Roanoke Cashie River Center Gets Pontoon Boat

Today was the launch for training purposes of the new pontoon boat that will shortly be taking people on trips up and down the Cashie River. The volunteers who have agreed to captain the new venture and provide guide duties, were given orientation and training on the new service at the River Center offices.

Pontoon Boat Orientation For Captains

Next all were taken out and provided training on operation of the boat.

All Aboard The New Pontoon Boat

Stowing The Gear For The Trip And Setting Up The Boat For Operation

Looking Aft As We Leave

Looking Forward Down The Cashie River

The Cashie River At Its Best - Note The Herron Flying Ahead Down River

It was a truly beautiful trip down the river, and just on this short orientation ride we saw an owl, 4 herrons, several turtles of various types and some great scenery.

You should sign up to take the trip soon! The public is welcome.

Edenton Championship Rodeo

The Edenton American Legion is sponsoring their third annual Championship Rodeo on June 9th and 10th, 2006. Performances will begin each evening at 7:30 PM, however gates, pony rides and concessions will open at 6:00 PM. Bring the family. This is a great rodeo. Feyer Ford Lincoln Mercury of Plymouth and Williamston is the Center Gate Sponsor.

Rodeo Star

The Edward G. Bond Post 40, American Leion, is a non-profit fraternal organization supporting the care of disabled veterans, widows of those who have paid the ultimate sacrifice and our children who are the leaders of tomorrow. The proceeds from the rodeo are put back into the community and primarily goes to support American Legion Baseball and various other orgnizations that do good works in our community.

Barrel Racing

The location of the fairgrounds is 1317 West Queen Street, Edenton, NC. To register as a rodeo participant call (704) 882-6994 or go on line at arealcowboystore.com

Bull Riding Is Only As Safe As The Clowns Make It

Don't miss the Rodeo. Bring the whole family.

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Bertie Correctional Institution Ribbon Cutting Ceremony

Yesterday was the equivalent of the "grand opening" of a new business.

State Department of Correction, Bertie County and City of Windsor officials worked very hard to get approval for the new prison just outside Windsor, and most were on hand to see what the new facility looked like now that it is complete and waiting for prisoners. The facility is an excellent prison, and the nearly one hundred million dollar price tag is just the starting point in steering money into our community. This is one of the most technologically advanced new prisons built, designed to increase safety for the community, the staff and the inmates. The annual payroll that will flow into our community is said to approach fifteen million dollars, and there are other expenditures of the prison that will also be spent locally. This makes the prison second only to the Bertie County Department of Schools in its dollar contribution to our county's economy.

The following pictures will take you on a tour of the facility this day, and try to give you an impression of the pride that the staff took in showing off their new institution.

It is called the "Bertie Correctional Institution" and was referred to all day by its nickname as "BCI".

First Sight Of BCI Through The Trees That Line The Entrance

As You Turn In To The Parking Lot The Huge Size Of BCI Becomes Clear

The Double Fence And Concertina Wire Makes An Imposing Sight

Entering The Guard Building At The Fence - Inside There Was A Visitors Book Like The Ones You See At Weddings

The Walk From The Guard Building To The Prison Building

Approaching The Door To The Prison Building

The Welcome Mat At The Door

Many Guards Greeted Visitors In Dress Uniforms

Registration Was Well Organized

As We Entered The Auditorium, New Guards And Staff Were On Hand To Meet The Public

As We Got Organized To Cover The Event, Sound Testing Was Going On To Get Ready For The Speakers And Band

The First Prisoner In The New Bertie Correctional Institution Also Arrived

I Got To Meet The First "Prisoner", Who Was "Released" In Conjunction With Cutting The Ribbon Later In The Day

"The Singing Morticians" From Aulander Entertained While The Audience Filed In

The Audience Was Said To Be The Largest For Any Prison Opening In North Carolina History

Local And State Dignitaries Jammed The Audience

As We Waited, A Banner Proclaimed The Motto Of Bertie Correctional Institution, "Changing Lives Through Quality And Integrity"

North Carolina Department Of Corrections Color Guard Starts The Ceremony

Speakers Filed In And Took Their Seats On The Podium

Invocation By Chaplain Rodney Williams

Anthony Hathaway, Administrator, Bertie Correctional Institution

Danny Safrit, Eastern Region Director, Department Of Corrections

Boyd Bennett, Director Of Prisons, State Of North Carolina

Keynote Speaker For This Day, Theodis Beck, Secretary Of Corrections, State Of North Carolina

Rick Harrell, Chairman, Bertie County Commissioners

Bob Spivey, Mayor Of Windsor

After the speeches, everyone filed outside for the formal Ribbon Cutting ceremony.

