Forum Flashbacks: Jan. 30-Feb. 5

FORUM FILE PHOTO
Forum Flashbacks: Fifteen years ago, Nodaway County Sheriff Ben Espey, left, accepted a framed proclamation from David Boyles at the courthouse on Friday. The proclamation, signed by newly inaugurated Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt, recognized Espey and the Nodaway County Sheriff’s Department for their swift and decisive action during the early hours of the Bobbie Jo Stinnett murder investigation and search for her baby Victoria Jo. In accepting the proclamation, Espey recognized the officers and staff of the sheriff’s department, whose professionalism and dedication he says were the key to the rapid discovery of the baby and arrest of a suspect.

25 years ago

• Fearful of damage to the community’s image and concerned about safety, a majority of area residents responding to a questionnaire said they were against a possible corrections facility locating in Nodaway County.
  A voluntary survey printed in the Maryville Daily Forum was completed by nearly 250 area residents, with 70 percent of them saying they were against a proposal to locate a minimum- to medium-security prison at the former Mount Alverno Convent. The facility would likely house 525 male inmates and be part of an $11 million plan put together by the Missouri Department of Corrections to address immediate space needs.
• A former United States Air Force colonel will fill the second-highest post in the city administration, officials announced yesterday.
  Ronald G. Brohammer of Warrensburg, has been chosen from a field of more than 60 candidates as the city’s assistant city manager/public works director. Brohammer’s selection was announced by Maryville City Manager David Angerer at a press conference at city hall Thursday afternoon.
  Brohammer retired from the United States Air Force only a few months ago, Angerer said. During his tenure, Brohammer served at Whiteman Air Force Base where he was involved in street, runway and building construction, as well as work with a nine-hole golf course.

15 years ago

• Maryville City Manager Matt Chesnut submitted a letter to the editor responding to the Maryville R-II School Board’s letter, which was printed in yesterday’s edition of the Forum.
  Both letters are concerning a tax-increment financing proposal, which will go before the city council for a vote at noon on Friday, Feb. 4.
  The school board’s letter argued (against) a proposed tax-increment financing district because it freezes the amount of tax money they receive from the proposed district at current levels.
  The plan will affect The Village shopping center in Maryville, which is being purchased by developer David Christie. As part of the deal, which goes before the council in a vote on Friday, Christie would be issued a $1.95 million bond to help pay for a massive expansion and renovation to the Hy-Vee grocery store in the shopping center.

5 years ago

• Crews contracted by United Fiber, a subsidiary of the United Electric rural electric cooperative, have been in Maryville since Monday laying a strip of finger-sized fiber-optic cable that will serve businesses up and down the Main Street corridor.
  Access to the underground data cable will reportedly offer United Fiber customers one-gigabyte connections and provide dramatically faster broadband Internet service.
  United Electric’s Darren Farnan said the co-op is financing the project, which will comprise 1,300 miles of cable across a six-county area, with $21 million in grants and loans.
• The Nodaway County Commission stiffened its employee tobacco use policy last week, extending an existing ban on cigarettes, cigars and pipes in county buildings to chewing tobacco and further prohibiting the use of tobacco products in county-owned vehicles.