Encampment, Riverside discuss summer events

Summer celebrations were a hot topic at both Encampment’s and Riverside’s recent town council meetings May 9.

At both meetings, John Farr mentioned a summer gathering celebrating the yearly opening of the Battle Pass Scenic Byway, or Highway 70, which runs from Encampment to Baggs. He also gave the Encampment and Riverside councils new Wyoming state maps that more clearly marked the Battle Pass Scenic Byway.

“On Friday the 21st of June, the first day of summer, we’re going to have a little celebration up there,” Farr said at the Encampment meeting. “The scenic byways are a very important part of Wyoming, and for next year the entire backside of the map is going to be about the scenic byways all over the state. Battle Pass will also be on one of the two covers of the maps.”

Farr said also that it would be awhile before all the necessary signs were put in along the Battle Pass Scenic Byway and Highway 789, which leads from Baggs to Interstate 80.

“It’ll be about three years before we get all that signage done there because nobody has any money anymore,” he said. “We have to get the grants and everything put together, and the state is very anxious for us to coordinate the signage all the way from Baggs to Creston Junction. If we’re going to bring people in that way, they need to see some of that history over there.”

Becky Kreusel spoke about the 11th annual Grand Encampment Cowboy Gathering, happening July 19-21, at both the Riverside and Encampment meetings. “I’m here to thank you for your past support, and hope that you’ll continue to support us,” Kreusel said at the Encampment meeting. “At the gathering, Friday night we have open mic, and then Saturday we have a night show that has three performers, which include two singers and a poet. Sunday morning we’ll have ‘Cowboy Church,’ and then we’ll have a yodeling workshop after church if anybody wants to learn how to yodel.”

With business at the Encampment meeting, Ken Schwerdt of PMPC Civil Engineers in Saratoga notified that bids for the Emergency Water Supply Project were due by 3 p.m. May 14. Schwerdt mentioned also that for the next Encampment town meeting May 23, he would have a summation of whatever bids they had at the time.

Approved by Encampment was a seasonal summer employee, Matt Jarrett, who was a lone applicant and hired for a wage of $11 an hour. Because the town needed more seasonal summer employees, the application deadline was reopened for May 23. The town also discussed the need to choose interview candidates out of those who applied for the open police department position.