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Newspaper Archive of
Shelton Mason County Journal
Shelton, Washington
December 27, 2007     Shelton Mason County Journal
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December 27, 2007
 
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rq co °N- untY JOURNAL Thursday, December 27, 2007 121st Year m Number 52 5 Sections -- 38 Pages Published in Shelton, Washington 75 cents Classical carols The Chamber Singers of Shelton High School bring the spirit of the season to Shelton United Methodist Church at the last of the Soup and Sound events hosted by the congregation in the weeks before Christmas. There's more on page 8. FF{ains also (.tevastate 00orest Serx00.tce roads For more than two weeks, U.S. Forest Service crews have been clearing, repairing and opening roads wracked by the big storm early this month. Those crews have been find- ing more and more landslides or washouts as they progress along major travel routes, Forest Ser- vice officials said. The early December storm left hundreds of miles of roads and trails inaccessible and damaged major campgrounds, administra- tive sites, bridges and special-use facilities throughout the national forest. After making emergency re- pairs and clearing debris from the first 11 miles of Forest Road 25 near Hoodsport, crews from the Hood Canal District found a mas- sive landslide of several thousand cubic yards that covered the road with as much as 15 feet of debris. The damaged and clogged culvert and debris over the road will take weeks, if not months, to repair, the Forest Service reported. BUT AS CREWS fix what roads and bridges they can, they're confronting more and more storm damage. Much of the emergency repair work they're doing now is temporary and the roads will have to wait until spring for needed cul- verts, fill, riprap or for the large earth-moving equipment needed to move large amounts of debris from road surfaces. "The snow level is low and most of the roads have compact snow or ice," Art Gibson, road mainte- nance engineer for the national forest, said last week. "It is impos- sible to see washouts and estimate the amount of debris over roads when they're buried by two feet of snow. The snow is preventing crews from accessing roads above 2,000 feet in elevation." One contractor with crews is opening culverts and installing culverts on Forest Road 25 in the Hamma Hamma area, and replac- ing washed out riprap at bridge abutments on the Hamma Ham- ma Bridge and Jefferson Creek Bridge over the 2480 Road. Crews are working one site at a time as weather permits, Gibson said. The storm's wind and rain affected different areas of the for- est with varying intensities. (Please turn to page 6.) IIIlUlIIIIIIIIIIIIlUlIIIIIIIIIIIIIlUlIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIlUlIIIIIIIIIIII the inside Classifieds ........................... 28 Community Calendar ....... 16 Crossword ........................... 31 Entertainment, Dining ..... 26 Health Journal ................... 7 Journal of Record ............. 23 Obituaries ........................... 10 Opinions, Letters ................. 4 Sports ................................... 19 Tides ..................................... 23 Weather ................................ 12 lUIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIUlIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIUIIIIIIIIIIIUIIIIIIII I][l!l!l!!l]!!ll!!l!l!lllll00 County hikes city's jail costs 20 percent The cost of housing Shelton prisoners in the Mason County Jail and in a jail in Wapato will increase starting with the new year. Shelton city commissioners at their meeting Monday morning heard from Shelby Conklin, ad- ministrator of the Shelton Mu- nicipal Court, that the cost of jailing a prisoner from Shelton in the Mason County Jail will increase from $62 a day in 2007 to $74.53 a day in 2008, an in- . crease of 20.2 percent. Meanwhile, the cost of hous- ing a Shelton prisoner in jail in the City of Wapato is rising from $40 a day in 2007 to $45 a day in 2008, an increase of 12.5 percent. Shelton has annual contracts with both Wapato and Mason County to house prison- ers sentenced to jail terms by the Shelton Municipal Court. The flat monthly rate for city prisoners in the Mason Coun- ty Jail will be $18,297.12 per month, Conklin wrote in a brief- ing memo to the commission- ers. Due to the above increases, she requested an additional $30,000, which she noted has been funded in the city's 2008 budget. The commissioners are set to approve the matter at their meeting scheduled for 10 a.m. on Monday, December 31, in the Shelton Civic Center, 525 West Cota Street. In other action Monday, the commissioners passed an