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The Piedmont Journal www.thepiedmontjournal.com
75 CENTS
WEDNESDAY // DECEMBER 4, 2013
COUNCIL
More Internet talks are planned City officials to meet with school personnel and Internet provider representatives
LAURA GADDY Consolidated News Service Tuesday’s Piedmont City Council meeting turned into a venue for public discussion about the future funding of a wireless Internet service for local students. A representative of the city school system and two representatives of an Internet company that the school pays
to provide wireless service to Piedmont students addressed the council for more than thirty minutes. After the discussion, the council voted to host a work session with the schools and the Internet company to discuss the wireless Internet system and postponed a decision about whether it will help pay for students to use it. “I’m encouraged that we are going to be able to sit down together, the three
LACK OF DIRECTION Sign thefts a frustrating, costly problem for cities LAURA GADDY Consolidated News Service Alabama Street in Piedmont stretches a little more than half a mile and intersects with 11 cross streets, about half of which are no longer marked. Where signs should be at those intersections, plain posts stand, their toppers removed. Just a few miles away, Auburn Street near the city’s edge is as likely to have bare posts with no signs. The same is true just outside the city limits on Crimson Tide Drive. “Auburn Street was just blank for years because you would get one set up and it’d disappear,” said Piedmont special projects manager Carl Hinton. Cities across the state, and county, face the same problem with street signs. “We have Alabama Street,”said Jacksonville Mayor Johnny Smith. “You may not find it because the sign is probably not there.” Officials say the main reason street signs with popular names go missing is theft, but it is not the only one. Some are struck by vehicles in crashes and others are
blown away in storms. Signs with people’s first or last names are almost as likely to disappear as those that pay homage to the state’s most popular sports teams. For example, Smith said, Laura Lane in Jacksonville is a prime target for sign stealers. Assistant Calhoun County engineer Michael Hosch said his department has to work through the year to keep signs up. County workers, meanwhile, must keep Crimson Tide Drive on its post. “We very seldom ever recover them,” he said. Hosch said some thieves take signs to sell them as scrap metal. The number of signs stolen seemed to decline, he said, after scrap yards became less likely to accept what appeared to be municipal property. Overall, he said, the county budgets $55,000 each year to buy materials to replace signs, but it costs more than that to repair them. Hosch said it takes between $150 and $200 in supplies, manpower and fuel to repair one sign. About a year ago Piedmont
parties, and work toward a resolution,” said Rena Seals, Director of Technology for Piedmont City Schools. School officials say the at-home Internet access for students is the underpinning of the school system’s progressive technology plan, which has helped it gain national recognition and more than $1 million in grant funding. In 2010, Piedmont City Schools received a federal grant to help establish
the wireless Internet service to serve students at home. Wetumpka-based Information Transportation Services agreed to pay the city $6,500 to use city owned cables to supply Internet service to students for 10 years. Beginning in April 2012, the city agreed to pay $6,250 per month for three years to help the school system supply ■ See COUNCIL, page 3
TECHNOLOGY VISIT
Lt. Gov. visits PHS
Submitted photo
ABOVE: Brian Mitchell,career tech teacher, talks with Lt. Governor Kay Ivey about the agriscience classes. SEE MORE PHOTOS ON PAGE 10.
■ See SIGNS, page 5
JOURNAL FEATURE
Bobby Glover drives ACTS bus for Piedmont Glover worked at SCT 20 years BY MARGARET ANDERSON JOURNAL CORRESPONDENT
Anita Kilgore
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Bobby Glover in front of ACTS bus.
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■ See GLOVER, page 10
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Bobby Glover, 74, was born and reared in Piedmont. The only time he’s lived elsewhere was when he was in his early 20s and in the National Guard. He was stationed six months at Leonardwood, Mo. Glover’s parents are the late Thad and Bernice (Langston) Glover. The Glovers lived on Logan Street in the mill village. That’s where Glover and his brothers lived and played and where they met many lifelong friends. The other two Glover brothers are Paul and Ray. Paul is deceased, and Ray still lives in Piedmont.
Glover said while his parents made the family a living by working at StandardCoosa-Thatcher, he and his brothers helped out by working in the yard and gathering coal and wood for the fire in wintertime. A few years after graduating from Piedmont High School in 1959, Glover went to work at Standard-CoosaThatcher. He stayed there 20 years and worked in the roller shop grinding material that came out of the spinning room. After the mill closed he went to work at Anniston Army Depot. He stayed there 10 years where he worked at the propane station. After retiring from AAD, he
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