South Brunswick will host
Hoggard Friday night in the
season's grid opener - 1C
The new f
Middleton $
Long Beach
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Long Bead ! for
and receive* _ ig
for town projects — Page 2
Schools
i ' 1
! New
SAT
is up
By Holly Edwards
Feature Editor
SAT scores in Brunswick County
this year were the highest this decade
but continue to fall short of state and
national averages.
While the average score in
Brunswick County was 926, the av
erage score statewide was 976 and the
national average 1013.
School board member Billy Carter
pointed out, however, that the aver
age Brunswick County SAT score in
creased 22 points since 1995, while
the state average increased only six
points.
j “I think this shows there’s been a
• change and we’re seeing improve
ment, and I feel good about that,”
Carter said. “Is it where we want to
be? No, but our short-range goal is to
get to the state level and then to sur
pass it. In the past we’ve improved,
but not at the same rate as the state.”
North Carolina ranks 48th among
the 50 states and the District of Co
lumbia. Brunswick County superin
tendent of schools Marion Wise said
much of the low ranking can be ex
plained by the percentage of students
taking the test. He said 59 percent of
North Carolina seniors took the test
this year, while only five percent of
the graduating class took the SAT in
top-ranked North Dakota.
‘ The more test-takers you have, the
lower the average score,” he said.
- See SAT, page 8
TV TIMEOUT
--- — -——-■—■ _- ^ ■ ■
. . ... , 1 . , ,, I’liolo by Jim Harper
Actor Richard Roundtree relaxed between scenes at American Fish Company as “Other Families’ Secrets”
was being fdmed there on Monday. Shooting of the USA television network movie shifted Tuesday to anoth
er yacht basin location and is expected to continue on the Southport waterfront and at the Garrison today
and Thursday.
$411.000 first phase
Fund-raising
will complete
city building
By Richard Nubel
Municipal Editor
A $411,000 fund-raising campaign
has been announced by the commit
tee charged with building a replace
ment for the burned Southport Com
munity Building.
That sizable fund-raising campaign
is to be completed between now and
October 31, the committee says.
“It’s a very aggressive campaign,”
said alderman Paul Fisher, a member
of the building committee which
spent most of Friday delivering infor
mation packets and winning initial
pledges. He said the committee has
designed an option for pledges to be
paid over a five-year period.
The building committee, which
began with a $274,933 insurance
settlement for the January, 1995, fire
which demolished the old USO build
ing of 1941, Thursday unveiled a new
building plan which is estimated to
cost $856,375.
Since the old Southport Commu
nity Building burned about a year and
a half ago, a little over $25,000 has
‘Probably the costs
we have stated are
on the high side and
not on the low side.
We did that on
purpose so we
wouldn’t come up
short.’
Paul Fisher
Committee member
been donated to building reconstruc
tion, including $10,000 from the
Southport Lions Club. Just over
$15,000 has been donated by indi
viduals.
While the committee seeks just
over $400,000 in pledges this fall, it
See Building, page 7
Elevation from Moore Street
Can New ABCs
spell progress?
By Holly Edwards
Feature Editor
The f irst phase of the state’s new student performance improvement
program, the New ABCs, will be implemented next week when third
graders countywide take pre-tests in reading, writing and math.
Last year’s end-of-grade test results will be used as pre-test results for
fourth through eight graders.
Under the New ABCs, the state expects students to achieve a year’s
worth of growth for a year’s worth of work, and individual schools are
held accountable for achieving those results, explained superintendent
of schools Marion Wise.
Students in grades three through eight will be given “post-tests” at the
See Progress, page 8
News on
the‘Web’
Live out of town and don’t like
waiting for the news?
Well, if you’re a World Wide Web
traveler, you can find out what’s hap
pening in the Southport-Oak Island
area on Wednesdays — just like the
locals.
Front-page stories in The State Port
Pilot are reprinted on Southport Web
Trawler (http://www.southport.net).
Updates are posted each Wednesday
morning under “The News” on the
Trawler front page.
Hurricane Bertha overtime
Some county workers
paid, others were not
By Tferry Pope
County Editor
Some county employees received
overtime pay when they were called
to duty as Hurricane Bertha struck the
county July 12.
But some county employees who
worked during the storm were not
paid.
They want to know why there ap
pears to be different policies for
county departments and what will
happen if another hurricane ap
proaches this season.
“If you pay some, why not pay
them all?" asks Jamie Orrock, direc
tor of the Brunswick County Depart
ment of Social Services. “Don’t pay
one and give the other one compen
satory time."
His 30-plus employees who
manned the evacuation shelters at lo
See Workers, page 8
Countywide meetine scheduled
Long-range planning is not yet done
By Terry Pope
County Editor
Officials from 18 municipalities and numerous county
agencies, including elected and appointed governing boards
or public bodies, will meet for a second countywide plan
ning workshop September 19, from 5 to 9 p.m., at Bolivia
Elementary School.
The Brunswick County Long-Range Oversight Commit
tee has changed its name and chairman since last year. No
longer is it a planning committee - it will be called an over
sight committee. And Boiling Spring Lakes resident
Michael L Royal has been appointed chairman.
I don’t think it will be as extensive of a process with
meetings,” said Royal, who is director of the Small Busi
ness Center at Brunswick Community College. “Our task
is to report where we are and where we’re going, but it’s
‘This isn’t our plan. This is the
plan. I think the citizens of this
want to be proactive instead of
Mike Royal
Committee chairman
also to look for new input. That was a histone meeting
As someone who was born and raised in thir county, it
that I had never seen before.”
Last year, more than 130 officials from every part ol
to agree on common growth issues likely to face the i
citizens’
county
reactive.’
lor this county,
u as something
the county met
"unty over the
next 25 years. It's time to update those goals and to see where
the county stands on the list of 16 recommendations that the
committee forwarded to county commissioners in February.
The long-range committee and its actions have been praised
by state officials as a positive example of community-based
planning. County planning director Wade Horne addressed
the N. C. Association of County Commissioners annual con
ference recently on how it all came about.
“Brunswick County has been identified as a leader in this
area,” said Horne, who begins work September 3 as manager
of Bald Head Island. He will stay on the long-range commit
tee and was elected vice-chairman last week.
Former chairman David Sanditer has resigned to campaign
for the District 2 seat on the Brunswick County Board of
Commissioners. He will face Democrat Willie Fullwood in
the November election. Other members of the committee are
See Planning, page 9
Forecast
A chance of showers and severe
thunderstorms can be expected for
the rest of the week. Temperatures
will reach the upper 80's.
INSIDE
Opinion. 4
Police report ... 8
Obituaries.14
Church ...._4B ,
Schools ........ 7B
District Court ,. 7C
Classifieds .,... ID
TV schedule ...... 8D
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