ordi- nance approving the annexation to the city of a parcel at Madi- son and G streets. The property is currently undeveloped and measures slightly over half an acre. Woman hurt when auto hits Shelton school bus head-on A 22-year-old Shelton woman is in satisfactory condition at Har- borview Medical Center in Seattle a week after crashing her vehicle head-on with a Shelton School District bus on West Cloquallum Road. Krista Lee Wiley was airlifted to Harborview on December 20 after injuries sustained in the crash reported at 8:51 a.m. about five miles west of Shelton. Trooper Maurice Bauer of the Washington State Patrol reported that no one on the school bus was injured and that includes the driver, 62-year- old Carole Susan Poole, of Shel- ton. Wiley was driving a 1991 Toyo- ta sedan eastbound on Cloquallum Road and crossed the centerlJne on a curve and struck the 1984 Ford van school bus head-on in /he westbound lane, Bauer reported. The cause of the crash remains under investigation by the state patrol. College students help design rejuvenation at Foothills Park Mason County Parks and Trails Department has collaborated with Western Washington University's park design class to get a fresh perspective and innovative ideas for its reju;enat{6"oT-'{]iiS .... Park. In August, Mason County Parks and Trails Director John Keates contacted Jim Moore, an associate professor of physical education, health and recreation, about utiliz- ing the park design class to design project plans for Foothills Park on the west side of Hood Canal. "John graduated from the Rec- reation Program in the early 1980s and has had an excellent parks and recreation career," Moore said. "He has kept in touch over the years and is a good friend to Western and the Recreation Pro- gram." Moore said Keates liked his ex- perience at Western and feels con- nected to it. "That is really amaz- ing because it has been 25 years since he was a student," he added. KEATES SAID he thought the project would be a good opportu- nity to collaborate with WWU and would provide students with an opportunity t ° generate ideas that could potentially be imple- mented. "Experiential education is a great way to get students in- volved," Moore said. "It's a tech- nique that isn't used as commonly as it should be." Keates visited the class in Oc- tober and presented them with the design guidelines. At the same time, he said, he didn't want these guidelines to limit the stu- dents' creativity. "I was very impressed. They spent a lot of time and effort gen- erating ideas, and I thought that really showed in the final presen- tations," Keates said. "I was hop- ing for some creativity and that goal was achieved; the students came up with ideas that nobody else had thought of." THE STUDENT proposals will be shared with Mason County residents during public meetings to discuss plans for park renova- tions. Keates said he thinks com- ponents from each of the propos- als will be combined to create a final park design. "The students really liked hav- ing a project that was more than a created scenario and appreciated that their creativity was invited," Moore said. "Some students de- signed the park to remain in its natural vegetative state with hik- ing trails; others incorporated more active sport areas. They all designed the park to meet the needs of the community but used the big-picture information differ- ently." Moore said the students could know the final outcome of the proposals early in 2008. The new ideas presented by the Western students have generated public interest in the parks, which will make it easier to get funding for the project, Keates said. VETERANS, SCOUTS and volunteers stand by 700-plus baskets of food for the needy Saturday morning. Large donation sends it over the top: Christmas Fund fills 745 baskets A generous woman walked into the Journal office last Friday and made a $1,500 anonymous donation to the Jour- nal-40 et 8 Christmas Fund that sent the fund over the top of its $25,000 goal. The fund was about $3,000 short of its mark last week, but thanks to that person and several last-minute donations, the total of the 61st annual Christmas Fund this week exceeded its goal. By Wednesday, the fund had reached $26,444. Veterans of the 40 et 8 filled 745 food baskets for the needy last Saturday morning. Final contributions to the Christ- mas Fund were: anonymous, $100; Jack Brown, $20; Roslynne and David Reed, $200; Kristmastown Kiwanis, $500; Saint Edward's Catholic Church, $500; anony- mous, $100; in memory of Dinah Allison, $50; anonymous, $20; anonymous, $250; John and Pam Harrell, $100; and Arnold and Smith Insurance, $100. Other contributions included Gumby and Pokey, $50; anonymous, $20; anony- mous, $1,500; Lois