Bulletin Column

CITY TOUR SET FOR CETC

Members of the Colfax City council will take a tour of the CETC building on Main Street tonight, Thursday. At Monday night’s city council session City Administrator Carl Thompson offered to provide council members with copies of the report from the consulting engineer who surveyed the damage to the building from snow load in the winter of 2009.

County commissioners at their Aug. 1 meeting discussed turning the building over to the City of Colfax. The city would be required to repair the building. Estimated costs for repairing the building have ranged between $130,000 and $150,000.

The county’s insurer, Travelers, has offered to pay only $19,000 toward repair of the structure because they believe most of the damage relates to improper foundation for the building which for many years served as the Colfax Elks Lodge. Razing the building has been another option discussed by the commissioners.

Colfax in the past has considered the building and other structures as a possible community center.

Mayor Norma Becker Monday pointed out a maximum of three council members could tour the building at one time without the session becoming an official meeting. Members Al Vorderbrueggen, Jeremiah Roberts and Don Henderson plan to tour the building today.

Evan Laubach of E & J Enterprises, the engineer which did the study on the building, will conduct the tour. Thompson also handed out copies of the Laubach report on the building to other council members. Councilman David Nails said he had already read the consultant’s report.

BALLOTS WILL GO OUT OCT. 21

Ballots for the fall general election will be mailed out to voters Oct. 21. At present the elections office has 19,194 qualified voters on the election rolls with more registrations arriving every day. Elections Supervisor Debbie Hooper said the county also has between 3,000 and 4,000 voters who have been moved into inactive status. Those voters can be placed on the active roles with a telephone call or an e-mail.

A first mailout this week will go to military and overseas voters.

CITY VOTES TO STICK

WITH PBAC

All six city council members present at Monday night’s meeting voted in favor of renewing Colfax membership in the Palouse Basin Aquifer Committee for $5,000. Studies by PBAC have determined the Colfax water aquifer source is not the same water source which serves Pullman and Moscow areas. The drop in the level of that aquifer is one of the key concerns of PBAC studies.

City council members Monday said they felt remaining a voting member of PBAC was important to keeping in touch with the work of the group.

KNIFE ARREST AT PHS

A 15-year-old Pullman High student was arrested Friday after allegedly threatening another student with a knife in the lower library. Probable charges for the arrest were harassment and unlawful imprisonment. The victim said she was confronted in a corner of the library and could not elude the youth. He has been released in the custody of a parent.

PHOTOS SAID REASON

FOR ASSAULT

Faisal Aldoesari, 21, was allowed release on his own recognizance Monday after being arrested early Sunday morning in Pullman on an assault charge. The Pullman Police arrest report filed with the court alleges Aldoesari hit a man in the elbow with a golf club. The report said an argument started when Aldoesari, who is from Kuwait, and his brother confronted neighbors in an apartment at NE Providence Court with taking pictures of them when they were outside of their apartment at NE Brandi Way.

Aldoesari’s brother, Husaam, first objected to the picture taking and brought the golf club to the scene of the confrontation, then Faisal allegedly took the club from Husaam and struck the victim. They told officers the alleged picture taking was not accepted in their culture.

The occupants of the Providence Court apartments told officers they were taking pictures of their friends. The report said the occupants of the two apartments knew each other.

COAL CHUTE DISCOVERY

An unused coal chute which at one time served the office and apartment building at the corner of Spring and Mill was discovered during excavation for the S. Mill project, according to the weekly report by Munir Daud, project engineer. The chute goes through the building foundation wall.

Daud reported they have decided to seal off the chute by installing a one-inch thick 6 X 8 foot steel plate over the present gate door.

He reported another problem encountered by the Motley & Motley crew is natural gas service lines which had been installed beneath the street at a relative shallow depth. Workers have had to use hand shovels to prevent damage to the shallow line during excavation.

In spite of some of the drawbacks, overall work on the project is ahead of schedule, and the contractor anticipates the project will be finished earlier than the projected Nov. 16 completion date.

STATE DROPS CASE AGAINST IVORY

A motion and order to dismiss the state’s 2009 assault case against Christopher Ivory, former WSU Cougar running back, was filed in court Friday. Prosecutor Denis Tracy said the state filed the motion to dismiss after Ivory’s alleged victim opted to accept a $7,000 settlement in a civil case against Ivory. Tracy told the court the settlement agreement had been finalized.

The prosecutor’s report said passage of time and the problem with getting testimony from witnesses who were possibly intoxicated at the time of the alleged assault led to the state seeking a settlement to resolve the case. He said they also considered reducing the charge against Ivory to a misdemeanor assault and asking the court to order restitution to the victim.

Ivory, 23, was charged July 25, 2009, with hitting the alleged victim over the head with a bottle 11 days earlier. The police report noted some witnesses at the scene believed Ivory was a member of the football team and later identified Ivory by reviewing photos of players on the team at that time.

Ivory, who was dismissed from the WSU team, now plays for the New Orelans Saints in the NFL. He is on injured reserve this year.

DRIVERS IN CAR-TRUCK

CRASH UNHURT

Drivers were unhurt Sept. 27 in a car-truck collision on Highway 195 two miles south of Colfax. According to the Washington State Patrol report, Marcia D. Jacobs, 59, Moscow, was driving a 2002 Dodge Neon northbound and attempted a left turn into a driveway. The Neon collided with a Ford F-350 truck being driven by Zachary T. Van Trease, 20, Colfax. The report said Van Trease, who was driving on the inside lane of the two southbound lanes, swerved into the right lane where the two vehicles collided.