Forum Flashbacks: Feb. 6-12, 2020

FORUM FILE PHOTO
25 years ago: Prison meeting packs house – Missouri Department of Corrections Director Dora Schriro attempts to address concerns about utilizing Mount Alverno as a correctional facility Saturday at the Northwest Missouri State University Conference Center.

25 years ago

• A standing-room-only crowd packed the Northwest Missouri State University Conference Center Saturday, many offering officials their input on a proposal to utilize the former Mount Alverno Convent as a correctional facility.
  During the more than two-hour session Saturday morning, several area residents took advantage of the opportunity to address Missouri Department of Corrections Director Dora Schriro and other elected officials about the proposal announced last week.
  Under the proposal, the Department of Corrections would utilize the facility to house as many as 525 minimum- to medium-security inmates. The facility would likely create 165 jobs and have a $4 million payroll, officials said.

15 years ago

• A standing-room only crowd saw the Maryville City Council unanimously approve the creation of a tax-increment financing district on Friday despite some heavy opposition from the Maryville R-II School District and several business owners.
  The TIF district was approved for The Village shopping center. The sale of the shopping center to Kansas City-area investor David Christie hinged on the council’s adoption of the district.
  At the center of the plan is a proposed renovation and expansion of the Hy-Vee grocery store, a multi-million dollar project which will double the size of the store. Other retailers are also being courted for the shopping center, and Christie is also in the process of purchasing the old Wal-Mart building, which is included in the TIF district.
  Through the TIF plan, Christie will receive a $1.95 million bond for the project, and property and sales taxes will be frozen at current levels.
• From the crashing sound of bowling balls striking pins on Monday and Thursday afternoons at Bearcat Lanes, you couldn’t tell that the average age of the bowlers in the Young-At-Heart Bowling League is nearly 80.
  But more than 70 senior bowlers take part in the league, which proves that you don’t have to be young — only young at heart — to have a good time.
  “This is such a fun group,” said Dora Moutray, who has been bowling for more than 20 years. “I enjoy the fellowship we have here. Everyone is so happy to see us when we come.”
  The Young-at-Heart Bowling League was organized after the late Eldon Wohlford and his wife, Ellen, presented an idea to Bearcat Lanes owners Deon and Jodee Roush. The idea was to have a casual and fun afternoon of bowling where the seniors could get together to visit and enjoy time with friends.

5 years ago

• Starting this spring, the Maryville R-II school district will be administering standardized tests in a different way. Students in third through eighth grades at Eugene Field Elementary School and Maryville Middle School will take the Missouri Assessment Program online for the first time. Maryville High School students have been taking their end-of-course exams online since 2010.
  “The system will be more efficient,” said Ashlee James, MHS counselor. “With paper testing, we didn’t get our scores back until the next August. Now we will have our test scores back before school gets out.”
• The Maryville City Council this week gave the go-ahead for entering into a $22,550 contract with the Austin Peters Group of Overland Park, Kansas, which will conduct the city’s first comprehensive job classification and compensation study in more than a decade.
  City Manager Greg McDanel said the last such study took place in 2003 and resulted in the current municipal salary schedule, which was implemented the following year.
  Since then, McDanel said, there have been minimal changes to the city’s pay scale aside from cost-of-living salary increases that ceased between 2010 and 2014 due to the recession.