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Shelton Mason County Journal
Shelton, Washington
February 4, 1999     Shelton Mason County Journal
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February 4, 1999
 
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HOOD CANAL SCHOOL Superintendent John Simpson relays elec- tion results as votes are tallied via a cell phone from inside the Ma- son County Courthouse Tuesday night, while other election watch- ers look on behind him. an who shot ailing admits murder Shelton man who admitted his ailing wife at the Hillcrest home last No- entered a change of plea Was sentenced immediately County Superior Court P. "Pat" Foltz, 77, of 1005 Avenue, Shelton, was in Friday to plead guilty to a of murder in the second and was sentenced for kill- Wife, Norma Foltz. He was on November 18 after he and told them he had Foltz because she was pain. Gary Burlson dis- the notion that this was a killing. Mrs. Foltz was af- by heart trouble, diabetes and problems following hip sur- gery, but she wasn't in a lot pain when her husband of more than 40 years killed her, Burleson said. "SHE WAS ASLEEP. He shot her twice in the head," Bur- leson told the court. Judge James Sawyer sen- tenced Foltz to 160 months in prison. If he serves out his time, Foltz will be 89 when he gets out of a special facility in the prison set aside for elderly offenders. He was ordered to pay $500 to the crime victims' fund and $260 in court costs. Burleson said that financial difficulties related to Mrs. Foltz' maladies may have been a motive in the crime. Foltz himself suffers from senile dementia, according to the prosecutor. "What that did was twist his thinking into an unreal situa- tion," Burleson said. "It just basi- cally caused him to snap." DEFENSE ATTORNEY James Dixon said his client be- lieved he was doing what was best for his wife. "Mr. Foltz was indeed of the opinion that his wife was suffering from her various ailments," he said. "All I wanted is for her to get some peace. She had suffered too much," Foltz said. Mr. and Mrs. Foltz had four children. One of their daughters, Rene Dengle, was in attendance at the hearing. CK youth center take over armory 4 P.m. on Friday, February will see a Changing of will mark the over of the Washington Guard Armory in Shel- lessee, SOCK. Save Our County's Kids, that has been a drop-in center and a of activities for kids in at Sixth and Franklin In downtown Shelton for tat year and a half. SOCK president, Sue Sheldon, a five-year lease for :E CHANGEOVER and !se will give SOCK a lot in its use of the said board member Vi who recalls gen- earing arrangements on of the National Guard. ld use it so long as we clean and repaired she said. $10,000 a year, it's a will weigh heavily edgling youth organiza- said the building to Washington Na- and the Guard will office in the building for in case of disaster, mili- or other emergency. longer will SOCK kids to take all the gear gYmnasium in advance or be unable to of the facility as special- rooms. Though they'll back for such outside s the veterans' annual basket distribution, all theirs. pry building enables kids a range of ac- l-court basketball, vol- pool tables, arts and more. "What this allowed us to do is open rooms," Cruickshank said. Separate areas allow perma- nent setups for arts and crafts, woodworking, weights and exer- cise equipment. "We even have boxing," she added. Barney Stewart, SOCK's activities director, is teaching boxing. (A feature story on SOCK's boxing program can be found in this week's Journal sports section.) A DANCE is planned for Fri- day evening to celebrate SOCK's new status. Taped music and re- freshments will be the order of the evening, Cruickshank said. "The kitchen," she smiled, "is al- ways open whenever an activity is going on." And activities there will be, es- pecially with that lease obligation looming in the wings - and utili- ties on top of it. "So we've got to really hustle with our fund- raisers," she conceded. One of the major fund-raisers for SOCK will be Saturday indoor swap-meets: "SOCK-swaps," Cruickshank said. They'll be like big garage sales, she explained. "People can rent a table for $15 and bring their crafts, collecti- bles, yard-sale stuff, whatever." They'll start on February 27. More information is available from Darlene Wilson at 427-3469 or Gail Yates at 427-0659. Also in the offing is a repeat of last October's seafood dinner fund-raiser. "That went very well," Cruickshank said, "especially for a first-time thing. Maybe we'll have more than one a year." And SOCK, along with Communities in Schools, will sponsor this spring's Fiddle Fest Cruickshank added. LIKE MANY other volun- teers, Cruickshank got involved with SOCK "when we had that first meeting at the PUD discuss- ing gangs in town." The extent of risk for young people was real, she felt. She recognized a call for action. "I think young people in town need something to do, a place to go," she said thoughtfully. 