Vance County High School

The Local Skinny! Elliott Credits Community Support And Consistency To Vipers’ Success

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The Vance County High School football team marched through the 2023-24 season, tackling opponents one after the other and coming out with wins each time. The Vipers hope to build on that 10-0 record later this week in the opening round of the state playoffs.

Head Coach Aaron Elliott said he and his staff have been preaching consistency to the team, and that is paying dividends.

The Vipers host the Terry Sanford Bulldogs Friday night at 7 p.m. and Elliott said he hopes the community will come out to support the local team.

“This year has been a little different than last year,” Elliott said on Monday’s The Local Skinny! Last year, he said, the coaching staff was working to build that culture of consistency to the football program that had been missing.

Elliott played football here and remembers how Northern Vance and Southern Vance fans got behind their teams. “There was a big deal for Friday night” games, he said.

And he’s looking to get that momentum going again.

“Having a 10-win season,” Elliott said, shows that the kids have bought in to what coaches have been saying. Those wins – one by a whopping 76 points – shows that the players are enjoying the process.

Elliott said he and the team appreciate all the community support that businesses, churches and others have shown, whether by providing meals or sending congratulatory emails, phone calls or text messages.

“That’s been real important,” he said.

He said he’s proud of the way the staff has worked to instill that sense of consistency to the players, and it’s what has contributed to their success this season.

“These kids really feed off the community’s energy,” Elliott said.

The 6th-seed Vipers face the Bulldogs in the first round, and Elliott said if they get the W Friday, they’ll stay at home for the next round – and possibly for a third game at home, depending on how the bracket shapes up.

He said the Bulldogs, like the Vipers, have a good quarterback who can run and throw the football. “We’re going to have to play good and not take them lightly,” he said. But they’ve got a good defense, too, and Elliott’s been watching a lot of film to be ready for Friday.

“I feel real confident on what we can do on offense,” he said. “We’ve gotten really good at executing plays on offense.”

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The Local Skinny! Maria Parham, Health Dept. Team Up For $5M In State Funding

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The atrium of Maria Parham Health was filled with dozens of county leaders, hospital staff and members from the community Wednesday afternoon to witness a big check presentation by N.C. Rep. Frank Sossamon.

The oversized check was appropriate, too, because it needed to accommodate a lot of zeroes – the check was written out for $5 million.

Sossamon, freshman representative for District 32, was flanked by fellow legislator Rep. Matthew Winslow, along with Maria Parham CEO Bert Beard and District Attorney Mike Waters for the presentation.

Sossamon called the General Assembly’s $5 million appropriation establishes a “milestone,” for the hospital, the local health department and for the larger community. Plans for the money include creating secure space within the hospital’s Emergency Department for patients in mental health crisis.

“I’m thankful we were able to bring this home,” Sossamon told the gathering assembled for the presentation.

The money will come through Granville Vance Public Health, and Director Lisa Harrison said the dollars will help to create a modern ER with “cutting-edge care and paying attention to modern-day practices that keep people safe in the emergency room.”

MPH CEO Beard said some of the funds would be used at the MPH behavioral health facility in Franklin County for intensive outpatient services.

Right now, law enforcement officers must remain with patients who come to the ER in a mental health crisis until those patients can be safely placed.

The “Safe Spaces” concept for the ER will allow law enforcement officers to get back to work more quickly, and also will put in place proper safeguards for hospital staff and patients alike.

“We’re working to try to help employees be safe,” Sossamon said.

District Attorney Mike Waters said the courts system is “downstream” from other areas in the community, including education and health care. In meeting with representatives from across the community over the past few years, one thing was clear: it’s important to intervene before an individual ends up in the courts system.

Waters said this project serves to address needs in the community, but it also gets law enforcement officers back to work quicker, which is key to keeping communities safer.

Beard said this ER rebuild is “forward-thinking in how we look at emergency care in this state,” and said he hopes what happens here at Maria Parham can be a model for others looking for ways to protect staff and patients in mental health crisis.

