Auditors say Rock Springs has no material weaknesses

Transcription

12515088.qxp
11/15/2012
10:35 PM
Page 1
Volume CXXXIII - No. 273
www.rocketminer.com
Friday, Nov. 16, 2012
75¢
YOUR LOCAL NEWS SOURCE SINCE 1881
Auditors say Rock Springs
has no material weaknesses
PAUL MURRAY
Rocket-Miner News Reporter
ROCK SPRINGS — The 2011-2012
fiscal year audit of Rock Springs did
not uncover any material weaknesses.
Cheyenne-based McGee, Hearne
and Paiz, LLP, conducted the audit of
the fiscal year, which ended June 30.
Robert Dahill, a certified public accountant, presented the audit results
at the Nov. 6 meeting of the Rock
Springs City Council.
Although no material weaknesses
were uncovered in the city financial
audit, the Oct. 31 report said there
were significant deficiencies uncovered that did not constitute a material weakness.
“Of 10 payments tested that were
made subsequent to year end, two included amounts that should have
been accrued in accounts payable as
of year end but were not. Both instances were for construction in
progress billings where a portion of
the service period was before year end
and a portion was after year end. The
aggregate amount of the portion of
the service period relating to before
year
end
was
approximately
$707,000. Neither instance had an income effect,” the report said.
The report said generally accepted
accounting principles require governmentwide and proprietary fund financial statements to be reported on the
accrual basis of accounting, which requires construction in progress expen-
ditures be accrued in the year in which
the service was provided by the contractor.
Dahill said the city finance department has control structures in place to
properly report expenditures. However, he said the two construction expenditures “slipped through the
cracks.”
“Because it was such a large
SEE AUDITORS, PAGE 3A
Investigators blame
ice for plane crash
CHEYENNE (AP) — Federal
investigators say ice most likely caused the crash of a small
plane near Rock Springs last
year, killing both people on
board.
A report from the National
Transportation Safety Board
says the single-engine Bellanca
17-30A Viking descended rapidly after flying into an area where
forecasts expected precipitation
with supercooled droplets.
Investigators say that likely
resulted in rapid ice accumulation on the plane. They found
no indications of problems with
the airframe, flight controls and
engine before the crash.
The plane went down about
30 minutes after taking off from
Pinedale en route to Fort Collins
on May 18, 2011.
Pilot Gilmer Mickey of Englewood, Colo., and passenger Bob
Albert of Fort Collins, Colo.,
both 55, were killed.
COMPLICATED RECOVERY
Sweetwater County Sheriff
Rich
Haskell
said
after
searchers located the downed
Bellanca 17 aircraft on May 19,
2011, it became clear special
equipment would be needed to
extract the bodies.
The Associated Press said
Steven Shute of Glenwood
Springs, Colo. told The Denver
Post that he and Mickey coowned Pinedale Natural Gas
and that Albert was a consultant
for the company. Wyoming Civil Air Patrol spokeswoman
Jeanne Stone-Hunter says about
2 feet of snow fell in the area.
STRANDED OFFICIALS
Haskell said nearly every
Sweetwater County Sheriff’s Office and Search and Rescue vehicle involved in the operation
became badly stuck in the snow
and mud.
Ultimately, two chained-up
Sweetwater County Road and
Bridge graders and a tracked
bulldozer were used to extract
some vehicles.
A number of Sheriff’s Office,
Coroner’s Office, and Search &
Rescue personnel spent the
night at the scene. Several were
able to make it out around daybreak, though others were delayed for hours.
Collared wolves from
Yellowstone killed
MATTHEW BROWN
Associated Press
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) —
Seven gray wolves originally
from Yellowstone National Park
and wearing collars for research
purposes have been shot by
hunters in Montana, Idaho and
Wyoming in recent weeks, a
park scientist said Thursday.
There has been no indication
any of the wolves were taken illegally, said state officials and
Dave Hallac, chief of Yellowstone’s Center for Resources.
Two of the animals were from
packs that no longer spend
most of their time in the park,
but the remainder lived and
denned primarily in Yellowstone, Hallac said. Four of the
seven were shot in Montana,
two in Wyoming and one in Idaho.
Wildlife advocates said Thursday the killings underscore the
need for a buffer zone around
Yellowstone, with strict limits
on wolf hunting and trapping.
They warned the number of
dead park wolves could quickly
climb once Montana’s trapping
season begins next month.
Gray wolves were removed
from the endangered species list
last year by Congress under
pressure from hunting and livestock groups.
Hallac said the number of
park wolves killed so far does
not threaten Yellowstone’s population of 85-100 wolves.
A more immediate worry, he
said, is retrieving the research
collars used to track the animals’ movements. Several of the
hunters who shot collared
wolves already have offered to
return the devices, Hallac said.
“Which is great for us because
we have a lot of data on those
collars,” he said. “We’ve been
able to get some of the collars
back and we hope to get all the
collars back.”
Four collared wolves were
killed during prior hunts: two in
2009, when the animals were
off the endangered list only temporarily, and two last year, Hallac said.
Montana this year joined Idaho in lifting its quotas on wolves
across most of the state, meaning there is no longer any limit
on how many can be harvested
except in certain areas.
One of those areas abuts the
park’s northern boundary; the
other is around Glacier National Park.
Only three wolves can be
killed annually in the special
management zone outside Yellowstone, which was established
after hunters killed nine wolves
there in the span of a few weeks
in 2009.
Two wolves have died in the
quota area so far this year. It
was uncertain if that included
any of the collared wolves that
were shot.
“That buffer zone is a minimum buffer and this is absolutely not enough,” said Kim Bean
with the advocacy group Wolves
of the Rockies. “These animals
travel and they go in and out of
the park. They don’t go far, but
they go far enough.”
Generally, any wolf that crosses the park’s boundary during
hunting and trapping season is
considered fair game, said Andrea Jones with Montana Fish,
Wildlife and Parks.
“The park boundary does not
have a fence around it. Animals
that have collars on them and
SEE WOLVES, PAGE 3A
It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas, and the
holiday season as Rock Springs starts to light up.
In addition to annual adopted tree decorating,
such as this example near the corner of Grant
and Elk streets, lighting the Rock Springs Christmas tree traditionally precedes the annual parade, which is scheduled for Dec. 1.
URA plans
for 2012 and
2013 holidays
Hangar fees may go up at the Rock Springs/Sweetwater County Airport as the board
said local fees were low compared to other airports.
Airport board discusses
raising airport hangar fees
PAUL MURRAY
ROCK SPRINGS — Hangar fees at the
Rock Springs/Sweetwater County Airport
may go up in early 2013.
The airport board is expected to discuss
fees at its December meeting. On Nov. 14,
board member Gary Valentine suggested
beginning the process of raising the
hangar fees.
Board chairman Larry Levitt concurred
and said a survey of hangar fees at airports
around the state showed local rates “were
way off.”
Legal adviser George Lemich said adequate notification would need to be provided to tenants regarding the proposed increases.
Valentine said they should give notice so
the board could take action at its next
meeting.
CONSTRUCTION UPDATE
Airport Development Group principal
Chuck Kellerman said they completed the
north end of the taxiway and it looks good.
“It passed all the tests,” Kellerman said.
Board member Sigsbee Duck said the
best test will be if airplanes decide to use
the new taxiway.
Ken Walker from Uintah Engineering
and Land Surveying said the new water
tank will be smaller than the 500,000-gallon tank previously envisioned.
Board member Donna Acker asked why
the figure had been used so frequently in
the past. Kellerman said the figure had
been a preliminary estimate.
Walker said the tank would not be filled
to capacity, which is not necessary given
the airport’s current level of use and requirements. The estimated completion
date for the tank is June 1, 2013.
The new water tank is a necessary before expansion of airport operations or development of a new business park near the
airport.
Airport manager Terry Doak said there
were mechanical issues with one of the
new snowplower and blower. The equipment is under a one-year warranty, and the
airport mechanics are working on the
problem.
Doak stressed the airport still has
enough equipment to plow snow when
necessary.
Board member Jerry Klein was unable to
attend the meeting.
NO PILOT PROBLEM EXPECTED
Levitt said he has not heard of a possible shortage of airline pilots which could
impact the airport, or they would have organizational meetings to discuss the issue.
Levitt said it can be stressful for new pilots throughout their training, as they are
continually confronted with a variety of
emergency situations so they know how to
handle any out-of-the-ordinary problems.
Acker said that one drawback for any
new pilot is salary level. It takes many
years, she said, for a new pilot to accumulate the hours and experience necessary to
graduate to a larger plane and a meaningful income.
Levitt said he did not foresee a problem
with airport operations in the future because of any projected pilot shortage and
talk of that nature might be overhyped.
Groups seek expansion of coal mining suit
MEAD GRUVER
Associated Press
CHEYENNE (AP) — Environmental
groups asked a judge Thursday to expand
the scope of a lawsuit they’ve filed against
the U.S. Forest Service over plans to mine
coal in northeast Wyoming.
U.S. District Judge Alan Johnson heard
the groups’ arguments, and the Forest Service’s objections to the request, and said he
would rule on the motion in a day or two.
He didn’t hint which way he might decide.
The lawsuit is one of several that environmentalists have filed recently to contest
Wyoming coal mining on grounds that include climate change.
WildEarth Guardians, Sierra Club and
Powder River Basin Resource Council filed
suit last December over a proposal to sell
402 million tons of coal reserves next to
St. Louis-based Peabody Energy Corp.’s
North Antelope Rochelle Mine in the
southern Powder River Basin.
The basin is the top coal-producing region in the U.S. and the surface coal mine
is one of the world’s largest mines.
In May, Peabody subsidiary BTU Western Resources Inc., successfully bid more
than $446 million with the U.S. Bureau of
Land Management to mine the contested
South Porcupine tract, helping to ensure
that the mine can be expanded and remain
viable for years to come.
The three groups also object to a separate plan to mine more than 721 million
tons of coal from another tract next to the
mine.
BTU Western Resources successfully
bid more than $793 million for the coal in
the North Porcupine tract in June.
Much of the coal in the two tracts underlies the Thunder Basin National Grassland. National grasslands fall under Forest
Service purview.
The Forest Service leaned heavily on
BLM analysis in approving both leases,
but the analyses were flawed in part because BLM didn’t adequately address how
burning the coal in power plants would
contribute to carbon dioxide emissions
and climate change, the groups say.
Now, the groups want to add their concerns about the bigger North Porcupine
tract to their lawsuit over the South Porcupine tract.
SEE SUIT, PAGE 3A
PAUL MURRAY
ROCK SPRINGS — Letters to Santa can be
sent through a mailbox outside the Rock Springs
Urban Renewal Agency/Main Street Office beginning Monday, Nov. 26.
The office is located in the downtown train depot, and the letter collection will continue
through Monday, Dec. 17.
URA/Main Street administrative assistant Terri Nations said they received a number of letters
to Santa dealing with economic or social situations facing families in 2011.
“One letter was from a kid who asked nothing
for himself,” Nations said. “He wanted a green
sweater and a blender for his mom because her
food has to be blended.”
She said other letters requested help from Santa in getting a driver’s license for a parent or
asked to get a father out of jail. One child told
Santa her family had recently lost their home and
included new directions so he could find their
new residence, Nations said.
Rock Springs councilman Glennise Wendorf,
who attended the URA board meeting in her role
as liaison, said, “It’s not at all like when we were
kids and we asked for a toy or two.”
Wendorf said the responses to the child with
a parent in jail said Santa could not go above or
around the law.
URA/Main Street manager Jeff Pedersen said
one kid told Santa to bring a six-pack for his dad.
“These are real-life issues,” Pedersen said.
“Mom losing her car, a parent losing a job, losing
a place to live and a child being worried that Santa won’t be able to find where they live now.
These are real-life issues.”
Pedersen said the responses try to convey
hope and tell kids to keep the faith.
CHRISTMAS PARADE
The Christmas parade in downtown Rock
Springs is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. Saturday, Dec.
1. The URA is not sponsoring the parade, but it is
participating with a float.
SEE HOLIDAYS, PAGE 3A
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Only ritual talk on
fiscal cliff so far
fect, a combination known as
the “fiscal cliff” that many economists say could send the econWASHINGTON (AP) — omy back into recession.
When President Barack Obama
That sounds ominous, and if
greets congressional leaders at nothing else, neither party
the White House on Friday, an wants to bear the responsibility
elaborate set of postelection rit- if it happens.
uals will be complete. Yet dividYet government, particularly
ed government’s ability to at- divided government, has a curitack the nation’s economic woes ous relationship with deadlines.
is no clearer now than it has
On the one hand, they can fobeen for months.
cus on compromise
Eventually, someefforts, and can result
thing’s got to give in a ‘I argued
in an agreement.
country where voters
Yet just as often,
are weary of gridlock for a
they lead to interim
and wearier still of balanced,
half-measures that set
high unemployment.
a new deadline for the
responsible final day of reckoning.
Or does it?
“I’m open to comThe fiscal cliff itself
approach,
promise and I’m open
is an example.
to new ideas,” Obama and part of
Republicans used
said at his White
the threat of an unHouse news confer- that
precedented federal
ence on Wednesday. included
default to win about $1
He stressed the imtrillion in spending
portance of avoiding making
cuts over 10 years
the “fiscal cliff,” a doufrom Obama and Deble whammy of tax in- sure that
mocrats in 2011. The
creases and spending the
same agreement set
cuts at the turn of the
up a deficit “super
wealthiest
year.
committee” to seek
Up to a point.
more and bigger
Americans deficit savings. That
He referred more
than once to his defeat pay a little
effort ignominiously
of Republican Mitt
failed a year ago, leavRomney, saying, “I ar- bit more.’
ing in place a series of
gued for a balanced, Mitt Romney
automatic across-theresponsible approach,
board spending cuts
and part of that intimed to coincide with
cluded making sure that the the scheduled expiration of tax
wealthiest Americans pay a little cuts at the turn of the year.
bit more.”
As always in the run-up to ne“By the way, more voters gotiations, the two sides vie for
agreed with me on this issue leverage.
than voted for me,” he added, a
Hence, Boehner is fond of
reminder to Republicans that pointing out that while the pressome of their supporters, too, ident may have a mandate, so,
disagree with the party’s posi- too, do the House Republicans,
tion.
who renewed their majority in
House Speaker John Boehner, last week’s elections.
R-Ohio, also regularly stresses a
Senate Republican Leader
willingness to reach across the Mitch McConnell of Kentucky
aisle, citing the emergence of a is more pointed. “Most people
“spirit of cooperation” since the may focus on the White House,
election that he says bodes well but the fact is the government is
for an agreement.
organized no differently today
Like Obama, he avoids defin- than it was after the Republican
itive answers to hypothetical wave of 2010,” he said earlier in
questions.
the week.
“I don’t want to box myself in.
Not exactly.
I don’t want to box anyone else
In other areas, numerous Rein,” he said recently.
publicans have made it clear
Yet also like the president, they are ready to talk comproBoehner has laid down a mark- mise — from a position of elecer for the talks ahead. “Raising toral weakness.
tax rates is unacceptable,” he
Despite the claim of a dual
said referring to Obama’s cam- mandate, Boehner has signaled
paign-long call to allow rates to the end of efforts to repeal Obarise on incomes over $200,000 ma’s health care legislation, a
for individuals and $250,000 cause that animated the tea parfor couples.
ty and united Republicans who
Both sides take credit for con- swept to power in the House
cessions, none of them particu- two years ago.
larly new.
Numerous Republicans in
In talks that came close to a Congress and among the nadeal in 2011, Obama said he was tion’s governors say the party
willing to make significant cuts must appeal more effectively to
in the growth of benefit pro- Hispanic voters, who account
grams like Medicare and Medic- for an ever-increasing share of
aid, infuriating liberals. Boehn- the electorate and gave Obama
er spoke of as much as $800 bil- more than 70 percent of their
lion in new revenue, angering votes this fall. Already there are
conservatives.
the first stirrings of compromise
The talks eventually col- talks on an overhaul of immigralapsed.
tion law, to include a pathway to
Now White House Press Sec- legal status if not citizenship for
retary Jay Carney says Obama millions who are in the country
will ask for $1.6 trillion in new illegally.
taxes over a decade when the
The “tone and rhetoric” emtalks resume after Friday morn- ployed by Republicans in recent
ing’s meeting at the White debates over immigration have
House.
“built a wall between the RepubIt’s an opening bid, not a de- lican Party and Hispanic command, part of the standard rit- munity,” Sen. Lindsey Graham,
ual for such occasions as is the R-S.C. conceded a few days afrhetoric from both sides.
ter the election.
Barring legislation, taxes will
So much for Romney’s staterise on nearly everyone on Jan. ment in last winter’s primaries
1, and a series of across-the- that illegal immigrants can selfboard spending cuts will take ef- deport.
DAVID ESPO
AP Special Correspondent
42/26
47/26
46/28
48/30
A mix of
light rain
and snow
later in the
day. High
42F.
42/24
Clouds giving way to
sun . Highs
in the low
40s and
lows in the
mid 20s.
Partly
cloudy.
Highs in the
upper 40s
and lows in
the mid 20s.
Mostly
sunny.
Highs in the
mid 40s and
lows in the
upper 20s.
A few
clouds.
Highs in the
upper 40s
and lows in
the low 30s.
Sunrise:
7:05 AM
Sunset:
4:56 PM
Sunrise:
7:06 AM
Sunset:
4:56 PM
Sunrise:
7:07 AM
Sunset:
4:55 PM
Sunrise:
7:08 AM
Sunset:
4:54 PM
Sunrise:
7:09 AM
Sunset:
4:53 PM
Area
Cities
Area Cities
City
Afton
Big Piney
Buffalo
Casper
Cheyenne
Cody
Douglas
Evanston
Gillette
Green River
Greybull
Jackson
Kemmerer
Lander
Laramie
Hi
38
42
45
47
47
39
48
41
46
39
41
33
40
43
44
Lo Cond.
17 sn shower
15 mixed
25 cloudy
25 cloudy
27 cloudy
24 mixed
22 cloudy
23 sn shower
25 cloudy
17 sn shower
23 cloudy
16 sn shower
18 sn shower
23 cloudy
25 cloudy
City
Lusk
Mountain View
Newcatsle
Pinedale
Powell
Rawlins
Reliance
Riverton
Rock Springs
Sheridan
Thermopolis
Torrington
Wheatland
Worland
Yellowstone NP
Hi
47
41
47
37
42
44
42
42
42
45
41
54
52
42
31
Lo Cond.
21 cloudy
22 mixed
26 cloudy
12 sn shower
24 cloudy
23 mixed
24 mixed
24 cloudy
24 mixed
21 pt sunny
21 cloudy
25 pt sunny
29 cloudy
18 cloudy
11 sn shower
City
Minneapolis
New York
Phoenix
San Francisco
Seattle
St. Louis
Washington, DC
Hi
47
48
78
72
50
53
51
Lo Cond.
34 pt sunny
37 sunny
52 mst sunny
51 pt sunny
38 pt sunny
33 pt sunny
38 sunny
National
Cities
National Cities
City
Atlanta
Boston
Chicago
Dallas
Denver
Houston
Los Angeles
Miami
Hi
51
47
44
63
53
68
76
80
Lo Cond.
43 drizzle
34 sunny
30 pt sunny
38 sunny
30 pt sunny
39 pt sunny
55 cloudy
68 pt sunny
Moon
Phases
Moon Phases
New
First
Full
Last
Nov 13
Nov 20
Nov 28
Dec 6
U.V.
Index
UV Index
Wed
Thu
Fri
Sat
Sun
11/14
11/15
11/16
11/17
11/18
2
Low
2
Low
2
Low
2
Low
2
Low
The UV Index is measured on a 0 - 11 number scale,
with a higher UV Index showing the need for greater
skin protection.
Holly Dabb
PUBLISHER
Michele
Depue
MANAGING
EDITOR
0
11
Rick Lee
Pam Haynes
GENERAL
MANAGER
CIRCULATION
MANAGER
How to reach us
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BYU research: Tiny tubes could revamp lab testing
JIM DALRYMPLE
Daily Herald
PROVO, Utah (AP) — Deep in
the basement of Brigham Young
University’s Benson building,
amidst piles of beakers and a jungle of piping, Debolina Chatterjee
sits on a stool staring at a clear
plastic rectangle, held delicately
between her thumb and forefinger. When held up to the light, the
piece of plastic looks almost like
a small, simple computer chip: in
the center, a smaller piece of plastic has been attached, and on that
piece several tiny lines span the
distance between a pair of ball
bearing-sized holes. The entire
thing is no more substantial than
a bar of soap, two weeks out of
the box.
But small as it may be, the implications of the device could be
tremendous. A collaboration between Chatterjee, a Ph.D. candidate in chemistry, professor
Adam Woolley and others, the
rectangle of plastic is a prototype
of a new testing device that could
revolutionize the way experts test
for contaminants in all sorts of
liquids. The idea, Woolley explained, is that a liquid — blood
or water, for example — is
dropped onto the piece of plastic
then travels along the hair-sized
lines, which are actually tubes.
“The tubes are about the same
size as real capillaries in blood
vessels,” Woolley said.
Researchers can then look at
how far through the tubes the liquid travels. From that distance,
they can extrapolate information
about what chemicals might be
present. The process could eventually be used to test for diseases
such as cancer or tuberculosis, as
well as contaminants in water,
among other possible applications.
OBITUARY
DARLA J. TALBOT
ROCHESTER, N.Y. — Darla J.
Talbot, 49, died Sunday, Nov. 4,
2012.
She is survived by her
husband, William Talbot; children, Toni and
fiancé James Reed and
Karla Arnold; mother,
Darlene Sexton; siblings, James and wife
Debbie Sexton, Susan
and
husband
Gary
Brown, Crystal Whitney
and fiancé William Wesley, Donna and husband Harry Bobak,
Elizabeth and husband Loren
Rogers and Valerie and husband
Tom Sylvester; grandchildren,
Aleycia Perez, Zachariah Reed,
Jacob Reed and Mekih Parson;
father-in-law, James Talbot;
brother- and sister-in-law, Debbie and husband Clifford Roy,
Ginney and husband Joe
Sofia and Jim and wife
MaryKay Talbot; 21
nieces and nephews; 34
great-nieces and greatnephews; and many
dear friends.
She was preceded in
death by her father,
Melvin J. Sexton; and
mother-in-law, Margaret
Talbot.
Memorial services were conducted Wednesday, Nov. 7, 2012,
at the Church of Christ, 15 Lawson Road, Rochester, N.Y.. Interment was conducted privately.
Condolences can be left at
www.MeesonFamily.com.
City settles with man
who flipped off officer
OREM, Utah (AP) — A manho
was pulled over and cited after
flipping off a Utah police officer
in 2010 has agreed to drop his
complaint after the city of Orem
agreed to pay him $2,500 in damages and promised not to ticket
anyone else for the obscene gesture.
The American Civil Liberties
Union of Utah had threatened a
lawsuit on behalf of Seth Dame,
saying an officer violated Dame’s
constitutional right to express
himself after Dame flipped him
off on June 25, 2010.
“Allowing police to detain and
charge people for impolite behavior would grant police wide discretionary power to harass people
they do not like,” said John Mejia,
Legal Director of the ACLU of
Utah, in a statement Thursday.
“Any police overstep of power to
crack down on expression, even
rude expression, is therefore
worth serious attention.”
The city declined to prosecute
the case, but ACLU claimed the
incident violated Dame’s First
Amendment free speech rights
and his Fourth Amendment protection against unlawful search
and seizure.
In the settlement, Orem agrees
it shouldn’t have stopped Dame
solely for giving the finger, and
won’t do so in the future. The police department also agreed to
continue training its officers
about First Amendment protection.
“We do view this as a one-time,
isolated incident, and don’t anticipate it happening it again,” Orem
City Attorney Greg Stephens
said.
The
settlement
provides
$2,500 in attorneys’ fees to the
ACLU, and $2,500 in damages to
Dame.
Officials with the Orem city attorney’s office didn’t immediately return a request for comment
Thursday.
The ACLU notes similar cases
have been settled in Pennsylvania
and Kansas.
“Various courts have concluded that using your middle finger
to express discontent or frustration is expressive conduct protected by the First Amendment,”
Mejia said.
“We are very pleased that
Orem has responded to our efforts to ensure that everyone’s
free speech rights are protected.”
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rocketminer.com
Family takes body
from mortuary
over burial fight
SHANNON DININNY
Associated Press
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) —
Teddy Serawop always wanted
to be cremated after he died,
with his ashes scattered across
his favorite hunting lands in
Utah’s Uinta Mountains, his
mother and sister said. But his
father’s side of the family wanted him buried in a traditional
ceremony on the Northern Ute
Tribe’s reservation.
When the two sides couldn’t
agree, tribal members went to
the mortuary in eastern Utah
and removed his body, burying
it on the Uintah and Ouray Indian Reservation in rural eastern
Utah.
“I’ve been here 38 years, and
I’ve never seen anything like it,”
John Hullinger of Hullinger
Mortuary in Roosevelt said
Thursday. “We’ve served both of
these families before, but the
Ute Tribe took it into their own
hands.”
Toxicology results are still
pending to determine the cause
of death for Serawop, a 32-yearold tribal member who died
Nov. 5. His father also is a tribal
member. His mother is not.
Unless a person leaves written instructions, decisions
about burial fall to the legal
spouse, children or parents of
the deceased.
Serawop had three children
with a woman who also is a tribal member. A tribal court named
her his common-law wife and issued two orders to the mortuary
to release the body to her and
his father’s family.
However, because the mortuary is not on the reservation,
Hullinger said, its legal counsel
advised the mortuary to wait for
a state or federal judge to weigh
in on the matter.
Hullinger Mortuary was still
awaiting a ruling when tribal
members arrived to pay their respects Tuesday night — along
with tribal officers who served
the mortuary with a third notice. Hullinger said his son was
trying to negotiate with the two
families when one of the officers
closed the door, at which point
tribal members removed the
casket from the building, loaded
it onto a truck and drove away.
Serawop’s older sister, 36year-old Ricki Lynn Hackford,
claims his common-law wife
had since married another man
and had no claims to her brother’s body. She said Serawop had
always wanted to be cremated,
but that she, her mother and sister agreed to bury him at a
cemetery off the reservation instead.
Tribal members still insisted
he be buried on the reservation,
she said.
“We don’t even know where
they buried him,” Hackford said.
“We haven’t been able to grieve
yet, because we’ve been too
busy fighting.”
The Ute tribe did not return a
telephone call seeking comment
Thursday.
Tribal leaders issued a statement criticizing the mortuary
for engaging in “unequal treatment and institutional racism,”
KSL television reported.
Serawop’s common-law wife
and his family had every right to
take his body from the mortuary, and he was buried in a
cemetery pursuant to the cultural traditions of the Ute Indian
Tribe, tribal leaders said.
3A
Army suicides for 2012
surpass 2011 numbers
WASHINGTON (AP) — Ten months into
2012, the number of suspected suicides by active-duty soldiers has surpassed last year’s total, even as the Pentagon struggles to stem
the persistent problem.
According to the Army, there were 20 possible suicides in October, bringing the total for
the year to 166 — one more than the total for
2011. The 20 suspected soldier suicides in October is also a spike, compared to 15 in September. U.S. Army officials have been worried
about the pace of suicides this year and were
concerned the numbers would surge higher
than last year despite efforts to increase pro-
grams and outreach. In late September, the
Army ordered a servicewide “stand down” requiring soldiers to put aside their usual duties
and spend time discussing suicide prevention,
including how to identify signs of trouble with
their comrades.
Military leaders have wrestled with ways to
identify factors that trigger suicides. While it
has been linked to combat stress, many of the
suicide victims are soldiers who have never
deployed. Other pressures, including marital,
financial or health problems, are also known
causes of suicides.
Officials have also been puzzled by the rise
in suicides after years of working to blunt the
problem with new programs such as a regime
of resilience training starting at boot camp
and the hiring of more psychiatrists and other mental health workers. The questions are
compounded by the fact that the pace of combat deployments — often thought to be a trigger — has begun to slow and suicide rates
were leveling off for the two previous years.
Suicides also are rising in the civilian population, officials said.
Suicides among National Guard and Reserve soldiers who are not on active duty are
also on pace to surpass last year’s numbers.
CONTINUED FROM PAGE ONE
AUDITORS
amount, we felt it should be brought to the attention of the City Council,” he said.
If the city did not have a control structure
in place to record and report expenditures,
Dahill said that would have constituted a material weakness. Since one exists, the auditors
categorized the mistake as a significant deficiency, but not a material weakness.
The city does have a good control structure
in place, Dahill said, but it simply needs to be
tightened. He said Rock Springs Finance and
Administration Director Lisa Tarufelli agreed
with the audit report, which said the two construction expenditures should have been included with the June 30, 2012 data.
The city responded to the significant deficiency.
“The city sends out letters to contractors
before fiscal year end asking them to invoice
the city for work performed up to June 30th
so staff can more easily determine what portion of the expenditures are to be included in
the proper period. Staff also reviews invoices to determine the fiscal year in which the
expenditures belong. In order to strengthen
internal controls, the city will send additional reminders to contractors and those responsible for administration of contracts to facili-
BY THE NUMBERS
Rock Springs audit figures as of June 30
Governmental fund
Total assets: $43,775,019
Total liabilities: $7,389,841
Total liabilities and fund balance:
$43,775,019
Net assets
Total current assets: $80,339,043
Total noncurrent assets: $139,745,722
Total assets: $220,084,765
Total current liabilities: $9,199,209
Total noncurrent liabilities: $15,221,704
Total liabilities: $24,420,913
Total 2011-12 net assets: $195,663,852
Total 2010-11 net assets: $187,980,000
Source: Rock Springs, McGee, Hearne and Paiz, LLP
tate invoicing promptly for work performed
before fiscal year end. Staff will also perform
more in-depth reviews of large invoices submitted after year end,” the city response said.
