Bulletin column - Sept. 24, 2009

City gets bid on golf course house

Valley Quality Homes, Spokane Valley, submitted the lone bid to supply a manufactured home for the Colfax Golf course at $61,400, city administrator Carl Thompson reported to the city council Monday night. Another $16,170 is the estimated expense of preparing a foundation for the house which has 1,067 square feet with two bedrooms and two baths.

The house will replace the present house at the golf course which is now uninhabitable. The golf club will lease the house from the city.

Thompson said the house will be purchased with city reserve funds. The lease rate will include an interest factor of 4.5 percent which exceeds what the city receives on funds it places in the state pool. The actual lease rate will depend on the term of the lease.

The golf club now leases the course from the city at a nominal fee and that lease continues to 2059.

City council members earlier this year approved a plan to purchase a new residence for the course with the aim of improving security at the course. The golf club had hoped to have the house on site this summer and still hopes to have the project finished before winter.

Thompson said the foundation for the new building will be high enough to get it above the flood plain of the North Palouse River.

Park slides will be returned

Two slides which were removed from city parks will undergo repairs and returned to the parks next year. The slides were removed by city crews after the city council received a complaint about slivers being picked up from one of the slides in the park.

Councilman Jeremiah Roberts said he had received several complaints, some from residents while he was at the fair, about the removal of the slides. City crew members removed slides from Schmuck and Hamilton Parks after getting the complaint at the Sept. 8 council session.

Mayor Norma Becker explained the city was aware of the condition of the slides. She said once the problem officially gets into the city record the liability factor increases.

Public Works Director Andy Rogers said crew members will work on the slides as a winter shop project. The slides also need to have “sit down” bars installed at the top.

State adds molestation charge

A second count of child molestation was included Friday in an amended charge filed against Kevin E. Grenz, 48, Farmington. Grenz, July 31, had pleaded guilty to the original charge of child molestation and had been scheduled for sentencing Sept. 4. However on that date, the court set aside the guilty plea and set a trial date for Oct. 5. The court ruled Grenz had not been not properly advised of the sentences he faced before he entered the July 31 guilty plea.

Grenz was originally charged April 14 with one count of child molestation dating back to November and December of 2001. He was allowed pre-trial release but later taken into custody and ordered to undergo a competency evaluation. After receiving the examination report, the court ruled he was competent to stand trial.

When Grenz pleaded guilty to the one count July 31, the charge had been amended to advance the dates of the alleged 2001 molestation to the months of September and October. The second amended version of the charge filed Friday alleges Grenz molested the same victim in 1999.

Grenz appeared in court Friday and was unresponsive. A review hearing has now been scheduled for Sept. 30.

Camas driver hurt

James Roads, 21, Camas, sustained bumps and bruises early Monday in a one-car accident on Highway 26 near LaCrosse. According to the Washington State Patrol report, Roads was driving a 2004 Nissan Sentra when it went off the right side of the highway just past mile marker 102 at 10 minutes after midnight. The driver overcorrected and the Sentra crossed the highway and rolled one or two times before coming to a halt in the westbound ditch.

Also, the hood of a southbound 1993 Honda Accord driven by Shaylan Goodwin, 19, Spokane, flew off and struck the windshield about eight miles north of Colfax Sunday at 9:05 p.m., according to the Washington State Patrol report. The driver was not hurt.

Fire destroys Cochran house

An early morning fire Sunday destroyed a house on the Crumbaker road about three miles north of Colfax. Fire crews were called at about 1:40 a.m. and the house was fully engulfed in flames.

Mike Cochran, who resides at the residence, was not home at the time of the fire.

The fire was reported by Terry Cochran who resides at a neighboring residence. Cochran told fire crews the front porch of the house was in flames when he arrived there.

Rural fire district crews from Colfax, Steptoe, Diamond and Albion responded. An Avista crew was also called when a power line went down across the road.

Fire crews were supplied by tanker trucks with water from a hydrant at the Busch Distributors station on the Walla Walla Highway.

Fire crews left the scene at about 6 a.m., but were called back when the fire rekindled Sunday at 9 a.m.

Verizon alleges cable damage

Verizon Northwest Inc. has filed a suit against Avista, Corp. seeking damages for an alleged digging mistake in Pullman. The suit alleges Verizon sustained $66,186 in damages when an Avista crew damaged a line May 7, 2007, while digging near Oak and Monroe in Pullman.

An appearance on behalf of the defendant was filed last Friday by a member of the Paine Hamblen law firm in Spokane.

Unused bales catch fire

Fire crews from Steptoe and Colfax last Wednesday afternoon, Sept. 16, responded to a fire on the Green Hollow Road. A stubble burn at the Gary Arata residence had ignited a straw pile which had been left from last year’s harvest. The fire in the straw pile threatened a neighboring pasture, and Arata attempted to halt the spread with a tractor and chisel.

Chief Jim Krouse said radiant heat from the burning straw ignited one side of the Caterpillar tractor. The Steptoe crew arrived at the scene first and extinguished the tractor fire. Fire crews remained on the scene while the hay bale fire burned itself out.

Arata sustained minor burn injuries to one hand.

The year-old straw bales, which were originally supposed to go to a mushroom farm but had not been loaded out, had been broken down by bailing crew members.

Pullman man sentenced

Michael Lee Tompkins, 40, Pullman, was sentenced Friday to a year in jail with all but four days suspended after pleading guilty to two domestic violence assault charges. Tompkins was arrested by Pullman police after they were called last June 15 to an apartment on NE Terreview.

The report said he assaulted family members because he felt they were making fun of him.

He was ordered to pay $1,775 in fines and fees.