No doubt about it, 2011 had its highs and lows. Here’s a look
back at some of the events and people that made the news during the
first half of the past year, with the retrospective concluding with
next week’s edition of the Coulee News.

January

• The West Salem Boys Girls Club’s year got off to a rough
  start. The roof of the building on Leonard Street that housed the
  club collapsed from the weight of snow. Luckily, it happened while
  nobody was in the building, but the disaster meant the young
  members of the club had to be bused to the Boys Girls Club
  branch on the north side of La Crosse for after-school activities.
  The owner of the building, Franciscan Skemp Healthcare, announced
  it would demolish the building because the cost of repairs would be
  prohibitive, but the building later was sold to Harry Griswold, who
  had the building’s roof repaired and remodeled and moved his legal
  practice into it, with room for other tenants as well. By the end
  of January, it was announced the club could move into the Hope
  Community Church building at 134 E. Hamilton St., which they did
  early in February.
• What would normally have been a low-key start for the spring
  local election season was much more interesting, thanks to Gov.
  Scott Walker hiring state Rep. Mike Huebsch, R-West Salem, as his
  administration secretary. Two Democrats — Steve Doyle and Cheryl
  Hancock — and four Republicans — Steven Freng, Jon Hetland,
  Lynnetta Kopp, John Lautz and Jake Speed — filed papers to run in a
  special election to replace him.
• The Bangor School Board was informed that the mystery of an
  excessively high electrical bill had been solved. It was discovered
  that the municipal utility had used an incorrect multiplier for
  figuring electrical use at the elementary school after a new
  transformer was installed in 2008. The mistake meant the school
  district had been overcharged to the tune of $80,000. Refunding of
  that money would enable the school district to purchase iPads for
  middle school students in time for the start of the new school
  year.
• Adam Yeoman was sentenced to 25 years in prison for the failed
  armed robbery at the Log Cabin in Bangor after he was convicted of
  attempted first-degree intentional homicide. He pulled a gun on bar
  owner Donald LaBarre and pulled the trigger at least three times
  but the gun failed to fire.
• A West Salem School District bus driver was disciplined for not
  noticing that a 7-year-old boy did not get off at school in the
  morning, instead remaining asleep on the bus until after the driver
  had returned to her home and parked the bus.
• Naomi Wells was chosen as Bangor High School’s winner of the La
  Crosse Tribune Extra Effort Award.
• The Coulee News launched a redesigned website.

February

• The region — and, let’s face it, the whole state of Wisconsin —
  was gripped by Super Bowl fever as the Packers faced the Pittsburgh
  Steelers.
• School had to be canceled in many area public schools on Feb.
  17 (Onalaska being one exception) when teachers staged a “sick out”
  to travel to the state Capitol in Madison to protest Gov. Scott
  Walker’s “budget repair bill.” The legislation required all public
  employees (except police officers and firefighters) to pay at least
  5.8 percent of their salaries toward their retirement pension
  program and bear a higher portion of the costs of health care
  insurance premiums. In addition, Walker’s legislation proposed to
  remove the ability of public employee unions to bargain for
  anything except wages (and included a cap on the percentage wage
  increase the unions could bargain for). With passage of Walker’s
  legislation looking all but assured because of Republican
  majorities in both the House and the Senate, all 14 Democratic
  senators left the state to prevent the Senate from voting on the
  bill.
• The West Salem Village Board voted to submit an offer to buy
  the former antique store at 136 E. Elm St. from the West Salem
  Farmers Co-op for $38,000. Plans called for demolition of the site
  and use of the  property for downtown parking, with the possibility
  of an addition to the village’s community center in the future. The
  village, however, had not reached an agreement to purchase the
  property by year’s end. The co-op preferred to sell that property
  and the adjacent former grocery store property as one piece, and
  the village board later voted in favor of offering to buy both
  parcels, an offer still pending at year’s end.
• Don and Cheryl Brenengen were honored with one of four Ford
  Motor Co. Salute to Dealers awards for “exhibiting unparalleled
  dedication” to community service.
• Jim Quinn was named the West Salem Business Association’s
  Citizen of the Year, while the Business of the Year went to
  Hansen’s IGA.
• The Burns Town Board meeting for February turned into such a
  chaotic shouting match that Town Chairman Paul Kitzmann began
  dialing the sheriff’s department at one point in the
  meeting.
• West Salem High School senior Stephen Helstad was the big
  winner in a talent show organized by fellow WSHS senior C.J. Bina
  as her senior exit project. Helstad’s entry was somewhat
  unconventional: he showed a short film he wrote, directed, edited
  and scored as part of his application to the University of Southern
  California.
• West Salem’s Crazy Horse Saloon closed after more than 25 years
  in operation, but the downtown bar soon reopened under new
  ownership as the Silverado Saloon.

