Editorials
Newspaper has new look
After 22 years, we have changed our banner.
Because the banner is the newspaper's identification and point of
recognition, it is a major event to change it. It is not a move to be
taken lightly or to be made whimsically. It is one we gave careful
consideration.
Unlike some newspapers which change their banner every week
like dirty laundry, the move in this week's News-Journal is only the
third in the history of the newspaper. ?
The last change of the banner was made 22 years ago almost to
the day of this week's edition. That change came when Publisher
Paul Dickson converted the printing process from "hot type" to
offset on August 17, 1961,
Prior to the shift in 1961, The News-Journal banner had remain
ed unchanged since Paul Dickson Sr. bought out D. Scott Poole
and merged the Hoke County News and the Hoke County Journal
on November 8, 1929.
The change today from the old Rondo type to the new Artcraft
style represents a continuing effort to make The News-Journal more
readable.
However, the change does not represent a shift in this
newspaper's policies or procedures.
We feel that we have a responsibility to keep our news stories ob
jective, and we will continue to present all sides of an issue.
At the same time we will present the newspaper's views about
subjects in the "editorials," individual writer's opinions in our col
umns and your thoughts in the "letters to the editor" section.
In the August 17, 1961 edition, Paul Dickson noted in an editorial
CLIFFF BLUE . . .
AT AGE 70... At age 70, Mrs.
Sadie Bye Hall of Lumberton is an
enthusiastic junior at Pembroke
University and is looking forward
to the day she marches down the
aisle to receive her B.A. degree in
history.
A widow with no children she
retired from the Seaboard Coast
Line Railroad in June of 1981 and
after 38'/: years of service, she
says: "I never got it out of my
head that I was going back to
school. The young people at Pem
broke State treat me like I'm one
of them. 1 don't feel any different
They call me Sadie "
She is proud of the fact that in
the fall semester of 1982 she made
the Dean's List at PSU.
N.C. GENERAL ASSEMBLY
... The North Carolina General
Assembly's 1983 session commenc
ed at noon January 12.
The lawmakers assembled in
Raleign talking budget austerity
and no new or increased taxes
Many of them spoke of how this
was finally going to be an efficient
legislature, one that wouldn't daw
dle, go through a lot of wasted mo
tion or allow time to slip through
its collective fingers.
And what happened?
When the General Assembly
finally called it quits at 7 p.m. on
Friday, July 22, it had gone into
the record books as remaining in
session longer than any other
legislature in state history .
As for budget austerity, the
spending bill that was enacted
displayed no trace of bare bones.
Rather than indulging in any real
budget -stripping the legislators in
creased various taxes and created a
few new ones -- to the tune of
about $212 million a year!
TAX INCREASE. ..We feel that
counties which are thinking of hav
ing a public hearing about the '/:
percent extra tax should go slow.
Once you get a tax on, it's hard to
repeal it.
For the first five years after
enactment of the half-cent sales
tax, a county may use 60 percent of
its proceeds from the tax for any
lawful purpose in an unrestricted
manner. The remaining 40 percent
must be used for public school
capital outlay purposes or to retire
an indebtedness incurred by the
county for such purposes.
The next five years the ratio is 70
percent for any lawful purpose and
30 percent for schools.
After 10 years, 100 percent of
the proceeds may be used for any
lawful purpose by the county.
Municipalities have the same
restrictions on the use of the lax
proceeds distributed to them as do
counties, except that towns must
use the funds for water and sewage
capital outlay purposes rather than
for public schools.
There is an important difference
in the distribution of the proposed
half-cent tax revenue and the ex
isting one-cent local option tax.
The half-cent tax will be
distributed to participating coun
ties on a per-capita basis according
to the most recent annual popula
tion estimates as certified by the
state, whereas the one-cent tax
revenue is distributed on a point of
collection basis.
ANYTHING GOES. .."In some
cities, double-breasted suits for
men are back in style... Jane Fon
da's exercise workouts are smash
hits in Los Angeles, but not in
Washington, D.C." -- U.S. News
<& World Report.
The News-Journal
im
Published F.vrry Tktndi) b)
Dickson Pr?, Inc.. Paul Dickson. Pres.
119 W H?ood A venae, P.O. Box 550
Rat ford. N.C. 28376
Subscription Rales la Advance
In Count) Per Year? 110.00
t Months? S5.00
Oul of Count) Per Year? $12.00
6 Months? $6. 00
l.Ot IS H. KHil.KMAN, JK Publisher
ARRF.N V JOHNSTON Mllor
HF.NRY I.. BIUF. Production Supervisor
MRS PAIII. DICKSON Society FUJItor
SAM ( MORRIS Contributing F4ltor
ANNWKBB Advertising Representative
2nd C lam Postage at Raeford, N.C.