Tarufelli said the oversight referred to
retrofit work at the wastewater treatment
plant to control the smell and miscellaneous
sewer work.
The money came out of the sewer fund, not
the city’s general fund. Because some of the
work done by the contractor started in May
2012 and continued past the start of the new
fiscal year on July 1, 2012, the bill did not
come in prior to the start of the new fiscal
year. As a result, the city did not apportion
the cost between the 2012 and 2013 fiscal
years.
Tarufelli said steps have been taken to ensure there is no repeat of any similar mistakes. Contractors doing business with the
city will be more strongly reminded to submit
invoices prior to the end of the fiscal year
when work was so costs can be included in
the audit.
A complete copy of the audit report on the
Rock Springs Web site at www.rswy.net. The
information is listed under the finance and
administration department. Financial and
compliance reports for 2006-07 to 2011-12
are listed under related pages.
HOLIDAYS
Sweetwater County
updates fire code
JOEL GALLOB
GREEN RIVER — New fire
code standards passed the
Sweetwater County Commission.
The changes replaced the
2006 version of the code.
The revised code does not include a board of appeals. Instead, people who claim the
code does not apply or the true
intent has been misconstrued
can appeal a fire code official decision to the Wyoming Council
on Fire Prevention and Electrical Safety within 30 days of the
decision.
The new code said anyone
who violates a fire code provision will be fined up to $750 for
each day the violation is discovered and remains uncorrected.
In addition, anyone who does
not obey a county stop work order, except work to correct a violation or unsafe condition, will
face a $50 to $750 fine.
Commissioners Wally Johnson, Gary Bailiff, Reid West,
Don Van Matre and John Kolb
voted to adopt the 2012 fire
code as amended by Sweetwater County Enforcement Officer
Jim Zimmerman.
Marijuana law introduced
to Uruguay congress
MONTEVIDEO,
Uruguay
(AP) — Uruguay came one step
closer to turning the government into the country’s leading
pot dealer on Thursday, as lawmakers formally introduced to
Congress a framework for regulating the production, sale and
consumption of marijuana.
The proposal is much more
liberal than what Uruguay’s government initially proposed
months ago, when President
Jose Mujica said only the government would be allowed to
sell pot.
The draft law would instead
create a National Cannabis Institute with the power to license
individuals and companies to
produce and sell marijuana for
recreational, medicinal or indus-
trial uses.
It would foster marijuana
growing clubs to provide the
weed to their members. And
most significantly, it would allow anyone to grow a limited
amount of marijuana in their
own homes, and possess marijuana for their own consumption.
“The thrust is the same, to
create state-controlled markets.
This provides the legal framework,” Colette Youngers, a drug
policy expert at the Washington
Office on Latin America, told
The Associated Press. “The
main difference is that they have
incorporated the idea of cultivation for personal use, and also
the cannabis clubs, which was
not in the initial proposal.”
Parade organizers said participants cannot throw candy from
floats. They said if candy is offered, it must be handed out by
walkers.
They also require all parade
participants be secured to the
float, no graffiti and all entries
must be in good taste and represent the spirit of the season. Any
float not in good taste can be disqualified at check-in.
In addition, there can be no live
fires or flames associated with a
float. There is an entry fee.
The parade will begin on C
Street, turn east on South Main
and turn right on Broadway. It
will proceed under the underpass
to M Street, turn left onto Pilot
Butte to K Street and take a right
on North Front.
The route will continue on Elk
Street and turn left to Grant
Street before floats can disperse
into the parking lot of Vase Funeral Home or over the A Street
viaduct.
2013 CHOCOLATE FESTIVAL
Looking ahead, the 2013
Chocolate Festival is scheduled
for Friday, Feb. 8, and Saturday,
Feb. 9. The Rock Springs Civic
Center will again host the event.
Chocolate Festival chairman
Jodie Barnum hosted the first organizational meeting for the
event on Nov. 13.
Barnum said the second day
will be kids’ day at the festival.
She said no decision has been
made for the theme of the first
day.
“After Dec. 1 is when we’ll really get going,” Barnum said.
During the next Chocolate Festival meeting in a couple of
WOLVES
are in Montana are considered Montana animals
once they cross the border, regardless,” Jones said.
Hunters, she added, are allowed to call for wolves
to draw them close enough for a shot.
Electronic calls are prohibited in the state, but
hunters can use verbal calls just like they can when
hunting other species such as elk.
Hunters have killed at least 61 wolves in Montana, 96 in Idaho and 34 in Wyoming this hunting
season.
That’s a combined 191 wolves out a regionwide
population of at least 1,774 animals at the end of
2011.
Government biologists say there are more than
enough animals to sustain the species, but wildlife
advocates and conservation groups have warned
state-sanctioned hunts could again imperil the animals.
SUIT
Their concerns about the Forest Service’s approval of the
North Porcupine tract are essentially identical to those they harbor about the South Porcupine
tract, third-year law student Jon
Lavallee argued for the groups.
“The decisions are quite hard
to tell apart,” Lavallee told the
judge.
The Forest Service argued that
the concerns over the separate
tracts warrant separate complaints.
“There are differences that,
when we get to the nitty-gritty,
will matter,” attorney Marissa
Ann Piropato, representing the
Forest Service, told the court.
She said combining the
groups’ concerns about the two
tracts under the same lawsuit
wouldn’t necessarily be more efficient for the system.
The lawsuit was originally filed
in U.S. District Court in Denver.
A Colorado judge granted a Forest Service request to transfer the
case to Wyoming in April.
Intervenors in the case on the
side of the Forest Service include
the state of Wyoming, Wyoming
Mining Association, National
Mining Association and BTU
Western Resources.
Three other lawsuits WildEarth
Guardians has filed against the
BLM to contest Wyoming coal
leases are still pending before
federal judges in Washington,
D.C.
weeks, the group will break into
committees. Although there is a
solid core group of workers already, Barnum said additional
helpers will be needed.
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LIFESTYLES
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Page 4A
COMMUNITY BULLETIN BOARD
Around Sweetwater County
the Girl Scouts, Uinta County
New Hope Baptist
Concert Series, a medical clinChurch hosting
ic in Farson, a 4-H Club meat
judging team and the Bridger
dinner on Nov. 18
Valley Food Pantry. It has also
ROCK SPRINGS — New
Hope Baptist Church is hosting a pre-Thanksgiving dinner
on Nov. 18.
Dinner will be served from 13 p.m. Sunday at the New
Hope Baptist Church, 513 G
St., Rock Springs.
Organizers said anyone is
welcome and there is no
charge.
“This dinner is our way of
giving back to the community,
for those who may be less fortunate and even those who
don’t want to cook,” New Hope
Pastor Elwood Stewart said.
For more information, contact Kent Porenta.
Operation Roundup
is in full swing
ROCK SPRINGS — Bridger
Valley Electric is raising money for those in need and community projects and programs
through
the
Operation
Roundup Program.
This program gives Bridger
Valley Electric members the
option to round up electric
bills and send the spare
change for donations. Monetary donations are also accepted.
Organizers said participants
donate about $11.88 a year,
which adds up with the number of participating co-op
members.
Past beneficiaries include
Military News
Joshua Barry
promoted to
specialist
ROCK SPRINGS — Joshua
Barry of Laramie was recently
promoted to the rank of specialist in the Wyoming Army
National Guard.
Barry is a bridge crew member in the 1041st Engineer
Company in Rock Springs.
He has been a member of
the Wyoming Army National
Guard for two years.
In addition to serving in the
Wyoming Army National
Guard, Barry is a drilling engineer with Encana Oil and Gas
in Denver.
Richard Wilson
awarded
Meritorious
Service Medal
ROCK SPRINGS — Staff
Sgt. Richard Wilson of Jackson
was awarded the Meritorious
Service Medal on Nov. 3.
Wilson is a senior boat operator assigned to the Wyoming
National Guard’s 1041st Engineer Company in Rock
Springs.
Lt. Col. Steve Alkire, the
commander of the 94th Troop
Command, presented Wilson
the award for meritorious service for more than 15 years, distinguishing himself in all positions served.
Guard, Wilson is a highway
Birth
Pehlke-Johnson
boy born
ROCK SPRINGS — A boy,
Ash Anders Pehlke-Johnson,
was born June 10, 2012, to Joe
Fibbers vie for
World’s Biggest
Liar crown
LONDON (AP) — Fantastic
fibbers vied at a remote pub in
northwestern England on
Thursday for the title of
helped pay bills due to illness,
death or other important
needs.
To donate, round up your
electric bill or send a check by
mail to Bridger Valley Electric’s Operation Roundup Program.
Baker, Willoughby
win pinochle games
ROCK SPRINGS — James
Baker won the Nov. 8 pinochle
game played at the Young at
Heart Recreational Center.
Frank Willoughby placed
second, and Gary Jensen came
in third.
Other pinochle players included Jim Rafferty, Lorraine
Hill, Betty DuPape and Joi
Jensen.
Besso, Melvin and
Willoughby win
cribbage games
ROCK SPRINGS — Barbara Besso and the pair of Don
Melvin and Frank Willoughby
won their respective tables at
the Nov. 14 cribbage games
played at the Young at Heart
Recreational Center.
Other cribbage players included Jim Rafferty, Dorothy
Logan and Joe Kruljac.
maintenance professional with
the Wyoming Department of
Transportation.
Seneca Phelps
promoted to private
ROCK SPRINGS — Seneca
Phelps of Green River was recently promoted to the rank of
private in the Wyoming Army
National Guard.
Phelps is a bridge crew
member in the 1041st Engineer Company in Rock
Springs.
She was a member of the
Guard for one year.
Guard, Phelps is a maintenance worker with the Sweetwater County Events Complex
in Rock Springs.
Matthew Wilks
promoted to
sergeant
ROCK
SPRINGS
—
Matthew Wilks of Laramie was
recently promoted to the rank
of sergeant in the Wyoming
Army National Guard.
Wilks is a bridge crew member in the 1041st Engineer
Company in Rock Springs.
He has been a member of
the Wyoming Army National
Guard for six years.
Guard, Barry is a student at
the University of Wyoming in
Laramie.
Johnson and Joy Pehlke in Ann
Arbor, Mich.
He is the brother of Austin
Aran Pehlke-Johnson. His
grandparents are Dave and
Karen Pehlke of St George,
Utah.
world’s biggest liar.
Judges were deliberating
into the night after two hours
of competition at the Bridge
Inn in the Lake District hamlet
of Santon Bridge. Contestants
had five minutes to impress
the judges with a whopping
but convincing lie.
Participants at the recognition dinner for volunteers at the Young at
Heart Recreational Center include, from left, Mardell and John Pieper.
Volunteers, from left, Mary and Ray Hardy received recognition for
supporting the Young at Heart Recreational Center.
Young at Heart recognizes
volunteers at special event
ROCK SPRINGS — About
250 community volunteers were
recognized by the Young at
Heart Recreational Center’s volunteer recognition dinner on
Friday, Oct. 26.
Approximately 250 volunteers, who gave a minimum of
one hour each month volunteer
time, were honored.
On average volunteers give
more than 2,500 hours per
month to help the center run
daily operations.
When asked why they volunteer, one volunteer wrote, “I get
a lot of satisfaction and pleasure
out of volunteering. I love to
help other people. It’s good for
the soul.”
Volunteers must complete an
application. Once approved they
go through orientation and receive a job description. Volunteers will do all things, such as
serve their fellow seniors, help
with fundraising activities and
help with other programs in the
community.
“YAH could not operate as
smoothly as it does without volunteers,” Director Jeanine Cox
said. “There is more than money
involved. Volunteers show how
much they care with every hour
they volunteer. There isn’t a big
enough ‘thank you’ that can be
said.”
Many volunteer opportunities
are available for community
members looking to help out.
Receptionists man the telephones, sell meal tickets and
greet people and may be asked
to help with paperwork.
Volunteers who are able to
drive are needed to deliver
home-delivered meals.
The task takes about 90 minutes and volunteers generally deliver the same day each week,
one time each week and the
same route.
Kitchen aides are needed at
different times in the kitchen.
Members of the activity committee donate one hour for a
meeting, usually at the end of
every month.
Help may include making
posters, putting together items
for noontime activities and
preparing mailers.
Members of the dance committee generally meet each
month to plan Oktoberfest, New
Year’s Dance, Spring Fling
dance and others.
Young at Heart Recreational Center volunteers include, from left,
Chuck and Betty Jean Carter.
Other ways to help include
making phone calls for outreach
programs, entering computer
data, filing, janitor/cleaning work
and organizing mailings.
Anyone interested may contact the Young at Heart Recreational Center.
‘Star Wars’ figures in Toy Hall of Fame
ROCHESTER, N.Y. (AP) —
Luke Skywalker and Princess
Leia outmuscled little green
army men for a spot in the National Toy Hall of Fame. “Star
Wars” action figures join centuries-old dominoes in the class
of 2012, which was announced
by the Rochester hall Thursday.
A national selection committee chose them from among 12
finalists, plucking the most ancient and most modern toys
from the list.
“Star Wars” action figures
went on the market in 1978, following the 1977 release of the
20th Century Fox movie. The 3
3/4-inch figures of Han Solo,
Chewbacca, R2-D2 and company were sold until 1985 and
again from the mid-1990s to today.
Museum officials say their
phenomenal popularity inspired
other toy makers to tie their
products to movies and television series and they note the
toys’ appeal extends to adults
who continue to collect them.
“They are a force to be reckoned with,” said Patricia Hogan,
curator at The Strong museum,
which houses the Toy Hall of
Fame.
More than 20 lines of “Star
Wars” figures have launched,
propelling the film series’ merchandise sales to $20 billion
over the past 35 years. The action figures were first made by
Kenner, which was bought by
Tonka and later Hasbro.
Dominoes originated in China
in the 1300s and appeared later
in Europe in a slightly different
form.
A standard set of 28 tiles represents all possible results when
rolling a pair of six-sided dice,
with the addition of two blank
sides.
Although there’s a variety of
ways to play with them, the cascading toppling of lined-up tiles
put the “domino effect” into the
American lexicon.
The toys beat out plastic green
army men, the board game Clue,
the Fisher-Price Corn Popper,
Lite-Brite, the Magic 8 Ball, the
pogo stick, sidewalk chalk, the
electronic game Simon, the tea
set and Twister.
Officials at the Toy Hall of
Fame say anyone can nominate
a toy and thousands of suggestions come in every year. An internal committee of curators, educators and historians chooses
the finalists and then a national
selection committee votes for
the winners.
To date, 49 toys have made
the cut.
They range from classics, like
Play-Doh and Slinky, to the less
obvious, like the stick and cardboard box.
Longevity is a key criterion for
getting into the 14-year-old hall.
Each toy must be widely recog-
nized, foster learning, creativity
or discovery through play, and
endure in popularity over generations.
“Play is an essential activity,
critical to learning and to human
development,” said Christopher
Bensch, The Strong’s vice president of collections. “Play is also
a window into understanding
American culture.”
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rocketminer.com
Diabetes
rates rocket
in Oklahoma
MIKE STOBBE
AP Medical Writer
NEW YORK (AP) — The nation’s diabetes problem is getting worse, and the biggest
jump over 15 years was in Oklahoma, according to a new
federal report issued Thursday.
The diabetes rate in Oklahoma more than tripled, and
Kentucky, Georgia and Alabama also saw dramatic increases since 1995, the study
showed.
The South’s growing weight
problem is the main explanation, said Linda Geiss, lead author of the report by the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention study.
“The rise in diabetes has really gone hand in hand with
the rise in obesity,” she said.
Bolstering the numbers is
the fact that more people with
diabetes are living longer because better treatments are
available.
The disease exploded in the
United States in the last 50
years, with the vast majority
from obesity-related Type 2 diabetes. In 1958, fewer than 1 in
100 Americans had been diagnosed with diabetes. In 2010,
it was about 1 in 14.
Most of the increase has
happened since 1990. Diabetes
is a disease in which the body
has trouble processing sugar;
it’s the nation’s seventh leading
cause of death.
Complications include poor
circulation, heart and kidney
problems and nerve damage.
The new study is the CDC’s
first in more than a decade to
look at how the nationwide
boom has played out in different states.
It’s based on telephone surveys of at least 1,000 adults in
each state in 1995 and 2010.
Participants were asked if a
doctor had ever told them they
have diabetes.
Not surprisingly, Mississippi — the state with the largest
proportion of residents who
are obese — has the highest diabetes rate.
Nearly 12 percent of Mississippians say they have diabetes, compared to the national average of 7 percent.
Ancestry.com
adds military
burial sites
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) —
Genealogy
web
site
Ancestry.com launched an online, searchable collection of
the burial sites of more than
500,000 members of the military on Monday, Veterans Day.
The project, a partnership
with the U.S. Department of
Veterans Affairs and the National Archives and Records
Administration, allows people
to search by name — for a fee
— through an online collection
of military burial sites at Ancestry.com.
The collection includes burial information for prominent
figures in history, including
President Abraham Lincoln
and Gen.
George Armstrong Custer,
who died with more than 200
of his men in the 1876 Battle
of the Little Bighorn against a
coalition of Native American
tribes.
“We are excited to be able to
share this wealth of primary
documentation,” Steve L.
Muro, the VA’s undersecretary
for memorial affairs, said in a
statement. “With the help of
Ancestry.com, we have opened
the doors to thousands of
service members’ histories
through the information contained in these burial ledgers.”
The National Cemetery Administration has overseen U.S.
military burial documents for
82 national cemeteries since
1973.
Concerned for the fragility
of the documents and wanting
to expand public access to the
contents, the administration
scanned about 60 handwritten
ledgers to produce more than
9,344 pages of high-quality
digital images.
However, those images
couldn’t be searched, making
it difficult to find records.
In 2011, the administration
partnered with Ancestry.com
to index the pages so users
can search them more easily.
Holiday Hosting 101
CEDAR BURNETT
Associated Press
Not everyone can be Martha
Stewart. For the mere mortal
hosts among us, holiday party
planning can whip up stress and
anxiety: Is my house inviting? Do
I have enough chairs? What
about food?
If the thought of entertaining
sends you to the nearest couch
with a bottle of aspirin, relax —
we’ve compiled advice from some
of the best party experts around.
SETTING THE MOOD
“Parties give us the chance to
suspend what’s going on in our
lives and give us space to be merry,” says Danielle Rollins, the Atlanta-based author of the new
“Soiree: Entertaining with Style”
(Rizzoli).
The best way to create that
space, she says, is to build tradition into your party and make it
something people can look forward to year after year. Decide on
a theme or an anchor activity —
gingerbread decorating, caroling,
ugly holiday sweaters — and
specify a dress code on the invitation.
“It’s fun to have an excuse to
dress up,” Rollins says. “You’ll
build excitement around the
event if guests know what to expect.”
Decor should echo the theme
and reinforce the style of party
you want to have. But don’t feel
you have to stick with a traditional holiday color palette or decorations. “Thanksgiving doesn’t
have to mean orange and Christmas doesn’t have to mean red
and green,” says Rollins.
Lyric Turner, the owner of Red
House Staging and Interiors in
Washington, D.C., suggests introducing a warm color palette —
burgundy, chocolate brown, purple and orange — through accent
pillows, throws or curtains to create a festive look in an unexpected way.
“If you are going to bring in red
and green elements to your decorating, keep the rest of your space
neutral. A cacophony of color is
too much,” says Turner.
SETTING THE STAGE
Whether your party is large or
small, deciding where to put the
guests can be tricky. Many people
make the mistake of removing all
the furniture for a cocktail party,
says Rollins, but it’s important to
have places to sit.
“Your living space should be
structured for conversation,” says
Turner. She recommends creating seating clusters around the
house. “Anywhere you have a little extra room — an entryway, an
office — you can group a few
chairs around a small table.”
Rollins emphasizes the need
for tables and stools spread
throughout the gathering spaces.
“Pretend you’re a drink,” she
says. “Where will you go?”
Too much furniture, however,
can feel claustrophobic.
“Some editing is necessary,”
says Turner, to allow for traffic
flow.
“You’re adding a lot with holiday decor,” she adds. “If you’re
not taking anything out, you’re
just adding clutter.”
SETTING THE LIGHTS
The right lighting makes your
home (and your guests) look
their best. Our experts agreed
that overhead lighting has no
place in a party; place lamps on
multiple levels throughout your
rooms, dim the lights and add
candles wherever you can.
“Avoid candles by the bar and
the buffet, though,” cautions
Rollins. “You don’t want your
guests going up in flames.”
She also suggests skipping
scented candles because they
compete with the scent of the
food.And while lighting should be
low in conversation areas, keep
bathrooms and food areas better
lit.
SETTING THE TABLE
Food can make or break a party, but Rollins insists, “It’s not
about what you’re serving, it’s
how it’s displayed.”
For buffets, she suggests using
smaller dishes and refilling them
frequently.
Push the dining table against
the wall to create more space for
mingling around the food, Turner recommends.
And a signature cocktail adds a
festive touch, and can streamline
bar mess and bar costs.
Report: Steps can reduce
preterm births — a little
LAURAN NEERGAARD
AP Medical Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) — For all
the miracle stories of tiny preemies who survive, the sad reality is that scientists know far too
little about what triggers premature birth and how to prevent it.
And despite some recent
progress, the U.S. has a far higher rate of preterm births than other similar nations.
On Thursday, an international
coalition said there are a handful
of proven protections — and if
the U.S. and other developed
countries do a better job of using
them, together they could keep
58,000 babies a year from being
born too soon.
That’s a blip in the global epidemic of prematurity: About 15
million preterm babies are born
every year, most of them in Africa
and parts of Asia where the priority is to improve care of these
fragile newborns. More than 1
million premature infants die,
mostly in developing countries,
and survivors can suffer lifelong
disabilities.
But in wealthier countries,
where sophisticated medical care
already keeps most preemies
alive, the focus is shifting to how
to prevent these births in the first
place. Nearly 1 in 10 births across
the developed world are preterm,
and about 1 in 8 in the U.S. Only
recently have rates begun leveling
off or dropping in many of these
countries after years of steady increases.
Thursday’s report makes clear
just how hard additional progress
on that front will be — projecting
an average 5 percent drop in
preterm birth rates across the
highest-income countries by
2015, if they follow the new advice.
“Shockingly, very little reduction is currently possible,” specialists with the World Health Organization, Save the Children,
U.S. National Institutes of
Health, March of Dimes and other groups reported in The
Lancet.
But even that improvement
would translate into about $3 billion in annual savings from medical bills and lost productivity, the
group calculated.
Nearly half that savings would
be in the U.S.
The bigger message: It’s time
for a major scientific push to figure out the causes of preterm
birth and find some better ways
to intervene.
“I don’t think it’s hopeless at
all,” said report co-author Dr.
Catherine Spong, a maternal-fetal medicine specialist at NIH
who points to clues that infections and inflammation affecting
the mother play a yet-to-be-understood role.
Because healthier babies grow
into healthier adults, “if you could
improve pregnancy outcomes,
you could improve the health of
the nation, quite honestly,” she
added.
Over half a million U.S. babies
are born premature, before completion of the 37th week of pregnancy. That’s 11.7 percent of the
babies born in 2011, the lowest
rate of preterm birth in a decade
and down from a peak of 12.8
percent in 2006, the March of
Dimes reported earlier this week.
Contrast that with Japan and
Sweden, where fewer than 6 percent of births are premature, or
Canada and Britain where fewer
than 8 percent are.
Last spring, this same international coalition provided the first
country-by-country estimates of
preterm births and recommended some inexpensive steps that
developing countries could take
to improve preemie survival.
Thursday’s follow-up analyzed
trends in developed countries, to
come up with advice on preventing prematurity.
The report recommends:
• Nearly eliminating the practice of inducing labor and C-sections scheduled much ahead of
mom’s due date unless they’re
medically necessary. Much of the
recent U.S. improvement comes
from reducing elective early deliveries, leading to a drop in “late
preemies,” babies born a few
weeks early.
• Helping women to quit
smoking. Smoking at some point
during pregnancy varies widely,
from 10 percent in Canada to 23
percent in the U.S. and 30 percent in Spain, the report found.
5A
Machining class
powers Gillette
KATHY BROWN
Gillette News-Record
GILLETTE (AP) — There are
some big bonuses coming out of
a combined Gillette CollegeCampbell County High School
machining class that’s the first
of its kind in the community
and perhaps the state.
• Students in the class figure
they save $1,000 toward a college certificate or degree.
• They are introduced to a
college-level program and can
earn eight free college credits.
• And the program puts to
use a full-service shop at Campbell County High School
(CCHS) that was gathering a bit
of dust.
Eventually, organizers hope
the program at CCHS will grow
to the point that students can
graduate with a high school
diploma and receive a college
certificate in machining on the
same day.
“I like it,” said senior Ben
Choate, 18, who was working on
grinding and tapering a handle
for a hammer. “I like to be creative, just hands-on.”
He is aiming toward a career
in welding, but his experience in
machining — making tools and
metal parts on lathes — will
help.
“I get eight college credits, so
if I go to college, I don’t have to
do this,” Choate said.
“Getting it done now saves
me about $1,000,” added Ben
Roberts, 18, a senior who hopes
to become a diesel mechanic.
He will work on oil rigs with
his dad this summer, and said
the ability to create needed
parts on site will just make him
that more employable.
“I’m saving myself about a
year and three months,” said
Alex Del Valle, 17, a senior who
is looking at a career in welding
or becoming an airplane mechanic.
The combined CCHS-Gillette
College class is a marriage between two schools with common goals, said CCHS Principal
Kirby Eisenhauer.
The college recently announced its strategy to increase
its number of graduates to
1,000 by 2020. This class will
help that effort.
“I think it’s working really
well,” Eisenhauer said. “We both
have the same goals, to make
kids career ready, and the earlier the better.
“The kids seem to enjoy it
and the parents enjoy it, especially when you say it’s free
credits. It gives the kids a taste
of college.
“I could see it growing. I hope
it does.”
The program seems to be a
natural.
CCHS had a shop that was
unused most of each school day,
although teacher Brandon Cone
would bring some of his students over from time to time to
work on projects.
“We’re real fortunate with the
facilities we have,” Eisenhauer
said. “We have some machinery
you don’t find in professional
shops.” Both Eisenhauer and
college officials had seen signs
outside of businesses in Gillette
advertising the need for general machinists.
That’s when the light bulb
went off.
“I thought, why can’t we grow
our own kids for that?” Eisenhauer said. “It’s not a piece of
cake. (The program) is rigorous.
The kids come in with some
high expectations on them. This
is a college course.”
Now the high school facilities
are being put to use by instructor Paul Plourde and his students. Plourde’s salary is paid
by Gillette College. But he
works at CCHS.
“It’s a new concept, a college
instructor who teaches at a high
school,” Eisenhauer said. “This
is a good partnership. This will
only help the college. It will be
nice one day to hand off a diploma and a (college) certificate at
the same time.”
That day may not be too
much further down the road,
said Jed Jensen, the new director
of career technical programs in
the Northern Wyoming Community College District. He will
be based out of the Technical
Education Center at Gillette
College.
“It’s a good partnership. If
Paul (Plourde) wasn’t here, this
would sit empty,” Jensen said,
pointing to the “beautiful”
equipment that was standing
idle.
“The brainchild was an empty shop,” he added.
“We want students to walk
out with a high school diploma
and tell local businesses ‘I’ve got
experience or go on to get an associate’s degree,” Jensen said.
The machining classes also
work well for students continuing in the college’s welding or
diesel mechanics programs.
Plourde, 27, is son of Mike
Plourde, a ceramics teacher at
the CCHS South Campus. He
also is a 2004 graduate of
CCHS who was introduced to
machining at Sheridan College.
After completing his two
years of instruction at Sheridan
College, the biking enthusiast
worked for a bike shop in Boulder, Colo.
When work in that field declined, he moved back to
Gillette and machined with local
shops for four years.
The past two years, he’s
worked full time while pursuing
a bachelor’s degree in secondary
education. He’d heard hints
about a machining program this
past spring, and applied in August when Gillette College
opened the position for applications.
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SPORTS
rocketminer.com
NEWS TIPS: Call the news department with your local news ideas,
events and organizational updates 362-3736
Page 6A
GYMNASTICS
RESULTS
Athlete: Vault; Bars; Beam; Floor;
Overall
LEVEL 3
Kyla Henry: 8; 6.5; 4.8; 5.8; 25.1
Breanna Macy: 7.75; 4.3; 6.25; 5.45;
23.75
Damaris Ruiz: 8.3; 3.8; 5.25; 5.45;
22.8
Kierra Levina Bell: 7.9; 3.8; 4.9; 5.6;
22.2
LEVEL 4
Alison Wheeler: 8; 3.7; 4.5; 6.8; 23
Payton Sweet: 8.4; 3.6; 5.4; 5.2; 22.6
Gabriela Torres: 8.1; 3.75; 2; 5;
18.85
First Competition
ROCK SPRINGS: Gymnasts from Legacy Gym, such as Damaris Ruiz on the beam, competed at the 2012 Wyoming Invitational Meet on Nov. 10. It was the first time Legacy gymnasts competed since the gym opened in October 2012. The Level 7 team won a third-place team award.
Selig reviewing pending
Marlins-Blue Jays deal
JAY COHEN
AP Sports Writer
ROSEMONT, Ill. (AP) — Bud
Selig was on hand when the Miami Marlins played their first regular-season game in their swanky
new ballpark in April. The commissioner provided a glowing review of the $634 million project
and boldly declared that opposition to the facility would fade
away within five years.
So far, it’s not looking so good
for that last prediction.
Selig said Thursday he is examining the pending blockbuster
trade that sends at least three of
Miami’s best players to Toronto
for a package of prospects just
seven months after the Marlins
moved into their new home,
which was financed primarily with
tax money.
Speaking at the conclusion of
the owners’ meetings, Selig said
he also is aware of fan anger in
South Florida but is going to do
what’s in the best interests of the
sport.
