July 27, 2017 – Fifteen members attended the meeting. Chris
Grover, running unopposed for Cheney mayor, spoke about his vision for
Cheney. He is focusing on keeping the
small town feel of Cheney along with having a vibrant downtown and keeping city
government fiscally responsible. Water
availability is currently priority one for him.
The city is issuing a request for proposal to get and outside
engineering evaluation of the water system and wells. The water supply problem is triggered by
summer irrigation and possible solutions include expanding reservoir capacity,
reclaiming waste water for irrigation and developing a better routine
maintenance program. He was asked about
the 50 acre park, which was funded by a grant but has become an eyesore. The problem is that the parks and recreation
maintenance staff have been cut back so the park has not been well
maintained.
Margie
reported that 4 club members spent about 45 minutes last week packaging dry dog
and cat food for distribution with Meals on Wheels. She hopes to make this an annual service
event.We had a preliminary report on the golf scramble – since the Cheney High athletic director resigned in June there wasn’t any support from school district staff and the level of participation was about one-third of what it was last year.
July 13, 2017 - Dave Reagan spoke about his experiences as an
engineer for the local short line railroad.
It is operated by the Eastern Washington Gateway and the state owns the
railroad. He explained that many of its
loads are grain that is brought to the Highline grain facility for blending and
then shipped to customers in the Pacific Rim.
Each grain car carries the equivalent volume of three semi-trucks, so
rail transportation is more efficient.
It takes 6- 8 hours to typically load a full train of wheat; sometimes
cars have to be unloaded if the wheat is tested and doesn’t meet the buyer’s
specifications. He said that federal law
allows a train to block a road for not more than 15 minutes but that time
period starts when the train has stopped moving; if it is moving very slowly
the 15 minute time limit has not begun.
Eighteen
members attended and discussed plans for a club picnic and for volunteering to
package dry pet food for distribution through Meals on Wheels.
July 6, 2017 - Fourteen
members heard John McCallum, editor of the Cheney Free Press, talk about the
challenges the paper is facing. Most of
their revenue comes from display ads, classified ads and legal notices. Many of these have dropped off because there
are no-cost alternatives on the internet.
There are also about 2400-2500 subscribers to the Free Press. They have to be careful to separate editorial
and news content from advertising to avoid appearance that advertisers are
influencing the newspaper reporting.
John explained that the parent company also publishes the Spokane Valley
Herald, Davenport Times and Ritzville Adams County Journal. Al Stover, who has been at the Free Press for
several years will relocate to Ritzville to fill a vacant reporter position
there. That means there will be only 2
full time editorial staff and one intern at the Free Press. They may have to rely on free lancers to help
cover community news and may ask community organizations to submit information
on their events. He was asked why the
Free Press does not have any marijuana ads – it cannot publish them because the
paper is distributed by US mail and marijuana is still an illegal drug under
federal law.
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