Davis Chapel Missionary Baptist Church

TownTalk: Davis Chapel Feeding The Hungry And More

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Davis Chapel Baptist Church is hoping to help provide a hot meal as well as clothing items to anyone in the community in need. Organizers call the program “Food for the Soul, Clothes for the Cold” and Charles Turrentine Jr. was a guest on Monday’s TownTalk to provide some details.

On the second and fourth Tuesdays of each month, the church is the spot where individuals can stop in between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. for a respite at the soup kitchen fellowship, Turrentine said.

“We want to impact people walking down the street…to be a light to them and help them any way we can,” he said.

And beginning in the new year, he said there are plans underway to partner with local schools and churches to provide meals to children when they’re out of school for teacher workdays.

The event organizers invite individuals to help them by making donations of clothing and toiletry items for distribution during the times the soup kitchen is open.

Donations are accepted at Aycock Rec Center, Exquisite Kutz Barber Shop (beside Southern Charm on Garnett Street) and East Side Barber Shop on Vicksboro Road.

“Think about being a blessing to somebody,” Turrentine said.

Davis Chapel Baptist Church is located at 742 N. Chestnut St.

 

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U.S. DHHS Secretary Xavier Becerra Makes Stop In Henderson To Talk About Health Care In Rural Communities

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The secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Xavier Becerra, made a stop at Medical Arts Pharmacy this afternoon on behalf of his boss – President Joe Biden. Becerra was joined by, among others, Dr. Mandy Cohen, whose reminder during the COVID-19 pandemic to “Wear, Wash, Wait” became second nature for many North Carolinians. Cohen, who during COVID was secretary of the state DHHS, became the new director of the Centers for Disease Control earlier this year.

Chocky White’s pharmacy on Ruin Creek Road provided the backdrop for Becerra and others to talk about access to health care in rural communities and how Medicaid expansion in North Carolina will help to close a gap for those who need access to health care.

In brief remarks to the gathering, Becerra said independent pharmacies like Medical Arts do so much more than dispense medicine. “You’re dispensing love and care and family” to patrons who come in seeking advice and consultation, he said.

Medical Arts is among other pharmacies that participates in the billion-dollar Bridge Access Program that provides COVID-19 vaccines at no cost to people on Medicare, which falls in line with Biden’s pledge to lower prescription drug costs including a $35 cap on monthly insulin for diabetics.

Today’s stop is part of an effort to share with the American public “what we’re trying to do to let rural communities…know that they’re included,” Becerra said. He said the President wants to make sure that, in rural America, you do have access to health care.

And he praised Gov. Roy Cooper’s efforts to get Medicaid expansion in North Carolina, which Becerra said would mean an additional 600,000 on the health care rolls. He said rural communities in states that don’t have Medicaid expansion are 50 percent more likely to lose their rural hospitals.

But it’s not just access to health care, he said. In independent pharmacies like Medical Arts, pharmacists and staff treat clients with respect and dignity.

When White opened Medical Arts in 1971, he was the sole employee in a 600-square-foot space just a short distance from the present location. Now he has five full-time pharmacists, one part-time pharmacist and 27 other employees that work every day to meet the needs of clients across a six-county area.

There are two immunization areas within the pharmacy, and White said folks are welcome to just drop in and get immunized, which surely got Cohen’s attention.

Her persistence in suggesting that North Carolinians stay up-to-date on COVID-19 vaccinations has been elevated to the national level as CDC director. And now she wants to make sure that everyone get the updated COVID-19 vaccine, influenza and RSV.

“Right now is the right time,” Cohen said. With Thanksgiving just three weeks away, she encourages everyone to be immunized to protect yourself and others.

The Local Skinny! Pop The Hood: Repairing Dents, Dings And Scratches

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For our sponsor, Advance Auto Parts, as part of a paid radio sponsorship on WIZS.

Don’t you just hate it when you get just a little too close to the mailbox with your car and you hear “that” sound – that metal on metal sound, just as you’re lowering your window to pick up the mail?

Even the most careful drivers can probably remember a similar experience, from a drive-thru bank or fast-food restaurant, or even a runaway grocery cart that came to a stop against your car’s side panel, leaving a little dent or ding.

How hard could it be to buff out a scratch, fill a ding or pop out a dent?

The folks at Advance Auto Parts can help you decide the materials you need to tackle the project yourself.

WIZS’s John Stevenson and Bill Harris discussed some how-to’s during the Pop The Hood segment of Thursday’s The Local Skinny!

“It’s not terribly hard,” Stevenson said of doing cosmetic work on your vehicle. “It’s just time-consuming. The more time you take, the better your results are going to be.”

A shallow scratch may be able to be buffed out, for example, but a deeper scrape could require some sanding before you add body filler and then paint.

Did you know that the sticker inside your vehicle’s door jamb is the place to look to find paint codes? The friendly staff at Advance Auto can find the paint to match the code and fix you up with the other items you need to tackle the job yourself.

Armed with a few items and a little bit of patience, you’ll have your vehicle looking great in a jiffy

Until the next time you get too close to the mailbox.

