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LOVELL
What's Inside ...
Man free on
reduced bail
Wizard of Oz
staged
Cowley spring
rodeo results
State Art winners
Page 2
Page 9
__ Page 10
__ Page 16
LOVELL, WYOMING • VOLUME 106, NUMBER 48 • THURSDAY, MAY 0, 2012 • 75¢
Towns move forward on sixth cent
BY DAVID PECK
The mayors and town officials
have spoken when it comes to the
sixth-cent sales tax proposal -
well, almost.
Meeting in Deaver Thursday
night, mayors and/or town repre-
sentatives of the nine Big Horn
County municipalities met to dis-
cuss projects to take to voters at
the November General Election
for the proposed sixth-cent sales
tax initiative.
When Thursday's meeting be-
gan, chairman Bruce Morrison
went around the room and asked
each town if their projects dis-
cussed at the May meeting had
changed. Here is the current list
as noted by each mayor or town
clerk Thursday:
Manderson - Water tank and
water main replacement, $2.2
million.
Greybull - Swimming pool
operation and maintenance for
20 years, $2.4 million, with the
school district also going to voters
in the district for $5 million for
design and construction of a new
pool. It was explained Thursday
that not all of the sales tax money
can be used for O&M, so a portion
must be used to help construct the
pool, as well.
Basin - 1) Remodel the cur-
rently vacant town hall an-
nex and refurbish the existing
town hall for a community cen-
ter ($200,000); 2) if and when the
state builds a new high school in
Basin, remodel the existing gym-
nasium as a recreation center
($200,000); 3) fund operation and
maintenance of the recreation
center for 20 years ($800,000) -
total $1.2 million.
Burlington - Address town's
potable water problems or pave
roads in town, $2 million.
Frannie - Rehabilitate
the town irrigation water well
($1,216,250) and purchase a new
town pickup truck with a snow-
plow capacity ($46,405), for a to-
tal of $1,262,655.
Deaver - Replace in-town po-
table water lines - mains and ser-
vice lines -- $2 million.
Cowley - Resurface streets
and improve intersections with
curb and gutter and aprons at the
intersections, $2.3 million.
Byron - Matching funds for
a sewer line replacement project
on the south side of Byron, park
improvements, chip and crack
sealing and recreation funding --
$1,250,000.
"There are still some ques-
tions to be answered within our
council," Mayor Bret George said
Thursday, noting that the town
will hold a public hearing on the
sixth-cent projects on May 24.
He said some citizens would
like to use sales tax money to re-
furbish the old school pool, but
there are questions about wheth-
er tax money can be spent on a
building that is now privately
owned.
Lovell - New building for the
proposed Lovell-Kane Museum,
See 'PROJECTS,' page 7
DAVID PECK
2011 Junior Prom Queen Maci Maytakes a crown from a crown bearer's head to present to
senior first attendant Jodi Walker (left) during the LHS Junior-Senior Prom grand march
Friday night at the Hyart Theatre.
Rocky Mountain High School announces
2012 valedictorian and salutatorian
BY PATTI CARPENTER
Ethan Strom was named vale-
dictorian for the graduating class
of 2012 at Rocky Mountain High
School. Strom is a straight A stu-
dent and member of the National
Honor Society. He participated in
track and field and participated on
the school's cross-country team for
three years. He is also a member
of the art club.
Strom hopes to attend the ITT
technical school in Utah, where he
plans to study electronics and en-
gineering. He will continue art as
a hobby.
Strom works at Walmart and
plans to live in Powell, while he
raises money to attend the college
of his choice. He considers him-
self a "goal-setter" and tries not to
"stress out too much" about things.
He moved to Cowley when
he was 6 months old and attend-
ed schools in the community. His
advice to his underclassmen is
to always have goals, take deep
breaths often and not to stress
out about the future. He plans to
speak on this topic in his address
to his graduating classmates.
Ashley Bridges was named
salutatorian of her graduating
class. Bridges is also a top aca-
demic achiever at the school. She
is a member of the National Hon-
or Society and has held the posi-
tion of president of the organiza-
tion for RMHS. She has also held
the position of vice president of
the student body for her class, is a
Valedictorian
Ethan Strom
member of Future Business Lead-
ers of America, and Future Farm-
ers of America and is a member of
the student council.
Bridges participated in vol-
leyball, track and field and was
basketball manager.
In her speech on graduation
day, she plans to talk to her class-
mates about what they have been
through together as a class and
about the future.
She has been accepted to at-
tend college at the University of
Wyoming on a full scholarship,
where she plans to major in gen-
Salutatorian
Ashley Bridges
eral studies at first. She is in-
terested in both the medical and
teaching fields.
Her advice to her underclass-
men is to "work hard" and "don't
settle for less."
