Month: July 2016

The Utah Public Lands Initiative, formally presented to the House of Representatives last week, includes a plan for Bear Ears and has an accompanying bill denying power to the Antiquities Act in 7 eastern Utah Counties including Uintah and Duchesne. The partner bill is written to ensure land use certainty in the 7 counties in Utah that are part of the Public Lands Initiative. 

One local community has plenty to celebrate with their upcoming 40th anniversary celebration approaching. Sandwiched between the Ute Tribe and Roosevelt City, Ballard is a unique mix of residential, agricultural, commercial and industrial uses with new development in recent years.

Locals came out in force Friday running under a brilliant pink sunset to support the Operation Underground Railroad 5K on Aggie Blvd and Main Street in Vernal. Registrations exceeded original goals for the event with 255 total registered for the race and 200 of those crossing the finish line in the event where every penny was pledged to Operation Underground Railroad in the fight against human trafficking around the world.

The 4 men charged with the rape of a 9-year-old Uintah County girl were in 8th District Court this week. According to Uintah County Sheriff’s Office, the rape of a 9-year-old girl by multiple men was reported to deputies on March 29th. The child was sleeping on the couch of a Uintah County residence on March 27th while her mother was visiting friends. According to investigators, the victim’s mother went into the garage of the home and was smoking methamphetamine. During that time, the child was taken into another room in the home where she told investigators she was raped by the four men. 

A Vernal man on the sex offender registry accepted a plea deal on kidnapping and sexual assault charges from an incident this spring. 57-year-old Charles Irwin Alexander was alone with a woman planning to smoke heroin with him on May 5th when he held a knife to her throat after she refused to have sex with him and had attempted to leave. 

After years of collaboration and thousands of hours of work, Representative Rob Bishop and Representative Jason Chaffetz have formally introduced the Utah Public Lands Initiative to the United States House of Representatives. “The effort of PLI was always to solve problems that have led to acrimony and to do so by conserving lands worthy of conservation and providing economic and recreational opportunities for all Utahns,” shared Representative Bishop after the initiative was introduced to the House. 

During Monday’s meeting, the Uintah County Commission approved an agreement with T-Mobile for a lease of property at Western Park.  T-Mobile will pay $700 dollars a month to Uintah County to have access to a cell tower owned by Strata Networks. 

Appreciation and gestures extended to local law enforcement throughout the Basin is expanding in some cases to include all professionals in the community that work to keep the peace.