Bear Growls

Who's No. 1 now?

2007-12-05T09:51:00.000-05:00

I have a friend in Missouri who sent out an email a week and a half ago in celebration of the University of Missouri football team’s rising to number one in the football polls. The next week all they would need to do is beat Oklahoma to play for the National Championship and the real Big Bucks.
A number of his friends from around the country emailed him and copied me and others, telling him to enjoy it while he can, that these things can be very fleeting. And indeed they are.
As you may know, Oklahoma thrashed Missouri, for the second time this season. Mizzou fell in the polls to No. 6.
As the friends counseled him right after that No. 1 celebration, this has been a season where it seemed that being designated one of the top two teams in the country has been a bit of a curse. There has been a parade of teams who ascended to the highest in the polls, only to fall the following weekend.
There are a lot of reasons why it has been so hard to stay on top. One obvious reason is the lack of a truly dominant team. No one is good enough, save Hawaii, with their cream puff schedule, to go through the season undefeated.
You have to credit coaching for a lot of the “upsets.” There are a lot of talented coaches out there who are great at looking at films of opponents and spotting a weakness. Then they come up with ways to exploit that weakness.
I went to a meeting Monday night, but imagine my surprise when I turned on Monday Night Football and there, in the second half, the lowly Baltimore Ravens were tied with the mighty New England Patriots, the NFL’s only undefeated team.
I credit the Raven’s coaching staff with coming up with a winning game plan, and they certainly could have won that game. There was more to it than that.
As I have said many times before, I know football is played on many different levels, and often I believe games are won or lost before the team takes the field. I believe Baltimore believed in Baltimore. I believe the players believed enough in their team, their game plan, to win that game.
On the opposite side of the field, the New England Patriots knew they were a better team and should easily beat Baltimore. After a tough match with another team that they should have easily beaten, Philadelphia, the Pats struggled again.
You can argue that it is hard to summon the level of play necessary to overcome the inevitable bumps and bruises along the way. Every team will have breaks during the season that go against them.
They celebrated the Mighty Undefeated Dolphins of 1972 Monday night and had their coach, Don Shula, in the booth. If you go back and look at that season, Miami had their share of close games against clearly inferior teams.
The mark of a champion, and the Patriots can claim this, is the ability to overcome a sub-par performance and pull out the win. We put a lot of stock in wins, and we should.
One of the benchmarks increasingly used in the BCS rankings is the strength of schedule, hence Hawaii not getting into the championship game, despite going undefeated. With the balanced scheduling used by the NFL, with the better teams from last year scheduled to play the other better teams, you tend to have harder games every week.
There is a lot of comment that the Southeastern Conference is so hard to win and even more difficult to go through undefeated because of the high level of competition. We in the ACC would have a hard time denying that, as I think our record against them wasn’t very good. I know Virginia Tech, our supposed best team, took a beating by LSU.
You can debate that if New England goes through this 16-game season undefeated, that is an even greater feat than Miami’s season, with the strength of schedule they play. Of course, like the Indianapolis Colts prior to last year, who had strong season after strong season, if you don’t win the big games at the end, the aura quickly fades.
Yes, the Mizzou Tigers had their 15 minutes of fame, and then the spotlight moved to another team. The target on the back of jerseys moved to another team.
And the fans of the Tigers, and a lot of other fans, joined in pulling against the new number one.

Over-doing decorating

2007-12-05T09:13:00.000-05:00

There’s a new TV commercial for a new version of the NC Lottery
where a couple decorates the exterior of their home for Christmas and
turns on the lights. The wife’s only response is “More!” The husband
dutifully responds with a heavy duty plug, and the home is illuminated
with a blinding display.
One can only imagine that the way to a truly great Christmas display
at your home is through winning the lottery. Maybe that’s the subtle message
here.
It speaks to what I see as an insatiable appetite
for decorating our homes for Christmas.
No offense ladies, but it almost seems like we
are over-doing decorating.
I spoke with a couple of guys the other
night apart from their wives. We were comparing
notes about ours.
I readily admit that I came out on the long
end of the conversation, but another guy’s
wife was sick and he got a temporary pass as
well.
The third was talking about how big a
production decorating his house was. There
was actually a packing up of things across
his house to make room for the Christmas
decorations. I’ve forgotten how many boxes of
decorations he said they brought down from
the attic for decorating his home.
He was saying that this year they had to replace the ribbons on some
of the decorations; that three years is about all you can get from bows. He
remembered how his late mother used to carefully store her decorations
so they would last another year.
The other was noting how last year his wife had bought a third
Christmas tree for their home. This one was to sit on the kitchen table so
it could be visible from the street in front of their home. The other two
couldn’t be seen from the front of the house, so they needed a third to be
seen from the front of the house.
This is a young couple. They have no children. Two people. Three
Christmas trees.
I did my share the day after, bringing home from our outside storage
(the attic is indeed full) four storage bins of Christmas stuff. That doesn’t
include the Christmas tree. I think the wife is holding out for a new tree
this year.
I’m not going to blame Lowe’s for all of this, but they certainly have
made it easy for us to go into excess mode on decorating.
I know my street couldn’t wait for Thanksgiving. While I let my beard
grow and was watching the endless stream of football over the holiday,
my neighbors were busy getting their decorations up. It almost seems
that there’s a decorating contest going on.
There’s some kid left in me, and I enjoy the lights. I can remember riding
in a neighbor’s van twenty or thirty miles to look at Christmas lights
with the side door of the van open so more could see more of the lights.
I remember riding through a neighborhood in Goldsboro just in the last
year or two to see all of the decorating they were doing.
In southern Johnston County there is a crossroads called Meadow,
famous for the Meadow Grill and their extra-good home cooking, and the
Meadow Lights, an extensive set of Christmas decorations. I wonder how
many fewer people will go to see the Meadow Lights this year. Our local
neighborhoods it seems are saying you don’t have to go.
We have gone to the Raleigh area display. I think they’ve moved it to
Walnut Creek in recent years. There’s another in Wilson which is used as
a fundraiser for a school, if memory serves me correctly.
We seem bent, if you will, on finding new ways to spend money for
Christmas.
I know there is a plumbing-electrical contractor who has an extensive
display at his house on a well-traveled road. I remember other “rich folk”
who used to extensively decorate their homes for the season. If you will,
maybe it was a way that they put back into their community.
I was struck recently as I drove past a rather modest home near a
busy intersection in northern Wayne County. I think there were about
seven inflatable decorations that lay flat in their yard, not to mention the
others that were dormant during the day, only to spring to life and light
once dusk came.
I got a call from someone yesterday. He mentioned there was someone
in our community that needed help paying their heating bill. They had
fallen on some hard times. I made another phone call and we figured out
a way to help the family.
I hope we aren’t getting so bent on spending money on decorations
that we don’t have any left to share with those who need a helping hand.
Don’t we all need one at one time or another?

A hollow turkey

2007-12-05T09:11:00.000-05:00

It’s the Monday before Thanksgiving. I guess I should be thankful,
because it’s the right thing to do this time of year. Certainly I have plenty
to be thankful for. Sorry, but things are not as they should be.
Part of life as I have known it is that this is panic time. There is so
much to do that I won’t get it all done. There’s a pace that’s extra quick.
While it may be a stress attack, it also helps clean out the capillaries.
From some perspectives, it’s exhilarating.
Trouble is, I’m not there.
We have early deadlines for the newspapers.
Your copy of the News Leader went to
bed early this week, presuming all went as
planned. That is usually plenty of cause for
panic. Yes, as I write this, we have some more
hurdles to jump, but most of them are well
in the rear view mirror. Our able and mature
staff has handled the challenges of putting
out early newspapers with few problems, at
least to this point.
There is an extra set of concerns usually
going on. We normally will be hitting the
highway as soon as we get the Thanksgiving
papers gone to visit Marilyn’s family in South
Carolina. That adds a layer of pressure and
some extra responsibilities, to get things
packed and everything situated for a few days out-of-town.
Well, we’re not going to S.C. this year. I guess I should be thankful that
I don’t have that to worry about. It doesn’t seem right, somehow.
The main reason we’re not going is our daughters will both be out-oftown.
I guess I should be extra thankful about that in some ways. Kelly
has been on an archeological dig in Mississippi for the past three months.
Ashley will be flying to Mississippi to meet her and they will be taking
an extra turn to Texas and they will be spending the holiday with my
mother before coming home. I am thrilled that they will be able to spend
that time together, as we don’t see my mother often enough. I’m saddened
that Marilyn and I won’t be there.
Normally, if we’re not going to S.C., and we almost always go to S.C.,
we would be preparing Thanksgiving dinner at the house. It’s a family
time as the girls all pitch in to do the various jobs to make the big Turkey
Day dinner a success. Even when we go to S.C., normally Kelly will figure
out a way that we fix a big dinner before or after.
Marilyn and I have reached an age where our metabolism is staring to
work against us. It seems to take weeks for us to get past sins of the diet,
and we are learning there is a heavy price to pay for overindulgences on
days like Thanksgiving.
Needless to say, there is no pressure for us to get a big meal together
for the family. I’m not sure where we will end up on Thanksgiving.
Probably won’t be a Lean Cuisine frozen turkey dinner, but we won’t be
overrun with tempting leftovers for the next two weeks, either. I guess I
should be thankful.
I have great confidence that I won’t have competition for the HD TV
when the football comes on. Normally Turkey Day football is an unchallenged
right, but I have heard women complain about having to watch
football all day. There’s another TV in the bedroom and for once, the male
cat and I can out-vote the females.
Traditionally, the Detroit Lions and the Dallas Cowboys host games
on Thanksgiving. Seeing Dallas win is usually a cause for celebration
in my house. In recent years Detroit has gotten slaughtered in the early
game, though this year the Detroit-Green Bay game could be the best
game of the day. That’s something to celebrate, isn’t it?
Dallas and the New York Jets is not one of those marquee match-ups.
It’s a bit scary as the Jets knocked off Pittsburgh Sunday, but it’s one of
those games Dallas can only lose as they should handle the Jets easily.
The real turkey of a game could be the closer on NFL Network. If the
Colts play halfway to their potential, they should easily topple the crippled
Falcons. Like the Jets, the Colts haven’t exactly played as expected
lately, so it might be a game.
Still, it looks to be a traditional day in that I probably will drift off
during a not very exciting match-up sometime during the day.
It’s going to be a bit of a sad day for what I’ll be missing.
On reflection, some of the important things that we have: we continue
to have full bellies, mortgage payments that are up to date, body parts
that work at close to their original factory condition in most cases, a comfortable
home, two beautiful children who are leading good lives, wonderful
relationships with each other, and a future that is so bright.
Maybe it won’t be a traditional holiday with all of the trappings of the
season, but we can take joy in the abundance of good things we do have.

Whose team are you on?

2007-12-05T09:10:00.000-05:00

I met with a group of men from across the Southeastern US this past weekend. As it was a bit of a retreat, we met in a building that did not have a television. I happened to have a laptop computer with a wireless (WiFi) card, and they had WiFi in the building. As we met all day
Saturday, my computer became popular during our infrequent breaks so that people could check the score of their favorite football team.
One of my friends who was at the meeting has an email that begins tigerrag. Would it surprise you that he hails from South Carolina?
There were a few who “wore their colors” during the weekend. That’s a little surprising in that it was a Christian gathering. Yes, a few wore cross necklaces during the weekend, and some wore shirts that showed their membership in our Christian group, but there were more than a few who outwardly were showing their support for their team.
To be sure, I’ve got more than my share of NC State stuff, and after my older daughter enrolled there, my number of shirts, sweatshirts and jackets with NC State logos has increased. Since my baby girl enrolled at Carolina, I’ve got some UNC stuff.
I won’t say that there is a balance in the amount I have. I’ve been a State fan for over 30 years, and my daughter just graduated from graduate school there, so I’ve had some years to build up my collection.
My younger daughter wants some equal time, some symbol that she is important. I would hope that she would understand, but if I wear NC State stuff exclusively for several days while she is home, her feelings get hurt. Yes, it’s just a shirt or a jacket, but it is a symbol. We may talk about how superficial that is, but symbols count.
If they didn’t count, why would we go out of our way, and spend as much money as we do, to make sure we have fan wear. If for nobody but ourselves, we want to wear things that show allegiance to our team. And we take pride in winning.
A few years ago on a Spiritual retreat, I received some little gifts. By themselves, they were not worth much, maybe $1.00 apiece, and they were given anonymously. They were little symbols. We called them “agape,” that Greek word for unconditional love. The cost of the gift had
little to do with the worth of the gift.
One of my favorite memories comes from one of those Spiritual retreats. The particular place where the retreat was being held had a kind of motel type of room, and there were maids who daily cleaned up those rooms, as you would expect.
Often during these weekends, people will wear the agape gifts they receive. Often some of those gifts will be cross necklaces of one sort or another.
As one of the men was walking in the motel area, one of the maids commented to him, asking why some of the men were wearing several crosses while some wore none or perhaps only one. He recalled that at the moment he came up with some flippant remark, but a few steps later
was stopped in his tracks. He turned, apologized, and said the reason some have more is they have not given them away, and he put crosses on the two ladies.
That story inspired me. I have given away lots of crosses since then. I have bought lots of small wooden cross necklaces and I give them away to lots of people. When I give them away, I ask them to wear it on the outside of their shirt that day, but after they get home, to continue to
wear it on the inside of their shirt.
I tell them if they are like me and haven’t worn anything like that, it may be a little uncomfortable at times. It may rub you at times. When you get too much change at the drive thru, maybe it will rub you the right way. When you go in the convenience store and you are tempted to look over at the pornography on the magazine rack, maybe it will rub you the
right way. I usually have some around, so if you’d like one, I’d be honored to give you one.
The story has another side to it. While that love is given to us unconditionally, and we do nothing to earn it, still, it changes us. As the song Pass It On says, “I’ll shout it from the mountain top - Praise God, I want the world to know; the Lord of love has come to me, I want to pass it on.”
I have given away lots of nicer crosses, as well. It’s just a symbol. Don’t you know people who beam with the love of Christ? Don’t you know people who pass it on every time you look on their face?
How about you?
I have been called to serve in a ministry to men through my church, Princeton United Methodist. As we have officers and different levels of officers, we have meetings to talk about the ministry and elect officers. Marilyn and I were in Atlanta this past weekend for one of those meetings. I’m in the ministry because of a man named Mack Parker from Raleigh. I met Mack eight years ago at a church retreat that had nothing directly to do with this ministry, and I can’t say that we immediately hit it off. In fact, I’m not sure we said much to each other on that weekend.
Mack, however, beams with the love of Christ in his life.
Five years ago Mack looked me up and asked me to get involved in
this men’s ministry with him. I did, and I continue to serve with him
today. He rode to Atlanta with Marilyn and me.
Mack has been my mentor in this ministry. He has groomed me for
leadership. He continues to advise me on what to do and how to do it. He
recognizes our gifts are different and allows me to do things my way, but
he helps me understand how to work with and through others.
Mack is a black man. He’s very astute and perceptive. While he has
helped me immeasurably in this ministry, he’s also made me more aware
of sensitivities to perceptions of black people in mixed racial situations.
He’s my friend. I owe him a lot.

Election reflections: Princeton

2007-12-05T09:07:00.000-05:00

The biggest winner in last week’s Princeton Town Board election? The people of
Princeton.
We might argue who the best man (or woman) for the job was, but clearly the two candidates
who were elected, Walter Martin and Brandon Holland, are two good ones. In my
humble opinion, we had six good ones who were up for election.
While I offered my choices in last week’s paper, and we have to make choices, I don’t
think any candidates have anything to be ashamed of. I believe
each offered their candidacy out of a caring for the community.
They felt they could make a positive difference for the
people of Princeton, and they offered to serve. While each
have distinctive gifts, I believe each had fine qualities to offer
the town and would have made good representatives.
I would say that the two that worked the hardest to get
elected were the ones who won. The key to getting elected
remains getting out, knocking on doors, and asking for people’s
vote. Those who care enough to get out and work hard
to get elected are the ones generally you want to get elected.
That says something positive about their caring for the people
in the community.
As Brandon indicated in the interview in this week’s
paper, he made as his goal early on to out-work the rest of the
candidates. He certainly did that. I believe the voters were
impressed.
The voters continue to be impressed with Walter Martin. I am surprised by how well
he does at the polls.
It’s no secret that Princeton and Johnston County have roots in racism, on both sides
of the color divide. I have no doubt that some in the white community opposed his election
based on the color of his skin. There may have been some in the black community
who opposed him, jealous of the success he has had in office.
Clearly, however, there were many more who favored his election based upon who he
is and what he stands for.
That speaks volumes about how Princeton has grown and is growing past our roots.
Walter indicated in a brief interview Monday that when he meets new people from
other areas and it comes up that he is an elected official, they assume that Princeton has
district elections. With the black population being a smaller percentage of the total population,
as compared with Fremont, where the percentage of blacks in the community is
over 50%, Walter reaches a lot of people over the racial lines in the community.
He said that his message particularly resonates with many of the older voters in the
community. Obviously those are a lot of the older white voters in the community, and
those are ones whom you would expect to see Walter first as a black man, and second as
someone who shared their values. Walter was able to overcome that and again drew more
votes than any other candidate. That’s very significant.
I have been called to serve in a ministry to men through my church, Princeton United
Methodist. As we have officers and different levels of officers, we have meetings to talk
about the ministry and elect officers. Marilyn and I were in Atlanta this past weekend
for one of those meetings.
I’m in the ministry because of a man named Mack Parker from Raleigh. I met Mack
eight years ago at a church retreat that had nothing directly to do with this ministry, and
I can’t say that we immediately hit it off. In fact, I’m not sure we said much to each other
on that weekend. Mack, however, beams with the love of Christ in his life.
Five years ago Mack looked me up and asked me to get involved in this men’s ministry
with him. I did, and I continue to serve with him today. He rode to Atlanta with Marilyn
and me.
Mack has been my mentor in this ministry. He has groomed me for leadership. He
continues to advise me on what to do and how to do it. He recognizes our gifts are different
and allows me to do things my way, but he helps me understand how to work with and
through others.
Mack is a black man. He’s very astute and perceptive. While he has helped me immeasurably
in this ministry, he’s also made me more aware of sensitivities to perceptions of
black people in mixed racial situations.
He’s my friend. I owe him a lot.

A plea for old times?

2007-12-05T09:06:00.000-05:00

A friend of mine was at the Princeton Town Board meeting Monday
night. He made some strong allegations against the town board and the
town staff. I’m hurt by what he said.
I consider Elmer Capps a friend. I sought his help and advice recently
on a question and appreciated his counsel.
What hurt me was the attitude behind his comments. He assumed
that the town board was not concerned about him or the citizens of
Princeton.
After he concluded his remarks, he asked the board to excuse him as
he had to get back to babysit his granddaughter.
It would be easy to dismiss his comments
as grandstanding, but Mr. Capps is a man of
integrity and I don’t believe he would do that.
One could question his appearance the night
before the election, but I don’t think he was
trying to influence that. He wasn’t in front
of a bunch of voters, and news reports won’t
come out until long after most have voted.
I noticed he didn’t use any names. He did
not say this one or that one didn’t care. He did
say that the board didn’t care and the town
staff didn’t care. The only one he referred to
by name regarding the running of the town
was former mayor William Earl Ormond, and
that was in a positive context.
I’ve pondered his comments quite a bit
since he spoke them, because he said a lot of
hurtful things against people I also consider my friends. I think they very
definitely do care about people, and try to do the right thing for all of the
citizens of Princeton.
Why does Mr. Capps see things differently?
Mr. Capps is free to disagree with this, but I doubt that he sees Don
Rains and David Starling and Eddie Haddock as people who don’t care
about Princeton. Mr. Rains and Mr. Starling grew up in his church, and
he has known their parents for more years than they all care to remember.
I suspect the Haddocks were almost as close. I know if any of the
Capps needed anything and they called on the Rains, the Starlings or
the Haddocks, it would be there right away without question, and vice
versa.
He complained ironically about condemnations and said he felt an
owner was not treated fairly, but I think the “fair” treatment is exactly
what he is complaining about.
He also said that bigger is not always better.
I think what he was saying was he wanted to go back to the “good old
days” when things were usually settled by individuals dealing with individuals,
not by a town board which set in place regulations that determined
how people and problems would be handled through a staff.
I asked the town board to respond to Mr. Capps, even though he did not
want them to. They did listen to his complaints, and they even responded
positively to some, trying to hear and consider his side on points he tried
to make. (You can argue that Mr. Capps was trying to guilt the board into
seeing his side by accusing them of being uncaring, but again, I believe
Mr. Capps is above that.)
I heard a relevant comment about the issue of a county growth plan.
Many people are more comfortable button-holing someone and trying to
personally persuade them to their point of view. That’s been the way that
things have been done around here for a long time. They’d rather argue
that than a policy that is expected to be applied across the board.
Mr. Capps suggests that lots of things should be covered by taxes, and
he points to examples where they are not always. Town board members
are aware of that, and the town staff is as well. There is some grease to
get things done around town, it is not all cut and dried as to what regulations
say or don’t say.
The problem is, from my perspective, too many people ask for too
much. There has to be a line drawn, and it isn’t based on whether you
like someone or not, but what is fair to all. Maybe in a small town where
you know everyone and you trust most people, things are different, but
we aren’t in Kansas any more.
I may not like the answer I get, but I do believe this town board will
listen to my concerns and try to respond if they can.
No, it may not be William Earl assuring Elmer that whatever his concern
is, he will take care of it, but be assured the Rains and the Haddocks
and the Starlings and the Martins and the Suttons are still concerned
about Mr. Capps and the rest of the people of Princeton.
Based on the frustrations of Mr. Capps with this board, I encourage
the board to consider what they can do to improve their handling of
town business that will remove this perceived unfairness. They have a
responsibility to be clear and consistent in all the operations of the town
to that end.

Broad shoulders

2007-12-05T09:04:00.000-05:00

There were a few times in my youth when Mom would take me to get a Sunday suit. We would take one to the tailor and he would chalk mark the pant leg to get the pants hemmed at the right length.
As he put the suit coat on me to check it, invariably he would turn to Mom and say, “nice broad shoulders, perfect on the coat.”
It was the only time I particularly remember anyone saying I had broad shoulders. I don’t think of myself as physically having broad shoulders. I can’t help but think it might be something a tailor might say just to make you feel better about making the purchase. Is there more than just a cute phrase there.
It seems to me that is a saying that somehow has faded away. Maybe we should regenerate it.
We seem to be more concerned about talent. We’re more concerned about flash than substance. We seem to be more concerned about what is hot right now rather than what will be important five years from now, or twenty years from now.
I’ve had the privilege in my early newspaper career to work with some pretty high powered professionals. The company I worked with regularly recruited Harvard MBAs to work with the company.
The last one I worked with paid me a high compliment. We had a particularly difficult economic environment to work with in the market, a downward spiral if you will, and with his help, we came up with and implemented a new incentive plan and changed the way our sales staff looked at selling. We turned the market around.
I clearly don’t deserve all of the credit, but I was responsible for getting most of it done. I had broad shoulders.
Today when we talk about responsibility, we seem to be more concerned about pointing fingers. “It’s not my fault!”
I’m pretty good at coming up with reasons why I can’t do this or that that is on my honeydew list, at least not right now. Or why I haven’t gotten this report or that report done for the bookkeeper. And don’t even ask me about cleaning off my desk (I’ve been meaning to talk to Lucy about that).
I wonder if we aren’t doing a better job of building excuse builders. “You just weren’t feeling good that day. It’s not your fault that there was an accident. They need to give you a second chance to do it right.”
The high-powered company that I worked for hired psychologists as consultants to help us with hiring. I would meet with them periodically. One of them, and I remember little else about him or the rest, one day told me that there are tons of people with great talent who amount to little. They want to believe that their talent will carry them to great heights in business and achievement.
As the father for two daughters, I have to say I give some thought to what I want in a son-in-law. While I would hope the girls could find a good looking manly man, someone like their humble father, seriously, I hope they find someone with broad shoulders. Someone who can and would take responsibility for providing for my daughter and helping raise a family.
What really counts are people who are willing to work hard. Those who are willing to put their shoulder to the plow day in and day out are the ones who truly achieve in this world.
Bill Gates may have been in the right place at the right time, but he got to the top with some massive dedication. Steve Jobs has had massive success at Apple and elsewhere, but he had the dedication to work through some difficult missteps along the way.
We like to say work smarter, not harder, and there are times that some analysis can help us see a better way, but there are few things in life achieved that don’t require someone to take responsibility to do some hard, dedicated work along the way. And aren’t those successes the things we relish.
Besides, it’s more fun to take responsibility for successes, even if no one else knows it, than to make excuses for failures. And even if it doesn’t turn out right, if you’ve worked hard with dedication along the way, few will fault you for failure.
Have you got broad shoulders?

Our endorsements: Fremont

2007-12-05T09:03:00.000-05:00

The News Leader traditionally has offered endorsements of candidates for your consideration. We continue that tradition this year.
Before we get started, let me be clear: some of the candidates we have endorsed won, some have lost. Some of the same traits and qualities that we saw in some of the candidates others saw we expect, and the same things that we valued, others did, at least in some races. In others, maybe not.
Clearly we have not known some of the candidates as long as some of you, and you may have a better perspective to make a choice regarding that candidate. From another perspective, our view may not be affected by the past that may or may not be relevant now. In other words, we may be more objective.
Our biggest concern is that you have good, relevant information to base your decisions on. Many elections are decided based on name recognition or popularity more than qualifications to serve. We vote for someone because we recognize the name.
We had candidate interviews in this paper and last week’s. We hope you refer to them.
If you want more information, or if you are just curious, read on.
In Stantonsburg, we believe both of the incumbents, Billy Bardin and Hubert Tyson, have done a good job for the town and should be allowed to continue to work on the projects they are involved with.
Ken Horne also merits consideration, and as we expect town council to name a replacement for Councilman Bill Edmundson, who will be elected mayor, often that is the next highest vote getter. He reflects a balanced approach, and is not a one-issue candidate, but seems to sincerely want to do what’s best for all of the town.
In the Pikeville election, again, we like the two incumbents running, Bruce Thomas and Al Greene. Mr. Thomas always carefully considers what the board is dealing with and asks thoughtful questions. The board benefits from his being there.
Mr. Greene knows the people of the town and has a good grip on what the people of the town want and need.
We believe the voters had good reasons to elect them the last time, and should continue to elect them.
We believe the voters will have a difficult decision on a third vote, as we had, but we went with Talmadge “Thiggy” Thigpen. He has a lot of experience serving on similar boards. Coming from one of the old families, he will respect the history of the town, while having the youthful enthusiasm to help the town move forward.
We also think Fremont voters will have a difficult choice to make, but again we are endorsing going with the incumbent. Devone Jones has done a really good job as mayor, helped the town start a lot of really good projects, and he has built a really good rapport between the town citizens and the town board. We appreciate his objectivity, as he has not sided with the black members of the board at times, and has tried to make decisions for the best interests of all of the citizens.
Again, those are our choices, but the ones that count are the ones you make at the polls on Tuesday. Please take the time to participate. Town elections are important.

