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  • Second Report Links Board Member to Coach

    Melinda Anderson

    BLYTHEWOOD – A second incident report from the Richland County Sheriff’s Department surfaced late last week, again linking Richland 2 School Board member Melinda Anderson to Westwood High School head football coach Rodney Summers.

    The report covers an incident of “intimidation” that took place on Oct. 30 at a Westwood High School football practice. According to the report, Anderson dispatched 69-year-old Clero Evans, of Rockingham Road in Columbia, to the football field to watch practice. Summers told deputies he felt threatened by Evans’s presence, the report states, and requested an official report for the record. Evans reportedly told deputies he had been sent by Anderson, and “after a verbal altercation” between Evans and Jason Nussbaum, the team’s trainer, Evans left the scene.

    “It was more like a conversation,” Nussbaum later told The Voice. “Eventually, the guy left when told to. We had great support from everybody, and we put it in the hands of the school board where it belongs.  We are here just to play ball.”

    Summers declined to comment, as he gets his Redhawks ready for this week’s road trip to Greer. Nussbaum, however, called the incident “disappointing.”

    “We were just looking out for our kids’ safety, as it were,” Nussbaum said. “We had a stranger in our presence. We didn’t know who he was, so we took the steps we would take with anybody.”

    Anderson, who in an Oct. 7 incident reportedly threatened the life of Summers, “was told to have no contact with coach Summers or his staff,” the most recent report states.

    According to the Oct. 7 report, Anderson was in a meeting at Westwood High School on Oct. 7 with Acting Superintendent Debbie Hamm and the District’s Human Resources Officer, Roosevelt Garrick Jr., to discuss the treatment of her grandson by Summers. Hamm, who filed the report, told the Sheriff’s Department that during the meeting Anderson said, “I’m so angry I just want to kill the coach, and I have a gun.” Summers was not present at the meeting.

    Anderson has since denied she made that statement, and last week told The Voice the alleged incident was nothing more than “some foolishness cooked up by certain administrators.”

    The Board issued a statement last week indicating that they had addressed the issue and that threats and harassment would not be tolerated. No charges were filed in either incident.

    Attempts to reach Anderson for comment on this most recent report were unsuccessful at press time.

  • Hamm Takes Top R2 Job

    Dr. Debbie Hamm

    Dr. Debbie Hamm, who had been serving as Interim Superintendent since the abrupt June 13 departure of former Superintendent Katie Brochu, accepted an employment contract valid thru June 2015 for an annual salary of $199,000. The motion to approve the terms was accepted 6-1 at the Richland 2 School Board meeting Tuesday night at Polo Road Elementary School. Board member Monica Elkins-Johnson voted nay on the grounds that the Board was moving hastily and did not go through a formal interview or national search. Assenting Board members cited longevity, understanding of Richland 2 culture, willingness to expand collaboration and the renewal of joy in the District as considerations for offering the permanent role to Hamm. At the end of the contract, a national search will be conducted and Hamm has the opportunity to put her name in the hat for continued consideration. Hamm told the audience that she is “grateful and it will be a privilege to serve as your superintendent.” She was met with a standing ovation from the audience.

    Board adopts plan for Lake Carolina Elementary

    A student assignment plan was decided for Lake Carolina Elementary and its newly built partner school just two blocks away, Elementary #19. All students living in the Lake Carolina neighborhood and students in the Ashland neighborhood will attend the two schools with Lake Carolina housing kindergarten through second grade and Elementary #19 housing the upper grades third thru fifth. Elkins-Johnson didn’t support the plan because, she said, she wasn’t comfortable that Lake Carolina teachers could adequately prepare children for third grade under this system. She also voiced concerns that “this establishes a private school in a public school setting.” Board member Melinda Anderson made no comment but also voted against the approved plan. Board member James Manning sees this decision as a new, modern tool for the District in making attendance choices. Board member Chip Jackson told the public that the principals for the two schools located just two blocks apart are proven academic leaders and the opportunity for deep collaboration is exciting for the students.

