lS|giSlti 50 CENTS VOLUME 66/ NUMBER 25 SOUTHPORT, N.C. ■ebruary 12,1997 Sports Wrestling is a big sport at South, especially when Brad McLean’s on the mat — 1C Yaupon seeking tax hike By Richard Nubel Municipal Editor Taxes will likely be raised to 13 percent of motel bills and cottage rental fees in Yaupon Beach begin ning in January, 1998, commission ers decided Monday night. By a 3-1 vote of the board of com missioners, a resolution asking the N. C. General Assembly to raise the town’s occupancy tax from three to six percent was approved. Only com missioner Dick Marshall, a real es tate agent and property manager, voted in opposition to the occupancy tax hike. The resolution will be forwarded to 14th House District Rep. E. David Redwine, of Brunswick County, who will be asked to introduce the accom modations tax hike as a local bill be fore the General Assembly in its cur rent session. The resolution adopted Monday night notes the three-percent tax on short-term lodging rentals in Yaupon Beach which was authorized by the General Assembly in 1992 no longer provides adequate revenue for the town. "... even though the revenue from this tax levy has helped Yaupon Beach improve its beach, recreation art as and services to its visitors and tourists, the financial burden of pro viding such services has exceeded the financial resources of the town,” the resolution notes. Yaupon Beach is among the small est — if not the smallest — coastal municipality to levy an occupancy tax. The one-square-mile town is also more residential in character than other coastal communities and has fewer rental units than most, the reso lution notes. Earlier in the evening, commission ers heard from/epresentatives of the Southport-Oak Island Chamber of Commerce who, with the South Brunswick Islands Chamber of Com merce, have asked Redwine to spon sor a local bill establishing a one-per cent countywide occupancy tax to support the promotional and market ing efforts of Brunswick County Travel Pack, a joint venture of the two See Yaupon, page 9 Murder charge is filed By Richard Nubel Municipal Editor It was a drug deal gone sour that left a former South Brunswick High School standout athlete dead of five gunshot wounds sustained during a dispute on a rural road near Bolivia. It was a murder to which there were at least two eye-witnesses, sheriff Ronald E. Hewett confirmed Tuesday. Aaron Thomas (Petey) Swain, of 732 North Lord Street, Southport, | died in the Dosher Memorial Hospi tal emergency room early Saturday : • morning, 19 days after his 28th birth 11 day. iy3 “Homicide was over a dope deal !' that went bad,” Capt. Phil Perry of the sheriff’s major crime unit reported to \[ sheriff Hewett. A .22 caliber handgun was located 75 feet from the scene of . the shooting and a quantity of a white * powdery substance believed to be cocaine was also recovered nearby on : Rutland Road, Bolivia. See Murder, page 6 VALENTINE Addie Taylor displays the Valentine’s Day card she made for mom la branch. The Brunswick County Parks and Recreation Department spon grams for children at libraries throughout the county. Photo by Holly Edwards week at (tie Southport library red Valentine’s Day crafts pro Long Beach Horse-a-Thon Town tightens reins on VFD fund-raiser By Richard Nubel Municipal Editor Horse-a-Thon, the annual fund-raiser for the Long Beach Volunteer Fire Department, may have no more than 250 participants this year, town council ruled in a specially called meeting TUesday morning. Breaking with tradition, council chose also to dictate other conditions of the March 21-23 event to the fire department volunteer, ('ouncil ruled by unanimous vote the fire departmeni i- ’>> charge a fee of $ 100 per horse and $25 per ridei lloi-.es, when not being ridden on the beachfront, will he re .iricted to an area bounded by East Oak Island Drive .m the north, 46th and 58th streets on the west and east atul Beach Drive on the south. Volunteer fire . t ' I im Pittman, in discussions with town manager J, 'A liters, had proposed to limit the event to 300 hoi > . aid charge $65 per horse and $25 v stl l-und-raiser, page 9 ■ TOP STORIES ON THE INTERNET www.soul VjSp i f Commissioners retreat Long-range plan group how history By Terry Pope County Editor County commissioners say long range planning won’t stop with the sudden 3-2 vote Saturday to disband a committee which last year drafted the county’s plan to deal with growth over the next 25 years. The Long-Range Planning Over sight Committee was appointed in 1995 and developed a list of 16 rec ommendations to handle projected growth. It was kept intact to track implementation of its goals and ob jectives and had recently hired a pro fessional planner to study ways to protect the Castle Hayne aquifer. “They have done a great job,” said commission chairman JoAnn Bellamy Simmons of District 4. “It’s not something that we’re planning to do away with completely. We have plenty of recommendations on what we need to do. We just felt like the ‘We have plenty of recommendations on what we need to do. We just felt like the time had come that we wanted to get some of these things done.’ JoAnn Bellamy Simmons Board chairman time had come that we wanted to get some of these things done.” When the issue was raised by Ms. See Long-range, page 6 No 'surprises,' county board tells member By Terry Pope County Editor Leslie Collier says she is just a jour nalist at heart and as the District 3 county commissioner isn’t shy about asking questions during a public meeting. Other board members say they don’t like to be surprised by non agenda items. At a board retreat Fri day they questioned her motives stemming from a January 21 board meeting where she asked about the use of county emergency vehicles for the filming of a movie in New Hanover County last October. V "It all came up, and it was a shock,” said chairman JoAnn Bellamy Simmons of District 4. “I felt like it was an embarrassment to the staff. I See Surprises, page 8 Bolivia. Belville. Leland Year-round schools suggested By Holly Edwards Feature Editor Principals of Lincoln Primary, Belville Elemen tary and Leland Middle schools will seek com munity support to implement a year-round school program, superintendent of schools Marion Wise told the school board Monday night. Parent forums are tentatively scheduled at 7 p.m. at the following locations and dates: Belville El ementary, Thursday, February 27; Lincoln Pri mary, Monday, March 3; Leland Middle, Tues day, March 4. The principals say a year-round school calen dar would offer 180 school days just like the cur rent calendar, but would provide students with more frequent and shorter vacations. Instead of a long summer vacation, students would attend school for nine weeks and have three ‘What we’ve seen in other areas, and we have research to back this up, is that year round schools have a positive effect on student achievement.’ Diana Mintz Leland principal iveeks off for three cycles, then attend school for line weeks and have fi\e weeks otf. Students who are having academic trouble could he targeted for remediation every nine weeks rather than at the end of the school year, the prin cipals say, and students would retain more of what they learn with shorter breaks rather than a long summer vacation. •‘What we've seen in other areas, and we have research to back this up, is that year-round schools have a positive effect on student achievement,” said Leland Middle principal Diana Mintz. “Be cause students and teachers get a break more fre ~ quently. they come back refreshed and ready to work. And when you have students who are eager to be here and refreshed, learning is going to be more significant. in addition to the parent forums, principals will gather parent input through surveys sent home with students. "We want the public to have a clear understand See Schools, page 8 ‘... I reserve the right to question why staff made a decision. I just have a hard time deciding which questions can be asked in public and which ones can’t be asked in public.’ Leslie Collier District 3 member Forecast The extended forecast calls for a chance of showers on Thursday & Friday with highs mid 50's to mid 60's. Saturday will be fair and cooler with highs in the 40's to mid 50's. INSIDE Police report ... 7 Business.. 13 Schools ...14 Obituaries . 15 Calendar «»»»«« 3B : Church........ 7B TV schedule_4C District Court « . 6C

Page Text

This is the computer-generated OCR text representation of this newspaper page. It may be empty, if no text could be automatically recognized. This data is also available in Plain Text and XML formats.

Return to page view