Our election picks

2007-12-05T09:02:00.000-05:00

Some of you have known many of the candidates for many years. Some of you may have known candidates for all of their lives. Some of you probably have made up your minds about who you will vote for. I find no fault with that.
There is an old saw in politics that people often pull the lever of the name they know, sometimes without having much knowledge of any of the candidates. They vote based on name recognition.
We hope you have more than name recognition to base a vote on. We invite you to read the questionnaire in today’s paper to help. If you want more information, I’ll offer my opinion.
I have to start with the present board candidates. I have to ask if they are doing a good job. If they are, I have a hard time justifying making a change.
Eddie Haddock has served on the town board for nearly twenty years. About the only thing negative that ever comes up about Eddie is his family’s company does contract work for the town.
Recently more allegations were made against Eddie, not surprisingly by another candidate for the board. In our cynical world, we find it easy to believe if a town board member has connection with a company doing business with the town, there must by some wrongdoing there.
Well, I can assure you that Eddie is not in league with the rest of the town board members to profit from contracts with the town. It soils everyone in town to make those allegations, that such dealings would be tolerated by the town staff and the rest of the town board members, if they were improper.
The town has taken measures to reasssure there is no impropriety.
I have asked many and can find no justification for the accusations, other than the lingering cynicism.
We are fortunate to have a firm like Haddock Enterprises willing to do small jobs around Princeton, because many larger firms are just not interested in doing the work, at any price.
Eddie is truly concerned about people. He has served as Rescue Squad Captain for many years as an indicate of his dedication to public service. He also tries to respond to complaints when citizens voice them. He has been a valuable resource to the board with his knowledge of the town’s water and sewer system.
I know there are many times when he has served the town without any compensation.
Walter Martin has been a strong representative for the town. He not only brings common sense to decisions before the board, but does his homework to research issues so he can intelligently discuss them. He has opinions and states them, more importantly with reasons why.
Walter sometimes takes unpopular stands on issues, and as a politician I sometimes wish he would pick his fights more, but he consistently votes his convictions without alienating the rest of the board with his opinions.
I have been surprised at how well he has been received as a black man in what is sometimes correctly characterized as a community with some racist attitudes on both sides of the color line.
Like Eddie, I believe the town has benefited from Walter’s experience with the Smithfield Police Department.
I believe the present town board is doing a good job, and has moved the town ahead greatly in recent years. I see no compelling reason to change.
Voters will decide on two issues on the ballot regarding county taxes. I favor approving both.
Both the land transfer tax and potential sales tax hike would be alternatives to property tax increases for the county, and I believe both generally are better than a higher property tax.
While the real estate industry lobbies heavily against any tax on their industry, fearing it will hit their pocketbook, their arguments don’t hold water for me. I don’t believe an extra thousand or two thousand dollars on a 20 year or 30 year mortgage will add more than a few dollars a month over the life of the loan, and it will help to pass along the costs of schools particularly to those families moving into our county creating a deficit. It takes a number of years for a new homeowner to catch up on paying the costs for schools and others services without the land transfer tax. In the meantime, you and I and other property owners are picking up their tab. If they are long-term residents of the county, even those paying a land transfer tax will benefit in the long run.
A land transfer tax helps put the costs of growth more on the shoulders of those creating the costs. That seems more fair to me.
Those are my thoughts and choices. The ones that count are the ones you and I make at the polls next Tuesday. Make your opinions count.

Priorities: God first

2007-12-05T09:00:00.000-05:00

“If you don’t set priorities, the world will set them for you.”
How many of us are too busy? How many of us have too many things on our plate? We want to do a good job at everything, but there are too many things coming at us to get everything done, and more especially, get it done well.
I certainly identify with all of that.
I suspect most of us are letting the world set at least some of our priorities. Instead of doing what we should be doing, we do what the world tells us to do.
There’s increasingly another side of this, at least for me. I only have a certain level of energy. I can go with most for a period of time, but particularly with hard and intense work, I run out of energy after a while. I usually get up at 5:30 and go until 10:30, but there are nights when I am in bed at 9 p.m.
“Take a look at your checkbook. That will tell you where your priorities are.”
I remember going to a financial advisor almost 30 years ago. We laid out our checkbook. She was horrified by how much money we were spending going out to eat. Right or wrong, and we were spending too much money there, going out to eat was a priority for us at that point in our lives.
I haven’t done a study lately, but I suspect if I did, a lot of our money now would be going to pay for things we bought but didn’t have the money in the bank for: interest on credit cards and the like. I’ve tried to get better at that.
There are things we want to buy for the house, improvements, and trips we would like to take. Part of the problem is waiting until we can afford them. It takes discipline. It’s a lot easier just saying yes when no is the right answer; for me as well as others.
I am a big believer in multi-tasking and working with greater efficiency. It is revolutionizing our society.
Computers have enabled us to do so much more. As I type this column, not that many years ago I would have been typing it on a typewriter, double spaced. After I finished typing, I would have marked corrections, and I might have re-typed it because I didn’t like what I ended up with (I still do that on occasion). It’s a whole lot easier to do on a computer. It usually underlines my misspellings so I don’t miss them.
After I finished my writing, someone else would have punched it in to a typesetter. There would have been changes made. Then there would have been someone to put it together on a page with the rest of the copy and pictures for that page. An editor usually would design the page, and someone else would put it together. The editor would help make it all fit right.
Then it would go to a pre-press department. Someone would make a page negative, and then someone else would make a plate.
Today I write the column, an editor puts it on the page and prints it out. It is proofed, posted on the internet, and then someone outputs it to a plate for printing. So much faster, much less labor intensive, and so much better. It enables a person to do more, and him or her to make more money.
I am amazed at the number of kids whose parents are at their school sports games. Even games during normal working hours, there are lots of parents who somehow get off work.
I remember Mom being at a lot of my games, but she was a stay at home mom. Dad never was, but he was always working.
This may sound a bit “if it was good enough for me, it’s good enough for them”, and I think it’s good that we try to support our kids, but I think sometimes we go overboard.
Do we coddle our kids with attention and a lifestyle that they won’t be able to recapture for many years on their own? Do we give them new cars, take them on (or give them money for) beach trips and vacations without expecting them to work? Do they have to pay for anything while they are living at home? Are we setting them up for a harsh world of reality, trying to make it living on their own, providing for their families, with the expectation of having plenty of money all the time and the things that go with it? Are we teaching them responsibility and preparing them for the world? Are we fulfilling our responsibility as parents?
Is it any wonder many kids don’t want to ever leave home?
Speaking of close to home, how about what we are using with our own time? Are we focused solely on our kids? Are we putting back into our community, our church? Are we taking the time to tell others that we care about them, maybe not so much in words but in actions?
Put another way, are we giving God what is right, or what is left over? Are we making His priorities our priorities? Are we bringing Him the first fruits of our time and our talents and our treasure, or are we giving Him what is left over after we get what we want?
It begins for me with setting and keeping the proper priorities. I can do better. How about you?

Paint me red and white

2007-12-05T08:59:00.000-05:00

I had every reason to be blue that Thursday morning. Some of you probably heard about the massive traffic jam at the RBC Center. I can testify how real it was.
I packed up five women from our office and we set out for the motivational seminar being held there.
I have to confess I was reluctant to push my girls too much, so I set a time of 6:15 to get started, and we picked up two on the way. Still, we left the last house, on the Raleigh side of Smithfield at 6:50, and you know it only takes 30 minutes to get to Raleigh from there.
While the girls were on good behavior, I was not in a great mood when we finally walked in the door of the RBC at 10 a.m.
As it turned out we missed Coach Roy Williams and Steve Forbes, two of the headliners for the day. What we mostly heard was two speakers, one trying to sell us a stock investment course and another selling another motivational seminar. I have no doubt that both were good, but I didn’t come to buy something else.
I particularly wanted all of us to hear Zig Ziglar, who I have never heard before. Unfortunately, Zig suffered a fall last year, and his dynamic motivational talk was reduced to his daughter asking him to recollect things he has said before.
That left us with General Colin Powell, and after a stressful and disappointing day, I wasn’t sure any of us wanted to wait for that. The vote was unanimous, however, that we stay.
Well, the general didn’t disappoint. He stirred emotions. He struck chords of pride. He said what I wanted to hear. And I think the rest of our crowd was similarly inspired.
I know the Iraq War has many in this country split. The criticisms of the war fill the airways. It’s hard to know how deep the anti-war sentiments in this country run. Obviously it is deep among those who want to criticize the president to promote their own run for his office.
Gen. Powell was not likely to attract an anti-war crowd. We business people tend to be a conservative group, and likely to support those who are pro-business, often Republicans.
Still, I was impressed with how well flag and country and the general played to this crowd. Clearly he could have said he was announcing his run for president and gotten a pretty strong show of support. (He made no hints of that, by the way.)
There was another not so overt theme of the day. Success was the goal, but how do you define success? Well, if you know who Zig Ziglar is, you know he’s a man of faith. What I didn’t know was many of the others there were also people of faith.
There was no altar call, but one of the motivational speakers, and I honestly missed the first part of his presentation, talked very openly about his faith and offered encouragement and support for those who wanted it.
Making more money was one of the themes of the day, you might say the primary theme. Isn’t that what the world says is important? Well, another theme was success that matters. As someone put it, are you climbing the ladder of success to only discover when you reach the top, you’re on the wrong ladder?
I’m not sure all of the speakers on the stage shared that perspective. I think some were there to make money or promote their own agenda. Some were there for a higher purpose, though.
It was good to see that, even in the midst of what could have turned out to be a blue day.

Between the ear holes Princeton

2007-12-05T08:57:00.000-05:00

I am still getting over the near upset of my Dallas Cowboys last Monday night. How can a team as sorry as the Buffalo Bills come that close to beating my undefeated Cowboys? Both teams are on the national stage of Monday night, so you know both wanted to play well. And yet, Buffalo did everything but win.
The Saturday before I was at Duke. You remember the Blue Devils, the team that ran their losing streak to 22 games earlier this year. That Saturday they were getting thrashed by Wake Forest in the third quarter when suddenly a football game broke out. Duke gave the Demon Deacons all they could handle and could have easily won that one.
Rosewood and Princeton are having tough seasons. Both have suffered some lopsided losses this year.
In fairness, most of us don’t attend or even watch most football games. Our impressions of a team are often shaped by the final score. More than that, by wins and losses. Wins and losses are important, but often what really happens on the field, the good plays and the bad plays, the strong efforts and the weak efforts, are overridden by the ultimate distillation: w or l.
I can’t speak about every Princeton and Rosewood game, but Friday night I saw part of both Princeton and Rosewood games. While North Duplin was the better team Friday night, and I saw that, Princeton did not play that poorly against the undefeated Rebels. They are undefeated for good reason.
I did not see the end of the Rosewood game, but from what I saw, I expected they would win the game. The week before they got beat, 52-0.
The nature of the game is also such that the bigger, stronger, and faster athlete usually dominates. You can usually get kids in the weight room to improve strength, but there’s a certain amount of this stuff that is God given, and you either have or you don’t. You can’t coach speed, for example.
No offense to those who are on the Rosewood and Princeton teams this year, but the talent level isn’t as high as on some other teams. I’m sure the coaching staff is working just as hard as they have been, and I suspect the kids are working as hard as they were last year. We just don’t have all the horses some other teams have. We don’t have the speed, strength, quickness and experience other teams have.
The same could probably be said at Duke and Buffalo: they don’t have the horses to have a winning team, or at least not a consistently winning team. But at Rosewood for a while Friday, at Duke Saturday, and at Buffalo Monday, each team looked like a winner.
Princeton broke a long losing streak three weeks ago. The team that had struggled to score, that had not been close to winning, suddenly became a winner. They not only won that game, but they won it by a convincing margin, and came back the next week and won again in a near blow-out.
I asked Coach Williamson about the turnaround. When the kids went out on the field two weeks ago, they knew they were the better team.
Last week, things went their way early, and the other team got discouraged and desperate. And I’m sure his team’s confidence went up.
As hard a game as it is, and as easy as it is to get discouraged, I am inspired by those who buck the trend, who make it happen, and who overcome the odds. I am also excited by those who can help us believe in ourselves enough to make it happen.
I enjoy watching Remember the Titans again and again. I enjoyed seeing Facing the Giants.
I have caught a time or two what I think is a new feature on ESPN. Former coach Lou Holtz (he’s coached at a lot of places, including NC State many years ago) is offering a pre-game pep talk for the underdog teams in big college battles. It’s entertaining, but I also think what I heard would inspire me to feel great about my chances to win before I took the field.
Believe and have confidence, and who knows, you might even beat the Cowboys, on Monday night.

Between the ear holes

2007-12-05T08:55:00.000-05:00

I am still getting over the near upset of my Dallas Cowboys Monday night. How can a team as sorry as the Buffalo Bills come that close to beating my undefeated Cowboys. Both teams are on the national stage of Monday night, so you know both wanted to play well. And yet, Buffalo did everything but win.
Saturday I was at Duke. You remember the Blue Devils, the team that ran their losing streak to 22 games earlier this year. Saturday they were getting thrashed by Wake Forest in the third quarter when suddenly a football game broke out. Duke gave the Demon Deacons all they could handle and could have easily won that one.
Aycock is having a tough season. My memory is long enough to remember long Falcon football losing steaks, and times when CBA had just 16 kids on the sidelines to play a game. Still, we’ve come to expect a lot more from Coach Pinkowski led teams.
In fairness, most of us don’t attend or even watch most football games. Our impressions of a team are often shaped by the final score. More than that, by wins and losses. Wins and losses are important, but often what really happens on the field, the good plays and the bad plays, the strong efforts and the weak efforts, are overridden by the ultimate distillation: w or l.
I can’t speak about every Aycock game, but Friday night I was at Beddingfield for most of the first half. I left to help cover another game for our Princeton paper, but when I left, I honestly thought Aycock would win. The offense was still struggling to establish consistency, though they had some good runs while I was there. What particularly impressed me was the defense was hitting and creating turnovers.
I would be the first to testify that football is a lot of hard work. My hat’s off to those who play.
The nature of the game is also such that the bigger, stronger, and faster athlete usually dominates. You can usually get kids in the weight room to improve strength, but there’s a certain amount of this stuff that is God given, and you either have or you don’t. You can’t coach speed, for example.
No offense to those who are on the Aycock team this year, but the talent level isn’t as high as it has been. I’m sure the coaching staff is working just as hard as they have been, and I suspect the kids are working as hard as they were last year. We just don’t have all the horses we had last year and in recent years.
The same could probably be said at Duke and Buffalo: they don’t have the horses to have a winning team, or at least not a consistently winning team. But at Beddingfield for a while Friday, at Duke Saturday, and at Buffalo Monday, each team looked like a winner.
One of my other teams, Princeton, broke a long losing streak two weeks ago. The team that had struggled to score, that had not been close to winning, suddenly became a winner. They not only won that game, but they won it by a convincing margin, and came back the next week and won again in a near blow-out.
I asked the coach about the turnaround. When the kids went out on the field two weeks ago, they knew they were the better team.
Last week, things went their way early, and the other team got discouraged and desperate. And I’m sure his team’s confidence went up.
As hard a game as it is, and as easy as it is to get discouraged, I am inspired by those who buck the trend, who make it happen, and who overcome the odds. I am also excited by those who can help us believe in ourselves enough to make it happen.
I enjoy watching Remember the Titans again and again. I enjoyed seeing Facing the Giants.
I have caught a time or two what I think is a new feature on ESPN. Former coach Lou Holtz (he’s coached at a lot of places, including NC State many years ago) is offering a pre-game pep talk for the underdog teams in big college battles. It’s entertaining, but I also think what I heard would inspire me to feel great about my chances to win before I took the field.
Believe and have confidence, and who knows, you might even beat the Cowboys, on Monday night.

A credible source

2007-10-04T13:44:00.001-04:00

I was in a professional office recently for a check-up. While passing some time during the exam, one of the nurses asked if I had heard about microwaving meals releasing dioxin into food.
I wanted to ask her why the mainstream media hadn’t picked it up if it is true. She said that someone in the office had printed it off the internet. That was my first sign of trouble.
My wife had chastised me some time ago about forwarding things I had received off the internet without checking them out. A couple of years ago I had forwarded an email with a heartwarming message about a famous pianist. I got a scathing response from a friend, as the heartwarming message was a fraud.
A similar message on Denzel Washington proved to be a fraud – a half truth. I was disappointed. I like Denzel and wanted to believe the good things about him. (From what I understand, he is a pretty decent guy, even if that story wasn’t true.)
I don’t like being skeptical, but I won’t accept such stores off the internet now, at least until I check them out. Fortunately, some turn out to be true.
The nurse went on to say that the story also said frozen bottled water releases similar dioxin, and plastic wrap over food heated in a microwave releases dioxin.
According to www.truthorfiction.com, that claim is false or at least unproven. A doctor in Hawaii made the claim five years ago, but has yet to offer any proof.
There are some of us who are skeptical of the government and media, and want to believe that there is a mass conspiracy out there, that government and media is hiding the truth. “There really is something like this out there, and you can’t get verification because of the cover-up.” We buy into these sorts of things too easily.
The problem here is credibility. Unfortunately, anyone can say anything they want in an email, true or not, and a lot of times, even in heartwarming stories, it isn’t true.
The publisher of the Kenly News, Rick Stewart, for the last several years, has been teaching journalism and communications at Barton College. A few months ago he brought three of his students to a newspaper publishers meeting so they could offer some of their views on the newspaper industry and about youth tastes.
Unlike many of us older folk, they were not raised to read a newspaper every day. Many like reading papers off the internet.
We talked about bloggers who post to the internet, and they indicated they enjoyed reading blogs. We talked about responses to blogs, which they liked to post and read other responses.
Interesting to me, one of their comments was they expected newspapers to clean up the blogs on their site. They expect us not to allow just anyone to put whatever they want on our site. Let me assure you, there is plenty of garbage posted to our site from people overseas. All of it is filtered off.
There is a recent movie, which I haven’t seen yet, and I don’t think has played in the area, called “Resurrecting the Champ.” The story, which is mostly fiction, has the seed in a similar incident in which a reporter “discovers” a former boxing champion living on the streets of Denver, Colorado.
In the movie, the story has such appeal, the reporter runs with it, but as he starts checking his facts, he finds that the story is not adding up. It’s a really good heartwarming story, just not true.
With TV shows and fringe publications trying to capture the public interest, anything like this that has even a smudge of credibility gets some play in the media. I recently picked up some free distribution newspapers from Asheville and was amazed at some of the things that they found to publish. They weren’t stories that you will find in the Asheville daily paper, and for good reason.
Every newspaper reporter comes across stories that are good, stories that people want to read about, but in the final analysis, the facts don’t bear out. You will find stories that people will swear to you are true, and in some cases you believe them, but you can’t get independent verification that what they are saying is right. Sometimes you can’t get it because it isn’t right, for whatever reason, and sometimes you keep asking and finally find the right person to tell you the truth.
Are we ever wrong? Of course. But we try very hard to get it right on the front end.
You expect that, and I’m proud that you do. You hold us to a higher standard. And you should.

Sensationalizing the news

2007-10-04T13:43:00.001-04:00

A couple of weeks ago, I got a compliment from a friend on how we handle news stories. In the same breath, he took a shot at WRAL-TV on their tendency to play up the negative aspects of their stories.
I didn’t say a lot at the time. I think we in the media sometimes take some unfair hits for what we do. I don’t personally support every person we cover. Yes, we do try to lift up people whom we believe make a positive difference in our communities, We also try to stand up for the little guy, and give him (or her) a chance to make their case in the community, even if we don’t agree with them.
The frequent complaint is “you are only printing that story to sell papers.”
Yes, selling newspapers is what we do. If we don’t sell papers, we don’t eat. If we don’t cover stories that people want to read, we don’t sell papers.
Yes, sometimes the news is hurtful. I don’t like covering some of the stories that come up. I don’t like hearing from people who say they were hurt by a story that was in the paper. I want to say I was just doing my job.
A fellow came in the office the other day to renew his subscription and he complimented my editorials. He thanked me for some of the stands I have taken. He said he agreed with me, at least most of the time, and he felt most people did.
The comment struck me. As of late, I have taken some pretty bold stands on some issues. I was quite certain that not everyone agreed with what I said. That’s all right.
Another friend (I swear I didn’t pay any of these people to say these things) made a positive comment a week or so ago. It resounded with me as well. It’s one of those quotes I kind of wish I could claim to have written, for it’s what I hope most people would say about us: “You write the news with a caring about the community.”

To be sure, school news makes up a lot of what we do every week. We try to maintain good relations with schools. We try to be a booster, a supporter.
There are times when the news media is seen rightly with the image of the old knock at the door and the “I’m Mike Wallace with 60 Minutes,” with the aggressive reporter and cameraman pushing their way in the door. Not surprisingly schools sometimes react with a siege mentality.
There have been allegations of misconduct by teachers in times past that schools have tried to handle internally. Certainly with the potential to end someone’s career, you want to handle things in a caring way.
The problem, like many others, is you get a rap for protecting your own and not taking proper action against someone. Schools I hope have learned that you’re better off dealing with things in an open manner. In trying to protect staff, they have at times not taken the proper actions on behalf of the students and parents. The liabilities are too great.
Still, it’s not too surprising when a principal won’t comment on allegations against one of his staff.
There is a public trust. It says that we in the media and the schools have to take it seriously when there are complaints. We have to respond. We can’t afford to dismiss complaints, saying they have no merit.
To do so violates that trust. That’s something we can’t afford.

Dollars and sense

2007-10-04T13:41:00.001-04:00

It is a bad use of our tax money to pay to signalize the crossing at Center Street.
There is widespread understanding that many of us are hard-headed enough to say we don’t want to be inconvenienced, and will impose our will on municipal officials. It is understood that many merchants will say they don’t want to close any railroad crossing that might adversely affect their business. If the town board is pro business as they are suppose to be, the businesses will rationalize the town board needs to support them.
I know the fire department and rescue squad will be lobbying in support of keeping the Barden Street crossing open, as closing it will delay the response of emergency vehicles. It seems that decision has pretty well been cast, to close that intersection.
Let me put this on a basis that we all can relate to: dollars and sense.
Are we truly that inconvenienced by going a block one way or the other to cross the railroad? Is it worth that much to us to not have to go an extra block when we are going to the hardware or drug store? I suspect for most people it isn’t worth much of anything.
Let me be clear: the merchants on Center Street I consider friends and supporters of this paper. I wouldn’t propose the town do anything that I truly believed would hurt them.
I believe the emotions of the moment are overruling our dollars and sense.
Let me make an offer to both the emergency services and the Center St. merchants that makes dollars and sense to me. Rather than asking all the citizens of the town to pay part the town’s share of the costs of signalizing the two railroad crossings, why not pick up the cost yourselves.
Have the town set up a special tax district to cover the costs of maintaining the railroad crossing. Cover those businesses who believe their business would be adversely affected by closing the crossing, and through additional taxes, let them pay the annual costs. It is only about $2,500 per year, and it could be cut up based upon the tax value of the buildings in the Center St. area. While the larger businesses would pick up a larger share and smaller businesses would take a smaller bite, it would be around $350 each for maybe seven businesses. That sounds reasonable, it they truly believe closing the intersection will hurt their business.
Our fire department and rescue squad have a good bit of tax money they are bringing in. Is it worth forgoing purchase of some new equipment more often to keep Barden Street open? You could argue that it would still be all of our tax money that would be going to keep that intersection open, but is it significant enough for the two departments to maybe wait on getting some new equipment to pay that cost?
Our major problems that we want our taxes to pay for sometimes become relatively minor problems when we are asked to pay the costs directly. We freely want the taxpayers often to pay for things to benefit us, but when we are asked to pay the direct costs, perspectives change.
Our town board needs to make the decisions that are best for all the citizens of Princeton. If they are spending the tax dollars of all the citizens of Princeton, they need to keep all of the taxpayers in mind.
I don’t believe the future of the hardware store or the pharmacy will be jeopardized by the closing of Center St. I don’t believe closing Bardin Street will significantly impact emergency services.
One other factor that I’m not sure we are weighing is the changes in traffic patterns when the new elementary school opens.
Many correctly point out that Dr. Donnie Jones Boulevard is a mess when school is beginning and ending. A big percentage of that traffic is generated by the elementary school students.
When the new school opens, the old school will be a safer place, and mornings and afternoons will be better.
Of course, Holt’s Pond Road will be a different matter.
Fewer railroad crossings and faster trains through town will improve safety and ultimately will reduce delays.
The state is not trying to hurt Princeton. They are not the enemy. They are trying to encourage us to make the right decision. They are offering some financial encouragement to make the right decision.
The right decision for all the citizens of Princeton is to close both crossings. It makes dollars and sense.

Light at end of sewer pipe

2007-10-04T13:39:00.000-04:00

You couldn’t help but feel for Eureka Town Board members who were wringing their hands over the massive sewer bills. There seemed to be no solution.
As some had suggested, maybe the town should go away, dissolve itself, and maybe somehow the debt would go away. Like declaring personal bankruptcy, yeah, that’s the ticket.
To their credit, the board members didn’t run away, or crawl away to a hole, curl up and die. They accepted the responsibility, and while some may want to complain, and they probably will, the town is on the road back.
I also praise the League of Municipalities. They stepped in and helped the town board to feel better about their situation. They pointed out that while the town might feel they are incapable of dealing with the debt the town was in, Eureka was in better shape than most towns.
I appreciate the willingness of the state to allow Fremont to re-open their spray field.
With recurring problems with small municipal sewer treatment plant spills, the state had adopted a policy of pushing regional treatment of sewer. With larger, more dependable and better financed systems and employees, there would be fewer problems to monitor and fewer spilling systems to try to get fixed.
The state has had some genuine compassion for both Fremont and Eureka with the high bills they are facing from the Goldsboro system. There was some discussion sometime back of trying to act on the smaller towns’ behalf in negotiating lower rates.
When the Fremont spray field is opened, the state has offered to act on Eureka’s behalf to negotiate a rate reduction for Eureka based upon Fremont’s lower cost for treating sewer sent to the field as opposed to the rates paid Goldsboro.
From another perspective, Fremont has been working through their sewer problems for a long time. There have been a number of mayors, town boards, and administrators. There have been a lot of grants along the way, but the town citizens have put many sewer dollars as well as tax dollars into trying to fix a deep down problem.
While the costs of repaying the bond issues will continue for some time to come, Fremont is nearing a time when most of their problems will be behind them. The seeming never ending repairs and rehabilitation of sewer lines will never be completely over, but the big stuff is behind us.
The town has suffered through big sewer bills and the complaints that generated, and the discouragement to new businesses and residents coming to the town. Struggling to have enough sewer capacity to handle their leaky system, with rainwater and ground water flowing into the system, there was little capacity left for growth.
Fremont’s sewer hole is significantly deeper, and the town has had to work through it for a longer period of time. In some ways, it may have seemed just as dark to Fremont as Eureka’s has to its town board.
Today there is some light at the end of that sewer line, too. There are brighter days ahead.
It won’t come too soon for many of us.

The News Leader is making a change in our sports focus. While coverage of Aycock will continue to be our primary focus with our sports coverage, and with the number of sports teams fielded at Aycock, that will be no small undertaking, we will be moving up coverage of Norwayne as our secondary sports focus.
Sarah Wise, our Wayne-Wilson News Leader reporter, and I met with the Norwayne coaching staff recently to announce the change and to ask their help. I think it is fair to say they were most enthusiastic in their response.
Let me confess that this has been a change that has been urged from the inside. As most of you know, we have been offering some coverage of Norwayne over the years, but now we will be increasing the numbers and length of stories, and the number of photos. One of our local sports cheerleaders and long-time office manager, Rosie Colvin, has been urging for years that we offer more coverage of Norwayne sports.
We hope you enjoy some of the sports spotlight being shifted to some of our younger athletes.

