/dmf 'til
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Supplement included in this issue.
mu
Hook, Line & Sinker
The latest fishing report and a newly
chartered safe boating organization
check out all these and more on Pages
11-C and 12-C.
THf
nniiiun
Twenty-eighth Year, Number 3*
?Z'ON . * t'Uu! B I NDER "
? H I N&f 'i *f\ i N I /i - 1 .
CIWO TM t BRUNSWICK BEACUfl
V:
Sign Of The Times
Brunswick County's newest
recycling center Is set to open
Saturday in the Holaen beach area.
For the details, see Page 12-A.
anaiione, North Carolina, Thursday, June 28, 1990
25c Per Copy
92 Pages, 4 Sections
Holden Beach
ABC Store May
Open Friday
The Brunswick County ABC
Commission's first store will defi
nitely open Saturday at 9 a.m. and
could open sometime Friday, ABC
Board member:; agreed Tuesday.
Tiio Brunswick County ABC
Board also unanimously approved a
store liability insurance policy by
Brunswick Insurance Service of
Supply at an annual premium of
$2,198.
After a short meeting, the board
recessed to the new store on Holden
Beach Road and board members
and store manager Dorothy Kelly
began sorting and pricing the 737
cases of liquor that have been deliv
ered to the store.
State ABC officials were sched
uled to come to the store Wednes
day to begin helping set up the store
and stack the merchandise and the
store's computerized cash register
was scheduled to be set up Wednes
day.
Douglas M. Robinson II, assis
(Sec STORE. Page 2-A)
Questions Still
Remain About
Ash Drowning
A lot of questions still remained
unanswered Tuesday in the Satur
day night drowning of a Shallottc
man in a pond off Alligator Road
near Ash, according to Sheriff's
Det. Lindsay Walton.
Larry William Miller, 38, drown
ed while apparenUy swimming dur
ing a camping party at a private
pond in a sccludcd location in the
woods, Walton said.
"It was a camping trip and party,"
Walton said. "People were partying
and drinking. Practically everybody
was intoxicated and nobody can tell
us what was going on. We haven't
reached any conclusions yet." He
said people apparently were in and
out of the water during the party.
Walton said Tuesday that he still
had not been able to interview ev
eryone he needs to talk to about the
drowning.
Someone called the Sheriff's De
partment between 11-12 p.m. Satur
day night to report a missing per
son, Walton said. The Sheriff's De
partment and Waccamaw Fire and
Rescue searched Saturday night and
then returned Sunday morning and
found the man's body, he said.
Walton said Miller was a person
who was "in and out" of Brunswick
County and that he recently return
ed to Shallotie.
BEACON Fill rttOTO BY DOUG BUTTER
FIREWORKS will light the night skies at several locations, in
cluding Campground By the Sea at H olden Reach, as Brunswick
County celebrates the Fourth of July next week. One of the
largest events is the N.C. Fourth of July Festival at South port;
details on Page 8-A.
Fireworks To Light Skies
At Beach , Batfieship Aiso
Southport's not the only placc to
go for a dazzling display of fire
works on the Fourth of July.
At Holdcn Beach, Campground
By The Sea near the west end of the
island will hold its Independence
Day fireworks display at dark,
about 9 p.m.
Visitors can go to the camp
ground to watch, or view the light
spectacle from elsewhere on the is
land, from across the. waterway or
from Ocean Isle Beach.
A display of fireworks will also
be launched from the USS North
Carolina Battleship Memorial, on
the Cape Fear River near the Cape
Fear Memorial Bridge at Wilming
ton.
The free show will begin at 9
p.m.
The fireworks will he visible over
the Cape Fear River between Wilm
ington's Riverfront Park and the
Battleship Memorial. However, pa
trons of the Independence Day pre
sentation of the Battleship's Sound
and Light Spectacular, The Immor
tal Showboat, will literally have
grandstand scats.
The outdoor drama will begin ap
proximately 20 minutes after the
fireworks display ends.
The Immortal Showboat tells the
story of the battleship's role in the
Pacific in World War II through
voice, music, sound cITccls and
more than 4(X) lights of varying col
or and intensity. Special effects in
clude 20mm and 40mm antiaircraft
gunfire, the blast and flame of large
5- and 16-inch guns and a simulated
torpedo explosion.
