Thursday August 23, 2012

Grand Junction Police are looking into a burglary and trespass around 3:15 this morning near 24th Street and North Avenue.  Sgt. Pete Chavez says a homeowner reported waking up and seeing one or two people inside his house.  He made a second call to 9-1-1 saying he had fired shots but wasn't sure if anyone was hit.  Chavez says officers searched the area with a K-9 from Fruita, but didn't find anything.  He says they're looking for any information they can get.

The latest BLM Coal Lease Sale in Routt County has brought in $800,000.  Sage Creek HOldings leased a 400-acre tract to develop some 3.2 million tons of recoverable coal near the Twentymile Coal Mine south of Hayden.  According to the BLM, roughly 90% of coal deposits in Colorado are on public lands.  Mining  is underway right now on 75,000 acres, contributing some $884 million to the economy in fiscal 2011.

26 people at Gordon Composites have gotten layoff notices.  According to the Montrose Daily Press, archery manufacturers are seeing a slow-down, with demand falling off significantly in the past 3-months.  Company owner Mike Gordon says he's confident the market will turn around as the economy improves and says there IS an opportunity for all of the laid-off workers to be called back to work.

You may have slept through a pretty good rain storm early this morning.  Grand Junction Police say heavy rain fell for about 20 minutes in downtown Grand Junction around 1:00, but the National Weather Service says only 2-hundreths of an inch was recorded at the airport.  -- In Montrose, heavy rain was reported in a storm around 2:00.  3/10 of an inch fell there.  The weather service says heavy rain is expected this afternoon, mostly in the San Juans.  A flash flood watch watch is up for much of eastern Utah and western Colorado.

70 oil field service workers from Slumberger have been transferred to North Dakota because of the drilling slowdown in western Colorado.  About 60 are still working here.  The Daily Sentinel says the layoffs are only the latest in the slowdown that started 2008 and '09.  The West Slope Oil and Gas Association says even with fluctuations in the industry, Grand Junction's significance to the Rocky Mountain energy industry hasn't changed.

The BLM is getting ready for public meetings on preferred alternatives for oil and gas drilling in the Piceance Basin in the next 20 years.  The agency has come out with four different alternatives, including its preferred alternative: the drilling of just over 15,000 new wells from 1,800 well-pads.  The meetings are the last week in September in Grand Junction, Meeker, Rangely and Silt.

A Grand Jucntion woman has reached a plea agreement in the plot to kill her husband by poisoning his whiskey. Deone Graham pled guilty yesterday and faces between 8 and 24 years in prison when sentenced in October.  According to The Daily Sentinel, Graham suspected her husband was cheating and wanted to collect his retirment benefits and 401k.

The Mesa County Public Trustee's Office is still runing, but without a head.  Chief Deputy Public Trustee Sharon Ener is in charge until a new appointment by the Governor.  Former Trustee Paul Brown was asked by the Governor to step down after stories in The Daily Sentinel and Denver Post about called into question spending by Trustees in 10 offices in the state some of those who resigned were re-instated, but not Brown.