Condemnation is necessary

2007-10-04T13:38:00.000-04:00

I appreciate the Fremont Town Board's willingness to condemn properties in town. As reflected in the discussion last week, it is never easy to condemn someone’s property, and Harold Cuddington’s questions are some I think we all have asked at one time or another.
The sorry truth is that the American dream of home ownership fades into a harsh reality: once you buy a home, you not only have to pay for it. but you have to pay to keep it up. Plenty of homes in eastern North Carolina have long been paid for, but no one has kept them up. And some, the owner can’t afford to pay for or keep up.
To be sure, plenty of homeowners do a good job maintaining their properties, but plenty also don’t. And no one wants one of those who don’t, beside theirs.
It doesn’t seem right that them that do right would have to pay for those who don’t, but as long as people can get easy credit, there will be people who will buy houses they can’t afford to keep up.
Not to mention the older retired couple whose money is nearly run out, just trying to keep food in the house and the lights on. The paint on the exterior or the new roof will go lacking on that home.
It used to be that the kids wouldn’t let their older parents go without, but a lot of them have moved away and they don’t have to face the neighbors.
No, it doesn’t seem that should be the town’s problem, but if the property owner won’t address it, and heaven knows the town has given them every opportunity, who is going to do it?
While the town can continue to attach the deed with bills for repairs or out and out demolition of property and sell the property to try to recover their expenses, in some cases they will never get their money back.
Spending public money on a park in the middle of town makes some sense, but spending public money on an individual’s house, and one that usually is not occupied or fit to occupy, doesn’t. What makes sense is for the owner either to fix it so someone can live in it or to take it down so something else can go up in its place. What happens too often is nothing, even when you threaten.
Some owners who should do something, will not do anything. Following through on condemnations, fixing up properties and attaching them, and demolitions will encourage some who can, to take action before the town does.
As happened with one home last week, the owners promised if they just had some more time they would address the problems, but they didn’t.
Condemnations are yucky business. I can’t blame Fremont town board members for not wanting to be in it. I’m just glad they are willing to clean up the town for the rest of us.

Planning for growth

2007-10-04T13:35:00.001-04:00

I’m not too young to remember when county-wide zoning was debated in this county. “I don’t want anyone to tell me what I can do with my land” was the common cry. Fortunately, enough people realized it wasn’t so much what you couldn’t do, but keeping your neighbors from doing something to hurt you.
“We want to preserve the rural nature of the county” has been the recent cry heard. That sounds real good until a farmer realizes that if we maintain the rural nature of the county, he can’t sell his farm to someone who wants to put in a subdivision. “That’s my retirement you’re messing with.”
I met with several people over the past week to discuss some of the growth issues facing the county. One of the articles that relates is in this week’s News Leader, relating to the quarry projects outside Princeton.
One of the concerns is having the infrastructure, the roads, the utilities, the schools, and the police and fire protection to serve growing areas. If growth is allowed and encouraged everywhere, it becomes unmanageable. If it is encouraged where it makes sense, where it is planned for, and where it is reasonable to serve, then we can do a better job of getting services to people.
The one big determining factor is sewer. If you have sewer service, you can build more lots in an area. If you are on septic tanks, if the land will permit septic tanks, you have to be on a bigger lot.
(Remember that Princeton recently moved their new sewer lift station that will serve the new school to allow new service to a several-mile radius.)
The emphasis on growth comes as the county has recently accepted the recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Committee the commissioners appointed earlier this year. That follows several initiatives to try to address growth issues in the county.
Some argue since the county has county-wide zoning in place, we have a comprehensive land use plan for the county. Others quickly point out that 90 of the 100 counties in the state have a comprehensive land use plan, and those who don’t have it, other than Johnston, are hopelessly rural.
One of those who I met with last week was Don Johnson, the former mayor of Benson, who now works with Johnston Community College. Mr. Johnson said most of us in Johnston County still prefer to do business with government one-on-one, button-holing them at the store or on the street and asking for our commissioner’s help.
He related a zoning request in Benson. At a main intersection in town, with businesses on three corners, and the old house on the other corner badly in need of repair, a request to put a business on that fourth corner was tabled after neighbors said they didn’t want a business there. “Legally, they don’t have a leg to stand on,” Mr. Johnson offered.
A comprehensive land use plan puts priorities into place. It suggests where growth is likely to occur, and it plans to provide the services necessary to serve that new population. You can’t sway it and you can depend on it being the same tomorrow as it is today. That’s putting growth on a business-like footing.
As was acknowledged at the recent Blue Ribbon Committee presentation to county commissioners, whatever the county adopts will require some hard decisions. It will be an easier path for the county to avoid any decision.
Clearly the reason we don’t have a comprehensive land use plan in place is because it’s a hard issue to deal with. Still, most understand the need.
At least some on county commissioners are behind this effort, or the committee would not have been appointed. We encourage them to press on and get this road map to the future on the books.

There has been an acknowledgement by the county that they need to do a better job providing in many areas, though I and many would acknowledge that they are trying. One of those areas is recreation.
When the old quarry is filled with water, it could be a wonderful recreation area for many in this county. It is one of the most beautiful areas of Johnston County.
While it is doubtful as it looks now that the county will have a recreation program up and running in seven years, perhaps Princeton could operate a recreation area at the quarry. Perhaps the town and the county could work together to help make that happen. We call on town leaders to have the vision and energy to help make that happen.
It would be a shame if such a wonderful natural resource was not utilized and appreciated.

Back to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee

2007-09-04T09:53:00.000-04:00

My wife, Marilyn, got a call from her sister a few weeks ago, asking us to join her and her husband for a long Labor Day weekend in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. While we looked forward to spending time with them, it wouldn’t have been one of the places we would have chosen to go.
When we lived in western South Carolina, and later when we moved to the Cincinnati area, neighboring Gatlinburg was one of the places people went to on holidays. Marilyn labeled it a “tourist trap,” and I can’t say I found a lot there to recommend it. For the twenty-five years we have lived in eastern North Carolina, we haven’t been back.
The first pleasant surprise was the length of the trip. The map services said about seven hours, and we made it easily in that length of time. Most of it is on I-40, and without any slowdowns or backups, it was a pleasant drive.
I can’t say that Gatlinburg has changed a lot, at least in the type of stores that are there. What has changed, and I would say in a really good way, is nearby Pigeon Forge.
There was not a lot to Pigeon Forge thirty years ago. Except for the charm of the hotels on the Pigeon River in Gatlinburg, for my money, Pigeon Forge has a lot more going for it.
With new land for development in Pigeon Forge, unlike Gatlinburg, what has really taken off has been live entertainment. There are literally dozens of showplaces. Many are country music shows, but there were also several playhouses, magic shows, a mystery dinner theatre, and even a Broadway style production on the life of Christ. Dick Clark has opened an American Bandstand themed show this year with headliners of old performing. Chubby Checker was there this past weekend.
If you like big country breakfasts, there are plenty of places to enjoy one in Pigeon Forge, particularly pancakes. Our host and hostess particularly like Cracker Barrel, so two mornings we ate there. There’s even a breakfast show at one of the theatres.
I’ve never been accused of being a big fan of going shopping, but if your ladies want to get in some shopping, Pigeon Forge has plenty to offer. I think there are no less than five outlet malls, plus lots of individual stores along the main drag through the area.
It looked as if rates went up some over the holiday, but when we got there Wednesday, there were some $30 rooms in Pigeon Forge. Again, Pigeon Forge isn’t as scenic, but with a great number of motels being built there, there is a lot of pressure to keep room rates down.
The in-laws were celebrating their anniversary, and they had been given a three-bedroom cabin in the mountains between Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge by their children for the week. The kids had also given them a night out at one of the nice restaurants. Some of the choices about where to go had already been made.
They had been up there many times in recent years, and had been to some of the shows and they weren’t interested in going back on this trip, so we did not go, though I would have liked to.
I had mentioned to a friend a couple of weeks ago we were going to the area, and she said she and her husband enjoyed the Old Mill Restaurant in Pigeon Forge. As the in-laws had been there and also enjoyed it, that was one of our choices. As recommended, we went early, and on a weeknight, as the in-laws had recalled waiting two hours to eat. We can heartily recommend the pot roast and the shrimp, and with family style fixings and huge portions, plus dessert included in the $20/head price, you won’t leave hungry. I couldn’t finish the leftovers at lunch the next day.
If you want dinner without a show, there are plenty of other places, many very nice, some modest, and many chain restaurants.
We had been to Cade’s Cove thirty years ago, and enjoyed that glimpse into the Appalachian past, and we returned. We stopped at one of the old churches in this part of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, but mostly went to enjoy the natural beauty of the area and to look for wildlife. We weren’t disappointed as we saw a number of deer and caught a glimpse of a mama black bear and her cub.
It’s still a healthy drive from here, but if you have a few days, you might want to consider what Gatlinburg-Pigeon Forge have to offer for your next holiday.

Tats, piercings and more, oh my!

2007-09-04T09:50:00.000-04:00

I heard a fellow relate the other day that when he noticed that his wife had decided, unbeknownst to him, to add a piercing in the top of her ear, he offered to get a couple of dogs to stay under the house. “If we’re going to be like trailer trash, let’s do it big time.”
I felt his reaction was a bit extreme. I don’t find those extra ear piercings to be that disturbing. As he’s maybe ten years younger than I, I was more surprised that he wasn’t more mellow about it.
I was in a restaurant Saturday night and the fellow waiting on us had an earring. I guess you could say that he was tastefully about it.
Another related that his daughter had recently applied for a very good job near the college she is attending. She was politely told that if she was accepted, it would be on the condition that she lost the nose stud she was now wearing. Tasteful or not, some are not accepting.
I heard another man, who is rather conservative, relate how his son had had his tongue pierced. I was surprised and I asked him how he and his wife responded. He said he didn’t say too much, and pretty soon the swelling and discomfort took care of it, as he has taken it out and it has healed over.
Another conservative noted that her daughter had a belly button piercing. Rather modest, doesn’t show. I don’t think it was her mother’s choice. In fact, from her comments, I’m sure she wasn’t consulted.
I couldn’t help but notice that one of my newspaper brothers on the sideline on a recent steamy football evening had shorts on that revealed a tattoo on his leg. I guess I was a little disappointed, but I didn’t think a lot about it.
Another related his daughter had a tattoo or two somewhere on her body. He didn’t relate where. I’m not sure he knows. They apparently had discussed the topic, and he had stressed to her how it would be important to keep it in a place where it was not normally visible.
While I expect they are fairly conservative, he related that he didn’t say a lot.
I wish I could say that if I was twenty something I wouldn’t be so stupid as to get a tat or a piercing. Of course, when I was twenty something, I was pretty stupid. At least until I was 22.
I fully believe that tats and piercings are forms of protest, mild or maybe a little more radical. Most of us go through that.
I also heard recently about some “wild kids” who have turned out to be pretty decent people. Some have some prejudices about them based upon who they used to be, and they have to overcome that. If and when people get past that, they find some good things, at least sometimes.
A friend was relating how prejudiced he was about tattoos, about how his whole attitude can change about someone, and he’s voiced that to friends only to find that they have a tattoo.
I guess we need to teach our kids about how we and others react to such things, and not overreact when it hits too close to home.
Some of my best friends have tats, piercings and more!

I rather expected to get an earful on the column that I wrote last week on the school board. Frankly, I was a bit concerned that it might go too far, and uncharacteristically asked a friend to look at it. He liked it.
I haven’t gotten any negative feedback on that one, but what I did get an earful on were the two letters to the editor that we published. I think they merit comment.
No, I didn’t write them. And no, I don’t agree with them. Either one of them.
One of the prejudices that we face in the news business is we don’t publish stories we don’t like, or opinions we don’t like. Yes, the newspaper to a great extent reflects what we think is important, but I hope we are open to other views.
I am a supporter of our President. My friend, Mr. Woodring, is not.
I think Trudi Rast has done a fine job with the volleyball program at Princeton, and her winning percentage speaks volumes about her ability to attract quality players and improve them. Obviously Mrs. Williamson disagrees.
It’s easy to say we don’t deserve criticism. The truth isn’t blunted by differing opinions. And whose truth is it?

Coffeemakers new, improved?

2007-09-04T09:48:00.000-04:00

We’ve got a new coffeemaker. Frankly I was hoping my wife would make me a cup of coffee with it this morning, but I heard the ding of the microwave, so I know I got the “old stuff.”
The “old stuff” is really some new stuff, and it’s not all that bad. Let me explain.
Marilyn and I are not really coffee connoisseurs. We do very much like our first cup in the morning, and we usually enjoy a second cup. And usually that does it for both of us.
I could easily be one of those compulsive people who drinks coffee all day long, but my nervous system won’t take it. I got my lesson on that thirty years ago.
I’m naturally a moving target, and like to get out and about most of the time, but I was promoted to a management job, complete with a secretary and a nice office. Being the thoughtful person she was, my new secretary bought me a Mr. Coffee for my promotion and new office, and being compulsive and in the office all the time, I sat around drinking coffee much of the day.
When night time came, I rolled around much of the night, unable to fall asleep. I realized that two pots of Mr. Coffee was too much of a good thing.
So for Barry, no coffee after noon. Even a lot of Cola or tea at night, and I am subject to have a hard time drifting off. Typically it’s hard to catch me awake after 10:30, and I like getting to sleep about then.
For many years we have been Maxwell House or Folger’s drinkers. We have a Mr. Coffee, but we don’t usually drink a pot of coffee, and some mornings one of us will only have one cup for whatever reason, so we make individual cups of instant in the microwave.
A year or so ago, Marilyn asked that we stay with Folger’s. I really think it has to do with the aroma when you open the jar more than anything else.
Marilyn is not a cream user. My Dad always liked cream in his coffee, so I grew up sipping his and would tend to do things like my dad did, but early on I decided I would do without most of the time. He always used half a teaspoon of sugar, and similar to him I use half a package of Sweet N Low.
I’m not one why buys a lot of drinks in convenience stores, and Starbucks is not on many corners where I hang out, so the many varieties of coffee and creamers have not been a significant temptation. Still, there have been a few times when I have grabbed a cup and have particularly tried the Irish Cream or Hazelnut creamers. I have to admit that Hazelnut has an attraction for me. I occasionally will buy Coffee Mate with Hazelnut, and I will do French Vanilla, but it’s certainly not something I obsess over.
Some convenience stores have started stocking seemingly 30 different flavors of coffee. I tried to make a cup one day, and what I ended up with was disgusting. I guess I was mixing flavored coffee with a different flavored cream. Whatever I did, I don’t want to do again. I’m afraid to try.
While on vacation, we stopped in a Starbucks, mainly to use their free Wi-Fi, which now you have to pay for. My daughters knew exactly what they wanted, and I got something which sounded safe, but all I know is it costs a whole lot more than what I am used to paying for coffee and it certainly wasn’t worth the difference. Particularly with no free Wi-Fi.
One thing we did discover, or re-discovered, on the vacation was Taster’s Choice. It had been a number of years since we had had any. My memory was that Mom, who we were staying with, used Taster’s Choice, but unbeknownst to me, she has had to give up coffee. We bought a jar of Taster’s Choice to bring with us so we wouldn’t drink up all of her coffee while we were staying with her, but she packed it up for us to take back home.
Well, lately that has been our coffee of choice. It is a bit stronger than the instant we are used to, so we don’t use as much, but Marilyn likes it. It’s our “new stuff”, so it’s not really the “old stuff.”
What she really likes however, and was a bit obsessed over, was a coffeemaker we both “discovered.” We recently went to different conventions at about the same time, and both were held at centers with a Hilton attached. I usually stay at something more akin to Motel 6 when I have to pay for a room, but the Hilton made more sense for the conventions we were attending.
Coffeemakers in the room are no big thing, even for a Motel 6, but Hiltons now have an individual cup drip coffeemaker that she particularly liked. You can make two cups at one time.
When she got back, Marilyn exhausted the Internet searching for one of those coffeemakers, or something similar. She finally settled on a Hamilton Beach Three-in One Beverage Center at Target for about $30. It makes one cup at a time, and it uses the individual coffee “pods,” filter wrapped grounds for one or two small cups. It also takes tea bags and heats water for hot cereals. It's not what she wanted, but the real thing is a Hilton exclusive by Cuisinart and not available on their “like our rooms, buy the contents here” website.
I was not 100% pleased with my first cup the other day, but I’m not sure I put the filter in the right place. She bought medium roast and French vanilla flavored pods. I’m not surprised she didn’t like the French vanilla since she has not cared for the flavored brands before. So she says she will use it when she wants a special cup. I’m not sure if we found the perfect cup or not. The jury is still out.
I’ll let you know.

The assertions of Donna White

2007-09-04T09:46:00.002-04:00

I haven’t covered the Johnston County School Board in our paper for some time. I had heard that the partisan bickering had gotten bad. Last Tuesday I saw it first hand. It was embarrassing.
Mrs. Donna White of Clayton, who serves on the school board, naturally felt compelled to assert the case of her neighbors who were opposed to the three-tier bussing plan that had been proposed for the Clayton area schools. Moving a start and ending time of school up or back 15 minutes is clearly an inconvenience, particularly with school set to start in just a few weeks.
In this society many people believe if they don’t like something, if they will complain long enough and hard enough, it will change. Mrs. White apparently believed that she could change this. While she got the TV cameras to the school board meeting, and got a few parents there, the designated parent to speak for the group didn’t make it. That may have been an omen.
Mrs. White asserted that the school board was violating their rules to push through this change. The board’s attorney assured her they could legally do this.
Mrs. White asserted this change was being put into effect without being thought through. The administration assured her they were only doing this in response to their budget being recently cut, and if the budget had not been cut, they would not be doing this.
Mrs. White asserted that the Clayton area was being unfairly singled out. The administration responded that they felt they could successfully implement the change in the Clayton area in the short time before school started, but lacked the time to make the change in other areas of the county. They plan to make similar changes next year in other areas.
Two other board members tried to offer alternatives to implementing the plan. Larry Strickland asked the board to consider borrowing the money from their own reserves, and Butler Holt asked the board to “borrow” busses from the state. The administration answered both of those suggestions would not effectively cut their spending and give the schools a balanced budget.
The three voted against implementing the changes in Clayton, and while I disagreed with their votes, I don’t have a problem with their voicing the complaints of those parents and even voting against in protest. I have a big problem with Mr. Strickland and Mrs. White not stopping there.
Mr. Strickland, who changed his party registration some time back from Democrat to Republican, is clearly staking his territory as a Republican on this non-partisan board. He consistently defends the Republican-controlled county commissioners as his friends, and condemns the school board and the administration as the enemies of the taxpayers.
Mrs. White goes even further. To make her points, she many times attacked the administration. She said the superintendent of schools lied to her. As they responded to her accusations and points, she would ignore their points as if they were not true. Seemingly she continued to insist, don’t confuse me with facts, my mind’s made up.
There is a natural tension between the school board and the county commissioners. The schools should be pushing for everything they believe they can justify in advocating for education in the county. The county commissioners are charged with keeping the interests of the schools in balance with the other needs of the county. There will often be disagreements.
Mr. Strickland is neglecting his responsibilities to education by consistently attacking the school board and administration. His job is not to make the county commissioners’ case every time there is a controversial issue before the school board. He’s more interested in feathering his own bed than doing the best for the students and staff in Johnston County Schools.
Perhaps this is a bit idealistic, but I would hope that every school board member is proud of the administration and staff of our schools and working to make them better. That doesn’t happen when you consistently attack them. I know that there are many fine people who work in Johnston County Schools, and I believe we have significantly raised the level of excellence in education in the 25 years I have been here. I am proud of our schools.
If Mrs. White is not proud of our schools and administration, and she has substantive reasons for not feeling that way, she needs to bring charges. Anyone who has a suggestion if convinced it might improve the schools should bring it forth. If Mrs. White or anyone else has substantive proof that the superintendent of schools is a liar, or there is a school employee not representing the schools well, they should try to run them out of office. I’ll certainly back her if there is more to it than just the superintendent not agreeing with her.
If her tactics are to make false accusations and to destroy the integrity of the leaders of our schools to justify her own purposes, she ought to be ashamed.
She accused the schools of unfairly singling out her area for a punitive system of bussing. I categorically deny that, based upon what I saw and heard at the school board meeting. Still, if I had been sitting on that board with her flagrant disregard for the integrity of the school system and her irresponsible representation of those parents, I would have been tempted. I’d have a hard time listening to her in the future.
She may be staking her ground as a parent not to be tangled with, but she didn’t win any friends outside Clayton or anyone who is truly concerned about education in the county. She needs to change her ways or get out.

Thanks, Rosie

2007-09-04T09:46:00.001-04:00

Ten years ago a rather assertive lady walked through the door of the News Leader. She was bold and confident and being astute, I put her in charge. Frankly, I didn’t have much choice, for she is a take charge kind of gal.
Rosie Colvin has run things since then in our Fremont office, and she has run things her way.
We’ve had many good people manage our Fremont office over the years. The job responsibilities have changed and no one before her was expected to do the things that Rosie has been doing. Still, nobody did it like Rosie, either.
This is a better paper today because Rosie came our way.
A few months ago, Rosie announced that she and her husband, Bob, would be traveling back to Illinois and would likely be gone for at least a month. She added that there were some other events on the horizon for them, and she wasn’t sure if or when she would be back, and I needed to find someone to fill in just in case.
I got a call from her a few weeks ago that she was back from Illinois but would be going to Georgia to see her son and grandchildren there.
In my heart, I have held out some hope that Rosie might get back and say she's ready to go back to work, but I know she and Bob have some other priorities now. I certainly am not closing that door, but I don’t want the time to pass before I say how much I appreciate all she has done for us.
From a business and professional standpoint, I could not ask for anyone to care more about doing it right. Rosie is a detail person. Just ask the stat people at Aycock and Rosewood High School, where she kept football statistics. She developed statistics for us on our newspaper rack sales and mail distribution, too.
If you came to work for Rosie at the News Leader, you were going to work. Some of the people who came in weren’t there to work, and weren’t around for very long. Even those of us who have been around longer than Rosie know that when we are over in Fremont, we do it Rosie’s way. And that was fine with us.
While there is a serious business side to Rosie, over time we have all realized that there's more to her than that.
About the time Rosie came to work for us, we had sold the Johnstonian Sun, the Selma newspaper at that time. Until we sold it, as that was the largest paper with the largest office, it was the base for our production and distribution for that paper, along with our Fremont and Princeton papers.
When we sold that paper, we moved the production to our Princeton office, and the distribution to our Fremont office, and we put Rosie in charge of that.
We had two retired gentlemen, one from Pine Level and one from Selma, who had been helping us by transporting the papers from the printer and addressing the papers. As part of the terms of our sale, they stayed with the new owners to help them with the Selma paper.
Well, as happens, the new owners had their way of doing things, and the old employees who stayed with them didn’t fit. A few months later, they asked if they could come back to work with us.
Jack and Bob continued with us for some time in Fremont, despite it being a bit of a drive, until their health situations forced them to quit. They didn’t stop being Rosie’s (and our) friends, however. She still has lunch or dinner with them from time to time.
For many of the years that Rosie ran the office, we had two reporters, John Feely and the late Greg Tobolski, both bachelors. I know they had a surrogate mom in Pikeville.
Both of them rented trailers while they were living in the area. When hurricanes came through the area, both were over in Rosie’s home.
Greg’s parents visited Rosie just a few weeks ago.
We have had retired folk help in our office, usually just for some part-time hours, who sometimes want a reason to get out for a while. One time in particular, Rosie chose to let one of those workers pick up the slack, making her own job more difficult, but Rosie felt it was the right decision to make.
In the last few years, Rosie’s grandson, Travis Milligan, and his friends would often help with processing the paper after school. Some of those kids Rosie and Bob had worked with in Little Falcons, and often they would be at Rosie and Bob’s house evenings and on weekends. They were her boys, as well.
The Cotton Museum, the Pikeville 4th Celebration, Little Falcons, Aycock Football, and the News Leader, among many others, are better because a lady from Pikeville cared about them.
Thanks, Rosie. We care about you!

Do we really need to do more?

2007-09-04T09:44:00.000-04:00

Some time ago, I prayed one of those prayers that you probably shouldn’t pray: I wanted to do more. I wanted to be enabled to do more. I wasn’t satisfied just doing what I was already doing.
Yes, I prayed in His name. Yes, I said it was for the Kingdom of God that I wanted to do more. Well, you know what people say about prayers like that: be careful what you ask for.
I remember well maybe six months ago my pastor preaching I think on a Wednesday night and saying there were two things you don’t pray for: patience and humility. Well, to show you how dumb (you can fill in other adjectives if you want) I can be, I thought to myself I could well use a dose of each. Within a few days I had a significant lesson, a speeding ticket while on the way to a church function. It was the first speeding ticket I had gotten in fifteen years!
If the first lesson didn’t take, I got a second lesson, another speeding ticket maybe two months later. Talk about patience and humility!
One of the things I stress is efficiency. I believe one of the great strengths of our American economy is our growth in productivity. We are doing more with less. With computers, I know our newspapers are much more efficient.
Despite publishing more pages than we did four years ago, our work hours are not that much different. For example, processing photographs a few years ago was a long process where we made photo prints, turned them into dot patterns for reproduction making negatives of the prints, and we physically had to cut out photo negatives and tape them into the page negatives that the press plates were made from. Making color photographs was a much more involved and expensive process.
The physical handling time to process a single photograph a few years ago in most newspapers was probably ten minutes each, not to mention the drying times for the prints and negatives. Oh, and that doesn’t count the time to develop the film the photo is on, and the time to go through and find the prints that you use, and the time wasted on prints that looked pretty good on the negative but don’t come out when you get them off the film.
Today, I can “process” a photo in a minute. With digital cameras, there is no film processing. Everything is done in the computer with Photoshop. It goes from our computer to their computer over the internet, and on the other end, that computer spits out a printing plate. That printing plate prints a better looking paper than we were able to produce with a lot more time and trouble and money just a few years ago. Praise God!
I love my cell phone as another example. It has a calendar function, to remind me of places I need to be. I can call people while I drive down the road (I’m trying to give that up) or while I’m waiting for something else to happen. It helps me get more accomplished.
There is something else, though. My wife regularly preaches to me about it. I know that I am able to do more, I am able to get a lot accomplished. I feel good about that.
But there is a price to pay.
I went to a photo assignment recently. Other staffers went to similar photo assignments at the same time. I covered the basics, got it done, and got back to other things; I moved on to do more.
One of our other staffers, Sarah Wise, got what I saw as an outstanding photo. The others on the staff will tell you I am hard to please, so this is no faint praise.
She took more time. She was more patient. She wasn’t more concerned about moving on to something else. She did a better job on the assignment.
Eight months ago, we hired an office manager in Princeton, Lucy Brower. I told Lucy I would delegate things to her and to scream when I gave her too much. Lucy is a lot like my wife, and worries too much about things, but like Marilyn, she gets a lot accomplished. I’ve seen her on more than one occasion wring her hands, but she has yet to scream about too much. Frankly, she’s taken on more than I would have thought she could do, and she’s done what she does well. Very well.
Forgive a little fatherly pride here, but my two daughters have come to work at the paper this summer. My older daughter (I still see her as my little girl), Ashley, has stepped in to put together the two papers with scarcely a ripple. I wanted to take some of the responsibility, and thought I would need to. I was wrong. It has been seemless, and I know in her own ways, she has improved the paper.
My baby girl, Kelly (and she’s growing up into a fine young woman), wanted to help make photos this summer, and she has helped fill in for vacations in some other areas. Kelly has also taken some photos which have been outstanding. She has been more patience and perhaps been more creative in her photos than I probably would have been.
I believe in excellence. I believe we serve a most excellent master, and we are called to serve in excellence. We reflect Him when we serve in excellence.
As Jim Collins says in “Good to Great,” good is the enemy of great. Settling for good keeps us from greatness.
I recently preached on Martha and Mary. As I told the congregation of that little church, I needed the lesson probably more than they did, and I keep learning.
Like Martha I want to do more, thinking that makes me worthy. Unlike Mary, I can lose focus on the important things, the priorities.
Do you really want to do more?

Ready for some football?

