Archives for May 2007

Clarendon College came out even when the Texas Legislature approved the state budget early this week.

CC President Myles Shelton said the budget contains $1.7 billion for community colleges with no new money for the local college.

“We got the same money as we did the last two years,” he said.

Early in the legislative session, community colleges across the state were hoping to see increases in funding; but as the session wore on, the colleges ended up working to not lose any money.

Shelton said, across the state, 14 community colleges received no new money.

State retirement contributions will go up from 6.0 percent to 6.5 percent, and Shelton said the Legislature did appropriate slightly higher amounts for health insurance but that will likely be offset by higher premiums this fall.

While funding for CC stayed even with the last biennium, the college’s appropriation is still approximately $236,000 less than its funding level in 2002-2003 despite increasing enrollment.

In other college news, the CC Board of Regents met in regular session last Thursday and approved several items. Lightning-damaged equipment was replaced at a cost of more than $11,000 to be paid for by insurance, and regents authorized a final payment of $4,050 for work on the gym floor.

The board re-awarded a roofing bid on the Downtown Automotive Center to Paramount Builders & Roofers after the original contractor notified the college that it would not be able to do the work.

Regents accepted a new policy that sets up a system of faculty rank. Shelton said CC has not historically had ranked faculty – titles of professor, associate professor, etc. – but that such a system was mentioned in the college’s last master plan.

The CC Faculty Senate unanimously approved the plan, which was endorsed by Shelton before being ratified by the board last week. The ranking system does not grant tenure to any faculty members.

Regents also reviewed and approved a new crisis management plan, which Shelton says is the first step toward addressing safety issues that came to light during the last semester.

The board set August 2, 2007, as the date for a budget workshop retreat. A public hearing on next year’s budget will be August 16.

In personnel matters, the board accepted the resignation of CC Pampa Center custodian Cliff Sandin.

At a called meeting on May 3, Regents approved a bid for $31,250 from Craig Dane to construct a 30-foot by 125-foot hay barn and ratified the employment of Doug Kidd as the college’s motor pool specialist and Candra McKee as softball coach and student activity director.

The second annual “Trash To Treasures” garage sale event is slated for Saturday, June 16; and the deadline to sign up is next week.

The Clarendon Enterprise and A Fine Feathered Nest, Inc., have again teamed up to sponsor “Trash To Treasures” to coincide with Father’s Day weekend.

“This event exceeded our expectations last year, and we’re hoping it will be equally successful this year,” said publisher Roger Estlack. “People realize that it makes sense to have these garage sales on the same day to draw a bigger crowd.”

Residents who wish to participate in this year’s “Trash To Treasures” are asked to come by the Enterprise before 5 p.m. on Friday, June 8, to sign up for the promotion.

For just $20, each household will get 50-word advertisement in the Big-E Classifieds and the exclusive “Trash To Treasures” garage sale kit, which includes tips for holding a successful sale, price stickers, and two yard signs.

In addition, the Enterprise will print a city map the week of the event indicating the location of each sale and will promote the citywide garage sale in area newspapers and with local radio ads.

“Trash To Treasures” is intended to not only help residents earn more money at their garage and yard sales but also bring people from out of town to Clarendon to spend the day visiting our neighborhoods and patronizing our local merchants and restaurants.

Remember: The deadline for joining the “Trash To Treasures” promotion is Friday, June 8, at 5 p.m. For more information, call 874-2259 or come by the office at 105 S. Kearney.

Clarendon College President Myles Shelton has been offered the job of leading a larger community college.

Galveston College officials offered Shelton the top position at that school following a board meeting there last Wednesday.

“I feel very honored that Galveston College thinks enough of me to offer me this responsibility, and we’re in the process of considering their offer,” Shelton said.

Galveston Interim President William Auvenshine contacted Shelton Thursday with the board’s decision. He said he had notified the CC Board of Regents when Galveston’s search committee had first contacted him about the availability of the job.

Shelton said Tuesday that he is still reviewing the contract offered to him by GC and has not resigned from his current position.

