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Volume 125 ¢ Issue 1 » Thursday, January s; eve | Wecansave you money! i
|
N SURANCE
704.739.3611
106 East Mountain Street
Kings Mountain, NC
www.KMinsure.com
Politics, train wrecks, loss, E. coli & more
pet ooking back at the top stories of 2012
= ELIZABETH STEWART
lib.kmherald@gmail.com
1- Economic development
Kings Mountain was a jobs
powerhouse for economic develop-
ment in 2012. AT&T’s industrial
announcement in early spring that
it would construct a data center in
Kings Mountain is the largest in-
vestment ever announced for
Cleveland County. Gov. Beverly
Perdue visited Kings Mountain in
February to announce AT&T’s
plans to invest $850 million into
the county, the largest capital in-
vestment of the year, and create
100 jobs. Data Center construction
continues in 2013 and area people
are being employed in construction
jobs.
Cleveland County had one of its
biggest-ever years for economic
development in 2012 with the in-
vestment of about $1 billion by
new and expanding businesses,
many of them in the Kings Moun-
tain area, and the creation of hun-
dreds of new jobs.
Other biggies: Disney Data
Center, Badger Color, Stout 21,
Baldor Electric, Strata Solar farm
on Dixon Dairy Road and an early
Christmas present was the start-up
of Southern Power’s new natural
gas-fueled plant southwest of the
city - revving up equipment capa-
ble of providing 350,000 residen-
tial customers throughout the
region. The new power plant will
pump electricity and money into
the county.
Big expansions in this area in-
cluded Rockford Lithium, which
unveiled its new global headquar-
ters in Kings Mountain recognized
as the world leader in lithium tech-
nology developing materials for
advanced transportation batteries in
their new state of the art 56,000
square foot technical center, one of
only two in the world; STI, Patrick
Yarns, Kitchen Ventilations and
STEAG Engineering.
2- County school scandal
An N. C. State Auditors Office .
report last year found improper use
of school system money by main-
tenance department employees and
brought changes in staff in that de-
partment. Now, the SBI is investi-
gating possible misspent funds
Soldiers accompany the flag draped casket carrying the body of US Army
Specialist James Justices after a procession to Kings Mountain, August 28,
2012. .
within the school system, an inves-
tigation continuing into 2013. Dur-
ing the past year the school system
took steps to improve its financial
accountability and reduced by half
the number of credit cards to em-
Herald file photo
ployees. However, questions still
remain in the community of lack of
documentation of some card pur-
chases by school system employ-
ees. Some of the expenditures
questioned in the 2011 state probe
went back several years. Citizens
are also asking why the SBI inves-
tigation is taking so long, the scope
of the investigation is-not clear, and
there has been no timetable for
completion of the report.
3- E.coli outbreak in October
Cleveland County Fairgrounds
remains shut down after an E-coli
breakout linked by state health of-
ficials to a petting zoo at the Octo-
ber fair. A total of 106 people
became sick and a two-year-old
toddler died. The families of three
E-coli victims filed civil law suits
alleging negligence by the Cleve-
land County Fair Association and
the out-of-state petting zoo owner.
4- Politics picks up steam
Politics picked up steam locally
and all eyes were on the Queen
City as Charlotte hosted the Dem-
ocratic national convention where
local people volunteered and Robin
Smith, a delegate from Kings
Mountain, was on the front row
when President Obama made his
acceptance speech. Local
See 2012, 6A
3 seats up for
grabs in 2013
2013 will be an election year for
three seats on
Kings Mountain
City Council.
Terms of Mike
Butler, Ward 2,
Tommy Hawkins, |
Ward 3, and At-
large commissioner
Dean Spears are up
in November 2013.
Filing with the
Cleveland County
Board of Elections
begins in May.
Kings Mountain
council has stag-
gered terms.
In November
2011 voters re-
elected Mayor Rick
Murphrey, Mayor
pro tem Rodney
Gordon, Ward 4;
Howard" Shipp,
Ward 1; and Rick
Moore, Ward 5.
Keith Miller
was elected At-
large commissioner
succeeding the re- Tommy Hawkins
tiring Houston
Com in a hotly contested five-man
race for the seat on the board.
