Golf and ladies

50 CENTSTRINIDADCOLORADO

Proudly Serving Southeastern Colorado and Northeastern New Mexico • www.thechronicle-news.com

~Vol. 139, No. 60

WEDNESDAYMARCH 25, 2015

MARCH 25Tourism BoardWEDNESDAY (9 a.m.) Commit-

tee meets in the City Hall Third Floor Conference Room, 135 N. Animas St. Information: City Clerk, Audra Garrett, 719-846-9843.

Housing AuthorityWEDNESDAY (6:30 p.m.) Trini-

dad Housing Board of Commission-ers will meet in regular session at the Corazon Square Activity Room, 201 Raton St. Info: Rosemarie Shier, 719-846-7204.

LENTEN SERVICEWEDNESDAY (6:30 p.m.) Weekly

service will be held at Zion’s Lutheran Church, 613 Prospect St. Info: 719-846-7785.

Today’s Quote“This has been my life. I have found it

worth living, and would gladly live it

again if the chance were offered me.”

~Bertrand Russell

MARCH 26Trinidad Ambulance DistrictTHURSDAY (4:30 p.m.) Trinidad

Ambulance District Board of Directors regular meeting at the Trinidad Am-bulance District Office, 939 Robinson Ave. Information: 719-846-6886.

Book SigningTHURSDAY (5 p.m.) “The Tunnels

under our Feet — Colorado’s forgot-ten hollow sidewalks” with author Tracy Beach will be at the Carnegie Library, 202 N. Animas St. Info: 719-846-6841.

Hoehne SchoolsTHURSDAY (6 p.m.) Hoehne

School Board will meet in regular ses-sion in the Superintendents Office. Information: Hannah Baca, 719-846-4457 ext.109.

PUBLIC SERVICESPBC Fire DistrictFRIDAY (10 a.m.) The Spanish

Peaks/Bon Carbo Fire Protection Dis-trict Board of Directors will meet in Century Financial Group Building, 109 W. Main St. Info: Dana Phillips, 719-846-2080.

SCRT PerformanceFRIDAY & SATURDAY (7 p.m.)

& SUNDAY (2 p.m.) Neil Simon’s “I Ought to be in Pictures,” directed by Fred Vaugeois runs at the South-ern Colorado Repertoire Theatre, 131 West Main St. Info: 719-846-4765 or www.scrtheatre.com.

NEW BOOK ‘REMINDERS’SATURDAY (10 a.m.) The Prim-

ero Community Center will host a free presentation “Reminders of a Forgot-ten Past: Weston, Las Animas County, Colorado,” by area native Phillip Ar-nold Vigil at the Center in the Primero High School. Info: Gloria Duran, 719-868-2753 or John Torres, 719-680-9381.

Friendly Farmers ForumSATURDAY (11 a.m.-5 p.m.)

Third annual Education & Exchange Forum will be at the Mt. Carmel Com-munity Center, 911 Robinson Ave. Re-freshments will be served. Info: Trini-dad Community Coop, Carter Morris, 719-680-3528.

PUBLIC RECEPTIONSATURDAY (1-4 p.m.) The public

is invited to join the Corazon Gallery as they host a Patrons’ Appreciation Re-ception for artist Lora Nave at the Gal-lery, 149 E. Main St. Info: Trish Keck, 719-859-7702.

SPAGHETTI DINNERSUNDAY (11-11:30 a.m. for take

home & 11:30 a.m.-2 p.m. for dine in) Annual Palm Sunday celebration and benefit dinner will be held at the Sebastiani Gym on Animas St. Info: John Pearce, 719-846-3369 or [email protected].

THE FINE PRINT

WEATHER WATCHWednesday: A 50 percent chance of

showers, mainly after 11 a.m. Partly sunny, with a high near 54. West wind 5 to 15 mph

becoming north northeast in the afternoon. New precipitation amounts of less than a tenth of an inch possible. Night: A 50 percent chance of rain and snow showers before 11 p.m., then a chance of snow showers. Mostly cloudy, with a low around 25. North north-east wind 5 to 15 mph. New snow accumu-lation of less than a half inch possible.

