Bridge Authority Commissioners

My name is Seth Gilchrist. I am an engineer and software developer. I live in White Salmon and currently work for a “somewhat local” company called Seeq, which is fully remote, but founded by Gorge locals. I’m also a planning commissioner for the City of White Salmon.

This is a complex project that requires knowledge of governmental processes, design thinking, and critical evaluation of different options and pathways. My background in engineering directly applies to the latter and my experience working as a planning commissioner applies to the former. I've been living in the Gorge or had family living in the Gorge for the last 25 years, so I'm familiar with the challenges of the bridge and what that brings.

My wife works in Hood River and my children go to school and daycare there. We live in White Salmon so we're frequent users of the bridge. I know it's a liability for the community and I want to be part of pushing it forward, getting it replaced.

As soon as they decreased the weight limit on the bridge, I was aware of that because we were building a house in White Salmon, and they had to start trucking materials through The Dalles for concrete and gravel. So I'm very aware of the impact that the bridge has on the community and what it can do for White Salmon, and what it can do for Hood River as well.

I work on the White Salmon side, but my wife works on the Hood River side as a teacher, and we use the bridge every single day. Both my kids go to school or daycare on the Hood River side, so we cross for that as well. It’s just a real lifeblood of the White Salmon lifestyle to have access to Hood River and the cross-river economy is really strong. Everything from logging to fruit to tech workers, we're just back and forth. We really can't afford to lose it at this point.

They've grown up with it at this point, so they're pretty used to it. But I have to say that we don't have a friend visit or family member visit that doesn't make a comment about how dangerous it feels. I'm also very aware of all the potential pitfalls of living in an active earthquake and volcanic region. Having a bridge of this age is really a liability for us.

I'm more afraid of the economic impacts, frankly, of if that bridge were to go down. I mean, it would just reshape our region overnight. And that's, that's scarier to me than the fairly minute chance of actually being on the bridge when that happens.