| VOLUME 64/NUMBER 43
SOUTHPORT, N.C.
50 CENTS
Sports
Former North Brunswick
star helped the Rockets win
NBA championship -- 1C
Neighbors
• Miss Brunswick County is
in Raleigh this week seek
ing the state crown — IB
Our Town
Large users of Southport’s
electrical system will have
to pay the price — Page 2
Long Beach
Tax rate
the same
By Richard Nubel
Municipal Editor
There wasn’t much to talk about at
the Long Beach Recreation Center
Tuesday night.
No property tax increase was pro
posed.
No water rate increase was pro
posed.
Monthly residential solid waste
fees will only increase six cents,
commercial fees about 1.8 percent.
That pesky municipal motor vehi
cle license sticker is gone.
Yacht Drive will be paved as will
72nd, 73rd, 74th and 75th streets
SE.
The recreation center will have
$40,000 for expansion and the ball
fields behind Middleton Park will
have $25,000 for development.
No one from the public offered
any comment. No one.
Council had talked for the better
part of a month and members had
reached agreement with one anoth
er.
Without discussion, council voted
unanimously to adopt a $5-million
budget for 1995-96 on a motion by
councilman Jeff Ensminger, second
ed by councilman Horace Collier.
Thanks were issued all around.
Although adoption of the budget
was easy Tuesday night, the path to
adoption was strewn with stumbling
blocks at every step. On May 1,
town manager Jerry Walters pre
sented council with a budget pro
posal calling for no tax increase, no
solid waste fee increase and some
$125,000 earmarked for recreation
center expansion. His proposal also
included the estimate $560,000 cost
of paving Yacht Drive.
in an initial round oi ouaget aeilD
erations, council sought to reincor
porate solid waste collection costs -
- initially estimated to be $254,000 -
- in the town’s general fund, thus
doing away with monthly solid
waste fees. Mayor Joan Altman
broke a tie vote of council to effect
that change, siding with councilman
Collier, Danny Leonard and
Ensminger. On June 1, however,
Ensminger made a motion to
remove the solid waste effort from
the general fund and reestablish a
solid waste fee. He was the lone
defector, but his shift was enough to
reinstate the solid waste fee.
The issue of solid waste serves as
only one example of how divided
council was on many matters affect
ing the formulation of the budget for
1995-96.
Minutes of the several budget
workshop sessions indicate council
split 3-3 on policy decisions seven
times. Mayor Joan Altman broke the
tie vote of council seven times.
Three of those votes had to do
See Long Beach, page 6
SAFELY ASHORE
The emotions of many anguished hours show on
the faces of Billy Ray Locklear Jr. and his moth
er, Delilah, at Oak Island Coast Guard station
Thesday afternoon. Locklear and his father were
Photo by Jim Harper
in peril off the Cape Fear River mouth since
Saturday and his mother began her terrible wait
ing Monday as searchers started looking for the
two.
No life jacket or radio, but
father and son survive at sea
By Richard Nubel
Municipal Editor
A bottle of Mountain Dew, a bag of potato chips
and the prayers of a large family landside kept a
Robeson County father and son alive through three
days and stormy nights adrift at sea without the com
fort of even a life jacket.
^ Billy Ray Locklear, 43, of St. Pauls and his son
Billy Ray Jr., 15, of Pembroke, stepped from U. S.
Coast Guard Station Oak Island's 41-foot utility boat
to the station's cement dock Tuesday about 11:30
a.m., returned from a fishing day-trip to Frying Pan
Tower that went terribly awry.
In remarkably good condition after their ordeal,
the two required no medical attention.
The father and son had been discovered aboard
their disabled 25-foot cruiser earlier that morning
about 40 miles off Little River, SC, by the crew of
the Triumphant Lady, a 90-foot yacht bound for a
Florida vacation.
"1 knew we were way south," said Billy Ray Sr.,
who had owned the unnamed boat for about a year
but had only taken it out two or three times. "The
Sunday storm took us way out, but then it turned
and brought us back in."
The Locklears set out from the N. C. Wildlife
Commission boat ramp on Fish Factory Road Satur
day morning about 7:30 with plans to fish the area
See Survive, page 8
'Superior performance'
CP&L given
highest mark
in evaluation
By Jim Harper
Staff Writer
The Brunswick nuclear plant has
received superior ratings from the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission in
all operating categories for the period
November 7, 1993, through May 13.
"The entire (CP&L) organization,
corporate and station, is commended
for the superior performance."
Stewart D. Ebneter, regional NRC
administrator, wrote in his Tuesday
cover letter announcing the grades.
The particulars of the four superior
marks -- "All 'ones,'" exulted
Brunswick vice-president Roy Ander
son on Tuesday — will be discussed
in a public meeting at the Brunswick
plant's technical training center al 1
pirn. July 10.
The ratings reflect an improvement
from the 2.4 average in SALP (Sys
tematic Assessment of Licensee Per
formance) ratings in 1992, when the
Brunswick plant was in the throes of
both self-repair and self-assessment,
through a 1.5 average in November,
' What it says is
that you can run
a superior
operation and
keep costs in line.
