April 8, 1998
THE STATE PORT
Phone 910-457-4568/Fax 910-457-9427/e-mail pilot@southport.net
Volume 67, Number 33
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Christina’s wheelchair ‘not that heavy’
Malpractice settlement will pay for medical bills, college
By Holly Edwards
Feature Editor
Christina Price has been awarded $8 million
to settle a malpractice lawsuit but she’d glad
■■ ly give it up to be able to walk again.
• ■ -“The- settlement Will help take care of me '
and keep me out of the nursing home and help
me go to college,” Christina said this week.
“But it sure isn’t going to make me walk
again. Nothing can make up for what that doc
tor did to me. If anyone wants to trade places
with me for $8 million, they can be my guest.”
Christina and her family filed the malprac
tice suit against Wilmington neurosurgeon
Raymond Sattler, whom she alleged failed to
take appropriate measures, to prevent.paralysis
from spreading after she suffered a spinal cord
injury in a 1994 automobile accident. Price’s
attorney will receive 40 percent of the settle
ment, leaving her $4.8 million. Her father,
Larry Price, said he will invest the money and
hopes to generate enough interest income to
pay Christina’s $350,000 to $500,000 annual
medical bill.
Mr. Price said it is a relief to the family that
they will no longer have to worry about’her
being institutionalized. The Prices recently
moved from their house into a trailer to save
money, and Mr. Price said he was prepared to
liquidate all of his assets to keep Christina at
home as long as possible.
“I don’t know how to explain the relief we
feel,” he said. “We were very well-prepared to
sell out, retire and face bankruptcy — whatev
er we had to do to keep Christina out of a nurs
ing home.”
Christina’s mother, Dena Price, said all she
wanted from the lawsuit was enough money to
take care of Christina.
“I love my kid better than life itself,” she
said, fighting back tears. “I pray everyday
she’ll get up and walk. I’d give my life if I
See Christina, page 7
PRICE
Airport
proposal
SBSD suggests
public input on
expansion plan
By Richard Nubel
Municipal Editor
Betting Brunswick County
Airport commissioners will get an
earful, Southeast Brunswick
Sanitary District commissioners
said Monday they will ask the air
port board to hold a public hearing
on a proposed runway expansion
project that may displace as many
as 400 district residents.
If airport commissioners refuse,
the district will hold its own public
hearing on the proposed $7.3-mil
lion Brunswick County Airport
expansion project, anticipated in
the next five years.
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airport, sanitary district commis
sioners Monday refused to act on a
request to provide the facility with
sanitary sewer service until it is
determined whether the airport
property is inside or outside district
bounds. Those residing outside the
district pay a higher rate for ser
vice. District commissioners also
resolved to write Federal Aviation
Administration officials to com
plain the airport does nothing to
prevent pilots from engaging in
“stunt” flying over populated areas.
The proposed project by which
the airport runway would be
lengthened from 4,000 to 5,000
feet drew most of SBSD commis
sioners’ attention, as the plan did
last month. The airport board is
awaiting word on its application
for a $6.57-million federal grant
supported by U. S. Sen. Lauch
Faircloth. That grant would be
matched by $730,000 from
Brunswick County.
The expansion, as now planned,
would require the acquisition of 56
additional acres of land by the air
port — most of it from five mobile
home parks in Southeast
See Airport, page 7
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_, Photo by Jim Harper
1 he Easter Bunny opened a busy schedule of appearances Saturday at the annual Southport Parks and
Recreation Department egg hunt -- and bunny hug -- in Franklin Square Park- Long Beach plans another
egg hunt for youngsters at 10 a.m. Saturday in Middleton Park, and a couple egg-ventures will be held at
Boiling Spring Lakes.
East Beach
' Time, tide
taking toll
By Richard Nubel
Municipal Editor
A small, one-story oceanfront cot
tage with the letters “Gilly” hung to
one side of the doorframe sat on
rails Tuesday, lifted from its founda
tion at 4921 East Beach Drive and
awaiting the moving crew.
Two lots down, at 4917 East
Beach, lies the broken cement block
foundation of what was once some
one else’s beachfront cottage. It is a
cottage that ran out of room on the
beachfront and had to be moved.
All along East Beach Drive, from
58th Street westward, houses are
disappearing, loosing the battle to
Mother Nature.
East of “Gilly,” Milligan’s
Moving had a crew working
Tuesday, placing a home on pilings
See Long Beach, page 5
‘We’ve been trying
to create a dune
with trucked-in
sand. But people
stop me and ask,
“Aren’t you the tur
tle lady? Where are
they going to
nest?”’
Tina Pritchard
Maybe Brunswick?
Convention center
considered in area
By Terry Pope
County Editor
It didn’t take much of a sales pitch
before the Brunswick County Board
of Commissioners bought into the
idea of building a regional hotel and
convention center in southeastern
North Carolina.
Wilmington mayor Hamilton
Hicks told the board Monday he is
drumming-up support for a
$750,000 planning grant he hopes
the N. C. General Assembly will
allocate next month. The funds
would come from a projected $1
billion surplus state legislators are
Leland school reopens April 20
Leland Middle
School fire
By Holly Edwards
Feature Editor
Leland Middle School faculty and students are “united in their sense of
loss” in the wake of a fire that damaged most of the school building and
destroyed an entire wing, said principal Diana Mintz.
“We all have a lot of emotion invested in this school, so this hurts,” she
said. “But at the same time, this gives us a sense of focus and direction and
a goal to work toward.”
That goal is to get most of the school ready for classes by April 20 when
students are scheduled to return from spring break.
Brunswick County school board members late last week approved a plan
to clean-up most of the fire damage, seal-off a wing that sustained the most
severe damage and rent six mobile units tor additional classroom space for
See School, page 6
Damage may
reach $3.5 mil
By Terry Pope
County Editor A
Final estimates place damage
to Leland Middle School at $3.5
million from last week’s blaze
that demolished the eighth grade
pod and blanketed the remain
ing classroom wings with black
soot and water.
Brunswick County fire marshal
Cecil Logan said it will cost $2
million to rebuild the wing of
classrooms where the fire began
See Damage, page 6
expected to appropriate during the
short session in May.
“This is an opportunity to show
teamwork among the communities
in the area,” said Hicks, who plans
to include Pender and New Hanover
counties and area beach towns.
The planning grant would help
plan and choose a site for the pro
ject that would include a convention
center to seat up to 10,000 persons,
along with a hotel and concert hall.
The center would benefit the entire
community, so each county would
have a representative on an authori
ty that Hicks said he will ask the
assembly to appoint.
The authority would work with
planners to site a facility and admin
ister the $750,000 planning grant.
All five county commissioners
agreed a convention center is need*
ed, and chairman Jo Ann Bellamy
Simmons said Brunswick County
would be a good location.
“When your comments came out
in the paper from the Pender County
meeting, I was surprised,” Ms.
Simmons told Hicks. “But I said, I
definitely thought we needed a con
vention center, and I’m sure you
were talking about putting it in
Brunswick County.”
“If that’s the best location, then so
be it,” said Hicks. “I certainly
would have no problem putting it in
Brunswick County.”
There is no place to seat a large
audience for concerts or other stage
programs in southeastern North
See Convention, page 7
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