'rhey're not all into sports; there needs to be something else, a place to come hang out with friends, but a place that's super- vised." A Sheltonian since 1949, she remembers when there was a skating rink in town as well as a theater. "And when my daughters were teens, there was a small teen center on Hillcrest called Inn Quest," she recalled. Save Our County's Kids opened its doors at the Armory in re- sponse to such a need on June 11, 1997. Since then, 1,200 kids have registered as participants at the SOCK Center. "Most nights," Cruickshank said, "we have 65 to 85 in and out." SUE SHELDON serves as president of a board of directors that includes Cruickshank, Barn- ey Stewart and Gaff Yates. Volunteers from a pool of some 25 to 30 people provide super- vision at the center regularly or on an on-call basis. "Everyone's a volunteer," Cruickshank says. There are no paid personnel. 'Tet," she adds. SOCK activities aren't confined to town. Last summer saw two outings to the Long Beach Penin- sula, for instance, once for the sand castle competition and once, with handmade kites in hand, for the International Kite Festival. WHAT'S AHEAD for SOCK? "We hope by mid-February to be open after school," Cruick- .... shank said. "We already have some computers set up for games, but we hope to have some dedi- cated for kids to do their homework." She added that since SOCK is a fully tax-exempt nonprofit agen- (Please turn to page 3.) School levies approved; two bonds short of votes By JEFF GREEN There was joy at Hood Canal and North Mason school districts, anxiety at Pioneer and dejection at Mary M. Knight following Tuesday's special election. Hood Canal voters shrugged off last year's disastrous double-levy failure and gave overwhelming approval to the district's two- year, $760,000 maintenance-and- operations levy. The levy received 69.7 percent voter approval. A four-year, $9.2 million main- tenance-and-operations levy at North Mason School District ap- pears to have squeaked past the needed 60 percent approval mark. The "yes" votes totaled 1,543, or 61.5 percent. Meanwhile, Pioneer School District's $16.1 million bond issue is hovering just below the 60 per- cent mark. Yet-to-be-counted ab- sentee ballots will decide the fate of the bond issue, which so far has garnered 59.6 percent voter approval. MARY M. KNIGHT School District voters gave a resounding "no" vote to the district's $8.4 mil- lion bond issue. The measure re- ceived only 34.3 percent voter ap- proval. Hood Canal's 26-member levy committee was the key to the dis- trict's levy victory, according to Superintendent John Simpson. "In truth," he said, "the levy was set by the community. We did have a good range of people in that committee. I mean, we had parents in the committee, we had people that didn't have any chil- dren in the school, we had people that didn't have grandchildren in the school. "It was a broad-based commu- nity committee, and I can't say enough about that committee and the people that worked as chairs in that committee - they all just need a super thank-you from everybody for the fine, fine job they did putting this thing to- gether. I'm eled. I really am. "We're not going to let 'em down. We will not let the people down. There's no question about that. We have a lot of plans in ef- fect that will be good academic uses for this money. And I really just have to say, again, to the community: Thank you very much for that, for this wonderful surprise. It's a vote for kids. It is. They know how many kids go to that school. People know that it's a K-8 school, and they're voting that those kids have a quality ed- ucation." From the first vote count inside the Mason County Courthouse, which tallied absentee votes, Hood Canal's levy appeared head- ed for passage. The percentage of "yes" votes increased during the periodic vote tallies, and when it was evident to all that the trend was irreversible a cheer went up from the levy supporters. BY CONTRAST, North Ma- son's huge $9.2 million levy hung in the balance throughout the night. The percentage crept up- wards toward the magic 60 per- cent mark and supporters hung around inside the courtroom for the arrival and counting of ballots from Dewatto and other far-flung rural areas. The North Mason supporters literally were on the edge of their seats as Mason County Commis- sioner Cindy Olsen posted the fi- nal vote tally. The anxious ex- pressions on their faces turned to smiles as the percentage of "yes" votes rose to 61.5. They're not out of the woods yet in Belfair, because 846 absen- tee ballots remain uncounted. It's unknown for now how many of those will be returned and count- ed, but of the absentee ballots iIIlIIIIIllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll On the inside Births .................................... A1 Classifieds ........................... 