Waldport – The Uncertain Future of Beachcomber Days – an Interview with TiAnne Rios

By Brian Bahouth

Since the city of Waldport denied a grant to the annual Beachcomber Days festival, a lot of rancor has ensued. There is an effort underway to recall six Waldport city councilors related to the incident. In denying the grant, Waldport city manager Dann Cutter accused TiAnne Rios, secretary of the Beachcomber Days nonprofit, of stealing funds and awarding her daughter a Beachcomber Days scholarship, and other malfeasance. Cutter worked to strong-arm the Lincoln County district attorney, Lincoln County police, and the Confederated Tribes of the Siletz Indians to press criminal charges against Rios, to no avail. TiAnne Rios won a temporary restraining order to prevent Dann Cutter from being near her or mentioning her in public. Rios is working to make the order permanent. I spoke with TiAnne Rios on Thursday September 4.

‘Take me back to the Beachcomber Days incident,’ I asked.

“Every year, Beachcomber Days raises money by asking for sponsorships from businesses, from the city, from, private individuals sometimes give money. There’s all kinds of ways that, you know, kind of but mostly it’s like sponsorships. 

“And so we Beachcomber days asks the city of Waldport for sponsorship every year, and this year, when we asked for sponsorship and we turned in all the forms that were required by the paperwork. The city manager, they were turned into him, personally handed to him at the end of August, and he never responded. 

“So the end of September, we sent him an email and said, Hey, do you remember that we gave you this paperwork? Like, where is it? What’s going on? And he then, the first of October, said, well, the city wants more information. They want a budget. 

“So that’s not required by the paperwork, but we complied. And sort of we complied. Our treasurer at the time had Covid, and so she was unavailable, and so I just kind of gave him a rough idea of a budget, thinking I’m talking to a friend, like, if you said to me, hey, what’s the budget? I would just like, kind of give you a generalized like statement, thinking, I’m just kind of clarifying for you. I’m not thinking anything beyond a request for funding. I’m not thinking about what would happen or whatever. 

“Well, I’m the secretary. I’m not responsible for the budget. I told them that I’m not the person that’s responsible. I didn’t use an Excel spreadsheet when I turned in the budget. I had dropped a number, so then the column didn’t add up because there was a number that was deleted from one of the lines. 

“It’s obvious that it was a clerical error. Most people would just say, hey, Ti, you dropped a number, you know? And I would say, Oh, my God, I’m so sorry that was dumb, and put the number back in, right? 

“This is just like a conversation of like, people make mistakes, right? But that’s not the way that went down. So he messaged me and said, hey, something’s wrong with these numbers. And I’m like, oh, shit, I made a mistake. Put that number in there, and I think it was a number nine, because it stands out in my head. But anyway, it doesn’t really matter. It was a number. 

“And then he came back with, well, the city wants more information. The city wants to know who got scholarships last year and who won money at the timber show. Specific names. We want names. And I’m thinking, that’s weird, but I didn’t think anything more about it. I’m thinking, I’m just talking to a friend. 

“However, these kids that earn scholarships are all minors, so I kind of, I sent him their initials and how much money these kids got on scholarships from Beachcomber days. And then a short time later, we get a very formal letter from him saying that we broke IRS rules, and that were that there’s obviously fraudulent activity here, and that we could go to jail, we could lose our IRS status, that we’re in jeopardy of losing all of that because of our activity. 

“We’re like, oh, crap. What happened here? Like we don’t even know what he’s talking about. None of us responded. Right? That day was October 3. Not only did he send that letter to us, he made a press release, and Yachats news published it, stating that after a lengthy investigation that we were found guilty of violating IRS laws, of giving money to our children. 

“We’re like, okay. Wait a minute, like that didn’t happen. But if you look back on October 3, there’s a letter that was posted on the city’s website, Yachats news, posted an article. Didn’t ask us any questions. Posted the article. Just all of this like we did something wrong. 

“He (Dan Cutter) didn’t ask any questions. Never asked me any questions. So it started with his thought is that in a public nonprofit, board members cannot give scholarships to their children or their relatives. But Beachcomber days is a private nonprofit, and those rules don’t apply, and he was informed that, but he continues on that narrative. 

“He wouldn’t get off that narrative, even when he was given that information by an independent, by an independent consultant, given the law printed out to him to say, these are the laws that govern Beachcomber days and there was no fraud. 

“Nobody ever asked, how do those scholarships get awarded? What’s the process? Nobody still asked. You’ll see the narrative is published by him that we broke the law, but we haven’t broken any laws. So that’s where it started.”

‘As I understand, your daughter did win a Beachcomber Days scholarship,’ I said.

“So those scholarships were awarded by an independent committee. The Beachcomber Days officers had nothing to do with it, but because he badgered my minor child so much in the media, naming her by name, dragging her name through the mud multiple times. Your child, my daughter, she didn’t take the scholarship.

“If you go on the Beachcomber Days website, it says what she was awarded, and she declined. She did not get 1 dollar from Beachcomber days. Even though she earned it, she didn’t get it. 

“And it’s not because we broke any laws. It was because he would not let her go.”

‘How old is she,” I asked.

