2011 in review - Part II

Last week, the Mountain Home News looked at the top stories each month for the first six months of 2011 in Elmore County. This week, we conclude out top story review of 2011 with the last half of the year's top stories for each month.

July

Seeking safer ways for children to get to and from school in Mountain Home, a group of city officials and concerned citizens met to identify problems and possible solutions.The gathering followed a public meeting in early May to identify needed improvements for walking and bike paths for children attending both schools. A grant from the Safe Routes to School office in Boise helped get the local project moving forward.

* * *

Community leader Mae Sanders, of Mountain Home, died at the age of 88.

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County and city leaders joined local business representatives to formally dedicate the county's consolidated ambulance complex. The building serves as the central storage and training facility for the county's fleet of 30 emergency medical technicians and paramedics.

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Local community leader Charles (Chuck) L. Devol died at age 69.

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The first major local wildfire of the fire season destroyed two mobile homes and a large two-story storage structure, as well as more than half a dozen outbuildings.

Labeled the Gunner Fire by the Bureau of Land Management, the fire burned 208 acres.

* * *

The assessed value of a home in Elmore County fell by an average of 11 percent over the past year with commercial businesses showing an even steeper drop in 2010. Figures released by the Elmore County Assessors Office showed some home property values actually fell by up to 30 percent with only a few showing signs of improving.

* * *

Ten years of planning finally became a reality as the Oasis Fire Volunteer Department broke ground on its first official fire station. Measuring nearly 1,500 square feet, the station will hold both of the department's engines and a third brush truck.

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The 2011 Elmore County Fair and Rodeo wrapped up with decent, but hardly record, attendance numbers at the mid-July event.

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The Mountain Home School District was one of 75 school districts in the state listed in a 600-page complaint by the federal Civil Rights Office in Seattle alleging violations of the Title IX program.

Title IX is a program, originally created in 1972, that requires schools to provide equal opportunities for female athletes. It was created at a time when female sports programs were nearly non-existent in many schools, with the focus on funding and opportunities on male sports.

The complaint alleged that Mountain Home was "not providing equal opportunities for female high school students to play sports" and was made based on information reported each year by the school district to the Idaho High School Activities Association, the state's governing body for high school athletics.

Specifically, it cited a 10.4 percent male-to-female participation gap. A total of 61 additional female athletes would be needed to bridge the gap, according to the report.

Although announced with great fanfare, the follow-up investigation showed the district did not discriminate against female athletes, and the charge was quietly dropped.

* * *

The Elmore County Sheriff's Office located a missing 14-year-old Hammett girl in Green River, Utah. She was found unharmed but a Mountain Home man, Eugene M. Peters, 51, was arrested in connection with her disappearance by the Emery County (Utah) Sheriff's Office and the Utah Highway Patrol. Peters faced several felony charges in Utah. He is a registered sex offender having been convicted in 1987 of lewd conduct with a child under age 16. Authorities believed the girl left the area willingly with Peters.

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Arthur Schafer, 58, of Nampa, who had been missing for over a week, was found dead at his campsite on the Middle Fork of the Boise River in Elmore County. Authorities said it appeared that he died from an accidental gunshot wound.

* * *

The annual Elmore County Relay for Life observance raised tens of thousands of dollars for the American Cancer Society to further its efforts to save lives by helping people stay well, helping them get well, and by finding cures and fighting back against cancer.

August

City officials proposed a $22.1 million budget for the next fiscal year. Although nearly $4 million more than the FY2010 budget, the increase largely reflected several major grants the city had obtained for infrastructure improvements. Otherwise, the conservative budget remained fairly flat compared to budgets adopted prior to the housing market crash in 2008.

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A lightning storm that passed through the area triggered a major fire in the Walker Road area northwest of Glenns Ferry that burned more than 1,300 acres. The fire, named the Alky Fire, was one of nearly a dozen fires in the area that were triggered by the storm.

* * *

Elmore County began burning down with a dozen fires ringing the city of Mountain Home on the east, west and south.

The air was filled with blue smoke from the fires that began, in most cases, from a brief lightning storm that swept through the area. The BLM literally ran out of resources to attack all the fires at once and some of the blazes, which began as small fires, were pushed by high and erratic winds, growing rapidly in size and melding into much larger fires. The Boise BLM requested assistance from "multiple cooperators" from across Southern Idaho, Oregon and Nevada.

The biggest of the fires was the Big Hill Fire, which consumed more than 67,000 acres in an area 20 miles south of Bruneau, and the Blair Fire eight miles north of Glenn's Ferry that eventually burned 39,000 acres and destroyed critical winter habitat for area deer populations.