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Home And Garden Show

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On the Home and Garden Show with Vance Co. Cooperative Ext.

  • Keep Leaves off of recently planted grass
  • Continue planting pansies.
  • Clean up your garden. Take up and clean any equipment you won’t use till next spring
  • Make sure sprayers are empty.
  • Compost your leaves this year. They are too valuable to BURN!
  • Clean up outdoor planters that will not be in use over the winter.
  • October is a great time to collect your Soil Samples when we get some rain. 2 week analysis time.
  • Don’t rush to cut back perennial flowers, especially those with dried flowers and seed heads that will feed birds through the winter.

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Perry Memorial Library

The Local Skinny! Youth Events At Perry Memorial Library

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It was noisy in the library the other day when the youth gathered to learn about electricity – just like Melody Peters had hoped for.

Peters, youth services director for Perry Memorial Library, said the electricity workshop was a big hit – in fact, it’s going to pick back up in January and run monthly through April.

“There’s nothing like seeing a kid’s face light up,” Peters said, when they realize what they’ve just accomplished or created.

Admittedly, it took a little time for the participants to understand some of the characteristics of energy and how energy flows, she said.

“It took a little doing,” she said, and the instructor allowed the youngsters to learn by trial and error.

“I love giving kids hands-on learning experiences,” Peters said. When something didn’t work, they had to problem-solve to make the devices they created work properly.

The electricity program, part of the library’s Life Hack series, continues for middle and high school students on the second Tuesday of the month beginning in January and continuing through April.

The third Tuesday is for Survival Skills, which currently is teaching 14 kids to crochet. The library purchased hooks for the participants to use, and the instructor donated the yarn – that was the easy part. The kids had the more difficult task of actually creating a chain of single crochet loops.

“It was hard at first, tedious,” Peters said. “Once the connection is made, then they’re off,” she said. The next gathering will take place Nov. 21, and Peters said she’ll be interested to see progress that the participants have made on their projects.

Check out www.perrylibrary.org to find out about all the programs and services the library offers.

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The Local Skinny! Sossamon Details Upcoming Transportation Meeting

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Vance County residents are invited to a forum this Thursday evening, Oct. 26, to learn more about local transportation projects – those currently underway and others planned for the future.

Always wondered just how the state DOT decides where and how a road gets built or just how to define right of way? Find out Thursday beginning at 6 p.m. in the county commissioners’ meeting room on the second floor of the county administration building in Henderson.

According to N.C. Rep Frank Sossamon, R-Dist. 32, this is the second in a series of meetings that he and his staff have set up across his district designed to inform and educate his constituents.

A DOT divisional director will spend the day in Henderson to speak with different groups, Sossamon said on Monday’s segment of The Local Skinny!

At 10 a.m., local realtors are invited to a session to learn about roads and other topics around transportation and development. Then at 3 p.m., governmental leaders are invited to convene with DOT officials to have a dialogue about road infrastructure, highways and the like.

Next month’s topic is mental health, Sossamon said.

Forums will be held in Henderson on Nov. 28 at 6 p.m. at Spring Street Missionary Baptist Church and then Nov. 30 at 6 p.m. at Cornerstone Christian Church on Knotts Grove Road in Oxford.

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The Local Skinny! Vance Co. Sheriff’s Office Presents Domestic Violence Awareness Event

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The fifth annual “Think Community” event is set for Saturday, Oct. 28 in observance of October as Domestic violence Awareness month. The program will begin at 3 p.m. at Clearview Church, 3485 U.S. Hwy 158 in Henderson.

Debbie Scott, domestic violence educator with the Vance County Sheriff’s Office, has planned an afternoon full of inspiration and remembrance for participants to “break the silence, stop the violence” around domestic violence.

Others in attendance include Deputy Lawrence Carter, of the Vance County Sheriff’s Patrol Division, Jayden Watkins, local minister, author (and WIZS Radio employee), as well as Chief Magistrate Debbie Small and others.

Special guests include God’s Men of Harmony who will provide musical entertainment and “Miss Get It Right” will perform a poetic tribute as part of the day’s activities.

