Mayoral candidates not satisfying everyone

Former Tribune sports editor Steve Moseley emailed this gem, reprinted here with his permission:

Do I understand this correctly...Mr. Mangold's mayoral platform is 4-feet deep at the shallow end while Mr. Sapp stubbornly centers his candidacy around this radical, madcap notion that 3.5 is better?

Of course the searing injustice in all this is that, once more, those of us in the 3.75-foot constituency get short shrift. Must we — the Proud 3.75s — go entirely unrepresented? Again? Apparently so. How very sad for for America.

Best,
Steve

If your sarcasm detector is on the fritz, please note that the comments are quite tongue-in-cheek.

Video: Wings and Wheels car show

The Powell airport was built to service planes, but for Wings N' Wheels, it hosted around 100 show-cars for vehicle lovers. A brief overview of the event.

Video: Wings and Wheels air show

On August 16, at Powell's Wings and Wheels event, Red Eagle Air Sports entertained folks with some aerial acrobatics. After their show, pilots Dan McClung and Buck Roetman took a minute to talk about what it's like to fly stunts for a living.

The mystery of the misspelled sign

On Monday, an active shooting drill was held at Powell High School. Law enforcement and emergency responders simulated a mock shooting at the new school.

As you might guess, the building was closed to the public while the drill was conducted. The following sign was posted on a couple of the doors.The author will probably remain a mystery. Sources in the agencies and organizations involved all denied involvement in or knowledge of the creation of the sign. Furthermore, I'm pretty sure the statute of limitations for gross negligence in writing has already passed.

But for the record, if anyone is charged, it'll be an inditement indictment.

Write-in results from Park County's primary election

For the 2008 primary election, Park County decided to individually document write-in ballots this year and released those results today. Looking at the write-in names and numbers, there are a few jokes (see below), a couple surprises, and some implications for the general election.

Some of the races that looked to be a done deal might not be so cut and dried. As Republican County Commission nominee Dave Burke noted yesterday, "It is Park County."

We'll have the full scoop on what's going on with the county's write-ins in Tuesday's Powell Tribune. Until then, you can check out the full, raw results by clicking on the image below or here. Keep in mind they're officially unofficial.
Overall primary election results (which do not individually name the write-in candidates) can be accessed at the county's elections website here.

Gunbarrel troubleshooters put feet to fire

A big part of the effort at the Gunbarrel fire has been protecting “values” (values are firefighter speak for structures — cabins, lodges, campgrounds, etc.) on the North Fork corridor, better known on maps as U.S. 14-16-20.

Firefighters are easy to spot. They are the ones sporting yellow shirts and green pants treated with Nomax, a fire retardant. Not the people. I mean their threads.

I’ve met some swell people on this fire and this cool crew in the pic are certainly no exception. They were checking some cabins a few miles east of Pahaska Tepee last week.

Be safe guys...

Clockwise are Neal Obray, Hayley Crosby, Jessica Brewen, Scott Nilson, Kevin Wiebe, Tom Lentz and Erin Elliott.

Now, some more on the fire...

The fire is more or less than 40 miles west of Cody, burning on the north side of the highway. If you are headed to Yellowstone National Park, look to your right. Your eyes will note burned trees that very closely resemble big charred toothpicks. On Saturday there was a new smoke plume on a ridge across from Eagle Creek campground. Now, roiling smoke can be spotted in the vicinity of Yellowstone Valley Inn, near the national forest boundary.

The powers that be decided in late July when lightning ignited a tree to allow the fire to consume the pine beetle infested hills. As much as 80 percent of trees are reportedly dead due to the insidious little insects.

If you can click on the below map, you can get a closer look at the fire's growth over the last few weeks.
Most of the locals I have chatted with on the North Fork believe the firefighters are doing a bang-up job. Of course, some lodge owners are sweating the loss of business and one fellow said they should have stamped out the fire the moment it ignited and thus saved a butt-load of money. The fire has cost $5.4 million as of Wednesday morning.