26 Community Calendar ......... 7 Crossword ........................... 30 Entertainment, Dining ..... 24 Health Journal ................... 14 Journal of Record .............. 16 Obituaries .............................. 9 Opinions, Letters ................. 4 Sports .................................... lS Tides ..................................... 23 Weather .............. ;t. ................. 9 IHIHHIIIHIIHMHIIIHIIHHmlIIIHHHHIHHli that were counted Tuesday 54.4 percent were in favor of the levy. Outstanding absentee ballots will determine Pioneer School District's 20-year, $16.1 million bond issue for a new high school, six classrooms at the primary school and modernizing and add- ing classrooms at the interme- diate and middle school. Tuesday night the measure fell nine "yes" votes shy of the 60 percent need- ed for passage. "I THINK IT'S a long shot right now," said Pioneer Schools Superintendent Dick Sirokman Wednesday morning. "We'll have to wait and see." There are 491 absentee ballots yet to be returned and counted. If all of them are returned, which is doubtful, then 303 (or 61.7 per- cent) of those need to be "yes" votes for the bond to pass. Of the absentee votes counted Tuesday, 52 percent were in favor of the bond. The current favorable bond market may have been the strongest selling point of all for the bond measure, Sirokman said. "It is the lowest we've had in history," he observed, "and this is a real opportunity for people to take advantage of. Not only are construction costs going to rise here in the future, but also the in- terest rates. They're not going to remain this low forever, so this is a real opportunity for the commu- nity." Sirokman said he felt Pioneer voters were more knowledgeable about the bond issue. One of the bigger issues was the increased number of Pioneer students at- tending high school outside the district. "We started talking to them about 400 kids on a bus every day for three and a half, four hours," he said. "That was pretty signifi- cant because we, as adults, would not get in a car and go to our jobs for three and half, four hours every day without feeling sorry for ourselves in a big way. "And so I really believe that probably had some imvact" (Please turn to page 2.) Hood Canal $lmol District Tax levy Yes 1,028 69.7% No 447 30.3% Outstanding absentee bal- lots: 418 Pioneer School District Bond issue Yes 1,223 59.6% No 830 40.4% Outstanding absentees: 491 Mary M, Knight School District (Matlock) Bond issue Yes 114 34.3% No 218 65.7% Outstanding absentees: 299 North Mason School District Tax levy Yes 1,543 61.5% No 967 38.5% Outstanding absentees: 846 Thursday, February 4, 1999 113th Year - Number 5 4 Sections - 36 Pages 50 Cents Woman hit by pickup near her mailbox dies Vivian Buechel, 88, of Shelton died of head injuries Monday when a pickup truck hit her by her mailbox at Mile 7.4 of the Shelton-Matlock Road. The incident occurred around 3:15 p.m., according to the Wash- ington State Patrol. It was rain- ing and the road was wet when Shelton Fire Department re- Buechel reportedly stepped into sponded to the scene. Buechel the road's westbound lane just as was taken to Mason General Hos- 61-year-old Donald Fred Likes of pital, where she was declared to Shelton was headed west in his be deceased. 1995 Ford pickup. Emergency units from Medic Troopers said the pickup had One, Fire District 16 and the $500in damage. MMK worker charged in school bomb threat The computer specialist at Mary M. Knight School in Mat- lock faces charges that he called in a bomb threat so he could take that afternoon off. That's the motive outlined in information filed last week in Ma- son County Superior Court. Brad A. Gallien, 21, of 430 West Satsop Bridge Road, Elma, was identi- fied in connection with the threat last Thursday. Students were evacuated from classrooms and sent home from the rural school in West Mason County shortly after 1:10 p.m. Thursday, January 21, when an unidentified caller with "a low, tough voice" called the school. The call was taken by school employee Cornelia Brehmeyer, according to court papers. She said the caller said, "There's a bomb in the school and it's going off in 20 minutes." Superintendent Fred Yancey told deputies about a rumor that one of the students had made the call. That student denied making the call but said that Gallien may have done it, according to court papers. Gallien talked about mak- ing the bomb threat at a birthday party after the incident, according to court papers. Deputies who investigated the case said there were 239 students at the school when the bomb threat was made. They wrote that Gallien's time card indicated he checked out for lunch at 1:12 p.m., or about three minutes