April -- Nevada native wins a new car, fuel prices continue to rise

Wednesday, December 31, 2008

The rising price of fuel was still a problem for the city of Nevada in April, at a time when gas prices were near their high point for the year. Randy Marti, administrative services director, said that the high cost of fuel is a double whammy -- it causes a drop in revenue, not just an increase in expenses.

"When people are paying more for fuel they have to conserve in other ways, and that means less spending," Marti said. "With our (the city's) income tied to the sales tax. that means lower revenues for the city."

Street repairs also suffer when fuel prices go up, as asphalt and other materials cost more as well.

"When the price goes up we have to re-evaluate the budget and see what can be done," Marti said. "The money stays the same but the projects get smaller to make up the difference."

Emergency services must remain active but Gary Herstein, public safety director, said that when calls came in they were responded to but regular patrol officers were encouraged to park and observe more often.

"It's helped," Herstein said. "It appears that the number of citations or arrests haven't gone down so the officers are still being just as effective, they're just not using as much fuel."

A failed attempt to win tickets to the Super Bowl resulted in an even better prize for Klemens Ast, a 2008 Cadillac CTS. Ast, son of Leroy and Ann Ast, is a pre-med student at Pittsburg State University who hopes to go on to medical school and become a radiologist.

"I entered because I wanted to win Super Bowl tickets, I didn't even know I'd be eligible for the car," Ast said. "It came as a surprise to me."

When he first heard about the prize he thought it might be a scam so he contacted his lawyer, Kendall Vickers. Vickers sent him away with the admonition that it was probably a scam but as he checked into it Vickers found it to be real.

"The day he came in I sent him away and told him I thought it was a scam," Vickers said. "I checked into it and someone got back to me and I found out it was true."

Three members of a band in Kansas City are from Nevada, Trent Bickel, Nate Williams and Holden Simpson. They're joined by Joel Brame and Justin Bird on stage to form Seeking Surreal; a rock, experimental and alternative band.

The band, founded by frontman Nate Williams and guitarist Holden Simpson, was created in 1998. They brought on Trent Bickel in 2003, guitarist Joel Brame joined the band in 2006 and in 2007 bassist Justin Bird completed the group. Brame is from Houston and Bird is from St. Joseph but all the band members live in Kansas City now.

The group is starting to get some exposure after winning two battle-of-the-band style contests. In 2006 they won their first and in 2007 they won Kansas City Club Wars. That exposure gave the band an opportunity to get their music in front of even more people.

"There were something like 90 bands in each one, that's quite a lot, so we got to play with some of the big-time bands that are national acts so it was pretty good," Bickel said. "We knocked it out of the park on that one, we signed up with Best Buy and J Distribution for distribution for our CDs through Best Buy Corporation. They're also backing our CD release through a CD release show. It's going to be pretty good for us."

Bickel, son of Judge James and Sherry Bickel, is the percussionist for the band. Simpson, the son of Charlie and Janice Simpson, does guitar and vocals. Williams is the son of Buzz and Laura Williams and does keyboard and vocals. Brame is the guitarist and Bird does bass and vocals.

James Bickel said he and his wife are proud of their son's accomplishments.

"They're doing well," Bickel said. "In the last couple of years they've won several battle of the bands. He's also doing well in graduate school."

For the first time in its 108-year history, the Nevada Elks Lodge has a female in its top post.

Kelly McLemore was inducted as the lodge's exalted ruler -- the Elks equivalent to president -- on March 18.

Kelly says her achievement isn't about gender or glory -- it's about the opportunities to serve the community she's found in the company of the Elks.

"It's really a great organization. It's not just a bar, or a social club. The Elks do a lot of great things." Locally, the Elks Lodge is active in drug use prevention efforts, a mobile dental program for children, the annual lip sync contest during Bushwhacker Days, scholarships, an effort that provides gifts, toiletries and other items to residents of a Missouri Veterans Home in Mount Vernon and many other benevolent activities throughout the year, according to Kelly.

She has worked on several such projects, and is involved each year in the lip sync contest, of which she said, "I really enjoy that. It's a lot of fun working with the kids on that."

Neverthless, if she had to pick a favorite project of those sponsored by the local lodge, "It would have to be the Christmas baskets," she said.

Making Christmas special for local families by providing a Christmas dinner and presents for the family, especially the children, is a rewarding experience, but it takes a lot of work to get it all done.

The lodge delivered baskets to 65 families last year -- but in order to do so, much planning and preparation, not to mention fundraising -- went on behind the scenes. "We had a lot of fund-raisers, feeds for the Elks, drawings, all kinds of things. It takes thousands of dollars to be able to do all this."

Thousands of dollars, and insight and sensitivity to the needs of the families who receive the baskets.

For example, " We switched from turkeys to ham... We found out that there are some who don't even have refrigeration."

On April 8, voters living within the Northeast Vernon County R-1 School District were asked to increase the operating tax levy in order to fund the construction of a new school on their ballots. The $1.90 tax levy increase failed. When ballots were tallied, 338 people, 46.11 percent, voted for the tax increase while 395, 53.89 percent, voted against it.

NEVC is separated into two schools; the high school, a 79-year-old building located a short distance from C Highway in Walker, and the elementary school located approximately 14 miles away, in Schell City.

On Jan. 3, more than 130 people attended a public meeting hosted by the NEVC school board and district superintendent Charles Naas, announcing the plan to build a new centralized facility.

During the meeting, faculty and staff at Walker provided tours of the building displaying a dilapidated structure with bowing floors, cracked walls, falling ceilings, separations between the floors and joists, exposed electrical wiring and a non-operational boiler. Several classrooms now act as storage since conditions have become so bad they cannot house students.

Superintendent Charles Naas said it will be business as usual in the district, at this point.

"It was such a close margin," he said. "But, for now, it's just business as usual and we're just going to keep trying on the levy."

Naas said initial reactions were somewhat mixed; but, overall, school officials are still positive about the possibility of getting the tax passed. "Morale's pretty decent. It was our first shot at something for the school to pass on its first try and we knew it was going to be hard the first time around. So, we're encouraged and discouraged at the same time."

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