* * *

Brad Seymour, a retired civil engineer from Mountain Home Air Force Base who helped develop the AFAD Fun Run/Walk, was named grand marshal of the 51st Annual Air Force Appreciation Day celebration.

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Community leader and former schools superintendent Harry Edward "Bud" Light, died at age 70.

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Hundreds of people made the annual trek to Mountain Home to participate in the 51st Annual Basque Picnic.

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The three-day Three Island Days celebration featured a number of cultural activities that highlighted Glenns Ferry's pioneer heritage -- with other events aimed at fostering community spirit.

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The Shoshone-Paiute tribes of Duck Valley Indian Reservation contended the federal government broke its word over a land deal involving the willing of some land near Mountain Home to the tribe, which the tribes indicated could have been used to develop a casino in the area. Title to the land had originally been approved to go to the tribe by the courts, then the approval was rescinded -- resurrecting native groups' enduring mistrust for the Bureau of Indian Affairs. The issue remains unresolved in the courts.

* * *

After a nearly one-year delay, the Bureau of Land Management released a draft environment for the Gateway West Transmission Line Project, which would pass through Elmore County. The project involves building a series of 145- to 180-foot towers capable of carrying up to 500 kilovolts of power across 1,150 miles of the western United States.

* * *

County chief deputy sheriff Nick Schilz was named by the city council to become Mountain Home's next chief of police. Schilz has served in law enforcement for 30 years.

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Mountain Home hosted the annual conference of the Idaho Volunteer Fire and Emergency Services Association, an event that drew approximately 100 representatives from volunteer fire departments and EMS groups around the state.

* * *

Anne L. Butler, 46, of Mountain Home, drowned in a swimming accident near Anderson Ranch Dam. Eyewitnesses reported that Butler was no more than 25 feet from shore when she started struggling in the water and couldn't make it back.Her boyfriend, who couldn't swim, went for help but she drowned before rescuers could arrive.

* * *

An 18-year-old Filer youth was taken into custody in Elmore County Sunday after a 70-mile high-speed chase on I-84 that began in Jerome and reached speeds in excess of 100 mph.

The incident began when David J. Miller called the Jerome dispatch operators to tell them that he'd stolen his mother's car and wanted to turn himself in. He said he'd be waiting for officers at Exit 168. But when city police officers arrived, he brandished what appeared to be a gun (later determined to be an air pistol) and sped off.

* * *

Stephanie L. Hoagland, a former staff member at a private juvenile corrections center in Mountain Home received a suspended jail sentence and two year's probation in a case involving inappropriate behavior with an inmate at the facility.

September

A wheel bearing thrown from a passing car was the likely cause of a range fire that burned nearly 1,200 acres of land along Highway 51 east of the intersection of Bypass and Airbase roads. As the fire swept along a stretch of land running nearly parallel to Highway 51, it prompted a mandatory evacuation order of homes along Hog Farm Road.

* * *

The Mountain Home Youth Center was one of dozens of city programs and local agencies hit hardest by a $63,000 shortfall in local tax revenue. Members affiliated with Mountain Home Parents and Youth United, which runs the center, recently sought financial help from the Western Elmore Recreation District, which declined their request and then the city, which also rejected a subsidy for the center beyond providing the building it uses.

* * *

Mountain Home Police arrested two city residents in connection with what originally had been reported as a robbery of the Taco Johns in town.

Sara Griffin, 23, an employee of Taco Johns, and Martel Newton, 23, described by authorities as her boyfriend, were initially charged with the robbery, in which Griffin had told authorities at first that a masked man had held her up and forced her to open the safe as she opened the facility.

Authorities later decided she'd lied and had stolen the money herself.

Charges against Newton were later dropped in the case.

Griffin later entered a written plea to one count of grand theft in the case.

* * *

A nationwide grant program helped the Mountain Home Public Library to not only upgrade its inventory of computers, but also overhaul its access to online resources.

The library's older communication lines were replaced with high-speed fiber optic cables, giving it a nearly 20-fold increase in Internet connectivity.

At the same time, the facility replaced its aging batch of 19 computers with two dozen brand-new systems and flat-screen monitors.

* * *

For the first time in three years, Mountain Home Air Force Base opened its gates to the public for Gunfighter Skies 2011. The event featured, for the first time, two full days of performances by the USAF Thunderbirds aerial demonstration team. The event drew more than 35,000 people to the base.

* * *

The Herb Hawley's service station in Mountain Home celebrated its 50th anniversary.

