WWWF to bring excitement for a fourth year. Photo courtesy of wildwildwestfestival.com

The 4th annual Wild Wild West Festival is taking place from May 18-20. It’s going to include live music and carnival style rides for families and children to enjoy.

The event is going to be hosted by the Professional Bull Riders and the Greater Pueblo Chamber of Commerce. The event takes place in historic downtown Pueblo on Union ave. and nearby the Historic Arkansas Riverwalk of Pueblo.

During the event, the Riverwalk will be on regular schedule, closing at 10 P.M. in case families are interested in taking a boat ride or purchasing tickets for the pedal boats. There will also be plenty of vendors and carnival rides for children around the Union District. One of the newer rides this year is going to include a Ferris Wheel and much more entertainment.

This Friday, the Lt. Dan Band will be the opening act. Gary Sinise is famous for his role of Lt. Dan Taylor and was nominated for Best Supporting Actor in the film, Forrest Gump. Sinise has been in large support of Veterans and the Center for American Values, a museum alongside the Riverwalk. Medal of Honor recipient from Pueblo, Drew Dix has connections to actor, Sinise.

The event is going to be hosted from various non-profit organizations and the Wild Wild West Festival Committee. Other bands that will be performing during the event include Western Underground performing on Saturday, and a Denver band called Five 13 performing on both Friday and Saturday night.

For more information about the festival and where tickets can be purchased, contact Shawn Sandoval for general information at shawns@pueblochamber.net or Casey Duggan at cduggan@pbr.com.

A mass text was sent out yesterday at 8 a.m. alerting students and staff that the computer systems would be down for most of the day.  The IT department has been working on the problem since Tuesday morning and systems are still unavailable for use.

According to the text, the replacement parts arrived Tuesday at about 4:45 p.m. and repairs were expected to be done Wednesday, by 8 a.m.

However, in another text, the process was at 65 percent at 8 a.m. Wednesday. No more information has been provided since this morning.

We will provide more information on this as it becomes available.

The Riverwalk in Pueblo will offer tour rides to locals and tourists alike for the summer season starting May 4. Photo by Nico Fatta.

The Pueblo Riverwalk is opening for the summer season May 4. There will be one dollar boat rides and half off prices for the pedal boats.

The Riverwalk is one of Pueblo’s top-visited tourist spots because there is several activities to do there down including sight-seeing, narrated boat tours, paddle-boat rides and summer events. The Riverwalk helps draw in tourists and in turn, attracts those people to local businesses and shops on Union Ave.

“I’m looking forward to opening day and seeing how many people we are able to bring in this year,” said Sean MacIndoe, manager of Boat Operations. The Pueblo Riverwalk includes several staff members who attend CSU-Pueblo while also driving a university-themed boat throughout the Riverwalk.

The excursion boat tour lasts roughly 15 to 20 minutes while covering historical data about the downtown community and what the town experienced after the flood in Pueblo in 1921.

There will be a booze cruise available for people of legal drinking age that will start at 5 p.m. Mixed drinks and Budweiser products will be available made by the bartenders while your tour is being given.

For more information, go to www.puebloharp.com or their Facebook page by typing Pueblo Riverwalk in the search option.

Photo courtesy of dealseekingmom.com.

The Daniel’s Fun Scholars is a scholarship for high school seniors who are planning on obtaining a bachelor’s degree at a higher learning institution.

The Cooperative Care Center’s mission is to provide food and other critical services to people who can’t afford basic necessities in a constructive and supportive atmosphere. Toilet paper is the greatest item that they cannot keep in stock, according to a press release.

Toilet paper may be brought to Library and Academic Resource Center, Room 357. Cooperative Care takes donations year round and the location of the center is on 8^th Street and Grand Avenue in Pueblo.

The week will focus on honoring crime victims while celebrating the advancement of the rights they have earned.

Each day will feature a different crime, beginning with identinty theft and ending the week with cyber stalking and bulling. Other important crimes that will be advocated will be relationship violence and sexual assault. 

It will include a number of resource tables with information concerning different crimes available for everyone. In addition to these tables, there will be workshops and technique trainings to help the public prevent them from becoming victims.  

Wednesday will be predominately focused on sexual assault and self-defense training will be held free of charge to everyone.

Events will be set up all over the campus, including Massari Arena, the Hasan School of Business and the biology building.

This is the 21st anniversary of the National Crime Victims Week, which has held various activities to educate Pueblo on the importance of taking necessary precautions to prevent crimes.

For more information on times and specific locations call the Office of Student Activities at 719-549-2975, or email nicky.damania@colostate-pueblo.edu.

Photo courtesy of thunderwolfevents.com.

The walk takes place in different lengths, the 5k, 10k run and two-mile walk.  To register an adult the cost is $25, and the student discounted cost is $10. Around 50 students are participating, said Todd Kelly, associate athletic director.

The event will last until the last runners and walkers have finished, he said.