    Melinda Anderson in the news

    Perhaps what garnered the most discussion was what was not discussed at the Board meeting – the recent allegations in the news that Board member Melinda Anderson verbally threatened Westwood High School’s head football coach Rodney Summers. Jackson, in closing comments, alluded to this when he gave praise for Chairman Bill Fleming’s excellent leadership for the past month during turbulence within the Board. Prior to the meeting and after the meeting, the audience was expectant that the situation with Anderson would be addressed, but no mention was made. In the recent weeks, Anderson is alleged in a report filed with a Richland County deputy to have threatened to kill her grandson’s football coach and stating that she had a gun. Top executives in the District were present during the reported incident and identified as witnesses to the alleged comments. Anderson denies the comments and says it is beneath her to address such “foolishness.” More recently there have been news reports that a friend was sent by Anderson to the football field to witness Summers’ football practice. A scene allegedly ensued and the School Resource Office, who is also a Richland County deputy, was called to file a complaint report. The District’s students who make threats of bodily harm, meanwhile, routinely face stiff disciplinary action and even expulsion.

    The next Board meeting is nearly a month away, Dec. 10, at Blythewood High School.

  • Blackville’s Healing Springs

    Yes, you can drink the water. That’s really the whole point, isn’t it?

    Drive south 80 miles and you’ll come to what well may be the only property deeded to God. You’ll find this unique place near Blackville. It’s well-known and popular Healing Springs. People have long made pilgrimages to this Barnwell County site to fill jugs, bottles and whatever works with water. It’s not for the taste, though the water tastes fine. No, they come to take the reputed healing powers back home.

    Healing Springs has long been considered special. We can go back to pre-European times when Indians considered the waters sacred. They bathed in the springs for restorative power when ailing or injured. The springs’ fame skyrocketed during the American Revolution. An historical marker chronicles the legend. “By tradition, Healing Springs got its name during the Revolutionary War. In 1781 after a bloody battle at nearby Windy Hill Creek, four wounded Tories sent inland from Charleston by General Banastre (the Butcher) Tarleton were left in the care of two comrades who had orders to bury them when they died. Luckily, Native Americans found them and took them to their secret, sacred healing springs. Six months later the Charleston garrison was astonished by the reappearance of the six men. All were strong and healthy.”

    Springs have long held a prominent role when it comes to a hot topic these days, our health. When modern medicine fails many people turn to springs hoping to heal various ailments. Back a ways I knew a woman who would regularly make a 120-mile roundtrip to Blackville. Laden with plastic milk jugs, she’d come home with the therapeutic spring water and swore by it.

    The water surges out of the ground in three places where four-spigoted fixtures make it convenient to collect. I stopped by the springs recently and three people were filling milk jugs and soft drink bottles with artesian water that surged up and out pipes. One lady told me she was from Pennsylvania. I have no doubt the water she collected was headed for the Keystone State. Folks come from all over. Some describe the springs as “a hidden gem in the middle of nowhere.” This hidden gem has ample parking and a picnic area. A sign urges people to revere God by keeping his property clean.

    Blackville’s Healing Springs, known as God’s Acre Healing Springs, is indeed famous and it’s true that no one owns it. Lute Boylston deeded the springs to God in 1944. The deed states that the owner of the land surrounding the springs is “God Almighty.” (I’d say He’s always been the owner, wouldn’t you?) Gallons gush forth every minute. Healing waters are just 80 miles away. Get some jugs and hit the road. Once you’re loaded up with water, drive into Blackville and enjoy Amish-Mennonite cooking at Miller’s Bread-Basket in Blackville at 483 Main St.

     If You Go …

     • Springs Court, 3 miles north of Blackville on Hwy 3/Solomon Blatt Ave. Turn onto Healing Springs Road, then make a quick right at Healing Springs Baptist Church. The springs are behind the church.

    • Open daily, dawn to dusk. Free.