Waiting For The Scissors

The Ribbon Cutting Ceremony With All The Dignitaries, The "Prisoner" Was Released While This Was Happening

Anthony Hathaway Being Interviewed By Local TV Stations

After The Ceremony We Re-Entered The Prison For Lunch

We Ate In The Gym Rather Than The Prison Dining Hall

After Lunch, everyone was taken on a tour of the new prison.

Prisoners Arrive In Busses Which Enter This Garage, The Secure Doors Are Closed Before They Exit The Bus

Prisoners Are Next Taken To The Entrance Area Where They Are Strip Searched

Entrance Area Showers - Showers Are Required For New Arrivals

Inside The Medical Facility For The 1000 Prisoners That Will Be Housed Here

The Prison Kitchen

The Prisoner's Dining Hall

A Typical Cell Block Where Prisoners Are Kept

And for a final picture, this is the place which makes a prison.

This Is Where Prisoners Spend Most Of Their Time, The Very Cramped, Very Severe And Claustrophobic Cell

If you want to spend some time here, any local police or Sheriff's department can arrange a visit!

Bertie Schools Propose Budget Increase

By Cal Bryant - Friday, May 19, 2006 - Roanoke-Chowan News-Herald

WINDSOR - Bertie County Public Schools is in need of additional local funds.

How much of a projected $1.54 million hike they requested remains in the hands of the Bertie Board of Commissioners.

Meeting with the Bertie School Board here Thursday afternoon, the commissioners closely studied a formal budget request as Bertie Superintendent Dr. Nettie Collins-Hart gave a Power Point presentation.

The bottom line revealed a request in the amount of $1,543,000 of additional local funds from the commissioners for the upcoming 2006-07 fiscal year.

For 2005-06, the Bertie school system operates with a shade over $2 million in local funding, meaning the proposed increase would nearly double the current budget.

Cal has provided extra detail about the budget requests, but has not addressed the major issue, how can Bertie County contemplate doubling the requested budget for the BOE when student enrollment is going down, our central administration is excessive, the number of schools is being reduced and the previous administration was clearly wasting money. Will there ever be any solution to our problems that involves tightening our belts, addressing the problems and focusing on the classroom?

This budget does not make sense. See other comments below in my article "Smoke and Mirrors?"

Heard The Good News?

by Michael Barone - May 29th, 2006 - U.S. News and World Report
(date above is the date on the article, I assume it is publication date of the magazine that the article will be in)

Things are better than you think. Yes, I know, most Americans are in a sour mood these days, convinced that the struggle in Iraq is an endless cycle of bloodshed, certain that our economy is in dismal shape, lamenting that the nation and the world are off on the wrong track. That's what polls tell us. But if we look at some other numbers, we'll find that we are living not in the worst of times but in something much closer to the best.

Interesting article with some very interesting information about how well the world is doing even though we are in a war. As Robert Heinlein often noted though, war is the natural state of man. There is almost never a time when there is not a war going on somewhere. Americans are not used to long ongoing wars and that is why our populace seems so depressed despite all the good news.

The really intriguing data in the article is the comparison of our growth with Europe. This quote says it all, "Lagging behind is the euro area (1 percent) and the rest of western Europe (2 percent). Lesson: Sclerotic welfare states produce mass unemployment and stifle initiative and innovation. In contrast, the Chinese and Indian growth rates show how freeing up an economy produces rapid growth, and the continued contrast between the United States and Europe makes the same point. Free-market economic growth is enabling millions of people to rise out of poverty every year . . . . "

Smoke and Mirrors?

The Bertie County Public Schools, with the approval of the Board of Education (BOE), presented its budget to the County Commissioners on Thursday May 18th, 2006. As previously reported here, Dr. Collins-Hart requested a nearly doubling of the contribution from the tax payers of Bertie County over last year's contribution. The only dissent from the budget request was Melinda Eure. However because she simply abstained rather than vote against the budget, BOE rules counted it as a vote in favor anyway, so they claim this is a unanimous budget request.