My opinion? Assuming of course someone is interested...

I’ll quote erstwhile Yellowstone Park Superintendent Ken Barbee, the oft criticized man of the Fires of 1988 lore: “Let it burn!”

Of course I don’t want to see the good people running lodges lose their livelihood or some friends that have a cabin there return to find a pile of broiled rubble.

However, if the dead trees are removed, re-growth will occur in forests that are around 300 years old. While the forest is in re-growth mode, new grazing will be available for elk and deer scampering across the hills.

Wednesday’s update: 43,066 acres. There are approximately 146 personnel on the fire. A complete update for Wednesday can be found here.

There will also be another public meeting on the Gunbarrel fire on Friday, Aug. 22, at 11 a.m., at the Gunbarrel fire camp.

The Internet is a good place to glean fire data. If you hit the right sites, the information should be accurate although it may be dated. For the uninitiated, try http://inciweb.org.

Wyoming Primary: Park County's 2008 election results

When results come in, you'll see them on this post. I'll be adding to this page, so refresh it for updates. Park County's official unofficial results can be found here.

10:58 Woah! Looks like I dropped the ball here. Keith Goodenough and Nick Carter had a lot less hype (and far fewer obnoxious mailings) running for the Democratic nomination for the U.S. Senate than the Lummis-Gordon race, but their brawl appears to be the highlight of the evening. Right now, the two are separated by just fractions of a percentage point and some 200 votes for Carter votes. He looks to have taken Park County by 91 votes or so - they may prove decisive. Follow that race on the Secretary of State's website here.

9:57 Time to call it a night. In recap: barring a serious change when results are finalized or an independent or write-in campaign, Dave Burke has won a seat on the Park County Commission. Commissioner Bucky Hall will retain his. However, given that we still have more than two months until the general election, who knows what will happen.

Cynthia Lummis appears to have won Park County by roughly 500 votes over Mark Gordon. Follow the Lummis-Gordon-Winney-Holland race here.

Read the full election stories with candidate reactions and more details on the election in Thursday's Tribune. Goodnight, anyone who was following this live blog. Let me know if there's anything I could have done better, or, since we reporters always prefer praise to criticism, if it was helpful.

Earlier updates from the night follow...

9:41 Here we go, absentee ballots are in. Burke and Hall maintain their leads, as does Lummis. Things are winding down, I believe.

9:36 Absentee ballots still have yet to be counted... There's a bunch of them. Not sure they'll have much of an impact on, say, the commission race, unless they all go heavily in favor of Hinkle or Allshouse.

9:16 Still waiting on absentee ballots, but here's the results from Powell's city races. Since no municipal race has more than 2 candidates, the results are little more than just a poll. We'll do it again in November with these guys. But in short,
incumbents are looking good, except Mark Senn.

Mayor
Scott Mangold: 64 percent (609 votes)
Tim Sapp 35 percent (330 votes)

Councilmembers
Ward 1
Jim Hillberry: 68 percent (183 votes)
Shea Reel: 31 percent (83 votes)

Ward 2
Floyd Young 72 percent (250 votes)
Mark Senn 27 percent (94 votes)

Ward 3
Don Hillman 70 percent (186 votes)
John Sides 29 percent (77 votes)

9:09 Look like Cynthia Lummis has sewn up Park County. She's got 44 percent (2,004 votes) to Mark Gordon's 38 percent (1,734 votes).

9:01 This is everything MINUS those 1,000 or so absentee ballots. Looks like Dave Burke will join the Park County commission and Bucky Hall will keep his seat.

Burke: 26.08 percent (2,186 votes)
Hall: 21.97 percent (1,841 votes)
Hinkle: 18.65 percent (1,563 votes)
Allshouse: 16.68 percent (1,398 votes)
Whitelock: 8.66 percent (726 votes)
Wilde: 7.49 percent (628 votes)

8:56 Cynthia Lummis has expanded her lead over Mark Gordon. Lummis has 45.6 percent (1,416 votes) or Gordon 40.13 percent (1,246 votes). Winney's at 10.6 percent (329 votes), and Holland's at 3.29 percent (102 votes).