2007-09-04T09:41:00.000-04:00

I got in the car to ride around yesterday. I wasn’t going too far, probably not far enough for the air conditioner to really get it cooled down anyway, so I just put the windows down and enjoyed the Carolina Summer. It’s that time of the year.
When I pick up the N&O sports section, articles are starting to pepper the paper on the upcoming college sports seasons. I saw Carolina’s ad hawking football tickets over the weekend.
The Panthers are in training camp. An article in one of the weekend papers spoke with excitement about the improvement in my beloved Cowboys’ defense. Even without Bill Parcells, there’s excitement in Big D.
I met a couple from Texas Friday night. Understand that Nolan Ryan and Roger Clemmens are from Texas, and Kevin Durant played for the University of Texas and went number two in the NBA draft. They really do play other sports there, but they confirmed still for most of us from Texas will say there are only two sports there: football and spring football. Maybe they are a little fanatical, but it’s not that different in North Carolina.
I interviewed a football coach Monday, and while we were talking his cell phone went off. It played the Notre Dame Fight Song as the ring tone. I think Coach Williamson is ready.
Monday morning cheerleaders were beginning practice. They’re getting ready to turn heads and stir the spirit on Friday nights. They’re eager for the season to get underway.
Monday night football players across the state were putting on some tattered practice jerseys salvaged from seasons past; beginning the work on the blocking formations and running the passing routes. They’re full of energy and optimism.
My daughter was making photos of the young guys on the first night of football practice. She was impressed with how many were eager to get their photos in the newspaper. They’re proud to say they are out there.
There is something different about football. No offense, but there are reasons that they build stadiums for football. There is something very masculine about the sport. It takes a lot of hard work and determination by a lot of young men to put a football team out on the field.
Most schools are blessed with some fine athletes, but to get twenty-two young men out there executing the game plan, putting in the extra effort to win the battle in the trenches takes something extra. Sometimes you are not going to be the biggest and the strongest. It can very much be a battle of wills.
And they put on helmets. Their hats are distinctive. It carries the school logo. It’s a sign of school pride. You represent not only those in the hallways of your school, but the ones who went before you. There are parents, and in some cases grandparents, who strapped on the helmet before you. It’s the sign you are a football player, ready to go out onto the field and do battle.
And right now they are all winners.
The victories are hollow if they are not won on the field of battle. Yes, there is some consolation in playing a good team well, even if you don’t claim the “W”, but there is no substitute.
I watched some fathers watching their sons from a distance.
To be sure, once they start playing for real, teams will have to lose, but right now, it is great to see the energy, the enthusiasm, and the optimism.
Are you ready for some football? I am!

Governor Easley signed the new state budget Tuesday. Like the Republicans, I am disappointed that the proposed bond issue for classrooms was not included, though I am hopeful that will be re-addressed soon.
I am sure most of you have seen the commercials the state’s realtors have spent big bucks on to dissuade the legislature from passing a land transfer tax. I join the governor in applauding the legislature for the passage of the land transfer tax.
As I have heard the issue discussed, I don’t feel there is a fairer way to help deal with the burden growth puts on county commissioners.
I don’t blame the realtors for protesting. If the legislature was proposing a tax on newspapers, I’d probably be screaming like a pig, too.
I think there is wisdom in giving counties the option of imposing additional sales tax. I’m not big on more taxes, and more sales tax, but that is one of the fairer ways to impose taxes, and certainly slower growth counties could better use a sales tax increase than a transfer tax.

What candidates need to do

2007-08-14T09:15:00.000-04:00

An editorial in the Smithfield Herald recently complained about one of our town board candidates, David Holt, and his lack of a platform. “I’m just offering my services,” the former mayor said when he filed. The voters and his supporters deserve more, The Herald complained.
I was bothered by the comment when I first heard it. Among all of the challengers, David has already paid his dues. He served as mayor with distinction. He worked hard as mayor. More than any one of the challengers, he can “run on his record.”
There is a side of me, the reporter side, who believes there is a story here we are not hearing. David’s last minute filing and his apparent change of heart suggests something happened. Often last minute filings are strategy moves: after seeing who else is in the field and assessing your chances of winning, you decide to jump in. After denying any interest in serving again, for several years, suddenly you jump in. Smells like a story there.
I’m not really shocked by David’s stance. He played things close to the vest while he was mayor. He wouldn’t speak up and volunteer a lot until it served to push things one way or another. To be sure, Mr. Holt is intelligent, and he usually did his homework on issues. When he spoke to something, he had something to say and the knowledge and logic behind it gave his opinions weight.
The Truman Administration was a bit before my time, but I still remember references to “Give ‘em hell, Harry.” There is a side to many who believe the way to get elected is by cutting up the other guy, and those politics are not foreign to North Carolina or Princeton. Certainly that kind of politics sells papers and makes for a controversial election.
I don’t believe it makes for better elections. While occasionally there may be someone who violates the public trust and deserves to be brought down, most people who offer themselves for office do it for the right reasons.
As The Herald implies however, just offering yourself for office may not be enough to get elected.

I was very disappointed last week when the town board met and only one of the four challengers for the town board, Gregory Collins, bothered to show up.
It is not uncommon for town board candidates to be elected without having ever been to a town board meeting. It’s akin to a football player starting a game without ever going to practice. It just doesn’t sound right.
In truth and fairness, there have been several over the years who went on the board who served with distinction without ever going to a meeting.
There are others who may not have had the complete appreciation for what they were getting into. After serving for awhile, they discover this is more than they bargained for.
If you are truly interested in serving the citizens, can’t you make the sacrifices in your schedule to get up to speed on what is happening in the town now?

There have been some elections where I have been surprised. People who I thought were relatively unknown did well. I’m beginning to appreciate more those who may not have been in public life, but have lived here all their lives and have quietly made their name.
Still, the best way to get elected is to get out in the town and sincerely listen to people. The reality is that not too many candidates really do that. There may be a circle of friends that they get affirmation from, but to impress the average voter, they need to get out.

Let me reiterate, the News Leader will work very hard to get you the information to make the right decisions on the candidates. You may not agree with who we like, but at least you won’t say I don’t know anything about the candidates.

Ready for some football?

2007-07-31T18:06:00.000-04:00

I got in the car to ride around yesterday. I wasn’t going too far, probably not far enough for the air conditioner to really get it cooled down anyway, so I just put the windows down and enjoyed the Carolina Summer. It’s that time of the year.
When I pick up the N&O sports section, articles are starting to pepper the paper on the upcoming college sports seasons. I saw Carolina’s ad hawking football tickets over the weekend.
The Panthers are in training camp. An article in one of the weekend papers spoke with excitement about the improvement in my beloved Cowboys’ defense. Even without Bill Parcells, there’s excitement in Big D.
I met a couple from Texas Friday night. Understand that Nolan Ryan and Roger Clemmens are from Texas, and Kevin Durant played for the University of Texas and went number two in the NBA draft. They really do play other sports there, but they confirmed still for most of us from Texas will say there are only two sports there: football and spring football. Maybe they are a little fanatical, but it’s not that different in North Carolina.
I interviewed a football coach Monday, and while we were talking his cell phone went off. It played the Notre Dame Fight Song as the ring tone. I think Coach Williamson is ready.
Monday morning cheerleaders were beginning practice. They’re getting ready to turn heads and stir the spirit on Friday nights. They’re eager for the season to get underway.
Monday night football players across the state were putting on some tattered practice jerseys salvaged from seasons past; beginning the work on the blocking formations and running the passing routes. They’re full of energy and optimism.
My daughter, Kelly, was taking photos of the young guys on the first night of football practice. She was impressed with how many were eager to get their photos in the newspaper. They’re proud to say they are out there.
There is something different about football. No offense, but there are reasons that they build stadiums for football. There is something very appealing to the male population when it comes to football. It takes a lot of hard work and determination by a lot of young men to put a football team out on the field. [And, yes, occasionally, young women.]
Most schools are blessed with some fine athletes, but to get twenty-two young men out there executing the game plan, putting in the extra effort to win the battle in the trenches takes something extra. Sometimes you are not going to be the biggest and the strongest. It can very much be a battle of wills.
And they put on helmets. Their hats are distinctive. It carries the school logo. It’s a sign of school pride. You represent not only those in the hallways of your school, but the ones who went before you. There are parents, and in some cases grandparents, who strapped on the helmet before you. It’s the sign you are a football player, ready to go out onto the field and do battle.
And right now they are all winners.
The victories are hollow if they are not won on the field of battle. Yes, there is some consolation in playing a good team well, even if you don’t claim the “W”, but there is no substitute.
I watched some fathers watching their sons from a distance.
To be sure, once they start playing for real, teams will have to lose, but right now, it is great to see the energy, the enthusiasm, and the optimism.
Are you ready for some football? I am!

It was one of those times that you’re sick on your stomach. You’re filled with dread about what you know will come.
Fortunately, I got concerned about doing my job, getting in the right place to get the pictures and getting out of the way of those who were doing their jobs. The emotions of the moment gave way to the duties of the job, fortunately.
Honestly, I could not tell at the time what kind of SUV they were riding in. It looked fairly new, but it was knocked upside down and a good 30 feet down the railroad tracks. I happened to come on the scene right after the rescue squad got there.
They had already gotten the baby seat out of the car, but no one else was out. Firemen were working along with rescue personnel to get them freed from the vehicle. I don’t know how long it was until the baby, maybe a three year old, came out with maybe what appeared to be a minor scratch on the face. Then came the brother, maybe a five or six year old, looking very much like all was well. Finally the mother came out, trying to walk, maybe sore from the wreck, maybe overcome with emotion, but needing some help to walk.
It was a miracle that they all survived. I know they are emotionally scarred from the event, but it looked as if their bodies came through without significant damage. I praise God.

They're off and running

2007-07-27T10:35:00.000-04:00

Thursday and Friday the race for the Princeton Town Board expanded,
and we now have six candidates for the two board seats up for election.
While Lisa Floors Brown had been widely rumored to be considering a
run, David Holt’s run for office was not on the radar screen.
With municipal elections set up as they are, with no run-off, funny things
can and do happen when you have more than two candidates for a seat.
I know many believe when Elmer Capps added his name to the mayoral
race a few years ago that heretofore had been between William Earl Ormond
and Don Rains, that shifted the tight race and put Don Rains in office. I’m not
saying that necessarily was a bad thing, but it did change the election.
Already I have heard more than one complaints
about the paving of streets in town. That
likely will be a point of discussion in the election.
With three active police officers on the ballot,
the police department will likely continue to
be a hot topic.
Beyond all of that, though, my early sense
of all of the candidates is there is no burning
issue which is fueling their desire to run for
office. I haven’t heard anyone say that if you are
mad about the condition of Princeton streets,
for example, vote for me for I will get them all
repaved. Or if you want to see so and so run out
of office, vote for me.
My sense is they are all offering to serve out
of a love and concern for our town.
To those of you who will be voting in the town
election, let me ask you not to take my word for any of this, but try to judge
on your own.
Beginning this week, the Princeton News Leader will present all of the
information you need, maybe even more information than you want, to help
you make the best decision about the candidates. We will try to help you
know clearly which candidates more closely align to your beliefs about town
government. We will talk about experience, background, and perspectives on
issues that matter to you.
As we will focus on the Princeton candidates and the local issues, we
will make every attempt to be fair and balanced in the coverage we offer the
candidates.
In our attempt to better serve what you are interested in, what issues do
you want to hear discussed? What topics would you like put before the candidates?
Would you like to see a public debate?
I don’t want to minimize the importance of this election. With two of
the four seats on the board up for election, plus the mayor’s seat, clearly the
potential is there to swing the town in a different direction. Some may feel
the necessity of keeping things going as they are.
Clearly the town is different today than it was two years ago, and like it
or not, it will be different two years from now. How we react to the changes,
embracing them, making sure controls are in place, all of that will in part
by the charge of this board.
I pray we make good decisions. I will do my best to help us.
Today I make one of those tough decisions. I will be raising the cost of
the newspaper for many of you.
We have not raised the subscription price of the paper in five years.
During that time we have absorbed a number of cost increases. We have also
tried to trim where we could to keep our costs in line. We’ve stretched the
rubber band about as far as we can go.
Last week our postal rates increased dramatically. While we knew to
expect a significant increase, we did not get the forms until earlier this
month. As we have analyzed the new rates and our other costs, we have recognized
that the increases would be more dramatic than we had originally
anticipated.
We are increasing local subscriptions from $20 to $24 annually. That is the
biggest jump I can remember. I wish we could keep it at $20, or at least keep
the increase smaller, but it’s just not possible to maintain a quality product
without passing along the costs.
We know some of you are on fixed incomes, and I regret the hardship
this increase may pose for you. We will continue to offer specials from time
to time, and encourage you to look at those as a means to reduce your subscription
costs.
While all of us recognize the costs of stamps continues to go up, those
of us who regularly mail larger items know those costs have increased even
more dramatically than the cost of stamps. That is even more the case for
newspapers mailed outside the local area. Out of state subscriptions will be
rising from $31 to $48 per year.
We will be offering for the first time six month subscriptions to help
people cope with the high costs of annual subscriptions.
We will continue to look for ways we can keep the cost of your subscription
reasonable.

Some interesting races

2007-07-27T10:30:00.000-04:00

Filing in the municipal elections closed Friday, and we should have some interesting elections in the fall.
Fremont’s mayoral race should be a good one. I think most people in town know all three of the outstanding candidates running.
I can’t say that I know all of the candidates in Pikeville running for the board. It is good to see that many people willing to put their names forward to serve.
Likewise in Stantonsburg, a number of people have indicated a willingness to run for the board.
Unfortunately, Eureka continues to struggle.
I have attended Eureka Town Board meetings in recent months, and I know there are concerned people who I believe, by and large, are making the best decisions for the Town of Eureka serving on the town board, regardless of how they were elected.
There’s a measure of humility that most of us find appealing in those who don’t step forward but who are tapped by others to serve. While Eureka has gotten by with this strategy in the past, in too many cases, people who receive a handful of write-in votes serve after those who received more turned the position down. It’s time for a change.
It’s time that some take it upon themselves, those who truly love the town, and make sure people who are qualified and eager to serve are elected. I call upon the good people in the churches, the Ruritan Club members, and any others to get together and discuss this with their friends. If you come up with candidates, the News Leader will help put them before the voters. Call us and let us know.

Twenty-five years ago this fall, Marilyn and I bought the Wayne-Wilson Weekly News and moved to Fremont. The next fall there was a mayoral election in Fremont I won’t soon forget.
W.A. “Punk” Wooten was the incumbent mayor, and Joel O’Neal, who had been serving on the board, filed to challenge. Fremont’s controversial electric department supervisor, Doug Lane, decided to run for office as well.
I won’t claim to know each of them well, but Punk was an older man who without a doubt loved Fremont. He made decisions with perhaps a bit of a heavy hand, confident he was trying to do the right thing. Punk was a bit what I would call “Old School” in his methods.
Joel was one of the younger leaders in the town. He perhaps represented a younger, more progressive approach to the challenges facing the town.
Doug Lane was in more than one way the “wild card.” He represented the mavericks in town who wanted to shake things up, go against the status quo. There were rumors, which I never substantiated, that he went before some in town promising if elected that he would lower their electric rates.
Clearly Punk and Joel split what some might consider traditional voters, and Doug appealed to another group. Doug was elected.
To his credit, Doug did his best to serve, and in some ways was a pretty good mayor. He clearly was the least qualified, and was embroiled in an investigation of a questionable electric department relationship with a supplier of transformers to the town.
I don’t believe we have anything like that this time in Fremont. I do believe we have an election that could be very exciting and difficult to predict.

I pledge that in our tradition, we will do our best to put the different candidates before you. We will hopefully give you more information than you need to help you make your decision before going to the polls.
We will do our best to present that information in a fair format. While we will, over time, no doubt form some opinions, we will do our best to keep those on the editorial page.
I think we have some interesting races to talk about.

Today I make one of those tough decisions. I will be raising the cost of the newspaper for many of you.
We have not raised the subscription price of the paper in five years. During that time we have absorbed a number of cost increases. We have also tried to trim where we could to keep our costs in line. We’ve stretched the rubber band about as far as we can go.
Last week our postal rates increased dramatically. While we knew to expect a significant increase, we did not get the forms until earlier this month. As we have analyzed the new rates and our other costs, we have recognized that the increases would be more dramatic than we had originally anticipated.
We are increasing local subscriptions from $20 to $24 annually. That is the biggest jump I can remember. I wish we could keep it at $20, or at least keep the increase smaller, but it’s just not possible to maintain a quality product without passing along the costs.
We know some of you are on fixed incomes, and I regret the hardship this increase may pose for you. We will continue to offer specials from time to time, and encourage you to look at those as a means to reduce your subscription costs.
While all of us recognize the costs of stamps continues to go up, those of us who regularly mail larger items know those costs have increased even more dramatically than the cost of stamps. That is even more the case for newspapers mailed outside the local area. Out of state subscriptions will be rising from $31 to $48 per year.
We will be offering for the first time six-month subscriptions to help people cope with the high costs of annual subscriptions.
We will continue to look for ways we can keep the cost of your subscription reasonable.

State school bond needed

2007-07-27T10:28:00.000-04:00

18/19 07 2007 -Last week Wayne County Schools officials made a presentation
on a proposed state school facilities bond issue. They punctuated the
presentation with a look at their own needs across Wayne County.
While we can argue about how county commissioners across
the state are addressing funding priorities, there is no doubt they
are struggling to pay all of the bills they are presented to pay. The
General Assembly recognizes that something has to be done to deal
with the growing Medicaid bills.
There is growing momentum for title transfer fees to help fastgrowing
counties keep up with growth that
taxes their resources, but for some that help
isn’t here yet.
Low-growth counties are struggling just
to pay the regular bills, with the low tax
base they have.
Ten years ago a state school bond was
passed, and this is a great time for another.
I have a growing appreciation for the art
of politics. I know you always catch more
flies with honey than vinegar. I know there
are many things on the agenda in Raleigh,
and recognize that timing is very important.
I want to believe that this proposed bond
issue is coming at the right time. I hope the environment is right
for a number of people in Raleigh to jump on this issue. I hope the
environment is right for there to be expectations that it will pass easily.
There are smarter people than me, and more importantly, more
politically astute people than me, who are strategizing all of these
things.
Rightly, we individually usually look at such things with the attitude
of “what’s in it for me”.
I know Johnston County Schools have great needs. They wanted
a bigger bond issue than was on the ballot a few months ago, but
agreed to back off.
Wayne Schools have much greater needs than this state bond
will meet, but it will at least get the process started. Hopefully with
county help, more needs will be met.
In the big split of how schools will be funded, traditionally the
state has shouldered the burden of paying the salaries, and the counties
have been responsible for facilities. As it works, however, many
counties are supplementing pay as they try to attract quality teachers
to their staffs. Periodically the state, through state bond issues,
has supplemented what counties are putting into school facilities.
There is knowing give and take here.
A state bond issue is a good idea and it seemingly is a good time
to try to pass it. Please let your state representatives know you support
it.
This may speak to only a few of you, but it seems in the society of
today, we tend to be more widely dispersed.
In generations past the children followed in the family business,
and in farming areas maybe continued to live in the big house after
they got married, until they could afford a house of their own, resettling
then on a nearby piece of land. Today the kids go off to college,
and sometimes never make it back home. (On the other side, some of
you are probably wondering –if reports are correct – if the adult kids
will ever move out.)
We’re fortunate to have our two girls home for the summer, and
over the 4th went to Texas to spend some time with my mother, my
brother, and that side of the family. It had been many years since we
all had been together.
It has been ten years since my late father’s side of the family has
gathered. I called an aunt I hadn’t talked with for a few years and we
had an enjoyable 30-minute visit. I asked her about trying to get us
all together next summer.
We used to have family reunions that we went to every summer,
and I know some still try to get together. As I get older, that becomes
more precious to me.
How about your family? How long has it been since they had a
meaningful gathering? Is it about time?

A slippery slope

2007-06-27T08:07:00.000-04:00

Some well-intentioned actions by the Fremont Town Board last week concern me.
Billy Harvey, a Fremont Town Alderman, protested the potential condemnation of a home he owned that did not meet minimum housing standards. He said he never intended for anyone to live in the house; he just wanted to use it for storage.
The town board unanimously approved, if he would take some steps to bring up the outward appearances of the house, to allow Billy to do that.
Billy is a nice man. Everyone likes Billy. I like Billy. From one perspective, it seems unreasonable to ask him to spend money fixing up the inside of a house just to bring it up to certain standards.
The problem, as some people including myself see it, is what about everyone else? We can do this for Billy, but what about the guy next door to him? If he asks for the same consideration, do we treat him the same way?
Does Fremont want to say that whatever condition anyone wants to leave a house in is all right with them? Clearly that isn’t working. Some people will allow houses to deteriorate, and if the town isn’t willing to take actions against them, soon no one will want to live in a town where so many houses are falling down.
That may sound like an exaggeration, but it is a reflection of what has happened in recent years. Some areas of downtown Goldsboro and downtown Wilson are proof. Some areas of Fremont are not too different. Unless the Town Board is willing to enforce standards, the town itself will fall apart.
Some people will say they can’t afford to do the work to bring homes up to standards. If they are forced to do the work, they say, they will have to sell their homes. That’s tough. So do you say, if someone can’t afford to maintain their homes to meet a bare minimum standard, we’ll let the town go down, or will we make the tough decision?
Some people will make threats to try to get town boards to make decisions that they want. Some people will try to make town boards feel like bad guys to get their way. When it comes down to it, some who will plead and moan can and will bring their homes up to standards if forced. Clearly some cannot.
Are the best interests of the town served by being compassionate towards some people, or are the best interests of the town served by being consistent in the standards you impose? Do we endorse people's living in homes they can’t afford to maintain?
If I buy an unfit-for-living house and say I don’t want to live there, just use it for storage, as long as I keep the outside looking decent, does that fit? Should I be expected and understand on the front end that owning a house in Fremont means I will maintain it to a decent level? I believe that reflects what Fremont expects and deserves.
Again, these are not bad people on the town board who made this decision last week. If I had been sitting in one of their chairs, I’m not saying for sure that I would have made another decision. But I think I would have, as they should have.
If they took Billy’s face and name off the request, and if they instead put someone who they didn’t particularly like in place of Billy, and could still say this is the right thing to do, then fine. I don’t think they can justify it as the right thing for Fremont.
That’s what sitting on the town board is about, and particularly what zoning and planning board issues are about: treating everyone the same, like them or not.

Thanks, Eddie

2007-06-27T08:06:00.000-04:00

Over the last 25 years that I have spend in eastern North Carolina, and especially in Wayne and Johnston counties, I have come to know many men who have served our small towns as police chief. I rank Princeton Police Chief Eddie Lewis at the top of the list.
While there has been some controversy surrounding raises for the police department, that controversy may be seen as a lack of support for Eddie, whether intentional or not. I rise to say how much I support and appreciate him.
For most of that time, Eddie has served as a police officer in Pikeville, and in recent years in Princeton.
I’m afraid some may judge him too much by appearances. No, he is no slim, trim crime-fighting machine on the outside. When he speaks, he sounds more like the country boy he was raised to be, than the community-college law enforcement instructor that he is.
Eddie brings rather unique experiences and perspectives to the position. Princeton is fortunate to have him.
As one who was raised down the road in Pikeville, he understands the people of the area. He has enough perspective, still living in that direction, to maintain a professional attitude about the people and the area he serves.
His experience in Pikeville gives him an appreciation for the workings of a small town police department, and as former chief in Pikeville, the concerns of the town board he reports to.
He has heard enough people complain about taxes and utility rates to understand why the town board may have a hard time funding the requests that police departments make of town budgets. He understands that, though some would not.
Eddie’s got enough old farmer in him to keep equipment operating with bailing wire until the town budget can come through with money for a much-needed replacement. He understands that, though some would not.
He was around in a time when policemen weren't required to have formal training, but he believes in being properly trained to do the work.
While training has been an unexpected blessing for Eddie, opening a door for him to work at Wayne Community College and Johnston Community College as an instructor, it has also been a blessing for the town. It gives him an opportunity to come to know and even recruit prospective officers for the town.
More than that, it helps give him an even greater appreciation for the problems and concerns of a young officer, often on duty by themselves in the middle of the night, trying to offer protection for the sleeping citizens. I personally would like to have someone with a great appreciation for the problems that young officer will face, as their teacher and mentor.
He also understands the pitfalls for those same young officers, where they are likely to fall into bad habits, particularly without feedback and supervision that are often lacking in small town departments. I believe Eddie is doing a good job of trying to address those needs. He understands, while some would not.
Police officers are often targets for criticism. If they don’t recover your stolen property they are criticized. Some may criticize for “allowing” their stuff to be stolen in the first place. Some may see drugs as a police problem rather than a societal problem.
Others will criticize the police for too aggressively enforcing the law when they or theirs are arrested or cited.
I’m sure that Eddie Lewis is not perfect, but when you look at all of the good things he brings to law enforcement to the Town of Princeton, we are fortunate to have him as our police chief.
I know it’s regarded as a thankless job by many, but I’m one who will take the time to say “Thank you for all you do, Eddie.”

The art of courtesy

2007-06-21T13:48:00.001-04:00

The Methodist Church, or more properly the United Methodist Church, held their annual meeting last week in Greenville. As an officer in the men’s ministry in the church, I am supposed to attend. As one who likes talking to people and would rather not sit and listen to others (judge that as you will), it is a bit of a struggle for me to sit for most of three days.
Our presiding officer at these meetings, and we call it holy conferencing, is our Bishop, Rev. Al Gwinn. We vote on budgets and resolutions and where the next Annual Conference will be held. We have a number of worship services, a retirement service, a commissioning service, and we celebrate Holy Communion.
This year we elected delegates to an upcoming Southeast regional meeting, and to a national meeting. Yours truly did get elected as a regional delegate (that’s another story).
I say all of that to tell you there is a lot of business that properly comes along with affirming we are people of God and seeking His will in our lives and in the work of the church.
While I would say, as you would hope, we are a pretty tame group overall, we are people of passion. We can and will speak ardently on topics, and sometimes, you could argue, our passion overrules our good sense and maybe even our Holy Compass. Our humanity may get in the way of our holiness. Most of the time I think we hold on to the right things.
The way in which the business of our church, at this level, is run, clergy and laity have virtually equal voice. As you may understand and expect, some of our clergy, and occasionally, some of our laity, may push along the extremes.
We debated a resolution which, from my perspective, might have been drafted by the Democratic Party (I know we have Democrats and Republicans among our group). The resolution was critical of the administration's actions during the current conflict, condemning the president and his administration. While as Christians we oppose war and we pray for our enemies, and I affirm that, I felt the resolution went too far. With passionate speeches on both sides of the debate on the issue, we ended up defeating that resolution but did adopt a more moderate resolution.
Again, presiding over all of this was our Bishop.
I have had the honor and pleasure of serving on a number of committees with our Bishop and have met with him individually on occasion. He is a man of passion and vision and he has advocated moving our church in a number of important and sometimes controversial areas. I say controversial, not so much from a liberal theology perspective, but because our church can grow fat and lazy. We like who we are and we don’t particularly like someone coming in and suggesting we need to get up off our good intentions if we are going to fulfill our role as the church in the community. I (we) need to hear that and I appreciate his Holy nudges.
I have also been in a meeting where he went into the lion's den, a church meeting where the church members were angry at him over a decision he made. There were some ugly things said and disrespectful things said. I was amazed at the way in which he acknowledged every comment and affirmed those which were appropriate. He was courteous to some people who were not always courteous to him.
Last week, in a long period, I saw the exhaustion of the three days begin to take a toll on many, including the Bishop. I was amazed at how well he held on to the courtesy he extended to all in trying to move us along on our business. With a number of things on the agenda, and we did get behind on our agenda at times, he encouraged us to keep things brief at times, and there were times that things were controversial.
All of us have been in meetings where parliamentary procedure was used against someone. He stated it early and practiced it many times, when someone would want to make a motion or amendment that was not proper or at the proper time, some of which he probably didn’t agree with. The Bishop helped speakers find the proper means, or came back to them at the proper time. He acknowledged those who were trying to be helpful but who were violating the rules under which we operate.
It took some considerable effort and caring. It was inspiring.
In contrast, I went to a local board meeting Monday night. I know those there, and particularly the presiding officer, were not intentionally discourteous, and it was a contentious meeting, with lengthy debates. But I couldn’t help but wish the Bishop had been there.
Maybe most of us could be more courteous.