Thursday: Mostly sunny, with a high near 53. West wind around 5 mph. Night: Partly

cloudy, with a low around 29. Calm wind be-coming west northwest around 5 mph

Friday: Mostly sunny, with a high near 65. West wind around 5 mph becoming south in the afternoon. Night: Mostly clear, with a low around 35. West wind around 5 mph.

Saturday: Sunny, with a high near 73. South southwest wind around 5 mph. Night: Mostly clear, with a low around 39. South southwest wind around 5 mph.

RIVER CALLPurgatoire River Call as of: 03/24/15. Hoehne ditch: Priority # 20 --- Appropriation date: 10/07/1865.

Trinidad Reservoir Accounting:Release .61 AFInflow 122.44 AF -- 61.73 CFSEvaporation 9.83 AFContent 18,987 AFElevation 6,182.22Precipitation 0

Downstream River Call / John Martin Reservoir: (Conservation Storage) 05/31/1949.

THE CHRONICLE NEWSCITY PLANNER

Fineberg resigns positionBy Steve BlockThe Chronicle-News

Trinidad’s City Planner Louis

Fineberg has resigned from the position he has held since Janu-ary 2011, according to City Man-ager Gabe Engeland, speaking in a Monday phone conversation. Unconfirmed reports suggested that Fineberg had taken a similar position in Taos, N.M. Victor Guti-errez will serve as acting city plan-ner until a permanent planner is hired.

During his time in Trinidad, Fineberg was responsible for get-ting millions of dollars of state and federal grant funding into the City for a variety of projects. Among those projects is the ongoing Old Sopris Trail Project, an extension of the City’s trails system, which will ultimately extend from the downtown Boulevard Addition to the entrance to Trinidad Lake State Park. Under Fineberg’s di-rection the Planning Department also secured funding for the City’s Wayfinding Signage project, the North Commercial Street Recon-

struction Project, a new pocket park and other important City im-provements.

Council member Anthony Mat-tie said in a Monday phone call that Fineberg was very good at what he did and would be sorely missed, and he said he wished him well in all of his future endeavors.

“Louis did a fine job while he was here,” Mattie said. “He was very accomplished at what he did. He not only got millions of dol-lars of grant funding into our city, but he managed it very well and brought projects closer to comple-tion.”

Fineberg was one of six final-ists for Trinidad’s City Manager position in October 2012, a job that eventually went to the since-fired Tom Acre. City Council member Carol Bolton said Fineberg had done an outstanding job as City Planner.

“Louis was just incredible in the way he could get grants from DOLA (the Department of Local Affairs),” Bolton said. “He helped our Creative District and our Main Street program. We can only hope

that our next City Planner has the same qualities that he had.”

Multiple attempts to contact Fineberg by phone on Monday were unsuccessful.

ARPA UPDATELamar power plant declared Impaired Asset

By Steve BlockThe Chronicle-News

There was both good news and

bad news coming from the most recent Board meeting of the Ar-kansas River Power Authority (ARPA), the six-member coopera-tive that supplies most of Trini-dad’s electrical supply. Earlier this year, ARPA was notified by its auditor that the Lamar Repower-ing Project (LRP), it’s Lamar-based coal-fired power plant, met the de-scription of an “Impaired Asset” for accounting purposes, because the plant cannot meet the emission requirements of its air permit.

The LRP has been unable to op-erate since 2011 and ARPA is cur-rently involved in a lawsuit with its boiler manufacturer, Babcock and Wilcox, because the boiler can-not meet its air emissions perfor-mance guarantee. At its February

Steve Block / The Chronicle-NewsLouis Fineberg accomplished a great many positive things during his tenure as Trinidad’s City Planner.

Continued on Page 3 ...

By Steve BlockThe Chronicle-News

Monday brought sunny skies and warm tempera-

tures to Trinidad, so it was a fine day for Wal-Mart employees to get outside and clean up the property around the store. Store Manager Hilary Lamb said she was impressed that the employees wanted to also clean up adjacent property as their first task.

