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Thursday. February 3, 1983-KINGS MOUNTAIN HERALD-Page 5A
Board Wasn’t
The Readers Write
NOTICE TO
LETTER WRITERS
Because of the action of the city board of commissioners last week
to ask the Elections Board to approve an ABC referendum, the Herald
expects many opinions on the issue from its readers.
We welcome your letters, but ask that you abide by the following
guidelines.
Keep your letters brief. The shorter the letter, the better it’s chance
of being printed. :
Stick to the facts. Don’t use this means to verbally attack any in-
dividual or parties involved.
Every letter must be signed and must include the writer’s complete
address and telephone number.
All letters must be legible. The Herald reserves the right to edit any
letter for spelling, liable or any other reason, and the Herald reserves
the right to refuse to print any letter for any reason.
Any letter which is judged to be a “free advertisement” for either
side of the issue will not be printed.
Under no circumstances will more than one letter be accepted from
any one person.
No letters will be accepted for publication during the week before
the election.
Won’t Get Off Ground
To the editor: :
Hopefully the following predictions will weather the storm:
I have a feeling that the ABC issue isn’t going to get ott the ground
within the present administration, as there is too much at stake
political-wise.
The present board of city commissioners will have more to lose than
to gain.
Even should the issue reach the ballot boxes, the time span between
the actual voting and the upcoming city election in the fall, the
wounds will not have healed, and this will cause a complete turnabout
of possible new candidates filing for office and a possible uprooting
and unseating of a number of the present board. And future aspira-
tions and ambitions for political office may become nil.
This issue is going to be quite interesting since it’s a moral issue. It’s
going to be a testing time as to how committed the churches are and
the members’ dedication, and their true grit and determination to
defeat further outlets of alcoholic beverage consumption to our youth
as well as adults.
The city hasn’t been able to control past bootlegging, nor the drug
traffic which prevails presently. Where is the reasoning and logic on
the part of the wets?
This whole mess has the overtones of a last ditch effort of holding
political office and someone is running scared.
The revenue for this ungodly act will never compensate for all the
harm it’s going to cause. A city built upon blood money.
As for myself, I'll vote against it. :
Everette Pearson
Kings Mountain
Cut And Dried
To the editor:
On the night of January 24, Governor Jim Hunt made a very
“touching televisonaddress to the:people of NiC. on drunken driving.
He spoke of how our innocent motorists are being killed on our
highways as the result, and his bill if passed would hopefully put a stop
to it.
Governor Hunt never mentioned the possibility of some new
legislation that would stop the flow of liquor into our state—one that
would stop every town and hamlet from having a referendum on the
issue. :
At the time the Governor was making his address, our town com-
missioners with the exception of Norman King were approving a lu-
quor referendum for Kings Mountain to be held on April 12th,
without the consideration of the citizens opposed to liquor. They were
so eager to approve the vote, the petition wasn’t examined to see
where the signatures came from. It seems to have been cut and dried.
Horace Walker
Kings Mountain
Disappointed In Board
To The Editor:
I write to express by deep disappointment in the action of the City
Commissioners in voting to call for a “Liquor referendum”.
The referendum itself is bad enough because it divides the people of
a city over a very emotional issue, it causes feelings of animosity bet-
ween friends and relatives that sometimes never heal. Also it costs
money, tax money, that could better be used elsewhere.
But the real disappointment I feel concerns the procedure that was
used by the people involved. It seems that no one would clarify the
State law about how a referendum is to be called for. When one of the
commissioners asked questions, he was given to answers or, at the
most, very vague answers. Did we elect those men to represent us by
voting on issues that they have no legal knowledge about? According
to the NC ABC statutes, a referendum may be called for by two
distinct and separate procedures:
1)The City Council may vote to ask the Board of Elections to have
the referendum. (This, of course, means that a few people take it upon
themselves to force the people of their city to go through the physical,
emotional, and financial experience of such a referendum.)
2)A person, or persons, may ask the Board of Elections to draw up a
petition for such a referendum. The Board itself then words the peti-
tion, dates it, and returns it to the person(s) requesting it. Then the peo-
ple requesting the petition, have 90 days in which to get 25% of the
registered voters to place on that petition their signatures, name, ad-
dress and precinct, [IF THEY DO NOT HAVE 25% IN 90 DAYS
THE PETITION IS VOID! If they present the petition back to the
Board of elections, the Board must verify those names within 30 days.
Then the Board of elections sets the date for the referendum.
The petition that was waved before the City Council, and which
they thought they thought they were referring to the Board of Elec-
tions wasn’t worth the papers it was printed on as a legal document. It
was a completely invalid petition.
