MADISON
COUNTY LIBRARY
GENERAL DELIVERY
MARSHALL NC
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The NEWS RECORD
Serving Madison And Northern Buncombe Counties
Vol. 88 No. 17
Thursday, April 28, 1988
25c
Ponder: Don't Give Up On Trust Highway
By BILL STUDENC
Editor
Former state highway commis
sioner Zeno Ponder asked the
Madison County Board of Education
not to give up hope on the construc
tion of a proposed highway between
Marshall and Trust.
But Ponder, addressing the school
board at a special called meeting last
Thursday night, fell short of saying
how that road could affect the propos
ed closing of Spring Creek Elemen
tary School.
School board members have ap
proved a plan calling for the closing
of Spring Creek School and the busing
of students from that community to
Hot Springs. A group of Spring Creek
parents and residents is opposed to
that plan and is trying to find funding
to keep the school open.
Although Ponder did not address
the proposed closing of the school, he
did remind the school board that Spr
ing Creek residents had agreed to a
consolidated high school IS years ago
County
Studies
Industrial
Recruiting
By HASSIE PONDER
SUff Writer
The Madison County poard of Com
missioners sponsored a forum on
economic development and industrial
recruitment Thursday night at the
Marshall Senior Citizens Center.
Three experts in the field of in
dustrial recruitment spoke at the
forum: Rebecca Williams, manager
of economic development for the
Asheville Area Chamber of Com
merce; Micheal Gouge, regional
development representative for the
N.C. Department of Commerce; and,
Bob Watson, industrial development
representative for Tennessee Valley
Authority.
Each speaker gave some sugges
tions on how Madison County can
speed up its ecomomic development
and increase the chances of new in
dustry locating here.
Williams gave a list of things that
industries look for when deciding
where to located
? Financial incentitives package -
Does the county offer tax breaks or
lower water or sewer rates?
? Labor ? Is there an available
workforce?
? Quality of life - Does the county of
fer the type of environment the com
pany is interested in?
Watson gave a list of trends affec
ting new industries that are locating
in Western North Carolina :
? Industries are going from larger
to smaller.
? Labor is more skilled; more com
puter knowledge and automation is
being used.
? Labor costs are higher.
? The United States will remain the
safe haven for primary industries.
? More international development
is occurring at the regional level.
? 60-70 percent of Jobs come from
existing industries
Gouge spoke about the overall sue
cess of North Carolina in. the
after then-Gov. Bob Scott promised a
modern road between the Spring
Creek-Trust area and Marshall.
"Bob Scott made an appeal that if
the people of Spring Creek voted for a
consolidated high school, he would
see to it as governor that an adequate
road would be built to reach a central
high school," Ponder said.
Construction began on that
highway, but the road currently ends
in the Little Pine section of the coun
ty
And, according to the N.C. Depart
ment of Public Instruction's Division
of School Planning, there are no plans
to complete that road. The Division of
School Planning had recommended
that the Madison school board con
tinue to operate Spring Creek School
because students there could not be
transported to centrally located
facilities, which would have also in
cluded students from Hot Springs.
(The school board decided, instead,
to keep a kindergarten through
eighth-grade school at Hot Springs
and to bus Spring Creek students to
Hot Springs).
"The Division of School Planning
contacted the N.C. Department of
Transportation regarding plans for
constructing the Marshall-Trust
highway and was informed that there
are no plans to complete this
project," according to the division's
report on Madison County schools.
But Ponder, a former member of
the N.C. Board of Transportation,
says that the proposed highway is not
dead.
"I would ask you to carefully look
and see if an east-west road is not in
the county's best interest, while
we've still got horses in the ballgame
and while we've still got the speaker
of the House (Liston B. Ramsey,
D-Madison)," Ponder said.
"Madison County has one-third of
one percent of the population of North
Carolina, but we've got the second
most powerful man in the state in the
speaker," he said.
Ponder suggested that Ramsey's
influence could be tapped to provide
funding to complete the Marshall
Trust road.
"This county will never realize its
full potential until we have an east
west road across Madison County,"
he said.
Ponder said that transporation
board member John Sutton told him
that he had "never been a party to
abandoning that road."
Ponder had been charged with us
ing inside information available as a
member of the transportation board
when he purchased land along the
route of the proposed road. A federal
judge dismissed charges against him,
and a state court jury found Ponder
not guilty of those charges.
Ponder, a Democrat, blamed those
charges on politics.
Jim Baker, Madison school board
chairman, said he agreed with
Fonder' s comments on the need for
the road.
