Archives for September 2005

AUSTIN – Texas Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn last week announced that the state collected $1.49 billion in sales tax in August, up 4.4 percent compared to a year ago, but the news locally was mixed.

After five straight months of stronger sales tax allocations, Clarendon’s rebate slipped 8.66 percent to $20,862.69. Despite this month’s lower allocation, the city is still 5.62 percent ahead for the year-to-date figure from this time one year ago.

Howardwick’s allocation was up 10.28 percent to $1,372.73 and was running less than half a percentage point ahead for the year-to-date. And Hedley was up from $244.36 this time last year to $795.54 for the month, but it still lagged more than four percent behind for the year-to-date.

Austin’s outlook was better. When the state’s 2005 fiscal year ended August 31, sales tax collections were 5.8 percent higher than in FY 04, contributing to a $1.2 billion revenue surplus for fiscal 2005.

September 2, after closing the books on the last biennium, Strayhorn asked the governor to convene a three-day special session of the Legislature to appropriate the necessary funds to assist Texas education, security, health care and human service providers who are helping Hurricane Katrina evacuees.

“While we can count on the federal government to do what it can in Texas, the feds are not going to pay for us to hire more police, and they are not going to pay for us to bring in more teachers to educate the thousands of new children enrolling in our already stretched local schools.

“The need is here. The resources are here. We need to act now to provide relief to our Texas communities,” Strayhorn said.

Strayhorn sent September allocations of $244.6 million to Texas cities, up 10 percent. Calendar year-to-date, city rebates are running 7.8 percent higher.

Fourteen wagons will be rolling into Clarendon next weekend for the eleventh annual Col. Charles Goodnight Chuckwagon Cookoff to be held September 23-24 at the Saints’ Roost Museum.

The second annual Saints’ Roost Gun & Knife Show will again accompany the Cookoff and is the opening activity for the event, opening next Friday from 1 p.m. to 6 p.m. at the Clarendon Community Center. Admission is free with a cookoff ticket or $3 at the door.

Friday evening on the museum grounds is an exclusive members-only Dinner With The Cooks that starts at 6:30 p.m. Plates are $12 each for museum members and their families, and reservations need to be made by this Friday, September 16, by calling Bobbie Thornberry at 874-3581. Annual membership in the museum is $25 per household.

On Saturday, the gates will open at 7:30 a.m. with breakfast and lunch concessions provided by Boy Scout Troop 433. The tradeshow starts at 10 a.m., and museum tours will be available throughout the day. The gun show will resume at 9 a.m. at the Community Center.

Patrick Robertson and KEFH-FM will provide music at 11 a.m. on the museum grounds.

Live entertainment follows with afternoon performances scheduled by Audrey Brown of Clarendon; the Saints’ Roost Jamboree Band; music by Katie Askew, Dan Hall, Chandra Holman, Amber Gatlin, Tracey Rhodes, and Bill Houston, all of Clarendon; Delbert Trew of Alanreed; cowboy poet Oscar Auker of Clarendon; Andi and Alex Kitten of Lubbock; and Payton Kane of Dodson.

The Chuckwagon meal will be served at 5 p.m. with a menu of chicken fried steak, potatoes, beans, and cobbler.

At 6:30, the museum will raffle off a pair of James Owens Handmade Boots, followed by the presentation of the cookoff awards.

Admission to the all-day event is free. Tickets for the authentic Chuckwagon supper are $10 each and can be purchased in advance at Henson’s in Clarendon by calling 806/874-3517.

Boot tickets are also available at Henson’s or from any museum board member.

On Sunday morning, cowboy church will be held under the tent at the museum with preaching by Shannon Hall of Loco, Okla.

Proceeds from the cookoff and the gun show benefit the Museum’s continuing efforts to preserve the history of Donley County.

The 2005 Clarendon street paving project is on track, and the contractor anticipates being able to finish before cold weather sets in.

That’s the word from Mayor Pro-tem Mark White following a report given to the city last Friday.

White said B&B Solvent project superintendent Brent Hall told the city his workers would begin pouring curb and gutter this week.

“I think it’s coming together; and once we start seeing curb and gutter, it will go a lot faster,” White said.