Van Slyke, $50; Rich- ard and Carol McInelly, $100; anonymous, $50; Josh and Levi Myer, $50; anonymous, $200; and Ray and Mildred Stevens, $10o. rq co °N- untY JOURNAL Thursday, December 27, 2007 121st Year m Number 52 5 Sections -- 38 Pages Published in Shelton, Washington 75 cents Classical carols The Chamber Singers of Shelton High School bring the spirit of the season to Shelton United Methodist Church at the last of the Soup and Sound events hosted by the congregation in the weeks before Christmas. There's more on page 8. FF{ains also (.tevastate 00orest Serx00.tce roads For more than two weeks, U.S. Forest Service crews have been clearing, repairing and opening roads wracked by the big storm early this month. Those crews have been find- ing more and more landslides or washouts as they progress along major travel routes, Forest Ser- vice officials said. The early December storm left hundreds of miles of roads and trails inaccessible and damaged major campgrounds, administra- tive sites, bridges and special-use facilities throughout the national forest. After making emergency re- pairs and clearing debris from the first 11 miles of Forest Road 25 near Hoodsport, crews from the Hood Canal District found a mas- sive landslide of several thousand cubic yards that covered the road with as much as 15 feet of debris. The damaged and clogged culvert and debris over the road will take weeks, if not months, to repair, the Forest Service reported. BUT AS CREWS fix what roads and bridges they can, they're confronting more and more storm damage. Much of the emergency repair work they're doing now is temporary and the roads will have to wait until spring for needed cul- verts, fill, riprap or for the large earth-moving equipment needed to move large amounts of debris from road surfaces. "The snow level is low and most of the roads have compact snow or ice," Art Gibson, road mainte- nance engineer for the national forest, said last week. "It is impos- sible to see washouts and estimate the amount of debris over roads when they're buried by two feet of snow. The snow is preventing crews from accessing roads above 2,000 feet in elevation." One contractor with crews is opening culverts and installing culverts on Forest Road 25 in the Hamma Hamma area, and replac- ing washed out riprap at bridge abutments on the Hamma Ham- ma Bridge and Jefferson Creek Bridge over the 2480 Road. Crews are working one site at a time as weather permits, Gibson said. The storm's wind and rain affected different areas of the for- est with varying intensities. (Please turn to page 6.) IIIlUlIIIIIIIIIIIIlUlIIIIIIIIIIIIIlUlIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIlUlIIIIIIIIIIII the inside Classifieds ........................... 28 Community Calendar ....... 16 Crossword ........................... 31 Entertainment, Dining ..... 26 Health Journal ................... 7 Journal of Record ............. 23 Obituaries ........................... 10 Opinions, Letters ................. 4 Sports ................................... 19 Tides ..................................... 23 Weather ................................ 12 lUIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIUlIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIUIIIIIIIIIIIUIIIIIIII I][l!l!l!!l]!!ll!!l!l!lllll00 County hikes city's jail costs 20 percent The cost of housing Shelton prisoners in the Mason County Jail and in a jail in Wapato will increase starting with the new year. Shelton city commissioners at their meeting Monday morning heard from Shelby Conklin, ad- ministrator of the Shelton Mu- nicipal Court, that the cost of jailing a prisoner from Shelton in the Mason County Jail will increase from $62 a day in 2007 to $74.53 a day in 2008, an in- . crease of 20.2 percent. Meanwhile, the cost of hous- ing a Shelton prisoner in jail in the City of Wapato is rising from $40 a day in 2007 to $45 a day in 2008, an increase of 12.5 percent. Shelton has annual contracts with both Wapato and Mason County to house prison- ers sentenced to jail terms by the Shelton Municipal Court. The flat monthly rate for city prisoners in the Mason Coun- ty Jail will be $18,297.12 per month, Conklin wrote in a brief- ing memo to the commission- ers. Due to the above increases, she requested an additional $30,000, which she noted has been funded in the city's 2008 budget. The commissioners are set to approve the matter at their meeting scheduled for 10 a.m. on Monday, December 31, in the Shelton Civic Center, 525 West Cota Street. In other action Monday, the commissioners passed an ordi- nance approving the annexation to the city of a parcel at Madi- son and G streets. The property is currently undeveloped and measures slightly over