Newspapers / The Pilot (Southern Pines, … / July 27, 1934, edition 1 / Page 3
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Friday, July 27, 1934. THE PILOT, Southern Pines and Aberdeen, North Carolina Page Thr«* She Ark j^outhrrn l^fnrs, N. €. Mrs. Millicent A. Hayea, Principal A COUNTRY DAY SCHOOL FOB BOYS AND GIRLS Kinderrartcn througfh the 8th year MUSIC--ART—LANGUAGES Tutoring Arranged for Older Groups Limited Accommodations for Boarders Will be in his office over the Poet Office, Sanford, N. C., eTery Wednesday, fqorn 10:00 a. m. to S:00 p. m. Don't faU to see him if yoor eyes are weak. The School Loan Question TUFTS AGREES AND DlSAGKEEvS DR.J. I. NEAL VETERINABIAN Caroilaa Pharmacy, Plnehnnt or A. S. Swlnaertoa's Rtablea ia Southern Pines E. V. PERKINSON General Contractor Southern Pines, N. C. Tel. 5033 Everett, Zane and Muse Certified Public Accountants Sanford, N. C. Greensboro, N. C. J. C. Muse, C. P. A., Resident Partner J. N. POWELL, INC. Undertaking Embalming Ambulance Service East Broad St., Southern Pines A. 1^. ADAMIS PAINTER — DBCORATOE PAPER HAKGBB WALL PAPERS Phone 6922 MONTESANTI Featuring North Carolina Homespnns TAILORING, DRY CLEANING Tal. 1641 V WE GUARANTEE to produce a letterhead, a statement, a handbill or whatever Idnd of printing you wish done, in a nuumer that will prove entirely satisfactory to you. Give us your next wof k and see how hard we work to insure your satisfactkm Editor, The Pilot: Mr. H. Lee Thomas’ explanation of the school situation has been read with much interest. Personally I agree with most of Mr. Thomas' statements and deductions. For exam ple, I agree that the extravagant school building at Carthage, for ex ample, and the exclusion of all chil dren from it except those living in the city was a mistake, but the school law was afterwards changed so that there had to be a certain number of children to a teacher which forced such cities a3 Carthage to take in the ct-ildren frona the surrounding coun- try. Pinehurst and Southern Pines built adequate inexpensive frame buildings covered with plaster or brick and included the surrounding country »o that those living within three or fear mill’s or perhap:> fur^Uer could havo all the advantage.-, of th? higher variations of these towns. Most ly I hope thit the next legislature will give us b?itor tdu- cation. What is needed to accompllsti this I don’t know, but I do know especially up to the 8th grade, that the education the children of the state are getting is a disgrace and a shame. Nor do I disagree with Mr. Thomas that some new construction is need ed and if this can’t be done from taxes, a small bond issue may be nec essary. Many of the buildings, that it is proposed to abandon and replace with new ones, could be enlarged and al tered so as to be approved by the State at a very small cost. The Com missioners had no way of getting es timates of the cost other than ask ing the architects of the State Scnool board to furnish them plans. These architects deserve our mo.st hearty commendation for they have design ed a series of inexpen.sive, attractive buildings to suit all needs. They sent a man here who suggested which set of plans was needed for each locali ty. He could not take the time to prepare alteration plans for each ex isting building. My suggestion is that some of the larger tax payers subscribe enough to have this work done and we at Pinehurst will be glad to subscribe and cooperate. If the adjoining counties have school facilities to teach some of the Moore County children why shouldn’t they? I can’t see any reason if this is pos sible why we should put up build ings. Why not cooperate with them ? The parents of the children in Manly as far as I know don’t object to send ing their children to Southern Pines. Why should the people of Moore ob ject to sending children to Montgom ery? A member of the school board told me recently that only two new build ings were necessary. These might cost $.50,000. We had better add this to next year’s taxes than to burden ourselves with the big debt proposed. If the construction of these build ings would aid in employment that would be a horse of another color, but the contracts into which Uncle Sam puts money are properly open to the people of the United States and the chances of even a North Car olina contractor, much less a Moore County man, getting it are very small. However the thing that seems wrong to me is that those cities that were so short sighted as to build needlessly expensive buildings and so selfish as to limit the school district to the city limits should be able to throw this burden on the rest of the County through a consolidation of debt and at the same time get more buildings in their cities. Take for example the city of Car thage will save $6,600 in taxes each year and get $33,550 more buildings. Why should the rest of the county not only pay them $6,600 a year for past follies but give them in addi tion $33,550 that I am told by a member of the school board isn’t nec essary. —LEONARD TUFTS. July 21, 