Compromise and commitment

2007-06-21T13:47:00.001-04:00

I don’t think any of the Princeton Town Board members, nor town employees, came away with the budget they wanted when they went into the budget meeting Monday night. I hope they will live with commitment to what they came away with.
Too often on town budgets, town employees come out the loser. While I know employees were certainly disappointed, I don’t believe that town board members were insensitive to their needs. I hope town employees will recognize that.
There was a philosophical debate, voiced primarily by Commissioner Walter Martin and Mayor Don Rains, over continuing to build funding for improvements around town as opposed to trying to provide relief for water and sewer rates respectively. The rest of the board ultimately agreed with Mayor Rains. While I can argue both sides of this issue, I believe the town will ultimately benefit from the decision to cut rates.
In arguing his case, the mayor said the town was going through a transition period when annexation and growing efficiencies would ease some pressure on the town budget. In some other words, town employees would get more of what they wanted next year. I hope the town board is committed to that.
The bigger debate was over pay, primarily for police officers and secondarily, the rest of the town staff. Mr. Martin could say he again came out the loser as he argued passionately for maintaining merit pay increases in the budget. I would say that the passage of a 4% pay adjustment was a reflection of his arguments for increased pay for the town staff.
In turning down merit increases again this year, there was much discussion on the need to fix the merit pay system. Mr. Martin argued, from my perspective correctly, that deserving employees should not be paid less because of a flawed merit pay system that the town board put in place.
I heard a commitment to fix the system. I know town employees deserve a merit pay system. Again, a 4% pay adjustment is a recognition that town employees deserve more than they are getting now. I hope the town board is committed to following through on fixing the system.
From a longer term perspective, I remember town boards who seemingly every year based pay on what was left over in the budget. If there had to be a tax increase, usually to cover other expenses, the employees might get an increase. Or if things had gone very good budget wise this year, there might be enough money left to give the employees an increase. Too often the board with long faces would lamely offer they would pay an increase if they could, but there just wasn’t any money left. If there was a pay increase, it usually was across-the-board, as the board wasn’t professional enough to evaluate employees and base pay increases on merit.
While I think most would agree there is more work to do to bring pay into line, the Princeton Town Board in recent years has been more professional in their dealing with the pay issue. I trust that will continue.
Perhaps forgotten by some, since it wasn’t part of the late debate, was the transition to a town administrator. This may be the biggest compromise and commitment of them all. It may be the biggest test of commitment for the town board.
With the tendency of us all to micro-manage, to go in and tell people how to do their jobs, this change in town government represents the town board backing off and allowing trained professionals to make the day-to-day decisions for the town. I hope this commitment holds, to endorse the town administrator, and board members reminded themselves of this Monday night, so they are mindful of the importance.
While Marla Ashworth is new to the position and the politics that surround it, and the board may have some problems letting go, I hope with an attitude of cooperation and charity, Mrs. Ashworth and the town board can move forward and make this work.
There is also a commitment to Police Chief Eddie Lewis. The board needs to stand behind his leadership of the police department. Some will always question what the police does, and if there are questions that can’t be answered satisfactorily, then changes need to be made. I don’t think that some appreciate how good a leader he is for the town.
I believe the town board made some difficult decisions and brought some relief for taxpayers and bill payers. While town employees didn’t get all they wanted, and some believe deserved, the budget did make some movement in the right direction.
I hope a spirit of compromise holds to move the town forward. I hope a spirit of commitment holds to make things right.

Ordinary men doing the extraordinary

2007-06-21T13:45:00.000-04:00

I had the privilege (and responsibility) of going to both the Princeton and Aycock baseball state championship series over the weekend. In case you were away on Mars over the weekend and didn’t hear, they both won.
I’ve also been, as some of you may have noted, working a lot of baseball games in recent weeks since we have made some staff changes. It’s been fun and I’ve come to know both teams to some extent.
I was talking with a writer from the Wilson Daily Times Saturday during the Aycock game, and the Beddingfield graduate mentioned that he went to school with both Aycock Coach Charles Davis and Princeton Coach Bruce Proctor. The two coaches grew up in the same area, through Charles is a few years older.
There are a lot of similarities between the two teams. Like most good high school teams, they start out with strong pitching. Both play good strong defense. Both teams have hitters who can pound the ball, and they can run up the score on teams, but both teams have run up on pitchers who gave their hitters problems.
Aycock has two pitchers who have already signed to play at Carolina and State, an indication of how highly regarded they are. They are two fine ballplayers, and although they can be dominating, another player, Jay Rose, was tapped as the MVP for that series.
I could argue that Ryan Daughtry is the best pure athlete on the Princeton team, and he was named MVP for their series. But during the year, a number of other players stepped up to make the big play and win games for Princeton through the year.
The point is the success of both teams was not based on one or two particular athletes, but as you would hope, both had rosters full of guys who had the confidence to, at the right time, step up and make the play that could win the game. Neither team went undefeated; both lost games late in the playoffs, in the East Finals for Aycock, and in the State Championships for Princeton. However, both had players who made the plays they needed to ultimately win.
A couple of former players who help coach also stand out to me. Allen Thomas, who is Charles’s brother-in-law, helps coach Aycock. Justin Willoughby, who was an outstanding pitcher in his day for the Bulldogs, is a key part of Bruce’s staff.
Friday afternoon, the Princeton game got particularly tight. The score was tied in the top of the sixth if I remember correctly, runner on first and potential winning run on second. It was one of those times when things could clearly have broken in East Surry’s favor.
I was watching through my camera lens as Justin went from the dugout to the mound with the knot in my stomach getting tighter, and he was grinning from ear to ear. As I was to learn later, he said something flippant to the infield gathered around their pitcher about how good he must look to get that kind of applause coming out of the dugout. The infielders broke out in matching smiles, and some of that tension must have eased.
Despite giving up a walk to the batter who was up, Daughtry got out of the inning without a run scoring, and Princeton went on to win the game.
I heard Princeton Assistant Principal Michael Price speak to the graduates Sunday morning at a church breakfast. In a reference to the recent movie, “Facing the Giants,” he said after Princeton’s win he was penning a screenplay to be entitled “Facing the (East Surry) Cardinals.”
That’s not a bad idea. We draw inspiration for living from stories like “Remember the Titans,” “Hoosiers,” and “Rudy.” The assistant principal made references to how he tried to offer words of inspiration to the team, and how they responded.
I met a man in Goldston Saturday night. He will be leading a group of volunteers going to Mississippi this month to build a church on the still suffering Gulf Coast. Their team of maybe 100 people will completely build that church during their week there. They have accomplished similar feats over the past eight years.
That group has adopted a slogan: ordinary people accomplishing extraordinary things. Their success has drawn others to their ministry. You might say the supernatural power they have displayed is attractive.
I think there’s a great story in our ball teams. I know you parents may see yours as extraordinary, but I see some kids who in some ways are not that much better than others fine kids playing in other uniforms, doing some extraordinary things. Like winning a state championship.
Congratulations on an extraordinary season.

Like Mama’s cookin’

2007-06-01T06:59:00.000-04:00

I went on a men’s retreat to the mountains of western North Carolina over the weekend. Like many other areas of North Carolina, there are many older people around Hayesville who are struggling economically. Ironically, there are many wealthy people who have bought homes, many of those second homes, in the area as well. We were just above Lake Chatuge, and even early Sunday morning you could hear the hum of power boats and jet skis of the well-heeled skimming across the water.
This was a Christian retreat center we were using, Hinton Rural Life Center, and during much of this summer, youths will be staying in the bedrooms at night and by day doing work projects to help many of the needy families in the area.
The retreat center offers basic skills employment to make a little dent in the poverty in the area. They also utilize volunteers to help keep their own costs down.
Being a bit of an early morning person, I came downstairs to the kitchen and dining room in the wee hours searching for coffee and was surprised to find the cooks enjoying some coffee. It was a couple of hours before breakfast. I have worked cooking breakfast before at a coffee shop, and the prep cook didn’t come in until an hour or so before we opened. There was a reason they were here this early.
The long braided hair of one of the cooks caught my eye. I suspect her hair would stretch down to her waist. There was noticeable contrast between the cook and the helper, one a local and the other was probably a transplanted volunteer.
The coffee was good, as you would expect. What I didn’t expect was what we got a couple of hours later.
Where I worked more than a few years ago, we served the regular bacon, sausage, ham and eggs, and pancakes. Times have changed, and many places serve biscuits, usually stuffed with whatever, often served through the drive-thru. I have little doubt that the ladies were there that early to make biscuits.
That wasn’t what impressed me, though. As we went through the cafeteria line, almost every plate had a biscuit opened up with sausage gravy ladled over it.
While there wasn’t anyone there who I would label as fat, most of us had a little more hanging over our belt than we need and probably would admit more than we’d like to have. Still, the lure of sausage gravy was a temptation I would not resist.
My mind immediately jumped to Mama. Breakfast was one of those special meals around our house while I was growing up. Yes, I usually had cereal in the morning, but on special Saturdays and Sundays, Mama would fix bacon and eggs. Daddy particularly liked his eggs basted, with the bacon grease pushed over the top of the egg with a spatula until the white got almost lacy. Mama sometimes spoiled Daddy.
I don’t care much for mashed potatoes. As things have developed, while we have baked potatoes at home and when we go out, I rather like sweet potatoes, usually with the butter and cinnamon and sugar. I think we often start out with a pretty healthy eating and figure out a way to make it gum up the capillaries. We don’t have mashed potatoes at home. Boiling and mashing is too much work, and maybe we think we’re too good for instant potatoes. Besides, in my book, mashed potatoes without cream gravy is hardly worth it.
Mama’s chicken-fried steak was particularly worth it. It always meant mashed potatoes and it always meant cream gravy to ladle over the steak and potatoes.
One of the things that I learned early in marriage was not to dwell on how much better Mama’s cooking was when at the dinner table. Even thirty years ago, we recognized if Marilyn served what our mamas served, we would have to get bigger doors in our apartments.
Most of the fellows there were raised in the country. As I surveyed them, most acknowledged that their mamas would cook big country breakfasts with sausage gravy, but their wives didn’t. To savor the flavor of their youth, they put their good habits of cholesterol watching and calorie counting on holiday.
I suspect most are like me, as we get on the scales on Monday morning: asking for forgiveness for our sins, even as we thank God for a sweet taste of home.

Two great inspirations

2007-05-23T09:54:00.000-04:00

A few months ago, I went to my former church, Fremont United Methodist, to cover their ceremony honoring the 50th Eagle Scout to come through the Fremont Boy Scout Troop. I usually go to Sunday School on Sunday mornings, and decided to come early and go my old Sunday School class, the Methodist Open Discussion (MOD) Class.
While it was great seeing and talking with some old friends, in the fifteen or so years since we moved away from the area, there were a number of new faces. One of those new faces belonged to a lady who was asking for prayer as she began a challenge in her life.
That face belonged to Joy Vinson. I recognized her from the years she has been at Fremont STARS, though I couldn’t claim to actually know her.
The last month or so we have been regularly contacted by Fremont STARS about different Relay for Life activities and fundraisers they have been involved with. The team’s very successful efforts this spring have seemingly picked up some extra steam in their support for Mrs. Vinson. The team’s organizer this year said she has been inspired by Joy’s courage in her fight against breast cancer, and they dedicated their efforts in her honor.
Five or six years ago, I was volunteering in prison ministry, working with the state prison in Pender County. Most of the volunteers we were working with were from the Wilmington area. A year or so in, there was a fellow from Goldsboro who began supporting the ministry.
Most of our activities were on Saturdays. We had several hours of training on Saturdays, and would go in for what we called reunions with those who had participated on the inside on Saturday nights. During many of the trips back and forth, I would car pool with this man from Goldsboro.
I came to know, during that time, a very fine gentleman named Dr. Lee Adams. He is one of the most caring people I have known, and he has been a true inspiration to me.
In his work with Boy Scouts over the years, his professional contacts, his work with the Goldsboro Family Y, and his work with his church, St. Luke’s United Methodist Church, Lee Adams has touched a lot of lives. Some of them I have known, and whenever Dr. Adams’ name is mentioned, faces light up. Many feel as I do about Lee.
Did I mention that he is well beyond the age when many give up work? His energy and enthusiasm deny his 70+ years. Mondays through Fridays you usually find him at his optometry office on Wayne Memorial Drive in Goldsboro.
Our prison ministry is focused around a fall weekend and a spring weekend. Lee was always very active and focused on the fall weekend, and a dedicated monthly volunteer for most of the time, but I was puzzled when spring rolled around and he said he didn’t have the time to volunteer.
I found out there was another great love in his life. He was one of the main movers and shakers for the Wayne County Relay for Life. (The humble man would often talk about fine people who served as his co-chair for the event, but year after year Lee was helping organize and get this thing done.) It wasn’t long after that that I purchased a purple bow for our Fremont office door, in support of the effort.
Under all of the caring and compassion of this fine man, there was some friendly competitive fire. He spoke with passion about all of the ways in which the people of Wayne County were coming together to support this great cause. He also spoke with some pride about how they would rally to beat out Johnston County in the amount raised, and other areas of the state.
We congratulate Relay for Life for another great event this past weekend. Also, two great warriors in the fight against cancer: Joy Vinson and Dr. Lee Adams.

Thanks, Dickie

2007-05-23T09:51:00.000-04:00

It was one of those opportunities you needed a particular eye to see.
Most small towns are strapped to just meet the police department payroll next week. One of the great disappointments for newcomers to town boards is not making these huge, impacting decisions every month. You don’t have a large surplus of cash to play with. Mostly you are responding to individuals who are concerned that they are paying more in taxes or utility bills than they should.
It was something someone who works with small towns understands.
The one time you have a chance to make one of those big decisions is when you have a developer who wants what you have in a small town: water and sewer. There can be a big payoff for developers if they have town services. Most important is the chance to develop twice as many lots in a development because you have sewer service rather than requiring the extra land to put in a septic tank.
It was something that someone who works with developers would know.
Another great opportunity for small towns is the construction of a new elementary school. With the new school come new homes, and many families with small children want to live near a new elementary school. Check out everywhere there is a new school built and you will see new homes in the area. The price of land and the pace of development are increased any time a new school pops up.
It was something anyone in construction in Johnston County could tell you.
In order to get the benefits of town services, Johnston County Schools officials wanted to locate their school near existing lines, but on a large enough piece of property that would provide for the facilities needed for some time to come. They knew they would have to front the expense money to get the lines extended to their site. They also knew that when the growth popped up around the school and other tied into those town lines, they could recoup much of their money.
It was something that anyone who works with school construction would know.
While the school people were looking for a piece of high ground that would drain well for their construction purposes, there was something extraordinary just down the road. Near this piece of high ground was a spot not a half-mile away that was a particularly low spot. In fact, it was so low that surrounding land as far as three miles away could be served if a sewer lift station was placed there.
It was something that someone who works with sewer construction would see.
Developers will try to nickel and dime construction projects to make more money. They will try to get by with minimal expense to maximize their profit on a project and move on to the next one. If the town was to maximize the potential of this lift station, they would need to insist that developers pay the extra money to put sewer lines deep in the area so as to preserve and maximize future development.
Someone who works with housing developers would know that.
This was an unusual opportunity, as school officials were pressing hard for town services to be on a fast track to meet an accelerated construction deadline. In order to finance the extra expense to move the lift station down the road, town officials would have to sell local developers on helping finance the move, and the town would have to borrow money based on future projections. There was a lot that needed to happen in a short amount of time.
It would take someone who was on top of what was happening and sensitive to the nature of this opportunity.
The conservative nature of town boards works against investing in opportunities like this. They are better at playing it safe and dealing with what’s in front of them than buying into the future. You need a strong, convincing argument and a willingness to spend the time to win town board members over to your view.
It would take someone who cared enough about Princeton to make it happen.
I don’t want to slight many others who were involved in making this decision a reality. Town Clerk Marla Ashworth, Town Engineer C.T. Clayton, and Commissioner Eddie Haddock, along with Mayor Don Rains and commissioners Walter Martin, David Starling and Billy Sutton certainly deserve credit.
Dickie Braswell, however, saw the opportunity, showed the town the opportunity, and helped others feel confident that this was the right thing to do.
Some might say this was a “no brainer,” but some of us need help. It may take a while for us to get a firm grasp on the obvious.
Thanks, Dickie, for taking the time to help us see.

A shining moment

2007-05-18T09:40:00.002-04:00

There were more than a thousand graduates of North Carolina State University on the floor of the RBC Center Saturday morning. I really only saw one.
As will happen, we had planned to meet friends for lunch, and the ceremony which we thought would last 1 1/2 hours went for 2 1/2, so we were rushing out and our focus was shaken.
Ah, but for a shining moment….
I did listen to the commencement speaker, and to the student speaker. And when we attended the departmental graduation ceremony after lunch, I listened to the student speaker there and the faculty speaker. While the research scientist who was the commencement speaker was a little dry, I did enjoy his point. I thought the departmental speakers were particularly relevant in their comments.
And then there was the time at the departmental when they called out “Ashley Christine Merrill” and the girl I have loved for 25 years was handed her Master’s degree. Her grandpa would have been proud.
I think this would have been his ceremony. My divorced parents maintained a respectful separation most of the time. Dad would gracefully await his time, deferring to Mother. She said since she had come for the undergraduate ceremonies for Ashley, and since she was planning to be here for her sister’s undergraduate ceremony next year, she would pass on this one. But Dad died two years ago.
We didn’t talk about my dad Saturday. I’m struggling two days later. We didn’t have to try to sort out who would go to my college graduation. It was while I was away at college that my parents’ marriage disintegrated. It was a hard time. Maybe if I had been at home….
I can’t blame my not getting through college on my parents’ problems. As Dad told me, college is a completion thing. It may not have a lot to say about how good a job you are going to do, but it does mark that you have made it through. It says something about your stick-to-itiveness. Maybe that’s a reason why I have been so committed to newspapers for these 35 years, I’m trying to prove something to myself.
Dad didn’t make it through college either. He was all wrapped up with conflict with his parents when he graduated from high school and couldn’t wait to get out of the house. Soon he was in the Marine Corps, and before he was discharged, he was married. I think he took a few college courses, and he always knew he was capable of doing the work, but there wasn’t the time for college. There was money to be made.
When I graduated from high school, there was no question that I would be going straight to college. I was not going to repeat the mistakes he made. There wasn’t even a discussion.
Having graduated from military school, there were a lot of social aspects of life I had missed out on for those two years, and my focus quickly shifted from studies to those other aspects of life. My dad’s patience and college money and marriage seemingly all ran out at about the same time. Colleges were growing tired of my charade as well.
Four years ago there was a famous commencement speaker who we didn’t care about hearing, and since Ashley would not walk across the stage, we skipped the big ceremony. Ashley wanted to be a part of this one.
It didn’t take long when the English Department banner led their graduates onto the floor of the RBC that we spotted our graduate. It rather seemed that her faced glowed with some special sort of makeup. I had little difficulty spotting her each time I looked down at the floor of the RBC.
There were ten thousand gathered parents and friends. There were signs and foam hands trumpeting their pride. I know for them, there was a shining face down there as well. I spotted a friend a few rows down and I could see the pride in his eyes.
For me, it seemed that Ashley’s chair on that row was pulled forward a foot, for nearly every time I looked down, I saw my Ashley. And several times she looked up at me.
“We did it, Dad!” her look said to me.
No, she did it, Grandpa.
Whether it be at a high school graduation in a few weeks, or a college graduation, or a wedding, or celebrating a job, or whatever the moment for you, make it shining. And savor it.

Lessons in wind resistance

2007-05-18T09:40:00.001-04:00

A number of years ago, my wife, Marilyn, dispatched my daughter, Ashley, and myself to Lowe’s to pick up some lumber and plywood for a bookcase she wanted us to build.
I guess I should have borrowed the neighbor’s pickup, but maybe having a bit too much pride, I took off in my Escort station wagon. I figured if we tilted the plywood sheets at an angle, it would fit.
Well, guess what, it didn’t fit. I seem to vaguely recall the people at Lowe’s urging me to go back home and borrow the neighbor’s pickup. Not me, we would get them home in the Escort, or rather, on top of the Escort.
No we didn’t securely tie the plywood down with the tobacco twine Lowe’s provided. I had more sense than that. I knew that wouldn’t hold it.
Ashley and I would roll the windows down in the front seats and we would hold it down with our free hand all the way back home.
What I soon discovered was how little wind it took to make the plywood get airborne. I don’t remember how many sheets we had on the roof that night, but I remember going down back roads that we could get away with going 20 mph so our plywood wouldn’t fly all over the road.
I have to add in to this story that the rest of the family thought that Independence Day was one of their favorite movies of all times. While I had caught bits and pieces here and there, for some reason it was on Saturday that I actually sat down and watched much of it.
If you have seen it, a key part of the plot is where Will Smith is piloting a Marine fighter jet and fleeing an alien spaceship. As the alien ship is closing in, and Will is running out of gas, he suddenly deploys a parachute that covers the alien ship, blinding the alien, causing him to crash.
Sunday was the designated day for Ashley and me to move much of her apartment, including her bed, back home. Ashley has been living in Raleigh much of the time for the past two years as she is completing her master’s degree at NC State.
I still don’t have a pickup, but I have moved up to a Ford Windstar van. If you take the seats out, it’s almost as good as a pickup.
Recently I needed to get my lawnmower serviced, so I took out the seats, backed the van into the ditch in front of my house, and with a couple of boards, loaded her up. The lawnmower repair shop said that was the first time they had unloaded one from a van. Worked for me.
Well, Sunday we got up to Raleigh. Ashley has a double bed, and we brought the mattress down and got it in the van with little problem. Then came the box springs. As it was going to be challenging to get them both in, we took the more flexible mattress out and put the box springs in. It was quickly clear that both would not fit at the same time.
Fortunately, we had some wire in the van. We would wire down the mattress to the roof of the van.
I must point out that my daughter began her college career in nuclear physics, so she has some knowledge of the laws of physics. She also had not completely wiped out what she remembers as a traumatic experience, trying to get the plywood home.
I had not forgotten the plywood lesson either, and told her we would go down non-interstate roads where we could go 40 or less, as the bulky, heavy mattress would not be likely to get wind under it and fly up like the more wing-like plywood.
I assured her that fortune favors the bold. I also reminded her that if an alien spaceship locked on our rear, we could speed up and blind them with the mattress.
She continued to have doubts, but trusted her father.
We had not gone a mile when suddenly the top tie down that I had tightened slid to the rear of the rails it was mounted on. The suddenly light as a feather mattress had taken wing. I searched the rear view mirror for the alien spaceship which surely must have triggered the emergency release of the mattress. Alas, it must have been a malfunctioning emergency release switch.
No alien spaceship and fortunately no closely following cars. The wire may not have kept the mattress from seeking freedom from the top of the van, but it maintained its hold on the handles of the mattress. So we drug the mattress some distance as I reacted to new lessons in physics.
A rather nice young man in a Jeep stopped to offer help getting the mattress back on the roof, but a rather red-faced father said he thought we could handle it.
Marilyn’s original advice was to save the mattress for the next trip, so we took it back upstairs, and brought it home later that day.
I was nervous about alien spaceships all the way home, though.

NL supports bond issue

2007-05-18T09:39:00.000-04:00

We at the News Leader urge our Johnston County readers to take the time to cast a ballot next Tuesday in support of the bond issues before the voters.
The big one of the three is the school bond, for $99 million. The county continues to try to keep up with growth that is adding seemingly more than a school’s numbers to our county each year.
Many of the reasons for supporting this school bond are no different than the last several that we have passed. At the risk of stating the obvious or repeating some things you have already heard, let me offer my take on some reasons.
When you drive past Princeton School or several of the other campuses that are particularly stressed by growth, you see a trailer park village out back. While that image is not one that is particularly appealing to us, school officials will tell you for the most part the education of students is not significantly adversely affected by having to sit in a mobile classroom for part of their day. The bigger problems are inside the building.
Hallways which are not designed for the numbers of students who are having to use them between classes become places of conflict. Extra time has to be built in because of the time it takes to get from one side of the campus to the other.
Cafeterias are stretched for more students than they are designed for. Students are sitting down for lunch in some cases at late morning so that enough lunch times can be scheduled. Media centers which are required to have a certain number of books per student are stretched for space for all of the books.
There’s a most important concept to Princeton that’s a part of the bond issue. There’s a fundamental belief that education is enhanced in a smaller school. When students become numbers who won’t get a chance to play varsity sports or be student body president or when teachers can’t have a meaningful student-teacher relationship with every student because there are too many more, there’s something wrong with that picture.
I have friends who are on staff at West Johnston, and the discipline problems they have to face in addition to the normal ones are staggering. The root of those problems come from a school with too many kids.
This bond issue doesn’t endorse building Princeton-size high schools across the county, but it does endorse staying away from mega-size schools in Johnston County.
Yes, we have something directly to gain from the passage of the school bond, as overcrowding on our campus will be relieved by the new elementary school this bond will fund. We also benefit when more students stay in school and are prepared to be meaningful contributors to our society, whether they live in Princeton or somewhere else in Johnston County. Our neighbors’ problems will be on our doorstep someday.
I appreciate the planning and the conservative approach of county commissioners. While I have heard some in the county complain that we can’t continue to pass bond issues and expect the taxpayers to pay the bill, bond issues are precisely the current taxpayers’ best friend.
With more people moving into the county buying homes, it takes several years for enough tax revenue to come in from them to pay the current costs of providing schools and other services for their children. Rather than shifting that burden to current taxpayers alone, the bond issue allows those new taxpayers to more fully participate in paying the bills they are bringing the county to pay.
Some may say there should be alternatives to property taxes, and many will agree, that is the best we currently have available.
While school officials will tell you they would have liked to have had some more money in this bond issue, they appreciate the county’s commitment to finance schools at a rate that will not require additional taxes.
Part of that commitment also extends to trying to take care of other needs in the county. As more students turn to our community college for vocational training and preparatory classes for a four year degree, we need to maintain and improve their facilities. This bond will help address those needs.
Our recreation programs in the county are volunteer driven, but they need support in helping meet the high costs of facilities and their maintenance. Certainly we appreciate the benefits of parental involvement with their children, the positive alternative to more hours of television and video games, and the fulfillment athletics can bring as an alternative to drugs and alcohol. This support is needed.
The biggest concern that county officials have is good people will not take the time to cast their ballots. Polls will open early and stay open late, and most of the time you can be in and out in five minutes.
In addition to passage, we are hopeful that we will continue to pass bond issues by a strong margin. This won’t be the last one put before voters as there are other pressing needs. We need to continue to say to the county we endorse bonds to pay for growth, and we encourage them to continue using them in this way.
Thank you for taking the time.

