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Schoolteacher Heather Kloer (left) is convinced saved her life when he foiled a carjacking and kidnapping in broad daylight. 5
After weeks of hearings and debate, the DeKalb School Board will vote on March 7 to close schools and realign districts to save money. 9
Find the ballot at www.crossroadsnews.com
A hero in every sense
Copyright © 2011 CrossRoadsNews, Inc.
March 5, 2011
www.crossroadsnews.com
Volume 16, Number 45
Brutal rape at Stone Mountain church shocks community By Jennifer Ffrench Parker
A man who brutally beat, robbed and raped an employee at St. Timothy United Methodist Church in Stone Mountain was still on the loose at press time on Thursday. DeKalb Police spokeswoman Mekka Parish said the suspect has not been identified and that they have no leads. The female employee, who is in a leadership position at the Memorial Drive church, was working alone just before 4 p.m. on Feb.
church leader when the man entered the office, and her cries of “Don’t hurt me” were heard on the other end of the call. That person was able to call the police. The attacker is described as a black man between 40 and 50 who is 6 feet 2 inches tall and weighs about 180 pounds. State Rep. Michele Henson Carlyle Bruce, a 15-year member and church leader, said the attack is a major 26 when the man entered a church office and shock and a big cause for concern, but that the church community is coping. attacked her. “The community is very strong and She was on her cell phone with another
“We have had enough. We need to address this. It’s time to take back our neighborhood.”
tight,” he said Thursday. Bruce said the victim, who is not being identified, was still hospitalized on March 3. Even though her name has not been released, Bruce said the church is asking people who may guess her identity not to contact her at this time. “It is very important that she has her privacy at this time,” he said. Please see RAPIST, page 5
South DeKalb Lags in Recycling Vera Penn of Decatur was sold on recycling after spending a year in New York, where it is mandatory. She is one of 2,408 South DeKalb subscribers.
More education, outreach needed, proponents say By Jennifer Ffrench Parker
After spending a year in New York caring for her ailing brother, Vera Penn of Decatur got used to recycling. “It’s mandatory there,” she said. “You pay fines if you don’t separate your recyclables from your garbage.” Back home in South DeKalb, Penn said it made sense to subscribe to DeKalb’s then 3-year-old voluntary Residential Curbside Recycling Program. “It would be a waste to go backward,” she said Wednesday. “By then it was ingrained in me.” As of February 2011, Penn is one of 2,408 South DeKalb residents who pay a one-time fee of $30 to subscribe to the county’s program, which had 30,665 residential subscribers in four regions – North, South, Central and East. Since its start in 2005, the program has diverted more than 69.3 million pounds of waste from the countyowned Seminole Landfill in Ellenwood. Billy Malone, the county’s assistant director for public works and sanitation, said that when the program started in 2005, they were hoping to average 25 pounds of Billy Malone recyclables per household. In February, they were at 15.51 pounds. South DeKalb ranks near the bottom for the number of residences subscribing to the recycling program. Only the East region, with 1,556 subscribers, has fewer. Malone says he is not sure why more people in the southern end of the county – home to large families – do not recycle. “Larger families are just trying to make supper and stuff like that,” he said. “They just might feel it’s so time-sensitive they are not doing it.”
Jennifer Ffrench Parker / CrossRoadsNews
DeKalb County’s voluntary Residential Curbside Recycling Program, with a one-time subscription fee of $30, diverts waste from the landfill.
Gil Turman, president of the South DeKalb Neighborhoods Coalition, says it’s more than that. “The education component hasn’t been to the point to get the attention for people to participate,” he said on March 3. Turman said enough real education about recycling has not taken place.
the 195-acre Live Oak Landfill in December 2004, he is not recycling and neither is anyone in his South DeKalb subdivision. “I am embarrassed to say all of this,” he said. “Someone needs to set me down and say, ‘This is what we need you to do.’ ” In Brenda Jackson’s small subdivision off Wesley Chapel Road, no one recycles. Jackson, who is also active in the community and is the SDNC’s secretary, does not have a blue recycling bin to put out on Wednesdays and has never seen one in her subdivision. “Recycling takes an extra effort,” she said. “When I throw my trash out, I have to sort it. That’s an extra effort. You have to change habit. So far I haven’t been willing to make that change.” Both Turman and Jackson say that intellectually they understand that recycling is a good thing to do, but that the case hasn’t
“We don’t talk about the things that will occur if you don’t recycle,” he said. “People are just not as informed about it as they need to be. The county wants you to recycle, but some folk don’t understand that people have to be sold on the process if they are going participate.” Even though Turman led the fight to close Please see RECYCLING, page 4