“People have different views of
that as to what you should do and
how you should do it, but I think
I’ve been able to come through all
these situations and the sport’s
been stronger and better as a result,” he said, pointing to his recent experience with the Texas
Rangers and Los Angeles
Dodgers going through bankruptcy proceedings.
“So when I say I have this matter under review and I’ve talked to
a lot of our people and I’ve spent
a lot of time here in between all
the other meetings — this is a
tough place to do it — that’s exactly what I mean. It is under review.
I am aware of the anger, I am. I’m
also aware that in Toronto they’re
very happy.”
The Blue Jays, who finished
fourth in the loaded AL East last
season, are bringing in All-Star
shortstop Jose Reyes, left-hander
Mark Buehrle and right-hander
Josh Johnson under the deal,
which is contingent on physicals
for the players. Selig also said
there is money going from Miami
to Toronto, but did not offer any
details and said the trade hadn’t
been officially presented to his office yet.
Reyes and Buehrle signed lucrative free-agent contracts with
the Marlins last offseason, and
Johnson has been Miami’s best
pitcher when healthy.
The Marlins get infielders
Yunel Escobar and Adeiny
Hechavarria, right-hander Henderson Alvarez and several top
prospects, a nice haul but certainly not enough to satisfy a fan base
that went through similar rebuilding after the franchise won the
World Series in 1997 and 2003.
“I’ve talked to two baseball people — I have a lot of people that I
check with and talk to — who
have, actually, an interesting view
on the trade,” Selig said at an airport hotel just outside of Chicago.
“They think that (Miami), in
terms of young players, did very
well. These are two independent
baseball people. These are not
chefs in these kitchens here.
“So I want to think about all of
it and I want to review everything.
I want to be my usual painstaking,
cautious, slow, conservative self in
analyzing it. ... There’s a lot of
variables here.”
Paul Beeston, the president and
CEO of the Blue Jays, rushed by a
group of reporters as he left the
owners’ meetings. Marlins owner
Jeffrey Loria was seen in the lobby at the hotel but did not make
himself available to media.
Loria went on a spending spree
last offseason, also signing freeagent closer Heath Bell. The Marlins thought they would contend
for the NL East title and draw 3
million fans in the first year of
their ballpark.
But they flopped, finishing last
in the division. Bell was traded to
Arizona in October, with the Marlins agreeing to pay $8 million of
the remaining $21 million owed to
the reliever.
Asked Thursday if it’s in the
best interests of baseball for Loria
to continue to own a franchise,
Selig said he wasn’t going to comment any further other than saying the trade is under review.
“I know what the commissioner can do, can’t do, what his legal
responsibilities are,” he said. “I understand the feeling and in the
end I’ll do what I’ve done in the
other past situations. People always ask me, ‘Boy, don’t you wish
SPORTS BRIEF
Martinez leads
Wyoming over South
Dakota 71-51
LARAMIE (AP) — Luke Martinez drilled 7 of 9 shots from 3point range and scored 21 points
to lead Wyoming over South
Dakota 71-51 in the Global Sports
Hoops Showcase on Thursday
night.
Leonard Washington added 17
points and 11 rebounds, while
Larry Nance Jr. scored 12 for
Wyoming (3-0). Casey Kasper-
bauer had 12 to lead South Dakota (0-2), while Juevol Myles
added 11 and Tyler Flack 10.
Martinez’s fifth 3 of the game
put the Cowboys ahead 46-26
early in the second half.
Washington keyed an early 9-1
run and his NBA-length 3-pointer put Wyoming up 28-16 at the
5:40 mark of the first half. The
lead never shrank below single
digits after that.
The Coyotes shot only 30 percent from the floor (18 of 53),
while the Cowboys hit 46 percent
(26 of 57).
The Blue Jays, who finished fourth in the loaded AL East last season,
are bringing in All-Star shortstop Jose Reyes.
it didn’t happen?’ Well, there are a
lot of situations I wish hadn’t happened, but they have, and then I
have to try to do what I have to
do.”
OTHER THURSDAY
DEVELOPMENTS
• Owners approved new television deals with ESPN, Turner
Sports and Fox worth about $12.4
billion from 2014-21, according to
Selig.
• Joe Torre, MLB’s executive
vice president for baseball operations, said the league still is looking into expanded use of instant
replay.
“Whether we do something for
next season or not, I think by the
time we start next season I’m confident we’ll have a plan,” he said.
• There was no update on the
situation in Northern California,
where Oakland wants to build a
ballpark in San Jose — an area
that is part of the San Francisco
Giants’ territory.
“I know people say ‘Gee, it
should be easy to do,’” Selig said.
“Well, the more they’ve gotten
into it, the more complicated it’s
gotten. But we’re headed for resolution.”
• Selig is planning to travel to
next month’s winter meetings to
speak to team doctors and trainers about drug testing, and he reiterated his support for baseball’s
drug program and its penalties.
LEVEL 7
Ali Lange: 8.18; 4.6; 6.45; 7.55; 26.78
Dumervil plans to practice
Friday and play Sunday
ARNIE STAPLETON
AP Pro Football Writer
ENGLEWOOD, Colo. (AP)
— If Elvis Dumervil and D.J.
Williams get their way, they’ll
both spend Sunday harassing
San Diego quarterback Philip
Rivers.
Dumervil first has to show
he’s healthy enough to play and
Williams has to prove he’s
knocked off the rust.
Dumervil hasn’t practiced all
week but plans to test his
sprained left shoulder at practice Friday in hopes the Broncos (6-3) will clear him to face
the Chargers (4-5). The twotime Pro Bowl defensive end
was injured at Carolina last
weekend but medical tests this
week showed no torn muscles
or ligaments.
“My goal is to play,”
Dumervil said. “That’s what
I’ve got to look toward tomorrow, coming out and getting a
good practice in and getting
ready.”
Dumervil had a similar injury
to the same shoulder that sidelined him for two games and
most of a third last season, but
he said this injury is “nowhere
near” as serious or as painful as
that one was.
He leads the AFC with five
forced fumbles and has seven
sacks.
“I do miss him being out
here,” cornerback Champ Bailey said Thursday.
“I don’t want him to miss
any time.”
Neither does Von Miller, the
other half of Denver’s “Doom
& Gloom” pass-rushing duo,
although he still had a monster
game when Dumervil went out
and was replaced by Robert Ayers and rookie Malik Jackson.
Williams returned this week
from two suspensions that kept
him out of the first nine games.
“He’s been looking good in
practice,” Miller said. “He’s in
shape. He’s right on point, he’s
looking sharp. I’m sure he’ll
have fresh legs on Sunday. I’m
quite confident he’ll have a
good game on Sunday.”
He’ll have to return to the
roster first and then get activated on game day.
At any rate, it could be some
time before Williams returns to
a heavy load because Wesley
Woodyard, Keith Brooking and
Miller have played so well in his
absence, as has rookie Danny
Trevathan in the nickel packages.
Barring injury, Williams, the
team’s leading tackler in four of
the last five seasons, will likely
have to make his mark on special teams and in sub packages
early on.
Still, his teammates expect
him to quickly work his way
back into a prominent role.
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rocketminer.com
Felton, unbeaten Knicks
rally past Spurs 104-100
SAN ANTONIO (AP) — Raymond Felton scored 25 points
and the New York Knicks
stayed undefeated by rallying to
beat the San Antonio Spurs
104-100 on Thursday night.
J.R. Smith added 17 points,
Jason Kidd had 14 and Tyson
Chandler 13 for the Knicks (60), who closed on a 22-11 run to
remain the NBA’s lone unbeaten team.
Tony Parker led San Antonio
(7-2) with 19 points and 12 assists. Kawhi Leonard added 16
points and Tim Duncan had 14
points and 14 rebounds.
Smith and Kidd hit consecutive 3-pointers to give the
Knicks a 100-95 lead with a
minute left.
San Antonio missed seven of
its last nine shots and had two
turnovers in the final 2 minutes.
The Spurs had won 18 of 19 regular-season games against New
York.
The late defensive push offset
an uncharacteristic start by the
Knicks.
After holding their first five
opponents to 87.8 points per
game, the Knicks allowed the
Spurs to set a quick tone when
Danny Green opened with consecutive backdoor layups off assists from Parker and Duncan.
The Knicks kept pace behind
Felton, who had nine points and
two assists in the opening period while shooting 3 for 5 from
the field. Felton’s first 3-pointer gave the Knicks a 29-24 lead
with 2 minutes left in the first
period.
Steve Novak and Rasheed
Wallace hit back-to-back 3s to
extend New York’s lead to 45-38
with 7:21 left in the first half.
New York opened 6 for 7 on 3s.
DeJuan Blair smiled at Spurs
coach Gregg Popovich and gave
him a double fist bump before
taking the court for his first
start of the season.
The move paid off. Blair had
two points and an assist while
Nets beat Rondo-less Celtics, 102-97
BRIAN MAHONEY
AP Basketball Writer
NEW YORK (AP) — Joe Johnson made the
tiebreaking basket with 3:03 left, Deron
Williams and Brook Lopez each scored 24
points, and the Brooklyn Nets beat the Boston
Celtics 102-97 on Thursday night for their
fourth-straight victory.
Williams had eight assists and made all nine
free throws on a night Paul Pierce had two huge
misses in the final minute for the Celtics, who
played without injured point guard Rajon Rondo.
Johnson finished with 19 points and eight rebounds for the Nets in front of a sold-out crowd
of 17,732 that was divided but certainly loud in
the tense, final minutes.
Pierce scored 22 points and Leandro Barbosa
had 17 in place of Rondo, who was out with a
sprained right ankle. Kevin Garnett added 14
points but Boston had its three-game win streak
snapped and lost to the Nets for just the third
time in the last 21 meetings.
Boston led 79-74 after three before the Nets
evened it up at 85 on Jerry Stackhouse’s 3-pointer with 6:21 to play.
It was still tied before Johnson made consecutive jumpers and Lopez scored on a follow shot
for a six-point lead, and the Celtics could never catch up — especially when Pierce missed
two free throws with 34.5 seconds left and
Boston trailing by three.
Rondo was hurt in the third quarter Wednesday night in a home victory over Utah. Without
the NBA leader in assists, averaging 12.6, coach
Doc Rivers said the playbook would be reduced
because Barbosa didn’t fully know the offense
yet.
But the speedy Brazilian created for himself
just fine, blowing by defenders for layups
denying Carmelo Anthony the
ball defensively and hounding
the Knicks All-Star into missing
his only attempt in the opening
8 minutes.
Anthony appeared frustrated
by the lack of touches, shaking
his head and laughing when the
Knicks rotated the ball away
from him late in the second
though finishing with just two assists.
Nets coach Avery Johnson said the Nets
needed a breakthrough against a quality opponent such as Boston and was interested to see
how far his team had come since the Celtics
smashed them 115-85 here in the preseason, a
night he felt the longtime Atlantic Division
rulers were trying to send a message to his
team.
The Nets have definitely closed the gap.
They had led by 20 or more in their last three
home games and opened a 13-point cushion early in the third quarter of this one. But Pierce,
who had a quiet six-point first half, suddenly got
going midway through the period with a 3pointer and basket as the Celtics fans — still noticeable around the arena though not nearly to
the extent as when the Nets played in New Jersey — became more vocal.
When he picked up his fourth foul and Rivers
sent Jeff Green to the table to check in for him,
Pierce pleaded to stay, Rivers agreed, and Pierce
made the gamble pay off with consecutive baskets that gave Boston a 73-71 lead.
The Nets shot out to a quick 11-point lead that
was trimmed to 31-26 after one quarter. Brooklyn kept its lead throughout the second quarter,
using 15 offensive rebounds in the first half to
score 19 second-chance points and build a 5950 advantage.
NOTES
• The Nets made their first regular-season appearance on TNT since Jan. 24, 2008, against
Golden State. Marv Albert, who is from Brooklyn and worked for the Dodgers when he was
young before later calling games for both the
Knicks and the Nets, was the lead announcer.
• Lopez came in averaging 8.2 points in the
first quarter and shooting 69.7 percent. He shot
5 of 7 Thursday.
quarter.
Anthony got aggressive after
that possession, taking four
shots in the final 3 minutes of
the first half. He was blocked
twice by Duncan under the basket. The first block resulted in
Anthony’s own follow-up basket
and the second led to a 3-pointer by Green with 0.8 seconds
that gave the Spurs a 57-55 lead
at halftime.
NOTES
• Including the playoffs, San
Antonio has won 23 of 26
games at home.
• Duncan had his 736th career double-double, extending
his lead among active players.
Reunited with Fox, Del Rio
charges up Denver defense
EDDIE PELLS
AP National Writer
ENGLEWOOD, Colo. (AP) —
There are a few more lines
around the eyes, each of them a
symbol of some lesson learned
during a head-coaching tenure
that lasted nearly a decade, had
its share of success but ended
badly for Jack Del Rio in Jacksonville.
Some things, however, haven’t
changed.
The Broncos defensive coordinator, now 49 and reunited with
John Fox in the same role he had
a decade ago in Carolina, is still
a formidable presence whenever
he walks onto a football field.
And the schemes the NFL linebacker-turned-coach crafts still
make life very difficult for offenses around the league.
Asked to describe his approach to defense without using
the word “aggressive” — because, really, what defensive coordinator doesn’t want to be aggressive? — Del Rio laughed.
“Aggressive,” he said. “I don’t
know. There are a lot of good
people out there doing a lot of
good things. From my standpoint, the No. 1 thing we want to
do is create a culture where players understand the things they’re
being asked to do. That they
build a confidence playing for
each other, with each other. And
that in the end, you play fast.”
Denver’s seventh defensive coordinator in seven years has the
Broncos (6-3) playing fast, and
at a level this defense hasn’t
reached in a while. Yes, they are
ranked a more-than-respectable
sixth in yards allowed and 10th
in points allowed, in the running
to finish with the best statistics
in those categories since the
mid-2000s. But they are also
ranked second in sacks per pass
play and, with four touchdowns
and a pair of safeties, are making
the kind of plays that swing
games.
They are building a reputation
as a swarming, playmaking and,
yes, aggressive group, which is
just how Del Rio coaches it, especially when the talent is there
to make it happen. Had it
worked this well in Jacksonville
over the past few years, the
coach might still be there. Instead, he got released 11 games
into last season with a 69-73 career record.
Some might have sat it out for
a while, let some wounds heal
and, in Del Rio’s case, collected
some easy paychecks, which
could have totaled up to around
$5 million.
Not this coach, who Thursday
was standing in the midst of his
defenders at the start of practice,
shouting, listening, correcting
and at one point, insisting the
players “get this (expletive)
down” by the end of the day.
“I love coaching,” he said.
“And this was a good opportunity for me to get hooked up with
a guy I respect and a program
that’s first class.”
Indeed, when Fox came calling, Del Rio knew he could get
right back into his comfort zone:
coaching defense alongside one
of the men he came up with;
working in the room with players; getting back to the kind of
routine that wasn’t available as
much when he was a head coach,
where PR, delegating to staff and
big-picture decision-making often overshadows the X’s and O’s.
“That’s something you probably kind of miss after a while,”
Fox said. “It kind of re-energizes
you. I think he’s having fun doing
it.”
No doubt, Del Rio said.
“When we interviewed, I said,
‘Hey, I don’t mind being an assistant strength coach again,”‘
Del Rio said. “I love ball with the
right people, right organization.
I love to be a member on the
staff and going through the grind
and having my feet in the grass
and having a chance to touch
some players. That’s what I have
a passion for.”
Del Rio’s last two stops in his
11-year NFL playing career were
in Dallas, where he played for
Jimmy Johnson, and Minnesota,
where Tony Dungy was the de-
fensive coordinator. It was Johnson’s “all-in mentality,” as Del
Rio called it, and Dungy’s ability
to coach, teach but not dwell on
failure that got Del Rio thinking
about the kind of coach he’d like
to be someday.
He started in New Orleans as,
yes, the assistant strength coach,
then moved to Baltimore to
coach the linebackers from
1999-2001. Led by Ray Lewis,
the Ravens won the Super Bowl
in 2001. Del Rio left Baltimore to
join Fox in Carolina in 2002,
where he transformed the defense from 32nd-ranked to second in the span of a season.
Impressed with that sudden
bout of success, and looking to
inject some new, young energy
into the franchise after firing
Tom Coughlin, Jaguars owner
Wayne Weaver bypassed coaches with more experience and
took a chance on Del Rio, who
with blue eyes, blond hair, standing 6-foot-4 and still close to his
240-pound playing weight was a
made-for-TV presence in a city
looking for a football star.
7A
Buffalo defense stuffs
Miami in 19-14 win
JOHN WAWROW
AP Sports Writer
ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. (AP)
— Mario Williams and the Buffalo Bills high-priced defense finally flexed its collective muscle,
stuffing the Miami Dolphins in a
19-14 victory Thursday night.
Safety Jairus Byrd forced a
fumble and had an interception,
while Bryan Scott sealed the victory with his second interception
to end the Dolphins’ last-gasp
drive in the final minute. Williams
had one of three sacks for a Buffalo defense that limited the Dolphins to 184 yards and 16.
That more than made up for an
offense that lacked finish. Rian
Lindell hit four field goals, including a 42-yarder, as Buffalo failed
to score an offensive touchdown
despite four trips inside the Dolphins 20.
Leodis McKelvin opened the
scoring 90 seconds in by returning a punt 79 yards for a touchdown in a game the Bills never
trailed.
The Bills (4-6) snapped a
three-game skid and won for only
the second time in seven games
to stay on the fringes of the AFC
playoff hunt.
Buffalo also ended several other inglorious skids, by beating a
division rival for the first time in
nine meetings, and snapping an
11-game prime-time drought that
dated to 2001.
Marcus Thigpen scored on a
96-yard kickoff return and
Davone Bess had a 2-yard touch-
down catch for Miami (4-6),
which has lost three straight.
Rookie quarterback Ryan Tannehill continued to struggle for
Miami. He finished going 14 of 28
for 141 yards with a touchdown
and two interceptions. He was
coming off a dreadful outing in
which he threw three interceptions in a 37-3 loss to Tennessee
last week. The No. 8 pick out of
Texas A&M has thrown six TD
passes and 11 interceptions.
It wasn’t all Tannehill’s fault as
the usually sturdy Dolphins defense gave up 120 yards rushing,
including 91 to C.J. Spiller, who
took over the bulk of the rushing
duties in place of Fred Jackson
(concussion).
After allowing 307 yards rushing in its first five games, Miami’s
now given up 661 in its past five.
For Buffalo, it was a long-awaited breakout performance for a
high-priced defense that entered
the game among the NFL’s
worst. Buffalo had ranked 31st in
yards allowed and last in allowing
an average 31.67 points per game.
Williams was supposed to be
the defense’s centerpiece after
signing a six-year, $100 million
contract March. He’s finally starting to play up to the deal, and his
sack gave him a team-leading 5
1/2.
The unit forced three turnovers
after failing to produce one its
past three games.
Buffalo didn’t allow the Dolphins to cross midfield until their
eighth drive, 11 minutes into the
third quarter.
Hope fading for deal to save NHL
TORONTO (AP) — Negotiations had already hit a wall in the
ongoing hockey labor fight, and
now the NHL has suggested the
sides take an official two-week
break before getting back to the
bargaining table.
NHL Commissioner Gary
Bettman floated the idea of a
break to players’ association executive director Donald Fehr. The
union hasn’t responded to the
league yet, but the players maintained their position on Thursday
night that they are ready and willing to meet at any time, and the
only way to reach a deal to end
the long lockout is to keep talking
and negotiating.
“Gary suggested the possibility of a two-week moratorium,”
NHL deputy commissioner Bill
Daly wrote in an email to The Associated Press on Thursday
night. “I’m disappointed because
we don’t have a negotiating partner that has any genuine interest
in reaching an agreement. Zero
interest.”
The suggestion of a break was
first reported by The Canadian
Press on Thursday night.
With no new negotiations
scheduled, and communication
in general shutting down, the
NHL appears to be getting closer
to calling off more games, putting
the entire hockey season in jeopardy.
“I hope not, but I’m more discouraged now than I have been at
any point in the process,” Daly
said. “I responded to Don saying
he did not know how to proceed
from here.”
The sides put on a push to
make an agreement last week
when they met over six consecutive days in New York. However,
Friday’s session ended with a
heated exchange, and talks lasted
only about an hour on Sunday.
The 61-day lockout has already
claimed 327 regular-season
games, including the New Year’s
Day outdoor Winter Classic, and
more could be wiped out within a
week. It is believed that an agreement would need to be in place
by the end of next week for the
season to get under way on Dec.
1.
That is starting to look unlikely because of the mere fact that
the sides are unable to find common ground on the big issues
keeping them apart. It is more
than just finances preventing a
deal.
The disagreements over player
contract terms have emerged as
just big an impasse.
The NHL wants to limit contracts to five years, make rules to
prohibit back-diving contracts the
league feels circumvent the salary
cap, keep players ineligible for unrestricted free agency until they
are 28 or have eight years of professional service time, cut entrylevel deals to two years, and make
salary arbitration after five years.
A few hours into last Friday’s
session, negotiations broke down
over the core economic differences that separate the sides.
A lockout wiped out the entire
2004-05 season.
12515096.qxp
8A
11/15/2012
9:11 PM
Page 8
rocketminer.com
Miguel Cabrera, Buster
Posey win MVP awards
RONALD BLUM
AP Sports Writer
Photo courtesy of WyoSports
The University of Wyoming punter, Tim Gleeson, kicks one away in practice. Gleeson has averaged 43.5
and 44.3 yards per punt in the last two games using mostly the rugby approach.
Cowboys’ punter is
learning on the fly
LARAMIE — For Tim Gleeson, the motion is familiar but
COWBOYS
the action is new.
GAME DAY
But the true freshman punter
for the University of Wyoming
Game: Wyoming (3-7 overhas made the rugby-style punt
all, 2-4 Mountain West) at
look easy the last couple of
UNLV (2-9, 2-4)
weeks.
When: 2 p.m. Saturday
He has averaged 43.5 and
44.3 yards in the last two games
Where: Sam Boyd Stadium,
— both UW wins — using mostLas Vegas
ly the rugby approach.
Gleeson, who is from Melbourne, Australia, is third in the
“I thought I knew what to exMountain West and 24th na- pect from talking to people,”
tionally with a 43-yard average. Gleeson said. “But kicking, the
Not bad for a guy who first protection and guys running at
tried punting less than
you is a different experitwo years ago.
ence.”
December 2010 was
Then came his debut
Gleeson’s first experiat Texas this past Sept.
ence putting foot to
1.
ball. After that, he didThe Longhorns were
n’t pick up a football
ranked 15th at the time,
again until March of
and there were 101,142
2011.
fans in the stadium.
After he graduated
Gleeson
described
high school, he wasn’t
the
experience
as
sure what he wanted to
“daunting.” So were his
do. By that July he
first few punts.
wanted to give punting ROBERT
His initial effort was a
GAGLIARDI
a try.
respectable 42 yards,
About a year later, he
but his next two went 19
landed in Laramie.
and 20 yards. Those
The first contact from UW short kicks enabled Texas to
came last November from for- score 10 points, and the Longmer assistant coach Alex horns went on for a 37-17 victoGrinch, who is now at Missouri. ry.
At that time, Gleeson said he
Gleeson’s last two punts were
had seen maybe 10 American 50-plus yards.
football games on TV.
“I had never really kicked
One thing led to another and against a rush before,” he said.
coach Dave Christensen offered “I tried to keep calm, but when
him a scholarship.
defenders are coming at you
Gleeson worked with Nathan pretty fast, you have to think
Chapman in Australia. He is a quickly.
former Australian Football
“I wasn’t kicking as well as I
League player who briefly punt- would have liked. I was rushing
ed in the NFL for the Green it.”
Bay Packers.
As for the rugby punt, Glee-
Views
Junior earns the first
honor of her career
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo.
— Wyoming Cowgirls swimmer
Morgan Hartigan has been
named the Mountain West swimmer of the week.
The weekly honor is the first of
Hartigan’s UW career.
Hartigan,
a
native
of
Cheyenne, was a key to the Cowgirls’ dominating 189.5-110.5 victory over Air Force on Saturday,
Nov. 10. Hartigan won all four
events she entered, including
three individual events and one
relay. Hartigan placed first and
posted a MW season-best time of
51.61 in the 100-yard freestyle.
She also touched the wall first
in the 50 freestyle, with a 23.70,
and the 200 individual medley,
with a 2:07.27, which are both the
third-best times in the MW this
season.
son said the motion of the kick
goes back to his days of playing
Australian football. But doing it
in one motion on the run and
making sure the ball has
enough height and distance is
tricky.
But Gleeson has made it look
easy.
Christensen said, “We felt the
last couple of weeks (that CSU
and New Mexico) had guys
back there who have done a
nice job and that if we could do
something that was difficult,
that would help us.
“For the returner, it’s being
more like a shortstop back
there and we’re able to get our
coverage team down there.
“(Gleeson has) done a nice
job of placing the football in the
last couple of weeks. Is that
what we’re going to do all the
time? No. It will be based on
where at on field, their returner
and things like that.”
Gleeson said he is comfortable with any type of punt that
he’s asked to do, and he has a
lot more confidence in his protection than earlier.
He was a track athlete in Australia, where he competed in the
jumps and sprints. But Gleeson
said that’s nothing compared to
what he sees from the athletes
who play college football.
“I didn’t know 6-foot-7, 300pound guys could be so agile.”
CLOSE BATTLE
UNLV’s senior punter, Chase
Lansford, is two-tenths of a
yard ahead of Gleeson for second place in the MW (43.2
yards per punt).
The leader is CSU senior
Pete Kontodiakos with a 46.8yard average.
NEW YORK (AP) — Miguel
Cabrera has a Most Valuable
Player award to go with his
Triple Crown. And Buster
Posey has an MVP prize to put
alongside his second World Series ring.
The pair of batting champions won baseball’s top individual honors Thursday by large
margins.
Cabrera, the first Triple
Crown winner in 45 years, won
the AL MVP by receiving 22 of
28 first-place votes and 362
points from a panel of Baseball
Writers’ Association of America.
The Detroit third baseman
easily beat Los Angeles Angels
rookie center fielder Mike
Trout, who had six firsts and
281 points.
Cabrera hit .330 with 44
homers and 139 RBIs to become the first Triple Crown
winner since Boston’s Carl
Yastrzemski in 1967. Cabrera
also led the league with a .606
slugging percentage for the AL
champion Tigers.
Some of the more sabermetric-focused fans supported
Trout, who hit .326 with 30
homers and 83 RBIs, and he
led the majors with 129 runs
and 49 steals and topped all
players in WAR — Wins Above
Replacement. Trout won AL
Rookie of the Year earlier in the
week.
“I was a little concerned. I
thought the new thing about
computer stuff, I thought
Trout’s going to win because
they put his numbers over me,”
Cabrera said.
“I was like relax. ... if he wins,
it’s going to be fair because he
had a great season.”
His victory is a win for the
traditional statistics.
“At the end of the game, it’s
going to be the same baseball
played back in the day,” Cabrera said.
Posey, at a charity event at
his mother’s school in Leesburg, Va., followed the AL debate and Googled to find out
the winner.
“I think it intrigued everybody,” he said. “As a fan of the
game, it was a fun race to
watch.”
With three fewer hits or two
less homers, Cabrera would
have fallen short of the Triple
Crown. The last four Triple
Crown winners have been voted MVP, including Mickey
Mantle in 1956 and Frank
Robinson in 1966.
“I think winning the Triple
Crown had a lot to do with me
winning this honor,” he said.
Cabrera became the secondstraight Detroit player voted
MVP, following pitcher Justin
Verlander in 2011, and was the
first Venezuelan to earn the
honor. Countryman Pablo Sandoval took home World Series
MVP honors last month.
Before the season, Cabrera
switched from first base to
third to make way for Prince
Fielder, who signed with Detroit as a free agent.
“I focused too much in
spring training about defense,
defense, defense,” Cabrera said.
“I forgot a little bit about hitting, about getting in the cage
like I normally do.”
In spring training, Posey’s
focus was just to get back on
the field. His 2011 season was
cut short by a collision with the
Marlins’ Scott Cousins on May
25 that resulted in a fractured
bone in Posey’s lower left leg
and three torn ankle ligaments.
On crutches, Mike
D’Antoni takes
over the Lakers
EL SEGUNDO, Calif. (AP) —
Mike D’Antoni circled the court 2
feet at a time, moving smoothly
on crutches while his Los Angeles Lakers went through drills orchestrated by his assistant coach
and brother, Dan.
Although D’Antoni’s surgically replaced knee is slowing him
down a bit, he couldn’t wait any
longer to get the Lakers rolling.
D’Antoni formally took over the
Lakers on Thursday, four days after the slow-starting club hired
him to replace Mike Brown. The
former Knicks and Suns coach is
still on crutches and pain medication after surgery earlier this
month, but thinks he’ll soon be
back to normal while he attempts
to transform the Lakers into his
vision of an up-tempo, high-scoring team.
“I’m really happy to be here —
excited,” D’Antoni said. “(We’re)
starting to put stuff in now. Might
take a little bit, but ... we’re built
to win this year. This is not a fiveyear project. We have a window,
and we’re going to try to get
through it.”
Lakers general manager Mitch
Kupchak welcomed D’Antoni after practice at a news conference
packed with dozens of media
members. Given his limited mobility, D’Antoni isn’t likely to
make his sideline debut until Sunday night against Houston, with
interim coach Bernie Bickerstaff
probably manning the bench
again Friday night against
Phoenix.
“This is a great city to have an
up-tempo, exciting game that has
a legitimate shot to win a championship,” D’Antoni said.
“I can’t ask for anything
more.”
D’Antoni’s affable charm immediately worked on the Lakers,
who praised their new coach’s demeanor during their first few
hours together.