-Continued on Page 9
Weaverville Town Manager Charles Horne
looks at the town's crumbling pool. An In
spector last week revealed major cracks in
BILL STUDENC PHOTO
the bottom of the facility, and town officials
may be forced to build a new pool.
BILL STUDBNC PHOTO
Zeno Ponder, left, addresses the Madison County school
board about a proposed road to Spring Creek while Superin
tendent Bobby Edwards, right, listens.
Weaverville Pool
In Poor Condition
By BILL STl'DEM
Editor
Workers uncovered some disturb
ing new* at the Weaverville swimnr
| ing pool last week when they
' discovered that water is leaking at an
alarming rate from the bottom of the
crumbling facility.
The leak is worse than Weaverville
officials initially thought, and will ap
parently force the town to close the
pool and build a new facility.
Crews inspected the pool last
Thursday to determine exactly how
water is leaking from the pool. Last
year, nearly 425,000 gallons of water
went through the pool during the sum
mer before town officials closed the
pool in late July. Normally the pool,
which holds an estimated 20,000
gallons of water, remains open
through Labor Day.
But the town closed the pool after
officials discovered the leak during a
summerlong drought that forced
Weaverville residents to take steps to
conserve water.
Weaverville officials had suspected '
that water was leaking through the
pool's walls. But after last week's in
spection, they learned that water is
also leaking through the bottom of the
pool, said Charles Home, Weaver
ville town manager.
. "We filled it up enough to deter
mine where the problem is, and the
water level dropped about an inch in
30 minutes," Home said. "About 8 in
ches drained overnight. That's a
significant amount of water."
The pool is in such poor condition
that it would make little sense to try
to patch up the cracks, he said.
"My recommendation will more
than likely be to construct a new pool
rather than try to put more money in
to this thing," said Home. "Spending
more money on the pool is not going
to be worth the effort."
Weaverville officials had hoped to
work with Buncombe County's
recreation department to build a
larger, Olympic-size pool for the en
tire northern section of the county.
But the Buncombe County Recrea
tion Advisory last week announced its
list of future projects. A pool for the
?Continued on Page ?
DSS Is Target Of Proposed Organization
By BILL STUDENC
Editor
Several Madison County families
are trying to organize a county
chapter of Citizens Against Social
Abuse to serve as a "go-between" in
child abuse cases.
Edward Hall of Mars Hill, one of
the leaders of the CASA movement in
Madison County, says it is just too
easy for the Department of Social
Services to remove a child from its
family on the basis of suspected child
abuse.
A CASA chapter recently organized
in Buncombe County, and CASA
members in Henderson County have
been involved in a running battle with
DSS officials there for several mon
ths.
Hall, 55, and his wife were accused
five years ago of abusing their two
granddaughters. He says those
charges were false and were brought
by a family member due to other
family disputes.
But Hall says his story illustrates a
common problem with local DSS
agencies - that the DSS has too much
power.
"They (DSS workers) have too
much power and we want to cut them
down to size before they can destroy
any more children and families,"
said Hall.
"DSS has got people so scared here
in Madison County that they won't
crawl out of their hole," Hall said.
DSS workers, without conducting a
full investigation, can ask a judge for
a warrant to remove a child from a
home where child abuse is s inspected,
he said.
"We would like to be a go-between
between the court system and the
DSS," Hall said.
Hall said he would like for CASA
volunteers to sit in when DSS workers
interview families in which child
abuse is suspected.
"The only training that DSS worker
has got is to get that child to say what
they want it to when they get it in
front of that judge," he said.
Having someone who is not paid by
the county to participate in child
abuse investigations would give an
unbiased viewpoint, he said.
Another idea being investigated by
CASA organizers is an arbitration
committee that would review child
custody cases before children are
removed from a family.
The committee would be composed
of DSS representatives and of people
with no ties to DSS.
Hall said he is also working with the
American Civil Liberties Union to
keep tabs on cases in which children
are improperly removed from their
parents or guardians.
The Halls, along with "four or five
other families," are now working to
contact other families in Madison
County that may be interested in for
ming a local CASA chapter.
"We just want to get a meeting
planned," Hall said. "We need to get
enough people to have a
County. I I
feet. We need to get this out in i
open and get the ball i
Hot Springs Woman Recovering
After Collision On U.S. 25-70
By HASSIE
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Marshall.
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tat Wedi ? sd to a I t
Highway Patrol report.
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fell asleep behind the i
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to the report
However, ? Highway patrol
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