The State Port
VOLUME 67/NUMBER 16 SOUTHPORT N.C SO CENTS
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‘Christmas-Dy-tne-Sea’*
activities move to Southport
for the weekend — Page 2
PPO
Dosher, other
hospitals plan
new coverage
By Holly Edwards
Feature Editor
Dosher Memorial and eight othei
hospitals in the Coastal Carolina
Health Alliance (CCHA) have
formed a preferred provider organi
zation (PPO) health insurance
product that can be marketed to
small businesses but have hit a
“snag” in finding an insurance
company with which to partner,
said Dosher administrator Edgar
Haywood.
“We found two or three compa
nies that were potential partners,
and one company from Alabama
that was moving in that direction.
But the company backed out when
they decided there wasn’t enough
business to put them over the
hump,” Haywood said.
Despite the setback, the alliance
hopes to have a small business
PPO plan in place within a few
months, said Scott Parisella,
CCHA executive director.
The alliance formed its PPO last
year to cover employees of mem
ber hospitals. The PPO is com
prised of nearly 500 doctors in the
region, including 15 from Dosher
Memorial and 14 from Columbia
Brunswick. Employees covered by
the plan must use health care
providers in the organization or
pay higher out-of-pocket expenses
for health care.
Haywood said the plan is saving
the hospital approximately $35,000
a year in costs of employee health
benefits.
Although Acordia National
Insurance of Charleston, WV, part
nered with the alliance to form the
PPO for alliance employees, that
company does not administer
health care plans designed to be
marketed to businesses, Haywood
said.
The primary purpose of forming
a PPO to be marketed to small
businesses is to direct health care
dollars back to the providers, rather
than to insurance companies,
Parisella said. As managed care
health insurance companies have
grown, doctors and hospitals have
seen their revenues decrease, he
added.
And, Parisella noted, a major
criticism of managed care compa
nies is that they often have more
power over patient care than doc
tors do. But if the providers and
health insurance company are part
of the same organization, doctors
can make crucial patient care deci
sions independently.
“Our main goals are to direct
more dollars back to the providers
and ultimately back to the commu
nity,” Parisella said. “We also want
to give physicians more ownership
in the process.”
Several insurance companies and
insurance brokers — companies that
market prospective insurance plans
to insurance companies — are eon
See Coverage, page 9
what’s inside
Police report 6
Obituaries 12
Home tour 2B
Calendar 5B
Church 6B
District Court 4C
Public notices 5C
TV schedule 6C
Business 10D
A right busy old elf is Santa Claus these days, now appearing at Dosher Memorial Hospital, next parading on Oak
Island. Tuesday night he was at Southport’s fire station; this Saturday he’ll be at Leland’s 10 a.m. parade, and parade
again in Bolivia an hour later. Then for good measure he will fly in at 2 p.m. Sunday to Brunswick County Airport.
Northern schools
Year-round school
passes its first test
By Holly Edwards
Feature Editor
As the first semester of the new year
round calendar draws to a close in north
ern Brunswick County schools, princi
pals, teachers and students say they are
less stressed-out and better prepared than
ever.
“Our attitudes have improved a lot and
there haven’t been nearly as many kinds
of conflicts,” declared Leland Middle
School eighth grader Robert Camp. “And
our teachers are better at teaching.”
The new calendar implemented at
Belville Elementary, Lincoln Primary and
Leland Middle schools shortens summer
vacation to five weeks but provides a
three-week break after each nine weeks of
instruction.
During the break, students with academ
ic problems can obtain remediation before
they slip farther behind while students
who are not having academic trouble can
take a breather or participate in enrich
See Year-round, page 8
Henson
chosen
mayor
By Jim Harper
Staff Writer
Fulfilling a promise made in
November, mayor Tom Brad
shaw resigned from his leader
ship post and from the village
council of Bald Head Island on
Saturday, and newly elected
council member Kitty Henson
was chosen to serve as mayor
for the next two years.
Bradshaw, the only non-resi
See Henson, page 6
Special meeting
Lakes water
compromise
agreed upon
By Richard Nubel
News Editor
Work of the Boiling
Spring Lakes water feasi
bility committee will con
tinue and all committee
members can remain on
the job, under terms of an
agreement reached be
tween three commissioners
and new mayor Tom Tully
Monday night.
But, the committee will
no longer have instruction
to prepare a binding refer
endum on water system
development by the May
primary election and Tully
‘I am not
against it. You’re
trying to tell
people I’m
against it and I
am not.’
Mayor Tom Tally
will appoint two or three additional members to the body, like
ly in January.
“We worked out a compromise,” commissioner Jack
Redmond announced to about 50 persons who gathered at City
Hall for a specially called meeting of the board of commission
ers initiated by him and commissioners Ray Hicks and Bertt
Buckbee.
The compromise ended a contentious session called ini
See Water, page 9
Yaupon board
is reorganized
Dot Kelly will remain mayor of Yaupon Beach for the next
two years, fellow commissioners decided Monday night.
Little change was brought to the board of commissioners at its
biennial reorganizational meeting. Just as Kelly remains mayor,
mayor pro-tern Bill Smith will keep his job until the board reor
ganizes again in 1999.
Kelly, Smith and newly elected commissioner Marty Wozniak
were sworn to four-year terms of office by the mayor’s brother,
. - See Yaupon, page 10
Meeting change
The regular meeting of the Southport Board of Aldermen
scheduled for 7:30 p.m. Thursday will be called to order and
immediately recessed.
Advertising requirements of the state’s open meetings law
could not be met in time to cancel and reschedule the session.
The board wishes to delay this month’s meeting in observance
of the December 4 death of Alneta Crowe, wife of city mayor
Bill Crowe.
The December reorganizational meeting of the Southport
Board of Aldermen will be reconvened at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday,
December 16.
Beach Road district
to become a town?
By Richard Nubel
News Editor
Could number 19 be far away?
With 18 incorporated towns and cities,
Brunswick County has more municipalities than
any other of the 100 counties in North Carolina.
Number 19 may be on the way.
Commissioners of the Southeast Brunswick
Sanitary District are at legist interested enough in
the benefits of municipal incorporation that they
have directed district manager Woody Wilson to
prepare a briefing on the possibility.
“The board, simply, at our last meeting, had
some questions and charged me with finding
some information,” Wilson said. “I am doing
that through the N. C. League of Municipalities
and the N. G. Institute of Governments.”
Wilson s&id if all responded in a timely fashion
he would have a “stack of information” for
commissioners when they next meet January 5.
Southeast Brunswick Sanitary District was
created by an act of Brunswick County commis
sioners in September, 19,X9. The initial task of
district commissioners was to construct a public
wastewater management system for the Long
Beach Road corridor.
In recent years, however, the district has
adopted its own zoning ordinance and subdivi
sion ordinance and has taken an affirmative
approach to land use matters. Commissioners,
See Beach Road, page 10
TVaflie backups on the Oak Island bridge were annoying at times this week as the
N. C. Department of Transportation began routine replacement of bridge joints. In
place of flagmen, DOT employed portable traffic lights to narrow traffic to one lane
across sections of the bridge as work progressed.
NEWS on the NET: www.southport.net