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Show VISITOR GUIDE Scene Sports Ski town holiday celebrations are all around at the resorts. Paae C-1 Big day in Midway for Bill Demong in combined sprint event. p a q e B - he Kimball Art Center will present an Art Talk on Normal Rockwell at 6 p.m. Dec. 21. T Admission is free and hors d'oeuvres will be served. For more information, visit www.kiraball-art.org or call 649-8882. '367 CON/- Serving Summit County since 1880 VOL. I25*NO.84 Wed/Thurs/Fri, December 21-23,2005 PARK CITY, UTAH ' www.parkrecord.com T.A.D.D. has national ambitions Center may help rescue more pets A lolly good timel Local taxi service helps drinkers avoid driving Friends of Animals ready to buy 60 acres near Brown's Canyon By ANNA BLOOM Of the Record staff Enjoy a drink, but don't drive is the motto of Park City's charitable taxi service Taxis Against Drunk Driving (T.A.D.D.). The year-old organization that has bused nearly 300 bar hoppers home at night and returned them to their parked car in the morning is revving-up its campaign. T.A.D.D. Executive Director Audie Wheeler recently filed for nonprofit status that will likely be finalized early next year, and has ambitions to take the concept to a national level, he says. "We're currently talking with city councils in other small towns relatively close to Park City like Sun Valley, Jackson Hole, Vail and Steamboat," Wheeler confirms. As a cab driver for Park City's Advanced Transportation Services, Wheeler has witnessed how dangerous the streets can be at midnight, watching intoxicated people stumble into their cars to drive home, he says. "One, I'm thinking, 'he's going to run into me later,' and two, 'why is this guy doing that?' It started to eat away at me witnessing all these over-served people driving away," he said. "Why weren't they taking taxis?" So Wheeler began to offer his friends and family members free rides, and as interest grew he says he began to wonder why he couldn't provide the service for everyone. "The difficult decision people have to make is how to get back the next morning, so they roll the dice and get behind the wheel because they need their car in the morning," he observes. Wheeler chose to make the morning ride free and charge a $10 flat fee for the ride home, no matter what distance. T.A.D.D. operates approximately 10 vehicles with 20 drivers through Advanced Transportation, who also initially absorbed the costs of the service. The T.A.D.D. model works with existing cab companies, Wheeler explained, paying drivers to make the extra runs. Initially, Advanced Transportation absorbed the cost of T.A.D.D., he said, but now there are several local donors who help fund the service. Eventually, through grants and donations, he would like the entire service to be free of charge, Wheeler says. "We know people might abuse the system [if it's free], so we're probably going to ask people to show us their keys first," he said. "There are more checks and balances we could put into place, but the way we look at it, even though he's abusing the system, we're still keeping an overserved person off the street and we got him home." Towing has also posed a challenge for the organization, especially between the Park City Winter no-parking hours between 2 and 6 a.m. and Wheeler says that he is currently working with the city to develop a system so that people aren't penalized for making the responsible choice of not driving home and calling T.A.D.D. instead. According to T.A.D.D. Development Director Marty Ogburn, so far there is no particular demographic group that has taken advantage of the service - users have been from all walks of life and backgrounds. Ogburn, an old friend of Wheeler's, moved back to Park City to take the nonprofit to the next level after retiring from the women's apparel industry in Atlanta, Georgia. "What I'm doing this for is for personal satisfaction," he explained. "I just think it's a service that can benefit my fellow man and I'm really happy to be doing it." Ogburn says in his early days, he was very fortunate. Sometimes he'd get home after drinking By PATRICK PARKINSON GRAYSON WEST/PARK RECORD Left to right: Dr. Craig Roles, of Las Vegas, Nev., Chase Rotes of San Luis Oblspo, Calif., and Brandon Barrick, of Salt Lake, lead the pack of Santas heading to The Canyons Saturday mornIng for the "Santa Skis Free" day at the resort. Over a dozen Santas participated in the event. Of the Record staff For more than a year, the Summit County Friends of Animals organization has worked with officials in Wasatch and Summit counties to ensure that adoptable homeless pets are not euthanized. But transporting dogs each day from Heber to Furburbia at Kimball Junction is expensive, and the store at Tanger Outlet Center is too small to house a vaccination clinic and spay-and-neuter facility. So, in January 60 acres near Brown's Canyon Road could become home to Summit County's newest animal rescue facility. Each month, Furburbia, an animal adoption agency the organization manages at the outlet mall, provides homes for about 50 stray animals. "We keep Wasatch County and Summit County no-kill counties," said Troy Stevens, president of Summit County Friends of Animals. "It is a vital link, almost guaranteeing that this will continue." The organization, which is reportedly purchasing the land for around market rate from Silver Creek resident Charmian Wright, plans to close on the property Jan. 6. Please see Rescue, A-2 Drink up: city's water meets federal standards Spiro Tunnel, a major water source on the western edge of the city, is contaminated with arsenic and antimony. The city has installed a treatment system at the site and Kathy Dunks, the city's water manager, reports that the system is successfully By JAY HAMBURGER cleaning the water. Of the Record staff According to Dunks, the system reduces the Store director Mike Holm isn't worried about amount of arsenic in the water from between 40 and bottled-water sales at Dan's Foods, even as City 80 parts per billon before treatment to 4 parts per Hall received notification that its drinking-water billion afterward. The federal standard for arsenic in January will system complies with federal standards. Holm predicts that Parkites