As always, if you drink… don’t drive. Not only is it dan­ger­ous, but this week it could also be more costly. The Defi­ance post of the Ohio High­way Patrol has announced that it is con­duct­ing an OVI check­point to deter and inter­cept impaired dri­vers this week. Just where the check­point …

April is Dis­tracted Dri­ving Aware­ness Month and offi­cials are remind­ing motorists that it includes more than just cell­phone use. Accord­ing to the Ohio High­way Patrol, dis­tracted dri­ving includes any­thing that takes a motorist’s atten­tion away from the pri­mary task of dri­ving. Dis­trac­tions can be visual — tak­ing your eyes off …

Unem­ploy­ment rates were down in our region in March. The Ohio Depart­ment of Job and Fam­ily Ser­vices reports the largest drop was in Henry County, which went from 9.6 per­cent in Feb­ru­ary to 8.9 per­cent in March. Put­nam County had the low­est over­all unem­ploy­ment rate in the area at 6.6 …

Stanley L. Werder, age 76, of Stryker passed away late Sunday April 21, 2013 in his home surrounded by his loving family. Prior to his retirement he had been a Tool and Die Maker for Tenneco for over 44 years. Mr. Werder was born in Stryker on June 6, 1936 …

Thomas James Fleming, age 81, of Bryan, Ohio, died at 2:23 P.M. on Saturday, April 20, 2013, at Parkview Regional Medical Center in Fort Wayne, Indiana, after an extended illness. Mr. Fleming was a 1951 graduate of Archbold (Ohio) High School and served with the United States Navy Seabees from …

Mervin C. Helf, of Edgerton, Ohio, died at 3:44 A.M. on Saturday, April 20, 2013, just eight days after celebrating his 87th birthday. Mr. Helf entered the United States Navy at the age of seventeen and served as a radioman on Palmyra Island in the Asia-Pacific Theater during World War …

Irene E. Ward, 76, of Montpelier died early Friday morning at Parkview Regional Medical Center in Fort Wayne, Indiana.  She was born on May 17, 1936 in Jackson, Michigan to Woodrow and Vivian (Wyatt) Wilcox.  She married Duane L. Ward on September 10, 1960 in Angola, Indiana, and he survives. Irene retired …

Monica M. Seibert, age 87, of Bryan, Ohio, died at 11:58 P.M. on Sunday, April 21, 2013, at Community Health Professionals Inpatient Hospice near Defiance, Ohio, where she was a patient. Mrs. Seibert was a member of St. Mary Catholic Church, Edgerton, Ohio, where she was a lector and cantor …

Williams County is get­ting some new office space. The County Com­mis­sion­ers on Mon­day morn­ing, awarded a con­tract for almost $4.4 Mil­lion to Mosser Con­struc­tion of Fre­mont to ren­o­vate the for­mer Miller’s New Mar­ket gro­cery store on East High Street in Bryan. The Bryan Times reports that the county will bor­row …

The Defi­ance Sheriff’s Office has been kept busy. Early Sat­ur­day morn­ing around 3:24 a.m., on Sny­der Road in Rich­land Town­ship, a north­bound vehi­cle dri­ven by 49 year old Tracy Whet­stone ran off the road and into a ditch, then flipped over. Whet­stone was cited for fail­ure to con­trol. Sat­ur­day morn­ing …