8:53 So, 18 of 29 precincts are in BUT more than 1,000 absentee ballots have yet to be counted in the results. That's a good chunk of ballots. It ain't over yet.

8:50 UPDATE: Rural Powell and Meeteetse results are in to join Cody's results. Dave Burke has pulled ahead of Bucky Hall. The two of them have separated a bit from Hinkle and Allshouse, but it's still close. 18 of 29 precincts are in.

Dave Burke: 23.65 percent (1,371 votes)
Bucky Hall: 22.59 percent (1,310 votes)
Terry Hinkle: 19.25 percent (1,116 votes)
Judy Allshouse: 18.66 percent (1,082 votes)
Margaret Wilde: 7.93 percent (460 votes)
Hank Whitelock: 7.31 perent (424 votes)

8:40 Ok, so if you haven't been following this: races are tight. Republican County Commission candidates Bucky Hall (23.5 percent), Dave Burke (22.2 percent), Terry Hinkle (20.33 percent), and Judy Allshouse (19.14 percent) are separated by 120 votes. That's with 9 precincts out of 29 counted - basically, Cody's precincts.

8:37 All ballots are at the courthouse. Just waiting for the ccmputers now.

8:28 Likewise tight is the race for the Republican nomination for Wyoming's lone seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. Cynthia Lummis (44 percent) leads Mark Gordon (42 percent) - or 42 votes. Winney is around 10 percent, Holland at 3 percent. Again, those results are from Cody.

8:26 So, in case the below results aren't clear enough: with Cody's precincts mostly in, the county commission race is pretty tight. Hall, Burke, Hinkle, and Allshouse are separated by around 4 percent, or 120 votes. Powell could easily swing this.

8:20 County clerk Kelly Jensen says she's heard that turnout is low statewide. Going theory is that people got burned out on the hub-bub over Wyoming's unprecedented role in the presidential selection process.

8:14 Bucky Hall has the early lead. Dave Burke in second, Terry Hinkle third, and Judy Allshouse fourth. Hank Whitelock and Margaret Wilde follow by a good margin. The votes represent most of Cody.

Hall: 23.5 percent (889 votes)
Burke: 22.2 (840)
Hinkle: 20.33 (769)
Allshouse: 19.14 (724)
Wilde: 8.83 (334)
Whitelock: 5.79 (219)
8 write-ins

8:11 Nine precincts in. 25 pages of results are on the way. I believe the coming results are only for Cody. I'll get what I can.

8:07 No results yet, so I've got time to make a prediction. Relying on my rough sign-counting, Dave Burke and Terry Hinkle seem to have the most support in Powell. Of course, who knows how signs compare to results. For example, last month, somebody removed Terry Hinkle for Commission signs and planted 8 Dave Burke signs in their place. Whose yard, you ask? Terry Hinkle's own.

Another concern: some sign planters don't seem to understand that they can't vote for everyone. Spotted this a few weeks back about two block away from the Cody courthouse.
8:03 Apparently, Bill Yetter of Meeteetse launched a late write-in campaign for a seat on the Park County commission. The ad at right appeared in Meeteetse's newsletter last week. County clerk Kelly Jensen is trying to individually count write-ins this election. However, those results probably won't come tonight. We'll keep you posted.

7:52 I'm running a bit behind schedule, but here we are. I'll start writing stuff.

The scoop on tonight's election results

As hopefully you've heard by now, today is Wyoming's primary election. In Park County, two seats on the county commission are at stake and most likely will be determined tonight.

As the evening progess, the Tribune blog will be posting live results. From 7 or so on, I'll be at the Cody Courthouse tracking results as they come in and passing along election tidbits (for example, did you know there's a write-in campaign for the County Commission?).

If you want to follow state-wide races (Mark Gordon-Cynthia Lummis-Bill Winney-Michael Holland, anyone?) are best tracked through the Secretary of State's election results webpage here.

