36 years ago this month

An agreement to stop pumping water from three wells has slowed but not halted the progress in developing Spring Meadows Ranch into a major cattle operation.

The ranch, located in the Ash Meadows area is converting about 3,800 of its 12,000 acres of alkali soil into cattle range. Spring Meadows agreed to a government move to stop pumping from the three wells by Sept. 9 in order to protect the pupfish at Devil's Hole. More than 50 employees work the Ranch.

A proposed tax formula for Pahrump Valley real estate will be presented to all interested parties at an open meeting tentatively scheduled at the Pahrump Community Center. Leo Funk, Nye County assessor, reports that information reflecting sales prices of land, recently collected from Pahrump land sales organizations, has been extremely valuable in working toward an equitable land taxation plan for Pahrump Valley.

30 years ago this week

A go-cart track and an arcade with soda fountain service will be opened in the coming weeks at the Saddle West. Owner Bob Huffman said the go-cart track will be built behind the restaurant-casino and will start off with about a half dozen vehicles.

Go-carts are built very close to the ground and give the driver the sense of high rates of speed while driving the closed course. Huffman said the course dedication will probably include some challenge matches involving local public officials, residents and celebrities.

The arcade will occupy 800 square feet and will include about 20 electronic games; the soda fountain will serve hamburgers, hotdogs and a full range of ice cream dishes.

A representative from Emergency Medical Physicians Inc. will be at the Nye County Commission meeting Nov. 1 to discuss staffing the Pahrump medical clinic. The staff will probably be paid through grants or federal funds. County commissioners are seeking to operate the clinic on a regular schedule. The facility is part of the new Nye County Complex.

20 years ago this week

A tricky legal problem was avoided by the state this week when officials refused to arrest demonstrators who trespassed into the Bullfrog County portion of the Nevada Test Site. Nye County District Attorney Phil Dunleavy said neither Nye County nor any other state court is qualified to handle arrests in Bullfrog County since it was created without any judicial jurisdiction.

Opponents of nuclear weapons testing hoped to be arrested and tried in a federal court in order to increase awareness of their desire to stop nuclear weapons testing in Nye County.

Sen. Chic Hecht said he is glad members of the Nevada Legislature made a recent trip to Europe to tour nuclear facilities and reprocessing plants. Hecht took similar tours last April.

"These legislators saw in Europe the same thing I saw," he said. "They saw that reprocessing can replace nuclear waste repositories as a safer, more efficient means of handling the waste, and that the political battle against disposal of high-level waste and in favor of reprocessing, can be won."

The Valley Electric Association board of directors will meet Wednesday at VEA headquarters in Pahrump. The board will discuss more about its negotiations with the Nevada Test Site for a power path for NTS access to its Parker and Davis dam's hydroelectric power.

NTS wants the power to come from the dams in part over transmission lines and a transformer that VEA owns. Directors will also discuss a rate for use of VEA facilities.

10 years ago this week

Even though the great majority of the public present vigorously opposed the action, the Nye County Board of Commissioners late Wednesday afternoon voted 4-0, with Red Copass abstaining, to impose a nine-month moratorium on land divisions within the Pahrump Regional Planning District.

The action came during a joint workshop between commissioners and the Regional Planning Commission to discuss flood mitigation and planning issues. Planning Director Ron Williams cited public health and safety issues as the major basis for the moratorium request.

Susie Baumberger's "Fire in the Hole Chili" may not live up to its name, but it was deemed tasty enough by the judges to put $500 in her pocket at the conclusion of the chili cook-off held Saturday at Saddle West. Baumberger's victory qualifies her for the Virgin River chili cook-off to be held in Mesquite in June. Baumberger lives in Las Vegas.

All winners received gifts purchased by Saddle West from Pahrump Valley Vineyards. Another Las Vegas resident, Jim Harvey, won the salsa competition.

The Pahrump Valley High School football team has a good shot at snapping its four-game losing streak tonight, at home, against the Whittell Warriors. After winning two of their first three games this season, the Trojans (2-5, 0-3) have lost their last four by a combined score of 140-26. That should change tonight; Whittell, a school of 250 students in Zephyr Cove, is still searching for its first win. The young Warriors, coming off a 38-0 loss at the hands of Hawthorne, are 0-7.

When is a freshman safe in a room full of seniors? When he wants to radically reform the IRS, get the U.S. out of the United Nations, and keep the country's nuclear waste from being stored in Nevada. The freshman in question is freshman Congressman Jim Gibbons, who held a town hall meeting at the Pahrump Senior Citizen's Center Thursday night.

About 50 local residents, most of them seniors, turned out to ask Gibbons questions and hear the Nevada Republican reflect on his first 10 months in office.