will still buy their drop from 50 parts per billion to 10 parts per billion, Aquafina or San Pellegrino rather than drink she said. Antimony is charted at between 8 and 9 parts per water out of the tap. "I don't care what they do to their drinking- billion in the water before it is blended with other water system, people will still buy bottled water," water sources but is reduced to between 0 and 6 Holm said, noting that half of the store's orders to parts per billion afterward. The federal standard for antimony is 6 parts per Pepsi are for Aquafina, the soft-drink giant's bottled billion. The city has agreed to test water samples for water. The local government has for years been trying antimony levels each quarter for now on. "They should feel very confident because we to clean its drinking water of contaminants like arsenic and antimony, which are primarily left over meet all water-quality standards," Dunks said about Parkites. from the city's mining heyday. Dunks said the city installed arsenic-removal filCity Hall recently won the compliance declaration from the state Division of Drinking Water. In ters at the Spiro site and built what is known as a an announcement, the government said, "Over the 'clear well,' which allows the water to be blended. past four years, the Park City Water Department Crews installed the equipment in the summer and it has been working on water quality issues and has was operational in July. People who drink water containing antimony for been successful in these endeavors." The city has long been worried about the quality years could experience an increase in cholesterol of its water and Park City Councilors and govern- and a decrease in blood sugar and, in high levels, arsenic can cause cancer and it is known to cause ment staffers have made water a priority. With treatment system, arsenic and antimony levels fall skin damage and problems in the circulatory system. "That was huge, to come into compliance," said Ken Bousfield, the compliance manager at the state Division of Drinking Water, who has been involved as City Hall developed a plan to treat the water and describes the city as cooperative. He said close to 40 water systems in Utah do not comply with the tighter arsenic standards. "It's just that confidence that the city is below that, so all is well," he said about the arsenic readings. At Dan's, Holm said bottled-water sales have been climbing between 3 and 5 percent annually in the last few years and predicts that sales will continue to rise. He calls bottled water a "status symbol" and said Parkites enjoy the quality of the more expensive waters. "People are a little concerned about (water quality) so they buy bottled water," he said. Mayor Dana Williams is pleased that the drinking-water standards are now met, saying that, when he won the mayor's office in 2001, water quality was the most important issue to voters. "I see it as a huge success. Water was the No. 1 thing on our priority list," Williams said, adding that he "would rank this up in the top" of his first-term accomplishments. He said Parkites should not be worried about drinking water from their tap. "They should know when they turn on their tap all EPA levels are at or under federal requirements," the mayor said. Students evacuate high school following gas leak Firemen say construction workers hit gas pipe By ANNA BLOOM Of the Record staff Park City High School students were evacuated from their classrooms and dismissed early on Please see Taxis, A-2 Tuesday after Park City Fire District responded to a gas leak outside the school building at 12:40 p.m. 4 SECTIONS • 70 PAGES According to Park City Fire District Captain Eric Agendas A-E Hales, the leak was caused when construction crews on a massive high school remodeling projAutomotive C-16 working ect severed a three-inch gas line near the west wing Business A-27 of the high school. Classifieds C-12 "We're trying to shut the off the gas and make sure Columns A - 1 8 we have no gas in the building to prevent a fire hazard," he told The Park Record Tuesday afternoon. Crossword C-4 Park City Fire District engines lined both sides of Editorial A-19 the building to help direct students. Ambulances Education A-21 and the Wasatch Back Hazardous Materials Response Team also arrived. Firemen suited up to Events Calendar C-6 enter the building to monitor fumes inside the buildLetters to the Editor A - 1 9 ing. The sound and smell of gas permeated the air Legals C-15 beyond Lucky John Drive and throughout the surMovies C-4 rounding neighborhood, but Park City Fire Professional Services B-10 Marshall Ron Ivie said the most dangerous threat to Restaurant Guide C-7 safety was the gas collected by the building's vents. "Gas can be seriously dangerous when you have Sports B-1 air intakes in big vents - that's my main concern," he TV Listings C-10 said. "There's no way to know how much gas has Weather B-2 gotten inside, so in the interest of safety, we decided to evacuate the building." Construction crews continued to clear the grounds after the leak to make way for Questar Gas repairmen to clamp the gas line. Students appeared calm as they exited, though Serving Summit County since 1880 some expressed some concern over the continuing www.parkrecord.com construction on the school. "I'm not happy about the whole thing," high 94937 00001 ™ParkRecoixL 500 school student Lauren Evans said, referring to the reconstruction in general. "My dad's actually thinking about putting me in private school during the reconstruction." Park City Fire District spokeswoman Tricia Hurd said that firemen monitoring gas throughout the school after the evacuation found the school to be safe. "[Firefighters] never got readings of gas within the school, so they determined that there was never any eminent threat [to students or teachers]," she said. GRAYSON WEST/PARK RECORD Park City High School students walk by The Wasatch Back Hazardous Materials Response Team Tuesday after the Park City Fire District determined construction workers had punctured a threeinch gas pipe behind the west wing of the building. Later, firemen monitored the Inside of the buildIng and found the building to be safe, according to Park City Fire District spokeswoman Tricia Hurd. y v |