BGH workers win $200,000 PB prize

SANDPOINT — Recipients of a $200,000 winning lottery ticket have no plans to quit their jobs at Bonner General Hospital.

The 12 people who pitched in 10 bucks apiece as part of a co-op ticket heard Thusday morning that their Idaho Powerball ticket was a prizewinner.

It was not the jackpot, the pie-in-the-sky utopia of shining tickets, but it worked, said Dave Flatt, one of the Sandpoint ticket holders.

“I’m a little richer,” Flatt said.

He was chosen as spokesperson for the group of hospital workers who each won $11,200 after taxes, he said. Many of the winners did not want to be identified.

“It was not the grand winner,” Flatt said. “They call everything over $100,000 a jackpot. Nobody won Powerball Plus.”

Flatt, a blues harp player when he is not managing the hospital’s environmental service department, will likely purchase a few new harmonicas, he said.

He hasn’t asked anyone else what they plan to do with their winnings, he said.

He was notified of the win when another ticket holder called him Thursday before work.

“I got a phone call at home before walking out the door,” he said.

What was his first thought?

“That it’s April, but it’s not April Fools,” he said.

It was the second time in less than a week that someone in North Idaho had won in the state lottery.

Last weekend, the Idaho Lottery announced that a Match 5 Mega Millions ticket was sold in Coeur d’Alene for the April 16 draw. Nobody has yet claimed the $250,000 winner.

“This is a great run of luck for northern Idaho,” Jeff Anderson, Idaho Lottery director said. “We are encouraging all of our players to check all of their draw tickets very carefully right now,”

Several winning tickets were purchased in North Idaho in the last six months. A St. Maries woman won $200,000 on Powerball before Christmas and a Wallace man won $250,000 on an Idaho Millions scratch game.

Flatt almost wasn’t allowed a shot at the $200,000 pot.

“I was the last name on the list,” he said.

When they heard about the winners, there was a lot of congratulations from hospital staff members.

“Everybody is excited,” he said.