be- fore the bomb threat was reported to Shelton Communication Cen- ter, the emergency dispatch agen- cy for the Mason County Sheriffs Office. Judge James Sawyer appoint- ed Ron Sergi to be his public defender and set bail at $5,000. He was ordered to stay away from the school or from any witnesses in the case. Arraignment was set for Feb- ruary 4. New 76-bed Shelton nursing home opens A new, $5-million nursing care facility opened its doors to pa- tients last week at the intersec- tion of North 13th Street and Johns Prairie Road in Shelton. SunRise Care and Rehabilita- tion for Shelton has scheduled an open house for the public on Sun- day, February 14, from i to 4 p.m. at 153 Johns Court. Music, bal- loons, a clown and refreshments will be the order of the day. At full capacity, SunRise is equipped for 76 patients, with an expected employee force of 80 full- time workers. "We're a skilled nursing facility," said administra- tor David Miller, who noted that SunRise is "soon to be dually li- censed with Medicaid and Medi- care. We're waiting for that in- spection; we expect that to hap- pen within the next several weeks." FOR THE TIME being, it's a gradual startup. The facility had eight residents as of Monday, ac- cording to Miller. Once the Medicaid and Medi- care licensing is completed, Miller indicated, the population will rise quickly. Initial hiring is complete, but as the patient numbers rise, there will be additional interview- ing and hiring of staff. A specialty of the facility, he said, will be transitional care for patients just out of the hospital setting whose condition is stable but who need monitoring. "We have 20 beds dedicated to that kind of intensive nursing care," Miller said. "We believe we will be able to handle that transition- al or subacute population in addi- tion to long-term residents." SunRise acquired the certifi- cate of need for 76 beds, a state process that's required for such facilities, from Exceptional For- esters, Incorporated. That certifi- cate of need was a contested issue for more than a decade between EFI and Fir Lane Terrace Con- valescent Center, ON SUNDAY, February 14, community members can explore the new facility. Staffers will lead tours and can answer all kinds of questions, Miller said. SunRise, Incorporated is the largest provider of long-term care in Washington, Miller said, citing Montesano Medical and Rehabili- tation as the firm's closest exist- ing facility. SunRise is a member of the Sun Healthcare Group of Albuquerque, New Mexico, which operates 400 nursing homes na- tionwide. HOOD CANAL SCHOOL Superintendent John Simpson relays elec- tion results as votes are tallied via a cell phone from inside the Ma- son County Courthouse Tuesday night, while other election watch- ers look on behind him. an who shot ailing admits murder Shelton man who admitted his ailing wife at the Hillcrest home last No- entered a change of plea Was sentenced immediately County Superior Court P. "Pat" Foltz, 77, of 1005 Avenue, Shelton, was in Friday to plead guilty to a of murder in the second and was sentenced for kill- Wife, Norma Foltz. He was on November 18 after he and told them he had Foltz because she was pain. Gary Burlson dis- the notion that this was a killing. Mrs. Foltz was af- by heart trouble, diabetes and problems following hip sur- gery, but she wasn't in a lot pain when her husband of more than 40 years killed her, Burleson said. "SHE WAS ASLEEP. He shot her twice in the head," Bur- leson told the court. Judge James Sawyer sen- tenced Foltz to 160 months in prison. If he serves out his time, Foltz will be 89 when he gets out of a special facility in the prison set aside for elderly offenders. He was ordered to pay $500 to the crime victims' fund and $260 in court costs. Burleson said that financial difficulties related to Mrs. Foltz' maladies may have been a motive in the crime. Foltz himself suffers from senile dementia, according to the prosecutor. "What that did was twist his thinking into an unreal situa- tion," Burleson said. "It just basi- cally caused him to snap." DEFENSE ATTORNEY James Dixon said his client be- lieved he was doing what was best for his wife. "Mr. Foltz was indeed of the opinion that his wife was suffering from her various ailments," he said. "All I wanted is for her to get some peace. She had suffered too much," Foltz said. Mr. and Mrs. Foltz had four children. One of their daughters, Rene Dengle, was in attendance at the hearing. CK youth center take over armory 4 P.m. on Friday, February will see a Changing of will mark the over of the Washington Guard Armory in Shel- lessee, SOCK. Save Our County's Kids, that has been a drop-in center and a of activities for kids in at Sixth and Franklin In downtown Shelton for tat year and a half. SOCK president, Sue Sheldon, a five-year lease for :E CHANGEOVER and !se will give