half an acre. Woman hurt when auto hits Shelton school bus head-on A 22-year-old Shelton woman is in satisfactory condition at Har- borview Medical Center in Seattle a week after crashing her vehicle head-on with a Shelton School District bus on West Cloquallum Road. Krista Lee Wiley was airlifted to Harborview on December 20 after injuries sustained in the crash reported at 8:51 a.m. about five miles west of Shelton. Trooper Maurice Bauer of the Washington State Patrol reported that no one on the school bus was injured and that includes the driver, 62-year- old Carole Susan Poole, of Shel- ton. Wiley was driving a 1991 Toyo- ta sedan eastbound on Cloquallum Road and crossed the centerlJne on a curve and struck the 1984 Ford van school bus head-on in /he westbound lane, Bauer reported. The cause of the crash remains under investigation by the state patrol. College students help design rejuvenation at Foothills Park Mason County Parks and Trails Department has collaborated with Western Washington University's park design class to get a fresh perspective and innovative ideas for its reju;enat{6"oT-'{]iiS .... Park. In August, Mason County Parks and Trails Director John Keates contacted Jim Moore, an associate professor of physical education, health and recreation, about utiliz- ing the park design class to design project plans for Foothills Park on the west side of Hood Canal. "John graduated from the Rec- reation Program in the early 1980s and has had an excellent parks and recreation career," Moore said. "He has kept in touch over the years and is a good friend to Western and the Recreation Pro- gram." Moore said Keates liked his ex- perience at Western and feels con- nected to it. "That is really amaz- ing because it has been 25 years since he was a student," he added. KEATES SAID he thought the project would be a good opportu- nity to collaborate with WWU and would provide students with an opportunity t ° generate ideas that could potentially be imple- mented. "Experiential education is a great way to get students in- volved," Moore said. "It's a tech- nique that isn't used as commonly as it should be." Keates visited the class in Oc- tober and presented them with the design guidelines. At the same time, he said, he didn't want these guidelines to limit the stu- dents' creativity. "I was very impressed. They spent a lot of time and effort gen- erating ideas, and I thought that really showed in the final presen- tations," Keates said. "I was hop- ing for some creativity and that goal was achieved; the students came up with ideas that nobody else had thought of." THE STUDENT proposals will be shared with Mason County residents during public meetings to discuss plans for park renova- tions. Keates said he thinks com- ponents from each of the propos- als will be combined to create a final park design. "The students really liked hav- ing a project that was more than a created scenario and appreciated that their creativity was invited," Moore said. "Some students de- signed the park to remain in its natural vegetative state with hik- ing trails; others incorporated more active sport areas. They all designed the park to meet the needs of the community but used the big-picture information differ- ently." Moore said the students could know the final outcome of the proposals early in 2008. The new ideas presented by the Western students have generated public interest in the parks, which will make it easier to get funding for the project, Keates said. VETERANS, SCOUTS and volunteers stand by 700-plus baskets of food for the needy Saturday morning. Large donation sends it over the top: Christmas Fund fills 745 baskets A generous woman walked into the Journal office last Friday and made a $1,500 anonymous donation to the Jour- nal-40 et 8 Christmas Fund that sent the fund over the top of its $25,000 goal. The fund was about $3,000 short of its mark last week, but thanks to that person and several last-minute donations, the total of the 61st annual Christmas Fund this week exceeded its goal. By Wednesday, the fund had reached $26,444. Veterans of the 40 et 8 filled 745 food baskets for the needy last Saturday morning. Final contributions to the Christ- mas Fund were: anonymous, $100; Jack Brown, $20; Roslynne and David Reed, $200; Kristmastown Kiwanis, $500; Saint Edward's Catholic Church, $500; anony- mous, $100; in memory of Dinah Allison, $50; anonymous, $20; anonymous, $250; John and Pam Harrell, $100; and Arnold and Smith Insurance, $100. Other contributions included Gumby and Pokey, $50; anonymous, $20; anony- mous, $1,500; Lois Van Slyke, $50; Rich- ard and Carol McInelly, $100; anonymous, $50; Josh and Levi Myer, $50; anonymous, $200; and Ray and Mildred Stevens, $10o.