12515100.qxp
11/15/2012
5:19 PM
Page 9
rocketminer.com
DEAR ABBY
WONDERWORD By
David Ouellet
MOMMA by Mel Lazarus
By Abigail Van Buren
DEAR ABBY: My boyfriend,
“Richard,” and I are a mature couple who have been seeing each
other for three years. I love him.
My dog is the issue.
“Princess” is a 2-year-old rat
terrier/mini-pinscher mix. She
weighs 9 pounds and is spoiled.
(I admit I’m a softy when it
comes to discipline.)
She barks at anyone and anything she sees. Her barks are
shrill and can be annoying. But I
live alone and feel she is protecting me.
Richard can no longer tolerate
Princess’ barking and has curbed
his visits considerably. Except for
this issue, he is my dream guy,
and I feel lucky to have found
him.
I feel Richard should understand my attachment to Princess,
especially when he’s not around.
Am I being selfish? Why can’t
I have them both? Is there a future for us, or have we reached an
impasse? — WON’T GIVE UP
THE PUP, LAFAYETTE, LA.
DEAR WON’T GIVE UP: Loving
one’s dog is not being selfish. You
COULD have them both if you
would contact a dog trainer and
start giving Princess a doggy education that includes boundaries.
Incessant barking should not be
allowed.
Perhaps once Richard sees that
Princess no longer regards him
as a hostile intruder, he will feel
more welcome. But that could
take some work on the part of all
three of you, if he’s still willing.
DEAR ABBY: My grandpa remarried when I was a child. He
and Grandma “Ella” each have
five children. She is a wonderful
woman.
When the holidays roll around,
especially Thanksgiving and
Christmas, my grandparents always host at their home. They
spend all day fixing up the house
and preparing the food. When it’s
time to eat, Grandma Ella’s children think they should be first in
the line. When the dinner is over,
it’s always my mom, one of my
two aunts and me doing the dishes and cleaning up. Grandma
Ella’s family never help. Any advice? — STRESSED IN ADVANCE IN IOWA
DEAR STRESSED: Gladly! This
Thanksgiving when everyone arrives, Grandma and Grandpa
should cheerfully inform the happy revelers that small children
will be fed first, regardless of
whose side of the family they
come from. At the same time,
each of the adults should be ASSIGNED a cleanup chore so one
side of the family isn’t stuck with
the entire burden.
GARFIELD by Jim Davis
DOG EAT DOUG by Ryan Anderson
BECKER BRIDGE Bidding Quiz
AGNES by Morrie Turner
ZACK HILL by J. Deering and J. Macintosh
JANRIC CLASSIC SUDOKU
BLONDIE by Dean Young and Dennis Lebrun
HOROSCOPE
By Holiday
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 16, 2012
ARIES (March 21-April 19) Random scattered efforts can at times be magically effective, but not now. The result you desire
is best attained with a methodical approach. Create or obtain a checklist and
use it.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20) Don’t believe
what you hear about other people. You’ll
keep friends if you steer clear of gossip
and make up your own mind about people.
Base your opinions on your personal experience instead of hearsay.
ONE BIG HAPPY... by Rick Detorie
CROSSWORD By
Thomas Joseph
GEMINI (May 21-June 21) Doing something
correctly once is not enough to constitute
success. What if it was a fluke? Truly successful actions can be repeated. You’ll
practice until you can create the desired
effect time and again.
CANCER (June 22-July 22) You’re a kind of
social director now, so create social scenarios in which you can shine. The friends
you invite to experience your brand of fun
will become enamored of you.
FLO AND FRIENDS by John Gibel and Jenny
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22) Is good enough really good enough? In certain jobs, you feel
that you must go beyond the expectation
for your efforts to really count. The trick is
in deciding which jobs warrant the extra
effort.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22) It is far easier for
you to accept others as imperfect than to
accept yourself as a work in progress.
Keep in mind that you bond with your fellow man through your vulnerabilities, not
through your strengths.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 23) Self-confidence
takes time. You may feel that there is
some area of your life in which you are underperforming. Expect to continue to build
on a positive experience
SCORPIO (Oct. 24-Nov. 21) There will be a
bit of inner turmoil to contend with, so
anything you can do to bring a sense of
calm to your inner world will be extremely
helpful. An earth-sign friend, which would
be Taurus, Virgo or Capricorn, will ground
you.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21) You are in
such a laid-back mood that others feel instantly relaxed when they are around you.
Suddenly they can be themselves without
judgment or worry.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19) To be human
is to sometimes fear that you’re not going
to be good enough to handle the task at
hand. Don’t believe the doubting voices;
instead let them trigger an extra flow of
fuel to your nervous system. The jolt helps.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18) You are fully
aware that what works for you won’t work
for everyone. But that awareness won’t
keep you from sharing your opinions and
stories just in case someone else can benefit from what you’ve already figured out.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20) You will be
praised for your talent and skill. As wonderful as this is, it’s not why you do what
you do. The personal satisfaction you get
from doing your best is your strongest motivation.
CRYPTOQUOTE
STRANGE BREW
9A
12515102.qxp
11/15/2012
7:27 PM
Page 10
BUSINESS
rocketminer.com
Super-sized sales?
CMRG
Wall Street anticipates Casual
Male’s sales improved in the
third quarter.
The clothing chain, which
caters to big and tall men, is
expected to report $95 million in
revenue for the quarter today.
That would beat the $89.4
million in revenue it posted a
year earlier. The company has
been focusing less on its traditional Casual Male XL stores
and opening more profitable
DestinationXL stores.
Fitness favorite
$3.31
Brisk demand for athletic
shoes and apparel has Foot
Locker off to a strong start
this year.
The retailer's earnings are
up 43 percent through the
first half of 2012, while
revenue is up 8 percent. The
company, which reports
financial results for the third
quarter today, is benefiting
from growing sales at stores
in North America and
Europe.
$5
$3.99
4
3
’12
2
Operating
EPS
$-0.03
est.
$0.00
3Q ’11
3Q ’12
Price-earnings ratio:
5
based on past 12 months’ results
Dividend: none
Source: FactSet
FL
$31.85
$40
$22.86
30
’12
20
Operating
EPS
52-WK RANGE
HI
YTD 1YR
VOL
CLOSE CHG %CHG WK MO QTR %CHG %RTN (Thous)
TICKER
LO
AK Steel
AKS
4.01
1
10.33
3.63
-.39
-9.7
t
t
t
-56.1
AT&T Inc
T
27.41
6
38.58
33.42
-.36
-1.1
t
t
t
Anadarko
APC
56.42
5
88.70
70.38 +1.05
+1.5
t
t
s
Annaly
NLY
14.01
1
17.75
14.22
+1.1
t
t
Apple Inc
AAPL
363.32
-2.1
t
BP PLC
BP
36.25
4
48.34
40.30
+.14
+0.3
t
BakrHu
BHI
37.08
2
59.84
39.87
+.23
+0.6
t
9
5 705.07
+.15
525.62 -11.26
-54.9
42810
+10.5
+21.8
-7.8
-12.1
t
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P/E
DIV
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25827
43
1.80f
3961
dd
0.36
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25993
10
2.17e
+29.8
+43.0
27630
12
10.60
-5.7
-3.3
7178
6
1.92a
-18.0
-29.7
5549
12
0.60
BAC
4.92
10.10
9.09
+.10
+1.1
t
t
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+63.5
+49.3
138261
24
0.04
CVX
92.29
4 118.53
101.62
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-0.9
t
t
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3.60
ChurchDwt
CHD
42.26
6
59.27
50.97
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t
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1468
22
0.96
Cisco
CSCO
14.96
5
21.30
17.94
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t
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54666
12
0.56
Citigroup
C
23.30
8
38.72
35.21
+.19
+0.5
t
t
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+33.8
+23.5
38934
11
0.04
Dell Inc
DELL
9.11
1
18.36
9.56
-.02
-0.2
s
t
t
-34.7
-36.9
33671
6
0.32
ExxonMbl
XOM
73.90
7
93.67
86.14
+.07
+0.1
t
t
t
+1.6
+11.8
13627
11
2.28
FMC Cp s
FMC
38.06
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59.41
51.44
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17.55
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8.82
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13.05
10.57
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48032
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0.20
GenElec
GE
14.68
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23.18
20.06
+.05
+0.2
t
t
t
+12.0
+28.5
50835
15
0.68
Hallibrtn
HAL
26.28
3
40.43
30.36
+.41
+1.4
t
t
t
-12.0
-21.3
13127
9
0.36
HewlettP
HPQ
13.07
1
30.00
13.08
-.06
-0.4
t
t
t
-49.2
-50.1
24373
5
0.53
HonwllIntl
HON
48.82
7
63.89
59.33
-.63
-1.1
t
t
t
+9.2
+12.3
5430
20
1.64f
Intel
INTC
19.95
1
29.27
20.03
+.07
+0.4
t
t
t
-17.4
-15.4
45388
9
0.90
IBM
IBM
177.06
3 211.79
185.85
+.34
+0.2
t
t
t
+1.1
+0.8
3358
13
3.40
Microsoft
MSFT
24.30
3
32.95
26.66
-.18
-0.7
t
t
t
+2.7
+4.1
48848
14
0.92f
Oracle
ORCL
24.91
7
33.29
29.95
+.37
+1.3
t
t
t
+16.8
-7.7
26144
15
0.24
Pfizer
PFE
18.15
7
26.09
23.66
-.15
-0.6
t
t
t
+9.3
+24.8
27058
14
0.88
PulteGrp
PHM
5.08
8
18.30
15.24
+.01
...
t
t
t +141.5 +175.0
20975
36
...
Questar
STR
17.20
4
21.47
18.50
-.25
-1.3
t
t
t
-6.8
-0.1
1038
16
0.68f
RegionsFn
RF
3.51
7
7.73
6.30
+.05
+0.8
t
t
t
+46.5
+56.5
25178
11
0.04
Saks
SKS
8.49
4
12.14
9.90
-.03
-0.3
t
t
t
+1.5
-2.6
3503
23
...
SandRdge
SD
4.81
2
9.04
5.32
+.13
+2.5
t
t
t
-34.8
-28.3
27147
dd
...
Schlmbrg
SLB
59.12
5
80.78
69.16 +1.33
+2.0
s
t
t
+1.2
-8.5
7336
17
1.10
SiriusXM
SIRI
1.65
8
2.97
2.65
-.05
-1.9
t
t
s
+45.6
+60.7
120811
5
...
SprintNex
S
2.10
9
6.04
5.54
+.05
+0.9
t
t
s +136.8
+92.0
29154
dd
...
Staples
SPLS
10.57
3
16.93
11.92
+.38
+3.2
s
s
s
-14.2
-22.1
34458
dd
0.44
UnionPac
UNP
95.15
7 129.27
117.99
+.53
+0.5
t
t
t
+11.4
+16.4
2004
15
2.76f
WmsCos
WMB
23.78
6
37.56
30.97
-.22
-0.7
t
t
t
+14.9
+29.3
6947
20
1.30f
Xerox
XRX
6.26
1
8.84
6.28
-.01
-0.2
t
t
t
-21.1
-20.7
9721
7
0.17
Yahoo
YHOO
14.35
0
18.08
17.89
+.07
+0.4
s
s
s
+10.9
+11.4
35323
5
...
...
Dividend Footnotes: a - Extra dividends were paid, but are not included. b - Annual rate plus stock. c - Liquidating dividend. e - Amount declared or paid in last 12 months. f
- Current annual rate, which was increased by most recent dividend announcement. i - Sum of dividends paid after stock split, no regular rate. j - Sum of dividends paid this
year. Most recent dividend was omitted or deferred. k - Declared or paid this year, a cumulative issue with dividends in arrears. m - Current annual rate, which was decreased
by most recent dividend announcement. p - Initial dividend, annual rate not known, yield not shown. r - Declared or paid in preceding 12 months plus stock dividend. t - Paid in
stock, approximate cash value on ex-distribution date. PE Footnotes: q - Stock is a closed-end fund - no P/E ratio shown. cc - P/E exceeds 99. dd - Loss in last 12 months.
Commodities
PVS.
86.32
2.34
2.99
3.76
2.68
%CHG %YTD
-1.01 -13.5
...
+6.1
-0.49
+1.3
-1.52 +23.9
+0.64
+0.4
PVS.
1729.50
32.87
1591.60
3.46
640.75
%CHG %YTD
-0.94
+9.4
-0.63 +17.2
-1.15 +12.4
+0.26
+1.0
-4.42
-6.6
%CHG %YTD
CLOSE
1713.30
32.67
1573.30
3.46
612.40
AGRICULTURE
CLOSE
PVS.
Cattle (lb)
1.26
Coffee (lb)
1.49
Corn (bu)
7.21
Cotton (lb)
0.74
Lumber (1,000 bd ft) 324.00
Orange Juice (lb)
1.16
Soybeans (bu)
14.02
Wheat (bu)
8.46
1.25
1.48
7.26
0.72
320.10
1.13
14.33
8.49
+0.14
+0.88
-0.62
+3.25
+1.22
+3.06
-1.19
-0.38
+2.2
-34.3
+11.6
-19.4
+31.1
-31.2
+17.0
+29.5
Stocks Recap
1,440
S&P 500
3,040
Nasdaq composite
1,380
Close: 1,353.33
Change: -2.16 (-0.2%)
2,920
Close: 2,836.94
Change: -9.87 (-0.3%)
1,320
2,800
10 DAYS
1,500
3,200
1,450
3,100
1,400
3,000
1,350
2,900
1,300
2,800
1,250
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
2,700
Where or how do you watch
most movies?
A. in the theater
B. DVD rental service
C. pay-cable TV
D. online streaming
Quick click your answers at
15
Source: FactSet
dd
METALS
Gold (oz)
Silver (oz)
Platinum (oz)
Copper (lb)
Palladium (oz)
3Q ’12
Dividend: $0.72 Div. yield: 2.3%
Chevron
FUELS
CLOSE
Crude Oil (bbl)
85.45
Ethanol (gal)
2.34
Heating Oil (gal)
2.97
Natural Gas (mm btu) 3.70
Unleaded Gas (gal)
2.70
3Q ’11
based on past 12 months’ results
BkofAm
Platinum fell
after workers at
a South African
mine returned to
work following
an eight-week
strike. Platinum
had earlier risen
on worries that
the strike would
affect supply.
est.
$0.54
Price-earnings ratio:
Local Stocks
NAME
$0.43
10 DAYS
J
J
A
S
O
Cracker Barrel nearly doubled its earnings in the final
quarter of its fiscal year, which ended in early August.
The company
benefited from rising
customer traffic,
which helped drive
stronger sales.
Investors will be
watching today to
see if the restaurant
chain was able to
follow up that
performance in its
fiscal first quarter.
AP Business Writer
NEW YORK (AP) —
Stock indexes closed lower
Thursday, a third straight
decline, after U.S. retailers
issued weak forecasts for
earnings and more people
filed claims for unemployment benefits.
Wal-Mart, Ross Stores
and Limited Brands, the
owner of Victoria’s Secret,
all fell after issuing forecasts
that disappointed financial
analysts. Wal-Mart fell
$2.59, or 3.6 percent, to
$68.72.
The Dow Jones industrial
average wavered between
small gains and losses
shortly after the opening
bell, then moved lower at
midmorning. It closed down
28.57 points at 12,542.38.
The Standard & Poor’s
500 index dropped 2.16
points to 1,353.33 and the
Nasdaq composite finished
9.87 points lower at
2,836.94.
Stocks have fallen steadily since voters returned
President Barack Obama
and a divided Congress to
power. The Dow has lost 5
percent from Election Day,
Nov. 6.
Investors are worried that
S&P 500
1,353.33
DOW
12,542.38
CRUDE OIL
$85.45
30-YR T-BONDS
2.73%
q
q
q
n
-2.16
NASDAQ
2,836.94
-28.57
GOLD
$1,713.30
-.87
EURO
$1.2773
...
6-MO T-BILLS
.13%
q
q
p
q
-9.87
-16.20
+.0028
-.01
U.S. leaders may not reach a
deal before tax increases
and government spending
cuts take effect Jan. 1. The
impact would total $700 billion for 2013 and could send
the country back into recession.
Bill Stone, chief investment strategist at PNC Asset Management Group in
Philadelphia, said the bargaining in Washington
would likely drag on until
next year, weighing on
stocks. “It’s hard to see the
market getting a whole ton
of traction until that gets
settled.”
President Obama will
meet with congressional
leaders Friday to talk about
the budget, but he appeared
to suggest Thursday that he
would insist on an increase
in tax rates for the wealthy.
T. Dale, a portfolio manager at Security Ballew
Wealth Management in
Jackson, Miss., said that
stocks are more likely to fall
than rise, partly because of
slowing global economic
growth and the U.S. budget
impasse.
“The market has gotten
well ahead of itself,” Dale
said.
Superstorm Sandy drove
the number of people seek-
ing unemployment benefits
up to 439,000 last week, the
Labor Department reported. Applications for benefits
rose 78,000, mostly because a large number were
filed in storm-damaged
states.
The European Union’s
statistics agency confirmed
that the euro zone, the
group of 17 countries that
use the euro currency, is in
recession. The economy in
the region shrank 0.1 percent in the third quarter
from the previous threemonth period.
Among the retailers disappointing Wall Street with
lower earnings forecasts,
Ross Stores, whose stores
includes Ross Dress for
Less, fell 70 cents, or 1.3
percent, to $54.44. Limited
Brands dropped $1.10, or
2.4 percent, to $45.50.
The yield on the 10-year
Treasury note was little
changed at 1.59 percent.
STOCKS MAKING BIG
MOVES
• NetApp, a data storage
business, jumped $3.08, or
11.3 percent, to $30.20 after
the company reported earnings that were higher than
analysts were expecting.
• Viacom, the owner of
Nickelodeon, MTV and the
Paramount movie and TV
studio, rose $1.24, or 2.6
percent, to $49.23. The media conglomerate did better
than investors had expected
thanks to lower costs and
higher fees from cable and
satellite companies for carrying its cable networks.
• Petsmart, a specialty
pet retailer, jumped $2.63,
or 4.1 percent, to $67.48 after raising its full-year outlook.
• Target rose $1.06, or 1.7
percent, to $62.44 after reporting that its profit rose
more than analysts had forecast. The company also issued a strong outlook heading into the critical holiday
season.
• Dollar Tree, a discount
retailer that sells items for
$1 or less, gained $1.94, or
5.1 percent, to $39.70 after
the company said its net income rose 49 percent in the
third quarter.
• Apple’s market value fell
below $500 million for the
first time since May, as the
maker of smartphones and
tablets dropped $11.26, or
2.1 percent, to $525.62. The
company’s market value
climbed as high as $658 million Sept. 19, according to
FactSet data.
Senate health chair wants
new drug compound rules
MATTHEW PERRONE
AP Health Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) —
The chairman of the Senate’s health committee
pledged Thursday to move
ahead with legislation to
tighten oversight of compounding pharmacies, amid
a deadly outbreak caused by
tainted specialty medications.
But a top lobbyist for the
compounding industry, and
some fellow senators, argued that existing state and
federal laws could have prevented the wave of fungal
meningitis that has killed 32
people. In the second hearing on the issue this week,
members of the Senate
Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions
sought accountability for
the contaminated steroid
shots which have sickened
N
How will the proposed
changes to capital gains taxes
affect your portfolio?
slightly
0%
Encore performance?
STEVE ROTHWELL
YESTERDAY’S POLL
greatly
33%
Page 10A
Stock indexes close lower
after weak retail reports
See us
online
www.
rocket
miner.com
M
not at all
67%
more than 460 people in 19
states.
“This committee will
forge ahead in developing
legislation,” said committee
chairman Sen. Tom Harkin,
D-Iowa. But after more than
three hours of testimony
from federal and state regulators and industry representatives, there was little
consensus on what form
new regulations should take.
The International Academy of Compounding Pharmacists’ CEO David Miller
condemned the New England Compounding Center,
the company at the center of
the incident, calling it “a
pharmacy hiding behind
that license and acting as an
illegal drug manufacturer.”
Miller pledged to cooperate with lawmakers, but
stressed that existing state
and federal laws could have
been used to shut the com-
pany down years ago.
“There is no question
about who has the authority
to immediately shut down
an illegal drug manufacturer, and that rests with the
FDA,” Miller told lawmakers. Compounding pharmacies, which mix customized
medications based on prescriptions, are traditionally
overseen by state pharmacy
boards. But in recent years
larger compounders like the
NECC have emerged, massproducing thousands of
vials of drugs that can be
shipped nationwide.
That trend has prompted
calls for tighter oversight.
Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Margaret Hamburg said her
agency needs clearer authority to go after largescale compounders, who
have
challenged
the
agency’s authority in court
since the 1990s.
In her second congressional appearance this week,
Hamburg described a “crazy
quilt” of conflicting laws and
court rulings that limit the
agency’s ability to take action. Hamburg suggested
Congress set up a two-tier
system in which traditional
compounding pharmacies
continue to be regulated at
the state level, but larger
pharmacies would be subject to FDA oversight.
But some senators questioned why they should give
the FDA more authority
when it did not appear to
fully exercise its existing
powers. Sen. Pat Roberts, RKan., pointed out that the
FDA inspected the NECC
three times before the latest
outbreak and issued a warning letter to the company in
2006, but never shut the operation down.
12515103.qxp
11/15/2012
4:44 PM
Page B1
rocketminer.com
REGIONAL
1B
The Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission is looking at tougher rules for how close drilling wells can be to buildings such as roads
and schools.
Drilling regulators hear
from critics at meeting
KRISTEN WYATT
Associated Press
DENVER (AP) — Colorado drilling regulators got an earful Wednesday from critics who
want more say in how gas and oil can be
drilled in their jurisdictions.
The Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation
Commission was meeting to consider expanded rules for sampling and monitoring of
groundwater near new oil and gas wells. The
commission also was looking at tougher rules
for how close drilling wells can be to buildings
such as roads and schools.
No decisions were made, but the meeting
turned into something of a public hearing on
the overall mood of those affected by drilling.
It was the commission’s first meeting since
Longmont residents voted overwhelmingly to
ban hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” despite
Lawmakers
hear report on
Wyo. education
department
BOB MOEN
Associated Press
CHEYENNE (AP) — Consultants hired by the Legislature gave the Wyoming Department of Education poor marks
in implementing state education reforms, saying the agency
failed in some of its responsibilities and hindered other entities involved in the state’s initiative to better prepare students for college and careers.
Their report presented
Wednesday to the Select Committee on Statewide Education
Accountability blames much of
the agency’s failings on the loss
of too many key personnel in
the last two years.
State schools Superintendent Cindy Hill, who was elected two years ago, told the committee the report contained
much misinformation but declined to respond in detail before the committee. She said
she would like to do so when
the panel meets in December.
Over her objection, the committee then approved drafting
legislation to reassign some duties from her agency to other
boards and committees involved in the reform effort.
After the meeting, Hill criticized the consultants’ work and
said there was an agenda other
than school reform involved.
“This isn’t about children,”
Hill said.
“This is about making this
superintendent’s position an
appointed position. It’s pure
and simple. And let me tell you
the good ol’ boys are at work
and they’re pretty, pretty
nasty.”
Sen. Hank Coe, co-chairman
of the committee, noted that
two separate consultants came
to the same conclusions about
the department’s performance.
warnings from state officials including Gov.
John Hickenlooper that a single statewide
drilling regulatory scheme is necessary.
The commission meeting was charged
from the start, when eight environmental activists seeking entry were wrongly told the
hearing was closed to the public. They eventually were allowed in, but not with their signs
decrying fracking as dangerous to the public.
One of the testifiers was Jonnie Westerop,
who handed commissioners photos of a playground with wells visible in the background.
“Do you think the citizens are just going to
sit back and say that’s fine? ... What are we doing to our state? Beautiful Colorado?” she
asked.
Most of the testifiers opposed fracking near
homes and schools, but some called on the
commission to uphold current drilling law.
John Moser, who owns 100 oil and gas wells
in northern Colorado, told commissioners
that onerous regulations harm the entire state
tax base.
The Greeley well owner said after his testimony that Colorado must stick with its current regulatory scheme.
“Otherwise you’d have a hodgepodge,”
Moser said. “It would be a disaster.”
Commissioners asked few questions during the public testimony. They got a lengthy
briefing on proposed new groundwater testing rules, which commission director Matt
Lepore said would be the first in the nation to
require groundwater sampling at all new
drilling locations.
Lepore said he was “confident” that disputes over the groundwater and setback regulations could be resolved in coming weeks.
The commission is expected to vote on both
sets of rules as soon as next month.
State fund reaches out to crime victims
KELSEY BRAY
Wyoming Truman Eagle
CHEYENNE — Most people
have to pay bills, and most people
would agree they don’t like to, especially if they are unexpected.
For victims of crime, these unexpected bills can add to an already
stressful situation.
Along with medical costs, there
are expenses like gas to drive to
court, lost wages and relocation.
Fortunately for some, the state
can help.
The crime victim compensation fund has been in place for
about 15 years. It helps victims by
paying expenses associated with
a crime. The fund has helped
many victims pay bills. It can help
them move past a traumatic
event debt-free.
But with recent federal grant
funding cuts, employees in the
Wyoming Office of the Attorney
General’s Division of Victim Services are feeling the squeeze.
“Programs like the Violence
Against Women Act money and
other federal grants that my office receives money from are considered discretionary non-defense funds,” said division director Cara Chambers. “And those
are going to be the first funds to
take a hit.”
Despite the cuts, division and
other victim service employees
around the state believe the fund
is a necessity.
“The simple answer is it’s the
right thing to do,” Chambers said.
“No one asks to be a victim, no
one deserves to be a victim. We,
as a state, have a responsibility to
our citizens to do whatever we
can to aid in their restoration.”
WHAT IS IT?
The victim compensation fund
was established in 1997 through
the Wyoming Legislature. Money
is received from several sources,
including federal grant money.
The amount of the federal grant
changes from year to year. Chambers said in 2011 the division received about $253,000.
“That has dropped significantly,” she said. “It has dropped
threefold from 2009.”
Another source of money is a
surcharge fund. The surcharge
money comes from criminal convictions. Chambers said anyone
who pleads guilty or no contest is
required to pay into the fund,
whether they are convicted of a
misdemeanor or a felony. (A nocontest plea literally means, “I
will not contest it,” but has the
same effect as a guilty plea.)
“They have to pay no less than
($100), and the amount is up to
the discretion of a judge,” Chambers said. “The amount varies by
the type of crime.” She said the
division collects roughly $3.5 million in surcharge money for the
two-year budget period.
This money covers victim compensation, as well as other expenses like wages for division
employees. “(The $3.5 million)
doesn’t all go to victim’s compensation, but the lion’s share of it
does,” Chambers said.
Each victim has a $15,000 cap
for services, although an extra
$10,000 can be added in case of
catastrophic injury. “Catastrophic is very specific,” division benefits and eligibility specialist Jean
Courts said. “It can cover lost
wages, a prosthetic, adapting a
car or building a ramp.”
Last year, about $1.4 million
was paid to victims. And the need
for these services is increasing,
Chambers said. “What we paid
out in 2011 was almost double
what we paid out in 2010,” she
said. “So it’s ever-growing.”
Also in 2011, 611 new claims
were submitted to the division,
and 511 were approved. Only certain victims are eligible to receive
funds because of the restrictions
of the statute, Chambers said.
WHO DOES IT HELP?
To file a claim, a person must
meet certain criteria.
“For example, there has to be
an actual physical or mental injury,” Chambers said. “In other
words, if you went on vacation,
your house was robbed and they
took all your stuff, we wouldn’t be
able to compensate that.”
Most people who receive the
compensation are victims of
physical assault, followed by victims of child abuse and sexual assault. As for what the fund covers,
Courts said it varies from victim
to victim. It can help cover medical bills, funeral expenses and
personal property taken as evidence.
“And mental health counseling,
thank goodness, is growing,”
Courts said. It can also go to other expenses, said Laramie County
Sheriff’s
Department
victim/witness coordinator Dory
Clark. Recently, she received a
call from a domestic violence victim whose partner broke her arm.
During the assault, her eyeglasses were also broken.
“She was not going to be able
to see or drive,” Clark said. The
compensation fund can help cover the woman’s eyeglasses because they are an emergency
need. According to the statute, up
to $1,000 can be paid out to an
emergency expense. This would
be deducted from the final
amount given.
“They may need help with
rent,” Clark said. “Or they may
need to go to work, but their car
windshield is broken out. We are
able to help them with those
things.”
For Pinedale resident Jacie
Rose, the fund helped cover expensive medical bills. “It was so
helpful to me,” she said. In the
summer of 2010, Rose was sleeping at home when someone broke
into her house. The person hit her
over the head with a piece of
weightlifting equipment. “Luckily my roommates came home
from camping and found me,” she
said.
The incident left Rose with extensive physical damage, including hearing loss. “I had to get a
bunch of stitches and staples in
my head, and it caused hearing
loss in my ear,” she said. “I also
had to have neck surgery because
it bulged two of my discs.”
She was told the first hit
knocked her out. Judging from
the number of stitches, doctors
estimated she was hit about four
times.
The new liberties of Amendment 64 apply to people 21 or older.
People can grow up to three immature and three mature cannabis
plants privately in a locked space, legally possess up to one ounce
of cannabis and give as a gift up to one ounce to other citizens 21
years of age or older. With all the ways for adults to share and consume marijuana, police are worrying how it will effect safety on the
road.
With pot legal, police
worry about road safety
KRISTEN WYATT
AND GENE JOHNSON
Associated Press
DENVER (AP) — It’s settled.
Pot, at least certain amounts of
it, will soon be legal under state
laws in Washington and Colorado. Now, officials in both
states are trying to figure out
how to keep stoned drivers off
the road. Colorado’s measure
doesn’t make any changes to the
state’s driving-under-the-influence laws, leaving lawmakers
and police to worry about its effect on road safety.