Dean Spears
wn ELIZABETH STEWART
~lib.kmherald@gmail.com
Alexander Sasha Pruette Mc-
Cachren, 5, is a lively, healthy
kindergarten student at Bethware
School who adores his family. his
home and his church.
“We are so blessed and can’t
imagine our lives without him,”
says Steve and Jennifer Mc-
Cachren and his doting Kings
Mountain grandparents, Joanne
and M. C. Pruette.
Four ‘years ago this month
Alex, born June 23, 2007 in Rus-
sia, became a Daddy’s boy and
everyone who knows him sees the
resemblance - brown eyes, brown
hair - all boy.
His parents went to Russia
three times - November 2008, De-
cember 2008 and January 2009 to
bring their beautiful son home to
Kings Mountain. They learned on
their first visit about 740,000 kids
in the Soviet Union in orphanages.
It was love at first sight for the
McCachrens and Alex, then 18
months old.
‘It is so unfortunate that Russia
President Vladmir Putin signed a
law Dec. 28 that bans Americans
from adopting Russian children,”
said Jennifer. “Those kids may
never know the love of a family
. and they are really “’ just caught in
the middle.”
Putin’s move came in retaliali-
tion for a U. S. law that sanctioned
Russians who were thought to be
violating human rights. The law
became effective Jan. 1, 2013.
Says Steve, “It it hard to imag-
ine that a government would use
children needing a home as a po-
litical pawn. Our thoughts and
prayers are with all the children
that may never be able to experi-
ence a family or a loving home.”
Steve and Jennifer McCachrens
began their adoption process 18
months before they brought their
son home. Mandola Agency in
Hillsborough, where Steve’s
cousin had worked, referred them
to Child of Hope, a non-profit li-
censed adoption agency in Moun-
tain Pleasant, SC that specializes
in placing children from Russia
and Ukraine in loving homes in
America.
Because the Russian adoption
process is such a personal and in-
timate experience, the Kings
Mountain couple quickly devel-
oped a special relationship with
“Alana” and her Russian-born
family and learned the human di-
mension of the process, what it
cost emotionally and the rewards
after they put their faith and trust
in them.
Alana’s mother, Eugenia, and
Alex McCachren in Disney World in
Alana’s brother lived inTula, Rus-
sia and speak the Russian lan-
guage. They knew the Russian
court system, contacted inter-
preters who were with the Mc-
Cachrens throughout the process
and met them at the airport when
they got off the plane in Russia
When they held the baby boy
The McCachrens... from Russia with love
November 2012
for the first time it was instant
love.
He was the child of their
dreams but they couldn’t bring
him home on their first trip. They
held him in their arms for an hour.
Their trips to Russia were bitter
See ALEX, 6A
CUMC, volunteers work to feed the Junerg in Kings Mountain
BETH BROCK
beth.kmherald @gmail.com
How do hungry residents
get a good meal when they
have no money or. trans-
portation?
Central United Methodist
Church, 113 S.Piedmont
Ave., across from the police
station, has the answer.
During 2012 a total of
33,800 people were in line
on Mondays at noon and
Thursdays at 5 p.m. with an
average of 300 meals pre-
pared each of the two days.
They start lining up early to
eat in or take out and by call-
ing 704-739-2471 on Mon-
day or Thursday they can get
free delivery thanks to vol-
unteers from Second Baptist
teers
ready
Church as well as other vol-
unteers. :
Jim Potter is heading the
community program, in its
11th year in Kings Moun-
tain. “We depend on volun-
food, serve the meals, and do
the cleaning up afterwards,”
he said, adding that anyone
wanting to help should come
in the back door and say ‘I'm
Volunteers are not limited
to Methodists. Several area
churches
from various organizations
regularly assist with the meal
program. On a recent Thurs-
day, volunteers from Created
to Praise Dance Academy
who prepare all the
to work.’
and volunteers
See CUMC, 6A
Volunteers from Created in Praise Dance Academy get ready to serve a hungry crowd. L-R: Nikki Brown, Alexis Moose, Mary
Cameron Lowrance, Patyon Goforth, Kaia Putman, Missy Lowrance, and Kelli Putman.
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