    • Read more here: www.roadsideamerica.com/story/12456

    Learn more about Tom Poland, a Southern writer, and his work at www.tompoland.net. Email day-trip ideas to him at tompol@earthlink.net.

  • The Voice of the Animals: Hoof and Paws for a Good Cause

    Shirley Locklear, president of the Hoof & Paw Benevolent Society, and Janice Emerson, Adoption Coordinator with Fairfield County Adoption Center, with some of the cats and puppies available for adoption at the Center.

    I spent Monday evening with some very dedicated people. We have lots of folks dedicated to helping their fellow folks in need, but the people I met with are dedicated to helping the four-footed members of the community. They are the members of the Hoof and Paw Benevolent Society, created several years ago to support the work of the Fairfield County Adoption Center. Since then, their work has expanded to the surrounding areas including Blythewood.

    Shirley Locklear, president of the Society, explained it like this: “We create opportunities to help animals in shelters and within our community,” Lockair said. “We host adoption events, sponsor spay and neuter clinics, help abused animals in whatever ways we can and we hold educational events and fund raisers to accomplish our goals.”

    You might have seen their booth at Rock Around the Clock or other community festival.

    Close to the Society’s collective heart is the Cat House at the Fairfield County Adoption Center where they make a special effort to find homes for cats who end up at the Cat House for whatever reason. And the group is always on the lookout for grants and funds to support their efforts. Member Doris Macomson, representing the Blind Dog Rescue organization in Rock Hill, reported that Fairfield County could be one of the beneficiaries of a $100,000 grant recently received by the Humane Society of Charlotte for a feral cat program. The trap-and-release program would include humanely trapping the county’s feral cat population, sending the cats to Charlotte to be spayed and neutered, then releasing them back to the areas where they were picked up.

    The Society, along with the Fairfield Adoption Center, recently sponsored a low-cost spay and neuter clinic for Fairfield County and surrounding areas where some 200 animals have been spayed or neutered. The group is also planning to hold a rabies clinic in the community and, more immediately, go door to door to inform pet owners about a recent rabies scare in the county and about the dangers posed to their pets from rabid raccoons and other non-pet animal types.

    “It’s important for pet owners to not leave water and feed bowls outside that could attract raccoons and other animals that might carry rabies,” Macomson said. “Eating from the infected bowls can lead to pets becoming infected.”

    The Hoof and Paw organization is more than a little busy these days speaking for those who have no voice. They are dedicated to the welfare of the animals, and they need other animal lovers from Fairfield, Blythewood and surrounding areas to join their efforts. Membership in the Society costs only $12 per year (“just a dollar a month,” as Shirley Locklear points out.)

    Check out the details of the Hoof and Paw Benevolent Society on their website, www.hoofandpawsc.org and see their Facebook page hoofandpaw(space)sc or contact Shirley Locklear at 803-633-0061.

    The Hoof and Paw Benevolent Society meets the first Monday of every month at 6:30 p.m. at the Fairfield Memorial Hospital conference room.

  • Election Signals Shift in Balance of Power

    Winners of the Blythewood Town Council election, Bob Mangone, Bob Massa and Tom Utroska, celebrate at a reception after their victory.

    BLYTHEWOOD – With the balance of power at stake in the Blythewood Town Council election Tuesday evening, two of the challengers, Bob Massa and Tom Utroska, came away with a clear victory over incumbents Paul Moscati and Ed Garrison. Ernestine Middleton lost her bid for a two-year term to Bob Mangone. Middleton, who returned to Blythewood last year after an embattled two-year stint with the Arkansas Lottery, joined Moscati and Garrison on a platform based on the recent rapid expansion of construction of high-dollar facilities in the town park.

    Massa, a CPA and self-described fiscal conservative, said he was confident the residents wanted a change in the Town’s direction.

    “I think everyone wants a nice town and I appreciate what has been done to make it so,” Massa said. “But the financial slope was getting steep quickly and I and a lot of other residents were getting worried. I think we need to step back and, along with the Town’s CPA, Kem Smith, analyze our spending before encumbering the Town with more big debt.

