SILVER DOLLARS AND WOODEN NICKELS: Carson City’s Jennifer Purcell is a natural at the plate

The Nevada Appeal’s Silver Dollars & Wooden Nickels feature recognizes achievements from the capital region and, when warranted, points out other acts that missed the mark.

SILVER DOLLAR: It’s no surprise to us former Carson City resident Tammy Westergard has been recognized for her work here in our community. Westergard served as the Carson City Library Deputy Director before moving to Jackson County last summer to become that county’s director of its 15 libraries. Westergard has received a national award from the Library Journal for a fundraising and development program she spearheaded here in Carson City. Westergard was one of 54 library officials in the U.S. to receive the Mover and Shaker Award. Westergard was honored for overseeing multiple workforce development and technology projects in Carson City while serving as the library’s interim director.

SILVER DOLLAR: To Carson City’s Jennifer Purcell for going 13-for-13 to tie an NCAA record on her way to being named the Mountain West Conference Player of the Week for the Nevada softball team.

SILVER DOLLAR: To Capt. David Halloran for assuming command of Naval Air Station Fallon and to the man he’s replacing, Capt. Leif Steinbaugh, who’s now the director at the Naval Aviation Warfighting Development Center.

SILVER DOLLAR: To all those who participated and all those who organized the Polar Plunge at Lake Tahoe to benefit Special Olympics.

WOODEN NICKEL: We’ve covered this topic many times about the major networks farming off their coverage of major sporting events to cable — and sometimes obscure cable networks — and this time we’re upset with CBS, who for the past several years has farmed out coverage of many of the NCAA Tournament games to cable, thus leaving millions of Americans in the cold. The straw that broke the camel’s back came last Sunday night when the tournament’s most riveteing game — Texas A&M against Northern Iowa in which the Aggies pulled off a comeback on their way to a win in a double overtime thriller — was on truTV. What is that the Spandau Ballet network? It’s bad enough the Final Four and championship game will be on TBS. Leaving millions of people without the ability to watch.