Admission fees to the Sound and
Light Spectacular are $3.50 for
adults (age 12 and older) and S1.75
for children ages 6-11. Admission is
free to those 5 and under.
Commissioners Cut About
$600,000 From Budget
BY BOB HORNE
The Brunswick County Board of Commissioners
had cut approximately $600,000, or between 1 1/2 cents
and 2 cents on the tax rate, in a series of three budget
sessions through Tuesday.
The commissioners were to have another budget
session Wednesday, with some of them vowing to adopt
the budget, which still called for about a 10 1/2-ccnt in
crease in the tax rate Tuesday, at the Wednesday ses
sion.
The board also voted to shift $235,000 in bond
money, which had been earmarked for improvements
on the Public Assembly Building a! the County
Government Complex in Bolivia, to engineering design
for water-system improvements and expansion.
Commissioner Kelly Holdcn made the motion
Friday to designate the funds for the water-system im
provements and rescind previous action that committed
those funds to the Public Assembly Building. It passed
on a 4-1 vote, with Commissioner Grace Bcaslcy dis
senting because, she said, she arrived late for the meet
ing and didn't understand the vote without being in
volved in the discussion.
Holdcn said $1.9 million will be available for the
water system in January and he would like to have the
engineering design completed and "be ready to move
on it" when those funds become available.
Commission Chairman Gene Pinkcrton made mo
tions that the county add 11 1/2 of the 42 new positions
that were included in the recommended budget. He pro
posed to start a county EMT program with seven new
employees and to add a computer programmer/analyst,
a person in the Sheriff's Department to implement a
Drug Abuse Resistance Education program, one of two
people requested for the Clean County Department and
1 1/2 requested for the Engineering Department. He
said that, as new departments, the Clean County and
Engineering departments "don't even have basic people
yet."
All of the commissioners expressed concern about
the growth of county government. Pinkcrton said the
county had 410 employees in 1987-88. That number, he
said, increased by 5 percent to 431 in 1988-89, he said,
then 2 percent to 440 in 1989-90. The 42 recommended
increase to 482 in 1990-91 would be a 9 percent in
crease, he said.
Commissioner Frankie Rabon said, "If we keep go
ing, we'll be the biggest industry in the county."
Pinkerton's motion Friday to employ an EMT su
pervisor beginning July 1 at a salary of $22,500 and six
other EMTs for nine months of the Fiscal Year passed
3-2, with Mrs. Bcaslcy and Commissioner Benny
Ludlum dissenting.
Mrs. Bcaslcy opposed "piece-milling" such a pro
gram and said, "I can see the supervisor, but I just think
you're talking about six people in that budget you don't
know what you're going to do with." She also ques
tioned whether such a program could use Rescue
Squads' ambulances and how other necessary equip
ment would be purchased.
Ludlum said he agrees with the program but said, "I
think we need to work some things out. I think we need
to chargc, sincc insurance will pay for it It's worth de
laying three months or six months to do right. But we
can't do it today; I want to see it on paper. The north
won't support it in the south, the south won't support it
in the north and Mr. Pinkcrton won't support it in the
west. You have to put 120 EMTs out there and do it
countywidc."
But Pinkcrton said his idea was to employ the su
pervisor and allow that person to help set up the pro
gram. He also specified that the program would be sep
arate from the county Emergency Management office.
He said his proposal would cost no more than employ
ing the six positions that were included in the recom
mended budget. No other mention was made of charg
ing for the service.
Mrs. Beasley and Ludlum also opposed Pinkerton's
motion to include the other 4 1/2 new positions, which
also passed 3-2. Then, after commissioners determined
that Pinkerton's motion had not done all he intended, he
made another motion that no other new positions be
added. It passed 4-1, with Mrs. Beasley dissenting, "not
because 1 want to go out and hire more people but be
cause 1 disagreed with the previous action."
However, the board received a visit from Sheriff
John CarT Davis Tuesday afternoon. Davis, who had re
quested seven new positions and had one approved, told
commissioners that, beginning Oct. 1, the state will
mandate that female jailers have no other duties.