Though Bertie County Public Schools will have over 100 less students and with two schools being closed, hypothetically to save money and reduce staff needs, Bertie County Public Schools nevertheless feels they need $1.54 million more money and feel they cannot continue to educate our children without adding several new positions to their staff (the majority of which are not slated for the classroom). This continues the BOE insistence that throwing more money at our problems will someday result in improvement. So far this has not worked.

The budget request did not in any way indicate or acknowledge the significantly larger funding that Bertie County gets than the majority of counties in North Carolina due to special stipends that put us in the top in money spent, while our performance continues to be at the bottom. How would we educate our children if we simply got the same amount of money as most other North Carolina counties?

There has been clear evidence that money has been wasted in the past. If the waste has gone away, why are there no savings? Has the waste gone away?

We continue to have a significantly larger central administration than typical counties our size. Why has there been no attempt to move some of this staff into the schools, the starting point for most of the school systems than have dramatically improved their performance?

One significance of the request is that all numbers in the report to justify the budget increase are calculated numbers. However there is not detail in the budet that allows anyone to independently verify the calculations. Therefore, the claim that they need $1.54 million more is really based on a request to TRUST the BOE. Do you trust the BOE?

Bertie County is a poor county. It is time the BOE stopped simply throwing money at problems and exercized some fiscal discipline. Until then, our County Commissioners should dramatically reduce this request to something reasonable. That will benefit the tax payers and our children.

Red Cross Works For Bertie

The Windsor Rotary Club was quite impressed with the update provided by our local Red Cross Representative, Judi Nicholson. Judi spoke about the number of individuals who have been helped after personal disasters, mostly home fires.

Judi Nicholson - Local Red Cross Representative

She also spoke about the on-going help provided by the Red Corss to our men and women in the military. We sometimes forget that it is not just during major disasters like Floyd and Isabelle that the Red Cross helps out.

If you need help, or would like to help out, please call Judi Nicholson at (252) 792-2661.

Justice Delayed?

by Thomas Sowell - May 15th, 2006 - TownHall.com

If there is a smoking gun in the Duke University rape case, it is not about the stripper who made the charges or the lacrosse players who have been accused. The smoking gun is the decision of District Attorney Michael Nifong to postpone a trial until the spring of 2007.

That makes no sense from either a legal or a social standpoint, whether the players are guilty or innocent. But it tells us something about District Attorney Nifong.

Suppose, for the sake of argument, that the players are guilty. What is the point of letting a bunch of rapists remain at large for another year? What about the dangers that they would pose to women on or off the Duke University campus?

Now suppose that the players are innocent. Isn't it unconscionable to have this damning charge hanging over their heads for another year?

The Constitution of the United States includes a right to a speedy trial, to keep people from being jerked around by unscrupulous or vindictive prosecutors who cannot prove that they have committed any crime. Prosecutors have to put up or shut up.

This is not a federal case, however, and the laws of North Carolina do not require a speedy trial.

North Carolina is in the news, but it is not something that we should be proud of. Nor in this case is it something that the courts of our nation should be proud of. Federal law is almost always extended down to the state level when it enhances government power over individuals, but where the rights of individuals against the state are concerned, judges can always find a way to make sure that the most restrictive interpretation is used. I understand the courts are agressive in making sure that the rights of one individual over another individual are interpreted expansively, so that they pit one citizen against another. However in this case, because it is an individual against the state, the rights of everyone in this case are being ignored, except for the rights of the District Attorney to flaunt his power.

As usual Thomas Sowell gets right to the heart of the matter. We don't have a right to a speedy trial, and our courts will not extend the federal right to us. North Carolina citizens have to wonder whether our state legislature or the federal courts really care about our rights.

The Great Seafood Buffet

The final event in the Tee and Sea was held last night. The Seafood Buffett with Music and Dancing was quite a night. There was shrimp, scallops, trout, crab cakes and clam strips. It was all good and the crowd ate a huge amount.

Crush and Backdraft provided music.

The Windsor Volunteer Fire Department provided the people who cooked and served the food.

Volunteers Working Hard

The Food Is Ready

Everyone Is Having Fun

Barely Six PM And The Tent Is Packed

Even The Overflow Tent Is Packed

One final thank you to all the fantastic Windsor Fire Department volunteers for the great job they do all year long. The entire Tee and Sea was outstanding!