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Klan to rally at site of grisly murder
JASPER, Texas - The Ku Klux Klan has
heea given permission to hold a rally in the
east lotas town where a black man was last
week chained to a pickup truck and dragged to
Ins death, officials said on Tuesday.
Deputy Sheriff Paul Brister said the Klan
group had been granted a permit to parade for
two hours on Saturday, June 27.
1 know they are expected here on June 27,"
he said. "I talked to one of them and asked
him his purpose and he said it was to let citi
zens know they were here, they were available
and that they can be contacted."
Three white men allegedly linked to white
supremacist groups have been charged with
murdering 49-year-old lames Byrd, whose
mutilated body was found on the outskirts of
Jasper on Sunday, June 7.
Police say Byrd was beaten senseless,
chawed by the ankles to the back of a pickup
truck and dragged more than two miles down
a backwoods road. His head, right arm and
chunks of his flesh were torn off along the
road.
The murder shocked the nation and focused
attention on the Klan and other white
supremacist groups still active in areas of the
South.
Most Jasper residents have condemned the
murder and insist it is not a racist town, but the
Klan rally is expected to increase tension in the
The Klan, with its white robes and burning
crosses, is the best known of the country's
white supremacist groups
When Byrd was buried here on Saturday,
over a dozen heavily-armed Black Muslims
and members of a self-styled New Black Pan
See KIm?h A3
' la - '? 4
Allegations
topic of
discussion
Roundtable
Trustees to discuss
allegations against
WSSUchcmmH^
By SAM DAVIS
.HKCHBQNIP.E r. . . ^
The recent controversy rg
surrounding Winston- ,?
Salem State Chancellor K
Alvin J. Schexnider will be ,?1
the topic of conversation -
at two meetings today.
The Black Leadership '
Roundtable of Forsyth
County will meet tonight
to allow members of the ?
community to air their I
concerns about the embat- I
tied chancellor.
Roundtable Co-Con- H
vener, N.C. Rep. Larry B
Womble, D-Forsyth, says
the meeting is the result of
Womblm
"concerns voiced by tne community
"We just wanted to offer an opportunity for mem
bers of the community to come and voice their opin
ions," Womble said. "The Roundtable hasn't taken a
stance one way or another. What we're doing is offer
ing an opportunity for people to voice their opin
ions."
The meeting begins at 6 p.m. and will be held in
the Winston Mutual Building.
The allegations are also sure to take center stage
during the university's Board of Trustee's quarterly
meeting at the Anderson Center on the WSSU cam
pus. Trustees are expected to issue a statement regard
tog recent allegations that Schexnider has misused
state funds. j
I-IUniversity officials are also expected to release the
results of an audit of Schexnider's spending at
WSSU.
I* Allegations against the chancellor began swirling
fhprtly after he was installed.
* j-When Schexnider took office as the chancellor at
Winston-Salem State, he stated that he wanted to
tAftke the school a "student-centered university".
:: However, some faculty members at WSSU have
Said that Schexnider hasn't lived up to that. Some say
they are concerned about the growing disparity
between faculty, staff and administrative salaty and
concerned about the direction that the university has
taken.
V" See WSSU on A10
*
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We're Flying
who took around tho Mad cdurtoty of tartwfnd AlHInmt.
Kids take ride of lifetime
By DAMONfdj^^E
Alan ThoBfpsen couldn't wait to get off the
ground.
A smile stretched across his face. In his head
danced thoughts of flying thought the clouds at
a "million miles an hour."
"He's talked about it a lot the last two or
three days," said his mother Tracey as they
stood in line at the Piedmont Triad Airport.
The six-year-old Hampton Elementary stu
dent was about to embark on his First plane ride.
Thompson was one of 90 children Eastwind
Airlines treated to a round trip flight from
Greensboro to Norfolk, Va.
The company was celebrating the arrival of
.its new Boeing 737-700 series jet and invited the,
children to be the first to ride.
Radar, Eastwind's mascot, greeted each
child as they entered the concourse to the plane,
but little Thompson wasn't really excited by the
oversized bug's presence. He had bigger fish to
fry.
His heart was set on flying and finally getting
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a chance to touch the sky.
Not only was it his first plane ride but for his ,
mother's as well.
"I have butterflies myself," said Tracey
Thompson. "The experience itself is the award,
the more children are exposed to it at a young
age the better."
As the children waited for the plane to take
off, Alan talked to his mother and friend, five
year-old Noell Massenburg. Both Alan and
Noell are members of Uplift, a Greensboro pro
gram that works with youth.
Thoughout the 30 minute flight excited chil
dren's voices echoed through the cockpit.
"Are we flying," said one child to no one in
particular.
"No, not yet," was the response from anoth
er child as the engines of the 737-700 jet roared
in preparation for flight.
"For the kids it exposes them something
they never might not even do," said flight atten
dant Brian Manubay. "I flew on my first flight
at about the same age of these children. After
*
See Flight on A4
r ,
?A . ?
