Newspapers / The Perquimans Weekly (Hertford, … / Nov. 19, 1981, edition 1 / Page 1
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THE PERQUIMANS WEEKLY ^ Voluma V. No. M USPS 42S-0K) Hertford, Perquimans County, N.C., Thursday, NOV. It, lt81 20 CEN Audit shows progress Hertford beginning to erase red tape The annual audit of Hertford's budget, presented to the Town Council last Monday night, shows that the town has made an enormous financial improvement over last year's dismal report. The audit, prepared by CPAs Biff Lang and Otis Hurd of Wanchese, ~ indicates that though the town is not * out of the financial woods yet. "the trend has definitely changed, and its a positive change," said Hurd. The audit is by state law an annual obligation of every municipality. Last year's audit showed the town in some serious financial trouble and, as Mayor and City Manager Bill Cox said at the meeting, "I've been taking a beating for it all year." * During this year's report meeting, it seemed to take Cox a great deal of effort to contain his pleasure. The report shows a decrease in the general fund debt of )U,025 to $44,568. "You can tell that Mayor Cox has tried hard to keep expenditures down," said Lang. Decreases in ex penditures for town services ? much of it done by holding the line on salaries ? put the town $76,872 under budget for the year ending June 30. lttl. Because of the decreased ex penditures, and money transfered from the utilities fund ? "the general fund has never been able to support itself," Cox noted ? the town was able to pay off $11,025 of its general fund deficit. The total government spending fund of the town, which includes the general fund, revenue sharing and the debt service fund, is still $22,871 in the red, but both Lang and Hurd agree that judging from the general trend of the town's finances, that red ink could disappear by next year's audit. "Overall, the town has been tightening its belt," said Lang. Hurd added, "We started with a big hole, and ended with a small hole. Hopefully next year we'll have a small hill." The enterprise, or utilities, fund also show a marked improvement over last year, according to the ac countants. The town showed an net income from utilities of 144,403, due in a large part to the materials and supplies expenditures that were $14,000 less than budgeted. "The town has stopped the bad trend of draining the utility fund." to support deficits in other funds, Hurd said. "That's the way it should be done." The accountants qualified their assessment of the town's finances slightly by noting that the town has not been depreciating its equipment. Capitalization of all new assets began this year, the accountants said, and it won't be for another 10 or 15 years ? after the effective life of the non-depreciated assets has ended ? that they can give the town an unqualified statement of its finances Marijuana arrest 1 Man charged with burglary Hertford police arrested a Tyner man for burglarizing Layden's TV in Hertford early Monday morning. They also arrested a local teenager on Tuesday of last week on charges of possession of marijuana with intent to sell. 1 The man arrested for larceny, Melvin Ray White of Rte. 2 Tyner, was allegedly seen leaving the store through a broken window at 2:31 a.m. Monday. Ptrl. Brooks Hart was notified, and following a high-speed chase on Grubb Street, White's car ran into a ditch at the Hertford FCX. Hart arrested White and charged ) him with breaking and entering, larceny and malicious damage to personal property (a television at Layden's store had been broken). Police found three pieces of stereo equitment worth $301.45 at the scene of the arrest which they believe White stole from Layden's. White also suffered a cut on his leg, which he said happened while leaving through the broken store window. He was treated at Chowan Hospital. White is being held in Albemarle District Jail on $4,000 bond. Police also arrested Joseph Richard Rogerson, 17, of Rte. 1 Hertford on Tuesday of last week, charging him with felonious possession of marijuana, possession of marijuana with intent to sell and deliver, and the manufacturing of marijuana (i.e. preparation of the drug for sale). Police arrested Rogerson after receiving a tip from an informant. An area around Hertford Grammer School was put under surveillance, and at about 10 p.m. Tuesday night a 1973 Chevrolet pick-up truck drove into the area behind the school. Police cordoned off the area and Police Chief Marshall Merritt and Cpt. Robert Morris, hidden in the woods, allegedly saw a man leave the truck with a large bag in his hand. Police stopped the truck as it drove away and arrested its driver, Hogerson. The man who left the truck ? after police ordered him to stop ? dropped the bag and ran into the woods behind the school. The police recovered the bag, which contained 18 smaller bags each weighing about an ounce, each of which contained what police believe to be marijuana. Police also found another three ounces of substance in the truck which they believe is marijuana, and a small amount of a similar substance .on Rogerson's person. This along with assorted pieces of drug parapher nalia, and several unidentified pills, police said. AU of the confiscated substances were taken to the state laboratory for analysis. Rogerson, who was on probation for a charge in Chowan County, was released on $30,000 bond. Touring the countryside Chikashi Takahashi beams after receive a gift T-shirt from Sports Spot in Hert ford. Takahashi, a car penter from Sizuoka, Japan, is traveling by bicycle around the United States. He started in Seattle six months ago, and rode about 70 miles a day through Canada, New York City, Washington, D.C. and, naturally, Hertford. He stopped for this picture (below) in front of the Olive Branch Restaurant. j Proposed peanut program could bring changes to local farmers The Farm Bill approved by the House-Senate conferees in Washington last week will bring a sigh of relief from many county farmers who feared that the country's 43-year old peanut program would go down the tubes in 1982. If the conferees bill is approved by } both houses of Congress, county Agriculture Stablization and Con servation Service Director Thomas L. Riddick believes we will have a "better peanut program" than the county had before. The House passed a bill last month