<I>Kathleen Ellyn/Chieftain</I><BR>School administrators, teachers and residents of Enterprise show 'em how it's done. One vote, two minutes tops, easy-peasy.

Enterprise High School has slipped to seventh place in the contest to win $100,000 from U.S. Cellular in the “Calling all Communities” contest. U.S. Cellular will award $100,000 each to the top 10 vote-getting schools in the nation. If Enterprise High School wins, the money will be shared between all three school districts in the county.

According to U.S. Cellular dealer Sam Summers, the first place school has fewer than 2,000 votes.

“Nationwide there’s been a total of over 37,000 votes in over 3,800 schools,” he said.

Enterprise residents have gotten the vote out pretty well, mostly accounting for the approximately 500 votes that put us in seventh place.

But the turnout of parents and grandparents from Joseph and Wallowa is meager, so far, despite an excellent example set by Joseph School District Superintendent Rhonda Shirley, Joseph High School Principal Sheri Kilgore, and a contingent of educators from that city.

In Enterprise, Superintendent Brad Royce and Education Service District Director Ed Jensen joined a dozen educators from Enterprise to vote last week. County Commissioner Susan Roberts voted.

Enterprise City staff and Mayor Irv Nuss and his wife voted.

State Rep. Greg Smith and his aide Phil Scheuers voted.

Smith has also vowed to send out an email to all of the folks on his email list, asking them to vote.

Summers hopes that leadership example will inspire residents in the coming weeks.

The contest ends Jan. 15, 2010. “This isn’t for the U.S. Cellular store,” he said. “We don’t get anything out of this. This is for the kids and it’s the simplest thing for anyone in the county to do. “We need the support from the community to get us there.”

The Chieftain is issuing a challenge to every business in town to match our “100 percent participation rating” and get every employee to vote for Enterprise High School this coming week.

It’s easy.

Just go into the U.S. Cellular office on Main Street in Enterprise and within two minutes you will have voted online.

No purchase is necessary and you do not have to be a U.S. Cellular customer.

The following businesses have already met the challenge:

? Ace Hardware

? Lear’s Main Street Pub

? Enterprise Chevron

? Enterprise Electric

? TW Bronze

? Enterprise Flower Shop

? County Clerks Office

? Wallowa County Chamber of Commerce board

? Enterprise City Hall Office

? Community Bank of Enterprise.

Next up for challenge is every service club in the valley.