Chromium Cleanup Resin OK'd

75¢ COLBY Thursday April 3, 2014 Volume 125, Number 53 Serving Thomas County since 1888 10 pages FFREEREE PPRESSRESS Chromium cleanup resin OK’d By Sam Dieter tract with little discussion, al- Colby Free Press though several members men- [email protected] tioned it was good the high price-tag for the resin – which has The Colby City Council ex- been the subject of discussion at tended a contract to clean chromi- past meetings – has not risen re- um out of the city’s under ground cently. The contract guaranteed a water supply Tuesday, in order to flat price for the year unless the maintain a flow of clean drinking manufacturer’s price of the resin water to the city’s system. changes, and City Manager Tyson The council approved a contract McGreer said the price of the resin with Evoqua Water Technologies, has stayed even recently. The city formerly Siemens, to supply resin paid the same amount for resin to clean well water at the city’s from February 2013 through the water treatment plant through end of last year, he said, and be- this year for $162 a cubic foot, fore that $155.97 for a cubic foot. or $194,400 for one 1,200-cubic- He added that the Kansas De- foot load. The resin is used to filter partment of Health and Environ- chromium out of the ground water ment will reimburse the city for Kids tune up for school at the Ace Services “Superfund” the cost. At its last meeting, the cleanup site on east Fourth Street, council approved an agreement formerly run by the U.S. Environ- with the state to take over running mental Protection Agency. The council approved the con- See “CHROMIUM,” Page 2 Foundation plans auction Colby Community College’s to generate. Endowment Foundation will cel- “With the cost of education in- ebrate its 50th birthday with a creasing, scholarships are even scholarship benefit auction, its more important,” said Wells, add- biggest scholarship fund raiser of ing that the foundation distributed the year, Saturday, April 12, at the about $180,000 in scholarships Comfort Inn Convention Center. last year. Doors will open at 4:45 p.m., To honor the college’s 50th with a buffet dinner at 5:30 p.m. year, the foundation will be giv- and a live auction at 7 p.m. ing away a classic Chevrolet Im- All of the money raised by pala that night, when one of ten the benefit will go to scholar- keys will start the car, signaling ships for the college’s students, the winner. Seven keys have been said endowment Director Nick drawn so far. Two more will be Wells. The event has raised over drawn that night, and the final key $100,000 each year for at least the will be auctioned during the ben- last three years. efit. Wells said this is the 41st Tickets are $40 per person or scholarship benefit auction for $300 for a corporate table, and the foundation, and the event has reservations must be made by grown significantly over that time. Monday by calling Wells at 460- The silent auction now brings in 4684. more than the entire auction used SAM DIETER/Colby Free Press Amy Jennings, a teacher at Puddle Duck Preschool (top), talked with parents Wednesday about signing their kids up while the prospective students kept them- Pharmacist selves entertained. Kylie Powell, 3, (center right) picked up the foam blocks that she and other kids (center) played with at the school. Hazel Stover (above) drove a plastic shopping cart. Kylie’s parents Sar- returns home ah and Aaron Powell (above) took her on a short tour during the preschool’s yearly For pharmacist Scott Smith, open house. working at Palace Drug Store is a return home – to where his pharmacy career got started. He has joined the downtown pharmacy, filling a position left open when Mike Larmer moved Spotters learn about tornadoes to Garden City earlier this year. Smith said he has worked in the store, which his parents own, for By Sam Dieter above Colby, and closer to two miles off the starts rising through the sky, building a tower as long as he can remember. When Colby Free Press ground above Hill City and Norton. of clouds. he was a kid, he cleaned and [email protected] This is why the service still needs storm Tornados themselves happen under the up- stocked shelves, and when he got spotters: radar picks up the clouds in a severe draft of the storm, where the base of the cloud old enough to drive, he delivered Colby residents learned how to spot torna- storm, Floyd said, but “we don’t know if a tor- is flat and has no rain falling from it. A curtain medicines around town, getting dos and severe storms from the ground at a nado’s there unless you tell us there’s a tor- of cloud called a “wall cloud” that drops down to know many of the pharmacy’s class Friday, so they can help give weather of- nado there.” from this base is where a tornado is most likely customers. ficials a more accurate understanding of storm. The service considers those who went to the to happen, Floyd said, adding that these which As a high school student, he About 35 people, including citizens, law class to be trained storm spotters, he said. They will often form quickly and start spinning. completed an on-the-job training enforcement officers, firefighters and city em- were asked to report funnel clouds that form at “The storm’s trying to produce a tornado,” program with all the pharmacies ployees, came to see a presentation by Dave the start of a tornado or the “wall cloud” that he said. HEATHER ALWIN/Colby Free Press Floyd, warning coordination meteorologist often forms just before one to the weather sta- On one side of this tower of clouds, Floyd in town. Smith became a certified Scott Smith of Colby returned pharmacy technician during his for the National Weather Service’s Goodland tion. They were also told to report hail over 3/4 added, the rising water vapor cools and rains to his roots when he came to office, Friday evening in the basement of the of an inch in diameter, winds of over 58 mph, falls to the earth. A “shelf cloud” often forms last two years of high school, and take a position at Palace Drug. following a short period of land- Community Building. It was the last of a series standing water over a foot deep or moving wa- beneath the main cloud in front of the rain, he scaping work, he went to college was always to own his own store. of storm-spotter classes held in the 19-county ter over six inches. said, pointing this part of the storm does not to get his pharmacy degree. During the last year of school, area of northwest Kansas, Colorado and Ne- A map that Floyd presented showed that contain a tornado but can lead to straight-line At the University of Kansas, he Smith rotated among several phar- braska served by the Goodland station. most tornados occur in the middle of the coun- wind gusts strong enough to damage buildings. majored in pre-pharmacy, a “fast- macies for hands-on training. He Floyd said the beam of doppler radar, which try, from the Gulf Coast to the upper Midwest, track” undergraduate program said this experience helped him helps the service track severe storms and spot including eastern Kansas. Tornados can occur See “SPOTTERS,” Page 2 that lets pharmacy students get learn what he really wanted to do: possible tornadoes, starts to aim upward far- here from March to October, but are most like- their degree quicker, Smith said. retail and community pharmacy. ther and farther off the ground as it moves out ly in May, June and July. He took on extra classes to get a from the weather station, so that it can only see He said the severe thunderstorms that lead minor in business because his goal See “PHARMACIST,” Page 2 things about 1,500 to 2,000 feet off the ground up to a tornado form as an “updraft” of hot air Page 2 Colby Free Press Thursday, April 3, 2014 Area/State Weather Spotters learn about storms Briefly From “SPOTTERS to the rising number of reported tornados, Floyd The deadline for Briefly is noon the day before. The deadline for Mon- said, including the advent of doppler radar in the day’s paper is noon Friday. He said he has been giving the much same pre- 1980s, cell-phones, storm-spotter classes and sentation year in and year out, but was inspired even the movie Twister. Another set of statistics City cleanup week coming next month the hold the classes earlier on the year after an he had showed that more and more very minor The City of Colby will have its annual spring cleanup week from Mon- outbreak of 16 tornadoes hit Kansas in a four-hour tornados have been reported over the last 60 day to Friday, May 5 to 9. Call in advance to have boxed and bagged items period May 4 and 5 in 2007, killing 13 people, in- years, while the service has seen about the same picked up from curbside. For questions, call the city at 460-4410. cluding 11 when a single tornado leveled the town number of major storms in that time, which would of Greensburg.

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