The area around the store just off of Exit 11 on In-terstate 25 is subject to some very strong winds and trash tends to pile up around fence lines and in an adjacent drainage ditch, so it helps to do just little bit more to clean things up. The two-day project involved dayshift workers picking up all the trash and hauling it away, and then washing down the sidewalks and parking lot and repainting the fire lanes.

“One of the things that impressed me the most was that when the employees all came out here to start the cleanup, they wanted to clean up not just our area but the trash that had blown on to other properties as well,” Lamb said. “It was a really good feeling to know that the associates care.”

COMMUNITY PRIDE

Steve Block / The Chronicle-NewsWal-Mart Store Assistant Manager Anna Jimenez, rake in hand, joined her co-workers in cleaning up the store’s grounds, as well as the surrounding property.

Wal-Mart employees get spring cleaning done

Continued on Page 3 ...

SOUTHEASTERN COLORADO

Drought updateThe National Weather ServiceSpecial to The Chronicle-News

February showed a tale of two seasons across southeast Colo-rado. The first half of the month was very warm with average tem-peratures running 10 degrees or more above average through the first 20 days of the month. The first half also saw mainly dry condi-tions across the area with two weather sys-tems bringing some snow to the higher e l e v a t i o n s along with rain and snow to the lower el-evations between February 9 and 16. A cool and unsettled weather pattern developed round February 20 and persisted through the end of the month, brin-ing much needed precipitation to the state, especially the south and eastern portions of the area.

Despite above average precipi-tation across southeastern Colo-rado over the past several months, more precipitation will be need to overcome the deficits experiences

throughout the past several years of extreme to exceptional drought. The current US Drought Monitor shows little change in the condi-tions across the area with severe drought (D2) conditions remain-ing in place across the eastern two-thirds of Crowley, eastern Otero, eastern two-thirds of Las

Animas and all of Kiowa, Bent, Baca and Prow-

ers Counties.CPS and VIC

Soil Moisture calculations indicate near normal condi-tions across most of south-east Colorado

with some improvements

noted across por-tions of the San

Luis Valley and the far southeast plains over

the past month.Two weeks of wet weather

through the end of February and the beginning of March provided a significant increase in snowpack statewide which had been reeling after a very from first half of the month across the region. Despite

Continued on Page 2 ...

Photo by Mike Salbato / TSJC

Trojan Golf tees off for stretch runJake Ice, hitting his tee shot on No. 18 last fall at the Trinidad Invitational,

and the Trojan Golf team will begin Region IX play this Thursday and Friday at the Municipal Course in Trinidad. See Page 8.

REGION IX

Page 8 Wednesday, March 25, 2015 The Chronicle-News Trinidad, Colorado

SPORTS2-0 RECORD

THS Lady Miner’s —Soccer starts off hotBy Adam SperandioThe Chronicle-News

The Trinidad Lady Miners soccer team kicked off the season with victories over Rye and Vanguard over the weekend, bringing their record to 2-0 with a lot of soccer still left to be played.

Junior forward Jay Lynn Griego re-corded the first goal of the season early in the first half and senior midfielder Niccole Cordova put the Miners up for good just be-fore halftime in a 2-0 shutout over the Rye Thunderbolts on what was a rainy Thurs-day afternoon at Central Park.

Griego blasted the 15-yard shot from just inside the penalty line and the host Miners protected the lead for the remain-der of the game. Cordova provided an in-surance goal right before halftime. Defen-sively, junior defenseman Marie Lubitz led the team with 10 steals and goalkeep-ers Amber Mitchell and Destiny Montoya combined for four saves on the afternoon, with Mitchell getting credit for the win. It was their first opening day win since the 2011-12 season, when the Miners finished with a 7-8-1 record.

The Miners’ defense held Rye in check

for most of the game and held the ball on their side of the pitch attacking the T-Bolt goalie, Alyssa Clayton at will with Griego and Cordova combining for 12 shots on goal. The T-Bolts were able to penetrate deeper into the Miners’ defense in the sec-ond half but could only manage one shot on goal in the game.

It was a much different story Saturday against Vanguard, as the Coursers jumped out to an early 2-0 lead in the first half. It wasn’t until the second half before the Lady Miners’ legs woke up with junior Dominique Quintana picking up her first goal on the season and Niccole Cordova adding two more, including the game win-ner.