According to White, Hall also expressed concerns that the city could not stay ahead of his crew in doing the rough cuts on the streets and said his crew could do the same work faster and with more expertise than the city could. City officials agreed and told Hall to continue doing the rough cuts for the city.

“We’ve spent a little over $2,000 so far for them to cut the streets,” White said. “I think that’s money well spent.”

City crews will continue to haul dirt out of the way once the contractor has moved it.

White said the contractor anticipates stringing curbs this Wednesday and will likely start pouring concrete Thursday. The work would start on Sixth Street, laying 1,000 feet of curb and gutter per day. Seventh and Eighth streets would follow.

“They want the city to come in and do the backfill behind the curb, and then they will start bringing in base material,” White said.

Work must be completed by some time in November otherwise it will be too cold and will force the project to either use more expensive cold temperature material or wait for warmer weather next spring.

White said he hasn’t heard much comment from the public on the project – pro or con. He has heard second hand of people wondering why the streets were cut so low, but he says the street level will raise back up after the base is brought it.

“I’m anxious to see it done and see a good rain on it,” White said. “The curb and gutter is going to make such a difference in the appearance of people’s homes. It’s just going to look totally different.”

St. Mary’s Catholic Church will hold their annual St. Mary’s Day Barbecue on Sunday, September 11, 2005, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Lions Hall in Clarendon.  The hall is located at 4th and Sully.

Chefs Roy and Sam will fix all the barbecue trimmings.  Refreshments and desserts will also be served.  The Ladies’ Altar Society will hold a quilt raffle, and the drawing for the World War II Russian M44 Mosin Nagant Rifle will be held.  Tickets are available from any parish member or by calling Denise Bertrand at 874-2846 or Tom Stauder at 874-5099.

Proceeds from the event will help water the park grass near the church.  Everyone is invited to attend.

Clarendon College nursing students are organizing food and blood drives to help the victims of Hurricane Katrina.

The food drive began Tuesday and continues through September 15. Citizens are asked to place donations of non-perishable food, personal hygiene items, paper goods, and diapers in donations barrels placed throughout the community.

The blood drive will be held next Monday, September 12, at the Bairfield Activity Center on the CC campus from 2 p.m. to 7 p.m.

Donations will be sent to South Texas to help those victims who have taken refuge in the Lone Star State.

Despite running on a muddy track and facing 17-1 odds, an American Quarter Horse partly owned by Walt and Janice Knorpp of Clarendon surged to a first place finish at the All American Futurity this week at New Mexico’s Ruidoso Downs.

The two-year-old Teller Cartel claimed the $1.9 million purse in the world’s richest quarter horse futurity Monday. The annual event is the equivalent in quarter horse racing of the renowned Kentucky Derby.

According to an online article by Michael Cusortelli of the American Quarter Horse Association, Teller Cartel covered the 440 yards in :21.504, the stakes’ slowest clocking in 11 years.

Cody Jensen rode the winner for reigning AQHA champion trainer Paul Jones, both of whom celebrated their first-ever All American victory.

“It’s a thrill – a big thrill,” Jones told AQHA. “There’s no greater thrill than winning the All American. It’s every Quarter Horse trainer’s dream.

Jensen, a California-based jockey, rode Teller Cartel for the first time on August 18, when the colt ran third in the 14th of 16 All American trials and posted the ninth-fastest qualifying time.

“He warmed up perfectly,” Jensen told AQHA. “For a colt, he’s really gentle and really mellow. You don’t need to rile him up. He gets himself ready – a guy doesn’t have to do much to get him ready.

Jensen said Teller Cartel broke from the gate so sharply Monday that all he had to do was hang on.

“He won it right from the gate.”

Bred by Charles and Marilyn Cockrill’s C/C Stock Farm at Alto, New Mexico, Teller Cartel was acquired by the Teller Cartel syndicate for $87,000 at last year’s Ruidoso Select Yearling Sale, Cusortelli reported.

The Knorpps purchased an interest in Teller Cartel just before Labor Day last year.

According to the AQHA, the colt’s All American win was his first victory in five outs, and the $1-million winner’s share of the purse boosted his earnings to $1,003,871, placing him 40th on American Quarter Horse racing’s all-time earnings list.