SOCK a lot in its use of the said board member Vi who recalls gen- earing arrangements on of the National Guard. ld use it so long as we clean and repaired she said. $10,000 a year, it's a will weigh heavily edgling youth organiza- said the building to Washington Na- and the Guard will office in the building for in case of disaster, mili- or other emergency. longer will SOCK kids to take all the gear gYmnasium in advance or be unable to of the facility as special- rooms. Though they'll back for such outside s the veterans' annual basket distribution, all theirs. pry building enables kids a range of ac- l-court basketball, vol- pool tables, arts and more. "What this allowed us to do is open rooms," Cruickshank said. Separate areas allow perma- nent setups for arts and crafts, woodworking, weights and exer- cise equipment. "We even have boxing," she added. Barney Stewart, SOCK's activities director, is teaching boxing. (A feature story on SOCK's boxing program can be found in this week's Journal sports section.) A DANCE is planned for Fri- day evening to celebrate SOCK's new status. Taped music and re- freshments will be the order of the evening, Cruickshank said. "The kitchen," she smiled, "is al- ways open whenever an activity is going on." And activities there will be, es- pecially with that lease obligation looming in the wings - and utili- ties on top of it. "So we've got to really hustle with our fund- raisers," she conceded. One of the major fund-raisers for SOCK will be Saturday indoor swap-meets: "SOCK-swaps," Cruickshank said. They'll be like big garage sales, she explained. "People can rent a table for $15 and bring their crafts, collecti- bles, yard-sale stuff, whatever." They'll start on February 27. More information is available from Darlene Wilson at 427-3469 or Gail Yates at 427-0659. Also in the offing is a repeat of last October's seafood dinner fund-raiser. "That went very well," Cruickshank said, "especially for a first-time thing. Maybe we'll have more than one a year." And SOCK, along with Communities in Schools, will sponsor this spring's Fiddle Fest Cruickshank added. LIKE MANY other volun- teers, Cruickshank got involved with SOCK "when we had that first meeting at the PUD discuss- ing gangs in town." The extent of risk for young people was real, she felt. She recognized a call for action. "I think young people in town need something to do, a place to go," she said thoughtfully. 'rhey're not all into sports; there needs to be something else, a place to come hang out with friends, but a place that's super- vised." A Sheltonian since 1949, she remembers when there was a skating rink in town as well as a theater. "And when my daughters were teens, there was a small teen center on Hillcrest called Inn Quest," she recalled. Save Our County's Kids opened its doors at the Armory in re- sponse to such a need on June 11, 1997. Since then, 1,200 kids have registered as participants at the SOCK Center. "Most nights," Cruickshank said, "we have 65 to 85 in and out." SUE SHELDON serves as president of a board of directors that includes Cruickshank, Barn- ey Stewart and Gaff Yates. Volunteers from a pool of some 25 to 30 people provide super- vision at the center regularly or on an on-call basis. "Everyone's a volunteer," Cruickshank says. There are no paid personnel. 'Tet," she adds. SOCK activities aren't confined to town. Last summer saw two outings to the Long Beach Penin- sula, for instance, once for the sand castle competition and once, with handmade kites in hand, for the International Kite Festival. WHAT'S AHEAD for SOCK? "We hope by mid-February to be open after school," Cruick- .... shank said. "We already have some computers set up for games, but we hope to have some dedi- cated for kids to do their homework." She added that since SOCK is a fully tax-exempt nonprofit agen- (Please turn to page 3.) School levies approved; two bonds short of votes By JEFF GREEN There was joy at Hood Canal and North Mason school districts, anxiety at Pioneer and dejection at Mary M. Knight following Tuesday's special election. Hood Canal voters shrugged off last year's disastrous double-levy failure and gave overwhelming approval to the district's two- year, $760,000 maintenance-and- operations levy. The levy received 69.7 percent voter approval. A four-year, $9.2 million main- tenance-and-operations levy at North Mason School District ap- pears to have squeaked past the needed 60 percent approval mark. The "yes" votes totaled 1,543, or 61.5 percent. Meanwhile, Pioneer School District's $16.1 million bond issue is hovering just below the 60 per- cent mark. Yet-to-be-counted ab- sentee ballots will decide the fate of the bond issue, which so far has garnered 59.6 percent voter approval. MARY M. KNIGHT School District voters gave a resounding "no" vote to the district's $8.4 mil- lion bond