Goodbye 2009!
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41 / 32 2010 •••••••••••••• HAPPY NEW YEAR! •••••••••••••• 2010 Craft room SEE ENTERTAINMENT 1 2010: and art scene Rain and snow. TREND Business 4 CATTLEMAN ACCUSED OF ANIMAL DRUG ABUSE >>> FDA says Jerome man didn’t follow label directions, BUSINESS 1 FRIDAY 75 CENTS January 1, 2010 MagicValley.com Crews Changing safely course IDWR chooses reach to re-examine stranded injury changes By Nate Poppino men Times-News writer By Laurie Welch The Idaho Department Times-News writer of Water Resources is tak- ing a closer look at one of BURLEY — Two Idaho the final changes made by Falls men were rescued its former director. from Mount Harrison by Early in November, search crews early IDWR Interim Director Thursday morning after Gary Spackman quietly spending more than 30 rescinded a complicated, hours in a communica- highly technical order tions shed during a bliz- that attempted to revamp zard. how his agency calculates Vance Hawley and Bliss harm done to water rights Wheeler rode snowmo- used for canal systems. biles up the mountain The order was issued by Tuesday to work on com- former Director Dave munications equipment Tuthill on the day of his they maintain in the retirement, June 30. building. When they tried Tuthill had promised the to get back to the snow- changes as part of a ruling mobile parking lot around on a water call by a group 4 p.m., they found of Magic Valley canal weather conditions had operators the year before. deteriorated, Hawley said Water users across the Thursday during a phone board were skeptical of interview. Both men were Tuthill’s adjustments. uninjured. The order also drew criti- “You could emulate the cism from former 5th conditions by hanging up District Judge John a white sheet and looking Melanson — now a judge straight into it,” Hawley with the Idaho Court of said. “I could have dug a The stories that affected our lives last year Appeals — who wrote hole in the snow and been while reviewing IDWR’s okay but the guy I was Computer giant Dell shook the Magic Valley new direction. handling of the water call with didn’t have water- economy, Canyon Ridge High School ushered in The threat of fallowed fields lingered before the that Tuthill abused his proof clothing. He also discretion by not releasing takes a whole drugstore of the era of the cross-city rivalry and Idaho hunters state’s first large-scale well closure. Oh, and a the changes with the orig- medications and didn’t 0put the Canadian gray wolf in their crosshairs. 9man was found in a rest-stop toilet near Filer. inal call decision. have them with him.” The pair kept in contact Area legislators navigated 117 days of political From stories that disheartened and disturbed, See IDWR, Main 2 with the Cassia County wrangling in Boise marked by dire budget cuts to those that lifted spirits or eyebrows, 2009 was sheriff’s dispatch Tues- Magicvalley.com day night by cell phone and the shifting landscape of the federal stimulus. a year like any other — full of life. And the Times- READ orders and figured they would CSI continued to expand its education empire as News was there. Here’s a sampling of the biggest wait out the storm. Later associated with when the cell phone went area residents displaced from their jobs sought stories 2009 offered. this issue. dead they were able to use a radio in the building to Stories and photos by Times-News staff reach Terry Fletcher of Twin Falls on an all- call frequency. Fletcher THE ECONOMY ARAGON TRIAL Goodbye relayed information to the sheriff’s office for several Dell closure adds to economic angst Jury acquits Aragon for hours. 2009! “When I first heard The Magic Valley shared in the pain of the national daughter’s death them, I thought it was unemployment crisis as area counties reported unem- World ready for a either somebody playing ployment rates as high as 15 percent while the state’s rate A Lincoln County jury acquitted Robert Aragon around or somebody real- climbed to 9.1 percent in November. on Oct. 11 of all charges more hopeful 2010 ly in trouble,” Fletcher The September announcement that Dell Computer Inc. connected to his said Thursday. would close its Twin Falls call center and lay off most of daughter’s hypother- By Jamey Keaten Fletcher said his HAM the center’s 500 employees added what Idaho Department mia death on Associated Press writer radio, or amateur radio, is of Labor regional economist Jan Roeser said could be a $20 Christmas Day 2008. a hobby and he regularly million hit to the Magic Valley economy. Lincoln County PARIS — Paris jazzed up monitors several frequen- High-tech