“We’re going to have more impaired drivers,” warned John
Jackson, police chief in the Denver suburb of Greenwood Village. Washington’s law does
change DUI provisions by setting a new blood-test limit for
marijuana — a limit police are
training to enforce, and which
some lawyers are already gearing up to challenge.
“We’ve had decades of studies
and experience with alcohol,”
said Washington State Patrol
spokesman Dan Coon. “Marijuana is new, so it’s going to take
some time to figure out how the
courts and prosecutors are going
to handle it. But the key is impairment: We will arrest drivers
who drive impaired, whether it
be drugs or alcohol.”
Drugged driving is illegal, and
nothing in the measures that
Washington and Colorado voters passed this month to tax and
regulate the sale of pot for recreational use by adults over 21
changes that. But law enforcement officials wonder about
whether the ability to buy or possess marijuana legally will bring
about an increase of marijuana
users on the roads.
Statistics gathered for the National Highway Traffic Safety
Administration showed that in
2009, a third of fatally injured
drivers with known drug test results were positive for drugs other than alcohol. Among randomly stopped weekend nighttime
drivers in 2007, more than 16
percent were positive for drugs.
Marijuana can cause dizziness
and slowed reaction time, and
drivers are more likely to drift
and swerve while they’re high.
Marijuana legalization activists agree people shouldn’t
smoke and drive. But setting a
standard comparable to bloodalcohol limits has sparked intense disagreement, said Betty
Aldworth, outreach director for
Colorado’s Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol.
Most convictions for drugged
driving currently are based on
police observations, followed later by a blood test.
“There is not yet a consensus
about the standard rate for THC
impairment,” Aldworth said, referring to the psychoactive
chemical in marijuana.
Unlike portable breath tests
for alcohol, there’s no easily
available way to determine
whether someone is impaired
from recent pot use.
There are different types of
tests for marijuana. Many workplaces test for an inactive THC
metabolite that can be stored in
body fat and remain detectable
weeks after use. But tests for
current impairment measure for
active THC in the blood, and
those levels typically drop within hours.
According to the National
Highway Traffic Safety Administration, peak THC concentrations are reached during the act
of smoking, and within three
hours, they generally fall to less
than 5 nanograms per milliliter
of blood — the same standard in
Washington’s law, one supporters describe as roughly equivalent to the .08 limit for alcohol.
Two other states — Ohio and
the medical marijuana state of
Nevada — have a limit of 2
nanograms of THC per milliliter.
Pennsylvania’s health department has a 5-nanogram guideline that can be introduced in
driving violation cases, and a
dozen states, including Illinois,
Arizona, and Rhode Island, have
zero-tolerance policies.
In Washington, police still
have to observe signs of impaired driving before pulling
someone over, Coon said. The
blood would be drawn by a medical professional, and tests above
5 nanograms would automatically subject the driver to a DUI
conviction.
Supporters of Washington’s
measure said they included the
standard to allay fears that legalization could prompt a druggeddriving epidemic, but critics call
it arbitrarily strict. They insist
that medical patients who regularly use cannabis would likely
fail even if they weren’t impaired.
They also worry about the
law’s zero-tolerance policy for
those under 21. College students
who wind up convicted even if
they weren’t impaired could lose
college loans, they argue.
Jon Fox, a Seattle-area DUI attorney, said he’s interested in
challenging Washington’s new
standard as unconstitutional.
Under due process principles, he
said, people are entitled to know
what activity is prohibited. If scientists can’t tell someone how
much marijuana it will take for
him or her to test over the
threshold, how is the average pot
user supposed to know?
11-16-12.qxp
11/15/2012
5:42 PM
Page 1
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Classified Display Ad Rates, Deadlines: Per Inch: $9.55.
Advertisements accepted daily until 12 noon for following
morning’s Rocket-Miner. Cancellations and corrections
accepted until 12 noon.
PICK YOUR FORMAT
Choose what works best for your ad. We also offer centering of text and Garage Sale Kits. Call for details.
WITHIN
ROCK SPRINGS,
1992 three bed, two bath, with
swamp cooler, fenced yard.
$850/month, $850/ de-posit,
lot rent included. FREE water,
garbage, sewer. One year
lease, no pets. 555-5555,
555-5555.
1
Good.
Simple,
multi-line ad.
2
WITHIN ROCK SPRINGS,
1992 three bed, two bath,
with swamp cooler, fenced
yard. $850 /month, $850/ deposit, lot rent included.
FREE water, garbage, sewer. One year lease, no pets.
555-5555, 555-5555.
Better. Add
an icon or an
attention getter.
FOUND - YOUNG gray and
white cat, corner of E
Street and Ludvig Street.
Call 362-7245.
CARPET INSTALLER - New,
Used, Repairs. Free Estimates. Henry, 389-4250.
JAMES BROTHERS - Since
1947. Professional painting,
paper hanging, residential,
commercial. For estimates,
389-6745.
CALL MONTE Vista Construction for all your roofing needs. 30 year Architectural shingles, quality service and installation, (307)
382-0767.
TOWING: Cars, Trucks, Semis. Also private property
towing. Call 389-9225.
ELECTRICIANS ON CALL
24 hour, 389-5069
IMMACULATE
CLEANING
LLC. Residential, commercial - regular clean, deep
clean, carpet cleaning.
307-371-3640.
INTERIOR and EXTERIOR
Painting/Texturing. Locally
Owned, excellent references. Pablo and Picasso
Painting, 362-4589, 371-2002
MONTE VISTA construction
is now seeking commercial/business interior remodels and residential full
bathroom remodels. (307)
382-0767.
CARPENTRY
Cabinets, Doors, Hardwood
Flooring, Decks, Windows,
Tile, Additions, Garages.
Rocky, 307-389-5473
S&E PROFESSIONAL Cleaning. Insured and licensed.
For all your cleaning needs,
307-389-7062.
QUICK, CLEAN Home cleaning, 354-6391.
LOOKING FOR a contractor
that does his own work?
HOLP CONSTRUCTION has
your on-the-job contractor.
Now doing estimates for
remodeling projects: additions, basement, kitchens
and baths. Call Terry,
362-6680.
holp-construction.com.
SHEILA’S DETAILING - Cars,
Trucks, Semis. Gift certificates
available.
(307)
922-3520.
3
Best.
Customize your
ad! Upgrade to
a display ad.
Add photos,
borders or logos
for maximum
impact.
Professional DJ Services
Wide variety of music and
lighting for your holiday
party, wedding or event.
Packages available.
Call 307-922-1574.
JEWELRY REPAIR, sizing,
custom work, guaranteed
in my home. Gold and silver
jewelry, pickup and delivery, 382-2547.
HANDYMAN
Dry wall, interior/exterior,
plastering, texturing, painting, tile repair, plumbing.
Twenty years experience.
Call Randy, 307- 871-3633.
PET SITTING in your home.
$20 per visit, in Rock
Springs. References available. 307-212-6095.
NEED ANY kind of work
done, call (307) 448-0880.
SPEED BUMP
BY DAVE COVERLY
KELLY’S Convenience Center is looking for experienced Clerks. You must be
21, honest, dependable and
drug free. Apply in person
at 1652 9th Street, 1900 Yellowstone Road, or 1645
Sunset Drive.
I WILL BE RETIRING and
closing the Unique Boutique Store on January 25,
2013. There will be three
payouts, one in each
month, November, December and January. If you
would like to pick up your
merchandise, you must do
so before January 25, 2013.
Things that are left after
this date will be donated to
charity. Payout money will
be mailed to people who
have payout money coming
and who have not picked it
up. A fee of $1 will charged
for postage and handling.
COME ON in to Daily Knead.
Now taking orders for dinner rolls and pies for the
holiday. Stop by 176 E.
Flaming Gorge Way, Green
River or call 875-8278.
MACHINIST NEEDED!
Hoerbiger Service is looking for a Machinist with
mechanical background in
our NEW Rock Springs, WY
location. We will train! Experience with compression
technology, manual lathe,
CNC, Mill and Drill Press
operation a plus but not required. Please fax resumes
to (720)258-9939 or email to
[email protected]
EXPERIENCED FINISH Carpenter. 382-0011.
PART-TIME
CUSTODIAN
needed for a small office
building in Green River. Six
- eight hours per week in
the evenings after 8 p.m.
Pre-employment
background check is required.
$10.24 per hour. Please apply at www.swcounseling.org or for more information and access to applications please contact
the Human Resources Manager at Southwest Counseling
Service,
(307)
352-6677.
HAMPTON INN and Suites,
Green River seeking Director of Sales. Salary depends on experience. Benefits. Apply in person, 1055
Wild Horse Canyon Rd.,
Green River, (307) 875-5300.
SIMPLOT
PHOSPHATES,
LLC, located in Rock
Springs, WY has openings
for
Operator
Trainees.
These are regular, full time
positions with shift work.
Interested applicants must
apply at Wyoming Workforce Services Department
located at the White Mountain Mall. Please direct all
phone calls to Wyoming
Workforce Services for information regarding the
job description. The job
posting will be open until
November 30, 2012. Applications will not be provided at the plant site. Simplot Phosphates is an Equal
Employment Opportunity
Company.
HOERBIGER IS looking for a
Service Operations Specialist in our NEW Rock Springs
location. Experience with
customer service, sales/parts orders, maintaining
records and inventory required. Experience working
in the Service or Oil/Gas industry preferred. Must be
proficient in the use of
computers, SAP experience
a plus. Please fax resumes
to (720)258-9939 or email
[email protected]
SIMPLOT
PHOSPHATES,
LLC, located in Rock
Springs, WY has openings
for Mechanics. These are
regular, full time positions.
Interested applicants must
apply at Wyoming Workforce Services Department
located at the White Mountain Mall. Please direct all
phone calls to Wyoming
Workforce Services for information regarding the
job description. The job
posting will be open until
November 30, 2012. Applications will not be provided at the plant site. Simplot Phosphates is an Equal
Employment Opportunity
Company.
EXPERIENCED HOT Oil Operator with minimum of
three years experience, for
local work with set schedule and guaranteed days
off. Seeking safe, dependable individual with clean
driving record and CDL
with X endorsement. Confined space, H2S and First
Aid/CPR training preferred,
but not required. Great
company offers benefits
and competitive pay based
on experience. Apply in
person at 16 Second Street,
Reliance, or send resume
to Human Resources, PO
Box 1974, Rock Springs, WY
82902.
CASPER - Field Service
Tech (Mechanic). Maintain
and repair heavy equipment. Must have two plus
years crane experience.
CDL preferred. Full benefits. Visit us at:
www.honnen.com to apply.
EXPERIENCED CLASS A CDL
Flatbed Driver needed, one
year driving and oilfield experience a plus. Call Mike,
(307) 212-2240 or Lori, (307)
371-5083.
PART-TIME Merchandiser
needed to service Magazines in Rock Springs to apply:
www.apply2jobs.com/selectmerchandising
ervices. Apply to Requisition number (ME2803).
SMALL MOTEL in Rock
Springs is hiring a Live-in
Manager. Must have good
people skills, some clerical
abilities and maintenance
skills a plus. Honest, clean
and dependable. Great job
for semi-retired or retired
couple. Send resume to
Manager position, 75 Center Street, Rock Springs,
Wyoming 82901 or call
307-362-6675 from 9 a.m. to
5 p.m.
SALES PROFESSIONAL
Looking for a self-disciplined, process oriented
person to fill a professional
sales position. Compensation: base plus commission
with quick start incentives.
Must have excellent computer, sales, people and
customer service skills.
307-362-4111.
ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT for Golden Hour Senior
Center. 30 hours a week.
Perform clerical duties,
computer knowledge a
must. If interested, pick up
job application at 550 Uinta
Drive, Suite A, Green River.
(872-3223).
SOS WELL SERVICES, LLC
has an immediate opening
for a Workover Rig Mechanic. Must have minimum three years of experience or technical diploma
in
related
mechanical
fields. PLEASE ONLY APPLY
if you have a valid drivers
license. PLEASE SUBMIT
APPLICATION ONLINE AT
www.soswellservices.com,
resume must be included!
**Good wages, and full
benefit package**.
Page 2B
11-16-12.qxp
11/15/2012
5:42 PM
Page 2
rocketminer.com
IMMACULATE TWO bedroom with washer and
dryer, storage shed included. No smokers, no
pets, references and credit
check required, $800 per
month plus utilities. Call
382-6451.
LUXURY THREE bedroom,
two bath apartment, great
location in Green River,
$945/month. 875-3909.
GREEN RIVER - townhome,
three bedroom, 1.5 bath,
$1225 per month includes
water, sewer and trash.
Call Amanda at (605)
939-4686.
FOUR BEDROOM, 1.75 bath,
yard, garage, RV parking,
no pets, 389-9639.
TWO BEDROOM, 1.5 bath
1200 sq. ft. townhouse, excellent condition, great location, one car attached
garage, well done decor.
Available December 1st.
$1250 rent, $1250 deposit,
one year lease. Pets accepted with reasonable pet
deposit. For information
call 389-8135.
TWO BEDROOM, one bath
house, 128 L St. Washer/
dryer hookups, no smoking, no pets, $635/month,
$635 deposit. 371-6759.
FIVE BED, two bath, fenced
yard, utilities paid, $1900.
Call 307-677-0848.
OPEN HOUSE
700 Arrowhead and 716 Arrowhead, Rock Springs.
Saturday, November 17th, 1
p.m. - 3 p.m. Turnkey Properties, 307-871-2772.
ONE BEDROOM RV’s for
rent. Short term, long term,
$500/month. 307-382-7482.
ONE BEDROOM, one bath,
recently renovated. All utilities included. No pets. $675
per month, $675 security
deposit. 389-0843.
***NEW LUXURY CONDO***
***FREE RENT***
Three bedroom, two bath.
Tile, granite counter tops,
air conditioning, garages.
Must see! First, last, plus
deposit. One year lease.
New, behind Smith’s, Green
River. (801) 368-8660.
GREEN RIVER, two bedroom, 1.5 bath, $800 per
month with one year lease,
deposit
$1000,
shorter
leases available. Owner
pays heat. No smoking, no
pets. Clean. 389-4039.
ONE
BEDROOM
studio
house in Green River, no
pets, no smoking. First, last
plus deposit, utilities extra,
$650. Available December
1st. 875-4004 or 871-1789.
TWO BEDROOM, one bath,
hardwood and tile in living
areas, new oak kitchen
with counter tops. $800
plus electric, no pets. (307)350-0128, 382-6542.
716 ARROWHEAD, newer
three bedroom, 2.5 bath,
two-car garage, no smoking, $1800 plus utilities.
Turnkey Properties, (307)
871-2772.
THREE
BEDROOM
furnished, all utilities paid,
free Wi-Fi. Absolutely No
Pets! (307) 705-1336.
TWO AND Three Bedrooms
located in Green River, all
include on site storage
unit, starting at $725. No
pets. 875-4296.
GREEN RIVER, three bedroom, 1.5 bath, pets okay.
$1200/month plus utilities,
$1200 security deposit, one
year lease, pet deposit
$200. 371-5495 anytime or
371-8265 after 4 p.m.
TWO BEDROOM, one bath.
No smoking, no pets. Call
362-7141.
STUDIO APARTMENT, no
smoking, no pets, $550 plus
deposit, one year lease,
362-2205.
TWO BEDROOM mobile
home. No pets, no smoking.
First, last, and deposit due
at signing of lease. $800 per
month, with discount for
paying on time.
Call
389-4026 for application.
TWO BED, one bath, fenced
yard, storage, $650 rent,
$300 deposit. 252-7776.
ONE BED, one bath, all utilities paid. $650 per month,
$650 deposit. No smoking,
no pets. 307-705-2075.
OFFICE/RETAIL Space, 500
sq. ft., all utilities included.
First Month Rent FREE.
307-389-6579.
CUTE THREE Bedroom, two
bath, one year lease, $1000
per month. Available December 1st, 2027 Carter. No
pets, no smoking. Credit
check. Call Tom Fossen at
AAA Properties, 389-5180.
Owner/Agent.
TWO BEDROOM, you pay
all utilities, first, last and
deposit, $800/month. Call
382-7030.
THREE BED, two bath, two
car garage, Garden City,
Utah, $800. (307) 677-0848.
FIREWOOD, $200 per cord.
Call Shawn, 307-389-8550.
TOOL BOX tank combo
with electric pump, DEE
ZEE Gold, perfect for RV
trailer, $400; Steel gangboxes, excellent condition,
$125 each. 389-7965.
CRAFTSMAN Snowblower,
24 inches, electric start,
like new, $400, 362-5508.
MISCELLANEOUS
FURNITURE: dining set, 21 inch
TV, two matching lamps,
wood burning inset for fireplace, queen size futon,
389-4086, 389-6562.
GREAT CHRISTMAS present. New set Roxy skis,
sweetheart design with
Roxy girls bindings, bindings not mounted, ski
length 140, radius 13, $180.
371-6734.
FLATBED, 11 ft. 7 inches x 8
ft., off of F450, $1000.
871-4782.
WORK SHED, insulated;
Piano, $600/best. 705-4960.
TWO AND three bed townhouse in Green River. One
year lease. NO PETS.
389-1077, 871-1351.
http://landlrentals.weebly.c
om
SUPER CLEAN three bedroom 1.5 bath, 1406 Raindance. $875/month plus deposit, one year lease. No
pets, no smoking. Credit
check. Call Tom Fossen at
AAA properties, 389-5180.
Owner/Agent.
LIBERTY GUN SAFES. Protect your valuables from
fire or theft, call 362-8356,
389-2629.
BEAUTIFUL THREE bedroom, two bath, and two
bedroom, two bath available now. For more information call 382-7482.
OVER 4000 sq. ft. building
for lease, with three 12 ft.
high overhead doors, located on Gannett Street,
zoned I-1. Owner is Real Estate Broker. Call Margie
Smith, Rock Springs Realty,
307-382-2995, 307- 350-7981.
COMPLETELY FURNISHED,
beautifully
decorated
home. Four bedroom, two
bath, two-car garage, landscaped, fenced yard, no
smoking, no pets. Six
month lease, $1500 per
month. 389-7629.
300 POUND Olympic weight
and bench set, $250 or best.
382-2547.
FIREWOOD - $200 per cord,
blocked or split. Call (307)
212-0701.
THREE BED, two bath doublewide. $1000 per month
and $1000 deposit. No
smoking and no pets.
389-3053.
STORAGE AND shop units,
Green River. 12x24 and
48x48, overhead doors.
(307) 875-2848.
6 BEVERLY Hills Dr., Rock
Springs, Friday and Saturday 8 a.m. - 5 p.m. Chin-up
station, small refrigerator,
stained glass scraps, green
house items, teen girl’s and
women’s clothes, toys, decor, costumes, truck trailer,
work bench with outlets,
2009 Jeep Rubicon bumper
with driving lights, and lots
of great quality miscellaneous.
105 K St. Rock Springs, New
Life. Friday, Saturday 9 a.m.
- 3 p.m. Lots of clothes,
miscellaneous, Christmas.
504 RAMPART Dr., Rock
Springs. Friday and Saturday 8 a.m. - 5 p.m. Squat
rack with lat attachment
and incline bench. 300
pound Olympic weight set
with
other
assorted
weights, weight racks and
dumbbell bars.
633 BRIDGER Ave., Rock
Springs, across from SCM
Parish. Saturday, Sunday 9
a.m. - 3 p.m. Youth Fund
raiser. Household items,
clothes, Louis Lamour hard
cover set, china. Come and
see, and support local
youth too!
3B
1348 COTTONWOOD Dr.,
Rock Springs. AFTER THE
RENO SALE! Saturday, November 17th, 8 a.m. to 1
p.m. New and used tools,
flooring, lighting, shelving,
miscellaneous.
NORTH OF Rock Springs,
three bed, one bath, $825
per month, $825 deposit,
tenant pays gas and electric, one year lease. NO
PETS. 389-1077, 871-1351,
http://landlrentals.weebly.c
om
2316 BIG SKY Trail - Large
three bedroom, 2.5 bath
house behind Home Depot.
Two-car garage, six appliances. No smoking, No
pets. $1550 per month,
$1550 down. Available immediately. (307) 371-8082.
GREEN RIVER, large townhome. Two bedroom, 1.5
bath, grassed yard. No
pets, $900. 875-5036.
TOWNHOUSES, TWO bedroom, 1.5 bath, garage. NO
PETS. Good references. For
appointments, call (307)
875-2848, Green River.
RV LOT for rent. $295/month includes water and garbage. 307-705-0586.
KENMORE ELITE DeLuxe
clothes dryer, red, 2 years
old, excellent condition,
$600 or best. 307-382-5844.
GOING OUT OF BUSINESS.
After 18 years Special FX
Darts and Pool, 758 Pilot
Butte Ave., Rock Springs
WY, 362-5062. Open Monday-Friday 1:30 p.m. - 5:30
p.m. and Saturday 11 a.m. 3 p.m. Everything 20 percent - 50 percent Off. Last
day
November
25th.
(Closed Nov 21st and 22nd.)
Fixtures will also be sold.
Hurry in for the best selection and supplies. Christmas is coming, get it now.
ARROWHEADS: 50 years of
collecting by A.J. Dolene.
Out of print, no more. I
have some new never used
copies. $40 plus tax each.
Price break for 10 or more.
307-362-4807.
WANTED - your unwanted
horses. 307-690-0916.
HORSESHOEING
Mike Murphy
362-6602
MATTRESSES - New and
used, lots to choose from.
Come see us at 520 Creek
Ave. - the old Taylor’s Furniture. 389-2758.
FOR SALE - Tan sofa and
loveseat. New, not broken
in yet. Moving must sell.
$750 for the pair. (307)
871-8825.
WHIRLPOOL GAS
$75. 307-677-0848.
dryer,
1973 TWO bed, one bath,
good condition, $8500 or
make offer. 371-8359.
ADMIRAL 3.2 super capacity washer. 3 years old, seldom used, $200. Call (307)
922-1921.
1982 24x65 Nashua, new
gas fireplace, siding, windows. Must meet park requirements. Call 389-4086
or 389-6562.
BLAINES APPLIANCES will
be closed November 18th
through November 26th.
Open by appointment only.
307-212-2432.
WOODEN TABLE and six
chairs, really nice, like new,
$900. Call 307-212-2432.
ALFALFA HAY, small bales.
Applequist Ranch, (307)
273-9311, (307) 350-9331.
GOATS, WITHERS and nannies, $75. (307) 922-3473.
2007
16x80
Friendship.
Three bed, two bath,
sunken living room, garden
tub and skylight. Large
deck, nice yard, shed. Must
See! $39,900/best. (307)
389-9611 or (307) 389-9606.
FOR SALE by Owner: 2006
Champion 16x80 mobile
home. Three bed, two bath,
new appliances, in Green
River. Will owner-finance to
right person(s), asking
$36,000. Contact Oscar,
(307) 371-0788.
SINGLEWIDE TRAILER for
sale, Desert Village. Possible financing available.
Asking what is owed on it.
350-1112.
2001 FORD Focus five
speed. AM/FM/Cassette,
193,000 miles, new timing
belt and fuel pump, 32 plus
MPG, $2200/best.
(541)
263-2277, leave message.
ANIMAL CONTROL has
some really great pets.
Some Pit mix puppies, 7
month old Hound, Pointer/
Dalmatian mix, super nice
adult cats, 350-1455.
YORKIES - Darling AKC
male and female Yorkies in
time for Christmas. Call
371-9474.
1995 SKYLINE, three bedroom, two bath. $20,000 or
best offer. 307-871-9000.
ONE BEDROOM, newly refurbished 14x60, large living room, fenced yard,
$4000 or best offer. Does
not have to be moved.
307-448-0874.
STEEL BUILDINGS, prices
reduced. Wholesale/factory offers on discounted
deals. Big and small.
Source#18x, 800-964-8335.
RED HEELER puppies, 6
weeks old, ready to go. Call
362-9233 or 382-2211.
FIVE ACRES in Watford
City, North Dakota. 40x80
building, 15 lot RV campground. Ideal for small
trucking company. (701)
580-4726.
$200.
BUYING JUNK Cars, Trucks,
Machinery. Prices from $35
to $2000. 389-9225.
GOLDEN RETRIEVER puppies. AKC, dew claws, first
shots, $500. 307-321-2315.
QUALITY OFFICE SPACE
For Sale/Lease. 2500 plus
sq. ft. with reception area
and five offices, conference
room. Great location Postal Square.
Agent Interest
All Seasons Realty
(307) 362-7575
GE
GAS
stove,
307-677-0848.
MAPEX MARS Series drum
kit and Ludwig drum kit.
Make offer, 970-216-1193.
CUTE BLACK-TRI male Australian Shepherd puppy.
Current on shots, micro
chipped, tail and dew
claws done, AKC and ASCA
registrable, ready for a
good home.
Call (435)
640-4042 or (307) 786-4433
POWERHOUSE COMMERCIAL unit. 2200 sq. ft., 16 ft.
door. Office and shop. For
lease. Call Century 21
Rocky Mountain 362-9990.
1927
PROJECT
RatRod
pickup, roller. 1990 GMC
Suburban. 1980 Skeeter
bass boat. For information
call (307) 707-3008.
2324 BIG SKY Trail- $164,900
TWIN HOME - TWO CAR ATTACHED GARAGE, THREE
BEDROOMS
AND
2.5
BATHS! Call Mary Manatos
at High Country Realty
(307) 382-2652.
MOUNTAIN VIEW, newly remodeled home on extra
large lot, in great neighborhood. Four bedroom, three
bath, two car garage, 12x48
patio. For more information
contact Jim or Lynn Moretti. 307-782-6732.
HOME IN SUPERIOR - three
bedroom, 1.5 bath house.
95 percent remodeled new roof, windows, deck,
granite countertops in
kitchen, new appliances.
Sits on two lots with two
additional lots available.
(307) 371-5495 or 371-8265.
2006 F-350 King ranch dually, 53,000 miles, $26,000.
Call 871-5562.
2003 DURANGO RT, 90,000
miles, $3800. 371-6030.
2005 CHEVY TAHOE, low
miles. Asking $17,000. Call
307-350-2476.
2006 GMC Envoy, 76,000 miles, air, 4x4, sunroof, towing
package,
$11,000.
389-6748 or (307) 705-1195.
12 FT. FLATBED trailer,
$1750/best . (307) 371-3691.
2001
TWO-PLACE
four
wheeler trailer, side load,
$500. Call 389-3223.
11-16-12.qxp
4B
11/15/2012
5:42 PM
Page 3
rocketminer.com
Sweetwater School District
Sweetwater School District Number One in amounts
exceeding $500 published in accordance with Chapter 3,
Section 110, of the education code, 1969 were as follows:
CHECK_KEY
0100049920
0100049924
0100049927
0100049928
0100049931
0100049933
0100049936
0100049937
0100049942
0100049943
0100049944
0100049948
0100049949
0100049952
0100049957
0100049958
0100049959
0100049960
0100049961
0100049962
0100049965
0100049966
0100049967
0100049972
0100049974
0100049979
0100049980
0100049981
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0100049984
0100049985
0100049986
0100049987
0100049990
0100049991
0100049992
0100049996
0100050001
0100050004
0100050005
0100050010
0100050011
0100050023
0100050025
0100050032
0100050035
0100050039
0100050042
0100050044
0100050045
0100050047
0100050048
0100050049
0100050050
0100050056
0100050059
0100050063
0100050067
0100050070
0100050072
0100050075
0100050077
0100050080
0100050081
0100050082
0100050084
0100050085
0100050086
0100050087
0100050088
0100050089
0100050092
0100050096
0100050099
0100050100
0100050103
0100050105
0100050107
0100050108
0100050109
0100050112
0100050114
0100050115
9200005974
0100050119
0100050121
0100050125
0100050126
0100050127
0100050128
0100050129
0100050130
0100050131
0100050133
0100050134
0100050135
0100050140
0100050142
0100050145
0100050146
0100050150
0100050151
0100050153
0100050154
0100050155
0100050156
0100050157
0100050159
0200082738
0100050161
0100050163
3100018225
9200005975
8200003887
8400000560
8200003888
2100003543
5100004946
0100050165
0200082739
0100050166
0100050167
0100050168
8004004749
8200003889
0100050169
0100050170
0100050171
0100050172
0100050173
0100050174
0100050176
0100050181
0100050185
0100050193
0100050194
0100050196
0100050197
0100050198
0100050200
0100050201
0100050202
0100050203
0100050204
0100050207
0100050208
0100050210
0100050219
0100050220
0100050223
0100050225
0100050228
0100050229
0100050230
0100050234
MAILING_NAME
CHRISTIANSEN, WHITNEY
LETS GO LEARN INC.
SMITH'S FOOD & DRUG
SWEETWATER SCHOOL DISTRICT #1 GENERAL FU
CDW-G, INC.
CLOSING THE GAP
DOUBLE TREE- BLOOMINGTON-MINNEAPOLIS S
FIRST BANKCARD- BRIAN KAUMO
FIRST BANKCARD- BRIAN KAUMO
FRANKLIN LEARNING RESOURCES
GRAND HYATT DENVER
SOLUTION TREE
STAPLES
WILSON LANGUAGE TRAINING
CAMCO FIELD SERVICES, INC.
CASPER STAR TRIBUNE ADVERTISING DEPT.
JOHN P. ELLBOGEN FOUNDATION
KONE, INC.
NBPTS C/O BANK OF AMERICA, ILLINOIS
PDQ CONTRACTORS
SULLIVAN AND ASSOCIATES
T-GRAPHICS WEST
NBPTS C/O BANK OF AMERICA, ILLINOIS
NICHOLAS & COMPANY, INC.
ROCK SPRINGS MUNICIPAL UTILITY HEAD STAR
CALICO INDUSTRIES, INC.