The information contained in this post is not advice from Advance Auto Parts or WIZS.  Safety First!  Always seek proper help.  This is presented for its informational value on and is part of a paid advertising sponsorship.

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Raleigh Theater Critic: “Ragtime: The Musical” Is “Phenomenal!”

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You’ve got three more chances this coming weekend to treat yourself by  attending “Ragtime: The Musical,” which has gotten rave reviews from members of the local community, as well as from a Triangle-based theater critic.

Kurt Benrud called the performance “phenomenal” in a review that appeared in the Triangle Review, a weekly email newsletter that covers theater and the arts in the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area.  The play is based on a 1975 book by the same name by E.L. Doctorow. The story takes place at the turn of the 20th century and weaves connections among three very different cultures and backgrounds.

He said “both the venue and McGregor Live! Series’ production of ‘Ragtime’ are first-rate and well worth attending.”

“The acting, the singing, and the choreography are all so excellent and so tightly integrated that it is nearly impossible to address them as separate aspects of the production,” Benrud wrote.

“Director Mark Hopper has skillfully plotted the entrance of the characters in the opening scene, establishing the distinct groupings as well as their interrelatedness. The opening song (and movement) by the full company — “Prologue: Ragtime” — was so well performed that it took my breath away.”

The vocalists were accompanied by a 17-piece orchestra, also conducted by Mark Hopper. There is a lot of local talent in both the orchestra pit and on stage, but McGregor Hall also is drawing talent from farther afield to perform.

Benrud noted the smooth, professional transitions from scene to scene. “The transitions, …while distinct, are smooth and seamless. The ensemble always blends beautifully with the principal cast in terms of the action, the song, and the dance.”

He said every song (and singer) was “spot-on” every time, but he singled out Kelley Keats (as Mother), Kamerin Hull (as Coalhouse), Karen-Leigh Albert (as Sarah), and Joshua Glasscock (as Tateh) for delivering “hauntingly beautiful” renditions of one or more selections.

This is Keats’ first time performing at McGregor Hall, but she has extensive experience as a stage actor. Likewise, Hull makes his debut as Coalhouse Walker, Jr. He is a student at UNC-Greensboro. Albert, who has performed at McGregor Hall before, lives in Woodbridge, VA. And Glasscock has been in numerous McGregor Hall performances during his almost 20 years of theatre work.

No doubt the actors are key to a successful performance, but the stage and scenery are an important aspect. Of the set design, Benrud said “The platform at the back of the stage makes a convincing deck of a ship at key moments, a bridge at others, and a second floor of a residence at still others. It also serves nicely to frame background silhouetted activity, as a street for a marching band, and many other functions.”

He gave kudos to scenic designer Matt Nowell and scenic artist Sarah Burns, too, noting that the “set pieces…are flown in subtly, often to and from shadowed portions of the stage, while the action is on another. Screens and banners are also used effectively.”

The costumes, which were coordinated by Sharon Hopper, were, in Benrud’s words, “amazing.”

The Friday and Saturday shows begin at 8 p.m.; the Sunday matinee begins at 2 p.m. Purchase tickets online at www.mcgregorhall.org or by calling the box office at 252.598.0662 Monday-Friday, 1:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. McGregor Hall Performing Arts Center is located at 201 Breckenridge St., Henderson.

Crossroads Christian School

SportsTalk: Crossroads Wins Boys Soccer Championship

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Since Spring of 2021 Crossroads Christian School has won five state championships. The school added their fifth last Saturday as the boy’s soccer team defeated conference rivals Bradford Academy 5-1.  “It’s boy’s soccer’s first championship,” said Crossroads AD Scottie Richardson on Wednesday’s SportsTalk.  “Holden Coghill won two games his first season and now a state championship,” added Richardson.  Coghill is the head coach at Crossroads.

Crossroads also had to face another conference rival, Cape Fear, to get to the championship game. “Familiarity with those two schools makes playing them more difficult because it’s harder to keep the kids focused,” Richardson added.  Last year Crossroads lost to Cape Fear in the semi-finals and this year Richardson was determined that would not happen this season.  To keep them focused the team spent the night in Rocky Mount where the tournament was played.  The ate meals together and Richardson said he felt that helped the team stay focused.

Crossroads will lose three seniors off of a team that lost its first game of the season and then peeled off 19 straight wins.  Congratulations to the Crossroads Christian Boy’s Soccer team for winning that state championship.

 

TownTalk: Pacific Organics Conducts Facilities Tour

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Quality control is a critical step in just about everything that gets made today. From food to fashion to cars and so much more, manufacturers and producers have to make sure that what comes off assembly lines or factory floors is as good as it can be.

Pacific Organics, located right here in Vance County, incorporates quality control at every step of the way to ensure that its pine bark potting medium products are just exactly what they’re supposed to be. In fact, said owner and president George Cunningham, his company tests each load of its potting medium before it gets shipped to the customer.