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Senior Allie Draper was named as the 2011 Mountain Home High School homecoming queen. She was crowned during halftime of a 41-8 loss to the Nampa Bulldogs.

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October

The Chamber's annual Fall Harvest celebration was canceled because the Chamber couldn't find anyone to coordinate the events.

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The new legislative redistricting map, will return most of Owyhee County to the same legislative district as Elmore County.

Under the new redistricting plan that followed the 2010 census, Elmore County, almost all of Owyhee County and a lightly populated portion of Twin Falls county west of the highway leading to Jackpot, as well as Buhl and Filer, will be organized into Legislative District 23. The only parts of Owyhee County that won't be in District 23 would be the main cities of Marsing, Homedale and Murphy, which would be lumped into District 11 with Canyon County.

The map is being challenged in the courts by Twin Falls County.

* * *

The Mountain Home Urban Renewal Agency (URA) purchased the King's building in anticipation of leasing the downtown core facility to a major retail chain store.

After buying the building, the URA will remodel the building to bring it up to modern code requiements.

Waiting in the wings to lease the facility is "a national family branded retail store" that has shown interest in the building. The name of the national chain store has not been released, pending an official announcement by the firm (which the Mountain Home News has agreed to respect). That announcement is expected to occur this February. The company hopes to be open some time in late spring.

* * *

After a "lost year" of delays during which little was actually accomplished, the combined effort by the Western Elmore County Recreation District and the Treasure Valley YMCA to build a community center in Mountain Home was set to get back on track with the creation of a committee to oversee a capital campaign feasibility study.

That study will determine if there is sufficient opportunity to raise just under $1 million to supplement existing funds available to the WECRD and begin Phase I of the project. That phase would involve a center with gyms, meeting rooms and fitness faciltiies -- essentially the full community center except an indoor swimming pool, which would be built in Phase II.

November

Mountain Home Tiger head football coach Brian Floyd submitted his resignation after his team completed a winless season.

Floyd was head coach of the Tigers for eight years, taking over as head coach in 2004. The Tigers finished 3-6 last year. In 2006, he was named the 4A Southern Idaho Conference Coach of the Year. In 2008, his team advanced to the state semi-finals.

Floyd was 34-44 as head coach of the Tigers.

* * *

Speech and debate teacher John Petti was voted the state's Speech Arts Teacher of the Year by the Idaho Speech Arts Teacher's Association.

Celebrating his sixth year of teaching in Mountain Home, Petti coaches the Mountain Home High School Talkin' Tigers -- a speech and debate team that currently is ranked 40th in the nation by the National Forensics League.

* * *

Jimmy Schipani won election to his first term in light municipal election voting, while incumbent Russ Anderson was re-elected to his second term on the council.

Mayor Tom Rist, who ran unopposed, also was re-elected. Schipani will replace Geoff Schroeder, who chose not to seek re-election to the council. He was sworn in Monday, when Schroeder's term expired.

* * *

The city approved a refinancing package that will help it pay off its remaining debt on the local golf course and police department building several years ahead of schedule.

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December

Mountain Home's annual Christmas Parade of Lights celebrated a blend of long-standing traditions while incorporating new ideas to make the event even more festive, organizers said.

Hosted by the city's Chamber of Commerce, the parade included floats and entries representing 19 different businesses and organizations in Mountain Home. Marking a break in tradition, the parade ended up in Railroad Park versus its previous stop in Triangle Park off American Legion Boulevard.

* * *

Dangerous crosswalks, inattentive drivers and speeding traffic pose significant risks to local area students, according to officials seeking to improve safety around two schools in Mountain Home.

Those and other findings were included in a public briefing held by representatives from the state's Safe Routes to School program.

* * *

Elmore County became the first in the state to launch an upgraded 911 service that puts more time-critical information in the hands of emergency responders.

Known as the Smart911 system, it takes the county's enhanced 911 service a step further by delivering insights about callers "that we usually only uncover upon arriving at an emergency," said Traci Lefever, 911 coordinator with the county sheriff's department.

Strictly a voluntary initiative, people begin the process by building a profile online at www.Smart911.com. They then furnish information they want paramedics, firefighters and police officers to know when they respond to an emergency.

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The seventh annual Christmas Creche Exhibit, hosted at the Latter-day Saints stake center in Mountain Home, saw a record crowd attend the display of 600 Nativity scenes. While the majority of people came from Mountain Home, the creche exhibit is now drawing people from throughout both the Treasure Valley and Magic Valley,

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Veterans in the Mountain Home community took part in the Wreaths Across America Day event, held simultaneously at more than 500 locations across the country. The event honors veterans for their service and sacrifice.