The 10k took runners south on Troy Avenue and then north onto Massari Road. Then the path went across the freeway and west on Bartley Boulevard into an off-road path behind the shopping center towards Jerry Murphy. The race turned on Walking Stick Boulevard and ended at the ThunderBowl.

The 5k circled from the starting line south on Troy Avenue to Alamosa heading west to Bartley, turned west on Walking Stick Blvd, and ended at the ThunderBowl. The two-mile walk circleed around Troy to Alamosa before returning to the football field. The Pueblo County Sheriff was located at intervals all along the path of the run, according to the map and legend.

This event was named Spank Blasing for the last five years. The athletic director and coaches will decide what students the scholarship benefits and will end up being distributed among 15 varsity sports, Kelly said.

“Our coaches are the ones that give out the scholarships,” he said.

There was approximately 100 student-athlete volunteers for this year’s Spank Blazing, Kelly said, and their jobs were to hand out water, assist with registration and sign-up, serve as course marshals and set-up and tear-down the event. There are about 400 student athletes, Kelly said.

Other annual fundraisers include the fall golf tournament, Thunderwolves Golf Classic, and the summer lobster bake, Kelly said. Student athletes volunteer to assist in fundraising efforts and contributed their services to benefit United Way of Pueblo serving meals and bussing tables at the Golden Corral, April 16.

There was a tent for the participants so they could get some food and sit around when they completed the track, Kelly said, and it was supplied with water, breakfast burritos and fruit, courtesy of Chartwells Catering.

Jon M. Riley, former president and current Colorado Criminal Justice Reform Coalition coordinator and Ellen Toomey-Hale, finance & development coordinator spoke to a group of six students about the coalition’s recent legislative accomplishments and current efforts.

Describing concerns about the Colorado prison system and juvenile detention practices, a Power Point presentation included statistical evidence detailing prison growth numbers, sentencing laws, reasons for repeat incarcerations and reform legislation recently passed.

Toomey-Hale spoke about her 30 years serving in the juvenile justice system sharing her knowledge from experience about the system.

 “She is a passionate child advocate who is intent on improving Colorado’s criminal justice system,” her bio said. This knowledge and passion were expressed while she described to the audience the situations prisoners and administrators face, legislation as it was and is, and cultural factors that help argue the need for changes

Working from law school into a position as a juvenile prosecutor she came to dislike the emphasis placed on getting convictions that would place youths in prison, noting the difference when tried as an adult as being considerably worse than for those who are tried as juveniles, Toomey-Hale said.

Riley followed her with an account of his own work history from Ohio to Colorado. He has also worked with juveniles, and took time to reflect on the similarities between social services and justice system programs. Riley related some of his life’s journeys, as it lead him to becoming involved in the coalition after retiring from a 30-year corrections employment career.

Speaking at length about culture, education, social service and corrections, historical and outdated methods of punishment and treatment of prisoners, Riley noted also the practices of administrative segregation, “solitary confinement,” as it’s commonly known and release and responsibility. Of those released directly from administrative segregation to the street because 40 percent end up homeless, he said.

The logic used to help create reform was data-oriented, using the numbers to support their arguments, Riley said.

Colorado’s prisons have grown from a population of under 5,000 in 1980, to well over 20,000 in 2008. “It’s not that people have become more innately evil. The three primary factors, which have increased the prison population in Colorado, are increased sentence length and mandatory sentencing, the war on drugs, and parole practices,” according to the Power Point.

One slide revealed it costs $33,000 to keep one person imprisoned for a year. This is considerably more than the average cost of tuition at higher learning institutions. The intrinsic complications resulting from technical violations of parole have led to the legislative reform the coalition they lobbied for and saw passed in 2009, 2010 and 2011.

 Their mission is “to reverse the trend of mass incarceration in Colorado,” they said.

The caolition has a Re-entry Program, Drug Policy Reform Program, Civic Engagement Program and a Public Outreach Program, which advocates for education not incarceration.

In the last three years CCJRC has been involved with 24 criminal justice reform bills that have been signed into law, according to the Power Point.  Department of Corrections budget will reinvest $22.5 million into treatment and support services. Their reform in 2012 includes changing employment opportunities for ex-offenders and getting reduced sentencing for drug possession charges.

You can read more about them at CCJRC.org, or by email at info@ccjrc.org.

David Arnold speaks about alcohol statistics at CSU-Pueblo at the forum April 12. Photo by Tyler Shomaker.

As the meeting started in the OUC Underground, Majorie Villani, the associate dean of Students, started off with a welcoming introduction to the event as police officers, nurses, members of the district attorney’s office and many others took their seats.

With nearly 60 people seated in the crowd, David Arnold, the Alcohol and Other Drug Prevention coordinator, walked up to the stage. Since his addition to the campus in January, Arnold was eager to get out his research on trends in alcohol and other drug use, he said.

