Category: Opinion

Public Hearings The City Council held the second of two mandated public hearings regarding Community Development Block Grants for infrastructure improvements. Although the City Council announces and holds public hearings the public appears uninterested or disinterested in providing input even when the city is going to apply for taxpayers’ money (a grant). There were two separate projects the Council sought the publics’ input. One project is for new sewer lines and the other is for improved fresh water lines. Both …

Water District Board The Water District Board was not the beginning of the meeting it is where this review of the meeting will begin. The published agenda contained only a place holder for the Water District Board’s portion of the meeting. The “head” engineer was not in attendance. The stand-in for the engineer had no written report and spoke only from his notes. Is this how the board of any American public corporation would do business especially regarding its largest …

Public Hearings City Council had two public hearings on their agenda. The first public hearing involved the rezoning of seven individual properties; 1.7 acres of land located in the south-east quadrant of the intersection of US 1 and NC 39. In January the Council held a public hearing regarding the rezoning of .43 of an acre in the same location. Nothing was said during either rezoning hearings to give a hint why the land needed to be re-zone to B4 …

Editors note:  This letter, as I understand it, was sent to Vance County Public Schools from an anonymous person in regards to the pending charter school application for Kerr-Vance Academy.   We received it as a PDF document, which I will attach.  I have also attempted to paste the text below, however there may be a few spelling and grammatical  errors created in the conversion so please refer to the PDF version as well.  Vance County Schools Superintendent Gregory has forwarded …

I arrived here in l993 and from my position as Pastor of one of the downtown churches, I became involved in a great number of civic activities. In all my years in Vance County I have not met anyone who worked harder or worked longer, had more vision and passion, who gave more to this community than Mr. Sam Watkins. Mr. Watkins walked and talked with politicians, bankers, and community leaders, but he was not opposed to getting out and …

I assumed that the special called meeting of the commissioners would last no more than fifteen minutes since the two topics had already been settled in committee meetings. Twenty minutes into the meeting I realized my assumption was grossly incorrect. Sadly, there is no public recording of the meeting because of my assumption. The agreement to sell the house was swiftly approved. The Water Board was one commissioner against the politically connected power base and silent commissioners. Neighborhood Stabilization House …

The Vance County Commissioners’ annual Planning retreat was held on Thursday January 23, 2014 at the Glass House. Nice view of the lake and would be better place in the summer time. The Peanut Gallery was across the room from the fireplace with its big roaring fire. The fire was nice to look at although it provided no heat to the Peanut Gallery. A housekeeping notes for those who choose to listen to the recording. Changing batteries in the microphone …

As a life-long North Carolinian, I understand the importance of the hunting heritage in our state. I appreciate the tradition of fair chase. Upon hearing that the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission is trying to open up baiting for bears through a proposed regulation, I found myself at odds with the state that I have loved for so long. There is no chase, there is no skill, and there is no sport. If baiting were allowed in our state, it …

The first city council meeting of 2014 was recorded and posted on HomeInHenderson (HiH).  Many HiH readers have expressed an interest in listening to city council meetings in their leisure as they do with the Board of Commissioners’ meetings.  Listeners of county meetings will notice a difference in the council meetings; a difference evident in the meeting packets posted on HiH.  The format of the city council meeting is more formal, less reliant on one individual, and responsive to citizen …

Appearance Commission Recognition of Adopt a highway Terri Hedrick’s presentation of awards was not the first appointment of the meeting although listed first.  Ms. Hedrick’s presentation was the highlight of the first meeting of the Board of Commissioners for 2014; a good start for another year of commissioners’ meetings.  Ms. Hedrick introduced and recognized all those who volunteer their time and effort to adopt a highway and try to keep that roadway clean and neat.  Many honorees were absent; those …

The economic theory that if you give corporations more money, they will hire more people, invest in research,  and open more stores continues to be a myth.  The Trickle down politics of the Republican Party since Reagan forward has not happened, is not happening, and will not happen. The News and Observer from Raleigh on Sunday, December 22 has on page 1 of section E further evidence that trickle down does not happen.  The article is entitled “Firms buy stock …

Before swearing in new council There were two high points in this segment of the meeting.  One was recognizing  Emma Granston’s retirement.  The other was Donna Stearns presentation of this year’s United Way fund drive.  Mayor O’Geary’s acknowledged Ms. Granston’s retirement with the presentation of a proclamation.  The mayor added a personal note of thanks to Ms. Granston after reading the proclamation.  Ms. Stearns summarized the results of this year’s United Way fund drive among city employees.  This year’s drive …

Changing of the guard The December Board meeting starts with the change of the Board’s leadership followed by the Board’s renewal or expulsion of county officers.  Nothing so striking as expelling any county officers occurred in fact all were allowed to keep their jobs.  The big change was Commissioner Brown’s elevation to Chairwoman and Commissioner Hester’s demotion to common commissioners.  Before Commissioner Hester relinquished his chairmanship he spoke glowingly of the county officers and of the Board’s accomplishments during his …

I’m pretty sure the public is unaware of what is going on in our school systems here in Henderson. Vance County Schools has failed to pay our Teacher Assistants the correct amount for a number of years for the job of substituting in the classroom when teachers were absent according to the State law indicated in the “Salary Manual – Public Schools of North Carolina”. Will McLean has met with some of our schools concerning the huge mistake that has …

After reading the article in Sunday’s News and Observer “Seeing the Invisible” by Gene Nichol, you will see Henderson as some live it and the sight is not a pretty one. Deplorable, disgusting, unjust, predatory, unconscionable, and evil are words that come to mind and these words are for all of us—not just that land lord and other land lords who profit from this. Tina Pope is just one of so many living like this in Henderson. Is it any wonder …

The Commissioners worked so swiftly through their long agenda those of us in the Peanut Gallery thought the meeting would end in record time, alas that did not happen.  Issues with County Wide Water drowned that potential.  But I’ve gotten ahead of myself.  Public Hearings and appointments The Commissioners’ completed two public hearings and two appointments in record time, about 15 minutes total time.  First of these was the approval to close the Community Development Block Grant for Scattered Site …

Mother Nature is incredible! Over the years, our wells have provided fresh, clean water for pennies a month. Oodles of water! Plenty for drinking, cooking, bathing, washing clothes, cleaning the car, watering the garden, and a thousand other things. Over the past couple of years, a small handful of us signed up for county water. County officials promised us $35-45 a month. In actuality, we may be forced to pay $75, $85, even $100 for water. What happened? First, the …

Yesterday’s city council candidate forum was sparsely attended by 30 – 35 attentive citizens. Each of the eight candidates were asked eight well written and specific questions that went largely unanswered by the individual candidates. Sadly, I do not have a copy the actual questions asked, I do have my notes of what I heard and the answers given. Knowing the forum was being broadcast live on WIZS, I assumed it would be archived as is Town Talk for later …

Work Session The Work Session was the last item on the Council’s regular session agenda intended to initiate the process of selecting a new police.  Ray Griffin appears to have taken a different direction for selecting a new police chief.  Since the retired police chief did not designate a subordinate worthy enough to be the new chief the task of selecting a new chief fell to the City Manager.  Mr. Griffin has contracted the City to engage The Management and …

Reading the one page agenda for the Board’s meeting one might assume the meeting would be short. In reality that was a wrong assumption. No one spoke favoring or opposing the Rural Operating Assistance Program although time was reserved for the public to speak. And no one had anything to say during the time reserved for public comments. So what held the attention of the commissioners for more than two hours; the water project. Topics covered before the Water Board …