1934. DR. POATE’S .ANALYSIS I Subscribe To THE PILOT Moore County's Leading Weekly $2.00 Per Year la Advance COOL — COMFORTABLE — PLEASANT WAY TO CENTURY OF PROGRESS EXPOSmON CHICAGO, ILL. AND RETURN* AIR-CONDITIONED TRAINS ALL THE WAY VIA WASHINGTON Unrestricted 18 Day Limit $34.85 ROUND TRIP FARES Unrestricted Season Limit $44.65 Coadu 30 Day Limit $26.80 Party Coach Faxes 25 or More Considerably Cheaper. For Information See Agent or Write e. E. FLEAaANTS, D. P. A., 505 ODD FELLOWS BUILDING Seaboaid LINE RAULWAV THE ONLY AIR-CONDITIONED TRAINS IN THE SOUTH Editor, The Pilot: It is very hard to get exact figures as to the proposed county school b .nd issue. In last week’s Moore County News, Mr. H. I,»'e Thomas speaks of j “the $166,000 bond issue.” From f)th- I er sources which I believe to be au- i tho'ritativi.' \ learn that tae total sum of money which the county would : borrow under this plan :s .o23:?,000 - j though not all of it comes from the I PWA. If we borrow' this $232,000, we should have to pay back nearly $400.- 000, counting interest. And thats a lot of money. ' Moreover, there are two sides to ‘ the plan. The total school-bond debt in Moore County is now $610,000— ; mainly contracted by various special ; charter school districts, and not by the county as a unit. It is now pro- ! posed that the county assume this load, and increase it by borrowing $232,000 more—which means that we should have to pay back, in all. about $953,000. Nearly a million dollars!— And that’s not all; the county has a j large bonded debt for other purposes; ' this would be for schools only. With nearly a fourth of all county taxes : now in arrears, how can we afford to assume this enormous additional debt? Bear in mind that the proposed county wide school-tax, of 45c on each $100, is not needed to repay the PWA loan. An additional 8c would be enough to retire this new bond issue. Or let’s be generous, and call it 9.5c. is proposed, only one-iourth of the 7c on each $100 be raised to 45c, as ilf our present county school tax of added tax will be used to pay off the new debt. The rest of the added 38c, or about 28.5c (it is really more) would go toward paying old debts 1 contracted, not by the county, but by I various single school-districts.— ; Moreover, the districts which have the ' biggest debts now would be the ones I to profit most by the new arrange- i ment. Let us take Mr. Thomas’s own ! figures; ! These six school districts would .have their tax-rate lowered by the fol- i lowing amounts; I Aberdeen-Pinebluff, reduced 27c on I each $100; Cameron, reduced 37c; i Carthage, reduced 42c, (and that's quite a reduction!); Hemp, reduced 12c; West End, reduced 29c, and Vass-Lakeview, reduced 22c. The rest of the county, on the other hand, would have to make up these reductions. In Pinehurst, the school-tax would be increased 9c on each $100; Eagle Springs, 23c; Eureka-Hallison, 28c; Southern Pines, 16c; Sheffield-Ritters, 38c; Deep River, 38c; Bensalem, and parts of Carthage township, 38c; Greenwood, and parts of Sandhills township. 38c (and these are pretty big increases!) and Mineral Springs, 21c. The folks at the north end of the county, and everyone who lives out side the former special charter school districts, are now paying 7c county school tax on each $100. Under the new plan, they would pay 45c, an in crease of 38c: and they would have to pay the total sum of $181,000 to re tire the proposed bond issue of $232,- 000. They’d have more than 2-3 of it all to pay! “But look at the benefits!” says Mr. Thomas.—As we have already seen, only 1-4 of the increased tax would go toward new buildings; the other 3-4 would pay old debts which these people never approved. Three-quarters of the “benefits” would go to Cam eron, and Carthage, and West End and Hemp, and the rest of the six districts whose taxrate would be low ered. If the folks in Sheffield and Ritters and Deep River and Eagle Springs and elsewhere want new buildings, they could pay for them out of an additional tax of ten or fifteen cents, at most. Or, they could get all the benefits of the new PWA loan by paying a county-wide tax of about &c per $100. As far as I can find out, uobody has even tried to explain why these two projects were tied together. The PWA doesn’t care about our existing debt-structure. They would be I perfectly satisfied with a county-wide I tax big enough to retire the bonds ] they have offered to buy—which ‘ would mean about 9c more, or a to- i tal county-wide tax of, say, 16c per $100. These school districts—Carthage, Hemp, West End, Cameron, Vass- Lakeview and Aberdeen-Pinebluff - whose taxes it is now planned to re duce, voted to borrow money for school purpo.ses. Nobody outside those districts had any say in the matter. They borrowed on their own credit. Why should the rest of us be asked, now, to help them pay off debts w'hich they contracted deliberately, without consulting us? Mr. Thomas speaks of “equalizing” the tax rate. But the Southern Pines town tax rate is now $2.60, plus 47c special