“Students don’t have to look any further than to MTV to see a bad role model when it comes to drinking” Arnold said. As Arnold pointed to a picture of Nicole “Snooki” Polizzi from MTV’s “Jersey Shore,” which revealed her drinking a margarita out of a glass with two bottles of Corona wedged in it.

Arnold went on to explain how the media has helped underage drinking become the latest trend because most media is directed towards the youth. Data he collected in a survey displayed that three in four students report to have drank alcohol before they graduated from high school.

“Though most students are coming in with an experience with alcohol before college, it is college that helps transforms the trend into binge drinking,” Arnold said.

His data also revealed that one in two students used an illicit drug before entering college.

“One in four students at CSU-Pueblo have reported current use of marijuana,” Arnold said.

Next, Andy Cohen and Shadia Lemus, from Webb PR, an organization that helps with public relations, were put in charge of the communications of this project, came up to the stage.

With some strategic planning, they have come up with the “Social Norming Initiative.”

Their specific area would be to focus on impaired driving behaviors.

“The campaign will run with the title ‘Even Zombies Know,’” Lemus said.  

Cohen explained how most of the funding was going to be coming from the Persistent Drunk Driving Committee and they are going to launch a promotion for the project through Facebook, as well as other social networks. The launch is scheduled to take place this summer, so that it has time to become popular by the fall semester, he said.

The meetings will take place every other month.

For more information, contact Arnold at 719-549-2121, or by e-mail at david.arnold@colostate-pueblo.edu.

Graphic courtesy of findfreegraphics.com.

Coach Richard Krinsky helped lead the team to the finals that were held in Tempe, Ariz., from March 25-31.

The team’s number one singles player Jansen Allen was the only senior on the team and he beat Oregon State’s Tyler Knoth. Allen won 15-13 in the first game, lost the second 12-15 and took the final match 11-all.

CSU-Pueblo teammate Nick Montalbano was right behind Allen, taking the number two spot in the championship game.

Along with their individual accomplishments, Allen and Montalbano teamed up to win the men’s number one doubles championship, as well.

“I was very happy with our team,” Krinsky said. “We brought eight guys with us and we plan to bring more next year. There are more recruits coming this following year that are good prospects.”

“I have a few players, such as number three singles player Felipe Comacho and number four singles player Jacke Breadenbech that look very impressive and with hard work and practice I believe that they can all be starting at the number one position,” Krinsky said.

Both Breadenbech and Comacho are junior players and are looking to battle on the court for a number one spot and a chance at bringing the national championship and winning their own national title.

Other names that are up for the number one position next year are freshman Jose Centano, who is from Nicaragua, and Matt Childers, who Krinksy said “is a developing player that has much talent.”

Krinsky also said Daniel Orlick, from Evergreen, Colo., has a lot of potential, and there will be three more recruits joining the team from Chihuahua, Mexico, he said

“There’s a connection between that city and our racquetball team that keeps them coming up here and creating a good squad of players,” he said.

The team was also mentioned Monday, April 9, on news channel KOAA which talked about their success and what it means to the university and to the people who attend CSU-Pueblo.

Along with coaching the men’s team, Krinsky plans on trying to recruit for a women’s team that he would like to take to a championship, he said. There has never been a women’s team and he would enjoy the competition from a different league, he said. With new recruits on the way and a plan to form a women’s team next school year, CSU-Pueblo racquetball could see more championships in the future.

Photo courtesy of skinsnsports.com.

In this year’s game, the Wildcats had six players scoring between nine and 15 points, along with having the best freshmen defensive player since Patrick Ewing. Freshmen center Anthony Davis had  six points, 16 rebounds and six blocks in the game.

Davis, who was given the Defensive Player of the Year and the South Eastern College Player of the Year, also had 30 total rebounds throughout the tournament, the most since Hakeem Olajuwon in 1981.               

The Wildcats did not lose the lead the entire second half including having a 24-point lead at one point. The Kansas University Jayhawks had a very hard time controlling the ball and getting points on the board. They made a run cutting the lead to seven points late in the half, but Kentucky kept fighting back and did not let the Jayhawks come back in the game.

After a long year and a record of 38-2, Kentucky’s head coach John Calipari won his first national championship after losing in the 2008 championship game versus the Kansas Jayhawks. The difference between then and now is that coach Calipari was not the head coach of Kentucky, he was coaching the Memphis Tigers.

The following year in 2009 he was offered a job to be the head coach at Kentucky and accepted the position. Coach Calipari is now fifth all time in collegiate basketball, with 505 wins and 152 losses and one national championship.

Though the 2008 championship game was a loss for Calipari, he managed to turn around a struggling Kentucky program and last year he worked with four freshmen players to help their skills get ready for the NBA. Despite losing four talented players, he was able to mold a young team to become national champions.

The last time the Kentucky Wildcats won a championship game was in 1998. That year the Wildcats went 38-2 and they beat all of their rivals throughout the year.