Therefore, he said, he would need five more positions
to provide a female jailer 24 hours a day, seven days a
week.
"1 don't know what we will do if we don't get those
positions," Davis told the board, "unless we contract
with someone to watch the female inmates." The board
took no action on the sheriff's request.
The recommended 5 percent across-the-board pay
increase for all county employees was approved after
one failed motion and discussion on another possibility.
Ludlum made a motion that funds equal to the 5
percent increase be divided equally among all county
employees, which would have amounted to about $750
per employee. It failed on a 2-3 vote, with Pinkcrton,
Mrs. Beasley and Rabon dissenting.
Rabon expressed concern for the employees with
the higher salaries, some of whom would have received
pay increases less than 2 percent under that plan, and
initiated discussion for a plan that would give each em
(See COMMISSIONERS, Page 2-A)
Calabash Cuts Tax Rate 9 Cents
BY DOUG RUTTER
Calabash Commissioners adopted a budget for fiscal
year 1990-91 Tuesday night featuring a hefty 9-cent cut
in the tax rate.
The tax rale will drop from 24 cents to 15 cents per
S100 of property valuation next fiscal year, which starts
July 1.
Despite the 37 percent drop in the tax rate, however,
adoption of the budget did not come without controver
sy.
As officials went through the spending plan and vot
ed on each line item, some board members voiced ob
jections about three expenses included in the budget
Commissioners George Taubel and Phyllis Manning,
who have worked on the issue of trash pickup for sever
al months as members of the community services com
mittee, opposed the $49,000 budgeted for contractcd
sanitation service.
As proposed, the S49.000 includes $24,000 for an ex
isting contract that provides residential and commercial
trash pickup in District 1. The $24,000 will come from
Calabash's fund balance, which is a reserve fund built
up over the years prior to the merger of Calabash and
Carolina Shores.
The other $25,000 in the sanitation budget could pay
for the disposal of trash dumped in green boxes located
in District 2, monitoring of those green boxes and four
pickups of yard and bulk waste in both districts during
the fiscal year. The town won't have to deal with green
box collection in District 2 until Feb. 1, 1991, when the
county slops picking up the trash.
Commissioners Taubel and Manning Tuesday night
restated their earlier objections to the town paying for
commercial trash pickup in District 1 .
Mrs. Manning said town taxpayers should not subsi
dizc businesses by paying for their trash pickup. "As
I've said time ami lime again, I see no reason we should
pay for commercial pickup," she said.
Taubel said the businesses don't pay enough town
taxes to cover the cost of curbside trash service. Using
the restaurant operated by Commissioner Keith
Hardee's wife as an example, Taubel said the town gets
about $300 in taxes each year but pays S900 for trash
pickup.
Other commissioners, however, favored the $49,000
budgeted for sanitation service, and it was approved on
a 5-2 vote.
Commissioners Taubel and Manning also objected to
the S24.000 budgeted for street paving. They said the
money budgeted isn't enough to meet the paving needs
in Calabash.
Taubel suggested the $24,000 be increased to
$52,000. But Mrs. Manning was the only board mem
ber to support his recommendation, and the allocation
was left at S24.000.
1-atcr in the meeting, Taubel objected to the $35,000
budgeted for mowing grass along the sides of the roads.
Mowing should be the responsibility of the property
owner, he said.
'This is the same thing as picking up commercial
trash," he said. "You are satisfying a small number of
people."
Commissioner Ed Rice joined Taubel in opposing the
appropriation, but other board members supported the
budgeted expense and it stayed at $35,000.
Although commissioners had talked earlier about cut
ting the lax rate by 1 3 cents, the board had to adjust the
tax cut Tuesday night because state sales tax revenues
(See CALABASH, Page 11-A)
STAFF PHOTO BY DOUG Bl/TTE*
Beating The Heat
Mark Leonard of Occur, his Reach bent the heat last week by taking to the surf. He was one of
about a dozen surfers and body boarders enjoying good surf conditions last Wednesday near Ocean
Isle Beach Fishing Pier.