Let ‘em spray

2007-05-02T06:31:00.001-04:00

Several years ago, the State of North Carolina took a hard stance against smaller towns maintaining their own sewer treatment facilities. The roots of that were the recurring problems plants were having with spills.
In their wisdom, state officials endorsed regional waste treatment facilities. Rather than individual towns, often with stretched staffs and under-funded maintenance, cities would act as processors for a number of communities.
Fremont and Eureka have had little choice but to tap into Goldsboro’s system.
Goldsboro has been a reluctant party to all of this. They have been concerned about maintaining sewer capacity to sell to new industry and for housing growth. They are also facing increasingly tougher standards to meet for the quality of the discharge they put back in the nutrient sensitive Neuse River.
The original problems with the towns’ sewer systems came from problems with infiltration and inflow. It was rather like insulating a house. Builders knew a hundred years ago that houses wouldn’t hold heating and cooling because they didn’t have insulation, but with energy costs what they were then, it didn’t make dollars and cents to spend the extra money for insulation.
Similarly, our sewer systems were designed to take our waste to facilities rather than depend on septic tanks. They weren’t designed to make sure ground water and rainwater stayed out of them. The cost of treating the waste was not significant.
Ask anyone who has paid a $100 sewer bill. There are plenty of those around. Times have changed!
In Fremont’s case, they not only weren’t designed to keep out infiltration and inflow, they weren’t designed for easy replacement when they broke or got cracked, as terra cotta pipe is very prone to do. I remember well the 15-foot hole in front of my house that opened up one day, as dirt from the 14 1/2 foot above the sewer line had washed away into the line, causing the street to collapse.
While not all the line in town is that deep, just think of the extra expense to dig up and replace sewer line that deep in the ground.
Fremont has been paying and paying. The state has been helping and helping with grants and loans, but literally millions of dollars has been going to contractors to fix Fremont’s leaking lines. The town is not out of the woods yet.
Eureka’s problems are very different, though similar. It wasn’t seventy years ago when Eureka put in sewer, more like twenty or thirty. It was suppose to be done so much better, as we knew better what we were doing in putting in sewer lines, but Eureka apparently has very significant infiltration and inflow problems as well.
A small town with few resources, no industry, and many who are not that far above the poverty line, town leaders have had no easy answers to how to pay the mounting bills. More than a few have suggested that the right answer would be for the incorporated town to disappear and let the county or someone else deal with the sewer situation. The state will have none of that.
As we have stated previously, we appreciate the work of our state legislators, and particularly State Senator John Kerr, in helping our towns deal with a difficult, some would say impossible, problem.
From our local perspective, Goldsboro has been a part of the problem, as they continue to increase their sewer rates. Adding to our financial strains, we have a hard enough time finding the money to pay for repairs, we have to pay more and more for the waste and the rainwater we are putting in the system.
Goldsboro officials will tell you they would be happy for the towns to find their own solutions to their problems and not eat up their capacity. They are just trying to provide for their citizens and the potential for growth.
A great at least short-term solution for both towns will be to allow the two to open spray fields. While much of the waste will still be going to Goldsboro, during the continuing high rainwater infiltration and inflow times that excess can be sent to lagoons to apply to hay fields.
This marks a change in the state’s stance. We need to make sure this works for all parties, including the state who has been burned by small towns who didn’t operate and maintain facilities like they should.

NL supports bond issue

2007-05-02T06:29:00.000-04:00

Could it happen here?

2007-04-24T20:53:00.001-04:00

I struggled last week trying to make sense of the senseless. The terrible shootings at Virginia Tech: the young lives that had so much potential; the popular professors who had inspired so many; the one desperate life that so seldom spoke but screamed by taking so many lives with him.
Like the Psalmist, we cry out to God! Where is justice? Where is righteousness? Where are you in all of this? Did you go on Spring Break, God? How could you allow this to happen?
Did the mental health system fail us? Did the gun control laws not work? What changes do we need to make to make sure this never happens again?
What changes do we need to make to make sure this never happens again? Yes, it bears repeating.
In our society we are great at placing blame. We find someone to take the fall. Who in the Justice Department must leave? Who does the 9/11 Commission say was responsible? Should Nifong be disbarred? How about the dog food crisis?
We aren’t nearly as good at accepting responsibility, particularly when it hits close to home.
I can’t and won’t judge those who were around this young man. I can’t say I would have done any better than roommates who got no response from him in sharing a room with him for a school year. Or the mental health professionals who tried to crack his tough shell.
But I should have tried. And I should try.
One of the things I love about living in a small town is caring people. Depending on how you look at it, it’s a burden as well. Maybe a yoke.
We all are little people at times in our lives. We get depressed, lonely, and sometimes in this big world, we feel like we don’t make a difference. In the big city, it’s easy to feel lost. You’re a number, an address on a street, and a piece of mail that says “occupant.” Maybe someone says to you emptily “Let’s do lunch sometime?”
When you go to a small school, it’s harder to get lost, particularly if you are around caring people. If there are fewer than 100 in your church on an average Sunday morning, caring people know when you are not there. If there are five people at your work, it’s easier taking the time to listen to someone’s problems.
When you see someone coming down the street that you know is hurting, in the big city it is easy to turn away and say you have somewhere else you are suppose to be right now. In a small town, it’s easier to take the time to stop and say I can make a difference today. Even when that person is hard to love, just making the effort says something powerful to that person: that you care enough to try.
I get frequent emails about children who are battling enormous medical monsters. I see community rallies to help pay medical expenses for families in those circumstances. Whose heart isn’t touched by the struggles of the helpless and young?
How about the unlovely? How about the ones who make us feel uncomfortable? How about the ones who don’t return our kindness as we would want our kindness returned? How about the young man at Virginia Tech who wouldn’t speak back when spoken to?
Could it happen here? It could if there aren’t enough caring people around like you and me, who take the time to say, “You’re important to me!”

A higher calling

2007-04-24T20:52:00.001-04:00

I read a couple of columnists (Melanie Sill and Ted Vaden) in the Sunday News and Observer. They said some things which caused me to change what I was preparing for you this week. Kudos.
I will say some things which some of you will disagree with. I make no apologies for that. To do less would shame this newspaper.
As is our responsibility, I call on our town board to make the “right” decisions for our town as they consider the coming budget. I cast no illusions. I believe these are troubling times ahead for the town, and I believe it will take men of courage to do the “right” thing.
What is the “right” thing, and why do I put it in quotes? For some the “right” thing is always clear. As long as you agree with them, you are in the “right.” For many of those people, the right thing is always cutting taxes, or at the very least not raising them. Clear cut and simple, right?
Before I soil my roots and my heritage, I was raised in those traditions. I believe well meaning people too often, particularly at the federal level, have believed that the federal government was better at spending money than individuals are, and they have labored long and hard to make money decisions for people before they had the chance.
While I still hold to those beliefs, I have found that there are times when it is for the collective good, the “right” thing, again just sometimes, for the government to make investments. I try to secure my wallet when I hear of that, but nonetheless, there are times when it is warranted, at least in this man’s opinion.
The Princeton Town Board is faced with the decision to raise taxes. I think it is a given that taxes will have to be raised, and I’m sure that has some on the town board, maybe all on the town board, cringing a bit at those who will offer their criticism of any such move, convinced they are “right” and the town board is “wrong.”
The board can try to get by with as few of cents increase as possible, but I ask them to consider getting by with as little as “humanely” possible.
I was reflecting earlier about the number of town clerks we have had working for the town in recent years. I can name four without trying. In fairness, two were near retirement age, but still, four?
How many police chiefs can you name? Some of those were good guys I would have liked to have stay.
You want to talk about maintenance workers?
Is the town better served by having new people working here every few years? What does it say to those who look to come to work for the town?
Let me offer a few reflections. It gets frustrating when you are trying to do a good job and you are constantly training new people. It sends out a bad signal when those who have been there longer are leaving because they aren’t getting treated fairly. It gets old when you get told over and over again, even though you are doing a good job, you won’t get a raise because there isn’t any money for a raise.
For those of you feeling justified with those words because they apply to a public employee, put yourself in your job experiencing that. Just because someone works for the taxpayers doesn’t make it right.
So I don’t sound above the fray, let me say I made some recent tough decisions around here. We let a man go, who was doing a good job, not because we wanted to, but economics dictated it. Sure, I could have endangered the long-term health of the company, or I could have asked everyone to take a 10% cut in pay, but I will ask many of us to work harder to make up for the loss. If we wallow in economic hardship for long, we won’t be in any better shape than the town is. My experience is that some will endure a hardship for a while if necessary, but it gets old.
We lost another employee, and while I have worked hard to ensure that everyone feels confident after the changes we made, I don’t know that his leaving wasn’t at least in part a lack of confidence in our emerging a strong company.
That brings me back to the revolving doors in Princeton, where new people are always seemingly coming and going. Is the Town of Princeton a good place to work? Does the town board truly appreciate those who work here, more than just signing a proclamation saying they do? Or would they rather train a new group of employees who will work cheap?
I believe the town board is a good group of men who try to do the “right” things for the Town of Princeton. I believe they serve for all the best reasons. I believe they want the best for the taxpayers of Princeton.
As they consider the new budget, I ask them to consider “Do unto the town employees as you would have your employer do unto you.” There’s something Golden about that.
They’ll work with you, but saying “there’s no money to pay you” is getting old, and it’s starting to stink.

With apologies to Fremont

2007-04-24T20:50:00.000-04:00

Several weeks after a recent column by our recently departed editor, Dave Williams, he heard some calls of unfairness from Fremont officials. Let me take the rap on this one and offer an apology.
I won’t deny any responsibility here. Dave and I talked over his column on the hiring of a police chief, and I was a party to the conclusions, though I didn’t personally scribe them. I recently got out his column on the matter and still don’t fell uncomfortable with what Dave said.
As he states, he is judging by appearances, and appearances are all we have to go from on this decision. Given a lack of other information, we have to go with what we have. If that leads us to the “wrong” conclusion, give us information to help us understand the “right” one.
I presume all on the town board are very excited about the hiring of Ronald Rawlings. I hope all see him as the right man for the job. In this man’s opinion, that needs to be stated more affirmatively if that is in fact the case, and we are told that.
At the risk of protesting too much, let me conclude by saying we will try to make it right. Town board, give us statements to publish.

Speaking of Fremont, I was making photos of the ribbon-cutting at You’re Home Realty last week and discussed the Daffodil Festival with the mayor and several town board members who were there. I would concur with the conclusions it was the best ever.
It seemed the crowd was as strong as it have ever been, and it seemed to be more sustained than in some years. Certainly the weather cooperated, and we had near ideal conditions, certainly better than in some windy, some cold years.
Congratulations to those who organized and coordinated the efforts this year. Certainly we have a strong tradition and a loyal following. Still, it takes some hard work to keep things going.
It’s a big credit to Northern Wayne.

I was delighted to see the new “Welcome to Fremont” signs at the entrances to the town. As one of the many who was touched by Anne Hinnant, I was also touched by the remembrance of her below.
While she was one of the pushers of Fremont, always trying to bring forth the best in the town, she was most humble. She wanted others to be in the spotlight.
I suspect she would be uncomfortable with the signs, but they certainly reflect my sentiments, and I know those of many in Fremont.
Thanks, Anne, and thanks, Frank.

Is bad good?

2007-04-24T20:48:00.000-04:00

I ran into some bike riders the other day. I remember a biker and his biker chick were decked out in some rather nice looking leathers. I know he had some facial hair, but otherwise they looked rather nicely kept. While they looked “bad,” I could easily imagine them riding to a Cary home and slipping into a six-figure income corporate lifestyle during the week. I’m not sure this was his bike, but one there had a personalized plate that read “abadboy.”
I guess the seeming to be putting on a “bad” persona struck me. I don’t know that these are good or bad people, but they want to at least look like “bad” people for an afternoon.
I don’t have a problem with bikers. My half brother has spent much more time on two wheels than four, though he’s slowing down a bit. Being on two wheels set him apart, and to some extent, classified him as a maverick. He didn’t want to fit in, and maybe he wanted to seem a little dangerous. He wanted to be “a bad boy.”
Over the years I’ve hung around Phil and his friends some. Most of them seemed to be pretty decent people.
Phillip was a machinist in a jet engine plant for General Electric for many years. He did a good job and was a dependable employee. He retired some years back with enough to live comfortably for many years to come.
Alcoholism was a part of being that bad boy. Fortunately, he has put alcohol out of his life.
Let me move to the world of professional football.
It seems if you are a 300 lb. offensive lineman, you have got to have a barbed wire tattoo on your bicep. I think it makes you look like a “bad” offensive lineman. If you are a “bad” offensive lineman, are you respected, maybe even feared. Or maybe not.
Are “bad” football players good football players? Maybe of all the teams in football, Oakland has cultivated an image of “bad boys.” This particular last season, they were sorry.
Some teams have gone after some players of questionable character, hoping to use their considerable talents, despite the baggage. Athletes have seemingly over the years gotten passes often, and indiscretions were ignored if not tolerated.
Both the NBA and the NFL have recently taken strong stands against “bad boy” behavior.
There are many on the football field who capture our attention and our idolatry. We are inspired by those who battle the odds, who seize victory from the jaws of defeat. We are inspired by the heroic fight, particularly when it results in victory, but sometimes even in defeat.
We root for the underdog and against the favorite. We applaud the weakling who triumphs over the bully, the David over the Goliath. We applaud the solitary struggle, the noble cause, and those who work to set things right.
There is something very different, though, about William Wallace of Braveheart fame and the “bad” persona that some people put on.
There is a manly persona, a warrior persona, that is part of who we are supposed to be, at least in my book. We are not suppose to wimp out
As I have commented before, I make no apologies for some prejudices that I grew up with. Good guys wore white hats, and they didn’t have facial hair or tattoos. If you wear a black hat or grow facial hair, or got a tattoo while you were in the Navy, I’ll probably get over it, but initially I’m going to be a bit put off by it.
Some people feel it is necessary to look “bad” for whatever reason. I went without shaving one Saturday recently. My wife gave me a hard time the other day for not showering when I came in from yard work. Sorry, but that’s about as “bad” as I get.
While my picture here shows me in a suit and tie, those I work with will tell you I seldom wear that to work. Maybe it gets the column a bit more respect. I did wear rather formal attire one day not too long ago, and my office manager commented about how nice I looked. Maybe I aught to wear something nicer more often?
Appearances do make a difference. They make a statement about who we are, and while we may put on a very different persona at times, it speaks about who we are down deep inside. Those we gravitate towards, and the way others will treat us will be affected.
Do you really want to be bad?

Reach ‘em thru their stomachs

2007-04-07T19:47:00.000-04:00

I got a call from an old friend to help out with his church’s BBQ chicken supper. It seems that several hundred barnyard birds were to be used to help support the church’s budget, and he was concerned that they wouldn’t be able to get it all done without an extra hand or two.
I think he’s kin to my wife, who never is assured that all the bases are covered, or that we will get it done on time. And that one time out of ten when her fretting was warranted, she hollers, “See!” And I wonder how many years of her life she took off from excessive worry.
Well, there were plenty of hands there, and maybe a few too many, but as happens, that just gives you more time to stand around and visit. And I got to get to know a rather good fellow who I had met before, but knew little of.
While I wondered what I could be doing that would have benefited me more early on that day, I counted it for profit as the day went on.
I called a friend, as they were worried that they might not sell out of plates, to try to sell a few more. It seems that another church was having a dinner, so he declined.
Later that day, I went to another fundraising dinner to make a photo. I supported another fundraiser dinner the next day.
I recently bought some doughnuts from a lady at the grocery store, selling for her church. When I asked where her church was, she told me it was two counties over.
One of the groups that I normally support was not raising funds this past weekend. I can only guess that they were responding to criticism from local restaurants about taking business away.
That is a common complaint. There is no doubt that a successful community fundraiser does take away from a restaurant’s business.
I also remember in small towns when you had almost no choice for where to go to eat. Even the bigger towns were complaining years back that there were no nice chain restaurants above McDonald’s. Today you have a great variety of choices, particularly if you are willing to drive just five miles down the road. And if you go 15 miles….
People are eating out more and more, and as a result, more and more restaurants are able to be successful.
One of the up-sides of being in a small community is the lack of local restaurant competition. If people want to find something locally, you’ve got a pretty good shot at them.
The down-side is when a local church or civic group has a fundraiser supper, it is going to hurt.
Given the number of people who are regularly going out to eat, and their willingness to support good causes, fundraiser suppers seem to be increasingly popular.
It also gives those who work them an opportunity to get to know one another better.

About two and a half years ago, I got a call from David Williams who was sports editor of the Goldsboro News Argus at the time. He told me he was leaving the Goldsboro paper, and asked if I might consider him for an opening we had.
I had known David for many years, as we would bump into one another at ball games particularly. When we had our basketball tournament, I’m not sure how it all came together, but David served as the announcer for several years. So, I knew him, and I knew him as a good guy.
I told him to come and we would talk. We made a decision that he would come to work for us. I haven’t regretted that decision.
David will be leaving us this week. I’m sorry to see him go, but I believe this will be best for David. He will be leaving newspapers to work for a magazine publisher in Raleigh.
During his tenure, we have changed dramatically the face of the paper, begun our web page, and advanced how we are going about things. I appreciate his hand in all of that, and he was a key player.
As this was not planned, I cannot say that I had planned for my daughter to step in to help fill his slot, but Ashley, who will be getting her master’s degree in May at NC State, will be filling much of David’s duties beginning next week.
She grew up in the newspaper, literally, as during many long nights she and her sister would be there doing their homework, or helping put inserts in the newspaper. She has helped fill in during times when we have been away, and both she and her sister have been there during summer breaks.
Again, this was not any part of any grand plan, but it makes some sense, particularly right now.

Nice guys finish first

2007-01-23T17:09:00.000-05:00

I believe I have spent far too much time in my life fixated on sports. I have made sports a priority that it didn't deserve. I have looked to sports for inspiration and motivation. As I reflect back, I have been disappointed in what I have found.
I recently saw a retrospective on one of the great teams that I thought so much of. As much as I tried to elevate them, I found them uninspiring.
As we get ready for the Super Bowl, let me put a big asterisk on all of that. With all of the hype and glorification, there are a couple of guys who are very worthy of praise: Tony Dungy and Lovey Smith, the coaches of the Indianapolis Colts and Chicago Bears who will be playing.
You won't hear any trash talk before this Super Bowl, certainly not from these coaches, and I doubt the media will get any from the players. Probably from the fans, but not from the two teams.
It's a different environment on the sidelines. Most kids are raised in sports in an environment where the coach yells and screams at his players to motivate them to do more. If you watch them, they do it a different way.
You don't get to the top of the sport without being an intense competitor. These are great strategists and coaches who are able to get the most out of their teams. They don't do it with yelling, screaming, and profanity. They are breaking the mold.
Probably most of you, like me, had never heard of Lovey Smith until recently. Tony Dungy has been a head coach for a number of years.
I'm affiliated with a Christian group, Methodist Men, and I remember that for a national gathering of our group that was being planned. Some knew of Coach Dungy, his different style, and his strong relationship with Jesus Christ, and wanted him to come to speak. We weren't able to make the necessary arrangements, but we knew he would have made a great speaker.
Coach Smith coached with Coach Dungy, I believe in Tampa Bay, and they are good friends. They share a lot of common coaching philosophy.
It's been stated over and over again, but I'll affirm that it is significant that two black coaches will lead the two teams into the Super Bowl. It is important that we lift up black men who are positive role models. It is important that we lift up blacks who are being successful in positive ways.
The tragedy of sports is as much as we focus on it as a society, there are so few who can earn a significant living at it, and then, often for just a handful of years. It is so highly competitive, kids with a certain level of talent and great determination and drive can only go so far. Hopefully, we can pick up some positive lessons along the way, and I think coaches like Coach Dungy and Coach Smith are the kind of men who will pass those along.

Speaking of black coaches, most people had very low expectations for the North Carolina State men's basketball team this year, with Sidney Lowe, the former Wolfpack great at the reins. I don't think that was particularly a reflection on the coach, who is somewhat of an unknown for most of us, but an assessment of the players he had to work with.
Coach Lowe seems to have gotten the most of what he had to work with. NC State probably won't win the ACC this year. It seems these upstarts in the league, Boston College and Virginia Tech among others, are winning more games than they are suppose to. They should be grateful to just be in the league, and allow the old league teams to pummel them. Ungrateful upstarts. It seems that basketball is getting like football this school year.
Still, Coach Lowe's team is impressing some national observers. Most recently, I watched the Duke-Wake Forest game and heard Bucky Waters, the old Duke coach, talk about how impressed he was with State.
Like with most teams, injuries have already had a hand in the team's fortunes. Point guard Engin Atsur went down early in the season, and if he can return and play near his level of last year, State may finish the year strong.

Speaking of college basketball, we have taken a lot of interest in both NC State and East Carolina this season as we have been giving away tickets to the two programs. While I thought many would be interested in NC State tickets, and we get a limited number from them, we get many more from ECU. I have been pleased with the level of interest in the Pirates.
We got a call recently from a winner of a couple of tickets. The older man who won had never been to a college basketball game before. He took a youngster with him. Had a great time.

Why get psyched up?

2007-01-17T07:43:00.001-05:00

Like a lot of others, Monday night I turned on the Ohio State-Florida game. As I watched the pre-game, they showed the Buckeye Band do their traditional halftime show, spelling the script Ohio.
When the drum major leads the tuba player out to dot the "i", the Buckeye fans erupt in cheers. Why?
I can't give you a good answer, any more than I can explain why I get excited when it happens.
I remember in my freshman year in college going to a pep rally. The cheerleaders taught us cheers and told us when the band broke into the fight song, we were to go crazy. And I did.
I guess it's learned behavior. We look around and see the people around us do something, and we do it.
Maybe it works that way early on, but why do we keep doing it, or why do we stop? There has to be some kind of reinforcement.
Over thirty years ago, I remember going to a Virginia-Clemson game. This was a time when neither program was particularly good, but Virginia was particularly sorry and seemingly had been for years. At some point during the game, the band played the fight song or the alma mater and the Virginia alumni in attendance at Clemson rose to sing and do whatever they do traditionally. They were faithful, but without a winning team on the field, their song lacked fire.
Obviously the Buckeyes, until Monday night, had a lot to cheer about this year. They've had a lot to cheer about most years.
I think one of the reasons we cheer for the home team, or even get goose bumps when we hear the fight song, is because we believe it makes a difference. We believe as fans our cheering helps our team win.
There are a lot of reasons why a team wins or doesn't, and it may be interesting to hear all of the experts who believed so strongly that Ohio State would win drum up reasons why Florida won so convincingly.
Emotions play a part. If you don't believe that, ask Coach K about the Cameron Crazies.

Speaking of emotions, there was quite an emotional roller coaster in Seattle Saturday night when the Cowboys played.
I have read a couple of so-called experts go on about how Tony Romo's bobble of the hold on a field goal will go down in history as one of the classic bobbles of all time.
As a Cowboy fan, I was hugely disappointed in how the game played out. Still, as I have watched what seem like endless replays, I am amazed at how Romo had the coolness to pick the ball up and sprint for the goal line. I heard one pundit argue if he had not been tackled from behind on the play he would have scored and no doubt won the game for the Cowboys. I'm not sure that he would have, but I think there was a good chance he would have gotten a first down. He was just a matter of inches short of that. If the tackler had been just a little slower. You can argue that the tackler summoned a super-human effort to bring him down like he did, and I would agree.
Not only is it a game of emotions, but it is a game of inches.
I'm not sure that play will go down as an endless replay, but had he been able to save the play, that might have been the stuff of legends like Montana and Elway.

Where are their parents?

2006-12-18T18:48:00.000-05:00

As the parent of a couple of college students, I probably note with more interest two big stories in our state: the Duke Lacrosse Rape Case, and the shooting death of the college student in Wilmington by law enforcement.
A lot of the media attention on both cases has suggested that the authorities are the ones in the wrong in both of these cases, and seemingly the young people are being wronged. While I can argue the merits of cases being tried in the media, and the distortions that can bring, I am more concerned about the young people’s decisions and those of their parents.
I can remember back to my college days and the son of a doctor or a dentist, his parents divorced and his dad set him up in a house. I think he was going to school, though I’m not positive. It was a place a lot of us went to party. I may have come closest to death one night there.
I made some terrible choices that night. It scared me. Maybe I was a little more careful after the next day when I realized what had happened, though I can’t say that I was scared enough.
While my parents loved me, and they gave me a lot, they didn’t try to help me with some decisions like I wish they had. They gave me rein to make some mistakes. Fortunately, this mistake was not devastating, but it could easily have been.
I am not naïve enough to believe that I can prevent my daughters from making mistakes (they’ve made some), and they have to start making some of their decisions, but I can try to help them the best I can to avoid the bad ones, and hopefully the mistakes they make won’t be major ones.
The rape accusation over the heads of the Duke students is said to be “ruining their lives.” What about the decisions to rent a house off campus to party and bring in strippers?
Obviously many young people at Duke are given access to significant funds, as many of their families are wealthy. Like my friend, they may not have a lot of accountability for those funds.
I guess you could say that the young man in Wilmington fell in with a bad group. Judging by the photos his defense lawyer and father provided the media, he seems to be an innocent youth. You have to wonder what kind of fellow hangs around people who end up being accused of beating up other students and robbing them and who brag about carrying guns.
I can’t help but think many attitudes about this would be vastly different if the young man were black, and we called the apparent thugs he was hanging with a gang.
He was living in a house his dad paid for, and he made some bad choices.
Yes, a lot of young people make a lot of good choices when allowed, but a lot of them also make some mistakes. Sometimes those decisions can be life changing, sometimes fatal.
As parents, do we have a responsibility to check on what our kids are doing while they are at college? You can argue that these young men may not have gotten much of a moral compass to make these decisions in the first place, but they are going to have different influences in their lives. If you and I as parents fund bad decisions, allow them to continue, or don’t even try to check up on them, do we take some responsibility?
I don’t believe they ever stop being our kids, and I don’t believe we should ever stop loving them. I don’t think we should ever stop trying to protect them from the bad things in this world, and we should never stop trying to keep them from making bad decisions.

Get over the sticker shock

2006-12-16T06:52:00.000-05:00

As per the request of county commissioners, the Wayne County School Board recently compiled a list of school construction needs. When the list came back to the county, the total supposedly staggered some. Some are already dismissing the amount as too big.
Get over it.
I don’t think there are any swimming pools being added to any of the schools or deluxe teacher lounges. Or leather furniture for a principal’s office.
School construction money in Wayne County for many years has been whittled down to little more than bailing wire and what you can get by with for now, just like current expense money. What the schools have gotten in recent years has been hard fought, just like the money in this year’s budget, which went to arbitration.
Yes, it is a whopping big number, but it really shouldn’t be that surprising. Get over it.
County commissioners have recently toured the schools and seen, first hand, much of the needs across the county. Many of our students are not in reasonable learning situations. That the staffs at our schools are effective despite the working conditions is remarkable. It’s a credit to both the teachers and the students.
What is on the books right now for construction does not even reach the most pressing needs in northern Wayne County. Both Norwayne and Aycock are too big. They are trying to process too many students through those buildings every day. There are too many students packed into the hallways not to have more fights break out. There are too many students they are trying to feed every day.
The Freshman Academy program at Aycock is being hailed as innovative, as it should be. Compartmentalizing the ninth grade at the school is part of trying to cope with the huge numbers at the school. They say that necessity is the mother of invention, and that program grew from just trying to make the numbers work.
I am tired of the wrestling match between the county commissioners and school board over money. Yes, I know it’s important as the county deals with growth issues, and there have been some things that schools probably should have handled better. Let’s move things forward. Get over it.
If a bond issue is needed to help address these needs, or a series of bond issues are needed, let’s get something started. Let the county manager come up with how he would propose to meet those needs. Does he want to address some out of pocket over the next three years or five years? Yes, it is going to be a tough issue to deal with. Get over it.
There are many who feel that bond issues are a way of spreading out the payments for schools over the years they are being used, much as a mortgage allows us to pay for homes over the years we live in a house. I know many of us have conservative backgrounds that discourage taking on debt, but with the costs of today and in meeting growth, most counties have to resort to bond issues to fund new construction. Current interest rates are still a comparative bargain. It’s a good time to finance.
I know some would like to hold on to a proud self-image of a county with little indebtedness. If that means students continuing to attend schools in inadequate facilities, get over it.
We should take no pride in having a low tax rate while still having under-funded schools. We need to get over it, and get ‘er done.

