Michael Ellington, on the Vance County Cooperative Extension Report:
This week we’re offering a timely reminder of fall lawn treatments. Also mentioned are opportunities for pesticide license holders to gain education credits.
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Plans for Rebuilding Hope’s Sept. 26 chicken plate fundraiser are well underway, and Co-Director Tom Wille said patrons are invited to pick up plates at the drive-thru, or they are welcome to park, come inside and visit for a while as they enjoy their meal.
One quick note: the price has gone up to $12 a plate, but customers can expect the same delicious food – half a chicken, potatoes, green beans, bread and dessert. The sale is from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.
“We still think it’s a very fair price,” Wille said on Monday’s TownTalk.
With the cost of everything going up – from the food to lumber, Wille said making the price adjustment was necessary.
“The cost of doing what we do has risen also,” he said. “We’re trying to keep up with the times.”
Rebuilding Hope, located at 414 Raleigh Rd, helps the community in many ways, including building wheelchair ramps and making repairs to homes in Vance County and beyond.
The nonprofit holds fundraisers to help purchase the lumber needed to construct the ramps and stairs that help people get in and out of their homes safely.
Wille said folks can order their plates ahead of time, and businesses can have five or more plates delivered. Call the office at 252.438.5132 to place your advance order.
One addition to this fundraiser is called Scraps to Treasure, Wille said.
“One of our steady volunteers is very handy,” he said, referring to Larry Leach, who creates items like planters, candlesticks and other decorative items from leftover wood.
“We bring all our leftover scraps from a job site and so many times they end up in the landfill,” Wille said.
Leach takes this “pile of scraps” and he turns them into treasures, he said.
It’s a way to put a few more dollars out into the community, Wille said, but it also diverts scrap wood out of the waste stream.
Visit rebuildinghopeinc.org to learn more about the services the Rebuilding Hope offers and to see a sample of the objects offered in the Scraps to Treasure program.
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Wayne Rowland, on the Vance County Cooperative Extension Report:
Fire Ants can be controlled using ant bait.
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The majority of Vance County’s schools need some work, from roof repairs and paint to sewer lift station upgrades and new windows and doors. All that work would surely come with a hefty price tag, but Superintendent Dr. Cindy Bennett has a work-around that she presented Tuesday to the Vance County Board of Commissioners.
The work-around comes in the form of a state-administered grant for capital improvements and Vance County could stand to get more than $47 million to make those necessary repairs and renovations, Bennett told commissioners Tuesday.
“The capital needs grant allows us to apply for $47.2 million as a school district,” Bennett stated in her comments to the board. All the commissioners need to do is agree to a 5 percent match.
If the school district were to be approved to receive the maximum amount, the 5 percent match would amount to about $2.5 million.
The matching funds wouldn’t have to be paid all at once; rather, the money could come in over the course of the projects, which could take several years.
Bennett and Vance County Manager C. Renee Perry agree that Vance County is poised to receive the funding because of its Tier 1 designation and because it hasn’t applied previously to get the funding.
Time is of the essence, however, and that’s why Bennett and VCS Chief Finance Officer John Suther appealed to the commissioners for financial support. The grant opened on Aug. 15 and the application came online on Aug. 18, Bennett explained. All documentation must be back to the N.C. Department of Public Instruction no later than Oct. 3.
Although she expressed full support for the plan, Perry said she would request that commissioners have a chance to review the documents shared by Bennett before the board makes a decision.
“I’m in full support,” Perry said, but suggested that commissioners review and discuss the matter at an upcoming work session and then make a decision at a special called meeting in a couple of weeks. As of Thursday morning, that special meeting has been scheduled for Tuesday, Sept. 16 at 4 p.m. The matching funds for the schools is one of three topics to be discussed.
“We need to look at our fund balance,” Perry said. “We also have to think about (other) capital projects. The school district gets money from the county each year that is designated for capital outlay, so perhaps some of that money from the budget line item could be used as part of the 5 percent match, she said.
Commissioner Tommy Hester called the decision a “no brainer” since the school district normally relies on county funding for capital projects. A 5 percent match is like saying the county will get a 95 percent discount if the state approves the grant funding.