“She was 17 at the time, and he posted her name in social media. And he was actually warned by a site that if he talks about children again, that he would be booted off the site. And so he took down her name. But yeah, he has no no problem saying my daughter’s name in the media. And that’s not right. Why is he doing that? That she earned a scholarship. Why is he doing that?

‘So it was an independent committee that made the decision, and it happens to be your daughter,’ I asked.

“It happened to be my daughter that day, October 3, instead of asking clarifying questions, Hey, how did those scholarships get awarded? What were the steps and processes? He didn’t ask any of us any questions. He contacted the Department of Justice and filed paperwork against us that day, he called the Secretary of State that day, no. 

“This is the way this is supposed to work. You ask an entity like the city for sponsorship. If they don’t like your fiscal paperwork that you turn into them, they have some question about it. The answer is, no, we’re not going to give you any money. That would be it. Either we’re going to sponsor you or not. But that’s not what happened here. That’s his jurisdiction. That’s the entire jurisdiction over all of it, everything that came from that point on, is outside his jurisdiction. He shouldn’t be doing it.”

‘What compels him,’ I asked. ‘What do you think? Do you have a previous history with him? Where you have animosity?’

“None,” Rios said.

‘Then what I wonder, because it sounds personal. I’ve seen some of the emails between the tribe and with the district attorney, badgering them to really strong arm them to press criminal charges against you. Do you wonder about it, what motivates him,” I asked.

“Wonder? Are you kidding? I lose sleep over it. I’ve had some critical health issues because of it. I’ve had to go on medication. I’m in counseling every week because of it. Scared to death that somebody’s going to come to my door. I’m afraid he’ll shoot me. I don’t know what he’s capable of doing. He is so set on finding me guilty of something, and I have not done anything, nothing.”

‘So what does this do for your public involvement,’ I asked.

“I can’t go anywhere. I can’t do anything. I stay home, I’m afraid.”

‘So you’re not working with Beachcomber days anymore,’ I asked.

“Well, Beachcomber Days … we did have Beachcomber Days last year. It was difficult. We had to get an attorney to get it done because of the things that he was doing. Clear up until the day before Beachcomber Days, two days before Beachcomber Days, he comes to the city, he comes to the fire department and tells them that they’re gonna, they’re running an illegal activity, and that he’s going to fine them if we had activities in the fire department parking lot. This was like, like two or three days before Beachcomber Days, because they did not fill out the proper paperwork to have an activity in the city of Waldport. 

‘None of this has been adjudicated. Neither the police nor the DA or the Tribe or anyone has charged you with a crime, let alone convicted you of one,’ I said.

“I think it’s important for people to know that we all have due process rights and that they have not been afforded to anybody in Beachcomber Days, nor myself specifically. So he continues to tout that there was some sort of an investigation, but there’s a due process in investigations that has to be followed. 

“The person that you’re investigating has to be notified. They have to be informed what they’re being investigated on. An independent investigator has to be hired to do that investigation. Evidence has to be gathered. The person that’s being investigated gets an opportunity to be, to say their portion of what’s going on, so that it’s a balanced investigation. At the end, somewhere down the line, is a report from this independent investigator to say what was found. What was the conclusion. Not one of those steps has been followed.

‘Well, let me ask you, what did it mean for Beachcomber days? What did the city do? Was it a significant amount of money? I mean, how much money …’

“They did not support Beachcomber days at all. The thing of it is that the city of Waldport gets $600,000 a year in short term rental taxes to be used for tourism in the area, and so for us to ask for a small amount of money, $2,000 or whatever, for Beachcomber Days …  until this all started, we had no idea how much the city got. I have no idea where they even spend the rest of it. If you look up what brings tourists to Waldport, it’s Beachcomber Days. There’s nothing else that comes up. So for us to ask for two or three thousand dollars, whatever it was, we asked for a small amount of money, a small chunk of change, compared to how much they get a year. You kind of wonder if you really investigate it. And I don’t have the answers. I’m just asking the question now.”

‘I thought the chainsaw logging competition part of Beachcomber Days was really popular,’ I said.

“When all this started, we lost the timber show because the coordinator of the timber show backed away, saying that she is employed by the school district, and all this negative press would affect, could not would, but could affect her position, And so she really needed to back away. And as long as Dann Cutter is in that position, she will not coordinate the timber show. So we didn’t have one this year.

“That Beachcomber Days timber show brought people here internationally, not just like from Washington or whatever, it was many states in the United States, plus people were coming here from Australia and other countries that, oh my gosh, who would have ever heard of that such a small little town and all that’s happening. 

“Plus we’re highlighting the school’s forestry team that’s been the state champions for six years. So it’s a way for us to highlight kids, right? It’s pretty exciting, and all of this has left us without that. Sadly.”

‘That’s too bad. It must be with some sadness … are you’re going to do it next year,’ I asked.

“Huge sadness. We don’t know. We’re gonna meet here this fall and figure out who’s gonna be officers and what’s gonna happen. Right now, we know that Dann has a couple of friends who, right after Beachcomber Days this year decided that they were gonna be Beachcomber Days, and they filled out paperwork to do the Beachcomber Day event. 

“So when we turned in our paperwork to do the Beachcomber Day event, he said, ‘Oh, there’s a group of people ahead of you.’ Well, those people don’t have a 501(c)3. They’re not registered with the state. They don’t have an organization, nothing. But yet, Dann Cutter is going to give them priority.”