KINGS MOUNTAIN
Thursday, April 12, 2007
LAB EDB DIN
MCRL LTE
TTY
. EMILY WEAVER
: eweaver@kingsmountainherald.com
The big freeze that swept through the
region over the past few days left a trail of
waste and broken hearts. With tempera-
tures below freezing and winds gusting at
nearly 20 mph, crops had no chance at sur-
vival.
Ervin Lineberger at Killdeer Farm in
Kings Mountain estimated $350,000 in
damages to their crops. “But that’s still
assuming we'll have a full crop of musca-
dine grapes,” he said, adding that they will
know for sure in about a week or two
when they'll be able to see whether or not
the buds have stopped growing.
“It's been a rough weekend,” he said,
with a heavy heart. “We lost a major part
of our food crops. All of our peaches and
probably 75-80 percent of our blackberry
crop is gone. We have 15 acres of blackber-
ries and that’s a major part of our income.”
Besides blackberries and peaches, the
farm also raises strawberries and grapes.
1s
Vol. 119 No. 15
Since 1889
Cameron Ware Inspects peach crop that was totally destroyed by weekend cold snap.
Peach crops destroyed, berries severely
damaged by sub-freezing Easter weather
Lineberger said that they lost about 25-30
percent of their strawberry crop, even
though they tried to prevent the loss with
irrigation. “This is the worst I've ever seen
and I've been here 26 years,” he said. “The
weather people say this is a 1 in 50 year
event.”
Ben Smith at The Peach Tree Orchard in
York, SC, agrees. He said the last freeze of
this magnitude occurred in 1955. “We've
had some freezes since then, but nothing
this bad.” York won't have any peaches
this year, he added.
His orchard has 75 acres of peaches. All
seem to have been destroyed. “It wiped us
completely out,” he said. “I can’t find a
good peach anywhere.”
Cameron Ware at Mountain View Farm
in Kings Mountain faces the same plight.
They have about 25 acres in peaches and
he said they are all wiped out. “It was a
bad investment this year,” he added.
“We'll have to wait until next year.”
Lineberger said two things probably
50 Cents
JOSEPH BRYMER / HERALD
contributed to the degree of damage from
the freeze: being so late in the season for
this kind of cold temperature to come and
having such a warm spring that pushed it
ahead.
“There was really not anything we could
have done. In case of the peaches, the high
winds prevented any kind of measures we
could have taken to prevent damage,” he
.said. They did, however, try to prevent
damage to the strawberries with their
ground-sprinkler system. “On Saturday
night the irrigation worked, but Friday
night's wind kept the sprinklers from
working and that was the damage night,”
he said.
Lineberger is hoping that their blackber-
ries will regenerate some buds and have at
least a small amount of growth. But the
peaches do not have secondary growth in
one season.
Despite the similarities in this wide-
spread damage, a stretch of land can be
See Freze, 7A
‘Brian Kies tries on a tuxedo at Bedazzled in
ithe Westfield Mall.
The male side of
eweaver@kingsmountainherald.com
With the junior-senior prom just weeks
away for Kings Mountain High School,
many girls are busy planning for the big day
on April 21.
If they haven't already bought the perfect
dress, they are busy shopping for one and
ironing out the beautification details of hair,
make-up, skin and nails. Looking and feel-
ing their best is essential. Showing up wear-
ing the same dress as another classmate - a
nightmare.
The prom is the epitome of every high
school girl's “fairy tale” ball. But what about
the “Prince Charmings”? While the girls are
| prom preparation
scampering and striving for the look of per-
fection, what are the boys doing?
Senior David Clark, 17, is acting as “fairy
godfather.” He and his friends, Brian Kies,
18, and Logan Hardin, 18, have pitched in
for the important necessities, like securing a
black Hummer limousine for the night.
They are all going as a big group of friends,
16 of them in total. :
“We just started talking about it and
decided we wanted to get a limo. So we just
all got together and planned it out. It’s kind
of hectic because everybody doesn’t know
what they can do, what they cannot do. So
you kind of have to get everybody's say-so
before you finalize anything,” Hardin said.
