From the pages of
Sublette Examiner
Volume 4, Number 15 - July 8, 2004
brought to you online by Pinedale Online

County paper, paving pondered

by Cat Urbigkit

Sublette County Commissioners met for a full day of business Tuesday. To start the day's business, the commissioners opened bids from the newspapers to handle the county's legal advertising and the status as the county's official newspaper.

The Sublette Examiner bid $1.75 per column inch, while the Pinedale Roundup submitted a bid of $1.00 per column inch.

Commissioner Betty Fear noted that last year when the commission gave the Roundup the designation, the commission expressed its intent to switch back and forth from year to year, so long as the bids stayed competitive.

Commissioner Bill Cramer made the motion that the Examiner be granted the official newspaper status, to which Fear seconded.

Commissioner Gordon Johnston spoke in favor of the motion, "with the idea that next year it changes," although the commission can't bind a future commission. The motion was successful.

Newly hired Sublette County Solid Waste Manager Rick Hoffman was greeted his first day on the job with a letter from a state regulatory agency complaining about the state of affairs at the county landfill.

County Clerk Mary Lankford said the letter from the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality raised concerns about the landfill and its current construction project, and "requesting that no further construction take place until approval from the department has been granted."

But the DEQ official who wrote the letter apparently wasn't aware of the county's efforts involving communications with another DEQ official, Lankford said, so things aren't as dire as it seemed.

County Road Superintendent Travis Sour reported that county crews have nearly complete soil stabilization applications on county roads scheduled for such work.

Butch Penton is Sour's new assistant at the road department, Sour notified the commission.

Cramer asked Sour about the possibility of paving the Forty Rod Road, but Fear said, "I don't think so."

Fear expressed her concern about the high cost of upkeep on paved roadways.

Sour confirmed that one research article he'd read indicated that maintenance costs double from a dirt road to an asphalt surface.

While the county may have money now, Fear asked, "Ten years from now when there is no money, what do you do with those roads?"

In other road business, the commission approved a resolution calling for extension of the county road designation on the First North County Road, once the landowners have achieved the required compliance items in the Meadow Canyon Estates Subdivision.

Next on the agenda was Laurie Hartwig of the Museum of the Mountain Man. She came to the commission on Tuesday with a new budget request, telling the commission, "I'm hoping the third time's the charm."

Hartwig said since the commission okayed the budget request for an elevator for museum, she's changed her other budget request "from publication to preservation" in a downstairs room at the museum.

Hartwig said that since the museum has to take everything out of the room to install the elevator, the museum would like to do some infrastructure upgrades to make it more suitable for archive storage, with a security wall and other preservation amenities. The commission agreed to take the $53,600 budget request under consideration.

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