school tax (22c debt-service and the rest for operating expenses), or a total tax-rate of $3.07, in addi tion to the county tax which everyone i must pay. I In Aberdeen, the town tax rate is I $1.50, I am told—which includes the ! special school tax. In Carthage, the I town tax-rate is $1.00, and the spec- ! ial school tax about 87c. or a total I ' I of $1.87 above the county tax. Is it “equalization” to raise the Southern Pines tax rate by 16c, mak ing it $3,23--while the Carthage tax I is reduced from $1.87 to $1.45, and j the Aberdeen rate- from $1.50 to $1.23? It would make our tax more than double that paid by either Aberdeen or Carthage; and that’s just not fair. As Mr, Thomas admitted (though it sounded like an accusation) South ern Pines has good schools. Our lax ' rate is by far the highest in the coun- ' ty; and we don’t object to that. But 1 vve can't see the justice in raising our high taxes still higher, in order ; to low’er taxes elsewhere, which are i already very much lower than ours. . Whatever the merits of these two proposals, they ought not to be tied together thus. If the folks of Moore County want to borrow $232,000, w'ell and good. Let’s do it, and raise the school tax 9c or so to pay the mon ey back. ' And if the rest of the county want to assume the back debts of Carth. age school district, and of Vass, Cam- ' eron, and the others in the six dis- ' tricts listed, and to pay off debts they j never approved, or had any good ; from, that’s all right, too. But let j us vote on the two proposals sepa rately; because these back debts of certain school districts haven’t a thing in the world to do with the PWA. Qne last objection, which seems mighty serious to me.—If we have more money to spend, it ought to go ’ to our school teachers, who have worked so faithfully and loyally for less money than the PWA pays labor ers. Plenty of teachers in Moore County are being paid $50 a month: ! now how would they feet to watch a ^ quarter-million dollars forth of new i buildings going up ? It is not marble buildings which make good schools: it’s skilled teachers. If we have mon ey to spare, let’s take care of our j teachers first -pay them decently, I and build new school-houses after ward. if there’s anything left. But with a quarter of our county taxes still unpaid, and with the pa pers full, every week, of tax-fore- closure notices, it’s a mighty poor time to be adding to the county debt, and trying to raise taxes. Our taxes are high enough now—plenty! And in the long run, even those whose tax- rate would be lowered for a while would suffer. Because it won’t be long before Southern Pines will need two entire new school plants. In ten years. West Southern Pines school has grown from 4 to 16 teachers. And with this conn- ty-wide scheme, the rest of the coun ty would be taxed to build new school- houses for Southern Pines. How would they like that ? We shall new $300,000 here before many years. Do the folks in Carthage, and Deep River, and Ritters, and Sheffield, want to help us pay it back? I won der! Youra sincerely, —ERNEST M. POATE. Southern Pines, July 23, 1934. REPLIES TO DR. DANIELS Editor, The Pilot: Dr. Daniels, in his article appear, ing in the Moore County News of July 19th, apparently overlooked the fact that the election on August 25th will decide whether we shall have the “county unit” plan of taxation to pay old and new school debts* or con tinue on the district basis. It was my purpose to discuss some of the j legal and administrative aspects of ! the “county unit” plan in my state ment July 12th and later in the July I 19th issue of the paper, to show how I the plan, if adopted, would affect the j tax rates in the various districts and I areas of the county. This was essen- I tial in order to give a complete un- [ derstanding of tha proposition. There appeared to be plenty of tim<» to do this before the election. If the good doctor will be patient, all the facts ' will be forthcoming in due time. My discussion dealt with condi- , tions as they existed over a period ! of years in the State as a whole prior to 1931, when tuition was abolished and children allowed to cross district lines freely. A few charter districts (Please turn to page 7) 4 Do you ever go to work feeling “done in”...dreading the long, hard day ahead of you? Then light a Camel. Fatigu« and irritability slip away in a few minutes. You feel a delightful “lift” Enjoy it as often as you please. Camel’s costlier tobaccos never interfere with healthy nerves. Get a LIfS with a Camel! 12 li ilWjr h Fhber Match This Performance at This New Low Price t795 [LOWEST PRICE L&1 BUICK HISTORY] A Straight Eight — 93 Horsepower — 85 miles per hour- 15 miles per gallon! UlC WHEN •IJRTTEF • AUTOMOBILES • A.RE 'BUILT—BUICK ‘WILL'BUILD >THEM Ninety-ihfce is the newest Buick’s horsepower. 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The Pilot (Southern Pines, N.C.)
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July 27, 1934, edition 1
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