Memo sent by
State Board
of Education .
'misleading'
? i
By JEW YOUNG "
THBCHHONKXE ; ? . .
A memo issued recently by the State Board of Edu
cation contains information that is "misleading." says
officials at the U.S. Department of Education.
The memo, sent to news agencies across the state '
May 27 by the Board's Division of Communication
and Information, said the U.S. Department of Educa
tion, Office for Civil Rights "has determined there is -
no finding that the North CfTQbna accountability
model has an adverse impact ott minorityadministra
tors and teachers" to a compMBHjS '
by Winston-Ssuem principal LarryfWjBff^
In the complaint, Fields claims the state's new
ABCs Accountability plan . ? -
will adversely affect r,
minority principals and 1*1
administrators.
Officials at the U.S. [1
Department of Education $
- say the state's interpreta- I
tion of the ruling in the k;
memo was "misleading." M
In a letter sent to state I
Superintendent Michael I
E. Ward, Alice Wender, I
acting director of the Dis- I
trict of Columbia of the I
U.S. Department of Edu- (
cation's Office for Civil
Rights, clarifies OCRs
findings and ask that state officials will "take steps to
ensure that the Division of Communications presents
a more accurate representation of OCR actions in the
future"
While the state's release says OCR found ABCs
wouldn't not have an effect on minority teachers,
OCR officials say their rulings clearly says there was
n't enough evidence to determine the program affect
on minorities because not enough data was available
to accurately assess the program.
ABCs, which was implemented in 1996, assigns rat
ings to schools based on how their students perform
on end of grade tests which cover reading, math and
writing.
Staff in low performing schools face competency
testing and, in some cases, termination if their schools
don't meet performance standards.
Fields claims the plan will hurt minority principals
and teachers, who he says are traditionally assigned to
low performing schools, because standards set by the
state don't take into consideration extenuating cir
cumstances in poorer schools.
In the letter Wfender writes: "The point of our let
ter was that it is simply too soon to determine if the
t ,
See Mwno on A2
Hunt addresses 'both sides of puzzle' in juvenile bill
By JOHN MINTER
CONSOI |irY^Tgp MEDIA GROUP
Gov. Jim Hunt used the wisdom of Solomon in
presenting his new $60 million juvenile crime ?ill to
the state's legislators last month.
Hunt would allocate $30 million for prevention
and $30 million for punishment, including increased
use of boot camps for young offenders.
But the legislature may approve all of Hunt's pro
posals and some fear the General Assembly may lean
more toward punishment than prevention.
"The governor is really trying to address both ends
of the puzzle," said Steve Redmond, director of the
Children's Law Center in Charlotte. "But he has a
General Assembly that needs to refund excess taxes
and it's not going to have money to fund alternatives
(to punishment). The questions is whether the Gener
al Assembly will fund the entire budget or just the
punishments.
"No one knows how it will play out," Redmond
said^It is expensive to fund both sides. Who knows if
wehave the will as a state to do that."
Redmond said alternatives such as boot camp need
to be supported with measures to help change the con
ditions in which young people live, help their families
and provide alternatives to life on the streets.
N.C. Rep. Beverly Earle said Hunt met with black
legislators before presenting his plan to the General
Assembly. The black legislators were supportive of the
governor's plan, but Earle said she thinks the Repub
lican-controlled House may not fund the entire plan.
Hunt proposals were based on a review by a study
committee which called from some major revisions in
the state juvenile justice system.
Among the proposals, in addition to the boot
camps, are opening of juvenile court to public scruti
ny. Now, most information about juvenile court is
considered private, though school officials are notified
when a student is charged with a felony.
Other revisions would reorganize family courts to
deal with juveniles, to ensure that the entire family was
involved in correcting problems and preventing a
recurrence of criminal activity.
Redmonds agency handles 1.S00 juvenil&cases a
year. The law center's attorneys are apporatecno rep
resent juveniles - mainly under 16 - in court.
Redmond pointed out that many serious crimes are
committed by children aged 16 and 17, so juvenile jus
tice statistics are sometimes skewed because all age
groups are blamed for increases in the criminal activi
ty of the older group.
"I don't think the primary focus needs to be on an
increase in detention beds and training school beds or
an increase in boot camps," said Redmond, whose
father is an Iredell County sheriff's deputy. "Those are
appropriate tools, but they have to be used when nec
essary. They are not appropriate for every kid. They
don't address why kids are committing crimes."
And, Redmond, pointed out, many incorrectly see
juvenile crime as an inner city problem and think pun
ishment is the only answer. Poor children get pun
ished, but others get the alternatives.
"There is as much crime in southeast Charlotte and
North Mecklenburg as there is in the inner city," he
said. "Juvenile crime crosses all economic barriers. A
lot of kids are doing things they ought not be doing in
Sre Hunt on A2
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