CONTROL TEMPERATURE SPECIALISTS (CTS)
EARTHGRAINS COMPANY
HORIZON SOFTWARE INTERNATION, LLC
MCFADDEN WHOLESALE
MEADOW GOLD
PAPA MURPHY'S
SMITH'S FOOD & DRUG
WYOMING DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION, HEALTH
ACE HARDWARE
APPLE COMPUTER, INC.
BRAINPOP
CDW-G, INC.
CEM AQUATICS
COMPUNET, INC.
CONTROL TEMPERATURE SPECIALISTS (CTS)
ELDER EQUIPMENT LEASING
EVERWHITE
HALL ASSOCIATES FLYING EFFECTS
HARCOURT SCHOOL PUBLISHERS
HOLIDAY INN
HUECKSTAEDT, TERRI
INTERSTATE BATTERY SYSTEM OF NORTHWEST C
INTERSTATE BUSINESS PRODUCTS
JACKSON CONSULTING
JME FIRE PROTECTION
1ST BANK - FISCAL MANAGEMENT
ALPINE PURE WATER
HYDE, BRAD
LEMICH LAW CENTER
MACY'S TRUCK REPAIR, INC.
MCGRAW-HILL PUBLISHING
MITCHELSON, PATTY
NASCO
NCS PEARSON INC.
PERKINS RESTAURANT SUGARLAND ENTERPRISES
PROJECT ADVENTURE, INC.
QUALITY INN
QUESTAR GAS
RESERVE ACCOUNT POSTAGE MACHINE
ROADWAY INN & SUITES
ROCK SPRINGS MUNICIPAL UTILITY SEWER FEE
ROCK SPRINGS MUNICIPAL UTILITY WATER FEE
ROCK SPRINGS NEWSPAPER, INC. PUBLICATION
ROCKY MOUNTAIN POWER
RYNO DESIGNS
SMITH DETROIT DIESEL
STAPLES
STEVENS, J. MICHAEL
SWEETWATER SCHOOL DISTRICT #1 COMMUNITY
TOWN OF WAMSUTTER
UNIVERSAL ATHLETIC
VERIZON WIRELESS
WAL-MART
WINGATE INN
WYOMING SCHOOL SUPPORT SERVICE
XEROX CORPORATION
AMERICAN FAMILY LIFE
AMERICAN FUNDS SERVICE COMPANY
DISTRICT DIRECTOR OF INTERNAL REVENUE, F
DISTRICT DIRECTOR OF INTERNAL REVENUE, M
FIDELITY INVESTMENTS
FRANKLIN TEMPLETON INVESTOR SERV.INC., R
GREAT AMERICAN LIFE INSURANCE
HARTFORD LIFE INSURANCE CO. GROUP BENEFI
INDIANAPOLIS LIFE INSURANCE CO.
NYLIAC
ORCHARD TRUST COMPANY
SECURITY BENEFIT LIFE INS. CO. SECURITY
SWEETWATER SCHOOL DISTRICT #1 DEPENDENT
SWEETWATER SCHOOL DISTRICT #1 RENT
SWEETWATER SCHOOL DISTRICT #1 UNREIMBURS
UNITED WAY OF SWEETWATER COUNTY
VANGUARD GROUP SPECIALIZED SERVICES
WADDELL AND REED
WADDELL AND REED, INC.
WORKERS' COMPENSATION DEPARTMENT OF EMPL
WYOMING CHILD SUPPORT ENFORCEMENT
WYOMING EDUCATION ASSOCIATION
WYOMING RETIREMENT SYSTEM TEACHERS' RETI
WELLS FARGO BANK OF WYOMING
AMERICAN EXPRESS
SWEETWATER SCHOOL DISTRICT #1 IMPREST FU
HUGHES GENERAL CONTRACTOR
RETAINAGE-345-HUGHES
SWEETWATER SCHOOL DIST #1 CAPITAL CONST.
SWEETWATER SCHOOL DISTRICT #1 FEDERAL FU
JOB, RAE LYNN
PLAN ONE / ARCHITECTS
ROCKY MOUNTAIN FIRE SYSTEMS
PACIFIC CORP.
SIMPLEX GRINNELL LP
BELLI, JEANNE, RN
DEBERNARDI APARTMENT COMPANY
HILTON SALT LAKE CITY CENTER
ACADEMIC DEVELOPMENT INSTITUTE
B.E. PUBLISHING
BARNES & NOBLE
GEOMOTION GROUP
KAGAN PUBLISHING
LEADERSHIP LEARNING CENTER
MARZANO RESEARCH LABORATORY
MIRAVIA, LLC
SHERATON FORT WORTH
SIMSBURRY INN, THE
SOLUTION TREE
GARLAND, MARY
NAZARENO, LORI
COMPASSLEARNING
ACE HARDWARE
AIRGAS INTERMOUNTAIN, INC.
ALLDATA
APPLE COMPUTER, INC.
AUTO PARTS UNLIMITED
CHECK_AMOUNT
$734.53
$4,500.00
$623.20
$1,137.00
$516.00
$3,870.00
$3,540.24
$995.89
$532.00
$1,199.85
$582.94
$609.00
$637.62
$5,814.90
$2,870.25
$561.80
$837.00
$7,075.00
$24,000.00
$11,850.00
$2,606.90
$1,552.60
$1,000.00
$1,406.18
$563.63
$3,744.00
$1,507.13
$1,846.33
$6,672.00
$3,085.52
$7,645.58
$37,813.03
$1,426.00
$2,142.52
$3,057.68
$858.55
$267,020.71
$8,353.20
$17,730.37
$2,366.00
$19,563.32
$2,098.20
$1,907.67
$1,124.00
$3,370.00
$2,689.41
$1,200.00
$754.00
$1,085.55
$658.00
$49,000.00
$1,042.80
$861.78
$1,097.68
$1,500.00
$3,976.86
$825.00
$2,072.80
$544.70
$1,256.44
$3,628.30
$593.61
$3,420.41
$594.93
$1,518.88
$2,141.00
$700.93
$6,073.41
$23,937.68
$5,562.62
$18,785.77
$1,058.25
$606.15
$859.98
$1,500.00
$595.00
$986.20
$3,224.87
$1,841.75
$1,026.43
$948.00
$6,951.66
$536.30
$576.65
$6,193.37
$960.00
$120,119.88
$155,325.92
$33,495.00
$550.00
$3,249.99
$700.00
$5,190.37
$799.80
$625.00
$4,667.50
$1,491.00
$856.90
$891.34
$3,397.79
$563.41
$1,000.00
$1,037.50
$6,679.50
$2,232.30
$772.13
$15,843.94
$169,531.47
$1,000,000.00
$4,959.20
$2,594.82
$17,923.60
$5,518.56
$233,908.28
$105,964.38
$11,201.55
$2,362.07
$1,217.91
$4,258.90
$1,500,000.00
$701,065.70
$12,956.30
$89,252.75
$15,376.55
$89,658.52
$12,175.00
$31,560.97
$1,221.90
$715.00
$48,520.02
$2,670.56
$535.00
$1,300.00
$1,088.85
$6,277.20
$3,059.04
$2,500.00
$1,675.73
$722.97
$5,455.00
$1,023.91
$2,037.00
$4,728.40
$2,625.00
$1,542.15
$2,173.00
$2,450.20
$9,182.63
$574.47
$2,535.00
$1,146.00
$1,270.45
$975.00
$15,859.85
$1,683.06
0100050235
0100050242
0100050244
0100050245
0100050250
0100050251
0100050254
0100050256
0100050257
0100050260
0100050262
0100050267
0100050268
0100050270
0100050276
0100050278
0100050292
0100050294
0100050299
0100050300
0100050313
0100050314
0100050315
0100050316
0100050317
0100050319
0100050320
0100050321
0100050325
0100050326
0100050327
0100050332
0100050333
0100050334
0100050335
0100050336
0100050337
0100050343
0100050344
0100050345
0100050346
0100050349
0100050350
0100050351
0100050355
0100050363
0100050368
0100050373
0100050374
0100050378
0100050380
0100050389
0100050390
0100050391
0100050394
0100050396
0100050398
0100050399
0100050400
0100050401
0100050407
0100050409
0100050410
0100050413
0100050418
0100050419
0100050420
0100050421
0100050425
0100050427
0100050428
0100050429
0100050430
0100050433
0100050434
0100050436
0100050437
0100050438
0100050440
0100050443
0100050444
0100050445
0100050460
0100050461
0100050462
0100050466
0100050467
0100050471
0100050475
0100050476
0100050477
0100050479
0100050481
0100050483
0100050487
0100050488
0100050490
0100050491
0100050494
0100050496
0100050497
0100050500
0100050501
0100050502
0100050503
0100050504
0100050505
0100050506
0100050507
0100050508
0100050524
0100050527
0200082740
0200082741
0100050535
0100050536
0100050537
0100050538
0100050540
0100050541
0100050543
0100050544
0100050545
0100050546
0100050547
0100050548
0100050549
0100050550
0100050551
0100050554
0100050555
0100050556
0100050557
0100050558
0100050559
0100050563
0100050565
0100050566
0100050568
0100050569
0100050570
0100050572
0100050574
0100050575
0100050577
0100050578
0100050579
0100050580
0100050581
0100050582
0100050583
0100050584
0100050592
0100050593
0100050595
0100050596
0100050598
9800001049
9200005976
8400000562
9200005977
NOV. 16
B M I SYSTEMS GROUP
BOSCHETTO'S
BRC FAMILY HEARING SOLUTIONS
BUSH WELLS SPORTING GOODS
CARDWELL DISTRIBUTING
CDW-G, INC.
COMFORT INN RAWLINS
COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGIES
CONTRACT PAPER GROUP, INC.
CUMMINS INTERNATIONAL, INC.
DAKOTA BACKUP
DELL COMPUTER CORPORATION
DELTA EDUCATION, INC.
DICK BLICK COMPANY
EDUCATIONAL RESOURCE SERVICES, INC.
ELDER EQUIPMENT LEASING
HAMPTON INN & SUITES
HARCOURT SCHOOL PUBLISHERS
HOLIDAY INN
HOLT MCDOUGAL
INFORMATION SYSTEMS CONSULTING
INSULATION, INC.
J.W. PEPPER
EARTHGRAINS COMPANY
HORIZON SOFTWARE INTERNATION, LLC
MEADOW GOLD
PAPA MURPHY'S
WAL-MART
WESTERN WYOMING BEVERAGE
WYOMING FOOD BANK OF THE ROCKIES
BRIDGER VALLEY ELECTRIC
CENTURYLINK
CENTURYLINK
FIRST BANKCARD DR. RON KALICKI
FIRST BANKCARD DR. RON KALICKI
FIRST BANKCARD TERI HANSEN/FOUNDATION
FLEET SERVICES
LARIAT INTERNATIONAL TRUCKS
LEWIS PAPER
MHS
MACBEATH HARDWOOD COMPANY
MCFADDEN WHOLESALE
MCGRAW-HILL PUBLISHING
NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC FOR KIDS
NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC KIDS
NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC LEARNING
NENDZA, DANIEL
NYSTROM CUSTOMER SERVICE
OFFICE SHOP
OFFICE SHOP, INC.
OFFICE SHOP, INC. LEASING (OSL)
OREGON TRAIL
PECOLAR, MELANIE
PENCE AND MACMILLAN LLC
PEPPARD, DARRIN
PITNEY BOWES, INC.
PYRAMID SCHOOL PRODUCTS
QUALITY INN
QUESTAR GAS
QUILL CORPORATION #118624
REAL KLEEN, INC.
RED HORSE OIL
RENAISSANCE LEARNING, INC.
RENAISSANCE LEARNING, INC.
RESERVE ACCOUNT POSTAGE MACHINE
ROCK SPRINGS MUNICIPAL UTILITY WATER FEE
ROCK SPRINGS WINNELSON
ROCKY MOUNTAIN TEXTBOOK
ROSETTE, SKIP
SARATOGA INN
SCHOLASTIC CLASSROOM MAGAZINES
SCHOLASTIC MAGAZINE
STAPLES
STATE OF WYOMING - A & I TELECOMMUNICATI
STUDENT PLANNER, THE
SWEETWATER SCHOOL DISTRICT #1 INSURANCE
TEGELER & ASSOCIATES - R.S.
TIRE DEN, THE
TROXELL COMMUNICATIONS
TYPING AGENT IIc
U.S. MATH RECOVERY COUNCIL
UINTA NETWORK SERVICES
UNIVERSAL ATHLETIC
VANDYKE SOFTWARE
WAEMSP
WAL-MART
WAMSUTTER CONOCO
WAXIE SANITARY SUPPLY
WESTECH EQUIPMENT
WESTERN WYOMING BEVERAGE
WESTERN WYOMING COLLEGE BOOKSTORE
WINGATE INN
WYOMING EMBROIDERY
WYOMING ENVIRONMENTAL SERVICES
WYOMING STATE LIBRARY SUPREME COURT & LI
WYOMING TRIBUNE-EAGLE
WYOMING.COM
XEROX CORPORATION
XPEDX
ZANER BLOSER EDUCATIONAL PUBLISHERS
SWEETWATER SCHOOL DISTRICT #1 FEDERAL FU
AMERICAN FAMILY LIFE
AMERICAN FAMILY LIFE (AFLAC) REMITTANCE
AMERICAN FUNDS SERVICE COMPANY
AXA EQUITABLE LIFE INS. EQUI-VEST ANNUIT
CAPITAL BANK AND TRUST CO. DEALER SERVIC
CLERK OF CIRCUIT COURT
CLERK OF THE CIRCUIT COURT GARNISHMENTS
DISTRICT DIRECTOR OF INTERNAL REVENUE, M
FIDELITY INVESTMENTS
FRANKLIN TEMPLETON INVESTOR SERV.INC., R
GREAT AMERICAN LIFE INSURANCE
HARTFORD LIFE INSURANCE CO. GROUP BENEFI
INDIANAPOLIS LIFE INSURANCE CO.
NYLIAC
ORCHARD TRUST COMPANY
PACIFIC LIFE INSURANCE ANNUITIES
PENN MUTUAL LIFE
PRIMERICA SHAREHOLDER SERVICES
SECURITY BENEFIT LIFE INS. CO. SECURITY
SWEETWATER SCHOOL DISTRICT #1 DEPENDENT
SWEETWATER SCHOOL DISTRICT #1 OPTIONAL M
SWEETWATER SCHOOL DISTRICT #1 RENT
SWEETWATER SCHOOL DISTRICT #1 UNREIMBURS
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
UNITED WAY OF SWEETWATER COUNTY
VANGUARD GROUP SPECIALIZED SERVICES
WADDELL AND REED
WADDELL AND REED, INC.
WORKERS' COMPENSATION DEPARTMENT OF EMPL
WYOMING CHILD SUPPORT ENFORCEMENT
WYOMING EDUCATION ASSOCIATION
NCPERS WYOMING
WYOMING RETIREMENT SYSTEM TEACHERS' RETI
HARD ROCK HOTEL
HOME DEPOT
R & D SWEEPING, LC
RENAISSANCE NASHVILLE HOTEL
$613.00
$3,630.90
$2,444.45
$1,504.00
$35,169.67
$6,846.40
$534.00
$2,260.25
$46,681.30
$4,676.72
$2,748.89
$546.95
$2,259.56
$731.91
$1,045.00
$1,195.58
$1,424.00
$107,830.53
$600.00
$4,324.90
$4,555.70
$595.00
$798.74
$1,780.31
$25,945.50
$7,333.19
$9,064.80
$1,959.20
$869.28
$1,387.50
$750.48
$657.38
$1,713.00
$995.00
$1,052.50
$720.00
$1,682.00
$668.70
$2,842.05
$2,706.62
$894.76
$2,350.00
$994.60
$1,181.97
$3,967.47
$3,230.09
$4,677.73
$2,668.42
$2,043.16
$791.05
$2,292.48
$721.27
$1,017.99
$77,163.19
$1,320.00
$673.56
$4,629.87
$5,909.61
$14,886.82
$702.50
$522.80
$13,321.43
$770.57
$637.50
$1,071.24
$1,614.81
$6,992.47
$885.12
$1,691.20
$18,055.00
$936.60
$869.80
$2,224.00
$2,173.96
$1,276.40
$1,813.54
$39,657.62
$1,167.57
$1,122.84
$675.00
$2,281.56
$986.71
$2,504.75
$2,501.80
$1,983.45
$500,000.00
$610.00
$2,430.74
$15,225.00
$1,975.00
$12,441.00
$20,687.48
$860.94
$516.00
$800.00
$1,577.98
$3,169.13
$768.55
$1,556.41
$1,272.95
$651.80
$2,607.00
$1,334.00
$4,553.59
$1,400.00
$564.88
$2,197.35
$8,017.33
$1,729.00
$1,706.88
$629.67
$980.44
$15,376.55
$1,600,000.00
$2,091.98
$15,032.58
$740.83
$960.00
$737.50
$750.00
$1,064.19
$2,757.05
$269,133.64
$307,331.39
$75,505.16
$700.00
$7,249.99
$1,700.00
$8,262.72
$1,049.80
$2,500.00
$12,347.50
$600.00
$3,225.00
$800.00
$1,581.00
$856.90
$1,365.00
$8,391.54
$2,164.64
$5,703.22
$637.42
$1,225.82
$2,684.09
$1,087.50
$11,814.50
$35,141.32
$2,580.13
$15,998.73
$704.00
$363,540.88
$829.39
$6,615.00
$960.94
$625.00
$5,258.88
$6,951.94
$5,148.19
$4,264.17
$98,922.38
$72,041.77
1997
SKAMPER
brand
slide-in over tab pop-top
camper, with brackets,
$850/best. 970-216-1193.
DON’S RV AND REPAIR
Monday - Friday, 9 a.m. - 5
p.m. 362-7646, 1901 Foothill
Boulevard, Rock Springs.
2004 POLARIS 500 HO in
green with snowplow and
rack bag, $3500; 1996 Polaris 400 Scrambler 4x4,
$2000, both in excellent
condition. 307-871-6881
2007 YAMAHA 400 Big Bear.
After market skid plates,
winch, snow plow, excellent condition, low miles,
$3500/best offer. 389-5142.
2003 ARCTIC Cat Mountain
Cat 900, low miles, $3000 or
best offer. 350-7667.
SNOWMOBILE - 2010 Arctic
Cat M8 Snow pro, 162 inch,
track, asking $6800. Like
new, only 1469 miles, call
or text 307-871-3766 for
more information.
PUBLIC NOTICE
The Rock Springs, Green River,
Sweetwater County Combined
Communications Joint Powers
Board will hold its regular meeting on Monday, November 19,
2012 at 2:30 p.m. at 212 D Street,
Rock Springs, WY.
Nov. 16_____________________
STATE OF WYOMING
Department of Environmental Quality/Division of Air Quality
PUBLIC NOTICE
Chapter 6, Section 2(m) of the Wyoming Air Quality Standards and Regulations provides that prior to a final determination on an application to
construct a new source, opportunity be given for public comment and/or
public hearing on the information submitted by the owner or operator
and on the analysis underlying the proposed approval or disapproval.
The regulation further requires that such information be made available
in at least one location in the affected air quality control region, and that
the public be allowed a period of thirty (30) days in which to submit
comments. A public hearing will be conducted only if in the opinion of
the administrator sufficient interest is generated or if an aggrieved party
so requests.
Notice is hereby given that the State of Wyoming, Department of Environmental Quality, Division of Air Quality, proposes to approve a request by the following applicant to construct a new source in Sweetwater
County, Wyoming.
QEP Field Services Company
1050 17th Street, Suite 500
Denver, CO 80265
The applicant has requested permission to install a 15.0 MMCFD TEG
dehydration unit at the Trail 56 Pad, with one (1) reboiler overheads
condenser, one (1) TEG flash tank separator and one (1) smokeless combustion device to control volatile organic compounds and hazardous air
pollutant emissions associated with the dehydration unit still vent, located in the SW1/4SE1/4 of Section 15, T13N, R100W, approximately
thirty-nine (39) miles south-southwest of Table Rock, in Sweetwater
County, Wyoming.
A copy of the permit application and the agency’s analysis is available
for public inspection at the Sweetwater County Clerk’s Office, Green
River, Wyoming. In accordance with the Americans with Disabilities
Act, special assistance or alternate formats will be made available upon
request for individuals with disabilities.
Written comments may be directed to Steven A. Dietrich, Administrator,
Division of Air Quality, Department of Environmental Quality, 122 W.
25th St., Cheyenne, Wyoming 82002 or by fax (307) 777-5616. Please
reference AP-13921 in your comment. Comments submitted by email
will not be included in the public record. All comments received by
5:00 p.m., Monday, December 17, 2012 will be considered in the final
determination on this application.
Nov. 16___________________________________________________
CITY OF ROCK SPRINGS, WYOMING
NOTICE OF ACCEPTANCE AND FINAL SETTLEMENT
To all persons, firms or corporations who have any claims for work done
for or any materials furnished to:
DeBernardi Construction Co, Inc.
514 G Street
Rock Springs, Wyoming 82901
General Contractors for: 2012 ADA Upgrades Project
That is located in the City of Rock Springs, Wyoming.
You are hereby notified that the City of Rock Springs, Sweetwater
County, Wyoming, has accepted as completed, according to the plans
and specifications and rules set forth in the contract between the City of
Rock Springs and the aforesaid contractor, the work in connection with
the 2012 ADA Upgrades Project and that the said contractor is entitled
to final settlement therefore.
You are further notified that upon the 27th day of December, 2012, being the 41st day after the first publication of this notice, the City of Rock
Springs will pay to DeBernardi Construction Co., Inc. (Contractor) the
full amount due under said contract; and in the event your claim is not
filed with the City of Rock Springs prior to said 27th day of December,
2012, the same shall be waived.
This notice is given pursuant to Section 16-6-116, Wyoming Statutes.
Dated this 16th day of November, 2012
City of Rock Springs
Sweetwater County Wyoming
Nov. 16, 24, Dec. 1, 22_______________________________________
PUBLIC HEARING
SALE OF MUNICIPAL PROPERTY
The Rock Springs City Council will hear public comments on the proposed sale of a 1999 Dodge PU, VIN#3B7KF26Z9XM587069, valued
at more than $500.00, to Rock Springs Resident Council for $1.00, and a
2001 Dodge PU, VIN#1B7GL22X21S207622, valued at more than
$500.00, to Rock Springs Resident Council for $1.00. The hearing will
take place at the regular council meeting on Tuesday, December 4, 2012,
at 7 p.m. in the Rock Springs City Council Chambers, 212 D Street,
Rock Springs, Wyoming.
This notice is made pursuant to Wyoming Statute 15-1-112.
Nov. 16, 22, 30_____________________________________________
NOTICE OF ACCEPTANCE AND FINAL PAYMENT TO
CONTRACTOR
Notice is hereby given that the Eden Valley Irrigation & Drainage District has accepted, as completed according to the plans, specifications
and rules governing the same, the work performed under that contract
dated September 14, 2012, between Eden Valley Irrigation & Drainage
District, Farson, Wyoming and McKinsey Fencing of Boulder, Wyoming, the contractor; that work under said contract, known as the Habitat
Replacement Fencing Plan, is complete, and the Contractor is entitled to
final payment. Notice is further given that subsequent to the forty-first
(41st) day after the first publication of this notice, as provided by Wyoming Statute 16-06-106, to wit, (December 20, 2012). Eden Valley Irrigation & Drainage District will pay to said contractor the full amount
under the contract.
Nov. 9, 16, 30, Dec. 7, 14, 18__________________________________
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rocketminer.com
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Hamas targets Tel Aviv
as part of rocket barrage
KARIN LAUB AND
IBRAHIM BARZAK
Associated Press
France explores
idea of arming
Syrian rebels
ELAINE GANLEY
Associated Press
Let The
Classifieds
Work For
You
362-3736
HARLEY-DAVIDSON Dyna
Wide Glide, 90th Anniversary Edition. 47,000 miles,
customized with Harley Davidson
Trailer.
(435)
513-0638, (307) 382-9999;
[email protected]
$5900 or best offer.
NOTICE OF FORECLOSURE SALE
WHEREAS, default in the payment of principal and interest has occurred under the terms of a promissory note dated February 7, 2008 executed and delivered by Denese H. McDonald to Quicken Loans, Inc.,
and a real estate mortgage of the same date securing the Note, which
Mortgage was recorded February 12, 2008 as Instrument No. 1526185,
Book 1113, Page 0964 in the public records in the office of the county
Clerk of Sweetwater County, Wyoming which Mortgage was the subject
of an Assignment to Green Tree Servicing LLC, as recorded in 1621358,
Book 1996, Page 6172. The premises that are described in the Mortgage
are as follows:
Lot Numbered Fifty-Five (55) of the Windriver Addition, Phase No. 3,
to the City of Rock Springs, Sweetwater County, Wyoming
with an address of 2010 Arthur Avenue, Rock Springs, Wyoming 82901.
Green Tree Servicing LLC, as assignee, has served a written Notice
Intent to Foreclose the Mortgage by Advertisement and Sale pursuant
the terms of the Mortgage to the record owner or party in possession
accordance with the statute ten (10) days prior to the first publication
the sale.
of
to
in
of
The amount due and owing on the date of the first publication is
$161,801.20, which includes the unpaid principal and accrued but unpaid interest. Interest continues to accrue on the unpaid balance at the
rate of $ 32.97 per day.
The property being foreclosed upon may be subject to other liens and encumbrances that will not be extinguished at the sale and any prospective
purchaser should research the status of title before submitting a bid.
NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN, pursuant to W.S.§ 34-3-101 et seq.,
(1977 Republished Edition) that the above described property will be at
public venue sold by the Sheriff of Sweetwater County, to the highest
bidder at the hour of 10:00 o’clock A.M. on the 7th day of December,
2012, on the courthouse steps of Sweetwater County.
DATED this 31st day of October, 2012.
BY: ruce S. Asay
Associated Legal Group, LLC
1807 Capitol Ave Suite 203
Cheyenne, WY 82001
(307) 632-2888
Attorney for Green Tree Servicing LLC
Nov. 2, 9, 16, 24___________________________________________
CITY OF ROCK SPRINGS, WYOMING
NOTICE OF ACCEPTANCE AND FINAL SETTLEMENT
To all persons, firms or corporations who have any claims for work done
for or any materials furnished to:
DeBernardi Construction Co., Inc.
514 G Street
Rock Springs, Wyoming 82901
General Contractors for: 2012 Concrete Replacement, Phase 1
That is located in the City of Rock Springs, Wyoming.
You are hereby notified that the City of Rock Springs, Sweetwater
County, Wyoming, has accepted as completed, according to the plans
and specifications and rules set forth in the contract between the City of
Rock Springs and the aforesaid contractor, the work in connection with
the 2012 Concrete Replacement, Phase 1 Project and that the said contractor is entitled to final settlement therefore.
You are further notified that upon the 27th day of December, 2012, being the 41st day after the first publication of this notice, the City of Rock
Springs will pay to DeBernardi Construction Co., Inc. (Contractor) the
full amount due under said contract; and in the event your claim is not
filed with the City of Rock Springs prior to said 27th day of December,
2012, the same shall be waived.
This notice is given pursuant to Section 16-6-116, Wyoming Statutes.
Dated this 16th day of November, 2012
City of Rock Springs
Sweetwater County Wyoming
Nov. 16, 24, Dec. 1, 22_______________________________________
See us online:
www.rocketminer.com
PARIS (AP) — France
raised the possibility Thursday of sending “defensive
weapons” to Syria’s rebels,
but Russia warned that
such a move would violate
international law.
French Foreign Minister
Laurent Fabius said his
country will ask the European Union to consider lifting the Syrian arms embargo, which prevents weapons
from being sent to either
side.
“We must not militarize
the conflict ... but it’s obviously unacceptable that
there are liberated zones
and they’re bombed” by
President Bashar Assad’s
regime, Fabius said in an interview with RTL radio.
“We have to find a good balance.” The civil war in Syria, which began as an uprising against Assad’s regime,
has killed more than
36,000
Syrians
since
March 2011, according to
anti-government activists.
The fighting and flood of
refugees seeking safety
have also spilled over into
several of Syria’s neighbors,
including Israel, Lebanon,
Turkey and Jordan.
The fighting has descended into a bloody stalemate, and rebels say they
desperately need weapons
to turn the tide.
“The question of defensive arms will be raised,”
Fabius said, without providing details about what such
arms would be.
“This cannot be done
without coordination between Europeans.”
The topic of Syria is sure
to be on the agenda at the
EU foreign ministers meeting Monday in Brussels.
France has taken a leading role among Western
countries in supporting
Syria’s rebels.
On Tuesday, it became
the first Western nation to
formally recognize Syria’s
newly formed opposition
coalition as the sole legitimate representative of the
Syrian people.
On Saturday, the president of the new opposition
coalition, the 52-year-old
preacher-turned
activist
Mouaz al-Khatib, is to visit
Paris and meet with President Francois Hollande. AlKhatib is scheduled to hold
talks a day earlier in London with British officials,
who have said they will urge
the opposition to set out a
strategy to halt the conflict.
Syria’s splintered rebel
factions agreed to a U.S.backed plan to unite last
weekend under the new
umbrella group, which
seeks a common voice and
strategy against the regime.
A French diplomatic official said Thursday that
Paris sees quick recognition
as a primary way to assure
success for the opposition.
“There won’t be many
other occasions like this,”
said the official who was
not authorized to speak
publicly on the matter and
asked not to be named. “We
have a collective responsibility, to the Syrians and
ourselves, to make this live.”
Turkey, which shares a
long border with Syria and
is a major backer of the opposition, followed suit on
Thursday, with Foreign
Minister Ahmet Davutoglu
saying Ankara recognized
the Syrian National Coalition as “the only legal representative” of Syria, the
Anadolu news agency reported.
The six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council already
has recognized the new
broad-based Syrian opposition group.