Voting in Beauty Contests

2006-12-16T06:50:00.000-05:00

(If you have not voted yet and are reading this column before the polls close, please do not read this as an endorsement or non-endorsement of Jackie Lee. I don’t know enough about her to endorse or not, and while this column could be interpreted as a slam against her, my comments are really about the system, not her.)
I was on a long drive Saturday, by myself, and as I came down US 70 this side of Clayton, I was struck by a billboard for this week’s election. Jackie Lee is running for judge. I think the billboard says “Elect Jackie Lee Judge” and features a large photo of Jackie. She is a relatively attractive lady who wears glasses, at least for this photo. (I wear glasses when I want to look intelligent, but mostly I’m too vain to wear them in photos.)
That’s pretty much the sum and total of that billboard.
In fairness to Jackie, there are severe restrictions placed on what Jackie can say in advertising for judges. Advertising experts will also tell you that billboard advertising is mainly for name recognition in political campaigns.
Still, even when I get mail pieces, it seems that the information that judicial candidates want me to know before I vote in a judge race is they reflect North Carolina values, whatever that means. Of course they seemingly all claim to have North Carolina values.
There are some voter guides out there with some information. There are some endorsements in these races. There are some helps in making the choices beyond just based on how attractive a face there is on the billboard or name recognition. (I like Mark Martin because he’s a Ford man. I know, he’s not the one running for judge, but I can’t help but believe Judge Martin thinks he benefits from the association.)
I’m sorry, but our system of elections works when there is an informed electorate. There is not enough information readily available to most to help them make an informed choice in judge elections. We end up voting based solely on name recognition or pretty faces on billboards, if we vote at all. Fewer and fewer people are influencing who is elected, either in endorsements, or by actual votes.
The system needs change.

I was very tempted to vote early, but did not make it to the polling places. I have not cast my ballot as the polls are not open yet today as I write this early Tuesday morning, but I usually make it.
I’ve been a bit fascinated by some of the television ads for some of the Raleigh area candidates. Both Marilyn and I have commented that we would vote for some of those whose ads we like, if we had had the chance.
Interestingly, when we have seen attack ads from their opponents, released a week or two later, we have changed our minds. I have also been affected by endorsements by the N&O. I respect their opinion, and may or may not agree with them, depending on why they endorse a candidate.
My perception is a significant number of people are voting early. I wonder if they have regretted their votes after getting more information about candidates they were voting for?
I think this will lead to longer campaign seasons, as more candidates try to get out their message out earlier.
I don’t necessarily see the early voting as bad, but I do worry about late revelations about a candidate.

Marilyn was commenting the other day on voting for sheriff. She said if the current sheriff hasn’t done anything to get in trouble, why would you vote against him?
I believe the public perceptions about crime are important in an election, but some may say the press and others can unfairly shape that perception.
It seems there is a patronage system in many sheriff’s departments. The perception is the sheriff hires who he likes, and when a new sheriff is elected, there are a number who suddenly leave the sheriff’s office.
If that is the case, you would at least hope that some of those who leave should have left. Still, it doesn’t seem to be the best way to develop amore professional law enforcement unit.

Speaking of sheriff, it will be interesting to see how the Wake County Sheriff fares in Tuesday’s election.
Donnie Harrison would seem to fit Marilyn’s criteria, at least on the surface. From some standpoints he has done a good job while in office.
He is being challenged by John Baker, who was seemingly well respected when he served as sheriff up until the most recent previous election when he was defeated by Mr. Harrison in a very close vote. (I can’t help but feel Mr. Harrison was helped by his Republican affiliation.)
As has been widely reported, the sheriff was named in an alienation of affection lawsuit, as a husband is suing his wife after she allegedly had an affair with the sheriff. Sheriff Harrison has acknowledged the affair with the married woman, but says he is not to blame for the breakup of the marriage.
We were discussing at church over the weekend the recent revelations about an evangelist/pastor and a male prostitute. One commented that it’s good that we continue to hold pastors to a higher standard.
Do we continue to hold law enforcement officers to a higher moral standard?
Sheriff Harrison says judge him on his job performance, not on his personal life.
Of course, you don’t hear people bragging on being Republican this time around. He could lose based on having an “R” next to his name.

As some of you no doubt noted, we did not do endorsements in this election. This is more a product of our recent staff changes than a change in our editorial philosophy. We will again make endorsement in local races, offering our opinion as more information for your consideration, if you wish.
We did offer interviews in many local races, and will continue to present information to help you make better choices in the election. We salute others who similarly devote space and air time to help us all make better choices in the voting booth.

Dreaming of a Green Christmas

2006-12-16T06:44:00.000-05:00

The girls in the Merrill Family and I didn’t set the alarm for 4:30 on Black Friday, but we did bravely venture out at a reasonable hour that day. We went up to Garner to take advantage of some of the super specials offered that day.
It was close to 10 a.m. when we got up there. I let the girls out near the front door of the store we had set our sights on. I started looking for a parking place and located one a significant walking distance, but was pleased by getting that.
I ventured into the store and was amazed at how many people were there, not at opening time but several hours afterwards. As I started looking around for items, I saw a line of people, waiting patiently. I wondered what they were in line for, what super special were they waiting to get their hands on.
As I was to soon find out, the line stretched from the front of the store to the back of the store, and there was a like line on the other side of the store. There were 16 cash registers operating, taking money, plastic and real, just as fast as they could.
I spotted a man on his cell phone, apparently trying to find his loved ones in the store. It was a scene I repeated several times that morning before we left the store. I heard that Black Friday is one of the heaviest cell phone usage days for that very reason.
My wife, Marilyn, asked that I find a shopping cart, but those were not available. They were like gold, precious and coveted. You occasionally would see one, but they were well guarded.
Long before we had finished shopping, Marilyn got in line with a half dozen items at the back of the store. I soon joined her, holding our spot as the girls brought their items, and then went out to find more stuff.
I didn’t time it, but I know we were in line to get to the checkout for an hour. You had to believe that the specials were good enough to invest this much time. This certainly was not something you would accept on a normal day.
As we were going back and forth, I spotted a woman across the store who resembled one of my neighbors. When I saw her husband the next day, I asked and he confirmed it was her.
He told me that he had gotten up there an hour before the electronics store opened, lured by one of their super specials. He said the line when he got up there was stretched not just outside the store, but down in front of the half dozen other stores, down the side of the buildings, and all the way down the back. I’m guessing there was a line of people 300 yards long, lined up an hour before the store opened up.
He told me that he and some friends had done this last year. They literally camp out to save hundreds of dollars.
Unfortunately, there were too many others already in line, and the special he came for was gone, sort of. I think he said about 30 minutes before the store opens, employees start down the line, asking people which special they are there for, and hand out vouchers for the special. Once they pass the number of items they have, they tell the people they are sorry.
He said that some people wait in line now to get their vouchers, then go back home or get in their cars for a while to get some sleep, and come back to get their item before the time limit expires. Amazing.
As you can imagine, Marilyn and I are getting pretty well stacked up with items as we are waiting in line. A lady with fewer items behind us takes pity and gives us her cart rather than watching us straining with the burden any longer. She told us how long she had waited to get the cart when she came in the store, but she voluntarily gave it up for us. It was a rather nice touch of kindness on a day when we see images of people running over others for big specials.
We did make a few other stops along the way, but spent most of our time at this one store. I got back in time to catch some more football on Friday, and actually did some work on last week’s paper later that day.
One of the things that I look to regularly, as it directly affects the newspaper business, is the optimism people are about the future. Even more so than how much money people have in their pockets, people’s spending is affected by how optimistic they are about their future earnings. They are willing to jack up credit card balances based on their optimism they will be able to pay things back when the bill comes.
That also affects merchants. If they are optimistic that people will respond when they run advertisements in our paper and other places, they will run advertisements. If they are not optimistic, they won’t.
Black Friday isn’t obviously your normal shopping day, but it is an indication. Certainly our business has been good, and continues to be good. The merchants in the area are optimistic about business, and there seems to be a goodly amount of money flowing out there.
Expectations can change dramatically, as 9/11 showed us, but we seem to have a very green Christmas season ahead. Hopefully that optimism will be borne out by a strong economy which continues to provide plenty of jobs and maybe some extra spending money to fill Christmas dreams for many.

Football frenzy

2006-10-31T07:40:00.000-05:00

Here we are, in the thick of the football season, and there seems to have been pain and glory for most everyone.
I am hurting a bit since my Cowboys lost on Monday night. It’s certainly been a mixed season for them. The same could be said for one of my other teams, the Carolina Panthers, who, like the Cowboys, are mentioned as a Super Bowl team, and then they suffer a disappointing loss.
It seemed before the college season started, North Carolina major college football was predicted to have a down year. Things started out worse for NC State, who suffered embarrassing losses to some smaller schools. They obviously have had some big wins up until the last two weeks to salvage Coach Amato’s job. They may have found a star in their young quarterback.
Monday Coach Bunting was shown the door at UNC. As I was speaking with a big UNC fan Monday, he said as much as he likes him, he hasn’t been able to do the job.
As the losses pile up at Duke, you have to think Ted Roof will follow at the end of the year. I saw them play Virginia a few weeks ago, and I know they have played some good ball. They’ve been in several games, but a young quarterback has really hurt them.
I didn’t hear much about East Carolina before the season started, but Skip Holtz has the Pirates playing some really good ball. They’ve lost several games to fine teams like West Virginia, who is one of the top teams in the national polls, but could have easily left Greenville early in the season with a loss.
We’ve been giving away mainly ECU football tickets this year in our football contest. We didn’t know exactly how that would go, but we’ve heard good reports from those who have attended, and appreciation for the contest.
Wake Forest has come back to the pack a bit in recent weeks, but the Demon Deacons have been the big story in North Carolina college ranks. Despite also having to go to a second string quarterback, they are contending for an ACC title this year.
Our local high school teams have seen some success and some pain this year. I’ve been shooting photos at more football games this season than in recent years with being short-staffed, and have been to see all four of our teams in recent weeks.
Aycock came out of the starting gate so strongly. They still have a fine team, despite some disappointments in mid-season. They look as if they will make the playoffs, and the great thing about the playoffs is someone can get things going at the end of the year, and who knows how far they will go.
Speaking of getting things going, Beddingfield had a rocky stretch of games and looked to be going nowhere, but suddenly the Bruins have caught fire. While it’s easy to point to their new, young quarterback as a visible sign of new things, they are playing with a confidence that could carry them far at the end of the year.
Rosewood was not expected to do well this year, but Coach Barrow has the Eagles playing hard. I saw them play North Johnston recently, and they were giving a fine NJ team all they could handle. While they probably will not go deep into the playoffs, they have had what I would consider to be a good season.
I have probably had the most sympathy for Princeton Coach Russell Williamson this season. The Bulldogs have been struggling for a win in recent years, and this looked like it could be another tough one. Despite the problems turning a program around, his kids have played hard, and pulled out a couple of wins. As often happens to Princeton, an injury at quarterback has really hurt their chances for more wins, but things are seemingly looking up at PHS.
If you will allow me a bit of philosophizin’, we put a lot of emphasis on football. Many would argue we put too much there, and I can support that at times.
Football is a complex game, with speed, strategy and grace certainly playing major roles, but to a great extent, it is won in what is called the trenches. Between the blocking of the offensive line and the rushing and blitzing and filling the holes of the defense, the game is usually won or lost.
There is a warrior side of football, a controlled aggression, that speaks to the hearts of most men. They like to hit. They like the feeling of beating their opponent, the fellow on the other side of the line. Certainly, we’ve seen that get out of line this year.
Football can feel real good sometimes, and sometimes it can feel real bad.
Obviously most guys don’t go on to play college or pro ball, but many have the opportunity to play in high school. I have talked with some several years after their playing days, and their eyes light up. They remember the good times, and they feel good.
I think all of our local teams have got some times they can hold on to, times that have felt real good. I think that’s good, and important for guys, despite what all of you mothers say who don’t want your sons hurt playing the game.

Schools moving forward

2006-10-31T07:38:00.000-05:00

I attended the Wayne County Schools Facilities Committee hearing last Monday at Rosewood High School. As a newspaperman, I was less than charmed. It was frankly a bit boring, with few really stirring moments. As a concerned citizen, I was thrilled.
In fairness, Rosewood is not where you are going to find the controversy that makes for stirring reading in the newspaper. While you can argue that Rosewood Middle School should be replaced, certainly the elementary and high school are in far better shape than many schools in the county, and so far, they are adequate to meet the student populations they are asked to serve.
What the committee heard last Monday was we are thrilled to see you here, coming together as a joint committee between commissioners and school board, ready to begin addressing the school facility issues of the county. We are ready to support a bond issue, if in your wisdom you feel that is the best way to go.
I was particularly moved by Stuart Kornegay’s statements during the hearing and I believe they represent the views of many across the county. As I pointed out in the article, he got the biggest applause of the night, at least one indication that he reflected the views of many in Rosewood.
Traditionally, when you try to sell a school bond issue, you try to address a need in every attendance area. You try to show every area that they have something to gain by supporting a bond issue.
As I suggested earlier, Rosewood really has nothing immediate to gain from the present proposal. Stuart and others rose to say this was not the important thing.
First, there was a recognition that Rosewood had received much in the past (thanks in no small part to Stuart’s father, Bobby Rex Kornegay, a former school board member). As Bobby Rex and others would point out, there were critical needs at Rosewood, and for the most part, they have been addressed.
There is nothing more divisive that the perception that one area is getting more than they deserve while your needs are not being addressed. By not putting in something for everyone, there is a danger that this bond issue could break down on that issue.
What the younger Mr. Kornegay said at the meeting, and what impressed me particularly, was there are other areas of the county hurting, their needs are critical, and they deserve the first share of any facilities construction money. He effectively said the “there is nothing in this for us” argument didn’t hold for him.
He effectively said that the committee should press forward with a bond issue, with confidence that Rosewood would vote for it. He said the funding of facilities needs was overdue, but with getting a means in place to address current needs, when their needs became critical, Rosewood would get theirs.
There were other voices there: a plea for no tax increase and suspicions about re-districting were aired, but those did not resonate. Stuart’s did.
If you want to be divisive, you can find fault with anything. You can find reasons to criticize, put in your preferences, and make sure everything completely suits you.
What is more important at this juncture is we get the ball rolling. There are critical facility issues in this county which have not been addressed for far too long. We can wallow in history and get pulled down by our past, and we can break it down by selfishly pulling it apart to make sure I get mine.
What I heard last Monday night was a determination by this county to do what needs to be done to meet the needs of our students. That voice, which I believe reflects the majority of Wayne County, will continue to resonate.
There will always be other voices. They will speak against any tax increase, for any purpose. They will say this proposal does not meet the needs as I see them and should be defeated unless I get mine.
I urge you to speak out. There needs to be a slam dunk. We need unity, not divisiveness. We need to move ahead.
Now is the time.

Horray for Princeton

2006-09-26T06:51:00.000-04:00

I have attended many a past Princeton Town Board meeting when the board acknowledged that something needed to be done about the town hall. Well, this week those complaints will end.
I am excited especially for the employees. They have put up with and adapted to working in an inadequate amount of space, leaky roofs, and a converted jail, just to name a few hindrances to being able to get their work done.
Town Clerk Marla Ashworth’s excitement was evident as she drove the moving van with town records and her husband drove a fork truck with the town safe down to the new building Saturday morning.
I know the police chief has complained about not having a secured, private room to talk with witnesses or to interview suspects.
The mayor has complained that the old town hall did not project a good image when talking with an economic development prospect.
I appreciate the pride Jean Haddock has shown in the new building as she has worked to assemble photos of all of the old mayors.
I haven’t been on a tour yet, but I look forward, along with I hope the rest of Princeton, to celebrating a building that represents the progressive leadership of the town.

On a somewhat related note, I am disturbed by the bickering between the school board and the county commissioners.
Princeton School is turning into a trailer town as more and more mobile classrooms are drug onto the campus.
While school officials will successfully argue that the students assigned to a mobile classroom don’t have a significantly affected classroom experience, hallways, cafeterias, and media centers, among other facilities, that are designed for smaller student populations are inadequate. And athletic facilities become trailer lots.
We could have some pride in the fact that there is a sign of growth in the area, and, we continue to have a Union School in the community.
I’m willing to give up those to providing an adequate facility to meet the education needs of the children of our community.
The bickering centers around a couple of points: the funding formula for building new school buildings and money for teacher supplements.
I will sound a lot like a parent here, but I tend to side with the schools on these two issues. I believe a lot of others do, too.
As it stands with the funding formula, Princeton will get a much-needed new elementary school four years from now. The school board is asking that lottery money be considered in the revenue mix, to move the new school up a year.
County Manager Rick Hester has vowed he will not sign off on a new budget that includes lottery money, as he does not know with the finagling by the state exactly how much money they are talking about.
As you want a conservative manager of our money, that’s a statement you would hope he would make, and I would normally say that’s a reasonable position.
I have pointed with pride to our schools as some of the good teachers from neighboring counties have chosen to move to Johnston County to teach. I have felt that better facilities and a good leadership team have made a difference, but I know with many a teacher it comes down to how much they will get in that paycheck.
Johnston County has been at a competitive advantage with teacher supplements in recent years, though they have lost teachers to higher paying Wake County, and continue to lose teachers to them. Now they are losing teachers back to adjacent counties as those counties continue to raise their supplements while Johnston does not.
As an astute friend points out, some of the bickering begins within the school board, as the non-partisan board is acting a lot like a partisan board. The board members who are suppose to drop political affiliations in order to unite to advocate for the students and staff of our schools are acting a lot like Democrats and Republicans.
Five years ago there was a good working relationship between the schools’ staff and county staff, and between the two boards. There is a natural tension, but they were able to work things out.
There needs to be some dialogue between the leadership of the two boards, and between the schools superintendent and the county manager. I believe we all have the same interests at heart, we just come at it a little differently. Maybe times have changed enough that we need to re-examine the funding formula, or come up with creative solutions.
There needs to be confidence that the county is doing all it can reasonably do to meet the schools needs. If the school board is convinced the county needs to do more, it’s up to the schools to convince the county board of that need.

Apology to Woodall

2006-09-12T09:54:00.000-04:00

A few weeks ago in this space I wrote a column on the dispute between the Town of Princeton and Johnston County over water customers. In that column I made some references and suggestions that a county commissioner may have used his position to influence decisions for his personal business interests. I regret those remarks.
I have talked with County Commissioner Ray Woodall and others about the situation since I wrote the column. I believe Commissioner Woodall made every effort to excuse himself from discussions and votes as a county commissioner as is proper, and as a candidate when his property was being considered for utility services, did not try to improperly influence that decision.
I apologize to Commissioner Woodall.

Thanks, Reggie

2006-09-12T09:53:00.000-04:00

It is with some sadness, and some joy, that I announce that Reggie Ponder, Jr. will be leaving the News Leader this week. He, his wife, Jane, and his son, Nathan, will be moving to Henderson, as he accepts a position with the Henderson Daily Dispatch.
I say with some joy, as I believe this is a good opportunity for Reggie. Several months ago we discussed his future, and we agreed that he should seek employment elsewhere, while continuing to work here. Let me be clear, I have been very happy with Reggie’s work, but he has heard a higher calling.
Reggie is an ordained elder in the United Methodist Church, and had gone on a leave of absence from the ministry before he accepted the job with the News Leader. He has wanted to return to the ministry on a part-time basis, and accepted an appointment in June, but working here and also serving there was not working out.
In July, though he was, as Reggie does, pushing himself very hard to try to get everything done and keep all his bases covered, we agreed that it was best for him to seek employment elsewhere. Again, this was not a reflection on his work here, as he continued to do more that was expected, but it was not the best situation for Reggie.
I am pleased for Reggie, as he is very familiar with the Henderson paper, having worked there a number of years ago in a similar capacity. As a larger newspaper with corporate ownership, they are able to offer benefits that we cannot. With a larger staff, his responsibilities will be narrower, whereas he is now on-call virtually 24-7. I believe this is a good move for Reggie.
I believe Reggie is a talented and gifted pastor. Like all of us, he has his faults and challenges, but I believe this appointment matches his gifts with the needs of the church. I know he works very hard to try to meet that church’s needs.
He told me recently how much he has enjoyed his time with us, and how it reminded him of his joy in working in this business. I believe that has been reflected with the quality of the work he has produced.
On a very personal note, Reggie has been a very special friend for four years. We have shared a lot over that time, and I will miss him.
He has also been a very special person with the News Leader.
When our, at the time, lone reporter, Greg Tobolski, passed away suddenly while on a family trip, I immediately called Reggie and asked if he could help us. That was nearly two years ago.
I believe in Divine Appointments, that some things happen, not out of coincidence, but because God wills them to happen. While I don’t believe that God willed Greg’s death, He used that for the benefit of the News Leader, Barry Merrill, and Reggie.
Reggie was uniquely gifted and was available to step in. I honestly don’t know how we would have produced a newspaper for several weeks if my friend, Reggie, had not stepped in to fill the gap. I give God the glory for that answered prayer.
Reggie was an important part of the transition that has happened over the past year and a half. We are evolving as a newspaper, and having a person with the talent and qualifications that he possesses was very important in our becoming the paper we are today. Having the right staff was not something I planned, but I do give someone else the credit for helping to make that happen.
I don’t want this to sound patronizing on our part, for it wasn’t, but I know that this time with the News Leader was important for Reggie. It helped him put a rudder on his ship during a difficult time of transition.
I don’t know if he will ever return to the ministry full-time, but I know he has significant gifts and talents for both the ministry and newspapers. For the near term, I am glad for him, for the ministry, and for newspapering, that he will be sharing those gifts in both the areas.
We wish Reggie, Jane and Nathan all the best, and we will miss them.

Black eye for Wayne County

2006-08-23T13:44:00.000-04:00

A few years ago, I was driving the family and was exceeding the speed limit. I looked over to the side of the road, and there was an officer with a radar unit.
My natural instinct would have been to hit the brakes and slow down, but for some reason I said to myself, “He’s got me, no use slowing down; if he wants to ticket me, come on.”
The officer turned on his blue lights, pulled me over, and asked me why I didn’t slow down when I saw him. He didn’t ticket me, and he clearly could have, but he embarrassed me.
As I told my daughters afterwards, most police officers want respect. I disrespected the officer by not slowing down when I saw him, and he stopped me as a result. While I could have rationalized I didn’t get ticketed, I could have avoided the whole incident had I just slowed down when I saw him.
Similarly, Wayne County Schools officials disrespected Wake County Superior Court Judge Howard Manning Jr. last week. They were singled out and embarrassed the county.
Goldsboro High School is one of the low performing schools across the state that could be closed, or the entire administration of the school changed by the judge. In a hearing last week, the judge heard from state and local school administrations about what was being done to improve education at these schools.
Six months ago Wayne County Commissioners were questioning school officials over what they were doing to change things at Goldsboro High School. Wayne Schools officials responded that they were not worried, that despite the threats, the judge was not going to close Goldsboro High School. It was all talk, and commissioners had nothing to worry about. The judge was not going to issue “a speeding ticket.”
There was no shame in making the list. Similar socio-economic communities across the state have similar problems with low achieving students. Wayne Schools officials are quick to point that out. They are not to blame for the problem.
Wayne was singled out, however, for not having a plan in place to improve schools. While other counties responded to “the threat,” Wayne did not.
As he should have, Judge Manning said another year to find a way to improve the school was too long to wait.
As they taught me in college a long time ago, management is a problem-solving process. If there is no problem, there is no real need for management. This is a management issue, and one where Wayne Schools didn’t make the grade.
There is a welcomed change in education philosophy. Schools no longer say we are going to present the material, do our best, and if the students don’t get it, that’s their fault. They are accepting the challenge to try to reach every student and help them be successful. They are coming up with individual strategies to embrace the “no child left behind” commitment.
Exasperated teachers may complain, with justification, that the idea is not practical, but I salute their work to achieve the goal, and I know fewer students are left behind today.
To be sure, bringing test scores up at Goldsboro High School is not going to be easy, and I am convinced that those in the administration at the school are trying their best. It is going to take some extra-ordinary efforts to turn things around.
I am very interested, and I think Wayne Schools officials ought to be very interested, in what Durham Hillside is doing, a plan which was praised, as I understand. They should be interested in what others are doing to improve their low-performing schools, and I would be copying others’ ideas.
As we have complained before, the leadership of Wayne County Schools have never won accolades for their innovative approaches to improving education in Wayne County. At times, it seems that they are more concerned about defending what they are doing rather than looking around at other successful school systems and emulating them.
It’s rather like a student who is struggling in a class, and rather than ask the teacher for some extra help, he’s too proud.
Wayne Schools officials can say they were right, that the judge didn’t close down the school, but in my grading book, they got a failing grade. They should do better.

Speaking of grades, I don’t know that we can give State Senator John Kerr an “A”, since he is not officially our representative, but maybe we can give him a “Gold Star.” (You’re old enough to remember when they gave those out in school, aren’t you, John?)
My friend, Sen. Kerr, called last week to announce that Eureka was getting nearly a million dollars to help with their sewer problems. John has lots of friends today in Eureka. Too bad they can’t vote for him.
John got some help to Eureka from the state. Eureka can’t solve its problems on its own, and as John was quick to point out last week, this doesn’t solve their problems, but they are a million dollars closer to a solution.
Maybe ten years ago I was talking about a particular state legislator with a town official in another area. “Most any legislator will listen to you when you call them asking for help. (That legislator) will call you back a week later to tell you what he has done to try to address your problems.”
Senator Kerr has consistently impressed this newspaper with his getting things done for people who need help, particularly helping towns with infrastructure issues. Even if they are people outside his senatorial district.
I have to question why the people elected to represent us are not effective in getting us help?

Cheap shot at Princeton

2006-08-18T16:03:00.000-04:00

My friend, Scott Bolejac with The Herald, took what I believe to be a Cheap Shot at Princeton in his Friday editorial.
He is taking the politically popular route, not what is best for the county.
Princeton has built and maintained a water system that has served people outside the town for twenty years. They tied on and paid the bills because they wanted water, not because they had to. They have benefitted from having water available, and others will continue to benefit. It benefits the county for towns to extend water and sewer beyond their corporate limits to serve people they can, not just town taxpayers.
Princeton has discontinued wells, as it was not cost efficient with the high mineral content, and is now buying their water from the county. They are charging, as most towns do, the cost for delivering the water through their system. When they have to finance improvements, they often do with developer money paying the bills. When faced with big bills for maintenance or improvement, they seek grants, and what they can't finance with grants, they often finance with bond issues. The bond people often tell the towns how much they will have to charge each customer on their system to pay off the bond. The fewer number of customers, the more each customer has to pay. Princeton taxpayers, I assure you, Scott, are not being subsidized from water rates as you suggest. Pick up the phone and call Keith Peedin. Many auditors chastise town boards for not charging enough for water and sewer, and passing some of their water costs on to taxpayers. I've never heard them chastised by auditors for charging too much for water. By taxpayers and rate payers, always, but by people in charge of town's making responsible financial decisions, never.
One has to question why a county commissioner, when he built a subdivision along the Princeton water line, suddenly got county blessings for the people in his development to get lower water rates than their neighbors. Was it Princeton's water line, or was it the county taking it back to the benefit of a county commissioner? When the county commissioners' neighbors started complaining, suddenly it wasn't Princeton's line after all. Wasn't it the Princeton-Pine Level Development Corporation that built the line? To serve the interests of the two towns? Or was it for the benefit of the re-election of a county commissioner?

