health and Human Services Director Sherri McDonald to hire Danelle Barlow to fill the department's vacant public health nurse position.

Barlow comes from Finney County, Kansas, where she has worked as a public health nurse, McDonald said. Her first assignment in Wahkiakum will be to set up pertussis vaccination clinics.

The board also approved purchase of a new patrol car. Undersheriff Mark Howie said it will replace an eight-year old car with 128,000 miles.

The new vehicle, a Dodge Charger police model, will cost $28,843.