SATURDAY
ON STAGE! Local students perform in districtwide show. SUNDAY
April 24, 2010 126th year No. 114
WORD PLAY: Denton Elementary students bring books to life. 1B
www.hpe.com High Point, N.C.
ONE IN A MILLION: Golfer holes double eagle at Oak Hollow. 1C
Trinity mulls trash, recycling service
50 Cents Daily $1.25 Sundays
Thanks for the helping hand
WHO’S NEWS
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Jeff Anderson, a senior at High Point University, received the Information Systems Outstanding Student Award in High Point University’s Phillips School of Business. The award names him as the top Information Systems student in the day program.
City Council panel revisits proposal BY DARRICK IGNASIAK ENTERPRISE STAFF WRITER
TRINITY – A panel of Trinity City Council members is revisiting a proposal that could mandate all residents have trash and recycling service. The city’s trash and recycling task force, composed of Councilmen Kelly Grooms, Robbie Sikes and Tommy Johnson, has directed City Manager Ann Bailie to research how much it would cost
Last year, the City Council nixed a proposal to implement the amenity. to implement a citywide trash and recycling service. The task force also told Bailie to see if the city’s trash haulers would agree to form a corporation to provide the city with the service, a concept the haulers agreed upon last year. Last year, the City Council nixed a proposal to implement a service after many residents told the governing body they couldn’t afford to pay for it. Because plastic was banned from landfills late last year, calls into City Hall requesting recycling service have increased dramatically, causing the city to explore the mandatory service again, Bailie said. “We’ve got to see what the figures are going to be,” Sikes said. “I definitely want to go in a positive direction. I definitely think we need it. It’s just another benefit of being a city. We want to go forward with what we are doing, and we want to do it for the best of the city and each taxpayer.” Grooms, who voted in
TRASH, 2A
INSIDE
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DON DAVIS JR | HPE
The Homeplace at Piedmont Christian Home held a picnic Friday for the facility’s volunteers as part of National Volunteer Week observance.
Jobless rates fall across Triad, state BY PAUL B. JOHNSON ENTERPRISE STAFF WRITER
TRIAD – Talk about a welcome and dramatic change on the job front. After more than a year of escalating unemployment across the region and state, jobless rates fell from February to March in all 100 counties, the N.C. Employment Security Commission reported Friday. The number of unemployed workers in the state decreased by 38,401 to 496,734 in March, while the number of people listed in a job increased by 66,804 to 4.06 million. The last time no counties recorded an increase in joblessness was April 2006, when 99 counties had a drop in unemployment and one remained unchanged, according to ESC figures. The improvement in the state job market reflects national
numbers released earlier this month by the U.S. Labor Department that showed net job gains during March. Davidson County recorded a drop in unemployment from 14.2 percent in February to 13.1 percent in March. Guilford County’s rate declined from 11.8 percent to 11 percent, while Randolph County’s rate fell from 12.8 percent to 11.8 percent, according to ESC figures. The city of High Point’s jobless rate fell from 11.8 percent in February to 11.1 percent last month. “The number of job orders are up from this time last year. We’ve had jobs orders coming in steadily all this week,” said Charles Diggs, assistant manager of the High Point ESC office. Despite the improvement, jobless levels re-
GUILFORD COUNTY – The way the numbers added up this week, state budget adjustments proposed by Gov. Beverly Perdue could cost the school district an additional $10 million. The cuts start with rollbacks in allotments and also include possible salary adjustments. Early estimates show that Guilford County’s allotment cuts, ranging from the hours paid to assistant principals and per-pupil allotments, could total $8.3 million, Sharon Ozment, district chief financial officer, told the Guilford County Board of Education. “We would have to cover all of that,” Ozment said Thursday.
Much of the $957 million in Perdue’s proposed spending cuts would be used for expanding other programs in the public schools and in higher education, help pay small businesses create jobs and pay for salaries and benefits. The current state budget eliminates $9 million in district funding for 2010-2011 to reach an estimated $29 million state cut in Superintendent Mo Green’s $651.8 million proposed budget. “So we are looking at $20 million now over the last year,” said Chairman Alan Duncan. Possible salary adjustments for employees paid with local dollars could cost $1.9 million to match state adjustments. Perdue has proposed restoring a
teacher longevity-based salary increase of about 1.8 percent. Teachers would get a one-time bonus to make up for a furlough last year that cost them 0.5 percent of their salaries. Perdue’s proposed adjustments could mean that the board may have to consider deeper cuts on Green’s second or “B” list in some areas, Ozment said. Those include a two-day furlough or pay reduction, cutting more administrative positions, and withholding half of the funds that principals use to purchase supplies and hire teachers. The board also discussed the possibility of cutting the $15 million local annual supplement to save money rather than using furloughs
1B OBITUARIES
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Linda Cook, 59 Don Haire, 70 Bessie Hulin, 85 Jane Lyle, 78 Billy Murphy, 77 Fred Parrish, 88 John Russell, 79 Vada Smith, 90 Jimmy Yow, 61
Obituaries, 2B
main at historically high levels. The last month when the city of High Point jobless rate bottomed out below 10 percent was January 2009, when the rate was 9.9 percent. Despite the improvement last month, 75 counties posted double-digit jobless rates and 43 counties recorded unemployment rates of at least 12 percent, reports the economic research firm South by North Strategies Ltd. The economy has a long
way to go to recover the 280,200 jobs, or 6.7 percent of the state payroll employment base, lost since the onset of the recession in December 2007, reports Chapel Hill-based South by North Strategies. “News that North Carolina counties experienced a decrease in the local unemployment rate is certainly welcome, but we still have challenges ahead of us,” said ESC Chairman Lynn Holmes out of Raleigh. pjohnson@hpe.com | 888-3528
Numbers add up to more possible cuts BY DAVID NIVENS ENTERPRISE STAFF WRITER
ELECTION FLAP: Candidates complain of signs being removed.
CUTS LIST
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Level A: Eliminate 25 positions to save $1.8 million, but only one of those positions is now filled. Cuts $4.2 million in projected requests for purchased services, supplies and materials, equipment purchases and contracted transportation. Level B: Eliminates an unspecified number of employees to save an additional $2.6 million and adds another $1 million in non-personnel cuts to administrative expenses.
that may not apply to all employees. “You can cut the supplement, or you can pay less, or nothing,” said Jill Wilson, board attorney. The board also could seek an additional increase from the Guilford County Board of Commissioners, but County Manager Brenda Jones-Fox
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so far has proposed level operations funding for the district at $175 million in a budget that offers $17.2 million in cuts. “This is not very happy place to be,” Duncan said of the complicated calculations. dnivens@hpe.com | 888-3626
WEATHER
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Few showers High 75, Low 62 6C
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