We are the low
cost operation in
the company.'
Roy Anderson
Plant vice-president
1993, to the present "all 'ones,'" and
represent the highest marks the
Brunswick plant has ever attained
under the NRC grading system.
"1 am very pleased with how things
(in the assessment) went," Anderson
See Evaluation, page 6
Ten-cent increase
County okays
68.5-cent rate
By Terry Pope
County Editor
Property taxes will increase, hut
not as much as first expected.
County commissioners cut two
cents off the proposed rate and
approved a ten-cent hike at 68.5
cents per $100 valuation at a special
meeting Tuesday night. It ends a
month of calculating the figures in
an effort to avoid a county tax hike
for the first time in four years.
“I don’t think there’s any one of us
that wants to vote to increase taxes,”
said Jerry Jones, chairman from
District 2. “I think we’ve done a
pretty good job of getting it to this
point. 1 hope we can keep it at 68.5
cents for another year or two.”
District 3 commissioner Leslie
Collier of Long Beach made a last
minute pitch to trim another half
cent from the rate by eliminating six
Festival celebrates 200th year

By Richard Nubel
Municipal Editor
•V
Two hundred years.
When the opening ceremonies are held for the
1995 N. C. Fourth of July Festival next Friday,
June 30, it will mark the 200th time the people of
Southport - and lately the region - have gath
ered to celebrate the birth of a nation.
Opening ceremonies for this year's festival are
to begin at 7:15 p.m. at festival headquarters on
Moore Street next to the Southport branch of the
Brunswick County Library.
TWo hundred years. ■
Does that excite 1995 festival president Don
Hughes?
"You bet it does," Hughes said, taking a break
Tuesday from last-minute preparations.
"It excites me and it makes me proud," Hughes
said. "This is the 200th anniversary of the first
formal celebration of Independence Day in the city
now called Southport and all of us who have
worked to bring the festival together this year are
especially proud to be a part Of this historic mo
ment."
If the last decade proves any guide, about 30,000
visitors will flock to the city limits of Southport
at any given time during the N. C. Fourth of July
Festival. Intense festival activity begins Saturday,
July 1, and culminates Tuesday, July 4, with the
11 p.m. N. C. Fourth of July Festival parade and 9
p.m. fireworks display.
But, even before the Friday evening opening cer
emonies, "The Division's Own" Second Division
Marine Band will have played a 7 p.m. concert on
the Garrison at Fort Johnston Wednesday, June 28.
From top to bottom, beginning to end, the 200th
anniversary 1995 N. C. Fourth of July Festival is
packed with events sure to please the ej^fre fam
ily.
"We anticipate this being as big and as fun a
festival as ever produced in the celebration's 200
year history in Southport," Hughes said. "From
the special events, to the stage entertainment, to
the arts and crafts and other static exhibits to the
parade and fireworks, this festival is shaping up
to be plain ol' good fun."
The 1995 200th anniversary festival will have
a special family flavor to it, Hughes said. Special
children's events have been planned on the Garri
son at 10 a.m. Saturday, July 1, and magician Gary
Nunnelly will be stationed in a booth near the
waterfront Sunday afternoon, July 2, with his crew
See Festival, page 5
emergency medical technicians
(EMT), new positions, and a substa
tion at a cost of $320,000. But her
motion failed, 3-2.
“I’m a nurse, and I’ve worked
with rescue squads, and I’m very,
very sensitive to this issue,” said
Ms. Collier. “As a nurse, I’ve taken
an oath. I have faith in the volunteer
rescue units. I'm just not sure this is
the right move at the right time.”
District 1 commissioner Doug
Simmons voted with her. One cent
See Tax cut, page 11
Forecast
Partly cloudy skies will prevail for
the period of Thursday through Sat
urday with highs in the 80's and lows
in the 70's.
Tide table
HIGH LOW
THURSDAY, JUNE 22
4:30 a.m. , 10:34 a.m.
5:04 p.m. 11:17 p.m.
FRIDAY, JUNE 23
5:21 a.m. 11:23 a.m.
5:53 p.m .— p.m.
SATURDAY, JUNE 24
6:10 a.m. 12:07 a.m.
6:38 p.m. 12:10 p.m.
SUNDAY, JUNE 25
6:57 a.m. 12:54 a.m.
7:22 p.m. 12:55 p.m.
MONDAY, JUNE 26
7:41a.m. 1:38 a.m.
8:02 p.m. 1:38 p.m. “
TUESDAY, JUNE 27
8:22 a.m. 2:20 am.
8:41p.m. 2:19 p.m.
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 28
9:01 a.m. 2:59 a.m.
9:17 p.m. 2:59 p.m.
The following adjustments should be made:
Bald Head Island, high -10, low -7: Caswell
Beach, high -5, low -1; Southport, high +7,
low +15; Lockwood Folly, high -22, low -8.