Stories from Wednesday, July 7, 2010

City fire fighters determined that static electricity triggered the initial explosion that started a series of additional blasts at the Desert Canyon Golf Course on Saturday.

Elmore County remains in contention to build a nuclear power plant near the city of Hammett despite approval last week to rezone land in Payette County for this type of generating facility. Payette County's Board of Commissioners approved a change to its comprehensive plan, allowing industrial development on land currently zoned for agricultural use...

The national Benjamin Franklin Tercentenary Library Traveling Exhibit will appear at the Mountain Home Public Library July 15-Aug. 27. Mountain Home is one of only 40 cities in the nation where the exhibit celebrating the 300th anniversary of the birth of Benjamin Franklin will appear. ...

Idaho families certainly face hard times today. The unemployment rate is well above 10 percent in many Idaho counties. Our federal budget deficit is approaching the point where it will eclipse our domestic economic output. But Congress just keeps running up the federal deficit -- even with some issues that seem well-intentioned, but that will burden future generations with incalculable debt...

Fire crews responded to a minor brush fire off Hamilton Road just west of the Hamilton Mobile Home Park Wednesday. The call came in at approximately 12:30 a.m. When firemen arrived they found a controlled burn in a slash pile had gotten out of hand and burned into a field of recently cut cheatgrass. Fire crews quickly contained and put out the fire, which burned approximately one-quarter acre of ground...