Shelton was named as one of four finalists for the Galveston job last month after a screening procession reviewed more than 30 applications. Among the four finalists was another candidate with ties to Clarendon College – Dr. Philip Shirley, who was the Dean of Instruction at CC from 1986 to 1990.

With an enrollment of more than 2,000 students, Galveston College has a student body twice the size of Clarendon’s.

Shelton said Galveston did not give him a deadline to commit to their offer, but he expects to make a decision later this week or the first of next week.

Shelton has led Clarendon College since July 1, 1999.

Clarendon city officials are looking for ways to address discolored water that is continuing to be a problem for some residents in the south and east parts of the city.

Rhonda Howell addressed the Board of Aldermen during last Tuesday’s regular meeting and said she has had rusty colored water for two years. Flushing the lines helps for about a day, and then the water is discolored again, she said.

Howell complained that her white clothes have turned brown and that the problem is affecting her appliances and requested the city find the source of the problem.

City Secretary Linda Smith said this week that City Hall is trying to figure out how to determine which citizens are affected since reports of the discolored water have been scattered and not in a single location.

Smith also said state tests show the city’s water to be safe.

In other city business, the oath of office was administered to Mayor Mark White, Alderman Terry Noble, and Municipal Judge Jimmy Johnson.

Graham Towerton addressed the board concerning grant writing. He said he would seek grants for the city and charge an hourly rate if successful. No action was taken.

Joe Shadle reported that the sanitation department is losing money. Part of the problem is the increased fuel cost to haul trash to the landfill in Memphis. The board discussed raising fees at the recycling center and the possibility of stopping free dumping and the citywide clean up. No action was taken.

Aldermen selected the low bid of Lewis Construction in the amount of $29,250 for seal coat work. Seal coat bids were opened in Perryton on May 11 as part of a group of cities looking at doing seal coat work this summer.

City Superintendent Jim Roberts said he has been spraying for mosquitoes and has put larvacide at the waste water plant with the county paying half the bill.

Prior to Tuesday’s meeting, a public hearing was held for a grant application that would revitalize downtown Clarendon. C.P. Paul spoke against the project.

Hedley High School is proud to announce Ruth Howard and Jaci Copelin as the top two graduating students of the 2007 Senior Class.

The Valedictorian is Ruth Howard with a 3.83 grade point average.  She is the daughter of Bruce and Gwynne Howard.

Ruth has been actively involved in Cross Country, Basketball, UIL, Tennis, OAP, and National Honor Society.  She has been voted Class Secretary for the past four years.  She has qualified for regionals in Cross Country for the past two years.  She has been named to the all-district 1st team in Basketball for the past two years. 

Howard was named to the All-District team, and Academic All-State team in both Cross Country and Basketball.

This year she also qualified for regionals in tennis.  She was the first place winner in district and regionals in UIL calculator, being the first student from Hedley to make state in this event.

Last year Howard was name Homecoming Queen by her peers.

Ruth plans to attend Amarillo College and WTAMU, where she will pursue a career in special education.  She is actively involved in her youth group at the First Baptist Church in Hedley.  Ruth Anne has been a great asset, not only to Hedley School, but also the entire Hedley community.

Jaci Copelin is the Hedley Class of 2007 Salutatorian.  She is the daughter of Ernie and Tangela Copelin.

Jaci has been a cheerleader for the past two years.  She has been named to the All-American Cheerleading squad, voted Miss Hedley High School, Senior Class President, National Honor Society President, and Homecoming Queen for the 2007 year, and she received All-Star Cast honors in One Act Play

Copelin has been in Cross Country for the past four years, qualifying for regionals three of those years.  She has been part of the Hedley Lady Owls basketball team for the past four years and part of the Owl Track team for the past four years, where she has qualified for regionals for the past four years and was 5th in state in the 300 hurdles her Senior year.

Copelin has been named to the All-District 1st team in basketball her junior year and named District MVP her senior year.  She has been Cross Country and basketball captain the past two years and was named to the Academic All-state team in both basketball and cross country.

Jaci is a member of the Calvary Baptist Church in Clarendon.  She plans on attending Clarendon College and then getting her Bachelors of Science degree in nursing at WTAMU.

