1976-01-07; Clare Sentinel

              GAEFJELO MEMORIAL LIBRARY
MCEWAN ST.
CLAJtE
®{)e Clare Sentinel
FIFTEEN CENTS
FOURTEEN PAGES   PLUS SUPPLEMENT
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 7, 1976
OUR 96TH YEAR
VOL.84 NO.19
Fire Destorys Clare Log Cabin Grocery
By Bill Chadwick
A fire completely gutted out the Log
Cabin Grocery, located at 314 E. Fifth
St.. Sunday. Jan, 4. The Clare and
Farwell fire departments battled for an
hour to stop the blaze.
A call was put into the Clare Fire
Department at 4:12 p.m., and they
arrived on the scene soon after.
There has been no estimate on the
value of goods lost in the fire, but the
Clare Police Report said that the damage
was extensive. The building was insured.
The interior of the building, owned by
Peter Evangelista, was destroyed. Police
believe that the fire started when the
deep frier exploded in the north sandwich
bar. There were no injuries.
Clare Fire Department was again
called out at 1:44 Monday morning as the
blaze started up again.
"It's a terrible shock to us," said
Evangelista's son Dominic.
The younger Evangelista said that his
father was right in front of the deep frier
when the explosion occured. He grabbed
his father and pushed him out of the way.
According to Dominic, the fire shot up
to the rafters and over to the office area,
which just as suddenly burst into flame.
The Evangelista's moved to Clare
eight months ago from Roseville, a
suburb of Detroit. Peter and his wife,
i Catherinel have two sons, Ronald who is
33 years old and a police officer in
Roseville, and Dominic, 25.
They have owned and operated the
store since purchasing it in May of 1974
from Lola Blystone.
As spokesman for the family, Dominic
said, "We're gonna rebuild it!"
"We appreciate the fine help we've
received from the Fire Department and
all the customers. We hope to see them
soon," he continued. "We'll give them
the same good service."
Walking through the rubble, Dominic
turned and said, "There's alot more work
ahead of us."
New Farwell Home
Burns to Ground
IIKAVV DAMAGE -Fireman and police extinguish the blaze at the Log Cabin       sparks again ignited a small blaze early Monday morning. No one was
Grocery Store, .114 E. Fifth, The fire started at about 4:00 p.m. Sunday and       injured.
Harrison Lions Club Must Pay Taxes On
Building Erected at County Fair Grounds
By Bill Chadwick
FARWELL - A one story, three
bedroom house burned to the ground
north of Farwell early Tuesday, J anuary
6. The fire was reported at 3:24 p.m.
The wood frame, aluminum sided
structure, 8920 Otter Lake Drive, is
owned by Ray Lambert, who resides next
door at B912 Otter Lake Drive.
*.~Xbfi£jtf totally destroyed the home and
1*3 damageto neighboring houses.
By Alfred It. Bransdorfer
Editor
A new building owned by the Harrison
Lions Club built on the Clare County
Fairgrounds will find the club paying
taxes on the building.
Most Clare County Commissioners
were surprised to hear that the County
Fair Board had leased land to the Lions
Club to erect the structure which can seat
300 persons.
The building presently is used for bingo
one night a week and is available for rent
at other times. During fair time the
building is used for lunches served by a
church group and bingo.
The building is owned by the Lions
although the land belongs to the county.
The land was apparently leased to the
Lions Club ($1 a year) by the Fair Board.
The county board was not informed of the
lease.
Harrison Tax Assessor Clarence Rien-
del said that the land is not taxable since
it belongs to the county but the building is
taxable as personal property.
The tax rate on the building will be the
same as real estate even though it is
called personal property.
Riendel said a formal opinion from the
State of Michigan indicated that the
building was taxable.
Riendel said some arrangements are
underway to avoid taxes in the future by
selling the building to the fair board and
then leasing it back to the Lions.
This procedure would place the building in the hands of a governmental
agency and eliminate the taxes.
Riendel said this plan was underway
late in the year but since it was not signed
by Dec. 31 then the building as of that
date goes on the tax rolls.
He said the building would be appraised this week for tax purposes.
Clare Scout Troop
Needs Key Leaders
Commissioner Thomas Bradley was
re-elected chairman. He received 4 votes
and Donald Case received 3 votes.
Case received 4 votes as chairman
pro-tern to 3 votes for Allan Kowalk.
The board voted to pay $2,250 for
membership in the Michigan Association
of Counties and $1,665 for membership in
the East Central Michigan Economic
Development District,
The board found themselves with a
problem at the recently completed
garage behind the sheriff department.
The building is used for storage.
The building was erected without any
heating plan to keep costs down. Lack of
heat has allowed moisture to seep around
the doors freezing them solid and making
doors impossible to open.
The board will look into the costs of
putting some type of heating plant in the
building. They believed that water,
sewer, gas lines were laid when the
building was erected but they were not
certain.