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip
(AP) — Palestinian militants targeted densely populated Tel Aviv in Israel’s
heartland with rockets for
the first time Thursday,
part of an unprecedented
barrage that threatened to
provoke an Israeli ground
assault on Gaza. Three Israelis were killed.
Air raid sirens wailed and
panicked residents ran for
cover in Tel Aviv, Israel’s
commercial and cultural
capital. Israel responded by
moving troops and heavy
weapons toward Gaza and
authorizing the call-up of
tens of thousands of reservists.
There was no word on
where the two rockets
aimed at Tel Aviv landed,
raising the possibility they
fell into the Mediterranean.
A third rocket landed in an
open area on the southern
outskirts of Tel Aviv.
The fighting, the heaviest
in four years, came after Israel launched a ferocious
air assault Wednesday to
stop repeated rocket fire
from Gaza. The powerful
Hamas military chief was
killed in that strike, and another 18 Palestinians have
died over two days, including five children. Some 100
Palestinians have been
wounded.
Israeli warplanes struck
dozens of Hamas-linked
targets in Gaza on Thursday, sending loud booms
echoing across the narrow
Mediterranean coastal strip
at regular intervals, followed by gray columns of
smoke.
After nightfall, several
explosions shook Gaza
City several minutes apart,
a sign the strikes were not
letting up, and the military
said the targets were about
70 underground rocketlaunching sites.
Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu said
the army was hitting
Hamas hard with what he
called surgical strikes, and
warned of a “significant
widening” of the Gaza operation. Israel will “continue to take whatever action
is necessary to defend our
people,” said Netanyahu,
who is up for re-election in
January.
There were mounting
signs of a ground operation. At least 12 trucks were
seen transporting tanks
and armored personnel
carriers toward Gaza late
Thursday, and a number of
buses carrying soldiers arrived. Israeli TV stations
said a Gaza incursion was
expected on Friday, though
military officials said no decision had been made.
Defense Minister Ehud
Barak said he authorized
the call-up of reservists,
and the army said up to
30,000 additional troops
could be drafted.
“We will continue the attacks and we will increase
the attacks, and I believe
we will obtain our objectives,” said Lt. Gen. Benny
Gantz, Israel’s military
chief.
Hamas,
meanwhile,
warned it would strike
deeper inside Israel with
Iranian-made Fajr-5 rockets, acknowledging for the
first time it has such
longer-range weapons capable of hitting targets
some 47 miles (75 kilometers) away. Tel Aviv is 40
miles (70 kilometers) from
Gaza.
By nightfall Thursday,
Hamas said it had fired
more than 350 rockets into
Israel. Israel, which estimates Gaza militants have
as many as 12,000 rockets,
said some 220 rockets
struck the Jewish state and
another 130 were intercepted by an anti-missile shield.
Israel believes Hamas
has significantly boosted its
arsenal since the last Gaza
war four years ago, including with weapons from Iran
and from Libyan stockpiles
plundered after the 2011 fall
of the regime there.
“After four years, we became stronger, we have a
strategy and we became
united with all the military
wings in Gaza,” said Hamas
spokesman
Fawzi
Barhoum, referring to
Hamas’ setbacks during Israel’s last major offensive in
late 2008.
In the current round of
fighting, Israel is facing an
emboldened Hamas with a
stronger
arsenal
and
greater regional backing.
Egyptian President Mohammed
Morsi,
like
Hamas a member of the region-wide Muslim Brotherhood, said he was sending
a high-level delegation to
Gaza on Friday in a show of
support for the fellow Islamists there.
Both Israel and Hamas
had largely observed an informal truce over the last
four years, marred by occasional flare-ups. In recent
days, however, border tensions escalated, then exploded into major violence
Wednesday when Israel assassinated Hamas’ secretive military chief, Ahmed
Jabari, with a missile strike
on his car.
Jabari led Hamas’ 2007
takeover of the territory,
turning small squads of
Hamas gunmen into a
fighting force and supervising Gaza’s fledgling arms
industry, including rocket
production. He was long
No. 1 on Israel’s most-wanted list, particularly for his
role in capturing Israeli Sgt.
Gilad Schalit and holding
him for more than five
years.
On Thursday, Hamas
gunmen fired machine
guns in the air as frenzied
mourners carried Jabari’s
body, wrapped in a white
burial shroud, through the
streets of Gaza City on a
wooden stretcher. At the
cemetery, young men
surged toward the corpse,
trying to touch Jabari’s face
before he was lowered into
the grave in a chaotic
scene.
Hamas’ top leaders have
dropped out of sight since
the assassination, but it
was not clear if they would
be targets. The Hamas
prime minister, Ismail
Haniyeh, said in a televised
speech Thursday that the
group “will not forget and
not forgive” the killing of
Jabari.
Xi takes China’s helm with
tough challenges ahead
CHARLES HUTZLER
Associated Press
BEIJING (AP) — Longanointed successor Xi Jinping assumes the leadership of China at a time
when the ruling Communist Party is confronting
slower economic growth, a
public clamor to end corruption and demands for
change that threaten its
hold on power.
The country’s political
elite named Xi to the top
party post on Thursday,
and unexpectedly put him
in charge of the military
too, after a weeklong party
congress and months of divisive bargaining.
The appointments give
him broad authority, but
not the luxury of time. After
decades of juggernaut
growth, China sits on the
cusp of global pre-eminence as the second largest
economy and newest power, but it also has urgent domestic troubles that could
frustrate its rise.
Problems that have long
festered — from the sputtering economy to friction
with the U.S. and territorial
spats with Japan and other
neighbors — have worsened in recent months as
the leadership focused on
the power transfer.
Impatience has grown
among entrepreneurs, others in the new middle class
and migrant workers — all
wired by social media and
conditioned
by
two
decades of rising living
standards to expect better
government, if not democracy.
All along, police have
continued to harass and jail
a lengthening list of political foes, dissidents, civil
rights lawyers and labor activists. A 14-year-old Tibetan set himself on fire in
western China on Thursday, in the latest of more
than 70 self-immolations
Tibetans have staged over
the past 20 months in desperate protests against Chinese rule.
In his first address to the
nation, Xi, a 59-year-old
son of a revolutionary hero,
acknowledged the lengthy
agenda for what should be
the first of two five-year
terms in office. He promised to deliver better social
services while making sure
China stands tall in the
world and the party continues to rule.
“Our responsibility now
is to rally and lead the entire party and the people of
all ethnic groups in China
in taking over the historic
baton and in making continued efforts to achieve the
great renewal of the Chinese nation,” a confident Xi
said in nationally televised
remarks in the Great Hall
of the People.
He later said “we are not
complacent, and we will
never rest on our laurels” in
confronting challenges —
corruption chief among
them.
By his side stood the six
other newly appointed
members of the Politburo
Standing Committee: Li
Keqiang, the presumptive
premier and chief economic official; Vice Premier
Zhang Dejiang; Shanghai
party secretary Yu Zhengsheng; propaganda chief
Liu Yunshan; Tianjin party
secretary Zhang Gaoli; and
Vice Premier Wang Qishan,
once the leadership’s top
troubleshooter who will
head the party’s internal
watchdog panel.
Xi gave no hint of new
thinking to address the
problems. The lack of
specifics and the new leadership heavy with conservative technocrats deflated
expectations for change in
some quarters.
“We should be expecting
more of the same, not
some fundamental break
from the past,” said Dali
Yang of the University of
Chicago.
Fundamental for the
leadership is to maintain
the party’s rule, he said.
“They are not interested in
introducing China’s Gorbachev” — the Soviet
leader whose reforms hastened the end of the Soviet
Union — Yang said.
Many of the challenges
Xi confronts are legacies of
his predecessor, Hu Jintao.
In addition to relinquishing
his role as party chief, having reached the two-term
maximum, Hu also stepped
down from the party commission that oversees the
military. The move is a
break from the past in
which exiting party leaders
kept hold of the military
portfolio for several years.
During Hu’s 10 years in
office, policies to open up
China to trade and foreign
investment begun by his
predecessors gathered momentum, turning China
into a manufacturing powerhouse and drawing tens
of millions of rural migrants into cities. Easy
credit fueled a building
boom,
the
Beijing
Olympics and the world’s
longest high-speed rail network. At the same time, Hu
relied on an ever-larger security apparatus to suppress protests, even as
demonstrations continued
to rise.
“More and more citizens
are beginning to awaken to
their rights and they are
constantly asking for political reform,” said rights activist Hu Jia, who has previously been jailed for campaigning for AIDS patients
and orphans. “The Communist Party does not have
legitimacy. It is a party of
dictatorship that uses violence to obtain political
power.
What we need now is for
this country’s people to
have the right to choose
who they are governed by.”
Chief among the problems Xi and his team will
have to tackle is the economy. Though Hu pledged
more balanced development, inequality has risen
and housing costs have
soared. Over the past year,
the economy has flagged,
dragged down by anemic
demand in Europe and the
U.S. for Chinese products
and an overhang from excessive lending for factories
and infrastructure.
With state banks prefer-
ring to lend to state-run
companies or not at all, private entrepreneurs have
had to turn to unofficial
money-lenders.
“The bank just asked me
to wait,” said Deng Mingxin, who runs a zipper factory with 10 employees in
Jiangsu province. “Maybe
it’s because I didn’t offer
enough ‘red envelopes”‘ —
a reference to bribes.
The World Bank warns
that without quick action,
growth that fell to a threeyear low of 7.4 percent in
the latest quarter may fall
to 5 percent by 2015 — a
low rate for generating the
employment and funding
the social programs Beijing
holds as key to keeping a
lid on unrest.
Analysts and Beijing’s
own advisers have said it
needs to overhaul its strategy and nurture consumer
spending and services to
meet its pledge of doubling
incomes by 2020.
“China will need a very
different economy in the
next decade,” said Citigroup economist Minggao
Shen.
In foreign policy, the U.S.
and other partners are
looking for reassurance
that China’s policy remains
one of peaceful integration
into the world community.
Tensions have flared in recent months between China, Japan and the Philippines over contested islets
in the East and South China Seas. Mistrust has also
grown with the U.S. as it diverts more military and
diplomatic resources to
Asia in what Chinese leaders see as containment.
Fresh in office, Xi can illafford to bow to foreigners,
crossing a nationalistic
public and a military that
may still be uncertain about
his leadership.
“The leaders can’t look
like they are being soft on
the U.S. or foreign policy
because they will lose power in terms of people,” said
Robert Lawrence Kuhn, a
business consultant and
author of the book “How
China’s Leaders Think.”
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Some states warming
up to health care law
RICARDO ALONSO-ZALDIVAR
Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — From
the South to the heartland,
cracks are appearing in the oncesolid wall of Republican resistance to President Barack Obama’s health care law.
Ahead of a federal deadline
Friday for states to declare their
intentions, Associated Press reporters interviewed governors
and state officials around the
country, finding surprising openness to the changes in some cases. Opposition persists in others,
and there is a widespread, urgent
desire for answers on key unresolved details.
The law that Republicans have
derided as “Obamacare” was devised in Washington, but it’s in
the states that Americans will
find out if it works, delivering
promised coverage to more than
30 million uninsured people.
States have a major role to play
in two of the overhaul’s main
components: new online insurance markets for individuals and
small businesses to shop for subsidized private coverage, and an
expanded Medicaid program for
low-income people.
Friday is the day states must
declare if they’ll build the new insurance markets, called exchanges, or let Washington do it
for them. States can also opt for
a partnership with the feds to run
their exchanges, and they have
until February to decide on that
option.
Some glimpses of grudging acceptance across a shifting scene:
• One of the most visible opponents of Obama’s overhaul,
Florida Republican Gov. Rick
Scott, now says “if I can get to
‘yes,’ I want to get to ‘yes.”’
Florida was a leader in the
failed effort to overturn the law in
the Supreme Court, and a group
formed by Scott ran TV ads opposing it before it passed Congress.
But the governor told the AP
this week he wants to negotiate
with the federal government to
try to help the nearly 4 million
uninsured people in his state.
• In Iowa, GOP Gov. Terry
Branstad says he is postponing a
decision because Washington
has not provided enough information about key details. But his
spokesman, Tim Albrecht, said
Iowa is exploring a partnership
exchange that could include several states. Albrecht said they’re
confident they can get to a state
option if needed.
Ohio, like Florida and Iowa a
state Obama carried in the election, is leaning toward a partnership with the federal government
despite GOP officials’ continued
misgivings about the law.
• In Mississippi, Republican
insurance commissioner Mike
OBAMACARE IMPLEMENTATION BY STATE
An early look at the routes states are taking to implement President
Barack Obama’s health care law, along with the number of people in
each state who don’t have health insurance:
STATE
Alabama
Alaska
Arizona
Arkansas
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Delaware
Washington, D.C.
Florida
Georgia
Hawaii
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Mississippi
Missouri
Montana
Nebraska
Nevada
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
North Carolina
North Dakota
Ohio
Oklahoma
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Carolina
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Utah
Vermont
Virginia
Washington
West Virginia
Wisconsin
Wyoming
EXCHANGE
OPTION
Federal exchange
Federal exchange
Decision pending
Federal-state partnership
State exchange
State exchange
State exchange
State exchange
Decision pending
Decision pending
State exchange
Decision pending
Decision pending
Decision pending
Federal exchange
State exchange
Federal exchange
Federal exchange
State exchange
State exchange
State exchange
State exchange
Federal exchange
Decision pending
Decision pending
State exchange
Federal exchange
Decision pending
State exchange
State exchange
Federal-statepartnership
Decision pending
Decision pending
Federal exchange
State exchange
Decision pending
State exchange
Federal exchange
Federal exchange
Decision pending
Federal exchange
Decision pending
State exchange
Federal exchange
State exchange
Decision pending
Decision pending
Federal exchange
UNINSURED
RESIDENTS
696,000
128,000
1,306,000
545,000
7,471,000
817,000
391,000
115,000
65,000
3,952,000
1,992,000
102,000
239,000
1,795,000
856,000
292,000
361,000
727,000
811,000
146,000
734,000
215,000
1,336,000
453,000
530,000
780,000
179,000
226,000
555,000
136,000
1,334,000
506,000
2,780,000
1,583,000
74,000
1,578,000
597,000
678,000
1,319,000
122,000
754,000
108,000
982,000
6,654,000
424,000
61,000
1,023,000
812,000
266,000
562,000
84,000
Source: Associated Press Research, U.S. Health and Human Services Department and the
Urban Institute
Chaney formally notified Washington on Wednesday that his
agency will proceed with a staterun exchange, disappointing
GOP Gov. Phil Bryant, who remains staunchly opposed to
Obama’s law.
Chaney, too, says he wishes
the law could be repealed, but he
worries that “if you default to the
federal government, you forever
give the keys to the state’s health
insurance market to the federal
government.”
As for trying to fight the Feds,
Chaney observed: “We tried that
150 years ago in the South, and it
doesn’t work.”
• In New Mexico, the adminis-
tration of Republican Gov. Susana Martinez had been quietly
working to put the law into place
as the political storm swirled.
With a fifth of its population
uninsured, the state is planning
to run its own exchange.
“The party is over. The opposition is over,” New Mexico Human
Services Secretary Sidonie
Squier told the AP. “Whatever
states didn’t think they were going to do it, I think they’re going
to have to do it whether they like
it or not. It’s a done deal now.”
Policy experts in Washington
are noticing the shift.
“I think it’s a very practical decision for states now,” said Alan
Weil, executive director of the
nonpartisan National Academy
for State Health Policy. “We are
going to have a significant number of states running their own
exchanges, a significant number
where the federal government is
running the exchange, and a significant number of partnerships.
The bottom line is we are going
to have to figure out how to make
all three models work.”
Although the public remains
divided about the health care law,
the idea of states running the
new insurance markets is popular, especially with Republicans
and political independents. A recent AP poll found that 63 percent of Americans would prefer
states to run the exchanges, with
32 percent favoring federal control.
The breakdown among Republicans was 81-17 in favor of state
control, while independents lined
up 65-28 for states taking the
lead. Democrats were almost
evenly divided, with a slim majority favoring state control.
There are several potential
benefits to a state operating its
own exchange, experts say.
The biggest advantage may be
that states would be more closely involved in coordinating between the exchanges and Medicaid programs. Because many
people are going to be going back
and forth between Medicaid and
private coverage in the exchanges, states would probably
be better served by a hands-on
role.
States can also decide whether
to allow open access to all insurers, or work only with a panel of
pre-screened companies that
meet certain requirements.
Also, the exchanges will offer
coverage to people buying in the
individual and small business
markets, areas that states have
traditionally regulated. Without a
state-run exchange, states could
be dealing their own regulators
out of the equation, as Mississippi’s insurance commissioner
Chaney noted.
When the legislation was being
considered in Congress, Democrats in the House wanted to have
a national exchange administered by the federal government.
But they lost the argument with
their centrist Democratic counterparts in the Senate, who wanted state exchanges in order to
preserve a state role.
Despite signs of movement toward going along with implementation of the overhaul, some
major Republican-led states are
holding fast.
In Texas, the election results
did not change any of the opposition to expanding Medicaid or
to setting up insurance exchanges. The same holds for
Louisiana, South Carolina, Missouri, Kansas and others.
More American workers
to pick their insurance
TOM MURPHY
AP Business Writer
For some American workers, picking the right health insurance
is becoming more like hunting for the perfect business suit: It
takes some shopping around to find a good fit and avoid sticker
shock.
In a major shift in employer-sponsored health insurance coverage, companies such as Sears Holdings Corp. and Darden Restaurants Inc. are giving employees a fixed amount of money and allowing them to choose their own coverage based on their individual needs.
The approach, called defined contribution health insurance, contrasts to the decades-old practice by most U.S. employers of offering workers a one-size-fits-all plan with benefits they may not
want. It also means American workers who’ve grown accustomed
to having their benefits chosen for them could wind up with bigger bills and inadequate coverage if they don’t choose wisely.
“It’s a big, big change in the nature of what it means to have
health insurance,” says David Cutler, a Harvard University economist.
Until now, defined contribution health insurance plans have
been largely limited to small businesses and retirees. But more employers are considering them as a way to control their rising health
care costs. After all, the average annual premium — or cost for insurance coverage — for an employer-sponsored family health plan
has almost doubled in the past decade to nearly $16,000, according to the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation. And companies
generally foot at least 70 percent of that bill.
But now the plans are catching on. Benefits consultant Mercer
found that 45 percent of the 2,809 employers it surveyed earlier
this year are either using or are considering a defined contribution
approach.
As a result, insurers and benefits companies are rolling out online exchanges where workers can buy insurance coverage roughly similar to how they buy plane tickets on travel Web sites. The
private sites are similar to the public online exchanges that will enable people to buy insurance starting late next year as part of President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul.
Aon Hewitt, a benefits consulting giant, expects 200,000 people to enroll this fall in coverage offered through its online exchange. Darden, which operates the Red Lobster and Olive Garden chains, and Sears are offering their defined contribution plans
through Aon’s exchange site.
WellPoint Inc., the nation’s second-largest health insurer that
runs Blue Cross Blue Shield plans in several states, plans to debut
its exchange next year. The insurer has an ownership stake in
Bloom Health, a Minnesota company that expects the number of
people covered by plans through its exchange to more than triple
to about 100,000 people next year.
MORE CHOICES
Defined contribution health programs can differ greatly from
the typical coverage offered by U.S. employers. Most coverage that
companies currently offer gives employees the option of one plan
or maybe two.
With defined contribution plans, the company gives the employee a set contribution toward coverage, and the worker then picks
the plan. That may involve choosing from among a few plans the
employer offers or using an exchange to sort through dozens of
choices offered by several insurers.
The employer’s contribution may cover the entire premium or
a smaller slice of it, depending on the coverage that the worker
choses. A young, healthy, single worker, for instance, may pick a
plan that balances a smaller premium with a higher deductible,
which is the annual out-of-pocket amount a patient pays before
most of his or her coverage kicks in.
The plans are an attractive option for companies that want more
predictable health care costs or more choices for their workers.
Neither Sears nor Darden would say how much they’re planning
to give employees so that they can buy health insurance. Sears, the
Hoffman Estates, Ill.-based retail chain, said 90,000 of its employees will be eligible for its new approach, and they will have 15 choices for health insurance instead of about 4.
Darden, which has 45,000 full-time employees, said its workers
will be able to go online and pick from five medical plans, four dental plans and three that provide vision coverage. The Orlando, Fla.,
company had previously just offered one health insurance plan.
The company said that the sum Darden will give workers to cover costs for their insurance will rise as health care costs climb. Ultimately, it said workers will have about the same out-of-pocket
costs that they currently have for about the same level of coverage
— but they’ll have more flexibility.
“One of the things (employees) asked for was more choice in
their health care,” says Ron DeFeo, a spokesman for Darden. “As
we looked for a way to do it, this was the best option.”
Obama vows not to forget storm victims rebuilding
MATTHEW DALY
Associated Press
NEW YORK (AP) — President
Barack Obama vowed Thursday
to stick with New Yorkers still
struggling 17 days after Superstorm Sandy “until the rebuilding
is complete” after getting an upclose look at devastated neighborhoods rendered unlivable.
Obama brought the spotlight to
people still without heat or electricity and hugged many of those
trying to rebuild their lives. He
also delivered a postelection message of unity, nine days after a
closely divided America gave him
a second term.
“During difficult times like this,
we’re reminded that we’re bound
together and we have to look out
for each other,” Obama said from
a Staten Island street that was demolished by the storm. “And a lot
of the things that seem important,
the petty differences, melt away.”
Obama announced that Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan, a former
chief of New York’s Housing Authority, will be his point person to
oversee long-term redevelopment
in the region. On a three-hour
tour, the president encountered
many still suffering in Sandy’s aftermath and waiting in lines for
food, supplies and other help.
He also met privately with parents whose two young boys, Brandon and Connor Moore, were
swept away by the powerful
storm. Damien and Glenda
Moore’s children were among
more than 100 people whose
deaths were blamed on Sandy.
“I expressed to them, as a father, as a parent, my heartbreak
over what they went through,”
Obama said. He said the Moores
were “still obviously a little shellshocked” but wanted to thank the
New York City police lieutenant
who stayed with them until the
bodies were found.
“That spirit and sense of togetherness and looking out for
one another, that’s what’s going to
carry us through this tragedy,”
Obama said.
Before arriving on Staten Island, his helicopter flew over
Rockaway Peninsula in Queens,
including the waterfront community of Breezy Point, where roughly 100 homes burned to the
ground in a massive wind-swept
fire. On Staten Island, Obama met
with residents waiting in line at an
emergency response center at
New Dorp High School, where the
Federal Emergency Management
Agency, Small Business Administration, IRS, Red Cross and city
agencies have set up tents to help
survivors.
Photo courtesy of Randy Lemoine/Flickr
This is a picture of some of the destruction that took place in Rockaway Peninsula in Queens, N.Y. After Hurricane Sandy, roughly 100 homes
burned to the ground in the area in a massive wind-swept fire.
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NATIONAL
7B
BP agrees to pay $4.5B;
3 employees charged
Post office reports
record loss of
$15.9B for year
MICHAEL KUNZELMAN
HOPE YEN
Associated Press
Associated Press
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A day
of reckoning arrived for BP on
Thursday as the oil giant agreed
to plead guilty to a raft of criminal
charges and pay a record $4.5 billion in a settlement with the government over the deadly 2010
disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.
Three BP employees were also
charged, two of them with
manslaughter.
The settlement and the indictments came 2 years after the fiery
drilling-rig explosion that killed 11
workers and set off the biggest
offshore oil spill in U.S. history.
The settlement includes nearly $1.3 billion in fines, the largest
criminal penalty in the nation’s
history. As part of the deal, BP
will plead guilty to charges involving the 11 deaths and lying to
Congress about how much oil
was spewing from the blown-out
well.
“We believe this resolution is in
the best interest of BP and its
shareholders,” said Carl-Henric
Svanberg, BP chairman. “It removes two significant legal risks
and allows us to vigorously defend the company against the remaining civil claims.”
Assistant Attorney General
Lanny Breuer said the deaths and
the oil spill “resulted from BP’s
culture of privileging profit over
prudence.”
Separately, BP rig workers
Robert Kaluza and Donald
Vidrine were indicted on federal
charges of manslaughter and involuntary manslaughter, accused
of repeatedly disregarding abnormal high-pressure readings that
should have been glaring indications of trouble just before the
blowout.
In addition, David Rainey, BP’s
former vice president of exploration for the Gulf of Mexico, was
charged with obstruction of Congress and making false statements. Prosecutors said he withheld information that more oil
was gushing from the well than he
let on.
Rainey’s lawyers said he did
“absolutely nothing wrong.” And
attorneys for the two rig workers
accused the Justice Department
of making scapegoats out of
them. Both men are still with BP.
“Bob was not an executive or
high-level BP official. He was a
dedicated rig worker who mourns
his fallen co-workers every day,”
Kaluza attorneys Shaun Clarke
and David Gerger said in a statement. “No one should take any
satisfaction in this indictment of
an innocent man. This is not justice.”
The settlement, which is subject to approval by a federal judge,
includes payments of nearly $2.4
billion to the National Fish and
Wildlife Foundation, $350 million
to the National Academy of Sciences and about $500 million to
the Securities and Exchange
Commission. The SEC accused
BP of misleading investors by
lowballing the amount of crude
that was spilling.
“This marks the largest single
criminal fine and the largest total
criminal resolution in the history
of the United States,” Attorney
General Eric Holder said at a
news conference in New Orleans.
He said much of the money will
be used to restore the Gulf.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The
struggling U.S. Postal Service
on Thursday reported an annual loss of a record $15.9 billion
and forecast more red ink in
2013, capping a tumultuous year
in which it was forced to default
on billions in payments to avert
bankruptcy.
The financial losses for the
fiscal year ending Sept. 30 were
more than triple the $5.1 billion
loss in the previous year. Having
reached its borrowing limit, the
mail agency is operating with little cash on hand, putting it at
risk in the event of an unexpectedly large downturn in the economy.
“It’s critical that Congress do
its part and pass comprehensive
legislation before they adjourn
this year to move the Postal Service further down the path toward financial health,” said
Postmaster General Patrick
Donahoe, calling the situation
“our own postal fiscal cliff.”
Much of the red ink in 2012
was due to mounting mandatory costs for future retiree health
benefits, which made up $11.1
billion of the losses. Without
that and other related labor expenses, the mail agency sustained an operating loss of $2.4
billion, lower than the previous
year.
Donahoe said the post office
has been able to reduce costs
significantly by boosting worker productivity. But he said the
mail agency has been hampered
by congressional inaction on a
postal overhaul bill that would
allow it to eliminate Saturday
mail delivery and reduce its $5
billion annual payment for future health benefits.
“We cannot sustain large losses indefinitely. Major defaults
are unsettling,” said Donahoe,
who made clear that the Postal
Service would now be profitable
had Congress acted earlier this
year.
Earlier this year, the post office defaulted on two of the
health prepayments for the first
time in its history.
The Postal Service, an independent agency, does not receive tax money for its day-today operations but is subject to
congressional control.
The Senate passed a postal
bill in April that would have provided financial relief in part by
reducing the annual health payments and providing a multibillion-dollar cash infusion, basically a refund of overpayments
the Postal Service made to a
federal pension fund. The
House, however, remains stalled
over its own legislation that
Rocket-Miner file photo
The settlement against BP came 2 years after the fiery drilling-rig explosion that killed 11 workers and
set off the biggest offshore oil spill in U.S. history.
Holder said the criminal investigation is still going on. Before
Thursday, the only person
charged in the disaster was a former BP engineer who was arrested in April on obstruction of justice charges, accused of deleting
text messages about the company’s handling of the spill.
The settlement appears to be
well within BP’s means, considering the oil giant made a record
$25.8 billion in profits last year.
And it will be given five years to
pay. But the company still faces
huge additional claims.
For one thing, the U.S. government and the Gulf states are still
seeking billions of dollars in civil
penalties against BP over the environmental damage.
Also, a federal judge in New Orleans is deciding whether to approve an estimated $7.8 billion
settlement between BP and more
than 100,000 businesses and individuals who say they were
harmed by the spill. They include
fishermen, charter boat captains,
restaurants, hotels and property
owners.
Under the settlement with the
U.S. government, BP will plead
guilty to 11 felony counts of misconduct or neglect of a vessel’s officers, one felony count of obstruction of Congress and one
misdemeanor count each under
the Migratory Bird Treaty Act
and the Clean Water Act. The
workers’ deaths were prosecuted
under a federal law that protects
seamen.
The largest previous corporate
criminal penalty assessed by the
Justice Department was a $1.2 billion fine against drugmaker Pfizer in 2009.
Greenpeace blasted the settle-
ment as a slap on the wrist.
“This fine amounts to a rounding error for a corporation the size
of BP,” the environmental group
said.
Nick McGregor, an oil analyst
at Redmayne-Bentley Stockbrokers, said the settlement would be
seen as “an expensive positive.”
“This scale of bill is unpleasant,” he said. But “the worst-case
scenario for BP would be an
Exxon Valdez-style decade of litigation. I think that is the outcome
they are trying to avoid.”
The Deepwater Horizon rig
blew up 50 miles off Louisiana on
April 20, 2010, in an explosion
that investigators blamed on
time-saving, cost-cutting decisions by BP and its drilling partners in cementing the well shaft.
Following several failed attempts that introduced the American public to such industry terms
as “top kill” and “junk shot,” BP
finally capped the well on the sea
floor after more than 85 days.
By then, the well had spewed
an estimated 172 million gallons
of crude into the Gulf, fouling
marshes and beaches, killing
wildlife and closing vast areas to
fishing. Nelda Winslette’s grandson Adam Weise of Yorktown,
Texas, was killed in the blast. She
said somebody needs to be held
accountable.
“It just bothers me so bad when
I see the commercials on TV and
they brag about how the Gulf is
back, but they never say anything
about the 11 lives that were lost.
