Looking out for taxpayers
Whitman County is on the verge of signing a 51-year lease with an LLC that owns property on the top of Bald Butte. In addition to the annual lease costs, the county will spend $800,000 plus interest of taxpayer funds to erect a cell tower on the butte. This is in response to an invoice received a couple of years ago from Inland Telephone (owners of the current site where county equipment is located) demanding back pay and monthly rent of $3,200. It is my understanding that Inland Telephone has not pursued payment since then and continues to allow the county’s equipment to reside on their tower.
Early on, the county intended to partner with Inland Cellular. Though we objected due to easement concerns, the county claimed they needed the partnership in order to make this financially feasible. They would provide Inland Cellular with the materials to build the tower, citing “a previous relationship” as the basis for this taxpayer gift. The county has now changed its mind and states that the tower and annual costs will be funded by taxpayers.
I do not know what has transpired between Inland Telephone and the county but I have reason to believe that Inland Telephone is willing to negotiate the fee if presented with a convincing proposal from the county.
For those of you who do not wish to see another tower on the butte, and would like to save taxpayer dollars — I encourage you to let your voice be heard by writing to Alan Thomson at Whitman County (who is ready to issue a conditional use permit). I also think it would help if letters went to Inland Telephone in Roslyn, Wash., appealing to them for some goodwill to the taxpayers of Whitman County.
Mary Hoffman
Colton
The perfect letter
Once again, Marilyn Lyshoir-Coates has written the perfect letter to the editor about the misguided changes the University has made to the mission of the Prichard Art Gallery. This time, her letter is in response to Dean Shauna Corry’s letter to the editor defending those changes.
Marilyn rightly categorizes Corry’s comments as “spinning, whitewashing and/or covering up” the true nature of the changes and their negative effect on Moscow and the community at large.
A fundraising appeal to help cover the cost of the upcoming MFA exhibit has now been sent to those of us who have supported the Prichard over the years. In my view, the appeal gives new meaning to the Yiddish expression “chutzpah.”
If the University wants the Prichard to be a faculty/student gallery run by faculty and students, then they should not look to the community to financially support it. They can’t have it both ways.
Barbara and Richard Wells
Moscow
