Payson HP Commission looking for new members

[Source: Alexis Bechman, Payson Roundup] -- What’s a conservation commission to do when it can barely preserve itself? The staffers at the office of Tourism and Economic Vitality are scratching their heads trying to think of ways to attract more volunteers for the Historic Preservation and Conservation Commission.  “In order to have a meeting, it would be nice to have the vacancies filled,” said Cathy Boone, project manager for the office of Tourism and Economic Vitality.

The commission, which is scheduled to meet at least four times a year, hasn’t met in more than a year and has several open seats on the board.  The committee was scheduled to meet Monday afternoon, but the meeting was canceled after several members canceled, Boone said. Recruiting qualified members is proving almost as hard as reinventing Main Street.  “We are looking for anyone who has volunteered in the past, lives within town and has an interest in state preservation,” Boone said.  “Someone who knows about the history of the area.”

Payson's Tonto Monument ruins yield fresh clues to ancient mystery

[Source: Payson Roundup] -- Like the poppies proliferating beneath the brooding 800-year-old ruin, research into some absorbing archeological mysteries has bloomed at Tonto National Monument. Many Payson residents looking for spring flowers, fishing on the revitalized Roosevelt Lake or diverted by the closed Beeline Highway have rediscovered the 1,100-acre, 100-year-old national monument about 50 miles from their doorstep.

When they arrive, visitors browse through the small visitor's center, climb the steep trail with its panoramic views, and stand in the mud and stone ruins abandoned so mysteriously in the 1400s. But few casual visitors realize that after dozing in the scientific shade for a century, the monument researchers now find themselves perched with a view of vital questions about human cultures stretching back 10,000 years. After spending most of its long history curating artifacts and keeping visitors from destroying the ruins, the park now has two archeologists on staff and deep questions to explore.

[Note: To read the full article, click here. Photo source: Tom Brossart, Payson Roundup.]