Park County's results will be posted at their elections website tonight (http://www.parkcountyelections.net) BUT the Tribune blog should have the results first (the post is up here). If all goes according to plan, the press will be getting printouts of results before they're placed on the county's website. I've been told that'll give this blog about a 10-minute jump.

So check back tonight early and often and weigh in with a comment or two.

Until then - get out and vote! You've got 'til 7 p.m.

Powell police welcome new dispatcher

Virginia Norris of Powell has joined the Powell Police Department as a part-time dispatcher.

Norris, 34, is originally from Billings. She lived in Washington for a spell before moving to Powell about 3 years ago, looking to be closer to her family.

She kinda found the job by chance.

"I saw an ad in the paper," she said. "I thought, 'That sounds really cool.'"

Norris has worked in child care and at Taco John's.

I suggested that perhaps her experience taking orders from desperately hungry folks would transfer to handling emergency calls. That was probably a bit of a stretch - Norris said she hadn't thought of that connection - but she humored me anyway.

"I have experience and I didn't even know it," she joked.

Norris started training Thursday.

Smoke on the Heart Mountain horizon

Smoke from the Gunbarrel Fire flows over Heart Mountain as the sun sets over Park County on Wednesday (Aug. 13).

Click the little image above for the full-sized version.

Pryor wild horse lovers buck BLM

Despite some public trepidation, Jim Sparks, field manager for the Billings Bureau of Land Management office has said repeatedly that Pryor Mountain wild horses that are rounded-up will not be euthanized.

The BLM has proposed gathering 38 of the estimated 172 wild horses in the Pryors.

No worries. I think...

Cutting 38 horses should not negatively impact the herd because there are plenty of spring foals, said Matt Dillon, who heads the Pryor Mountain Wild Mustang Center in Lovell.

Ginger Kathrens, a Colorado Springs author who has filmed the Pryor herd for public television and founder of The Cloud Foundation, does not necessarily suspect the horses will be poked by a poisonous needle. However she fears if the animals are not adopted, they could spend their final days at a BLM long-term holding facility. And those days could numbered if the bureau decides to euthanize horses.

Kathrens said the BLM is holding 33,000 wild horses, which far outnumbers 13,600 roaming within the confines of wild horse management areas across the west. Sparks said the BLM has the legal authority to euthanize its horses. So theoretically, the bureau could play the dirty needle card to rub-out its surplus horse stock.

Kathrens’ contention is that could lead to a stampede of lethal injections to thin herd numbers and clear pastures for more incarcerated horses.

However, bear in mind, euthanization was only a proposal, not a plan of action.

You got me. I am inclined to believe Sparks at least on the local level. But, what the BLM big shots in Washington, D.C. decide is an entirely different matter.

Kathrens’ argument may have validity. She said the BLM should be exploring ways to get all their horses adopted. If she keeps the heat on, that could elicit more public and media scrutiny and so protect horses from potential death.

Dillon made a valid point too. He said folks should concentrate on finding means to get wild horses adopted, not fretting over the killing of Pryor horses, which he said won’t happen.

You decide. I am just a wacky reporter striving to make sense of what I am told.

I favor protecting both the McCullough Peaks’ and Pryor herds. I also prefer wolves, bears and all other four-legged critters to development.

I will make efforts to stay abreast of the issue. There is a proposed roundup for the McCullough herd as well. There is natural gas in them thar hills. Who will come out on top, natural gas developers or horses?

In the picture, two stallions duke it out for choice grazing.

Park County election judges ready to do their thing

Under the tutelage of Park County Elections Deputy Virginia Livingston, Powell election judges took their oath of office on July 31.

The judges will preside over both the 2008 primary election on August 19 (a week from today for those of you counting) and the general election on November 4.

Park County has 225 judges this year, including alternates. There are 142 Republicans, 70 Democrats, 10 unaffiliated, and 3 Libertarians.

Livingston said the county has worked hard to increase party parity among judges. Last year, there were only 50 or so Democrats.

