Free Food Distribution Thursday
NEWS RELEASE
From: Morris White, County Extension Director
Topic: Vance County Food Giveaway!
Community agencies and the faith-based community have joined forces to help feed Vance County! On Thursday, May 12, 2016 the NC Central/Eastern Food Bank will be distributing bags of food to community members who are in need of food at the Vance County Regional Farmers Market. The distribution will begin at 10 A.M. with student volunteers from Vance Charter and Southern Vance High School. Citizens will receive disbursements using a drive through method, as bags will be bought to individual cars when citizens arrive at the site. This project is being sponsored locally by St. James Missionary Baptist Church, Vance County Department of Social Services, Vance County Cooperative Extension Center, and the Vance County USDA and Soil and Water Conservation.
Northern Vance Baseball Team Thanked
Donald and Maggie Anthony of Roanoke Rapids, came to Northern Vance High School on May 5 to meet with members of the Vikings baseball team and offer them a face-to-face special thank you.
On April 15, Donald Anthony became ill after the Vikings played a game in Chapel Hill. Emergency response personnel had to be called to the scene to take care of Anthony and transport him to a nearby hospital.
The Vikings’ players and coaches joined the players and coaches from Chapel Hill in kneeling as a group and offering prayers for Anthony.
The Anthonys’ grandson, Justin, had just pitched in the game to lead Chapel Hill to a win over the Vikings. Despite their loss, the Vikings’ players showed great sympathy and caring for Anthony and his family members who were at the game.
Once he was released from the hospital and strong enough to travel, Anthony said he wanted to visit Northern Vance High School and thank the players and coaches in person.
With great emotion, he talked to the players and coaches in the school’s media center.
“I can’t thank you enough for the great caring you showed that night,” Anthony told them. “You are truly fine young men and, if you continue on your present path, I know you will be successful in life.”
Anthony stayed for about 20 minutes to talk individually with the players and coaches. In addition to the players, on hand for his visit were Principal Larry Webb, Athletic Director Jeff Tate, Head Coach Benji Nelson and Assistant Coach Kevin Boone.
Nelson presented Anthony with a Vikings t-shirt and baseball cap, as well as a framed copy of the article that appeared in The Daily Dispatch, Henderson’s newspaper, about the teams’ fellowship that night after Anthony collapsed at the end of the game. Around the border of the framed article were the names of each of the Vikings’ players and their jersey numbers.
The Anthonys also posed for several pictures with the players, coaches and school officials.
(Press Release provided to WIZS News by Vance County Schools)
Vance Charter School Pep Rally
Monday night the Vance Charter School held a pep rally to help kick off its capital campaign. The event was held at McGregor Hall in downtown Henderson and was well attended by students, teachers, staff and other interested members of the community. The building seats about 950 people and the room was very full.
The Vance Charter School, which is now located on Dabney Drive inside the Henderson Mall, will move in the fall to its new location on Ross Mill Road. At the present time, local general contracting firm H.G. Reynold is retrofitting the former Clayton Homes building for the school’s use.
The overriding intent of the Charter School’s capital campaign is to help complete certain areas of the building such as the gymnasium.
The school will also be expanding to cover high school grades over the next few years with the intent to increase the school population by 20 percent per year until it reaches the capacity of the new building, which is figured to be around 1000 students. Enrollment presently is about 550 kids.
The theme of the pep rally and of the capital campaign is “Taking Excellence To The Next Level.” A 15-minute documentary-style news and information video was shown which described the school’s beginnings and how the school’s board of directors, staff and teachers intended to continue to improve.
A math experiment was conducted, for fun but also to prove a point. A couple of buckets were passed through the crowd and those in attendance dropped about $3,000.00 into those buckets. They added it up on the spot. Vance Charter School board member Josh Towne then took the stage and described the economic impact of each person giving that same amount, a dollar or two each day, for the next year. It would add up to over $1 million and nearly $5.5 million over the next five years. That kind of money would not only help cover the debt of the new building but also help complete discretionary parts of the building like the gym as well as help with the high school grade level expansion.
Henderson City Council Report May 9th
The Henderson City Council held its regular monthly meeting Monday night and dealt with a laundry list of items.
In a phone interview with Councilman Garry Daeke, he told WIZS News the City sold some land and also sold a home that the City and County had taken as a tax seizure.
He said, “The land was the 50 acres we owned on Southerland Mill Road. Actually, it’s just inside Warren County, and that 50 acres was put up for sale for upset bid to see what we might get. It started out in the 40 thousands, but we finally got it up to where we sold it for about $65,000.00. So we were pretty happy that that process worked well and we would have some funds coming into the general fund to use.”
The City had no need of the property. It was an old hold out from years ago when it was thought a waste water treatment plant might be built in that area. Not to be confused by any means with the treatment of fresh water, but several ponds like Fox’s Pond, Weldon’s Mill Pond and Southerland’s Mill Pond were at one time a source of fresh water for the City as well as expansion pools for the City’s fresh water, prior to the present day fresh water intake and treatment facility near Kerr Lake called the Kerr Lake Regional Water System.
Daeke said a Mr. and Mrs. Caulder bought that property on Southerland Mill Road, and he said he believed they already owned some property that would join the property they bought.
In another matter, Daeke said, “And then we had a house on Parkway Drive, and for lack of taxes, it ended up with no sale on the court house steps and it ended up with the City and County. And the owner of the house came back and wanted to pay all the back taxes and all the fees to the City and County for all the work they did as well as the new deed.”
That’s one of the ways you can get it back, he said, and they did come in a pay all of that to re-establish their residency and own the house.
Daeke said, “It’s back on the tax books. I was pretty excited we were able to do that. Especially to get it back in the hands of the owners.”
It’s an unusual circumstance according to Daeke that the owner would pay off everything to re-establish his/her residency.
Daeke said, “It was good collaboration between the City and County to get that done.”