Ridgway school district hires interim principal for permanent job
Ridgway Elementary School will keep Perri Gipner as principal permanently, after selecting the interim principal for the long-term position.
Gipner, who previously worked at the school as a reading interventionist, has already served in an administrative position. She previously worked as the secondary school principal in Norwood, where she worked for the district for 10 years, and also served as the suicide/threat coordinator for five school districts in the region.
Gipner has served as the interim principal since former principal Heidi Hanssen left her position for health reasons shortly after school started in the fall. She died on Sept. 2 after battling cancer.
The district received four applications for the position, according to Superintendent Susan Lacy. A screening committee selected two finalists – Gipner and Winifred Lezine, the current principal of Fort Lupton Middle School. The finalists interviewed last week and Lacy announced Gipner was selected for the position on Monday.
Horsefly fire organization receives donated truck
The Horsefly Volunteer Fire Protection organization has received a hand-me-down fire vehicle, a 25-year-old truck that is now the newest vehicle in the fleet.
The 2000 F450 – equipped with a pump, water tank and storage – will be used for wildland fire response in northern Ouray and southern Montrose counties.
The Telluride Fire Protection District donated it to the Horsefly volunteer organization, after purchasing a new vehicle.
The fire truck has less than 16,000 miles on it, and will be retrofitted and ready to begin the fire season this year.
The all-volunteer Horsefly district serves an area in northern Ouray County that is rugged and remote, focusing on putting out lightning strikes and preventing wildfires from growing in the hot, dry summer.
Its service area includes Simms Mesa, where the last large wildfire in the county destroyed a home and other property after a prescribed burn set by the U.S. Forest Service flared up and became out of control in 2022.
New EMS sleeping quarters in Ouray
Ouray County Emergency Medical Services now has sleeping quarters in Ouray in addition to Ridgway, meaning the department can more readily respond to calls for service on the south side of the county.
As of Feb. 25, two on-duty paramedics can stay overnight in a unit rented from the former Ouray Chalet Inn, which local business owners purchased for affordable workforce housing in 2021.
New EMS Chief Nathan McCullough told county commissioners on Tuesday staffing the Ouray station, which houses additional ambulances, was a big priority in his new role. He was focused on eliminating the 14-minute trip between the sleeping quarters in Ridgway at the fire station and the Ouray station. Paramedics will now respond to calls as they come in on each respective side of the county, McCullough said. For bigger calls, paramedics in Ridgway and Ouray will respond jointly. The $11,000 worth of annual rent was already in the department’s budget. In the future, he said he’s looking at what the department could do on Log Hill.
County to review nonprofit requests at once
Ouray County commissioners tabled a $10,000 funding request from Ouray County Baseball, saying they want to look at nonprofit requests all at once during budget season, rather than case by case.
Commissioner Jake Niece recommended this approach during a work session on Tuesday, saying he wanted to take an approach similar to the town of Ridgway. The town solicits nonprofit applications for a specified amount of grant dollars with an annual deadline in September.
Ouray County Baseball approached the county before fully launching a capital campaign to fundraise $3.2 million for two new baseball fields within the Ridgway Athletic Park. Representatives with the nonprofit told commissioners they’d update their request with more information before July and August, when county leaders said they’d begin to review those requests ahead of budget season.