II SPS 3SS-260)
that "our most important position is that we are interested in the
future of Hoke County, not dredging up skeletons from the past."
That position has not changed, and we feel the new banner sym
bolizes our regard for what's ahead for this county.
Fight for pork * barrel '
should start immediately
It is unfortunate that a lack of political clout stood in the way of
funding for the Hoke County Courthouse restoration project dur
ing the past session of the state legislature.
The 72-year-old courthouse is deteriorating and in need of speedy
repair.
In order to cover the cost of project, county officials had re
quested an $82,500 slice of the state legislature's $1.5 million "pork
barrell" or voter appeasement bill.
Members of the local legislative delegation cannot explain exactly
why, but the Hoke Courthouse bill was not pushed, and the only
money coming to this county was $25,000 for the Mill Prong
restoration project.
The way the "Omnibus Local Appropriations" bill works is that
each senator and representative is given a fixed amount of money
for projects in their districts.
Anyone with a worthy public project can ask for a share of the
pie. Those, who make enough political noise, get the money.
This year Hoke County did not ask loud enough, and the money
went elsewhere.
Robeson County, which is in the same legislative district as Hoke,
received $14S,000 from delegation members Reps. Danny DeVanc, ?
Pete Hasty and Sidney Locks and another $50,000 from Sen. David
Parnell.
For Robeson, which has almost 80,000 more people than Hoke
and about five times the number of voters, some of the plums were
doled out to projects like $50,000 for a resource center, $35,000 for
Strike At The Wind, $35,000 for the Carolina Theatre, $10,000 for
a senior citizens center and $20,000 for forest fire service.
Around the rest of the state, Cumberland County got a new
library, the Hamlet Railroad Museum got $25,000, Swansboro got ^
$16,000 for a festival and $85,000 went to a mountain International
Folk Festival.
In addition to the courthouse rehabilitation, county residents and
officials are considering projects like an arts festival and downtown
revitalization.
The pork barrell would be a good source for backing for these
projects.
If one looks at what was funded during the last session, it is clear
that money does not go to the worthiest projects, just to the askers
with the most "clout." f
Robeson obviously had their plans organized and pressured the
delegation into giving them the grants.
Because Hoke is smaller than Robeson and Scotland counties, we
are going to have to work harder and pull the right strings to get the
money we need.
This county will have another shot during the short legislative ses
sion held next June.
If we are going to get the money for the courthouse and for other
local projects, county officials and others are going to have to start ?
their lobbying efforts now.
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?1963 Copkr Nm Sct-nct
Letters To The Editor
Other side not told
To the Editor:
I read with interest yoty
reporter's article iri the August 1 1
Mem Journal concerning the pro
posed new dog pound, as discussed
at a Hoke-Raeford Humane
Society meeting Monday night
August 8 at the library.
I was present. There was a good
attendance, and all of us expressed
ourselves audibly, as well as the
director. We felt it best to com
promise on the site favored by
most of the city council and the
county commissioners, in order to
speed up the work.
1 was on a committee appointed
by these bodies back in the early
winter, to investigate and study the
pros and cons of a location and to
draw up tentative plans for a new
dog facility. We worked together
(five on this committee) every week
for a month and met all these re
quests, and then presented them to
the commissioners.
We favored the Calloway site.
We thought it had only one minor
drawback, which was written up in
your paper, but we felt like the
isolated place of the present land
fill would be a serious deterrent to
people going there to adopt an
animal, which after all, is our ideal
goal.
However, there were some
favorable things to be said about
the present landfill location, as
well as the Calloway property.
Therefore, at the Humane Socie
ty meeting Monday night we all
agreed to go along with the landfill
location.
Before the vote was taken many
of us expressed ourselves pro and
con about these two sites. But we
felt it best to compromise in order
to get the new dog pound built
before freezing weather.
It would be interesting to know
why Sherry Matthews quoted only
Jack and Sheryl McGinnis, over
and over, and never quoted a
single remark made by the rest of
us.
Frances Gatlin
Puppy Creek
Philosopber
Dear editor:
I was listening to a group of
high-salaried TV commentators
talking about politics the other
day.
One commentator said the
government's deal to sell a lot of
grain to Russia was just a move to
get the farm vote.
Another one broke in to say
that's not so. "Only 3 percent of
the population are farmers," he
said. "And they're so insignificant
they're not worth worrying
about."
That's like saying that of all the
thousands of manufacturing plants
in this country, only four, or less
than 1 one-thousandth of 1 per
cent, are making cars, so the
automobile industry isn't worth
worrying about.
I could cite the fact that
agriculture is the country's largest
user of petroleum products, that
it's a multi-billion-dollar business
affecting millions of jobs in other
enterprises, and without it super
markets and cafes couldn't stay in
business. But it wouldn't do any
good. TV commentators are paid
to have opinions. Nothing in their
contracts says they have to know
what they're talking about.