To learn more, contact Scott at the sheriff’s office at 252.738.2235 or by email at dscott@vancecounty.org.

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The Local Skinny! Oakwood Cemetery To Host ‘Sip And Stroll With Souls’

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The second annual “Sip and Stroll With Souls” in Louisburg’s historic Oakwood Cemetery promises to shed some light on some of the dearly departed who find their eternal rest there.

Dorothy Cooper is one of the event organizers, and she told WIZS’s Bill Harris on Tuesday’s segment of The Local Skinny! that the Oct. 29 tour is shaping up to be another success.

There’s an online registration on the Louisburg Historic District’s website, Cooper said. Find the link here: https://www.louisburghistoricdistrict.com/ and click on Events/Tickets.

A $10 donation per person helps the group with its ongoing efforts to clean, restore and repair gravestones in the cemetery, one of two owned by the Town of Louisburg.

From 1:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m., participants will have the opportunity to visit a dozen or so different gravesites, with docents on hand to provide some history on the person buried there.

In some cases, the docent is a relative of the deceased; expect to see some docents in period dress and others with family portraits on display.

“We had a really great time last year,” Cooper said, adding that a good number of participants were from outside Franklin County. She said it’s always interesting to uncover new family connections and learn more about distant relatives.

“Some people are find out about family that they didn’t know before,” she said.

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The Local Skinny! Duke Remote Area Medical Clinic Update

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The Remote Area Medical pop-up clinic that set up shop back in May provided $186,000 in free medical, dental and vision care to people who attended the weekend event.

Saajan Patel and Anvi Charvu, both upperclassmen at Duke University, helped to organize the two-day clinic and provided a follow-up report on Thursday’s The Local Skinny!

“The clinic went really well,” Patel said.

Health professionals were able to attend to 230 different patients who came to the parking lot of Vance Charter School where the pop-up clinic was held.

In addition to many children seeing a doctor for the first time, Patel said there were 30 dental cleanings performed, 92 tooth extractions and 140 pairs of glasses made on the spot to give to those in need.

This is the second year that RAM has had a clinic in Henderson, and Charvu attributed this year’s success to having more volunteers to help things run more efficiently and smoother.

“Our first year, we had a limited number of volunteers, so we had a limited capacity,” Charvu said. This year, clients could pretty much walk in and be served, she added.

Duke sophomore Grace Wang is helping to plan next year’s clinic, which will most likely take place in February 2024. Wang said she was impressed with the “amazing energy” of the volunteers and the health professionals who provided the care during the May clinic.

Don’t want to wait until February? There’s a RAM clinic at Nash Central High School in Rocky Mount this weekend, Patel said.

The pop-up clinics are “band aid” solutions to the overarching challenge of health care inequities, Patel said. RAM clinics are free and open to anyone – with or without insurance.

The May clinic demographics broke down like this: 48 percent of clients were African American, 20 percent were Hispanic; 79 percent had not completed a college degree and 64 percent had neither dental nor vision insurance.

“We want to continue expanding and educating everyone” on how to solve the challenge of health care inequity, Patel said. Wang said the RAM organizers are partnering with local agencies like the health department, Triangle North Healthcare Foundation and others to help make a difference.

“We want to support the health of this county in more ways than one,” Wang said.

Visit www.ramusa.org to learn more or to view the clinic schedule.

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Home And Garden Show

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On the Home and Garden Show with Vance Co. Cooperative Ext.

  • Start preparing for season extension. Have your frost protection plan ready!
  • Should you apply lime to your lawn?
  • Clean up your garden. Take up and clean and store your vegetable trellis if vegetables are finished producing on the trellis
  • What should you do about moss? Stop fighting it?
  • Check fall vegetables for harlequin bugs. These insects are shaped like stink bugs. Black with red markings on back
  • Mowing tip: aim discharge chute away from flower and shrub beds to cut down on weeds.
  • October is a great time to collect your Soil Samples when we get some rain. 2 week analysis time.

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