    “We have a Master Plan and I would like for us and the Town’s people to re-look at it before moving forward,” Massa said. “I want to make sure we are all on the same page, not just doing what a few leaders have decided is best for the Town.”

    Massa, the leading vote getter with 195 votes, said he was “overwhelmed.”

    “It’s just the start of the hard work, though,” Massa said. “Blythewood is growing. We have to not only manage that growth, but do so with financial soundness. I’m humbled by the vote of the people.”

    Massa is the Financial Director of the City of Forest Acres. He serves on Blythewood’s Board of Zoning Appeals and is a Board member of the Blythewood Chamber of Commerce. A resident of the Oakhurst neighborhood, Massa said he plans to retire in January and focus on his duties as Town Councilman.

    Utroska, a resident of Cobblestone Park, said he was “pleased that the voters in the Town have given me, Mr. Massa and Mr. Mangone the opportunity to serve in this capacity. I promise that we’ll do our best to fulfill our campaign platforms. Now, I’m looking forward to getting to work.”

    A native of Canada, Utroska is retired from the Canadian National Railway and is a partner in a railway consulting firm. He is a member of the Town’s Board of Zoning Appeals, Chair of the Town Park Committee and is past President of the Town’s Planning Commission.

    Both Massa and Utroska will serve four-year terms on Council. Bob Mangone will serve the two years left in Jeff Branham’s term following his resignation last summer for employment in another state.

    Although Mangone ran on a separate platform from Massa and Utroska, he said he shares their desire to manage the Town’s growth appropriately and in a way that is good for the residents and businesses in the Town. He campaigned for fiscal responsibility, integrity of office and for targeted growth. Mangone said he wants to make sure the growth benefits the entire town and preserves its history, charm and values.

    “I’m humbled by the confidence the voters have shown in me and I will work to follow through with everything I promised in my campaign. My door and my phone are always open. I plan to listen to what the residents have to say,” said Mangone who currently serves on the Town’s Board of Architectural Review and is Chair of the Athletic Fields Committee.

    Councilman Ed Garrison, who has served two terms on Council, told The Voice Tuesday night following the election, “The election speaks for itself. I guess the Town has a new set of visioneers and I wish them the best and all that it holds for them.”

    Councilman Paul Moscati and Ernestine Middleton did not return phone calls and emails from The Voice.

    The newly elected Town Councilmen will be sworn into office at the next meeting on Nov. 25, which will be held at the Doko Manor in Doko Meadows. The public is invited to the meeting and swearing in ceremony.

  • Historic Church Celebrates 200 Years

    Members and guests of Zion UMC in Blythewood enjoy lunch under the picnic arbor next to the historic church during its recent Homecoming celebration.

    When members and visitors recently gathered to celebrate Homecoming at Zion United Methodist Church, located deep in the woods of Blythewood off Zion Road, they weren’t sure how many years they were celebrating. Records of the church are no more specific than to say it was established in a rustic log building in the late 1700s or early 1800s.

    What is clear, however, is that they were celebrating more than 200 years of worship that took place there in the clearing of a quiet forest of trees in at least two different buildings, with the promise of a future on every horizon.

    On this homecoming, the little white church on Zion Road was awash with remembrances. The church’s pastor, Debbie Miller, welcomed the congregation, many of whom had lived in Blythewood and gone to church together all their lives. While the building is old and the congregation is small, the church’s history lives on, not only in the families who have worshipped at Zion for decades, but in the building’s many appealing attributes – wonderfully hand-hewn walnut pews and pulpit and wide board, heart pine floors.

    One of the oil lamps that illuminated the interior of the church until 1943 has been electrified and now hangs above the pulpit as a reminder of days gone by when Zion had over 100 active members.