Howard and Copelin along with their classmates will graduate on May 25 in the Hedley High School gymnasium at 7:30 p.m.

Clarendon residents are having mixed reactions to new handicap ramps being installed along Koogle Street as part of an ADA project by the Texas Department of Transportation.

“So far this week the contractors have completed 9th, 8th and 7th streets on Koogle,” said Fu Benavidez, TxDOT Donley County Maintenance Supervisor. 

Jayne Starnes, who lives at Eighth and Koogle, says her family is satisfied with the work being done on the sidewalk in front of her home.

“It’s gone fine,” Starnes said. “We had one little problem (a leaking sprinkler line), but they corrected it immediately.”

But up the block at Seventh and Koogle, Frankie Henson is not happy at all about the work.

“I have never been so mad in all my life,” Henson said. “They’ve torn up my yard and everything.”

TxDOT Childress District Public Information Officer Barbara Seal says the project is being required by the federal government’s Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), which is mandating that the state remove barriers to the handicapped.

The project will cost $15 million statewide, and an estimated $211,000 is the cost of the local work, Seal said.

 “If there is any walking path – whether it’s just a trail but especially if it’s a sidewalk, we have to have access from the highway; and for us, that means removing the curb,” Seal said.

But Henson says she has lived in her home for 39 years and the state has never taken care of the sidewalks or the grass, and she also sees the project as a waste.

“There’s no way any one who is handicapped could get across the alley (on Seventh) to even get down that sidewalk,” she said.

The improvements are being made in the state right of way, but Henson sees the work as an intrusion.

“We don’t have any rights any more,” she said. “They just do what they want and tell you it’s the law.”

The project will continue on FM 2162 (Koogle Street), FM 2362 (Fifth Street), and US 287. Knish Corporation of Lonsdale, Minnesota, is the contractor for this project, and 280 working days have been scheduled to complete the project throughout the district.

To meet this goal, TxDOT is currently working to install or improve curb ramps at many corners in various locations in the Childress District as part of TxDOT’s Statewide Curb Ramp Program. Curb ramps will be installed or upgraded at corners on the state highway system, and existing pedestrian signal buttons and marked crosswalks will be made accessible from the curb ramps. 

Seal said TxDOT officials looked at every intersection and eliminated some corners from the project to prevent building “ramps to nowhere.”

For more information, contact Dan Baisa, Childress District Engineering Assistant (940) 937-7205 or Seal at (940) 937-7145.

The Donley County Hospital Board is taking bids to replace the roof of the Medical Center Nursing Home following their regular meeting last Tuesday.

The project is expected to cost more than $90,000, and Administrator Vicky Robertson said Monday that the district can pay for the project with money on hand, but they hope insurance will cover some of the cost.

“We’ve contacted the insurance company, and they’ve sent an adjuster,” Robertson said. “We had a hail stone actually go through the roof last spring, but the adjuster then didn’t find anything to pay a claim on.”

The now leaking roof became an obstacle to the board’s effort to sell the home when it was cited as one of the reasons Ron and Sharon Wetzel backed out of purchasing the facility last month.

The board also voted last week to hire an architect to put together a plan for adding four new semi-private rooms on the west side of the nursing home in an effort to improve the facility’s profitability and make it more attractive to potential buyers.

The eight new beds could generate an estimated $280,000 in new revenue annually.

The board expects the addition to cost about $200,000, and Robertson said that could also be paid for largely by money the district has in reserves.

“We want to pay for most of it up front and finance as little as possible,” Robertson said.

The district is moving forward with listing the facility with a Houston firm that will try to sell the nursing home.

While MCNH is on track to finish this fiscal year in the black, the board continues to worry about the long-term financial health of the home.

The hospital district’s new fiscal year starts in July, and Robertson says they know of an estimated $13,000 increase in Worker’s Compensation insurance premiums. Rising fuel costs and an expected hike in the federal minimum wage are also expected take a toll on the budget for the home.

“That and other increases mean a loss of maybe two positions,” Robertson said. “I hope we don’t have to do that, though.”