(Our WIZS written coverage will appear here soon.)
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Vance County Sheriff Curtis Brame appeared before the board of commissioners on Tuesday to thank them for the financial support that allows sheriff’s office employees to give much-needed support at the detention center and to ask for an extension of that support through the end of the year.
In the past five months, County Manager C. Renee Perry said the county has paid more than $483,000. And that is an unsustainable amount, Perry told commissioners at their Tuesday meeting.
Brame contends that much of the money comes from lapsed salaries – money budgeted for positions that haven’t been filled.
“It’s still a lot of money,” Perry told commissioners. “Five hundred thousand is excessive in my opinion.”
Perry estimated that the county has paid for roughly 9,671 hours – at $50/hour to sheriff’s office employees to fill in at the jail. She suggested that the agreement be revised to exclude exempt staff. “We’ve got to get this cost down – we have to,” Perry stated.
Brame said he expects that six of the 12 new jail hires can be certified by Dec. 1.
He said it takes time for employees to be trained, much less certified, for the positions they’ve been hired for.
“Right now, we need it,” Brame told commissioners. The ongoing staffing shortage, coupled with corrective action plans in place by the state spell big challenges for the sheriff, who oversees the detention center.
The state mandated the jail be depopulated, dispersing detainees to other facilities from Cherokee County in the mountains to Brunswick County on the coast.
On any given day, up to four transport teams are traveling to fetch detainees from where they’re being housed to court here in Vance County or to medical appointments. All the while, these teams are on the clock, racking up hours in vehicles, as well as lodging and other associated costs.
The Vance County jail has between 45 and 50 detainees as of Wednesday, but that number can swell temporarily as individuals come in for court appearances and other matters related to due process. Brame said there are about 150 detainees housed in facilities across the state at this time.
Perry said there will come a time when she will have to come before the commissioners to ask them for more money for the jail situation.
“At some point, we won’t have enough money to do a jail,” she said.
Commissioner Dan Brummitt said he would like commissioners to take some time to review the current plan, “probably make some revisions to it to try to tighten the belt a little bit.”
A motion by Commissioner Tommy Hester, seconded by Brummitt, passed unanimously to table a decision until the commissioners’ work session in a couple of weeks.
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Jamon Glover, on the Vance County Cooperative Extension Report:
We talk about self-doubt in fatherhood.
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In a 5-1 vote, the Henderson City Council approved a motion that will allow Mayor Melissa Elliott to take part in a “train-the-trainer” session to teach day trading.
Council Member Sam Seifert cast the dissenting vote and Council Members Garry Daeke and Lamont Noel were not present at the special called meeting, announced on Friday, Aug. 29 with the intent of going into closed session to discuss a personnel matter.
The meeting lasted just over an hour and the closed session never happened. According to the city’s website, Tuesday’s meeting is the 10th special called meeting of 2025.
Elliott said the grant opportunity comes from the African American Mayors’ Association, which will allow for up to 10 city residents, selected by a committee, to learn the ins and outs of day trading, using $100 of “free” money that is all part of the grant.
Council Member Tami Walker expressed reservations about the program, but she ultimately voted in favor of the city participating. Walker also asked to be included on the committee that will select the individuals who will participate. Elliott said she didn’t have exact dates, but said she would get the dates and send them to the Council.
Much of the meeting was contentious, with Elliott and City Manager/Attorney Hassan T. Kingsberry talking over one another and arguing the finer points of mayoral roles and responsibilities versus those of the city manager.
Elliott said she checks the city calendar before scheduling meetings in the Council Chambers; Kingsberry said he needed some notice about any meeting that will be held on city property since it will involve city staff and facilities.
“The city manager doesn’t have power over elected officials,” Elliott said.
And Kingsberry’s response was that he manages City Hall. “I don’t have a problem with you holding things,” he said, adding that “you can’t just commandeer a space in the City Hall.”
We still need to know when it’s going to be.”
Elliott did agree to providing a two-week advance notice to Kingsberry when the Council Chambers would be reserved for a training or a meeting that Elliott schedules.
The City Council is set to meet at 6 p.m. on Monday, Sept. 8 for its regular monthly meeting.
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