    The Oasis Choir from Trinity UMC provided music and, following the service, the members did what they’ve done for more than 200 years – gathered in the side yard of the church for ‘dinner on the ground,’ prepared by the women of the church. And until only three years ago the dinners were truly a picnic on the ground. But this homecoming dinner was not. It was spread beneath a fine picnic shelter constructed on the edge of the woods next to the historic church.

    The shelter, built to accommodate activities of the current and growing membership, speaks to a church with a memorable and glorious past as well as a bright and glorious future.

  • The Tunnel to Nowhere

    The mouth of the Stumphouse Mountain tunnel – enter if you dare!

    A drive to Walhalla runs about 143 miles and not quite three hours. Follow S.C. Highway 28 out of Walhalla into the Appalachian Mountains and you’ll discover a tunnel where men performed backbreaking labor pursuing a railroad dream. You’ll also see a beautiful waterfall.

    I made the drive north out of Walhalla early one fall day. I visited Issaqueena Falls and its three stair-stepping cascades in the early morning. The air was cool and crisp. Approaching the falls I saw water flowing over an edge — a bit of a disappointment, but then I walked down the trail to its right and there a treat greeted me. Falling dramatically, early light glittering on a filigree of aquamarine water, I beheld Issaqueena Falls.

    A short walk uphill took me to Stumphouse Mountain, where a 1,600-foot tunnel fell short of creating a railway passage from Charleston to Cincinnati. Check out Stumphouse Tunnel, the Upcountry’s black hole. Enter its hand-chipped, reverberating, dripping shaft that’s 1,617-feet long. It’s so dark in there man can’t even pipe in daylight. No bats though . . . or are there? Enter if you dare.

    Irishmen chipped and drilled through though solid granite, hoping to link Charleston to the Midwest. Hard to imagine what difficulties they encountered. Stumphouse Mountain tunnel reminds us of their failed 1850’s attempt to link the port of Charleston to the cities of the Midwest by rail. After six years, the Civil War and a lack of money brought the backbreaking work to a halt. The tunnel had been excavated to a length of 1,617 feet of the planned 5,863 total feet. Some 100 years later, Clemson University used the tunnel to age blue cheese but relocated the operation to air-conditioned cheese ripening rooms where they were able to duplicate the conditions indoors, chiefly the 85 percent humidity and constant 56 degrees Fahrenheit. The tunnel measures 17-feet wide by 25-feet high. About midway in a 16 x 20-foot airshaft shoots 60 feet up to the surface. As a result, a steady breeze flows out of the tunnel. It also leads to condensation and the tunnel is generally wet.

    As for Issaqueena Falls and its beautiful 200-feet cascade, legend holds that the Indian maiden, Issaqueena, rode to a nearby fort to warn of a pending Indian attack and then escaped pursuing Indians by pretending to leap over the falls, while actually hiding beneath them.

    The City of Walhalla operates a park at Stumphouse Mountain Tunnel and Issaqueena Falls, which has picnic facilities and trails. It’s open daily from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. except Christmas Day and inclement weather. Admission is free but there is a fee to reserve the large picnic shelter. The park does not have camping facilities or drinking water. Outhouse restrooms and picnic sites exist.

    Camping is available at nearby Oconee State Park and other beautiful falls such as Whitewater Falls are nearby. A hiking trail is also nearby. Make the trip and see the black tunnel and glittering waterfall, studies in contrast that make the park so compelling.

     

    If You Go …

     • Stumphouse Mountain and Issaqueena Falls

    www.oconeecountry.com/stumphouse.html

    • 864-638-4343

    Learn more about Tom Poland, a Southern writer, and his work at www.tompoland.net. Email day-trip ideas to him at tompol@earthlink.net.

  • Come Out, Hang Out and Pig Out!

    The brains behind the barbecue, Pig on the Ridge organizers Henry Dixon, Tom Connor, Rufus Jones and Donald Prioleau will stay on task and on the golf cart throughout the Pig on the Ridge festivities this weekend in Ridgeway.

