The NEWS RECORD
SERVING THE PEOPLE CO'JNTY SINCE 1901
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Policy Change
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Story on Page 14
Community
Calendar
Parenting Classes Offered
The Blue Ridge Mental Health Center and the Hot Springs
Health Program are offering a series of weekly parenting
classes beginning on April 9 at 7:30 p.m. The sessions will
meet each Tuesday night through May 14 in the Marshall
Senior Citizens Center on Long Branch Rd. Classes are free
and poen to the public.
For more information, call Becky Eller at 649-2112 or
622-3245 or Marian Plaut at 649-2367.
Spring Creek VFD Auction
The Spring Creek Volunteer Fire Dept. will hold an auction
on April 5 at 7:30 p.m. in te fire station. Everyone is invited to
attend. All proceeds will benefit the fire company.
ARC To Meet April 11
The Madison County Association for Retarded Citizens will
hold a meeting on April 11 at 7 p.m in the Marshall Senior
Citizens Center on Long Branch Rd. to discuss plans for the
May Day Festival on May 4. All interested persons are urged
to attend.
Job Search Class Offered
The Opportunity Corporation of Madison and Buncombe
County will conduct a five-day training session for persons
wishing to develop their job searching skills. Classes will be
held at the Marshall Elementary School beginning on April 22
at 9 a.m.
For more information, contact the Opportunity Corp. at
649-3231 or come to the school on April 22.
County GOP Names
Briggs Chairman
By ROBERT KOENIG
Mars Hill attorney Bruce Briggs
was elected the Madison County
Republican. Party chairman Satur
day at the county convention in Mar
shall. Briggs was unopposed in the
election.
Briggs succeeds C.N. Willis of Mars
Hill. Willis is currently being con
sidered for a post with the state
Board of Elections.
Briggs, a former District Court and
Superior Court Judge and state
senator, was nominated by James
Baker, Jr. of the nominating commit
tee. More than 60 registered
Republicans gathered in the county
courthouse for the annual convention
to name local party officials and
delegates to the district and state con
ventions.
The convention re-elected Pat
Roberts as the county vice chairman.
Roberts told the convention, "( was
going to tell my age and tell you I'm
too old for this, but two years from
now this courthouse will be full of
Republicans and I want to help."
Brenda Fuller was also elected the
party's county secretary without op
position.
In the convention s only contested
election, Bob Phillips of Mars Hill
was elected county treasurer, replac
ing Mars Hill attorney Ed Krause
The convention also selected 16
delegates to the district and state con
ventions. Outgoing county chairman
C.N. Willis told the convention that
the county's delegation has increased
by four delegates for this year's con
ventions.
Named as delegates representing
Madison County were James Baker,
Jr., Karen Baker, Pat Roberts, Dr.
Larry Stern, Bruce Briggs, Roger
Swann, Roy Norton, Bob Phillips,
Clyde Roberts, Buster Norton,
Lucretia Griffin, C.N. Willis, Dedrick
Brown, and Brenda Fuller.
The convention also named nine
alternates, including two registered
Democrats from Spring Creek who
announced they would be changing
their registration. Russell Rowe told
(Continued on Page 3)
- - u " - 1 ??
Adams Trial Is Postponed
The first degree murder trial of James Arthur Adams was
postponed Monday morning in Marshall. The prosecution
sought the delay because of illness suffered by one of the
witnesses.
Adams is charged with murder, rape and obstruction of
justice in connection with the 1970 slaying of Volunteer In Ser
vice To America worker Nancy Morgan.
Jury selection for the trial was to have begun on Monday
morning in a special session of the Madison County Superior
Court. The trial has been postponed until June 24.
The decision to postpone the trial brought complaints from
Adams' attorney, Joseph Huff. Huff told Hie News Record,
"The continuance was granted over our vehement protest. We
were ready to go to trial. My client and his family have been
here for two weeks. We were anxious to try it."
Adams has indicated he will {dead not guilty to the slaying.
He has remained free on $50,000 bond since shortly after his
arrest. Huff said Adams would return to his Florida home to
await his next court date.
Huff said the delay was a hardship for his client. "He's lost
his job when the indictment hit the papers down there. His
wife has lost her job and their daughter has tried to commit
suicide. This man's life has been wrecked by this thing."
District Attorney Tom Rusher was not in Marshall on Mon
day. Attempts to contact the DA by telephone were unsuc
cessful.
Monday's postponement also cancelled a scheduled session
of the Madison County grand jury.
Vandals Steal, Burn Marshall Police Car
SBITo
Investigate
By ROBERT KOENIG
A Marshall Police Dept. patrol car
was stolen and destroyed sometime
Tuesday night. The unattended car
was driven to the rock quarry south of
town where it was set on fire and
pushed down a bank into the French j
Broad River.
The car was a total loss.
The Marshall Vol. Fire Dept.
responded to a call received about
8:30 p.m. Tuesday, former police
chief Larry Davis said.
Mayor Wild said Wednesday that
the theft will be investigated by the
Federal Bureau of Investigation,
State-Bureau of Investigation and the
Madison County Sheriff's Dept.
The Tuesday night theft and fife is
the latest in a series of vandalism
directed against the police cars. Last
year, vandals slashed tires on both
the town's cars
The patrol car was seen parked on
Main Street as late as 8 p.m. Rumors
circulating on Thursday said the thief
left town with the patrol car's blue
light and siren on.
