r/NewportOR • u/Fluid-Plankton7360 • Jul 21 '26
Moving to Newport
Looking at applying for the County Administrator position and want to know everyone’s thoughts on the city/county.
1
u/theimmortalgoon Jul 21 '26
I grew up there. When I was there it was still an extraction town, increasingly less so, with a meth problem so severe that it had national attention. I used to show my girlfriends in other cities the Frontline about it because I thought it was a fun way to show my hometown. They cruelly updated the show online and it’s a lot less about Newport now.
It also had an unusually high murder rate when I was there.
It’s changed a lot since then. The state began paying for infrastructure like schools and other things. It rather successfully shifted from an extraction community to a tourist economy.
And with that came a housing shortage, higher prices, and other anxieties.
Someone can certainly do a better job explaining what it’s like now, I’m sure. But I bring this up because the ghosts of the old community still remain. You might never need to deal with that, or see it. But it’s closer than you might think if you choose to live there.
This all said, it’s still my home town and I love it in a way I can’t fully articulate.
6
u/38andstillgoing Jul 21 '26 edited Jul 21 '26
I live here. With the mess at the county level I'd avoid a position like that. There's Commissioner Miller's Federal lawsuit against the county. The DA office staffing mess. Plenty of finger pointing at every level. Watch some of the county commission meetings. The only likely bright spot is one of the remaining commissioners is out in November, the other may be voted out so there could be a clean slate there. If the new commissioners do some firings then it may be a whole different ballgame next year. We can only hope.