    Round about this time every year, folks in Fairfield County, Blythewood and beyond get a strange gleam in their eyes. They tie on their napkins and head to the Town of Ridgeway where an important little to-do called Pig on the Ridge has been known to happen. This is the festival’s 15th consecutive year.

    Pig on the Ridge provides a great event for the community, raising funds to support community projects. Most especially, the festival funds Christmas gifts for needy children in the community. Founding committee member Tom Connor estimates that over the years Pig on the Ridge has funneled about $130,000 into the Ridgeway community – toys for the kids, much needed equipment for the fire department, Welcome to Ridgeway signs for the town and major contributions to the restoration of the Century House.

    Pig on the Ridge 2013 begins on Friday, Nov. 1 at 6:30 p.m. with the cook teams showing off their cooking skills with their best Friday night no-pork dishes until about 8:30. Fistfuls of tickets that can be exchanged for samples of these delights go on sale Friday night for $1.50 each. Many a food fan will be wandering up and down the Cotton Yard, grazing their way along the booths. The tickets can also be redeemed for barbecue on Saturday. According to Tom Connor, there will be 78 cook teams from South Carolina, North Carolina and Georgia competing during the Saturday barbecue contest.

    A shag dance will be held from 7-10 p.m. over on Palmer Street and a street party from 7:30 to 11:30 p.m. will kick off on Dogwood Drive.

    But let’s admit it; Pig on the Ridge is all about the ‘Que, and mighty good barbecue it is, too. On Friday night, the cook teams will receive their supplies of whole pigs and Boston butts for the next morning’s contest. They’ll begin cooking and smoking their butts and pigs that night and will probably be up all night tending to them. Connor said he anticipates about 1,100 Boston butts will be cooked and 16 butterflied whole hogs.

    On Saturday, judges certified by the S.C. BBQ Association (yes, there really is one) will judge the barbecue in all its forms beginning at 9:30 a.m. Bill Rogers, one of the SCBBQA founding members and a certified judge since 2005, reckons he has judged about 30 contests around the state and is a regular guest at Pig on the Ridge.

    “Pig on the Ridge is one of the oldest and most well-respected barbecue contests in the state, particularly because you have a mixture of amateur and professional cook team categories. The judges will be coming from across the state,” Rogers said.

    He said there will be a good variety of types of ‘Que, including vinegar-based, mustard-based and the traditional Texas ketchup-based.

    “Good barbecue is like good wine; you should eat what you like,” Rogers said, though he recommends that barbecue eaters tend to step out of their comfort zone and try different styles. He also said good barbecue will have the “bark,” the browned outside of the meat showing the cookers know what their ‘Que is all about.

    On Saturday, children’s activities will also crank up and craft booths will line the streets. But what will have most folks salivatin’ and standin’ is the sale of barbecue, which will begin once the barbecue judging has been done. Folks will have a chance to load up on the best barbecue this side of Memphis. DJ Don Prioleau (one of the Pig on the Ridge organizers), along with other local talent, will provide music to buy barbecue by.

    At 10 a.m. the classic/antique car display on Dogwood Drive will open to receive visitors who want to gaze at Detroit’s finest from days gone by.

    But remember, this festival is all about the pig, and you’ll be reminded of that at about 12:30 noon when the hog calling contest starts. Then at 1 p.m. our brave emergency workers and public safety workers will receive a much-deserved salute and the classic cars and bikes will take part in a cruise-by and Pig on the Ridge 2013 will be capped off at 2 p.m. with the awards ceremony. After that, the barbecue that you purchased that day will be your only reminder of two great days in Ridgeway, unless you were lucky enough to take home a trophy, or some great local crafts. See you in line!

  • Cable TV Program Features Local Stories

    Ridgeway’s Virginia Miles (left) sits down with Todd Hansen, host of BYU-TV’s “The Story Trek.”
    Blythewood’s Jackie Graham with Hansen, talking about what it means to be a good mother.