EDITORML
OPINON
Why did the City Commissioners not notify some people in this
community whom they knew be opposed to such a referendum, to be
in attendance at the meeting. Surely, the Commissioners want to have
all the citizens of this city to have a voice. It seems, in this case, at
least, that a large part of this city’s citizens were not represented. I
know for a fact that the agenda for the Monday commissioners
meeting is drawn up and presented to the commissioners on the
preceding Friday. Knowing the devisiveness of this issue, it seems to
me to be, reasonable to expect that at least one person of the opposing
view should have been notified and have at least been given the oppor-
tunity to speak in opposition. Some of us could have given the Com-
missioners the truth about the law so they would not have the excuse
of voting in the dark.
Why and by who, I don’t know, but I honestly feel that the people
of his city have “been had”. The responsibility of this referendum rests
solely, entirely and completely upon the shoulders of the majority vote
of the City Commissioners. If that is not ture, if the commmissioners
did not know that they were calling for a referendum...then I call upon
* them to rescind that vote and let the “Liquor crowd” get a petition and
see if they can call for a referendum LEGALLY instead of by the
uncertain, invalid, shady smoke screen method that was used. Do the
citizens of this city have to monitor the Board meetings to be sure we
get a fair shake?
Well, the majority of our people voted AGAINST this issue before
and the reasons we did so are stronger and more numerous than
before. You can rest assured that the people’s voice will be heard...by
ballot!
Gene Land,
citizen-tax payer
Misled On ABC
The City Board of Commissioners last week ap-
proved a request by local Attorney Scott Cloninger
that an ABC election be held on April 12.
Now, it appears some or all members of the board
may consider rescinding that action.
Some members of the board say they were misled
by Cloninger and City Attorney George
Thomasson at last week’s city board meeting. They
say they believed they were actually voting to pass
petitions along to the elections board and it would
be the elections board’s decision on whether or not
the vote would be called.
That may be the case, but we doubt it. Actually,
the city board is being urged by citizens who did not
have a chance to voice their opinions in the open
meeting to rescind their vote.
The commissioners should have known full well
that they were calling for an ABC referendum. The
procedures for calling such a vote were explained
very clearly by Attorney Cloninger before the vote
was taken. The procedures were also explained very
clearly the Thursday before in a front page article in
the Kings Mountain Herald.
Responding to a question by Commissioner Nor-
man King, Cloninger stated that the petitions he
carried into the board meeting did not have to be ex-
amined by the City Elections Board, and that if the
city board did not call for an ABC referendum, he
would be required to submit petitions directly to the
Elections Board and that those petitions must con-
tain the signatures of at least 25 percent of the
registered voters in the city limits of Kings Moun-
tain.
King voted against the motion. Any other com-
missioners who are against the sale of alcoholic
beverages in the city should have done the same.
It should be pointed out that this is the third time
in the past 16 years that an ABC referendum has
come before the citizens of Kings Mountain. Some
of the members of the city’s governing body were
also on the board on at least one other occasion of
an ABC vote. They have no excuses for not know-
ing the procedures.
What we have here is a case of hindsight. Com-
missioners who would consider rescinding this ac-
tion on an excuse of being “misled” are only looking
for excuses.
If they are having second thoughts, they are hav-
ing them only because of the pressure being applied
by some citizens.
In future matters of such emotions, the city board
should publicize such matters before the city board
meeting in order to give both sides a chance to voice
an opinion before the vote is taken.
PUBLISHED EACH THURSDAY
GARLAND ATKINS GARY STEWART DARRELL AUSTIN
Publisher Editor General Manager
MEMBER OF NORTH CAROLINA PRESS ASSOCIATION
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Mountain, North Carolina. 28086. Business and editorial offices are located at
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STATEMENT OF CONDITION
Home Federal Savings and Loan
(Name of Association)
Kings Mountain, N.C.
(Location)
Date
12-31-82
ASSETS
1. Mortgage Loans and Contracts
2. | Nonmortgage Loans
3. Real Estate Owned & In Judgement
4. Stock in Federal Home Loan Bank or
NCSGC Deposit
5. Cash and Investments
6. Investment in Service Corporation/Subsidiary
7. Fixed Assets (Net)
8. Other Assets
TOTAL ASSETS
(101) 49,727.761
(102) 1,826,665
(103) 1,870
(105) 410,400
(106) 3.999.873
(107) 259,325
(108) 90,531
(109) 1,152,467
(120) 57,475,392
LIABILITIES AND NET WORTH
9. Savings Accounts
Accounts at Passbook Rate or Less
Accounts Above Passbook Rate
Total
10. Federal Home Loan Bank Advances
11. Other Borrowed Money
12. Loans in Process
13. Specific Reserves
14. Other Liabilities
15. Capital Stock
16. Additional Paid-in Capital
17. Permanent Capital Reserve
18. Unappropriated Retained Earnings
TOTAL LIABILITIES AND NET WORTH
Certified to be frue and correct by Z :
(201)
(202)
13,778,576
40,643,321
(205) 54,401,897
(206) ==
(207) 410,667
(208) 757,801 »
(209) 50,000)
(210) A56,:35Y
(211) =0=
(212) =U
(213) -03
(215) 1,408,668
(220) 57 475,392
Title V1CS