News

Debbie Maguire sat in the crowd gathered for the 2021 Crime Victims Vigil holding her daughter’s hand and listening to grandmothers Anita Gibbins and Terri Heinley talk about how violent crime changed their lives forever.

It was a feeling Maguire knows all too well.

“I felt so much of the family’s pain. Sitting there listening to them tell their story and then seeing the picture in front of them, I knew I needed to talk,” said Maguire.

Holding back 30 years worth of tears and heartbreak, Maguire spoke about the day her two children were shot to death.

The conference center at Redlands Community College was all about science as students from county high schools showcased their research and discussed their findings as part of the BlueSTEM AgriLearning Center’s 2021 Agriscience Symposium.

Some 19 students representing El Reno, Yukon and Calumet high schools took part in the Tuesday evening symposium.

The BlueSTEM Center is a partnership between the USDA and its Grazinglands Research Lab at Fort Reno, Redlands and El Reno Public Schools.

Oklahoma Environmental Management Authority is asking the assistance of all curbside recycling participants to adhere to the current recycle standards.

David Griesel, general manager of OEMA, said crews are finding all sorts of items in the recycling containers that do not belong.

In fact, some participants cause the entire efforts of those that want to recycle to be rejected due to contamination.

Northbound and southbound U.S. 81 will be intermittently narrowed to one lane in each direction between Okarche and County Road 840 from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday and Tuesday for survey work.

Work mostly will occur along the shoulders. Motorists are advised to expect delays and to watch for workers in the area.

Canadian County commissioners signed off on nearly $1 million in newly financed county landfill equipment.

Commissioners approved proposals for the Oklahoma Environmental Management Authority (OEMA) to purchase financing for a landfill compactor and front-loader truck.

“As beneficiary of the trust, we approve the debt they incur,” District 2 County Commissioner David Anderson said.

Anderson, Canadian County’s representative on the OEMA board, said both pieces of new equipment are already “in the fleet and working.”

The Oklahoma Media Center recently selected the name “Promised Land: A Supreme Court Decision Places Oklahoma at a Crossroads” for a shared topic in 2021.

The collaborative will cover the affirmation of tribal sovereignty after the Supreme Court ruling last year.

When a deep freeze settled across Oklahoma in mid-February, the greenhouse sheltering Oklahoma State University’s wheat breeding program showed its age in the worst way. 

Constructed in the 1960s, the facility’s heating system failed, pipes froze, and 70 percent of the hybrid plants inside succumbed to crippling cold. The loss was catastrophic and exemplified a need to reinvest in the crumbling infrastructure of agricultural research. 

In the first school-sponsored Junior-Senior Prom since 2019 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, El Reno High School students flocked to the Festivities Event Center to walk the red carpet for the grand march. Called “The Masquerade Ball,” students turned out in colorful dresses and tuxedos for the event.

Vehicles such as classic cars, muscle cars, sports cars, farm trucks, a monster truck and stretch limousines lined up three wide for more than a block waiting to drop off students for the walk.

El Reno has a film commission in place.

Last week the city council named the 10-person board to help guide, grow and foster the film industry here.

El Reno has hosted a number of movie productions over the past year, most finding their way to the Lifetime and Hallmark television channels.

Oklahoma has an attractive rebate program tied to the movie and music industry, and while California was shut down because of COVID-19, Oklahoma was open for moving-making.

Downtown El Reno development drew attention during last week’s city council meeting.

Council agreed to rezone property on South Rock Island from Combined Residential (R2) to Convenience Commercial (CC).

The request for the rezoning was made by David Jensen. The proposal was approved 4-1 with council member Steve Jensen voting to abstain, which counts as a no vote.

The property is .45 acres. It rests on the east side of Rock Island, just across the road from the campus of Etta Dale Junior High.