SPORTS: Cats’ title team heads toward breakup — B1
Air Conditioning Service
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The Winchester Sun
TUESDAY,
APRIL
17,
2012
WINCHESTER/CLARK COUNTY
Paying the tab for the EOC
Officials fret over potential cost overruns
B y Katie Perkowski
The Winchester Sun
City and county leaders asked emergency management representatives
Monday who would pick up the tab if
the new Emergency Operations Center
went over budget.
In late March, the county secured
the necessary three acres for the project from the Clark Regional Foundation for the Promotion of Health. The
Federal Emergency Management
Agency will give the county $3.6 million
for the building.
The 6,400-square-foot, single-story
building will house the WinchesterClark County Emergency Management
office, the Chemical Stockpiles Emergency Preparedness Program and the
911 dispatch center. All are currently
housed in the Winchester Police Department.
“When we moved dispatch from the
front of the building of the police department to the other part of the
See EOC, A3
Katie Perkowski/kperkowski@winchestersun.com
Wayne Burb, project manager for the Kentucky Division of
Emergency Management, far right, gives a presentation about
the new Emergency Operations Center during a joint Clark
County Fiscal Court and Winchester Board of Commissioners
meeting Monday evening.
GENERAL ASSEMBLY
Called
session
leads to
quick
actions
James Mann/jmann@winchestersun.com
Firefighters from Winchester Fire-EMS, from left, Lt. Greg Witt, firefighter/paramedic Dan Gurecky, firefighter/EMT Chris Howard and firefighter/paramedic Josh Slugantz, right, and Clark County Board of Education maintenance worker Billy Damron walk around the top of Shearer Elementary School
to check on an air conditioning motor that burned out Monday afternoon.
Shearer students evacuated
after air conditioner overheats
By Bob Flynn
The Winchester Sun
Students at Shearer Elementary School were evacuated from
the building Monday afternoon
after an air conditioner motor
above a classroom ceiling malfunctioned.
Clark County Public Schools
District Administrator Paul
Christy said that a second grade
teacher noticed “a smell like
something burning” in the classroom and notified Principal Cynthia Powell.
After checking out the smell,
Christy said, Powell pulled the
fire alarm to notify Winchester
Fire-EMS at 2:22 p.m., then began
evacuating students from the
building.
All students were removed from
the building and were standing
outside when firefighters arrived
at the school four minutes later.
The district routinely conducts
fire drills at the schools, Christy
said, so the majority of the students thought it was just another
fire drill.
“We do fire drills once or twice
a month so most of the kids
FRANKFORT (AP) — Lawmakers hurriedly introduced two key
bills dealing with highway construction and drug abuse Monday
in hopes of wrapping up a $60,000a-day special legislative session as
quickly as possible.
Gov. Steve Beshear had called
lawmakers back to the Capitol on
Monday because they ended their
2012 session last week without
passing legislation that would appropriate some $4 billion for road
projects over the next two years
and that would attempt to curb
overdose deaths from widespread
prescription drug abuse.
Logistically, Kentucky lawmakers need a minimum of five days to
get legislation through both the
House and Senate. If lawmakers
can wrap up their work by the end
of this week, the cost of the session
would be limited to some $300,000.
“I would hope that we could get
through in five days,” House
Speaker Greg Stumbo said Monday.
“Nobody really wants to be here
any longer than five days. I can assure of that, at least nobody in the
House.”
Kentucky’s divided Legislature
has a history of ending legislative
sessions without budget agreements. The state’s last three state
operating budgets were adopted in
special sessions called after
See QUICK, A3
IN YOUR WORLD
OBITS
Anna Catherine Eades, 98,
Winchester
Fred Bond, 72, Danville
Anna Jean Proffitt Warner, 89,
Mount Sterling
James Mann/jmann@winchestersun.com
Shearer Elementary School teacher Tony Thornberry directs a classroom of students to go to the back of the
school building and wait for parents to pick them up after a malfunctioning air conditioner prompted an evacuation. There was no fire in the school. Students were about 15 minutes later than normal leaving school because
the fire happened just minutes before t he end of the school day.
thought this was just another
drill. The only ones that knew the
difference were the ones in that
classroom and the ones that
walked by it on their way out of
the building,” Christy said. “One
little boy told me he just thought
somebody was popping popcorn
and burned it.”
After the electricity was turned
off from the school, firefighters
checked the classroom and the
roof of the building and determined the cause of the smell was
See SHEARER, A3
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1275 Industry Road, Lexington, KY
Mon-Fri 8am-6pm
859-281-CARS (2277)
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— A2
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