that would have completely eliminated the old peanut program, causing many farmers to expect a ruinous peanut market next year. k But the Senate voted in favor of the old program, and in conference the two houses agreed to a compromise bill that would leave most of the program intact. The result Is a bill with a number of changes, some more significant than others to the county. Among the changes are: ?Abolishing peanut acreage allotments, which means that anyone farmer who wants to grow peanuts can. But the proposed bill retains the pound quota system, which means that new peanut farmers won't be able to receive the support price for their product. The quota system has three classes of peanuts. The quota-supported peanuts, peanuts that will be under the pound quota system, will be supported at the new price of $580, up from last year's $455. Additional peanuts, those peanuts grown above a grower's quota, will be supported at a lower price to be set by the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Additional-additional peanuts, peanuts grown by farmers without a quota, will not be supported at all. The effect of this change, according to both Riddick and county Agriculture Extension Chairman Bill Jester, will likely be minimal. New deadlines for Thankgiving Due to the Thanksgiving holidays next Thursday, The PERQUIMANS WEEKLY will be published early and county residents will receive it in the mail on Tuesday rather than Thursday. Because of the earlier publishing time, DEADLINES FOR CON TRIBUTIONS TO NEXT WEEK'S PAPER ONLY WILL BE SATURDAY NOVEMBER 21 AT 5 P.M. Offices will remain open that Saturday. The Weekly offices will be closed on both Thanksgiving at the following Friday. ? Because the county does not have a lot of prime peanut-growing land, Rid dick and Jester believe they won't risk growing peanuts without some government support. "I don't foresee a lot of new peanut acreage in Perquimans County," said Jester. "The cost of production is extremely high." Riddick agreed with him. "With the yields we have a farmer has got to have some guarentee to stay in business." ?The bill proposes to allow inter county transfers of quotas, a development that Jester and Riddick believed could have a great deal of impact on the county. Under the old progra m , transfers of quotas between counties was nearly impossible. But if the new farm bill is approved by Congress, transfers between counties would be almost a simple as transfers within a county. This move is significant for Perquimans County because, while in the past county farmers competed with each other on quota rental rates, they would now be competing with farmers from counties with a greater amount of good peanut land, like Chowan County. This extra competition, Riddick and Jester said, could raise the rental rates on quotas. Many county farmers could be getting out of the peanut business. ?The bill also proposes abolishing allotments to people who don't have tillable land. This bill has its greatest significance in more developed areas of the country, where urbanization has left landowners without any real farmland, but still with an allotment, which they then proceed to rent out. Because Perquimans County has very little new development, this proposal wouldn't effect the area a great deal, but Riddick pointed it out as one of the improvements on the old bill. Many of these farm-less allotment holders are large corporations who have no intention of using the allot ment for anything else other than to lease it to someone else, Riddick said. The new bill would release more allotments to people who do have farms, and Perquimans County should benefit from that change. Riddick was pleased with the new bill, while Jester was more relieved. "I think if farmers sit down and look, they will see that we don't have bad program," Riddick said. "And in some ways it's a better program," particularly because the new bill will not only raise the support price to a figure "more in line with production costs," but also because the change in farm-less allotment holding will release more allotments to actual farmers. There could be another change due to the new bill, Riddick believes. "They won't be giving out contracts like last year," he said, adding that the bill could cause uncertainty in the peanut market. Jester was just glad to see the old program left largely intact. "It's tough to go from a program to no program," he said. Plaque Jfrem WerWMP resident Jimmy Local man honored for good deed Martin Sawyer just happened to be at the right place at the right time one afternoon lait June. And it was lucky for John Henry White that Sawyer fii there and knew what to do. Sawyer received a Life Saving Commendation Plaque from the Hertford unit of the Woodman of the World on October 27 for saving White from burning truck. Just as Sawyer was walking to his New Hope home for lunch that June afternoon, he saw a pick-up truck jump a ditch near his house, sail over small bridge and hit a tree and catch Are. Sawyer ran over totfrc truck and found White inside, unconscious. Since the door on the driver's side was Jammed shot. Sawyer reached through the broken window and began to pull White out Of the burning truck. White weighed about 100 pounds more than Sawyer, and when White's leg became stuck inside the cab. Sawyer called for his father Mason Sawyer, who had seen the wreck from nearby, to help him out. Between the two of them, they pulled White out just before the truck was completely destroyed. White had serious burns on the upper part of his body, but soon recovered. Sawyer was burned on the arm and face. Sawyer wa< modest about what he'd done. "It happened so fast," he (aid. "I never had time to think about it. I waa afraid maybe the gas tank would blow up, but it never did." Sawyer gave a lot of credit to his father. "If It hadn't been for dad I would have never got him out," he said Sawyer, also a Woodman, lives in New Hope and works at a Ford plant in Norfolk. r This week ^ Local farmers discuss their problems with weather and markets. See page three. Weather Rain expected through Friday, clearing up oo Saturday. Highs in the upper 50s and lows in the low 40s.
The Perquimans Weekly (Hertford, N.C.)
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Nov. 19, 1981, edition 1
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