Citing a grim financial picture, city of Powell leaders want Park County voters to consider passing an additional, ongoing 1-cent sales tax in a special election this November.

“Why haven’t we ever tried at least to put it before the voters?” Powell Mayor Scott Mangold asked Park County, Cody and Meeteetse leaders during a meeting last week.

Some of the Big Horn Basin’s public lands would see increased restrictions under a draft management plan released this week for public review by the federal Bureau of Land Management.

The draft Resource Management Plan contains the BLM’s preferred plan for managing millions of acres of public lands in the Basin over the next decade or two.

Some of the Big Horn Basin’s public lands would see increased restrictions under a draft management plan released this week for public review by the federal Bureau of Land Management.

The draft Resource Management Plan contains the BLM’s preferred plan for managing millions of acres of public lands in the Basin over the next decade or two.

More than a dozen Tea Party-backed candidates were elected to Congress in last year’s elections and a more conservative Republican majority took over the U.S. House. But the primary message at Friday’s Big Horn Basin Tea Party rally in Cody was not one of celebrating past victories, but of fear over what the future still may hold.

“The collapse is coming,” warned Rob DiLorenzo, an Emblem attorney and a co-founder of the Basin’s Tea Party group. He described the national deficit — currently at $14.3 trillion — as a fast-approaching brick wall.

Two young Powell men have been charged with counts of burglary in connection with the thefts of a number of firearms and other items from a rural Powell residence last month.

Police say the thefts are loosely connected to an altercation last week where a stolen pistol allegedly was used to threaten a Powell man and fired. However, the pistol recovered in that incident is alleged to have been stolen from a different residence earlier this month.

One charged as of Monday

Powell police are continuing to investigate a Wednesday incident where a pistol was reportedly fired on West Second Street.

The only individual charged in the case as of Monday afternoon, 19-year-old Sage M. Miears of Powell, has been charged with threatening an individual with a gun, but he is not alleged to have fired the shot.

Hopes to make move in a couple months

Closing a deal some two years in the making, Powell Valley Recycling took ownership Monday of what soon will be its new, expanded location — the former Park County Road and Bridge shop.

“It’s been a long time coming,” said Powell Valley Recycling Manager Mary Jo Decker.

When a 7-foot inflatable rabbit was stolen off their lawn last week, Shauna Sickinger and Nicole Goubeaux didn’t abandon their Easter decor. To the contrary — on the Fourth and Clark street corner where their lone Easter Bunny once stood, two replacement bunnies now stand.

“If you steal, they multiply,” laughed Sickinger in a Tuesday interview, describing why she replaced the heisted hare with two more.

Seeking compromise, gas company withdraws McCullough drilling permits

Hoping to avoid a potentially complicated and drawn-out legal battle, a Denver-based gas company has withdrawn its permits for drilling a series of exploratory wells in the McCullough Peaks area.

The Wyoming Legislature passed 204 bills during its 37-day session from Jan. 11 to March 3. But it’s one that didn’t pass — House Bill 74: Validity of Marriages — that continues to draw the most interest, Park County legislators said Tuesday.

Speaking to the Park County Republican Women in Cody, state Sen. Hank Coe, R-Cody, said gay marriage bills consumed “an incredible amount of time” during the legislative session, that he received hundreds of daily emails on House Bill 74 and that he was still getting emails about it.