While the balance is nice, Livingston said political orientation isn’t an end all.

“It’s their brain that matters,” she said.

Gunbarrel meeting coming up

A quick heads up for anyone interested:

A community meeting for lodges and local residents effected by the Gunbarrel fire is on tap for tomorrow (Wednesday) at 11 a.m. in Wapiti at the old ranger station.

Fire management officials will talk about the fire's current status, and the Forest Service's long-term plans for managing the 39,370 acre blaze.

Graphic courtesy of the National Forest Service.

Gunbarrel fire close-up

It was chocking smoke, invading eyes, nose and throat. Cough, cough — I could hardly hack it.

The flames were lapping at trees and brush. Pine sap was popping like popcorn and pine needles were sizzling like bacon in a skillet.

The fire was moving at a leisurely pace above Wayfarer’s Chapel in the vicinity of the Gunbarrel fire Saturday, but it was still mighty eerie.

The fire had been there before, as evidenced by toasted trees waiting for a stiff wind to mow them down. Still, there was plenty of fuel left and the fire was back - perhaps to finish what it had started.

I didn’t get the cool shot, but I’ll never forget the blistering heat or the snap, crackle and pop of the forest cooking around me.

It was like standing in the middle of a bonfire.

Personnel are keeping a sharp eye on the Gunbarrel fire. Most are minding lodges, campgrounds and cabins. But on the ridge that smoking Saturday, my world was reduced to smoke and flames.

Taking a dip in Buffalo Bill’s pool

A handful of plucky youth were jumping into the Buffalo Bill Reservoir above the tunnels Saturday.
The temperature was in the mid 80s — just right for a somersault or two into the cool waters below.

“I had to get my cliff diving in for the year,” said Rick Jones of Billings and a former Powell resident.

Tyler Evans, Powell, was digging the 10 to 12 foot dive. He's leaped 100 feet at Yellowtail Reservoir, but doesn’t recommend it.

“It was really scary,” Evans said.

The bold bunch were jumping and then warming themselves on the granite rocks.

Two ladies spread beach towels to take in a few rays between dips.

Jeremy Rowan completes a neat jackknife dive and then climbs the rough inverted face rather than swim around. It’s a tricky climb and Rowan loses his grip once, to splash down. Undaunted he tries again and succeeds.

With water dripping from his hair, he says there are places in Spain where people climb hundreds of feet free-hand. If they fall, they plunge into the sea.

Hand-in-hand, Brandie Lambdin and Ivy Garlow, both of Cody, take the leap.

With a minor splash, the two disappear, then resurface to swim about.

“It is so warm on the top,” Lambdin said treading the gentle waves, “I just want to swim on the top.”

It’s a cool crowd on the rocks. Beating the heat is sweet.

In the photo, Tad Denning, Cody, completes a back flip.

Fires to Football

Morgan Tyree of Powell was recently running the track on one of his usual 12-lap (approx. 3 mile) runs. After the 2nd lap Tyree noticed the developing sunset and wishing he already had his camera with him. As Tyree finished the lap he said to himself, “Oh what the hell.” So, he climbed back over the fence, jumped on his bike and pedaled home to retrieve the camera and came back to the track and was fortunate enough to still find that the scenario hadn't deteriorated as found in this image.

Tyree said, "I like to think of the 'fire season' as the precursor to the upcoming football season."

He added, "So, what’s with the track being locked up these days anyway?"

To read more about his adventures and takes on the upcoming and previous football seasons check out his blog at: http://six-eight-eleven.blogspot.com

Cascade Flare-up

In the picture, Chris Davis, task force leader trainee, takes a look as the Cascade flares on a ridge a mile or so from his position on Wednesday.

Although it was a bit tense Wednesday, July 30, it appears that they are getting the fire is under control.

As of Monday morning, the fire was 44 percent contained and had consumed over 10,000 acres at a cost of $5.8 million.
This is not the best picture I have taken, but I must admit it was exciting sitting on the ridge watching the fire flare-up.