PC = TY TE We rl, [7 Jie SR i 3%. 33 Vol. 102 No. £ MORE TRUCKS TRAVEL ROUTE 309 - Back Mountain motorists Dallas cagers take tourney win o Dallas, PA Tuesday, December 31, 1991 35 Cents have had to learn to share the road with many more.tractor-trailers By ERIC FOSTER Post Staff W,. of the worst situations a firefighter, ambulance crew mem- ber, or police officer can find them- selves in may happen before they ever get to where they're needed. The worst case scenario is that they can't find the address towhich they've been called. Rollie Evans, Jackson Township's fire chief, remembers stich a case all too well. “We couldn't find the location,” said Evans. “The people loaded up ¢ person in the car and took them to the hospital themselves.” To help make it easier for police, ambulance and fire crews to find homes, the Back Mountain Com- munications Center, Back Moun- tain Firefighters Association, and the U.S. Postal Service are team- ing up to encourage people to at least put their box numbers on the mailboxes if they live on a rural delivery route. “There is a regulation, people are supposed to have the numbers up,” said Noxen Postmaster David Scharr. However Scharr adds that letter carriers deliver the mail as long as they know who lives at the house. Scharr, and Rocky Knorr, Hun- lock Creek Postmaster, are both facilitators for the Post Office's Quality of Work Life Teams — postal volunteers who are working and other trucks since the Cross Valley Expressway opened in No- vember. (Post photo/Grace R. Dove) with Back Mountain emergency personnel to draft a letter to send to rural customers asking them to put up their box numbers. Scharr expects that the letters will be sent within the next two months. While it would be better to have a name on the box, Scharr said that only numbers are required. Paint, he said, is better than stick- on letters because the stick-on letters can fall off. “First what we're trying to do is make every box holder aware that there is a regulation that they have the numbers on the box,” said Evans. “The long term goal is to convert the RR numbers to street addresses.” umbertess homes hold up heip If you ever must place an emer- gency call, simply giving a rural delivery route doesn't tell a fire- men, ambulance driver or police officer much. “If they don't tell us what road they live on... take RR 1, you have all of Kunkle,” said Dallas Town- ship Police Officer Wayman Miers. Dallas Township encompasses parts of seven rural delivery routes. “Say we receive an emergency call at RR 2 Dallas,” said Evans. “That covers parts of Jackson Township, Lehman Township and Harveys Lake.” What's needed says Evans, is the proper street name. To make See HELP, pg 8 Former cheerleader comes home to coach By ERIC FOSTER Post Staff When Kathy Farrell took over the coaching duties for the Dallas Middle School cheerleading squad at the beginning of December it was like meeting a good friend that she hadn't seen for some time. ing A 1987 graduate of Dallas High "S¥hool, Farrell had been a cheer- leader from 9th to 12th grade, and previous to that, had been a Gate of Heaven cheerleader since 6th grade. After high school, came college, and work, so Farrell, a 6th grade teacher at Sacred Heart School in Luzerne, hadn't had time to stay involved with cheerleading. “When I jumped in, there was a game in three days,” says Farrell ‘who lives in Dallas. “We've basi- cally been working with the bas- kKetball cheers.” : Farrell became head cheerlead- ing coach December 10, after the school board accepted Cherie Davis's resignation from the post with regrets. Calendar................ Classified........ 12-13 Editorials................ 4 Obituaries............ 11 Police report.......... 2 Property transfers..2 School.................. 8 + «CALL 675-5211 ~~ FOR HOME DELIVERY, . NEWS OR ADVERTISING “Things really have changed,” says Farrell. “One thing they are beginning to realize at Dallas is that it's a sport, not an activity or a club.” “My main thing is dedication,” says Farrell, who notes that cheer- leading is a year-round activity. For 16 girls from 7th, 8th and 9th grades on the Middle School squad, dedication means two prac- tices a week, along with two or three games. When Farrell has questions about new cheers, or training methods, she can turn to “one of her closest friends,” Mrs. Sheila Bonawitz, head cheerleading coach at the high school, and the assis- tant coach, Ann Marie Danna. What's the hardest part of coach- ing? One of the basics. HH A CHEER FOR THE NEW COACH - The Dallas Middle School recently welcomed Kathy Farrell as “Trying to get everybody to do the exact same thing,” says