Cincinnati confessions

2006-08-16T07:36:00.000-04:00

Twenty-four years ago, Marilyn and I moved to eastern North Carolina from Cincinnati with a nine month-old baby. After heading back for one last load of furniture, we had not been back in all those years.
Last week, we took off for four days, with that baby who has grown up, and her sister. Marilyn and I went back to what had been home for these newlyweds for five years.
One reason we had not been back was we didn’t really have close friends in Cincy. One couple we really liked, our next-door neighbors, went through a divorce, and we stayed in contact with the wife, but over the years, we lost contact with her.
That last load of furniture was another reason. It was a long road, by myself, with my wife and daughter back home. I drove there, stayed the night with the neighbor, got up the next day, probably packed until noon, and headed out. I think it was a 12-hour trip, and being tired from packing didn’t help, so by the time I made it to the new home around midnight, I was frazzled. Memories of the trip lingered.
Last summer I went with a couple of other guys to Purdue University, just north of Indianapolis. We made the trip in a day, and I was pleasantly surprised how quickly we made it to Cincinnati. The roads are greatly improved.
Wednesday morning we set out about 7:30 a.m., and we had no problems at all on the way. Mapquest sent us down some roads off the interstates in Ohio, but as I trust Mapquest, I stayed on their plotted route. Marilyn gave me a break in the middle from driving, and we had no real traffic congestion the whole way. There was about a twenty mile stretch of two lane road, but few cars along the way.
We arrived not too tired around 6 p.m., and missing the rush hour traffic of the city. We checked into our Holiday Inn, and went for one of the important parts of our trip, maybe a quarter mile down the road. We had five ways and a cheese coneys at Skyline Chili. Cincinnati chili is unique, unduplicated as I understand. The five way (Marilyn help me) is spaghetti, chili, red kidney beans, onions, and cheese with a side of oyster crackers. The actual chili is closest to what we call hot dog chili, a ground beef with a gravy or sauce, with a touch of sweetness. Cheese coneys are hot dogs, with Cincinnati chili and a mountain of grated cheese.
This was a newer section of Cincinnati that we were unfamiliar with, but regional shopping centers have sprung up all over the city, with Skyline and other chain stores. If you go to Cincy, you won’t have any trouble finding a Skyline or Gold Star Chili, their competitor.
(Marilyn and I relished the taste of our past, but our girls were scratching their heads about what we thought was so special.)
I had gone online before we left and bought Cincinnati Reds tickets, for an afternoon game Thursday, against the St. Louis Cardinals. As the series was for the lead in the National League Central Division, it was very significant, and we saw several fans at the hotel and on the street decked out in their St. Louis garb.
After dinner Wednesday, I went downstairs to the van to listen to the radio broadcast, as I had listened to so many when we lived there. Marty Brennamen is still the main broadcaster. In a very exciting game, the Reds got a homer in the bottom of the ninth to win, and I got to hear Marty’s famous “And this one belongs to the Reds.” That helped make the visit special to me. (The Reds were probably a lot of what this trip was about for me, and the girls all seemed to enjoy it, but not as much as me.)
Thursday we left around 9 a.m. for downtown, to do some shopping and get a bite of breakfast. There are a series of downtown stores connected by skywalks, and indoor malls.
We went to the “I Love Cincinnati” store, with loads of souvenirs, photos, etc. There are a number of parking garages downtown, but many had filled with the afternoon game, even though we were getting there what we thought was early. We parked two blocks from the shopping, and the ballpark is just five more blocks away. (It looks like they are putting in parking at the ballpark.)
We picked up Reds T-shirts at stores at the local mall the night before, and got hats from a street vendor outside the ballpark. If you are tight with a buck, I recommend that.
It was $1 hot dog day at the ballpark, so we got a couple of dogs apiece. And they were great hot dogs, not dried up or shriveled, but healthy sized, hot and just right. We topped it off with an ice cream cone about the sixth inning. Drinks and other food was not a bargain, but what do you expect. It was a perfect day to watch a game, too.
I wish I could say it was a great game, and if the Reds had won it would have been, but it was competitive, though Cincy’s offense was off that day. The new Great American Ballpark is beautiful with lots of style, and it offers that close to the field feeling.
That night we tried to take the girls to a nice restaurant we had gone to when we lived there, but it had changed hands for the third time in two years, and we didn’t have the guts to give the new owners a shot. There was another restaurant, a very nice restaurant, just across the street from the aformentioned Rookwood Pottery, The Celestial. It’s on Mt. Adams, very near downtown and the Ohio River. We got there about 7, actually a little early to enjoy the very impressive view of the lights of the city, but the food was outstanding. (The girls were impressed by the prices and said they said it was probably their best dinner ever. There was a $64 entree on the menu, which Kelly joked about. I told her that was for four.) It may have been my most expensive meal, too.
Friday we visited places where we had lived and worked. Marilyn worked for most of the time we were there in the Crosley Building, where Crosley refrigerators had been built many years before. The newspaper company she knew had moved out not too many years after we left, and today the ten story building stands vacant, with broken windows. It was a sad sight. The big GE plant is still going strong, apparently.
We went north to Fairfield, where we had lived for a couple of years and I had worked for a weekly newspaper, to Hamilton where I worked for the daily newspaper, and to West Chester, where we built a house. There were a few familiar landmarks, an old high school that is now a middle school and the GM Fisher Body plant now closed and partially reopened to a renter or two. Where some familiar stores were, other stores have gone in, and some have closed. There was a lot of new construction in areas I’m sure were undeveloped. Some of the older row houses had Mexican stores near. Not unlike when we were there, there were apparently still many German, Italian, Irish and Polish families in the area.
As you probably understand, food is important to us, and we stopped at another important landmark food place, Chester’s Pizza in Hamilton. They had four locations at one time, but now just the one survives, as good as ever. It is take out only, so we ate in the van, but it was evident, with so many other businesses coming and going, why they had lasted over fifty years.
The new development where we had built our home has matured. I suspect the average age of the homeowners may be 20 years higher, though there was a basketball goal outside our home. I told Marilyn, and I believe it, that we would not recognize the inside of our home. Though the house number directed us, the outside was hard to recognize.
Someone said you can never go home again. This didn’t look or feel like home, it was in so many ways unfamiliar.
We found the hospital where Ashley was born, went in Union Terminal, home to the city’s museum district, and tried to go by, as we were driving near, the world famous zoo, signs misdirected and we could not find it.
Saturday we visited the Serpent Mound, a famous archeology site, about a thousand years old, chronicling native Americans from that time. Kelly is an archeology student, so it was important to her, and if you like this sort of thing, it’s probably worth a side trip. Then we headed home to help get out this paper.
Cincinnati has great restaurants, and many attractions including Kings Island amusement park and something called the Purple People Mover Bridge Climb we talked about, and the now very hot Cincinnati Bengals NFL team, as well as the University of Cincinnati, Xavier University, and much more.
If you have roots there, and I think we could claim some, it is a meaningful place. Even if you don’t, Cincinnati has a rich history, great diversity of cultures, wonderful entertainment opportunities, and did I mention great food!

Miami Vice

2006-08-03T19:17:00.000-04:00

Not to particularly disagree with our reviewer, but....
Miami Vice was not a movie that you can spend a lot of time analyzing, but if you just let it flow over you....
One of the best parts of the original series was the cool cars, and the movie opens with a fabulous Ferrari. The action is plenty exciting, and Li Gong as Isabella is hot. It's a fun two hours.
What did you think?

Asleep on the watch

2006-08-03T14:35:00.000-04:00

As most any day on US 70 will attest, most of us are tempted to exceed the speed limit if we believe we won’t get caught. Not only will most of us speed, some will take it to truly dangerous levels. Even after law officers step up enforcement for a week or two, it doesn’t take long for the feet to get leaden again.
Similarly our legislators seemed righteous in trying to slow down their bent for accepting gifts and favors from lobbyists after a public outcry. After things quieted down, they slipped out of Raleigh last week after passing what former Superior Court Judge and chairman of the NC Board of Ethics Robert Farmer described as “pretend ethics.”
I accept, along with my colleagues in the media, the responsibility for not making sure that the legislature felt the pressure to pass meaningful legislation. I pledge, and call on my colleagues to pledge, to let legislators know that what they have done is unacceptable.
The NC Press Association is particularly incensed by the arrogance of the legislature in saying that any ethics violation under investigation won’t be publicly discussed. You don’t have a right to know about any ethics complaint until and unless their fellow legislators who sit on the legislature’s ethics committee impose sanctions. The NCPA Legal Counsel credits the Democratic Party leadership with crafting this protection for the legislators.
Particularly galling to me is the way in which the legislation came to the floor. Instead of legislation which is debated in committee and comes to the floor with arguments for and against, the Democratic Party leadership meets behind closed doors and puts together something and then schedules it for an immediate vote, all as legislators are weary and ready for adjournment on the last days of the session. That has been the way the legislature has done business with controversial measures for too many years.
Perhaps most egregious is their unwillingness to have a truly independent voice looking over their shoulder. They want their friends looking out for them, as if that has worked in the past.
They aren’t acting like a legislature who the press and public have put on notice. It sounds more like business as usual; the legislature continuing to do what they darn well please.
House Speaker Jim Black, a Democrat, has been at the center of much of the ethics controversy. His unpaid political director wined and dined lawmakers while collecting monies from her real (and publicly undisclosed) boss, a major lottery vendor. The passage of the lottery, while key objectors were away and who didn’t bother to log in to oppose, smacks of another deal worked out behind closed doors, and suggests lottery money greased some consciences.
Contributions solicited by Black were directed to others, with names written in on the checks by him. A Republican, Michael Decker, switched parties to support Black and keep him as speaker. Black is said to have funneled campaign funds to Decker, who later used campaign money to go to Florida to pick up a car, also bought with campaign money.
Trips, liquor, ACC basketball tickets, golf outings and more are on the gift lists that lobbyists provide our legislators, not to mention the money that flows to our politicians. While there is recognition that the temptations are too great to resist, the legislation which lawmakers enacted had too many loopholes. There are already suggestions that lawmakers aren’t disclosing what they are getting from lobbyists.
Attorney General Roy Cooper, in a letter in May, said in the past five years prosecutors and SBI agents had investigated 350 public corruption cases. He complained that a lack of teeth in enabling legislation hinders further prosecutions and helps hide wrongdoing. He calls for change to give prosecutors the right to call for grand juries, penalties for lying to SBI agents, and greater financial disclosure requirements for those in government.
He goes on to say in advocating for ethics reform, “corruption can happen when powerful public officials have complete control without having to answer tough questions.”
It’s a long time before the legislature goes back into session, but we need to start calling our legislators to account for their actions now. They are going to be asking for our votes; we have a right to ask for their answers to our tough questions.
Let’s be clear: while the Democratic Party leadership may have to claim authorship for what did or didn’t pass in the legislature, the final legislation passed 111-2. The steps outside the legislature weren’t filled with Republican voices protesting what passed. They have to accept the record of what they voted for.
If we let them know that what passed doesn’t pass for ethics legislation, maybe we can help government clean up, letting them know we really are watching what they do and will vote accordingly. And we’re not asleep on the watch.

Stuck in the '70s

2006-07-20T11:35:00.000-04:00

There was a trivia challenge show on over the weekend that one of my daughters was watching on VH1. The show went on for hours and hours, some sort of marathon challenge. I watched a few minutes, while she seemed to be watching all weekend.
When I came back from dinner last night to continue working on the paper, our newest reporter was waiting for a board meeting to reconvene in open session, watching Jeopardy in our break room. I like Jeopardy, too. She volunteered that she had once tried out for the show.
One of our earliest family memories was the WoWo tape. It seems we had taped a concert off HBO not long after we moved to North Carolina. It was a 4th of July concert by the singing duo of Hall and Oates. Their signature song was “Maneater,” with resounding bass guitar in the chorus, followed by the words, “Wo Wo, here she comes.” My very young daughter at the time gave the tape the name “WoWo.” Great concert, by the way.
I remember very well record players with spindles that you put on to play 45’s. I remember 33’s of course, but I also remember well 78’s. Mom had lots of 78’s when I was young. I got to know Glenn Miller and The Dorseys through those 78’s. It may have been Mom’s music, but I knew it, too, and we had a common bond.
As the 78’s wore out, she bought a bunch of Ray Coniff Singers records. They were a lot of contemporary renderings of older songs. They struck a chord with Mom. They were beautiful recordings.
My daughter, Ashley, has been a fan of The Police, and of course, Sting, for many years. Her sister, Kelly, just came back from an archaeological field trip in Peru, but they took in a lot of the contemporary culture while there. She noted that the Peruvians play a lot of The Police. They broke up twenty years ago!
There are some interesting common chords here. A lot of it, as I have presented, is around music, though as game stores profit today, we have common themes in TV shows and movies.
Have you every thought about why concerts are so popular? I have certainly been to my share over the years. We obviously go to hear a particular artist or group that we like. There’s something else beyond that. We like being with a group that shares our like for that group.
It’s kinda like going to a UNC football game. If you’re weird enough to like UNC, you want to be surrounded by weird people like you so you don’t stick out of the crowd. (Just kidding, Joey and Keith and David and Steve and the rest of you, you...well you know what you are.)
What I’m trying to say is we like our values affirmed. When we cheer for The Police or the Tar Heels, we like the guy or gal next to us to say, “Yeah.”
I think most of us treasure our memories. Like they said about Norman Rockwell’s illustrations, most of us remember all of the good, and we minimize the negatives. It never really was as good as we remember.

We’re planning a trip to Cincinnati, though I’m not sure we’ll ever get there. We want to show Ashley where she was born. We’ve been trying to call our old next door neighbor that we lost contact with ten years ago or so. We can’t find if she is still living in the old house. She had gotten divorced, and may have remarried and moved somewhere, but we can’t tell.
I’m afraid we will go back and look for places we used to go when we lived there and not be able to find them because they will be gone. Surely Skyline Chili is still there, even though Riverfront Stadium is gone. Most of the places we will look for, I’m afraid, won’t say “Yeah,” when we search for them.
I guess it’s why people in Goldsboro are so desperate to hold on to the old Paramount.
Yes, the Reds are still in Cincinnati, but the (my) Big Red Machine is but a distant memory. There’s a Reds museum for guys like me, and a place for us to take our kids to show them our memories. I guess that’s what museums are for.
Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio? And Johnny Bench?

Inside Man

2006-07-09T21:55:00.000-04:00

Marilyn and I went to see Inside Man Wednesday night at a $1.50 theater. I think it's the first Spike Lee film I have seen. It wasn't the best movie I have seen, but it was good. There were a lot of comments about racial attitudes. There were no bad guys or good guys. People may have responded the "right" way in one circumstance, and the "wrong" way in another. My favorite line is Denzel Washington's. After a Sikh is roughed up by police, he complains about the prejudices against him. Denzel pops off, "Bet you don't have trouble getting a cab."
One of the things I liked was the main bad guy (Clive Owen) asking a black kid about his video game. The overly violent game with questionable values draws a response fromm Owen that he needs to talk to the kids father about what he is allowing him to play.
Those of you who watched the movie, what did you think?

Slow drive thru

2006-07-09T21:42:00.000-04:00

After the Mudcats game Marilyn and I stopped to get her a soft drink at the McDonald's drive-thru at Catch Me Eye. I didn't time it, but I know it took us 15 minutes to get through the drive-thru at 11:30 p.m. to get a soft drink. How could it take that long?

Mudcats Fireworks

2006-07-09T21:35:00.000-04:00

Marilyn and I went to see the Mudcats game on Monday, July 3rd. The game was good, the crew entertaining. The fireworks were spectacular though. The concession crew got everything cleaned up after the game, and then went down on the field to lay down in the grass to watch the fireworks. They had the right idea. Our necks got tired straining to watch the fireworks.

Weighing in on housing issue

2006-07-03T11:02:00.000-04:00

We got an unsigned letter in the other day (Princeton) responding to our series on rental property (http://www.princetonleadernow.com/062106/rent3.html). As is our policy, we are not publishing the letter, because it is unsigned, but I think the writer raises some good points.
As they point out, many younger people in today’s economy can’t afford to buy a home, and many older people can’t. While there was discussion of renters who can destroy property and not be the type of people you want to live around, many renters are good people, good neighbors and good citizens. Still, some are clearly not.
I don’t believe anyone is saying we don’t need rental property or renters in Princeton. The experts say we have too many older, not well maintained, rental houses in town, owned by absentee owners.
Those are very troubling parts of that equation. Too many means there is a glut of properties available, meaning it will be tough to get a good rental income from them. Older homes often mean high maintenance costs, and often that means that leaky roofs or busted screens or worse go unfixed for long periods, adding to the problems. Absentee owners are often only concerned about their rent check, not investing more money in their property.
There’s nothing wrong with some. Some older homes make good rentals. Some landlords spend a lot of time and money keeping their properties up. Some absentee owners are good landlords. In every case, clearly, some are not. And in too many cases around Princeton.
One innovative way to turn things around is to offer incentives to good perspective buyers for former rental property. Owner-occupants are more likely to make improvements in properties.
One way is to aggressively pursue the minimum housing ordinance, and perhaps increase the standards. One can argue that most residents would never accept living conditions which the current standards call for. This is hard and controversial.
Another, which some have suggested, is licensure for rental agents/owners with three or more rental properties. Again, this is controversial, but it may be the most practical of all solutions. You have virtually no control over renters, but you can put some limits on landlords.
The town board has had the good sense to address important issues, rather than just wringing their hands because they were tough or would cost some money to address. This issue could bring Princeton into a death spiral. There are other examples across eastern North Carolina.
It’s easier to say we don’t know how to handle it, and less costly. Not addressing it is making a decision to kill the town.

As I was reflecting on that letter, the writer jumped to some assumptions and accused us of making some rash judgments (which were not borne out by the articles). We all have our triggers and I am not immune.
I was a bit put off by the Princeton Town Board’s lack of guts in putting off merit increases for town employees in favor of not increasing taxes. That hit two of my triggers.
I have a responsibility to my employees to pay them and fairly compensate them. If I cannot do that, I risk losing them. To tell them I can’t pay them more because I can’t afford it is one thing. When I don’t have the guts enough to ask my customers to pay more for the good product we are producing, that’s another.
Some will argue that any tax is bad, any fees are bad, and virtually no one will tell you they want to pay more for this newspaper or for taxes or for water or sewer fees. That doesn’t absolve the town board or me of our responsibility to our employees. Anyone who has employees will tell you it’s a lot cheaper to reward good employees than to hire and train new ones.
I have an even greater responsibility to those employees who have done a better job. I particularly need to reward them if I want to keep them. To say we will do across-the-board increases and no merit increases really bangs on that other trigger. You tend to lose the employees who are good and can find work elsewhere, and keep the ones who can’t find a good job (with regular increases). I could live with some merit increases but no across-the-board increases, but it’s easier to say we will give everyone a little raise.
I might be tempted to say gutless.

A political posture in Pikeville

2006-07-03T10:35:00.000-04:00

It would be easy to applaud the speech by Pikeville Assistant Town Clerk Sherry McAllister. Someone on the inside, a town employee, blowing the whistle on her bosses. She says the board members are to blame for raising water and sewer rates because they are not making the town staff strictly adhere to town billing policies. It’s not the cost of operating the water and sewer departments that is to blame for the increase, it’s the town board’s giving favors out. Then she offers a petition with 300 signatures saying the town should not increase their rates.
Sounds like a Fourth of July flag-waver to me. If we only had a hundred more like her.
Sorry, but it sounds more like grand-standing than good government to me.
There are too many in the town who want to find snakes and bugs under rocks for my taste, and they feed on things like this. “Aha! I told you that things were wrong, twenty years ago, and this just proves it.”
OK, people had their utilities turned on without posting a deposit. The town worked with some people who had gotten behind on paying their utility bills. Did it follow the letter of the law? Are we feeding everybody out of the same spoon? “Aha!”
Show me some people who are stuffing big bags of money at the town hall and taking it home. Show me some people who are making big bags of money because of the favoritism shown by the town staff.
There’s no huge money trail to follow here, or even a little money trail. We are talking about people trying to work with people.
It reminds me of a town board discussion one time about not cutting off utilities on Friday, because they could not make payment until Monday and would have their water or utilities off all weekend. You could cut it off on Monday or Thursday, but not Friday. Sure, they hadn’t paid their utility bill, but which makes more sense as a compassionate person.
Ms. McAllister makes this Grand Canyon leap and says if everything had been done completely properly, it MIGHT have prevented the town from having to raise sewer rates. If it doesn’t rain for six months they might not have to, either, but we know it’s going to rain and we know the billing exceptions won’t come close to balancing water and sewer revenues and expenses.
What she and Commissioner Johnny Weaver are saying is we are on the side of those who want to believe something is wrong in town, and who don’t want to pay higher bills because something is wrong.
There is something to be said for cleaning up practices like making exceptions on deposits, and publicly taking exceptions on paying off utility bills before the board. Maybe it gives some of the old timers something less to try to scrutinize.

Speaking of Commissioner Weaver, he is convinced that in a number of cases the town has been violating state laws, often with the blessing of the town attorney.
I have been to a couple of board meetings where he has spoken and I have to admit that some of his statements make good sense to me. We have as a newspaper dutifully investigated charges which he has levied against the town. Unfortunately, we can’t justify them.
The most recent is the office built for the new town administrator was a violation of the law. The $1500 spent may have offended Mr. Weaver because he didn’t personally approve it, but it clearly wasn’t illegal, or a misappropriation of funds. The money was there for it in the budget, and was needed to be used for that.
It would make for a good headline, too. Town commissioner uncovers illegal acts by town board and town staff. Unfortunately, the facts don’t back it up.
I guess when the facts don’t bear you out, you make up things. Lately we understand that some claim the area newspapers won’t publish the truth about the town, only what the town wants put out. I guess we didn’t really publish that story last week.
Maybe they’ll be saying that the new office caused water and sewer rates to go up. Aha!

Congratulations, Caniacs

2006-06-21T19:21:00.000-04:00

I turned on the TV at the office Monday night as the finals of the Stanley Cup were being played. Honestly, I peeked in a few times when the roar got loud. As I had finished most of my other newspaper tasks, I settled in to watch the final few minutes. I don’t think I watched any other match they played all season, so I am definitely not a Caniac.
David Williams, on the other hand, was rising and falling with the fortunes of the ‘Canes as he was fixed in front of his set (he had gotten his work done, pretty much, on the paper earlier in the day, so he could enjoy the match). David has been regularly watching and proudly displaying his Hurricanes flag from his vehicle.
As excited as David is about the ‘Canes, I don’t think he’s the hockey fan that the late Greg Tobolski was. Greg attended a number of Hurricanes matches, dating from when they played in Greensboro. I should say that Greg attended a number of Philadelphia Flyers games that were played locally, and he may have seen a few other teams, but he primarily went to see Philly and to proudly wear his Flyers jacket.
Greg even got me to a Hurricanes match a few years ago. I have to admit that I enjoyed the match. I don’t remember whether Carolina won or not, but it was a good day.
I am reminded of my years in Cincinnati, going back close to 30 years ago now. I had pulled for the Cincinnati Reds before moving there, and they had had a couple of World Series winning teams in the 1970’s, with Pete Rose, Joe Morgan, Johnny Bench, and George Foster, managed by Sparky Anderson. Some say they were among the best teams ever (I would make that argument).
I remember commemorative coffee cups and glasses in abundance celebrating the Reds’ World Series wins. There probably were bumper stickers around. We moved there as the fortunes of the team began to slip some, but there were still plenty of us who went to several games during the year, and who regularly listened to the games on the radio.
For good or bad, there is a certain element of civic pride that rides with the team. I think it’s often overstated, but there is also the economic impact of a winning franchise. There are people who attend a match who drive or fly in, and maybe stay overnight, and eat and drink before and after. They also help pay for the facility by buying a ticket, parking, and buying concessions once inside.
In this age of free agency in sports, there is an element of buying the best players around so that you can put on a winning team (or hockey club, as they say). In hockey, that is even more of an undertaking, as I think most of the NHL teams are losing money. I don’t think Carolina has made a profit since moving here, though they keep talking about moving in the right direction and the expectation of making a profit in the next year or two. I don’t think one owns a hockey franchise in order to make money.
While there are some baseball and football franchises which make money, again, a product of this time of free agency is many do not. I’m not against the players making money, and competitive owners, wanting to win, bid up the price of good players. Still, you have to wonder how long this can last.
It will last for a while, for our economy is an engine that builds massive fortunes. Paying the bills for a hockey franchise is a way that one can put back into the community, and in this case, take pride in putting a winner on the ice.
It’s much the same as when an alumnus puts into the athletic facilities of his alma mater to help them recruit better players so they might have a better team the next season.
It seems to be a lot of effort and money so some of us can stand up and scream “We are the Champions!” On Monday, a lot of people around here were screaming.

Speaking of civic pride, I haven’t been out to the new park in Princeton, but I plan to go out Saturday for the celebration. I hope we have a good weather and a good turnout.
I believe we have a facility that we can be proud of. A lot of people deserve credit for this, starting with the Floors Family, who gave the land. Without their vision, I suspect a lot of people would still be talking about a park, rather than using one this Saturday.
Many on the town staff were a part of this effort, as grants from a variety of sources were applied for and some were awarded, and as with most grants, there had to be some money raised locally. Many contributed to that effort. I appreciate those who helped make this a reality.
There is more to be done, and taxpayers won’t be asked to pay the majority of the bill. The county is helping, and we can say that tax money is contributing, but many good people will help, as they should.
Saturday is a time to step back and celebrate how far we have come. It has been a major step for Princeton, and many should be congratulated.

I did get over to the Pikeville Veteran’s Memorial celebration. I was bowled over with how well everything was organized and how well the ceremonies went. Dennis Lewis and his team are to be congratulated.
For many years the old school was the hub of the community, and it seems that time is coming back, as when there are events that bring us together as community , they will happen at the school.
It gets frustrating at times that we can’t get some things done sooner, but that is part of having to work with the limited budgets that towns have. With patience and over time, great things and major projects can be accomplished, as Pikeville has done.
The community has a lot to be proud of, there.

Put some sides on my plate

2006-06-03T23:48:00.000-04:00

There's a calendar that Marilyn put up in the bathroom with inspirational sayings on it. The May calendar has been preaching to me, "Our life is frittered away by detail...simplify, simplify." That's attributed to Henry David Thoreau.
I don't know if Marilyn picked out that calendar with that particular message in mind, but it sure sounds like her. She preaches to me frequently about how I have too many things on my plate. I can't do all I have in front of me and do it well. I need to start saying "no."
That's not particularly my nature, hence the need to hear that. I am too quick to say yes to things, and I'm not a great delegator. A lot of things end up as seeming my responsibility, and sometimes I don't put the effort in them they deserve.
I have several other things I am currently involved in, beyond our newspapers. I work with United Methodist Men in eastern North Carolina, I help with the church's newspaper for that area, and I work with the local library board. I can't say that any of the three require twenty hours a week, but they do add up.
We've got a big United Methodist Men weekend coming up, and there is a lot that needs to be done. I had several other things that were also pressing me.
I sometimes sense God's hand in all of this, sometimes hearing my prayers, sometimes hearing the prayers I should have said.
Well, as I was heading off to Raleigh to a meeting I really didn't need to go to, but felt like I should, I called the fellow who was in charge. We were planning an event for August, and really should have been a month further along on it. Given several questions that had arisen, I had asked him to survey the others involved to see if they felt we should move forward or not. He had not gotten back to me, and I assumed no news was good news, let's go forward. But I felt this nudge to just check with him.
Well, it turned out that there had been some others that felt it would be best to wait. So I pulled off the side of the road, tied up the loose ends of the conversation, and headed back home as I needed to.
The next day I was preparing to go to Raleigh to work on the church newspaper. The fellow that I work with on it, who works in Raleigh, suggested that he come to my office to go over the paper. That also was an answer to prayer.
There was a newspaper work thing recently, some things I had been doing. We decided to re-assign some of that to one of our other staffers. That wasn't a conscious decision I had been working on, just something that sort of happened. It made a lot of sense, though.
The difficulty with having a lot of things on your plate is making sure you give the things that are really important the attention they deserve, and you don't get bogged down with things that are really not that important.
I clearly have trouble making that distinction, but I don't want to shy away from something I really should be doing by saying I don't have time. I am willing to maybe not do some things I should as well as I should (is that selfish pride?) rather than not do them. I am going to try to do everything well, but sometimes I won't get there.
As I am finding out, I can delegate some things to get them done. That is hard for me, and I have a hard time accepting that some of those delegated to will do it differently that I would do it. That's exactly what I need to accept, though. Often, it will get done better than I could do it, because they will put more time in it than I could have.

We have been sliding into a web page for the newspaper over recent months. That has been a major undertaking for us, and my wife, Marilyn, has been the guiding force for that. I appreciate her dedication in learning all that it requires to get this done, and her dedication to get it updated on a timely basis.
My younger daughter, Kelly, has been helping us out in the office and she has been helping out on the web page. She's offered several ideas which we believe will improve it over the next few weeks.