Davis said that the stolen patrol car
could be started without keys and was
m
m
m
DESTROYED MARSHALL POLICE CAR sits in the is investigating the Tuesday theft and destruction of the
town garage on Island Rd. State Bureau of Investigation tar.
not kept locked.
Mayor Wild said on Thursday that
the town's insurance coverage would
pay for a portion of the damage. The
theft leaves the town's police with on
ly one patrol car.
110 Attend GOP Dinner
An estimated lie Madison County
Republicans attended their party's
annual Lincoln Day Dinner at
Madison High Saturday night. The
party faithful dined on roast turkey
and heard optimistic speeches from
local political leaders.
Eleventh District GOP chairman
Harold Corbin addressed the dinner,
telling the gathering, "The
Republican Party is alive and well in
Madison County, in the 11th District
and in North Carolina."
Corbin accused General Assembly
Democrats of sabatoging Gov. James
G. Martin's plans for tax cuts. The
chairman said, "We've got the best
governor this state has ever had and
they're playing their dirty politics
and trying to tie his hands. We'll send
some people to the legislature and
help our governor govern." . .
Martin's senior policy advisor,
Jack Hawke, was the dinner's
featured speaker. Hawke told the
local Republicans that Democrats in
Raleigh are trying to stop Martin's
proposed tax cuts.
Hawke also said that the General
Assembly should place a referendum
on gubernatorial veto on the ballot
along with one limiting succession
Hawke said, "Liston B. Ramsey says
the governor of North Carolina is the
strongest governor in the nation. I'm
sorry, but we are the only state in
which the governor has no veto. Only
four states don't allow their gover
nors to succeed themselves."
Hawke also criticised General
Assembly Democrats for attempting
to impose a hiring freeze and endors
ed Sen. John East and Rep. Bill Hen
don for re-election in 1986.
Police Chief
Resigns
Wild Appoints Lisenbee
To Force
Citing long hours, short pay and in
terference from Mayor Betty Wild,
Marshall's acting police chief, Larry
Davis, resigned from the town force
last Wednesday.
Davis. 29, had served as the town's
acting police chief since the Board of
Aldermen suspended Joe Griffey on
Feb. 13. He joined the Marshall police
force in October, 1984, following the
resignation of Michael Beasley.
On Thursday, Mayor Wild invoked
emergency provisions of the town
charter and named former Marshall
and Mars Hill police officer Bill
Lisenbee to the Marshall police force
without the approval of the Board of
Aldermen.
Lisenbee formerly served on the
Marshall POlice Dept. and ran unsuc
cessfully for Madison County Sheriff
in 1962. He was a member of the Mars
Hill Police Department until ter
minated in December following a
dispute with poliec chief R.J. Cut
shall.
Davis becomes the fifth Marshall
police officer to resign since Betty
Wild took office in Dec., 19(3.
Following the dismissal of Carlie
Gunter. officers Jasper Treadway
and Ed McLean submitted their
resignations in protest. Treadway 's
(Continued on Page 3)
Cost, Method Among Questions In Food Tax Debate
By .ELIZABETH LELAND
The News and Observer
Once a month, EUza Harvey of
Raleigh goes shopping with $2M in
food stamps at a downtown Winn
Dixie. She loads three carta with 30
days worth of groceries for herself,
her unemployed son and three small
grandchildren
Her shopping list every month ifv
eludes, among other things, 24 pounds
of flour. SO pounds of rice, SO pounds
of potatoes, 16 chickens, four large
packages of hot dogs, six dozen eggs.
30 pounds of fUh, h?lf a sack of cab
wortth of food and non-prescription
medicine. The plan won't affect local
sales taxes, but nevertheless would
save Mrs. Harvey about $7.48 a
month in taxes.
While $7.48 may not seem like a lot
to someone who can afford to pay that
much for a bottle of burgarjdy far
Mrs. Harvey, 81, who sometimes runs
out of food before the end of the
month, it would buy another 20 cans
of biscuits, another half-sack of cab
bage or 24 more pounds of flour
Won't that be better for us poor
people," Mrs. Harvey said Friday as
she peeled potatoes and warmed her
feet in front of a black pot-bellied
stove in her living room ''I think it
" idea. I .
lawmakers sat there simply isn't
enough money, and others say
privately that tte tax should remain
because it's the only tax many poor
people pay.
Under Martin's plan, the tax wot^d
be eliminated Jan. 1, 1986 It would
cost the state an estimated 170.3
million for the rest at the 1985-06
fiscal year, which ends June 30, 1988,
and >178.1 million in 1986-87. The cost
would rise to $189.8 million in 1987-88
and $303.1 million in 198MB.
Coat isn't the only issue. How to
eliminate the tax is another- one that
Martin says is of secondary impor
tance In his State of the State ad
dress last month, be told I
showed him still trailing then
Attorney General Rufus L. Edmisten
in the race for governor. Much
earlier, Martin had called for
elimination of the intangibles and in
ventory taxes, which he describes as
"anti-job" taxes.
Martin won't rank the tax reform
measures in order of priority, saying
each is as important as the other.
"I am convinced and have been
since the beginning that strategic tax
reforms- repeal of the intangibles and
inventory tax- will not only benefit
savers and investors, but will also
benefit workers," Martin said in a re
cent interview. "It will provide more
jobs, more ;? i w. as well as
a tax base In i