They want us to forget about it,
but they don’t know what they’ve
done to the families that lost
someone,” she said.
Sherri Revette, who lost her
husband of 26 years, Dewey
Revette, of State Line, Miss., said
the indictments against the employees brought mixed emotions.
“I’m saddened, but I’m also
happy at the same time that they
will be prosecuted. I feel for them,
of course. You never know what
impact your actions will have on
others,” she said.
Frank Parker, a shrimper from
Biloxi, Miss., said: “I just hope the
money gets down to the people
who need it.”
Scientists warn that the spill’s
full effect on the Gulf food chain
may not be known for years. But
they have reported oil-coated
coral reefs that were dying, and
fish have been showing up in nets
with lesions and illnesses that biologists fear could be oil-related.
Oil churned up by storms could
be washing up for years.
The spill exposed lax government oversight and led to a temporary ban on deep-water drilling
while officials and the industry
studied the risks and worked to
make it safer. BP’s environmentally friendly image was tarnished, and CEO Tony Hayward
stepped down after some gaffes
that included lamenting at the
height of the crisis: “I’d like my
life back.”
The cost of the spill far surpassed that of the Exxon Valdez
disaster in 1989. Exxon ultimately settled with the government for
$1 billion, which would be about
$1.8 billion today.
The government and plaintiffs’
attorneys have also sued
Transocean Ltd., the rig’s owner,
and cement contractor Halliburton, but a string of pretrial rulings
by a federal judge undermined
BP’s strategy of pinning blame on
them.
CIA deputy: Rice got initial assessment on Libya
WASHINGTON (AP) — Five
days after the attack on the U.S.
Consulate in Libya, U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice described what
precipitated the deadly incident
based on initial intelligence that
later proved incorrect, the deputy
CIA director told Congress on
Thursday.
In a closed-door session with
the House Intelligence committee, Mike Morell said Rice was
provided with an unclassified version of events at the U.S. mission
in Benghazi that left American
Ambassador Chris Stevens and
three others dead, according to
Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., a
member of the panel.
The assessment concluded that
a spontaneous protest over an
anti-Muslim video had evolved
into an attack on the American
consulate, a description that Rice
presented in television interviews
the Sunday morning after the attack.
Schiff told reporters that he didn’t think the intelligence community had politicized the information. “They gave us the best initial
assessments, and those proved inaccurate, but they warned us
those assessments were subject to
change as they got more information,” he said.
Rice’s comments on national
television have drawn fierce criticism, with some Senate Republicans promising to block her nomination if President Barack Obama taps her to replace Secretary
of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Obama angrily defended Rice on
Wednesday at a White House
news conference and called the
complaints outrageous attempts
to besmirch her reputation.
Rep. C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger
of Maryland, the top Democrat on
the Intelligence panel, said Rice
“was given that same information
we received from the administration through the intelligence community. And that’s the information she testified to, end of story.”
In one of her TV interviews,
Rice said she was providing the
“best information and the best assessment we have today.”
“In fact this was not a preplanned, premeditated attack.
That what happened initially was
that it was a spontaneous reaction
to what had just transpired in
Cairo as a consequence of the
video,” she said. “People gathered
outside the embassy and then it
grew very violent. Those with extremist ties joined the fray and
came with heavy weapons, which
unfortunately are quite common
in post-revolutionary Libya, and
that then spun out of control.”
That answer has drawn constant criticism from Republicans,
who question why Rice failed to
call the event a terrorist attack.
Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and
Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said
they would work to defeat Rice’s
selection if she is nominated to be
the nation’s top diplomat. Graham said Wednesday that he
couldn’t back anyone who is “up
to their eyeballs in the Benghazi
debacle.”
Ruppersberger said the initial
attack on the consulate was chaotic, with “a lot of people running
around,” while the second attack,
on a CIA annex near the consulate, “seemed a lot more sophisticated,” with the use of mortars,
more clearly pointing to terrorist
training and tactics.
would allow for aggressive cuts,
including an immediate end to
Saturday delivery.
It remained unclear whether
House leadership would take up
the postal bill in its current
lame-duck session. Rural lawmakers are resisting action,
worried about closures of postal
facilities in their communities.
Congress is focused now on a
Jan. 1 deadline to avert acrossthe-board tax increases and
spending cuts known as the “fiscal cliff.”
While urging quick congressional action, the Postal Service
acknowledged the uncertainty
in its legal filings on Thursday,
which anticipate that Congress
will fail to act. But Rep. Darrell
Issa, R-Calif., who chairs the
House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and is
a sponsor of the House bill, has
said he believes postal legislation can be passed this year.
“The U.S. Postal Service is
clearly marching toward a financial collapse of its own,” said
Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del., a
sponsor of the Senate bill. “I am
hopeful that now that the elections are over, my colleagues
and I can come together and
pass postal reform legislation so
that a final bill can be signed
into law by the end of the year.”
Overall, the post office had
operating revenue of $65.2 billion in fiscal 2012, down $500
million from the previous year.
Expenses climbed to $81 billion,
up from $70.6 billion, largely
due to the health prepayments.
The annual payment of roughly
$5.6 billion had been deferred
for a year in 2011, resulting in a
double payment totaling $11.1
billion that became due this
year. The Postal Service is the
only government agency required to make such payments.
The post office also has been
rocked by declining mail volume
as people and businesses continue switching to email and
other online options in place of
letters and paper bills. The number of items mailed in the last
year was 159.9 billion pieces, a 5
percent decrease. Much of the
decline came in first-class mail.
On the plus side, the mail
agency reported that its fastgrowing shipping services,
which include express and priority mail, grew by 9 percent,
helping to offset much of the declining revenue from first-class
mail.
Donahoe said package volume also is expected to jump by
20 percent this holiday season
compared to the same period
last year, boosted by increased
consumer purchases on eBay,
Amazon.com and other Internet
shopping sites.
Questions on sex scandal:
Top gov. officials testify
ROBERT BURNS
AND NANCY BENAC
Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — Top
national
security
officials
trudged to Capitol Hill on
Thursday to grapple with fallout
from the David Petraeus sex
scandal as Defense Secretary
Leon Panetta asked service
chiefs to review ethics training
for military officers.
He said he was unaware of
any other top brass who could
turn out to be ensnared in the
debacle.
One person missing from the
tableau: Afghan war chief Gen.
John Allen, whose nomination
to take over in Europe is on hold
because of suggestive e-mails
turned up in the investigation.
Legislators went forward with
a hearing on the nomination of
Gen. Joseph Dunford to replace
Allen in Afghanistan. But with
Allen’s own future uncertain,
they put off consideration of his
promotion to U.S. European
Command chief and NATO
supreme allied commander.
Allen had initially been scheduled to testify.
Panetta, speaking at a news
conference in Bangkok, gave
new words of support to Allen,
voicing “tremendous confi-
dence” in the general.
Citing a string of ethical lapses by senior military officers,
however, Panetta asked the Joint
Chiefs of Staff to review ethics
training and look for ways to
help officers stay out of trouble.
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.,
opened Dunford’s hearing with
kind words for Allen, saying, “I
continue to believe that General
Allen is one of our best military
leaders. And I continue to have
confidence in his ability to lead
the war in Afghanistan.”
Leading administration officials, meanwhile, met privately
with lawmakers for a thirdstraight day to explain how the
Petraeus investigation was handled and explore its national security implications. Among
those appearing before the
House Intelligence Committee:
Director of National Intelligence
James Clapper and Acting CIA
Director Michael Morell.
Maryland Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger, the committee’s top
Democrat, said after the hearing
he was satisfied that the FBI
had behaved properly in not notifying the White House or lawmakers about the inquiry sooner, in keeping with post-Watergate rules set up to prevent interference in criminal investigations.
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OPINIONS
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“I disapprove of what you say, but will defend
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GET INVOLVED: Send your signed opinions to P.O. Box 98
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Page 8B
Mandate to raise
taxes on the ‘rich’
SUSAN ESTRICH
Within days of winning the
election, President Obama announced that his victory gave
him a mandate to raise taxes on
the “rich.”
Come again? This was a twoand-a-half-point election. It reflected a painfully divided electorate.
The only mandate I saw was to
unite a divided country.
I voted for Obama. I voted for
him because I know how hard it
is to buy health insurance for a
single person with even a minor
pre-existing condition. In the
case
of
my
nanny/housekeeper/dear friend, it
was gastritis.
Thank God for Kaiser, which
sold me the insurance that some
years later saved her life when
she was diagnosed with cancer.
So call it what you will, but I did
not want to see Obamacare repealed.
Years after I stopped worrying
about unwanted pregnancies, I
did not want to risk Roe v. Wade.
I was appalled that contraception
could even be an issue.
I believe that whoever wants to
marry should have a right to do
so regardless of their sexual orientation.
I voted for Obama because I
worry about cutting back on environmental regulation.
I voted for Obama because I
believe local schools need help
from the federal government, because I believe we are one country, and that if there is an earthquake in California, we will need
as much help from our fellow
states — which is to say the federal government — as New York
and New Jersey do in dealing
with the aftermath of Hurricane
Sandy.
I voted for Obama because he
ended the war in Iraq and is committed to ending the war in
Afghanistan.
I did not vote for Obama because I think I am paying too little in taxes.
Like many people I know, I am
“rich” by Obama’s standards. I
pay more taxes, percentage wise,
than Mitt Romney and Warren
Buffett, because I earn virtually
every penny of my income. I
work.
And yes, all those deductions
that allow the truly rich to not
work, or at least to not work all
the jobs I do, make me angry.
I am all for closing loopholes.
I am all for ending deductions for
things I don’t even understand.
But I am not for putting a low cap
on deductions that would make it
all but impossible for the charities I support to raise funds.
I am not for putting a limit on
the mortgage deduction that
would mean, as a practical matter, that “middle class” (not rich)
people in California would be
priced out of the housing market,
and the charities I support would
not be able to raise what they
need to survive.
And frankly, I don’t think I’m
alone.
As a matter of fact, on this one,
I don’t think 51 percent of all
Americans are to my “left” — if
that’s how you define the higher
tax constituency. Obama needs to
be very careful.
Yes, he was re-elected. But so
were all those folks who blocked
the extension of the Bush tax
cuts if they excluded individuals
and small businesses who make
enough money to qualify as rich
— but not enough to send their
kids to college, or help their aging
parents, or buy a home in a decent neighborhood.
We need to avoid going over
the fiscal cliff.
But Obama must also avoid
the political cliff. One of the
amazing things about this country is that the middle class doesn’t hate the rich.
We are not a society divided by
economic castes. Yes, there are
real issues as the gap between the
top and the middle, between
CEOs and those in good but not
great jobs, grows.
But beginning a new term with
what will look to many like a class
war is not the way to fulfill the
real mandate of this election,
which is to bring us together, not
turn us against each other.
To find out more about Susan Estrich and read
features by other Creators Syndicate writers
and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate
Web site at www.creators.com.
Tips can help make
presentations effective
A weekly look at Wyoming business questions from the Wyoming
Small Business Development Center, part of WyomingEntrepreneur.Biz, a collection of business assistance programs at the University
of Wyoming.
BRETT HOUSHOLDER,
WyomingEntrepreneur.Biz market researcher
“I don’t like giving presentations but, when I do, it seems like
PowerPoint is pretty much the
standard tool. If I absolutely have
to do a PowerPoint presentation,
what can I do to make my presentation more effective?” Jerry,
Casper
“Just put together a quick PowerPoint.” How many times have
we heard this advice when
preparing for a presentation?
By now, PowerPoint should be
included in thesauruses as a synonym for presentation. Despite
being overused, sometimes it really is the only choice when presenting. When given no other options, there are always some basic, but powerful ways to make a
PowerPoint presentation even
better:
• Keep slides brief. Do not fill a
slide with text. Slides crowded
with text are difficult to read and
draw the audience’s attention
away from what they should be
paying attention to — you. If using bullet points, which I prefer,
limit to four or five at most.
• Don’t read to the audience.
The information on slides should
serve as a cue for to elaborate on
the topic, not as the presentation’s script.
Highlight main points and use
slides as note cards to keep on
track.
• Use large text. Depending on
how large the audience is, it may
be difficult to read slides from the
back of the room. Use 28- to 32point size font, which is recommended.
This helps keep slides brief as
well.
• Don’t be afraid to use different, interesting or creative formats.
All slides don’t have to follow
the typical “title-subheading-bullet points” format.
In fact, varying the style of
slides can keep the audience
more engaged. Using something
different — such as one picture or
a single word — enables the audience to refocus on what is being
said instead of what is on the
slide.
• Don’t get caught up in using
effects. There are plenty of choices for slide transition effects —
sounds and graphics to spice up
slides — but resist the urge to
overuse them.
Simple fades in and out of
slides are fine, but some transitions are distracting and unprofessional.
Also, along with sounds and
graphics, they can draw attention
away from an actual presentation.
The content of a presentation,
not the effects, should be the audience’s focus.
Whether you like it or not, giving a presentation with PowerPoint is probably unavoidable.
So, as long as you are going to
use it at some point, it is worth
learning a few simple tips to help
make the presentation more effective and enjoyable for the audience.
The WSBDC is a partnership of the U.S. Small
Business Administration, the Wyoming
Business Council and the University of
Wyoming. To ask a question, call, e-mail
[email protected] or write 1000 E. University
Ave., Dept. 3922, Laramie, WY, 82071-3922.
Let’s hear it for The
Rat’s tree planting efforts
ROBERT LEO HEILMAN
Writers on the Range
The Arbor Day Foundation
sent me a Tree Survey a few
months ago. At least it called itself a survey, but it turned out to
be more of a pitch for donations
in the form of a questionnaire.
Still, I decided to finish reading
the thing before I tossed it in the
wood burner with the other junk
mail. Living as I do in a southern
Oregon forest, I found questions
like, Are trees important to you?
amusing.
Reading along, I came to a
question that gave me pause:
Have you ever planted a tree? I
thought first of the 150,000 trees
that I planted while reforesting
clear-cuts in the Cascades and
Coast Range, about enough to
cover 300 acres of mountain
slopes. That sounds like more
than what it was, though. I have
friends who were serious tree
planters.
My pal Darlene told me that
she must have planted about a
half-million of the little things
during her winters on the slopes.
And there are three of my ex-tree
planter buddies — Johnny Escovido, Bruce Gordon and Les
Moore — who slammed over 1
million trees in the ground
apiece. I’m sure there are others
among my acquaintances who
have surpassed that impressive
number, though most tree
planters dont talk about how
many trees they’ve planted. They
talk about their chronically sore
backs.
One million trees sounds like a
much bigger deal than it is. It
only takes about 40 seconds to
plant a seedling conifer eight feet
away from the last one you planted. Reforestation crews generally plant about 500 seedlings to
the acre, so a million trees would
only replant about 2,000 acres of
logged-off land, about enough to,
someday, provide habitat for a
single nesting pair of northern
spotted owls. I’ve worked on corporate clear-cuts here in Oregon
that were that big, while up north
in British Columbia there are
cuts that are measured in square
miles rather than acres.
A few weeks later, I ran across
Lester “The Rat” Moore, and I
got to wondering about when
and where he planted his onemillionth tree.
He was busy stealing firewood
off of some timber company
land at the time, buzzing up an
old buckskin-colored seasoned
madrone log and tossing the
rounds into his pick-up to haul
back to the tar-papered shack he
lives in. He was in a hurry, and I
was on my way into town, so we
“howdied” but didn’t stop to talk.
The Rat isn’t exactly the sort
of guy you’d see in a TV commercial.
He’s not the square-jawed
handsome woodsman type the
corporations like to promote, nor
the caring sort who could serve
as a poster child for an Arbor
Day celebration. He’s a small,
wiry, snaggly-toothed guy who
chews tobacco and drinks
whiskey straight from the bottle.
If you saw him on a city street,
you’d probably try your best to
walk past him without making
eye contact.
But when it comes to tree
planting, he was the genuine article, good for a steady 1,000
trees every day, five days per
week, 20 to 30 weeks a year for
20-something years.
It’s a tough way to earn a paycheck, humping up and down
mountains in the rain all winter.
The State Employment Office in
Eugene, Ore., once posted a
warning notice about tree planting: It is the hardest physical
work known to this office. The
most comparative physical requirement is that of a five mile
cross-mountain run, daily.
Most people would consider
logging a tough job; tree planting
is a logger’s idea of hard work.
That one-millionth tree of The
Rat’s career might have been
planted in Oregon or Washington, Montana, Idaho, British Columbia, Alaska, Arizona or Colorado. I doubt he remembers it.
It was probably a lot like the
20,000 others he planted that
month, and I’m sure that nobody
handed him a golden shovel or
took his picture for the occasion.
Nobody gives out awards for
stoop labor, which is really a
shame.
It is difficult work, demanding
both physically and mentally. I
have seen many a fine physical
specimen give up the attempt to
plant trees after a day or two because they lacked the necessary
gumption (or the desperation,
which is just as useful) to see it
through to payday. It seems that
the people who actually bend
down and touch the earth in order to do the work of healing the
world are always the least honored of all.
Robert Leo Heilman is a contributor to Writers
on the Range, a service of High Country News
(hcn.org). He lives in Myrtle Creek, Oregon,
and he is the author of “Overstory: Zero, Real
Life in Timber Country.”
ABOUT LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
The Daily Rocket-Miner welcomes letters to the editor on
subjects of interest to our readers. Letters selected for publication do not necessarily reflect
the editorial policies or beliefs of
the Daily Rocket-Miner, however.
Short letters are most likely to
DOONESBURY
be chosen for publication, but
the use of any material is at the
discretion of the editor.
All letters must be legibly
handwritten or typed with double spacing and on one side of
the paper only. Editing may be
necessary for space or clarity or
By Garry Trudeau
to avoid obscenity, libel or invasion of privacy, but ideas will not
be altered.
All letters must bear the handwritten signature of the writer
and include correct name, address and telephone number(s)
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Anonymous letters will not be
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As of Aug. 1, 2007, people will
be limited to having one letter to
the editor published during a
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REGIONAL
9B
Parents
happy to find
businesses
autism-aware
WENDY LEONARD
Deseret News
Philkon Phil Konstantin
Utah Field House of Natural History State Park Museum has packed up 33,000 dinosaur fossils, rock samples and other specimens for the move from an aging building to a stateof-the-art repository two blocks away.
Vernal history museum moving
dinosaur fossils to new home
VERNAL, Utah (AP) — Workers at the Utah Field House of
Natural History State Park Museum in Vernal are ready for a major move.
They’ve packed some 33,000
dinosaur fossils, rock samples
and other specimens for the
move from an aging building to a
state-of-the-art repository two
blocks away.
The pieces of the region’s prehistoric past will be moved beginning this week, officials said, and
the bulk of them should be at
their new home by the end of this
month. Employees began preparing for the move in August.
“If you were to move an entire
‘If you were to move an entire
neighborhood of houses, you’re kind of
looking at what we’re up against here at
the museum.’
Mary Beth Bennis-Bottomley
neighborhood of houses, you’re
kind of looking at what we’re up
against here at the museum,” said
Mary Beth Bennis-Bottomley, the
park’s curator of education.
The $1.5 million for the new
11,664-square-foot fossil repository and laboratory building
came from the Uintah Impact
Mitigation Special Service District, which is funded by mineral
lease money paid by oil and natural gas companies in Utah, the
Deseret News reported.
It will allow museum staff to
properly store and prepare fossils
and artifacts that have been discovered in eastern Utah’s Uintah
Basin. Without the new facility,
many of the fossils and artifacts
were destined for six museums in
cities from San Diego to Pittsburgh.
The specimens have been
stored in the dilapidated, 63year-old building that used to
be home to the Field House before the current museum
opened in 2004.
The new repository, which is
located next to the existing museum, is a cavernous, climate-controlled space capable of housing
decades of fossil discoveries, said
Steve Sroka, park manager at the
museum.
“This room is about 8,600
square feet, which gives us about
2,000 to 3,000 more square feet
of space (than the old building)
for storage of specimens,” Sroka
told the Deseret News.
The laboratory space features
floor-to-ceiling windows along
one wall, which look out onto the
museum’s main hall.
They will allow visitors to
watch park staff and volunteers
work on finds in the museum’s
vast collection.
“People can come and see how
fossils are prepped, how they are
cared for and what the real work
entails to get a bone from out in
the field into the exhibits for display,” Bennis-Bottomley said.
Prosecutor:
Cancer hoax
may not
violate law
Retired Wyoming game warden
reflects on his 30-year tenure
GYPSUM, Colo. (AP) —
The story began circulating in
October: A boy with leukemia
had moved with his family to
spend his final days in the Colorado mountains.
The Eagle Valley High
School team in Gypsum drew
inspiration from the tale and
dedicated a game to the 9year-old boy known as Alex. A
radio station took up the
cause, and a Facebook page
bearing his picture drew more
than 1,000 followers.
However, the story began to
unravel when he failed to show
up at the game, and the
woman spreading the story
said he suffered a seizure and
could not attend. It wasn’t
long before she said he had
died.
She submitted an obituary
to local media, but no one
could find a death certificate,
The Vail Daily reported.
Police are now calling the
story a hoax and investigating
whether it violated any laws.
“This story just shows the
best of human nature and the
worst of human nature,” said
Holli Snyder, general manager
of NRC Broadcasting, parent
company of KSKE, which
broadcast the story.
Authorities are trying to determine if the 22-year-old
woman who spread the story
collected any money from the
hoax, Eagle County District
Attorney Mark Hurlbert said
Thursday.
So far, they haven’t found
any evidence that she did.
“It hinges on whether any
money was taken,” Hurlbert
said about the possibility of
charges.
The woman has not been
identified by authorities. The
photo of the boy was traced to
a Kids Cancer Crusade Web
site and turned out to a South
African boy who is still alive.
Laramie Boomerang
EVE NEWMAN
LARAMIE (AP) — When you
spend almost 30 years driving
empty back roads across
Wyoming, you might start to
measure time differently.
Retired game warden Roger
Bredehoft measures the years
with a list of four names: Chase,
Data, Bruin and Bear.
“That’s 30 years’ worth of
dogs,” he said.
Two yellow Labs and two
chocolate Labs.
“Great dogs, all. They’d listen
to you all day long and never
say a word. They were good
company,” he said.
Bredehoft retired from the
Wyoming Game and Fish Department this fall after working
as a game warden since 1983,
most recently in northern Albany County.
That’s a couple thousand
square miles of sagebrush,
mountains and big game. It’s
about 125 miles to the community of Esterbrook by mostly
dirt roads, which marked the
northern tip of Bredehoft’s jurisdiction.
“They give you a truck, a gun
and a law book and say, ‘Go get
her and never worry.’ It’s the
best job in the world,” he said.
Bredehoft grew up in northeastern Colorado, earning an
education degree from the University of Northern Colorado.
He went back to school intending to earn a degree in speech
pathology, but he changed his
mind at the last minute and decided to study zoology instead.
After finishing his degree at
the University of Wyoming, he
worked for the Wyoming Game
and Fish Department as a biologist.
After spending a couple years
working on short-term projects,
he took the game warden’s
exam as a way to move into a
full-time position. When a full-
time biologist position came
open a few years later, he decided being a game warden suited
him just fine.
Bredehoft was based in Green
River, Jeffrey City and Wheatland before becoming the North
Laramie game warden.
Back in the day, game wardens weren’t restricted to how
many miles they could drive or
how many hours they could
work, and Bredehoft remembers logging more than 300
hours a month during hunting
or watercraft season (if you do
the math, that’s 30-straight 10hour days).
He remembers a professional seminar he attended where
the speaker warned about the
No. 1 way law enforcement officials steal from their employers:
They log time they don’t actually work.
The game wardens in the
crowd had a nice chuckle about
that one.
“Most guys are like me, and
the only reason they’ve got supervisors is to try and slow
them down,” he said.
Laramie Region wildlife supervisor Rick King agreed that
Bredehoft has logged the hours
over the years.
“Roger has displayed an admirable level of commitment
and ability fulfilling the wildlife
management responsibilities in
each of the districts he has been
assigned,” King said in a press
release.
Bredehoft is still an active
member of the legislative arm
of the Wyoming Game Wardens
Association, which lobbied to
influence wildlife laws.
He said he’s proud of the association’s work to increase the
punishment for taking big game
on their winter range. Before
the implementation of a statute
known as 102(d), the fine for
taking an animal out of season
was $450.
During Wyoming winters, big
game herds congregate where
food is still available, usually because the area is open and
blown free of snow. The animals
are concentrated in larger
groups, and they’re highly visible.
“People go out there and they
see these huge bucks and bulls
like they’ve never seen in their
life, and they kill them. They kill
them for the horns. That’s the
only reason. They’re not shooting them for the meat that time
of year. That’s all trophy,” Bredehoft said.
When a hunter might pay several thousand dollars to an outfitter in an attempt to harvest
the same trophy animal during
the regular season, a fine of a
few hundred dollars is nothing.
The Game and Fish Department even had evidence of a
group that regularly traveled
from California to take winterrange prizes.
“It just didn’t seem like
enough,” Bredehoft said.
With the implementation of
102(d), anyone who takes big
game out of season or without a
license faces a minimum fine of
$5,000, up to $10,000, and possibly a year in jail. They could
lose their hunting privileges for
life.
Additionally, the department
can seize anything used in the
crime, such as guns, knives and
vehicles.
“In one case in Cody, we
seized a helicopter,” he said. “It
got their attention.”
In many places across the
state, the game warden is the
public’s main connection to the
department that regulates hunting seasons and manages the
state’s wildlife.
“My house was the office; my
wife was the secretary. If people
had questions, they came to my
house or they called me on the
phone,” he said.
Game wardens enforce the
state’s wildlife laws, but their
role extends beyond checking
hunters for licenses.
“The most important thing
you can do in any district is to
get your landowner relationships good,” Bredehoft said.
As the department works to
open more private land for
hunting access, the process can
go more smoothly if the
landowner already knows the
local game warden. For Bredehoft, building relationships
sometimes meant settling in for
a visit.
“They hardly ever get to
town. They’re on their ranches.
You’ve got to plan on spending
a little time. They want to talk
and they love to talk,” Bredehoft
said.
King said Bredehoft has
worked hard to maintain public
access for hunting and fishing.
“Roger was the Wheatland
game warden when the department’s Private Land Public
Wildlife program started. The
work he did in getting this program up and going in Platte
County helped ensure the program’s long-term success,” he
said.
Ask Bredehoft about his
dogs, and he might tear up. But
ask him about dealing with a
crime scene, and he’ll stress the
importance of keeping his emotions in check.
“The important thing is you
don’t let the moment overtake
you,” he said. “The main thing
you want to do is make sure
everything’s in line and that
you’ve got all the facts right.”
Game
wardens
protect
Wyoming’s wildlife, and that’s
what motivated Bredehoft to
leave his house at 4 a.m., push
through a snowstorm or spend
a dozen hours patrolling a reservoir.
“That drives enforcement,
that drives your seasons, that
drives your being out there to
see what’s going on. And that’s
really important,” he said.
MURRAY, Utah (AP) — Hagen Dickinson took in as
much of his surroundings as
he could bear on a Friday.
The bright lights, fancy
decor and plethora of attention directed at him was almost too much for the 4-yearold autistic boy, as he clung
tightly to his mother’s hand
and then made his way into
her arms.
The staff at BRIO Tuscan
Grille, however, did all they
could to make him and four
other autistic children and
their mothers feel comfortable while enjoying a lunch
date.
“I’ve never dealt with
autism personally, so I really
don’t understand it,” said
Steve Rose, BRIO’s general
manager. “But they’re really
no different than kids we have
ourselves. They just need a little bit of special attention to
have a great experience.”
Rose said he wants the
restaurant to be a safe, comfortable environment for
everyone — no exceptions.
The Fashion Place Mall location is one of the first establishments in Utah to earn the
Autism AWARE status, meaning it has trained employees
and can provide an environment to accommodate families with autistic children in
an atmosphere where autism
is welcomed, accepted and respected.
“I don’t like going around
telling everyone that my son
has special needs, but going
someplace where they are
used to it and can handle it
will make it more normal for
us,” said Cobilynn Dickinson,
Hagen’s mom.
“These are incredible kids,”
she said.
“We need the opportunity
to get them to grow and reach
their potential.”
Autism is a mental condition that produces a range of
abilities and disabilities in
each individual who has it. It
can be limiting, especially in
social situations. Sights,
sounds, smells and textures
can provoke out-of-the-blue
responses from individuals
with autism, and “you never
know when you’re going to
have a meltdown,” said Amy
Baker, mother of two children
with autism spectrum disorder.
Baker said she wishes the
general public wasn’t “so
quick to judge.”
“If we take them away from
the situation, they will not
learn,” she said. “We have to
fight through it and would
love more support than the
look that we’re not doing our
job as parents.”
Baker wouldn’t typically
think of BRIO as a childfriendly place, but she was
pleasantly surprised when
servers helped her sons,
Braden, 7, and Bryson, 8,
make their own pizzas at the
restaurant’s brick oven.
Recent Wyoming
grizzly bear deaths
human-caused
JACKSON (AP) — Six recent grizzly bear deaths in the
Wyoming portion of the Yellowstone ecosystem are being
investigated as human-caused.
Because the incidents are
being investigated, Wyoming
Game and Fish Department
officials are revealing few details but they come at a time
when grizzly-hunter encounters are most frequent. The
grizzly bear is protected under
federal law.
The string marks the 40th
through 45th grizzly deaths in
the ecosystem this year.
Mark Bruscino, of the
Wyoming Game and Fish Department, says it is about an
average year for grizzly deaths
in Wyoming.
Bruscino says the string of
bear deaths has little bearing
on the overall health of the
ecosystem’s grizzlies.
He tells the Jackson Hole
News & Guide that the grizzly
population continues to grow.
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Auditors say Rock Springs has no material weaknesses

Transcription

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