|
Daily Newspaper and Travel Guide
for Pecos Country of West Texas
Wednesday, January 29, 2003
City seeks Bonilla's help with delayed Post Office
By ROSIE FLORES
Staff Writer
PECOS, Jan. 29, 2003 - Congressman Henry Bonilla will be in town Friday night to address
area members of the Texas Municipal League, and Town of Pecos
City leaders will ask for his help on an issue that has been put on hold
for the past three years.
"We don't want to put him on the spot or anything like that, we
just want to ask for his help," said Town of Pecos City Manager Carlos
Yerena. "We're planning to talk to him about the new post office."
Yerena said city officials would be welcoming Bonilla on Friday,
when Pecos hosts the Texas Municipal League Region IV meeting.
The meeting is scheduled for 7 p.m., at the Reeves County Civic Center.
Dinner will be served and door prizes awarded.
"We want to talk to him about moving that issue forward,"
said Yerena.
Talk about a new post office in Pecos began in the late
1990s following completion of the new United States Federal
Courthouse two blocks east of the current building in Decemeber 1995. The federal
court had shared the Post Office building since its construction in 1935.
After a selection process of about a year, a site for the new building
was chosen in the 800 block of South Cedar Street. The new building
was supposed to have more parking spaces and better
handicapped accessibility than the current 68-year-old facility, and work on the
structure was scheduled to be only weeks away from beginning when the U.S.
Postal Service delayed construction in January of 2000.
Then-Postmaster Ramona Sterling said at the time that "The
Postal Service is working on about 25 new post offices simultaneously and
the paperwork is behind." However, a few months later, Postal Service
officials halted all new construction, citing deficits that would result in
later postal rate increases.
"Money allocated for the post office has been frozen for right
now," said Yerena. "And it's not just here
in Pecos, but several other sites as well."
Yerena said that the group just wanted to talk to Bonilla about
that particular issue and get his input. "Maybe he'll know the right
people to talk to and can help us with this issue and hopefully move it
forward," he said.
Yerena said that no other big issues would be discussed
with Bonilla, who is one of the ranking members on the
House Appropriations Committee.
"We just want to welcome him and the main thing is for him to come
to this area," said Yerena. "We want him to tell us what is going on
in Washington."
Eagles fighting with gophers for home field
By JON FULBRIGHT
Staff Writer
PECOS, Jan. 29, 2003 - Before the Pecos Eagles softball team battles
the Yellowjackets or Loboes this year, they're having to deal with
the gophers.
They're not a District 4-3A team, they're the real thing,
and they're also one of the main reason that when workouts
began for Texas high school girls softball teams on Monday, the Eagles
were working out on the Pecos High School football field.
Gopher holes and barren patches in the outfield
where grass should be is what Eagles' coach Tammy Walls said
she found earlier this month at Martinez Field, and after
a disagreement between the county and the
Pecos-Barstow-Toyah ISD on who would fix the
problem, county crews are out at the field this week smoothing out
the infield and doing work on the outfield areas.
"We've had to practice on the football field," said Walls,
who has a digital slide show of pictures showing the gopher holes
around the infield area prior to this week's work. She said with the
gopher holes on the infield, "It isn't safe for my girls to practice."
The Eagles moved into Martinez Field in the middle of
the 1998 season and have played all their home games there the
past four seasons. "We've never had a gopher problem before,"
said Walls, whose team will be competing in the tougher
District 4-3A this season against the Kermit Yellowjackets
and Monahans Loboes, along with Fort Stockton, Greenwood
and Presidio.
Reeves County Judge Jimmy Galindo was out of town
today, but he said last week that the county would have to order
special dirt to put on the field, and the black dirt was laid out by crews on
the infield and behind home plate this morning. However, the
outfield remains a problem, with a dirt path running through the middle of
it, from left to right field where some of the other gopher holes
were located.
Workouts also began on Monday for Pecos' baseball
team, who'll be using their high school field on Feb. 7 to
scrimmage Midland Christian. The girls' first home game this season won't be
for another month, when they play Monahans in their second
district game. But they'll open up their regular season a week before
the baseball team, and will have two scrimmages, two regular
season games and three tournaments between now and March 7.
"We need a place to work out and right now we don't have
one," Walls said.
There was no word as of press time how long county crews
would be working on the field.
Chamber still selling tickets for annual banquet
By ROSIE FLORES
Staff Writer
PECOS, Jan. 29, 2003 - Tickets are still available for the annual Pecos Area Chamber
of Commerce Banquet scheduled for 7 p.m., Thursday, Feb. 6.
The annual event will be held at the Reeves County Civic Center
and tickets are $15 and can be purchased at the Chamber of Commerce
office, 111 S. Cedar St., or from any Chamber of Commerce board member.
Guest speaker will be Lemuel Phillips, a motivational speaker
and humorist from Texas A&M.
"The price of the tickets is lower this year, to help the
distressed economy and because of the wonderful response
of sponsorship," said chamber director Linda Gholson.
Gholson said that the lower price of the tickets in no way means
that the speaker or the food will be of less quality.
The Bears' Den of Balmorhea will cater the event and the group will
be cooking on-site. "We had six menus submitted, by four different
caterers and a group chose the Bears' Den," said Gholson.
"It would be nice to have a sell-out crowd by this time, but we
still have tickets available and we want to invite everyone to come out
and join us," said Gholson.
Banquet sponsors include: West Texas National Bank, Security
State Bank, Calvary Baptist Church, KIUN/KPTX, Peaceful
Garden Funeral Home, West of the Pecos Museum, Alfredo's
Mexican Restaurant, Dairy Queen, McDonald's, Pecos Funeral
Home, Valley Distributors, Cellular One, Texas-New Mexico Power
Company, Standard Sales and Pecos Main Street.
Phillips has delivered both serious and humorous speeches
to more than 1,000 different clubs, fraternities, businesses,
professions, unions, public schools, colleges and universities, youth groups
and churches in most of the United States, including Hawaii and
Alaska and three foreign countries.
His undergraduate studies include Harding Junior
College, Garden City JuCo, Midwestern State University, and Abilene
Christian University and he has degrees in Education and Bible.
Phillips received an MA degree in psychology and
counseling (marriage and family therapy. Honors: Magna Cum Laude,
Kappa Delta Pi (National Honor Society in Education), Alpha Chi
National Honor Society (top ten percent of college and university grade and
is a certified counselor; public school teacher and minister of the
Gospel/Elder.
Weather
PECOS, Jan. 29, 2003 - High Tuesday 78. Low this morning 35. Forecast for
tonight: Partly cloudy. Lows in the lower 30s. Southeast winds 5 to 10
mph. Thursday: Mostly sunny. Highs in the upper 60s. South winds 5 to
15 mph. Thursday night: Mostly clear. Lows in the mid 30s. Friday:
Mostly sunny. Highs in the lower 70s. Saturday: Increasing clouds. Lows
in the upper 30s. Highs in the mid 70s.
Obituaries
Pecos Enterprise
York M. "Smokey" Briggs, Publisher
Division of Buckner News Alliance, Inc.
324 S. Cedar St., Pecos, TX 79772
Phone 915-445-5475, FAX 915-445-4321
e-mail news@pecos.net
Associated Press text, photo, graphic, audio and/or video material shall not be published, broadcast, rewritten for broadcast or publication or redistributed directly or indirectly in any medium.
Copyright 2003 by Pecos Enterprise
|
