By Rodger Nichols
Cascade Locks, Ore., Oct. 10, 2023 - The Columbia River Gorge Commission met in person for only the second time this year Tuesday in Cascade Locks.
Commissioners received updates about the Cascade Locks, improvements to the Historic Columbia Gorge Highway and how the Forrest Service is dealing with standing dead trees left behind from the Eagle Creek Fire in 2017.
Tuesday's meeting contained several interesting aspects, including the welcome from the Port of Cascade Locks General Manager Jeremiah Blue.
"What we're seeing from our community is no longer a look for a casino or a Nestle or a mill or some big sort of entity to come in and provide those jobs," he said. "Most of the community at this time have those jobs. What they're looking for is why are we missing things in this town that other communities have. Why don't we have a bank? Why don't we have a dentist? Why don't we have these sorts of things that the community members really, absolutely feel like they deserve?"
He pointed out that the Cascade Locks city council has five of seven members who are new to political office and the Port of Cascade Locks has four new members, and they have concluded that the future of the town depends on tourism. To support that, the Port is going to concentrate on developing workplace housing, which is not a traditional area ports are involved in.
Commissioners also heard from Washington State Parks Commissioner Holly Williams, who said she met recently with Gorge Commission Executive Director Krystyna Wolniakowski about adding electric vehicle charging stations to parks in the gorge, and made a startling discovery:
"They are not expressly permitted in the 2020 Gorge Plan," she said, "which is not really surprising, given that when the plan was being developed in, say like 2018, 2019, there wasn't a lot of talk about vehicle chargers. The long and short of it is the installation is not quantified, and therefore may be difficult."
She also noted that the organization is considering Class 2 stations that can fully charge a vehicle in 10-15 minutes, at a cost of $40,000, and Class 3 stations, which take 3-4 hours to charge, but only cost $4,000.
The Commission will take up the subject in the coming months.
Forest Service representative Donna Mickley told the Commission she had been asked if the Forest Service was planning on doing any replanting in the area affected by the Eagle Creek Fire:
"This summer, we were able to maintain 95 percent of the trails in the burn area," she said, "and that includes the eight miles of closed trail what we'll have reopened in this coming year. What we saw this winter was a lot of landslides, and a lot of rock falls. So five years is the that time that root systems begin to fail after a fire - a lot of slides on the trail and so continue to have to do that ongoing maintenance to keep those open."
Asked if the Forest Service was doing any replanting in the area, she said that they have found that Mother Nature does a better job, though the Forest Service was trying to control invasive species in the area.
Terry Lingley, who coordinates activities in the Gorge for the Oregon Department of Transportation, announced that two more miles of the Historic Columbia River Highway State Trail had been completed, running east from Viento State Park towards Mitchell Point, and new restrooms, complete with showers, were installed in Viento State Park.
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October 14, 2023 at 03:21AM
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Gorge Commission grapples with adding electrical charging stations ... - Columbia Community Connection
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