Mitchell recorded six saves and the Miners overwhelmed the Courser’s goal-tenders to the tune of 12 shots on goal for the second straight contest.

The undefeated Miners will take the pitch again on March 31 when they will host Pueblo Central at Central Park before heading on a two-game road trip that will take them to Colorado Springs for a match-up against James Irwin on April 2, and Lamar on April 4. Kickoff against Pueblo Central is scheduled for 4 p.m.

Adam Sperandio/The Chronicle-News Trinidad Lady Miner Jillian Duran battles a Rye Thunderbolt defender for the ball in Thursday’s season opener at Central Park. The Miners defeated the T-Bolts 2-0.

Lady Trojans move into first with sweep of McCook By Mike SalbatoCorrespondentThe Chronicle-News

Trinidad State Junior College coach Steve Swazo knew his team had their hands full facing Region IX leading McCook Commu-nity College this past weekend at Southside Park. The Indians were riding an 18-game win streak, but in the end the Lady Trojans played solid softball for four games and came away with a series sweep. TSJC won by the scores of 5-3, 9-5, 8-7—and a thriller in eight innings—a 5-3 walk-off win.

Samantha Glover had the hot bat for the Trojans, going 6-for-15 at the plate in the four games with ten RBIs and two home runs. It was Glover’s two-run home run in the bot-tom of the eighth inning that sealed the 5-3 win in the fourth game of the series.

On Saturday in game one, Demi Madalena pitched a complete game for the 5-3 win with ten strikeouts. Glover had a three-run double

while Macie Christian and Vicky Gonzales also had RBIs. In game two, Jessica Salbato kept McCook at bay for the 9-5 win. Courtney Vigil and Sami Miele had the hot bats going 3-for-4, each with a home run. Teaja Rivera also had a home run in the game.

Sunday was another battle as Madalena (7-3) picked up the win in the circle with Salbato getting the save in the 8-7 victory. Glover had three RBIs and Allyson Grywus-iewicz came up with a clutch, pinch-hit, two-RBI single in the sixth inning to lead the Tro-jan attack. Game two of the afternoon was a dandy as TSJC had a 2-0 lead until the sixth inning when McCook took a 3-2 lead. Trini-dad tied the game in the bottom of the sev-enth inning off a single from Morgan Ginger to force the game into extra innings. Glover then provided the heroics, hitting a two-run home run over the right field fence to win it for the Lady Trojans in the bottom of the eighth. Salbato (7-3) pitched all eight innings for the win.

Trinidad State is now 17-8 overall and 12-2 in Region IX play. They are currently in first place in the Region IX standings, one game up on Western Nebraska. The Trojans will host Lamar for a doubleheader on Wednes-day, March 25, and then travel to Nebraska this weekend for a six game road swing fac-ing North Platte on Friday, McCook on Sat-urday and Western Nebraska on Sunday.

TRINIDAD STATE SOFTBALL

Photo courtesy of Trinidad StateSamantha Glover, a freshman from Highland, California, is hitting .385 on the season. She leads the Trojans with five home runs and 21 RBIs.

By Mike SalbatoTrinidad State Junior College

The spring portion of the golf season is just getting started and the Trojans are primed to make a run at a return trip to the National Tournament in May. They are currently fourteen points ahead of Eastern Wyoming in the standings with four tourna-ments played this past fall and five remain-ing on the schedule. To prepare for the up-coming regional tournaments the Trojans went to a tune-up event this past weekend in Midland, Texas. The event, featuring some of the best teams in the country, is a taste of what they will experience at the national tournament if they stay ahead in the stand-ings through the second half of the season.

The Trojans finished fifth overall in Mid-land with three of the teams ahead of them being nationally ranked. Trinidad shot their lowest scoring total ever in Midland finishing with a total of 609 in three rounds. They shot a 299 on day one, a 297 on day two before a downpour soaked the Trojan golf-

ers and their scores rose to 310 for the final round.