Both students spoke about
the uncertainties faced by their
generation and their hope for a
brighter future upon college grad-
uation. They will both touch on
this subject in their speeches at
the Rocky Mountain High School
class of 2012 graduation ceremo-
ny that will take place on Tues-
day, May 22.
Plan announced to keep
rural post offices open
The U.S. Postal Service an-
nounced a new strategy on Wednes-
day that could keep the nation's
smallest post offices open for busi-
ness, while providing a framework
to achieve significant cost savings
as part of the plan to return the or-
ganization to financial stability.
The plan would keep the ex-
isting post office in place, but with
modified retail window hours to
match customer use. Access to
the retail lobby and to P.O. boxes
would remain unchanged, and the
town's zip code and community
identity would be retained.
"Meeting the needs of post-
al customers is, and will always
be, a top priority. We continue
to balance that by better align-
ing service options with customer
demand and reducing the cost to
serve," said Postmaster Gener-
al and CEO Patrick R. Donahoe.
"With that said, we've listened to
our customers in rural America
and we've heard them loud and
clear- they want to keep their post
office open. We believe today's an-
nouncement will serve our cus-
tomers' needs and allow us to
achieve real savings to help the
Postal Service return to long-term
financial stability."
The new strategy would be
implemented over a two-year,
multi-phased approach and would
not be completed until Septem-
ber 2014. Once implementation is
completed, the Postal Service esti-
mates savings of a half billion dol-
lars annually.
"The Postal Service is commit-
ted to serving America's commu-
nities and providing a responsible
and fair approach for our employ-
ees and customers," said Megan
Brennan, Postal Service Chief Op-
erating Officer. "The post offices
in rural America will remain open
unless a community has a strong
preference for one of the other
options. We will not close any of
these rural post offices without
having provided a viable solution."
The Postal Service will pro-
vide an opportunity for the Postal
Regulatory Commission (PRC) to
review this plan prior to making
any changes. The Postal Service
intends to file a request for an ad-
visory opinion on the plan with the
PRC later this month. Community
meetings would then be conducted
to review options in greater detail.
Communities will be notified by
mail of the date, time and location
of these meetings.
This new option complements
existing alternatives, which in-
clude: providing mail delivery ser-
vice to residents and businesses in
the affected community by either
rural carrier or highway contract
route; contracting with a local
business to create a village post
office; and offering service from a
nearby post office.
A voluntary early retirement
incentive for the nation's more
than 21,000 non-executive post-
masters was also announced.
Survey research conducted by
the Opinion Research Corpora-
tion in February showed 54 per-
cent of rural customers would pre-
fer the new solution to maintain
a local post office. Forty-six per-
cent prefer one of the previously
announced solutions (20% prefer
Village post office, 15% prefer pro-
viding services at a nearby Post
Office, 11% prefer expanded rural
delivery). This strategy would en-
able a town to possibly have a post
office with modified hours, as well
as a Village Post Office.
The Postal Service has im-
plemented a voluntary moratori-
um on all postal facility closings
through May 15, 2012. (See relat-
ed stories.) No closings or changes
to post office operations will occur
until after that time.
Mayors vote to continue county
consensus funding formula
BY DAVID PECK
Mayors and/or representa-
tives of Big Horn County mu-
nicipalities gathering in Deaver
Thursday night voted to maintain
the current funding formula for
the county consensus block grant
program, leaving towns with the
same funding formula they have
had in recent years and requiring
special districts to negotiate with
the county for a slice of the pie.
A proposal had come before
the Big Horn County commis-
sioners last week for each town,
plus the county, to give 10 per-
cent of their funding to special
districts, and that idea did come
up Thursday, but the towns ul-
timately voted to retain the cur-
rent formula.
Under the formula, each in-
corporated town, plus the coun-
ty, would receive a base award
of $35,000 from Big Horn Coun-
ty's allocation of $1,407,505 from
the Wyoming Legislature, with
the balance distributed on a cal-
culated rate of $90.63 per person
in each community. The $1.4 mil-
lion from the Legislature is for
the 2012-14 biennium.
Under the current formula,
the Town of Lovell would receive
$248,893.71 over the biennium,
Greybull $202,399.02, Basin
$151,463.31, Cowley $94,364.57,
Byron $88,745.33, Burlington
$61,102.28, Deaver $51,132.66,
Frannie $47,507.34, Manderson
$45,332.15 and Big Horn County/
special districts $416,564.63.
Thursday's meeting began
with Kris Robertson of I-Iyatt-
ville explaining to the gathered
officials the plans Hyattville -
an unincorporated town - has to
continue to upgrade the old Hy-
attville school, now a community
center, which has been gradually
renovated over the years using
grant money, local fundraising
and volunteer labor.
Robertson said the commu-
nity center has been through
See 'CONSENSUS,' page 7