March

• John McCue of Bangor was notified he would receive a
  meritorious service award at the Wisconsin Soccer Hall of Fame
  dinner in Milwaukee, this coming after he won five first-place
  awards at the National Veterans Creative Arts Festival in
  Tomah.
• Supporters of Eric Koula, charged in the shooting deaths of his
  parents, Dennis and Merna, launched a website proclaiming the West
  Salem man’s innocence and aiming to raise the $250,000 needed to
  free him from jail pending his trial.
• With the impending passage of Gov. Scott Walker’s “budget
  repair bill,” area school districts and municipalities with looming
  contract expirations rapidly renewed contract
  extensions.
• Keith Marchbanks was sentenced to 22 years in prison for an
  incident the previous March in which he stabbed his estranged wife
  with a paring knife in the stomach and leg and then set fire to her
  house in the town of Hamilton. An Onalaska police officer
  responding to the 911 call shot Marchbanks as he advanced toward
  the officer with a knife. Marchbanks was left paralyzed from the
  waist down after the shooting.
• Burns Town Board Chairman Paul Kitzmann was named in a libel
  suit brought by Onalaska town assessor Howard “Bud” Raymer over
  claims about him in Onalaska Town Board campaign literature
  distributed by Doug Shefelbine. The lawsuit claimed that Kitzmann
  helped write the letter. At the time, Kitzmann was serving as
  Onalaska town administrator.
• More than 800 people came to West Salem High School for the
  annual Celebrate West Salem business and community expo, which
  featured a record number of vendors (75).
• Gov. Scott Walker’s proposal for legislation that would require
  voters to present a photo ID card before voting prompted outcries
  from municipal clerks and others, who claimed that it would make
  elections more costly, complicated and time consuming,
  disenfranchising voters to solve a problem (voter fraud) that was
  very rare. The legislation was passed anyway, with the February
  2012 elections to be the first in which photo IDs will be
  required.

April

• Primary races for the 94th District Assembly seat boosted voter
  turnout throughout the county, and a hot race for town chairman in
  Burns brought a county-high 77 percent voter turnout in that town,
  where incumbent Paul Kitzmann was unseated by Burns Town Board
  member Matt Hoth (263-216). West Salem builder John Lautz won the
  Republican primary for Assembly, while La Crosse County Board
  Chairman Steve Doyle won on the Democratic side. In a major
  surprise, West Salem Village Board member Marvin Iverson, who had
  decided not to run for re-election because of health reasons, was
  re-elected to the board with 51 write-in votes, topping the 42
  votes received by Curtis Baltz, a local dentist who was conducting
  a write-in campaign for the board.
• State Rep. Jennifer Shilling, D-La Crosse, announced her plans
  to run against state Sen. Dan Kapanke, R-La Crosse, after people
  outraged by Kapanke’s support of Gov. Scott Walker’s “budget repair
  bill” collected more than 21,000 signatures within 30 days to
  trigger a recall election for Kapanke.
• The state Government Accountability Board ruled that state Sen.
  Dan Kapanke did not violate state law when he used money from a
  charitable foundation to pay for improvements to the city-owned La
  Crosse stadium that is the home field for his baseball team, the
  Loggers.
• The 2011 West Salem Relay for Life raised more than $81,000 for
  the American Cancer Society, a bit short of the $90,000 goal. Roger
  Fish, a survivor of prostate cancer, was the honorary
  chairman.
• A proposal to change the name of the West Salem Middle School
  band from the Marching Farmers to the Marching Panthers (along with
  a change in uniform) was met with opposition from people who didn’t
  want to see a change in the tradition.
• A late-season winter storm laid a thick layer of snow across
  the region to cap one of the snowiest winters on record. The storm
  meant West Salem’s annual spring community cleanup day had to be
  cancelled.
• Three long time West Salem Lions Club members — Vernon “O.J.”
  Romskog and Marvel and Bud Greene — were honored for their past
  service and commitment to Lions Club ideals. Romskog was given the
  Melvin Jones Award — named for the founder of Lions Club
  International — while the Greenes were honored with the club’s Lion
  of the Year Award.
• Bangor High School sophomore Alex Plenge was named La Crosse
  County Conservation Alliance Youth Conservationist of the
  Year.
• The West Salem School Board approved a move for the high school
  baseball team from a summer schedule to a spring schedule, joining
  a number of other Coulee Conference schools. The move prompted the
  West Salem American Legion to launch an effort to start a summer
  Legion baseball team.
   