Far- rell. While she jumped into the head coach slot part way through the year, Farrell notes that the squad had already been working on their material, and the work has paid off with a close-knit group. See CHEERLEADERS, pg 2 its new cheerleading coach. Shown from left is the Middle School squad. First row: Dana Siglin, Beth Wagner, Sheila Brutko, co-captain, Becky Mathers, Julie Haas. Second row: Kristen Nackley, Erin Williams, Tami Frederici, Leona Miller, Bobbi Jo Swire. Third row: coach Kathy Farrell, Marina Knappman and Mary Ann Selenski. (Post Photo/Eric Foster) More big rigs on Rt. 309 raise safety concerns By GRACE R. DOVE Post Staff Now that the new Cross Valley Expressway has made the 1992 Rand-McNally Road Atlas, drivers looking fora short cut to Tunkhan- nock or Route 6 are more likely to pass through the Back Mountain. Tractor-trailer drivers have quickly learned of the convenient new highway, either from the road at- las or from other drivers on the CB. “Route 309 in the Back Moun- tain resembles a huge funnel,” commented Kingston Township Manager Jeff Box. “Anyone look- ing for a shortcut from the south- ern tier of New York or the north- ern tier of Pennsylvania to points south will probably choose it in- stead of the old route, across Route 6 to Clarks Summit and down Route 81. The expressway cuts at least 45 minutes from the travel time.” Kingston Township police, Box said, have already noticed in- creased heavy truck traffic in the two months that the new artery has been open. “PennDOT (The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation) estimated that 1,500 heavy trucks per day traveled through the Back Mountain before the expressway opened,” Dallas Police Chief Jack Fowler commented. “They told me that they expect this number to eventually increase to 8,000 rigs a ‘day. My men have already noticed more heavy trucks in the Back Mountain.” PennDOT Traffic Engineer Ron Bonacci quoted figures from a traffic study of Route 309 in King- ston Township done 3 days before the Cross Valley opened. His equip- ment logged an average of 40,319 vehicles passing in both directions through the “rock cuts,” roughly 2,800 of them heavy trucks. Bon- acci's office plans another traffic study when traffic patterns nor- malize after the holidays. Where are all the rigs coming from? Why are they coming here? And how should we change our driving habits to accomadate an See BIG RIGS, pg 8 By ERIC FOSTER Post Staff ‘Hanson pleads guilty in waterskiing fatality Gregg Hanson pleaded guilty to three misdemeanor charges in connection with the waterskiing death by Richard Walter while a felony charge was dismissed before Luzerne County Judge Ber- nard Brominski Friday, December 27. Hanson pleaded guilty to operating a watercraft while under the influence of alcohol, homicide by watercraft, and negligent opera- tion of a watercraft. The third degree felony charge of homicide by watercraft while under the influence of alcohol was dismissed. Hanson, 31, of Harveys Lake, was driving a motorboat which was towing water skier Richard Walter on July 27 when at about 7:30 p.m., Walter struck a dock and was killed. Walter was a Dal- See HANSON, pg 2 SOMEONE'S WATCHING - The two Canadian geese on the left are wearing bright yellow neck coliai. as part nf a Came Commission tagging program. (Post photo/Grace R. Dove) Tagged geese are part of wildlife study By GRACE R. DOVE Post Staff Recent visitors to Harveys Lake may have noticed several Cana- dian geese wearing bright yellow collars. According to Pennsylvania Game Commission biologist John Dunn, these geese are part of two state and federal migratory wild- life studies. “Geese with flexible, oddly- shaped yellow collars have flown in from Forest or Lancaster coun- ties, where they were part of a group of 400 ‘nuisance geese’ relo- cated from other parts of the state as part of a wildlife mamagement program,” Dunn explained. They earned this distinction by damag- ing farmers’ crops, ruining resi- dents’ lawns or defecating in water supplies. These geese are a breed known as the Great Canadian goose, a non-migratory breed which looks similar to the migratory Canadian goose. They were introduced to Pennsylvania between the 1930's and the 1960's as part of a pro- gram to establish a resident goose population. Although Great Cana- dian geese do not migrate, Dunn said, they can easily {ly a 20-mile round trip between their nighttime roosting sites and daytime feeding areas. Occasionally these birds will return to their original homes where they initially caused prob- See GEESE, pg 2 E | ii | i fie i
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