The bark products that Pacific Organics makes is “not just stuff in a pot,” said Brian Jackson, an N.C. State University horticulture professor who’s conducted research with Pacific Organics for 15 years or so. Jackson was speaking to a group of more than 200 conventioneers who had come to Henderson to tour the facility.

Durham is hosting the 47th annual gathering of the International Plant Propagators Society and they have spent the past few days learning from plant experts and touring area nurseries. They visited Pacific Organics Tuesday afternoon to see the operation. They visited the lab, the aging field, production and shipping areas.

Pacific Organics produces “highly engineered materials that serve very specific functions for whatever plant it is you’re growing or whatever system you’re growing,” Jackson said. “I hope today you see why these barks are engineered.”

There’s a new product called RM18, and company officials said it could become an alternative to peat moss. It holds moisture like peat moss, but it’s bark – called substrate in the industry, which makes it a soil-less medium.

“A customer had a growing application that required a lot of moisture retention, and we didn’t have an existing product that met those requirements,” said Bobby Oakley, recently retired from the company. “So we got a different screen to make (the bark) even smaller.” The result is an engineered substrate that could prove useful to other customers.

Pacific Organics gets its raw material – pine bark – from area sawmills and paper mills. And then they get to work making their different products that get shipped all over the Southwest, Midwest and up and down the East Coast from Florida to Maine, Cunningham said.

They got started in 2004 and spent the first couple of years supplying landscape mulch before developing their business to include nurseries. Today, the company’s aged, stabilized pine bark line is designed and tailored for each nursery it supplies.

“All of your production starts here,” Jackson told the IPPS group. “The growing medium is where it starts.”

The International Plant Propagators Society represents the epitome of plant production, said Scotty Hipps, general manager at Pacific Organics. “To be offered this chance for them to come and see us,” Hipps said, “it means everything to us.”

Hipps said all aspects of the production process is based in science. “Everything we do is numbers-based,” he said, which means that it’s easily replicated. “We make it every day the same way…we don’t leave anything to happenstance.”

Cunningham said the company prides itself on testing throughout the production process to make sure that pH levels and soluble salt levels are in acceptable ranges and that customized blends meet the customers’ specifications.

 

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VGCC Logo

VGCC Announces Ramona Cox As New Associate VP Of Student Services

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Information courtesy of VGCC Public Information Officer Courtney Cissel

Vance-Granville Community College has announced that Ramona Cox, Ed.D. will join the college as associate vice president of Student Services, with a start date of Nov. 13.

With more than 20 years’ experience in higher education administration and student and academic support services, Cox most recently was dean of Student Affairs at Rio Salado College in Tempe, AZ, according to information from VGCC Public Information Officer Courtney Cissel.

Prior to her role at Rio Salado College, Cox was the executive director for the Department of Defense STARBASE Maxwell program in Alabama. STARBASE is a nationally recognized STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) education program for underserved and/or underrepresented student populations across the nation.

Cox has held several senior administrator positions within higher education, including dean of Faculty & Student Services for Florida’s Miami Dade College and division director of Arizona’s Maricopa Center for Learning & Instruction. During her time at Maricopa Community College, she and her team successfully supported the strategic efforts of 10 college presidents, the executive vice chancellor/provost, associate vice chancellor of Student Affairs and division administrators.

Cox previously spent more than a decade working at various North Carolina educational institutions, including the state’s public school and community college systems. In addition, she served as the director of University – K-12 School Partnerships for N.C. Central University and the coordinator of Student Recruitment & Retention for the School of Education at UNC-CH.

Cox holds a doctorate in Educational Leadership & Cultural Foundations from the UNC-Greensboro, as well as a post-master’s certificate in College Teaching & Adult Learning from the same institution. She also holds two master’s degrees, including a Master of Arts in Instruction & Curriculum from the University of Colorado at Boulder.

 

 

 

 

Battalion Chief Doug Owen Retires From Henderson Fire Department With 30+ Years Of Service

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It’s been a couple of hours now, probably not long enough for it to really sink in, but as of 3 p.m. today, Battalion Chief Doug Owen is officially retired. Central Fire Station on Dabney Drive was filled with a hundred or more family, colleagues and government officials Tuesday afternoon to wish Owen well as he begins a new chapter of his life.

“I’ve had the best years of my life right here,” Owen said during the ceremony. “I’ve really enjoyed my career.”

Amy Colbert and Fire Chief Tim Twisdale presented Owen with a fireman’s axe to say thank you for the 30-plus years Owen devoted to the fire service.

“Chief Owen has been an asset to our department for more than 20 years,” Twisdale told WIZS News after the ceremony, adding that he was always an effective leader and always brought a good work ethic to the job.

“He expects a lot out of his crew and encourages all of us to do our best” when headed out on calls.

For these reasons, and more, Owen has earned the respect of his peers within the local fire department and across other jurisdictions, Twisdale said.

Owen may be retiring from his full-time fire job, but he told WIZS News that he’s planning to stay part-time. “This is the best career anybody could have,” he reiterated.

“If you’re a fireman, you know that bond,” Owen said. “The brotherhood in the fire service is unreal – unbelievable,” he said. “It becomes a bond you can’t break.”