Duane Bannock, director of the Division of Motor Vehicles, reported last Thursday that the Homer DMV office would reopen this week from 8:30 a.m. to noon and 1:30 to 4:30 p.m. through Friday.

"This is a temporary fix," Bannock said. "We will reevaluate the situation after next week."

For more information, contact the Soldotna DMV office at 262-4681.

Diamond Ridge dust doomed

Rep. Paul Seaton (R-Homer) announced this week that though the project cannot be confirmed, the paving of Diamond Ridge Road is his top priority after the reconstruction of Bartlett Street and Hohe, which has gone out to bid.

In addition, Seaton's office announced that dust abatement on the road would start this week. Funding for the dust abatement came from the Department of Transportation's discretionary accounts, the office said.

4,700 affected by outage

A problem at the Bradley Lake hydroelectric plant resulted in a power outage for a large number of Homer Electric members on Tuesday afternoon. The hydro plant, located near the head of Kachemak Bay, went off line at 1:22 p.m., resulting in outages from Homer to Anchorage and the Mat-Su Valley.

In the Homer Electric service area, approximately 4,700 members lost power. The areas that were part of the outage included Fritz Creek, Kasilof, Kenai and Nikiski.

HEA was able to restore the system within 45 minutes and all HEA members were back on line shortly after 2 p.m.

The cause of the problem at the plant has not been determined at this time.

A few days earlier, the Homer Spit and portions of Ocean Drive lost power for several hours.

An underground cable near Glacier Drive-in on the Homer Spit failed at 12:30 a.m. Saturday, just as Homer Electric Association crews were beginning to work on a primary transmission line near East Hill Road.

Electricity was restored to the majority of the Spit by 8 a.m. The area closest to the damaged portion of the cable had power by 2 p.m. Saturday.

Sales tax cap holds

Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly voted not to reconsider a measure at its meeting Monday that would have boosted the borough sales tax cap from $500 to $1,000.

The issue failed in a close vote at the assembly's last meeting and Gary Superman, of Nikiski, called for a reconsideration at this week's special meeting.

He voted for the reconsideration as did Dan Chay, Ron Long and Milli Martin. Paul Fischer, Betty Glick, Pete Sprague and Grace Merkes voted against the reconsideration.

Raising the sales tax cap on each sale or rent of goods and services would have captured an additional $1.9 million annually for the borough. The cap has been the same since 1965.

Education bill signed into law

Governor Frank Murkowski signed HB 233, a bill that increases the foundation formula for educational funding by $407 per student, into law at the Soldotna Chamber of Commerce luncheon Tuesday.HB 233, sponsored by Rep. Peggy Wilson, R-Wrangell, will result in an additional $82 million dollars of state funds for school districts across the state, and will allow municipalities to raise their local contributions by millions more.