Today is the day the nation honors its past presidents. But it is NOT the birth date of George Washington, contrary to what at least one popular local calendar says. It was the proximity of Washington's birthday -- actually on February 22nd -- and Lincoln's birthday on the 12th, which led to this third Monday of February being designated as a consolidated salute to them and the other 42 U.S. presidents. Presidents Day this year turns out to be a moot point for many schoolkids who normally would get the day off ... those in Cheshire County have this WEEK off on Winter Break.
Ever since the YMCA moved from Roxbury Street to West Keene, and the sale of the old site to realtor Chris Tasoulas became final, the recurrent question has been: what will be done with the Roxbury Street site? Now we know, sort-of. Tasoulas tells the Sentinel he envisions new upscale condominiums replacing the current structure, sometime down the road ... fewer than a dozen units worth, with a deeper setback from the street to accommodate parking and greenspace. But none of this is imminent. Tasoulas says while he'd like to have plans ready for zoning and planning board scrutiny by this summer, it will take many months to bring to fruition.
Perhaps it was the weather. Or maybe the fact that it had never been performed in Keene before. But the Keene Lions Club's weekend presentation of the stage musical version of The Wizard of Oz appears to have set a record in this, the 60th year of Lions Club shows. Three of the four performances were virtual sellouts, and the fourth didn't miss it by much. All told, well over 3000 people saw the show Friday and Saturday night, and Saturday and Sunday afternoons. The scheduling of two matinees may also have contributed, in place of the traditional three-night schedule. All four audiences showed their appreciation with long standing ovations at the end.
There is plenty for Keene city council's committees to do this week, but little of it appears likely to draw a crowd. Planning, Licenses & Development gets the first seven applications from downtown restaurants for permits to provide sidewalk table service. Barring something out of the ordinary, most if not all should win quick approval. Municipal Services gets a couple of requests for new street lighting, one of which comes from the association representing the three condo complexes off Summit Road, asking for lighting of the rerouted stretch of Stonehouse Lane, which was moved to accommodate the new YMCA. MSFI also gets the request to change the name of what initially has been named Butterfly Park North, at the behest of HCS, which actually owns the original Butterfly Park.
The latest Gallup daily tracking poll shows former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum ahead of Mitt Romney by eight points. It includes responses from nearly 1200 Republicans and Republican-leaning independents across the country last week. The poll shows 36 percent of registered Republican voters support Santorum for the GOP presidential nomination, with 28 percent backing Romney's White House bid. The two candidates had been statistically tied in the Gallup poll just last Wednesday. Santorum recently won GOP election contests in Missouri, Colorado and Minnesota on the same day. He and Romney are locked in a tough fight to win the primary in Michigan on February 28th. Michigan is the state where Romney grew up and where his father served as governor.
You know you're in gas price trouble when New Hampshire's lowest gas prices is only 11 cents cheaper than the lowest price in Keene. A station in Merrimack showed the lowest price as of this morning on the web site NHGasPrices.com, at 3.43 cents for self-served regular. Keene's lowest this morning is an effective 3.54, not as much higher than the statewide low as usual, which usually hints at an imminent further price increase this week. Could be worse, though; a station in Twin Mountain is up to 3.76 for self-served regular.
Two men are OK, but their ATV sank when it plunged through ice yesterday morning at a fishing derby. Contestants Edwin Ridley and Robert Plaszewski of Fitzwilliam rode out to a spot on Contoocook Lake in Rindge, where they've ice fished before many times, and dropped in through thin ice. Other fishermen nearby got them out quickly. About a hundred fishermen were at the annual Pelletier's Ice Fishing Derby, but no others fell in or lost vehicles.
A body recovered from Lake Massabesic yesterday is indeed that of a missing woman. Janet Langella was reported missing by her family Saturday. Two women who were among the dozens of relatives and friends searching for her spotted the body near the Mill Pond area of the lake and called police. Manchester police confirmed a few hours later it was Langella. An autopsy is scheduled, but investigators say her death is not considered to be suspicious.
A Farmington man is considered by his neighbors to be a hero, but police and prosecutors are not as generous. Dennis Fleming says he tracked down a burglary suspect and after firing a warning shot held him at gunpoint until police arrived. He says he found his own home ransacked, picked up his gun and started talking to neighbors when he saw a man running out in back of another's home. Fleming says that's when he told him to stop and fired the shot while neighbors called 9-1-1. Joseph Hebert was arrested and charged with burglary, but Fleming was later arrested as well on a reckless conduct charge.
While the actual "Occupy" actions taken last fall are pretty much over, the protest movement is continuing, looking for ways to keep the momentum going. Several dozen members of Occupy New Hampshire met over the weekend at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Nashua, talking about ways of spreading their message and increasing their membership. One of the events they're working on is coming up May 1st, a day which is usually associated with recognizing workers' rights.
If you were one of the many who saw a harp seal on the sand at Hampton Beach over the weekend, don't worry. A volunteer from the New England Aquarium went there Sunday to check out the seal to make sure it was OK. According to the aquarium, hundreds of seals come in from Canada this time of year and often come up on shore when they want to sleep or rest. The volunteer said the seal was in good health, just stressed out from the crowds, adding it would go back in the water when ready.
Tropical Storm Irene is still doing collateral damage, all the way into the coming Summer. The flood, which inundated downtown Brattleboro last August, left huge damage to Brattleboro Housing Authority structures, so much so that all of BHA's resources are directed to recovery on that front. That means the agency can't operate the annual summer food program which ensures healthy lunches for low-income children during summer school vacation. Officials are scrambling to find a replacement sponsor. Ironically the housing authority itself replaced a previous sponsor back in 2000, when that group could not continue.
As had been widely expected, the state of Vermont is not taking a judge's ruling, which effectively allows Vermont Yankee's continued operation, without a fight. The state has filed formal appeal of Federal Judge J. Garvan Murtha's ruling that the state overstepped its legal authority in barring the Public Service Board from granitng a new Certificate of Public Good. Yankee's Federal license has been approved by the NRC, but under state law, the plant must be certified for the public good, too. Murtha concluded that the legislative blockage of the CPG was based on safety issues, something federal law specifically allows only at the NRC level.
The former office manager for the Hardwick Electric Department gets a week's reprieve from reporting to prison. Joyce Bellavance was sentenced last month to embezzling one-point-six-million-dollars from the municipal department, the largest such theft from a Vermont town on record. She was supposed to report to a prison in Minnesota Tuesday to begin serving her three-and-a-half year sentence but her attorney is fighting for the sentence to be carried out in Connecticut, closer to her family. The judge is giving both sides a week to resolve the issue.
Lyndon State College is getting a new president as of July 1st. The college says Joe Bertolino, who has served the past eight years at Queens College in New York will become Lyndon's 15th president. He'll replace Steve Gold, who has served as the interim president ever since last June, when former president Doctor Carol Moore retired.
Norwich native Hannah Kearney failed to win at the World Cup freestyle moguls in Japan, breaking her winning streak of 16. Kearney, who holds a 2010 Olympic gold medal, came in fourth. Audrey Robichaud of Quebec City placed first in the freestyle moguls. Kearney says she's disappointed in the way she skied and competed, saying the course got the best of her.
Hundreds of hockey players came from all over Sunday to play it the way they say the game was meant to be played: on outdoor ice. Skaters from around the country, young and old, joined in the Lake Champlain Pond Hockey Tournament, with some from as far away as Florida and Colorado. 57 teams and more than 400 skaters participated, all with the goal of having fun. This was the first year for the tournament on Lake Champlain, as a blanket of snow made it too slushy last year.