issue. The measure re- ceived only 34.3 percent voter ap- proval. Hood Canal's 26-member levy committee was the key to the dis- trict's levy victory, according to Superintendent John Simpson. "In truth," he said, "the levy was set by the community. We did have a good range of people in that committee. I mean, we had parents in the committee, we had people that didn't have any chil- dren in the school, we had people that didn't have grandchildren in the school. "It was a broad-based commu- nity committee, and I can't say enough about that committee and the people that worked as chairs in that committee - they all just need a super thank-you from everybody for the fine, fine job they did putting this thing to- gether. I'm eled. I really am. "We're not going to let 'em down. We will not let the people down. There's no question about that. We have a lot of plans in ef- fect that will be good academic uses for this money. And I really just have to say, again, to the community: Thank you very much for that, for this wonderful surprise. It's a vote for kids. It is. They know how many kids go to that school. People know that it's a K-8 school, and they're voting that those kids have a quality ed- ucation." From the first vote count inside the Mason County Courthouse, which tallied absentee votes, Hood Canal's levy appeared head- ed for passage. The percentage of "yes" votes increased during the periodic vote tallies, and when it was evident to all that the trend was irreversible a cheer went up from the levy supporters. BY CONTRAST, North Ma- son's huge $9.2 million levy hung in the balance throughout the night. The percentage crept up- wards toward the magic 60 per- cent mark and supporters hung around inside the courtroom for the arrival and counting of ballots from Dewatto and other far-flung rural areas. The North Mason supporters literally were on the edge of their seats as Mason County Commis- sioner Cindy Olsen posted the fi- nal vote tally. The anxious ex- pressions on their faces turned to smiles as the percentage of "yes" votes rose to 61.5. They're not out of the woods yet in Belfair, because 846 absen- tee ballots remain uncounted. It's unknown for now how many of those will be returned and count- ed, but of the absentee ballots iIIlIIIIIllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll On the inside Births .................................... A1 Classifieds ........................... 26 Community Calendar ......... 7 Crossword ........................... 30 Entertainment, Dining ..... 24 Health Journal ................... 14 Journal of Record .............. 16 Obituaries .............................. 9 Opinions, Letters ................. 4 Sports .................................... lS Tides ..................................... 23 Weather .............. ;t. ................. 9 IHIHHIIIHIIHMHIIIHIIHHmlIIIHHHHIHHli that were counted Tuesday 54.4 percent were in favor of the levy. Outstanding absentee ballots will determine Pioneer School District's 20-year, $16.1 million bond issue for a new high school, six classrooms at the primary school and modernizing and add- ing classrooms at the interme- diate and middle school. Tuesday night the measure fell nine "yes" votes shy of the 60 percent need- ed for passage. "I THINK IT'S a long shot right now," said Pioneer Schools Superintendent Dick Sirokman Wednesday morning. "We'll have to wait and see." There are 491 absentee ballots yet to be returned and counted. If all of them are returned, which is doubtful, then 303 (or 61.7 per- cent) of those need to be "yes" votes for the bond to pass. Of the absentee votes counted Tuesday, 52 percent were in favor of the bond. The current favorable bond market may have been the strongest selling point of all for the bond measure, Sirokman said. "It is the lowest we've had in history," he observed, "and this is a real opportunity for people to take advantage of. Not only are construction costs going to rise here in the future, but also the in- terest rates. They're not going to remain this low forever, so this is a real opportunity for the commu- nity." Sirokman said he felt Pioneer voters were more knowledgeable about the bond issue. One of the bigger issues was the increased number of Pioneer students at- tending high school outside the district. "We started talking to them about 400 kids on a bus every day for three and a half, four hours," he said. "That was pretty signifi- cant because we, as adults, would not get in a car and go to our jobs for three and half, four hours every day without feeling sorry for ourselves in a big way. "And so I really believe that probably had some imvact" (Please turn to page 2.) Hood Canal $lmol District Tax levy Yes 1,028 69.7% No 447 30.3% Outstanding absentee bal- lots: 418 Pioneer School District Bond issue Yes 1,223 59.6% No 830 40.4% Outstanding absentees: 