    BLYTHEWOOD/RIDGEWAY – Their stories are not the stuff of legend. Their tales are not tall. But their real, true-life accounts of their own personal struggles and triumphs reach a zenith of inspiration that stir the human spirit. These stories come from your friends and neighbors, right here in your own back yard; and Monday night, BYU-TV will share them with the world.

    “When they knocked on my front door, I thought they were going to rob me,” said 71-year-old Virginia Miles of Ridgeway of the afternoon last August when Todd Hansen and his camera crew from The Story Trek showed up at her home on Dogwood Avenue. “You know how people try to do things to old people. I didn’t know if I should trust them or not. Then I thought they were going to hand me a check and flowers.”

    Hansen, who has been taking his television crews into people’s homes for the last three years, said that reaction is typical. Many expect Hansen’s crew to be the Publisher’s Clearing House Prize patrol.

    “They’re a little disappointed when they find out we’re not,” he said.

    Instead of handing out prize money, Hansen and his crew are instead looking for real-life stories from real-life people. Each week, BYU-TV airs those stories on its Emmy winning program, The Story Trek. Monday night at 8, The Story Trek will feature the life stories of Miles and Blythewood’s Jackie Graham. Hansen said he found their narratives particularly moving.

    “If I had to sum up their stories in one sentence, I would say they are about a mother’s love,” Hansen said. “If I am ever asked to run a special Mother’s Day episode, this is the one I would suggest.”

    A mother’s love, Hansen added, in the face of great tragedy. Miles had lost a child when she was 29. Graham when she was 26. Miles lost James Richard Mattox Jr., her 10-year-old son, to a rare blood disease and Graham lost her child in a premature birth because of an ectopic (tubular) pregnancy.

    “It’s like it was yesterday,” Miles said, recalling what she said she described to Hansen as the most significant event of her life. “I have a big picture of him over my bed and I still write letters to him every night in my journal, telling him how much I miss him.”

    Miles said she found solace in a circle of friends who had also lost children, and the tragedy eventually strengthened her.

    “When you lose a child, you can survive anything after that,” Miles said.

    But what really transformed Miles’ life, and the life of her daughters Rebecca (now 47) and Judy (53), from “coping” to “moving on” was the birth of her next child, Allen.

    “Having Allen made us want to live again,” Miles said.

    Graham’s story, Hansen said, brushes against the supernatural.

    “She had this amazing dream before her daughter was born about a girl with reddish-brown hair and blue eyes,” Hansen recalled of his sit-down with Graham. “That’s the daughter she wanted, and when she was born that’s the daughter she had!”

    Graham, 33, said that, following her ectopic pregnancy back in 2006, her doctors told her she could never become pregnant again. But three years ago, they were proven wrong. And before little Kristi Mobley was even conceived, her coming was heralded by Graham’s precognitive dream. Prior to Kristi’s birth, Graham and her fiancé – Kristi’s father, Chris Mobley, 33 – were debating how the newborn’s name should be spelled, Hansen recalled. Once again, otherworldly powers appeared to be at work.

    “We got a piece of junk mail one day,” Graham explained. “And it was addressed to ‘Kristi Mobley’.”

    Junk mail. Addressed to a yet to be born, yet to be properly named member of the family.

    “That was the name we had planned for her,” Graham said, “but how did they know?”

    Apart from the unusual events surrounding Kristi’s birth, Graham said the crux of her story was about being a good mother.

    “I learned it from my mother,” Graham said. “I learned right from wrong, to be respectful of other people and how to raise my baby.”

    “Everything she does is for her little girl,” Hansen said. “I asked her how she became a great mother, and she said she learned it from her mother. When she described to me what made her mother great, I told her she was describing her relationship with Kristi.”

    BYU-TV can be found by Dish users on channel 9043; DirectTV 374 and Time Warner 274.

  • Lawsuit Looms for Council Members

    State Rep. MaryGail Douglas (D-41) breaks the news to County Council. (Photo/Barbara Ball)

    WINNSBORO – Three members of County Council were formally put on notice Monday night – pay back money received since 2009 in lieu of supplemental health insurance premiums, or tell your story to a judge.