didn’t take the only hit, as plummeting milk Prosecutor E. Scott the Eiffel Tower with a cies.He was just glad to be prices put the squeeze on area dairymen. Paul pushed hard for multicolored, disco-style able to help, he said. The Department of Labor set a new record by paying Aragon to be punished light display as the world “That’s a part of why a nearly $596 million in state and federal unemployment for the death of 11- basked in New Year’s fes- good many HAM opera- insurance benefits through early December and extended year-old Sage Aragon, tivities with hopes that tors do this,” Fletcher office hours in Twin Falls after the Dell announcement. who did not survive the 2010 and beyond will bring said. Experts say Idaho’s unemployment rate will likely con- trek she and her broth- more peace and prosperity. Hawley said he and tinue its climb in 2010, as a late-year reduction in job loss- er Bear Aragon took From fireworks over Wheeler were fairly com- es has not yet signaled a turnaround in the economy. along West Magic Road Sydney’s famous bridge to fortable and this was not to visit their mom an balloons sent aloft in the first time he has been A Dell employee heads to estimated nine miles Robert Aragon walks through a Tokyo, revelers across the snowed in on the moun- her car after being told in away. Bear, then 12, Shoshone courtroom during globe at least temporarily tain. September Dell’s Twin Falls was found in a public an appearance for the charges shelved worries about the “I was snowed in for call center would close by restroom, suffering he faced in the death of his future to bid farewell to two weeks one time,” January and most of its 500 from hypothermia, but daughter Sage on Christmas “The Noughties’’ — a bit- Hawley said. employees would be laid off. his sister’s body was 2008. ter-tinged nickname for He said the building is found lifeless a short the first decade of the 21st Media were denied access equipped with lights and distance away. century playing on a term heat, some food and even to Dell’s announcement The story gained national attention through for “zero’’ and evoking the a bed. “But the bed was conference and employees Aragon’s trial.A film crew from the truTV cable net- word naughty. filthy and wet,” Hawley had been instructed to not work filmed the trial but has yet to air a related pro- In New York City, hun- said. The two were able to give their names. gram. dreds of thousands of rev- melt snow on a hot plate elers gathered in chilly for water. weather in Times Square Mini-Cassia Search MINI-CASSIA to usher in the new decade. and Rescue was called out Ethanol plants run dry bankruptcy court in December to ruptcy in 2007. Organizers prepared 3,000 shortly after 4 p.m. Wed- reopen the plant and was able to rehire In a last-ditch effort to recoup their pounds of confetti that nesday, when Wheeler’s Mini-Cassia ethanol production,or many of the workers it let go. losses by selling parts of the plant this scattered when the New medical condition deteri- the lack thereof, became an economic Partially constructed Renova year, Renova’s creditors asked Year’s Eve crystal ball orated and required issue after Pacific Ethanol laid off 24 Energy Inc., located in the Burley Minidoka County to defer the plant’s dropped at midnight. attention. Because of the workers and closed its Burley plant’s Industrial Park, ran over budget still taxes,which the county agreed to.The Even as some major white-out on the moun- doors before filing bankruptcy in May. owing $20 million to local subcon- creditors also asked the city of Burley stock market indexes rose tain, search crews were Pacific received permission from a tractors and filed for Chapter 11 bank- to defer rent payments. in 2009, the financial See RESCUE, Main 2 FIND MORE OF 2009’S TOP STORIES ON MAIN 3 See NEW YEAR, Main 2 Comics....................Sports 4 Crossword ......Classifieds 4 Obituaries ..........Business 3 Commodities ......Business 2 Dear Abby........Classifieds 4 Opinion ......................Main 7 COATS’ SENIOR SWITCHEROO Community................Main 4 Movies ......Entertainment 2 Sudoku ............Classifieds 6 Minico’s teen goes from b-ball to wrestling > Sports 1 MORNINGMORNINGMain 2 Friday, January 1, 2010 BRIEFINGBRIEF- Times-News, Twin Falls, Idaho Pat’s Picks TODAY’S HAPPENINGS Two things to do today BENEFITS AND FUNDRAISERS 360 Shoshone St. E., Twin Falls, $100 in For detailed coverage of Pat Marcantonio Canceled: The 22nd annual Freeze on advance ensures materials pre-ordered in Skis, due to economic issues, 734-5065. time for class start-up, 208-736-7315, 208-329-0254 or 208-733-5872.