Yours faithfully,
J. A.
Senator Parnell
takes exception
to news article
To the Editor:
I normally do not respond to ar
ticles in the press, but in the case of 0
your article in last week's News
Journal headlined "Politics Cost
Hoke County Courthouse Funding
Bill," I felt that I should make an
exception.
The writer of this article and
Rep. Danny DeVane, through
quotes attributed to him, have in
ferred that I have neglected Hoke
County in that the General
Assembly failed to fund Senate Bill
218 which would have provided ^
funds for restoration of Hoke
County Courthouse.
I feel that this is somewhat un
fair in view of the fact that during
the five terms I have served in the
General Assembly, I am the only
member of this body who has in
troduced Special Appropriation
Bills for Hoke County.
We introduced bills in 1977,
1979, and 1981 that were funded m
for projects in Hoke County.
Since your article was critical of
the fact that three other bills were
funded rather than Senate Bill 218,
I would like to point out that Hoke
County will benefit from all three
of these bills.
(1) Mill Prong House: This
house is located in Hoke County,
is 18S years old, and has con
siderable historical and architec
tural value to Hoke County and ?
the surrounding area.
(2) Pre-Release and After-Care
Center: The appropriation of
$25,000 will be used as "seed
money" to eventually establish this
Center in Robeson County. This
center will serve not only prisoners
from Robeson County, but
prisoners from Hoke and other
counties in the area.
(3) Tribal Economic Training ^
Fund: The appropriation of
$25,000 in this bill will fund one
position with the N.C. Indian Af
fairs Commission for an Economic
Developer . Hoke County, with
a large Indian population, could
benefit from this program.
Although the writer of the arti
cle in last week's News Journal and
Rep. DeVane apparently do not
agree with my decision to fund ?
these bills rather than the Hoke
County Courthouse Bill, I do not
feel that I have in any way short
changed Hoke County.
David R. Parnell
N.C. Senate
Occasional words
spell difficulty
for writer
By Warren Johnston
Back when I was working my way through journalism school as a
bartender, Phil Sanderlin would stop in the establishment for an occa
sional happy hour.
Phil, who is an associate editor for The Athens (Georgia) Observer, had
a spelling problem then, as he apparently does now. The other patrons at
the bar and I tried to help Phil by asking him to spell his drink orders. If he
did not spell it correctly, he did not get the drink.
Phil was a quick learner and the Pavlovian approach to spelling seemed
to work until about the fourth drink when he would lapse into ordering a
"gen and tunic."
Spelling problems seem to still be plaguing Phil, and he talks about
them in this recent column he wrote for The Observer.
You'd think that working with words constantly a man would learn to
spell. I do all right with most words, but for some reason there are certain
words I have a mental block against. No matter how many times I use
them, I have to look them up in the dictionary every time. This selective
amnesia baffles me, but I can't get rid of it.
The Puppy Papers
The word "concede" is a prime example. I usually spell it "conceed."
To me, that's how it ought to be spelled. But Mr. Webster doesn't agree.
Every time I use the word in an article. I either misspell it or have to look it
up. Why does a simple little word like c-o-n-c-e-d-e refuse to stay in my
memory?
Another one of my bugaboo words is "occasion." I can never
remember if it's spelled "occasion," "ocassion" or "occassion." I had to
look it up just now before I wrote it in this column. Some people say you
can just write down the spelling you're thinking of using and see if it looks
right. That doesn't work for me because all three spellings of occasion
look just fine to me.
Some people say the reason we get confused in our spelling is that
English is too inconsistent a language. They recommend a simpler, more
phonetic English with words spelled just as they sound. (The word
"recommend," now that it's come up, is another one of those devil words.
I swear it ought to be reccomend.")
Horace Greeley, the famous editor, was a spelling reformer. He was
constantly urging people to use simpler spelling, like "tho" for "though."
After his unsuccessful attempt to gain the presidency, a newspaper oppos
ed to his politics and his spelling had a one-word headline on the story of
his election defeat: "THRU."'
What's really bad is when one of the words whose spelling you can't
remember is one you are forced to use often. Covering the city council and
the county commission back when they granted or revoked liquor licenses,
I was always spelling it "licence." This is acceptable British spelling, but i
my editor isn't an old Oxford man, and he got rather irritated at my cons
tant mistake.
Now, I no longer misspell license, but I still have to look it up every
time. I'm also working for a cable TV station now, and I'm in trouble
again. I can never remember if it's "cable" or "cabel."
. Putting all these nuisance words together is my worst nightmare. I know
that someday, writing a story just at deadline, I'll hear this statement from
some public official as I listen to my tape recorder: "On this occasion, I
concede it would be best to recommend the granting of the cable license."
I'll quit. [