See Prom, 7A
=
residents
voice concems about
KM overlay proposal
Board admits ‘fine tuning’ needed
before recommendation to council
ELIZABETH STEWART
Herald Correspondent
Sixteen land owners on NC 161 aired their concerns about a pro-
posed York Road Gateway Protection Overlay District Tuesday night
and got some favorable response from the 11-member Kings
Mountain Planning and Zoning Board.
“We commend you all for coming tonight and we don’t feel you
put us on the hot seat,” said member Phil Hager, who joined his fel-
low board members in a brainstorming session with the delegation
headed by Norman Bumgardner. ;
Chairman Jim Childers recessed the regular meeting for the group
of men and women to talk one-on-one with board members who
came down from their seats to the audience to discuss how they
could “get on the same page” in plans for the new text amendment
as it applies to the extra territorial jurisdiction (ET]).
City Council last month approved by 4-3 vote an overlay district
which extends from city limits to city limits.
Board members said some fine tuning is needed, they could not
make a recommendation on the zoning ordinance text amendment
to Council at its April meeting and invited the landowners back for
additional work sessions. They also said the York Road group of 33
landowners would be notified by mail, encouraged the residents to
write down their suggestions and turn them into City Hall and to be
sure that city staffers had their correct addresses.
Bumgardner said he telephoned all landowners on York Road
about Tuesday night's meeting after 10 a.m. Tuesday when he visit-
ed City Hall and learned about the meeting. “You might have passed
this text amendment as it’s written if we had not come,” he said,
adding, “I am strongly opposed to a new district as it's written
because it contains too many loopholes.” He said that he and York
See Overlay, 2A 2
Childers breaks tie vote to d ony
recommendation for storage units
ELIZABETH STEWART
Herald Correspondent : : Led
City Planning & Zoning Chairman Jim Childers broke a tie vote (6-
5) for only the second time in 10 years Tuesday night. Go
He voted with Phil Hager, Hugh Logan, Doug Lawing, Steve
Marlowe, and Bob Scoggins to recommend that City Council deny
the rezoning of property off Churchill Street where Dan Smith wants
to put in more new storage units. vo
“The units will be in my back door,” said Fire Chief Frank Burns,
of 1420 Shelby Road. He also spoke on behalf of a 90-year-old neigh-
bor who calls him often about noise and said the proposed units
would back up in her yard . “Keep the residential area like it is,” he
said. : > pa
Kathy Burns, 1410 Shelby Rd., said that noise, lights and traffic at
all hours of the night came from people loading and unloading items
from storage units and she said the new units would be too close to
the Westover Church. Board member David Allen said the property
owner's plan appeared to be workable with some conditions
attached and voted, along with Tommy Hawkins, John Houze,
Curtis Presley and Preston Todd for the proposal. City Councilman
Dean Spears, speaking for the applicants, Inez Swansson and Joyce
Henkle, spoke favorably for the project. i
The board, also during a lengthy session, voted to recommend to
Council denial of rezoning from residential to Neighborhood busi~
ness request from Mark Beach, applicant, and property owner Billy
Condrey for three parcels at 1102 Gold Street Ext., 1102 Shelby Rd.,
and 1105 Shelby Road after a protest petition was presented by six
: See Tie Vote, 2A ang
Public hearing on
four-year council
terms set April 19
ELIZABETH STEWART
Herald Correspondent
Councilman Jerry Mullinax,
who voted against the resolution
of intent, says the change should
be up to the people who voted
the four-year term out in 1995
and then joined Mayor pro tem
Houston Corn and other coun-
cilmen Dean Spears, Rodney
Gordon, Keith Miller, Howard
Shipp and Mike Butler in
approving the public hearin
date suggested by City Attorne
‘Mickey Corry. a0
Originally Council had suggest-
See Council, 2A + 4
A public hearing on lengthen-
ing the terms of City Council
from two to four years, reversing
what voters decided in 1995, has
been set for Thursday, April 19,
at 7 p.m. in Council Chambers at
Kings Mountain City Hall. 2
By a 6-1 vote April 4 Council
adopted a resolution of intent to
amend the city charter. By a 7-0
vote Council called for the spe-
cial public hearing.