Sophomore Jake Ice finished ninth overall and won a trophy for top 10 out of 33 players. He finished +6 with rounds of 72, 74 and 73. “All things considered, I felt like we grinded very hard and posted de-cent scores even though we did not play all that well,” commented Coach Rich Holden. “Jake was the only player that looked fairly close to his best game. He really struck the ball well, but did struggle around the greens a little. I believe our scores will give us a ton of optimism heading into Region IX play this week.”

The Trojans will return to their home course this Thursday and Friday to open the Region IX spring season. TSJC always plays strong at home, but Ice is especially good in Trinidad. He tied the course record this past fall shooting an amazing 62 at the Municipal Course. This ties Aaron Veltri (2003) and Tom Schultz (2010) in the record books. Ice is joined by Justin Carlock, who won three of the four regional tournaments held in the fall and had a double-eagle in tournament play last year. They are joined by local standout Carlos Sisneros, who fin-ished second at the Trinidad meet last se-mester, Justin Fredericks, currently sitting in fifth place in the regional standings and Frazer Pomfret, who won the McCook invi-tational this past fall.

This talented group has a few more goals to meet this spring, which include qualify-ing and placing at the National Tourna-ment. Their run begins this Thursday at 1 p.m. at the Trinidad Municipal Course.

DEAR ABBY

By Abigail Van Buren

DEAR ABBY: My fiance, “Jerry,” has a daughter-in-law who flashes both of us inti-mate parts of her body. At a recent gather-ing, she went down to the floor 2 feet away from where Jerry was sitting and gave us both a full view up her dress. Abby, she did it deliberately!

I thought the time one of her breasts popped out of her blouse was a “ward-robe malfunction.” I no longer feel that way.

Jerry is a push-over. He doesn’t say anything; he just runs away from it. I’m afraid things will only get worse. She must be trying to run me off. I can’t think of any other reason for her behavior.

We have decided to not go on vacation with them this year because of this. Jer-ry is doing what he can for us to avoid being around her, but he has his 1-year-old granddaughter he adores to consider. What do you think is going on? -- COVERING MY EYES IN TEXAS

DEAR COVERING: I think the daughter-in-law either has no sense of modesty or she’s an exhibitionist who enjoys shocking people. Because it bothers you and embar-rasses your fiance, he should tell his son and explain how it makes the both of you feel. If the son delivers the message to his wife, it shouldn’t cause a family rift.

DEAR ABBY: A few years ago, I broke up with a guy who was emotionally and sexu-ally abusive. We had been seeing each other for eight months. We weren’t living togeth-er, but I still was scared to break up with him because of what he might do to me. He

would often call me bad names if I disagreed with what he wanted to do, and have angry outbursts during which he would throw things.

I have looked up how to safely exit an abusive relationship, but everything I find deals with what to do if you are living with the abuser. They don’t teach us in high school how to safely drop an abuser; they just tell us to drop him. How do you safely

break up with an abuser when mov-ing to the other side of the country is impractical? -- RECOVERING IN THE USA

DEAR RECOVERING: Here is what I recommend: If you have mutual friends, tell them why you ended the relationship with him. In addition, stop going places where you know he hangs out.

If he continues to call you, tell him to stop and hang up. Then screen your calls. If he emails, de-lete his messages without looking at them. However, if he follows or con-tinues to pursue you, make a police report.

DEAR ABBY: Last year my un-married 30ish niece became a mother. Nev-er once at family gatherings has there been any mention of a father.

I am more than a little bit curious. A one-night stand? A fertility clinic? A do-it-your-self turkey-baster job? Would I be wrong to bring up the subject? -- CURIOUS UNCLE IN OREGON

DEAR UNCLE: Yes, you would. I can 100 percent guarantee that a male was involved at some point in the conception of that child. And if the father’s identity was any of your business, you would already know the answer to that question.

Dear Abby is written by Abigail Van Bu-ren, also known as Jeanne Phillips, and was founded by her mother, Pauline Phillips. Contact Dear Abby at www.DearAbby.com or P.O. Box 69440, Los Angeles, CA 90069.

DAUGHTER-IN-LAW WHO FLASHES NEEDS MESSAGE TO COVER UP

Trojan’s golf in Midland

TEEING OFF