Most committee appointments will
remain the same as last year except for
the addition of new committees. Case and
Kowalk were named to the Fair Board
Committee.
Toni Lester was named to the Twin
Council on Aging Committee, George
Palmer was named to the Big Brothers-
Big Sisters Committee and Arnold
Stamman was named to the Budget
Committee.
The board has requested a representative from Airport Board to appear and
explain recent activities by the board
including leasing of some county land for
use as a drain field by a private
restaurant owner.
No one appeared and the board has
asked for the Airport Board to have
someone at the next commission meeting.
County extension director Lynn Gould,
and 4-H Agent Eric Bickel brought the
board up to date on activities of their
departments and asked for suggestions
for future programs.
Reappointed to the county election
schedule committee were Allegra Prie-
lipp, Olive Pifer and Bernard Davision.
The garage adjoining Lamberts residence was charred and the house owned
by Alex Kurnik, 8926 Otter Lake Drive,
was scorched.
The Clare Fire Department believes
that the fire started near the furnace.
The house was unoccupied at the time.
No one was injured.
Lambert said that he had just lit the
furnace the morning before and that he
and his wife were to move into the house
five years after he built it,
Lambert estimated that damage was
w/irth $30,000, including $3,000 worth of
tools he used.
"I had $20,000 in the house not
including labor," Lambert said as he
walked through the rubble.
He picked up some charred equipment
that he recognized and dropped it back
where he found it.
"Here's the vacuum sweeper," said
Mrs, Lambert. "I don't think it'll sweep
any more."
The house was partially insured,
Lambert feels that it won't be enough.
"I don't know if it will cover it. I know
that I had more in the house than it was
insured for," said Lambert,
"You pay insurance for 25 years and
nothing happens; then when you're not
insured, something like this happens,"
Lambert said.
William Ulrich Is
Re-elected Mayor
Clare Mayor William Ulrich was reelected mayor at the organizational
meeting of the City Commission Monday
night.
Chris Smith was named mayor pro-
tern. Audrey Patterson was appointed
clerk and treasurer. She succeeds
Madge Ruark who retired at the end of
1975.
Twonewly elected commissioners A.J „
Doherty and Bob Beck were seated at
A lack of adult leaders threatens the
future of Clare Boy S cout Troop 620.
S ponsors of the troop have been unable
to fill serveral key positions necessary to
a successful program. The most important vacancies are Scoutmaster and
Assistant Scoutmaster, with several
other important positions also not filled.
A special emergency meeting will be
held Tuesday, J anuary 13, at 7:00 p.m. in
the Clare Primary S chool Building, in an
attempt to find interested adults
Failure to fill the vacant positions will
result in curtailment or possible discontinuance of the program.
Any adult is welcome and urged to
participate. Boy Scout leaders are not
required to be parents of members of the
troop.
For more information call: Leo Chase
at 386-2539 or Dave Waldron at 386-2206.
Burglars Get $625
From Three Offices
Burglars broke Into thf office at 600
Pine Street earjy Monday, January 5,
and took a total of $625* Clare Police
Chief Elry Tice said.
tice said the prowlers broke a window
then pried it open and entered. The
building nouses the offices of Attorneys
Hughes and Trucks, Forsberg Insurance
Agency and John Quinnan, accountant.
Money was taken from all three
offices,
J erry Forsberg* who came to his office
before leaving for a business trip,
discovered the break in and notified
police at 5:45 a.m.
Tice said that they do have suspects,
and that the Clare Police were "working
dn it."
BURNED OIT - Dominic Evangelista, 25, inspects the cash register after a fire gutted his fathers store.
The door way In the background leads to the office, which was damaged extensively.
their first meeting. The replaced O.D.
Bayes and Larry Eastley who did not
seek re-election.
While most city commission meetings
rarely last a hour Monday night's session
set some sort of a record with all business
on the agenda completed in 6 minutes.
Doherty pointed out that the Clare City
Code says that no one under the age of 21
can be served liquor in the city.
Mayor Ulrich said the code does need
some updating as well as the charter,
(The charter was adopted in 1948 and the
code in 1971.)
Ulrich wondered what the status was
on Bi-Centennial plans for the city. No
one had the answer and some information will be made available at the next
commission meeting,
Ulrich also said that it was time to
begin doing some active thinking on the
Clare Centennial in 1979. It was not
completely clear exactly when Clare
incorporated but the 1979 date is going to
be used for the Centennial.
Police Chief Elry Tice said that
approval has been received for new radio
equipment for the police department.
A question was raised on the broken
street drain at McEwan and 5th S t. City
manager Glen Cain said repairs have
been made which should last until the
Street is paved this summer.
Damaged
A house trailer on Bawkley road was
heavily damaged When a fire broke out at
5:15 p.m. Monday, January 5,
The trailer, owned by Gilford Brick-
wine, was covered by insurance, Firemen said.
The Clare Fire Department said that
the blaze was caused by faulty heating
tapes on pipes.