491 Mary M, Knight School District (Matlock) Bond issue Yes 114 34.3% No 218 65.7% Outstanding absentees: 299 North Mason School District Tax levy Yes 1,543 61.5% No 967 38.5% Outstanding absentees: 846 Thursday, February 4, 1999 113th Year - Number 5 4 Sections - 36 Pages 50 Cents Woman hit by pickup near her mailbox dies Vivian Buechel, 88, of Shelton died of head injuries Monday when a pickup truck hit her by her mailbox at Mile 7.4 of the Shelton-Matlock Road. The incident occurred around 3:15 p.m., according to the Wash- ington State Patrol. It was rain- ing and the road was wet when Shelton Fire Department re- Buechel reportedly stepped into sponded to the scene. Buechel the road's westbound lane just as was taken to Mason General Hos- 61-year-old Donald Fred Likes of pital, where she was declared to Shelton was headed west in his be deceased. 1995 Ford pickup. Emergency units from Medic Troopers said the pickup had One, Fire District 16 and the $500in damage. MMK worker charged in school bomb threat The computer specialist at Mary M. Knight School in Mat- lock faces charges that he called in a bomb threat so he could take that afternoon off. That's the motive outlined in information filed last week in Ma- son County Superior Court. Brad A. Gallien, 21, of 430 West Satsop Bridge Road, Elma, was identi- fied in connection with the threat last Thursday. Students were evacuated from classrooms and sent home from the rural school in West Mason County shortly after 1:10 p.m. Thursday, January 21, when an unidentified caller with "a low, tough voice" called the school. The call was taken by school employee Cornelia Brehmeyer, according to court papers. She said the caller said, "There's a bomb in the school and it's going off in 20 minutes." Superintendent Fred Yancey told deputies about a rumor that one of the students had made the call. That student denied making the call but said that Gallien may have done it, according to court papers. Gallien talked about mak- ing the bomb threat at a birthday party after the incident, according to court papers. Deputies who investigated the case said there were 239 students at the school when the bomb threat was made. They wrote that Gallien's time card indicated he checked out for lunch at 1:12 p.m., or about three minutes be- fore the bomb threat was reported to Shelton Communication Cen- ter, the emergency dispatch agen- cy for the Mason County Sheriffs Office. Judge James Sawyer appoint- ed Ron Sergi to be his public defender and set bail at $5,000. He was ordered to stay away from the school or from any witnesses in the case. Arraignment was set for Feb- ruary 4. New 76-bed Shelton nursing home opens A new, $5-million nursing care facility opened its doors to pa- tients last week at the intersec- tion of North 13th Street and Johns Prairie Road in Shelton. SunRise Care and Rehabilita- tion for Shelton has scheduled an open house for the public on Sun- day, February 14, from i to 4 p.m. at 153 Johns Court. Music, bal- loons, a clown and refreshments will be the order of the day. At full capacity, SunRise is equipped for 76 patients, with an expected employee force of 80 full- time workers. "We're a skilled nursing facility," said administra- tor David Miller, who noted that SunRise is "soon to be dually li- censed with Medicaid and Medi- care. We're waiting for that in- spection; we expect that to hap- pen within the next several weeks." FOR THE TIME being, it's a gradual startup. The facility had eight residents as of Monday, ac- cording to Miller. Once the Medicaid and Medi- care licensing is completed, Miller indicated, the population will rise quickly. Initial hiring is complete, but as the patient numbers rise, there will be additional interview- ing and hiring of staff. A specialty of the facility, he said, will be transitional care for patients just out of the hospital setting whose condition is stable but who need monitoring. "We have 20 beds dedicated to that kind of intensive nursing care," Miller said. "We believe we will be able to handle that transition- al or subacute population in addi- tion to long-term residents." SunRise acquired the certifi- cate of need for 76 beds, a state process that's required for such facilities, from Exceptional For- esters, Incorporated. That certifi- cate of need was a contested issue for more than a decade between EFI and Fir Lane Terrace Con- valescent Center, ON SUNDAY, February 14, community members can explore the new facility. Staffers will lead tours and can answer all kinds of questions, Miller said. SunRise, Incorporated is the largest provider of long-term care in Washington, Miller said, citing Montesano Medical and Rehabili- tation as the firm's closest exist- ing facility. SunRise is a member of the Sun Healthcare Group of Albuquerque, New Mexico, which operates 400 nursing homes na- tionwide.