Weekend Talk

Kansas City still wants in on the action.

I did not hear any of my customers talking about the fact that the Shut-Ins is closed nor did they have any complaints about the condition of the river. I did talk to one couple from Clinton, MO that were in Lesterville for the first time, and they had never heard of the Taum Sauk event. So is this just a Jeff City and Black River story?

On a personal note on Sunday we had the largest one day sales of any Memorial Day weekend in the last 23 years. So if you hear some of the usual suspects complaining about business being bad you would have to wonder what they are doing wrong.

DNR and the Lawsuit

Well, isn't this interesting.

Sen. Kevin Engler (r) Farmington

An article in the May 23 Mt. Echo states that Sen. Kevin Engler wrote a letter to Gov. Blunt and Doyle Childers strongly suggesting the following be included in a settlement with Ameren.

A lease of no longer that 20 years on Church Mountain.

The inclusion of funds to construct a sewer system for the city of Lesterville.

A requirement that Ameren will inexpensively lease land in the area to a wireless company to lessen the cost of a cell tower.

Funds to cover the operating cost of a 911 call center.

In order to raise sales tax revenues, funds should be included to develop a professional marketing campaign to bring tourists back to Johnson Shut-Ins and the Black River.

Here is what I find interesting. First the local elected officials want the tax money from Church Mt. so they don't want the state to get control of this land. There was an attempt to get a sewer system out of the $5 million, but there just were too many hands out for that money. And as I remember about $500,000 of that money went to the 911 system, but there is fear of what happens when that money is gone. All the out of county people, elected officials and news people, go crazy down here because on the poor cell coverage. Its just part of our life in paradise. As to getting people back to the Black River area I think they should just hand out $50 gas cards. That's about the cost of a round trip to Lesterville from St. Louis.

No Crime

Link to article about the AG and Ameren.

BSA/Shut-Ins

Here is link to an article about the scouts work at the Shut-Ins.

Brrrrrr!

It was 33 degrees this morning at Peola Valley. So if you are coming down this weekend pack some sweats for the mornings. Yesterday was beautiful once it warmed up and the rest of the weekend is going to be sunny. For us this is the beginning of the season, the first weekend that Black River Lodge is open.

If you have not seen the announcement on our web site this is also our last season. Pam and I
will close Peola Valley Pottery on October 15. We plan on spending the winter building a new studio in Springfield and will operate on the internet starting next summer.

We also will spend part of the winter in Lesterville getting our home and other buildings
ready to sell next spring. So if you know someone that wants 9+ acres in paradise with deeded
access to the river have them email me and I will let them know when it goes on the market.

Finally, many will ask if this has anything to do with the Taum Sauk event and the answer is no.
We had a good summer in 2006 and we expect to have a good one in 2007. It has everything
to do with getting older.

Just The News

The events of last Saturday have meant that all the other news is off my radar. However, it does look like maybe some important things might happen with the State/Ameren conflict. I talked to someone yesterday that suggested that this might be the time to write a letter or email to Blunt, Nixon, and DNR and suggest that the public would like to see this settled now.

There also was this article in the News-Leader that bothered me. If the drunks are thrown off the Current River you know where they will come next, the Black. Not that the Black is not out of control on most Saturdays, but we don't need additional drunks with the limited law enforcement in Reynolds County.

Is The End In Sight?

This article sounds to good to be true.

Doug Hendrickson

For those of you that have been customers and friends of Peola Valley I want you to know that Doug died this morning. You can go to the Peola Valley web site for more information.

New Photos

Ameren has posted a few new photos of work at the Lower Reservoir and the East Fork. How about a few photos of work at the Upper Reservoir?

Stuff

For those of you that don't read the St Louis Post Dispatch here is their take on yesterdays events. At the bottom of the article are a few quotes from Jan Flowers, the owner of Wilderness Lodge. Pam and I were at Wilderness yesterday to put up a display of our pottery in the main dining room. Wilderness did a complete remodel of the kitchen over the winter, I'm talking about taking the floor out right down to the joists and starting over. One of the long time cooks told me how nice it's going to be to work in an air conditioned kitchen for the first time. The staff was also busy putting in new mattresses and linens and a group of carpenters was busy remodeling the riverside suites. So in spite of what goes on up river, the folks on Peola Road are getting ready for a great season.

As of 8am we had received 2 inches of rain and more is expected. Don't think this will be a flood event, but it should help to continue the process of cleaning out the river.

Disney Dreams

What in the world is DNR planning on Church Mountain that they want to spend $5 million on a wilderness area. Maybe an assisted living home for old political appointees.

For Your Eyes Only

DNR has posted Ameren's Confidential Offer of Settlement. Go to this link and then open the attachment at the bottom of the page. Wonder what part of the word confidential DNR didn't understand.

Is This Anyway To Run A Railroad?

Todays activities make me nostalgic for some Monty Python reruns.

Do Over?

DNR presented Ameren with a second settlement agrement today. I have family in the TV news business and I'm trying to figure out all the activity this week. In TV land they call it "news cycle" and someone wants this story to be front and center this week.

Dead or Unimportant?

In my last post I said this was a "dead" story. Shelley Powers added a comment and used the word "unimportant". She also put a comment on her own blog saying that the folks in Lesterville would just as soon see the story die out.

What I was trying to say was that the media have decided it is a "dead" story, because they have stopped covering it. What should have been one of the big stories, how the $5 million fine was dealt with and what it is going to be spent on, no one covered. When ever I'm in Springfield and meet someone new and say I'm from Lesterville no one ever says, oh, the town down river from the Taum Sauk event. Most people in the entire state have put this story behind them.

So what I was trying to say is I live in one of the most unpopulated parts of Missouri and to the rest of the state this is an old story. There are a few thousand people that have been coming to the Black River for decades and they are still concerned about the condition of the river, but they number less than the population of all of Reynolds County (6,000+). I really think that all the noise from Jeff City has more to do with undeveloped males that are still trying to win a basketball game with the guys from the next small town. Childers doesn't want to lose, but I'm not convinced that he cares about the trophy. He just wants to go home and know that he scored a 3 pointer against the AG.

Dead or unimportant, ether way I have to drive 100 miles round trip for a doctors appointment today, just one of the factors of living in paradise.