Commissioners sell first business park
lot, end curbside recycling
BY TODD LUCK
THP.CHROWiriJ
Forsyth County commissioners took action toward
selling the first lot in the Idols Road Business Park and
ended county-run curbside recycling in its Monday, Oct.
10, meeting.
Forsyth County is planning to turn 169 acres off Idols
Road near Tangle wood Park into a business park.
Beaufum LLC Inc. is offering $399,5000 for the park's
first 143 acres. Commissioners-Toted to accept the offer,
with an upset bid period that would allow others to bid if
they want to.
The county will need to build infrastructure for the
park, like a road to access the area. Clemmons has
planned to annex the land and will cover the cost of build
ing sewer and water infrastructure for the park. The coun
ty expects the project to pay for itself once all the property
is sold.
Beaufurn, a global furni
ture maker located in
Advance, is looking to relo
cate into a larger space. The
county already approved a
$118,000 incentive package
over a five-year period for
the company, contingent on
it retaining its current 33
positions and adding 13
more.
ine commissioner aiso
voted to change county ordinances to end the curbside
recycling franchise for the unincorporated areas of
Forsyth County. The service will cease at year's end.
Recycling collection is being deregulated to allow service
providers to negotiate service with neighborhood associ
ations. The county would require the recycling collectors
to have a permit to make sure the recyclables are being
collected and delivered properly.
The vote was 5-2, with County Commissioners Walter
Marshall and Everette Witherspoon voting against it.
Both of them support mandatory recycling, similar to
what the city has.
"Recycling is a major environmental issue as far as
trash is concerned," said Marshall, who believes the end
of the curbside county recycling service will lead to more
dumping.
The county has had two service providers not renew
their contracts. Low participation and a downturn in the
commodities market has made it hard for these companies
to make money. The hope is the deregulation will let sub
divisions, which contain most of the service's costumers,
negotiate for service with recycling collectors. Those that
don't fall in areas that have negotiated service will have
to bring their recyclables to one of the county's three
drop-off recycling centers themselves
Marshall
Activists urge tethering ban but
commissioners hold off on vote
BY TODD LUCK
THE CHRONICLE
The Forsyth Animal
Coalition made an exten
sive case for a ban on unsu
pervised tethering last
week, but will have to wait
a bit longer for county
commissioners to act on it.
Forsyth Animal
Coalition held a press con
ference last week at
Reynolda Manor Library
presenting the case against
owners tethering dogs in
their yards. Leila Warren
opened by citing the
American Veterinary
Medical Association,
which advises against teth
ering because it makes
dogs territorial and aggres
sive, and the U.S.
Department of Agriculture,
which found it to be inhu
mane because it restricts
the dog's movement and
often leads to injury or
strangulation of the dog.
The Centers for Disease
Control found that chained
dogs are three times more
likely to bite. The chances
increase to five times more
likely if the victim is a
child.
The Forsyth County
Veterinary Medical
Association, which is made
up of 75 local veterinari
ans, sent a letter to county
commissioners in support
of the ban because tether
ing can lead to neglect and
aggressive behavior.
"It is never the owner's
intention to abuse or neg
lect the pet, but without the
dog's ability to demand
attention to have its needs
met, it invariably heads in
that direction," said
Veterinarian Dr. Molly
Douglass as she read the
letter.
Jerry Canady, described
the tethered dogs he saw
during his time as Forsyth
Animal Control director as
being aggressive and hav
ing very little socialization
with people. He described a
dog he saw that had wom a
choke chain for so long his
skin had grown over it.
Tethered dogs were often
un-adoptable, he said, and
had to be euthanized.
"The chaining of dogs,
tethering of dogs to short
leashes and so forth, is the
Number One problem and
has been for as long as I
remember," said Canady,
who is also a Rural Hall
town councilman.
To show that the prob
lem persists, Mary
Madison Lovette talked
about a dog she called
Peter, who she'd found just
days earlier after he'd bro
ken his chain. He still had
his collar around his neck
when she found him scav
enging for food. She said
the dog looked like a
"walking skeleton." He
weighed about 30 pounds,
and was flea ridden and
infested with parasites.
Lovette is currently
helping Peter recover from
the ordeal. Fur-Ever
Friends is offering a $1 jOOO
reward for information on
who was responsible.
"My heart breaks
because, despite his unfair
treatment, I believe he will
a phenomenal pet for
i
someone," she said.
Warren said that all this
makes a case for "a clean,
concise, chaining ordi
nance that can he
enforced." Currently the
county has a tethering ordi
nance that deals with some
of the ill effects of tether
ing, but does not ban the
practice itself, and is wide
ly considered unenforce
able. Activists want a ban
on unsupervised tethering
similar to what Guilford
County has.
The next day, at the
county commissioners
briefing, not all the com
missioners were sold on the
ban.
"I do see there's some
common sense that if you
have a dog that's chained, it
does get angry after a long
period of time and if you go
up to it, it might bite you,"
said Commissioner Don
Martin. "But I can tell you,
if you come to my house,
my dog will bite you ... if
he doesn't know who's
coming in, I hate to say it,
but he's done it."
Martin said that he
believed studies were
inconclusive on if tethering
was bad and that dogs can
be tethered humanely. He
said other cities and coun
ties have dealt with it in
varied ways determined by
community norms and not
"small, emotional advoca
cy groups."
Commissioner Richard
Linville was unsure how
he'd vote, but Gloria
Whisenhunt opposed the
ban.
"This ordinance that
you all want to pass, it vir
tually says if you cannot
affoni a fence, if you can
not afford a doghouse, then
you shouldn't have a dog,"
she said.
Commissioners Dave
Plyler, Walter Marshall,
Everette Witherspoon and
Ted Kaplan voiced support
for the ban.
"We need it badly,
because it is cruel," said
Marshall.
Marshall also said that
he believed that groups that
build fences for those who
can't afford them, like
Unchain Forsyth and
Unchain Winston, will help
low income households
prepare for the ban.
The measure was very
close to getting a vote this
week, but Marshall said he
would like to look it over
before voting on it.
Normally an item to be
voted on is part of the agen
da during Thursday briefin
gs, letting commissioners
see it in writing and hear an
overview of it from staff,
which Kaplan said
would've happened if he
hadn't been absent from the
previous week's briefing.
In a previous briefing,
Kaplan had presented a
final version of the ordi
nance, modeled after the
one in Guilford County,
with a one year education
period before the ban
begins.
The item is planned to
be included in the agenda
for the Oct. 24 meeting and
will be discussed in today's
commissioner briefing.
m
WITH TRULIANT
BANK WHEREVER,
WHENEVER, it
YOUR COMMUNITY CREDIT UNION CLEMMONS I DOWNTOWN WINSTON
KERNERSVILLE I NORTH POINT I TRULIANT WAV | PEACE HAVEN ROAD
SEE ALL PIEDf^pNT TRIAD LOCATIONS AT TRUUANT.ORO/ljOCA'pONR