May

• Democrat Steve Doyle topped Republican John Lautz (8,369 to
  7,219) in a special election to fill Mike Huebsch’s Assembly seat,
  a slot that had been in Republican control for 17 years.
• The killing of Osama bin Laden spurred a scam email that
  promised photos or videos of his death but really were carrying a
  computer virus programmed to steal personal information from
  victims’ computers, such as account numbers and
  passwords.
• West Salem Elementary recently received a Gold Award of
  Distinction from the HealthierUS School Challenge, a certification
  initiative for schools participating in the National School Lunch
  Program. The school is the first in the state of Wisconsin to
  receive the award, which comes with $2,000, an award plaque, a
  banner to display at the school and inclusion on a Team Nutrition
  website.
• With an earlier start and twice as many tagged fish, the second
  annual Lake Neshonoc fishing derby took a big jump
  forward.
• Rockland Boy Scout Aaron Manzella completed work on a veterans
  memorial in Gaylord Nelson Park, a community service project that
  was part of his work to attain Eagle Scout rank.
• Members of the Bangor Middle School Leadership Club were given
  the Citizenship Appreciation Award by the La Crosse County
  Sheriff’s Department for raising $5,500 to help fund a K-9
  unit.
• The West Salem High School yearbook was dedicated to former
  West Salem Middle School science teacher Chuck
  Bockenfeld.
• Three young men from Mindoro — Thomas Storandt, Joel Kirchner
  and Joshua Koss —  were killed in a crash on Highway T, two miles
  west of Highway 108 in the town of Farmington. The truck in which
  they were riding was involved in a high-speed chase with a
  sheriff’s deputy, who was about a mile behind them when they
  crashed.
• The Bangor School Board approved the hiring of Jac Lyga, an
  Onalaska elementary school principal, as Bangor Elementary
  principal to replace Lois Meinking.
• The West Salem Village Board became the first municipality in
  La Crosse County to adopt a pedestrian and bicycle friendly
  Complete Streets policy.
• The John Bosshard Memorial Library marked its 20th anniversary
  with a special event for kids.

June

• Duane Kneifl, a member of the West Salem First Responders for
  27 years, was named June Dairy Days parade marshal. Warm weather,
  sunny skies and pleasant evenings combined to make the 2011 June
  Dairy Days a big success.
• Second- and third-graders at Bangor Elementary got a special
  visit from Tonette Walker, wife of Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who
  was at the school to promote the importance of summer reading.
  During her talk, Walker also notified the children that each of
  them would receive a free book from Scholastic to read over the
  summer.
• The West Salem School Board approved a debt refinancing plan
  that saved the district about $120,000.
• At a special meeting, the West Salem School Board approved a
  technology infrastructure upgrade that will cost up to $320,000 and
  be ready for the beginning of the school year. A comprehensive
  technology upgrade is one of Superintendent Troy Gunderson’s
  goals.
• Pete Elsen retired from the Bangor Fire Department after 50
  years of service.
• Nick Bonsall of West Salem caught a crappie with a $500 tag in
  the Lake Neshonoc fishing derby, the top prize in the
  derby.
• Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker served cheese curds at the annual
  La Crosse Area Dairy Breakfast at the Lash Land Dairy Farm in
  Mindoro.
• Amy Stauffer, a 42-year-old West Salem woman, died after she
  suffered a head injury in a moped accident on the 800 block of West
  Franklin Street.
• Jamie Betsinger, a 17-year-old West Salem girl who has been
  working for charitable causes for more than a decade, was
  recognized by the Kohl’s Cares Scholarship Program as one of more
  than 2,000 young volunteers nationwide who have positively impacted
  their communities.
• Mild summer weather and an expanded schedule of events helped
  make Rockland’s annual community celebration — Park Progress Days —
  a success. With a parade and a full schedule of other events on
  Saturday for the first time, there was some concern whether enough
  people would turn out, but for the most part activities went off
  better than expected.

Article source: http://lacrossetribune.com/couleenews/lifestyles/rewind-a-look-back-at-this-year-s-news/article_65094dd6-323a-11e1-8c42-0019bb2963f4.html

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