Teller Cartel began his racing career in California, running second in a 300-yard maiden race on May 5 and placing third in an Ed Burke Million Futurity (G1) trial on June 4.

Walt Knorpp said from Ruidoso Teller Cartel will travel to California, where it is anticipated he will run in three $1 million races.

While Gulf Coast residents are dealing with the very personal effects of Hurricane Katrina, folks in Donley County are feeling the economic impact at the gas station.

The category-four hurricane hit Louisiana, Alabama, and Mississippi last Monday, taking a heavy toll on the United States’ domestic petroleum production. Eight major refineries were taken out of commission by the storm, which reduced the nation’s refining capacity by more than 10 percent.

By noon last Wednesday, most local stations had raised the self-serve price of regular unleaded by 20 cents to a total of $2.95 per gallon, and that price jumped to $3.05 by the week’s end.

Paul Bivens, whose Bivens Oil Company supplies gasoline to pumps at the Clarendon Outpost and Kidd’s Shell, said he placed an order for fuel last Tuesday but was told there was none that could be delivered.

“We’re paying more for gas to be delivered here anyway, but I don’t understand why the fuel ran out so fast,” Bivens said. “I mean, in just two days suddenly we go from having fuel to no fuel?”

With no delivery to replenish their tanks, Kidd’s ran out of regular unleaded Thursday, and the Outpost began asking customers to limit their purchases to 10 gallons.

“We were very concerned because this [Labor Day weekend] is like the number three weekend of the year for us,” Bivens said, “and if people can’t get gas, they are just not stopping.”

Fortunately, a shipment was delivered Saturday, and Bivens said supplies are currently fine at both stations. The Outpost was out of Unleaded Plus Tuesday morning, but he said that was due to an ordering error.

Things were not fine, however, at Clarendon’s West Texas Gas, which ran out of both farm and road diesel last Friday and was still out Tuesday morning.

“We’ve got two or three farmers that really need some diesel, and we don’t have any to deliver,” said WTG’s Lyndel Moffett. “We’re trying to locate some now; and when we find it, we’ll have to allocate it to make it last.”

Moffett said West Texas Gas locations in Claude and Groom are also out of diesel, and he didn’t know when his company might get a delivery.

“Refining is where the hold up is,” he said. “It’s not in the supply of crude oil.”

While its diesel pumps were dry, West Texas Gas did have one thing going for it – regular unleaded at below the three-dollar mark.

One customer en route to rebuild his home in Biloxi, Miss., told the Enterprise that $2.99 at West Texas Gas was the cheapest gas he had found between here and Las Vegas, Nevada.

Bivens said he thinks the price of gas has stabilized for now, and Moffett thinks things will get better as refining capacity gears back up.

Meanwhile, officials at the Texas Railroad Commission are urging Texans to practice measures to conserve gasoline to help mitigate price increases caused by Hurricane Katrina.

The RRC does not have authority to regulate gasoline prices but does offer these conservation tips.

Drive Sensibly: Aggressive driving (speeding, rapid acceleration and braking) wastes gas. It can lower your gas mileage by 33 percent at highway speeds and by five percent around town. Sensible driving is also safer for you and others, so you may save more than gas money.

Observe the Speed Limit: Gas mileage decreases rapidly at speeds above 60 mph. Each 5 mph you drive over 60 mph is like paying an additional $0.15 per gallon for gas. Observing the speed limit is also safer.

Remove Excess Weight: Avoid keeping unnecessary items in your vehicle, especially heavy ones. An extra 100 pounds in your vehicle could reduce your mile per gallon by up to 2 percent. The reduction is based on the percentage of extra weight relative to the vehicle’s weight and affects smaller vehicles more than larger ones.

Avoid Excess Idling: Idling gets zero miles per gallon. Cars with larger engines typically waste more gas at idle than do cars with smaller engines.

Use Cruise Control: Using cruise control on the highway helps you maintain a constant speed and, in most cases, will save gas.

Use Overdrive Gears: When you use overdrive gearing, your car’s engine speed goes down. This saves gas and reduces engine wear.