    State Rep. MaryGail Douglas (D-41) delivered the ultimatum during the closing of Monday night’s public comments portion of the meeting, and said that the citizens’ group calling itself Saving Fairfield was not going to let this issue die. Douglas said Council had failed to respond to a Sept. 25 deadline for action set forth in a letter sent by State Sen. Creighton Coleman (D-17) and herself in August and now there was only one recourse remaining.

    “Since Sept. 25, I cannot count the number of calls and the number of emails I have gotten asking ‘What did they say?’ ‘How are they going to pay the money back?’ Not one response has come,” Douglas said. “This, to me, smacks in the face of responsiveness to people who live in the walls of Fairfield County. Do you think this one’s going to go away, like the concerned citizens group did? Because that’s what you counted on then, and it happened. They threw their hands up in the air when the saw that nothing new was going to happen, that nothing different was going to happen. I’m going to tell you that you can count on the group that’s behind this movement now. It’s not going away. People in this county continue to be outraged, and I’m putting it mildly, at your belief and your behavior that you can do as you please, when you please and how you please.

    “Saying that, allow this third time at the podium to serve notice that further legal action is in process,” Douglas continued. “For you to simply ignore and not respond is not acceptable. This will be seen through to closure. The notice that we give tonight is that the court system will now deal with that. You can look for papers to be served.”

    Douglas said that more than 20 people had signed on as plaintiffs, and more, she added later, were pending. Coleman, she said, was handling the lawsuit.

    Phone calls to Coleman were not returned at press time.

    The practice of paying certain Council members for coverage of their hospitalization insurance dates back to 2009, according to county administrators. Council members are eligible for the County’s insurance policy, unless they are already, through their current or former employer, covered by a state plan, as is the case with Mikel Trapp (District 3), Chairman David Ferguson (District 5), and, until her retirement from Fairfield Memorial Hospital this summer, Mary Lynn Kinley (District 6). Because they were covered by a state plan, the County’s hospitalization supplement was not available to them.

    Prior to 2009, these Council members, along with all part-time employees, were covered for hospitalization by the Carolina Cares plan. For each of the Council members in question, it was costing the County approximately $877 a month – or $31,560 a year total – to include them on the Carolina Cares plan. As the County worked through attrition to wean part-time employees from the plan, the three Council members were also asked to drop the plan and take a direct payout of $475 a month each – or $17,100 a year total – to get their own hospitalization insurance. That practice ended following a July 8 opinion from the S.C. Attorney General’s Office that called the payouts “unauthorized” and “a departure from the law.”

    But a court of law, the Attorney General’s opinion said, would ultimately have to determine the legality of those payouts. It appears that now, the A.G.’s opinion will be tested.

    Ferguson has maintained that those payments were received in good faith, and as recently as last month he reiterated that position.

    “We were told by our (former) Administrator (Phil Hinely) it would save the County money,” Ferguson said in September. “Our question was, can we legally do that, and he said yes.”

    But Monday night, Douglas said that just wouldn’t wash.

    “You can beat it all you want that you did it in good faith, that you didn’t know it was wrong,” Douglas said. “In 2005, I stood at this same podium and told you that it was wrong then. It is still wrong now. The money that was paid to you needs to come back to this county.”

    After the meeting, Ferguson characterized Douglas’s comments as “hurtful” and “hard to take.”

    “And for what? What do you gain?” Ferguson said. “That seat (District 7) you ran for and lost (in 2008), you don’t get that. What do you gain from this?”

    Kinley, near the close of Monday night’s meeting, said that Council had responded to Coleman by the Sept. 25 deadline. She also said the State Ethics Commission was reviewing the former policy of the payouts in lieu of insurance premiums.

    “Once they conclude their investigation, then we’re going to make our decision,” Kinley said. “Once that is done, we will be responding to that.”