GOVERNMENT/POLITICS A4 | OUR COLUMNISTS A6-7 | BUSINESS A13
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powell
VOL. 50, NO. 30
JULY 25, 2011
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Detention basin fails, devastates family downhill By Betty Bean
Interns invade UT Bud Ford shows Neyland Stadium See page A-10
‘Ageless grace’ Powell High graduate develops low-impact exercise program for seniors See Greg’s column on page A-2
FEATURED COLUMNIST SANDRA CLARK
‘Right and righter’ Looking at the three-woman battle for the District 6 state Senate seat. See page A-5
At 4 a.m. on June 24, Gary and Marsha Carter were asleep in their home on the dead end of Dawson Hollow Road. They have 27 acres of wooded land halfway up Copper Ridge that they bought in 1993 because it made them feel like they were living in the Smokies. But they’d never heard a noise like the sound that awakened them that morning. Gary got out of bed and was startled yet again. “I remember putting my feet on the floor and I was in a creek. I saw sticks floating. I closed the kitchen door to stop the water coming in and I ran downstairs to open the basement door to let the water out. I was trying to save anything I could.” When daylight came, the Carters learned that a detention pond on a construction site owned by Rufus Smith Development at the top of the ridge had collapsed, sending a slimy tsunami surging downhill, sweeping up old tires and abandoned hot tubs and assorted trash from a garbage dump along the way. It slammed into the Carter’s home, taking out a fencerow, a stand of bamboo, a doghouse and a new Troy-Bilt lawn tractor. The torrent blew open the kitchen door, took out the electricity, destroyed the air conditioning unit and coated the interior with mud. A month later, the property reeks of mildew and mold. A sodden oriental rug is stretched out on the asphalt driveway and the lawn tractor To page A-3
Gary Carter digs through debris that slammed into his home when a detention pond collapsed uphill from his property. Photo by Ruth White
The detention pond at the Childress Road subdivision construction site atop Copper Ridge caught the eye of Knox County stormwater inspector Derek Keck 18 days before it collapsed, causing catastrophic damage to neighbors down the hill. Keck visited the Rufus Smith Properties-owned site June 6 and issued a
Notice of Violation, citing problems with Southland Excavation’s erosion and sediment control. He mentioned numerous erosion control issues and also said, “There are several areas where rills and gullies are forming due to lack of stabilization or inadequate stabilization. This includes a large channel that has eroded and deposited a large
amount of sediment into detention basin #1.” On June 8, county stormwater manager Chris Granju sent a letter to the Southland Group, which shares a Ball Road address with Rufus Smith Development and Smithbilt Homes, setting a June 22 deadline. On June 22, Southland Group engineer Wanis Rghebi asked for more time,
Work continues on airplane filling station Group receives 2012 THC grant
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By Greg Householder The restoration and preservation efforts on the airplane filling station building on Clinton Highway are slowly progressing. Recently, the “nose” area of the building underwent renovation as steel and aluminum framing was installed. Previously, the only thing holding up the nose was the metal skin of the building and wooden supports added to the outside. Previously the subfloor had been installed and the rear of the building extended slightly to The current state of the airplane filling station. accommodate the handicapped accessible rest- Photo by Greg Householder room required by code. Rough plumbing for the adding doors and windows. restroom has also been completed. The Airplane Filling Station Preservation The next phase of the project will involve removing and replacing the old bead board, Association (AFSPA), the group that owns the making necessary repairs to the framing, and building and is funding and overseeing the
news@ShopperNewsNow.com ads@ShopperNewsNow.com EDITOR Larry Van Guilder lvgknox@mindspring.com ADVERTISING SALES Patty Fecco fecco@ShopperNewsNow.com Darlene Hutchison hutchisond@ ShopperNewsNow.com Shopper-News is a member of KNS Media Group, published weekly at 4509 Doris Circle, Knoxville, TN, and distributed to 8,314 homes in Powell.
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restoration efforts, recently learned that it has received a grant from the Tennessee Historical Commission. Most of the grant funds come from federal sources. The grant is a “60/40” matching grant. Every 40 cents the AFSPA raises will be matched with 60 cents in grant funding. The maximum grant funding is $24,000, which means the AFSPA needs to raise $16,000 to maximize the grant. The AFSPA raises funds through events such as the recent car show at the Karns Fair. The group’s next fundraiser is a sausage and biscuit breakfast at the Texas Roadhouse near West Town Mall from 7:30 to 9:30 a.m. Saturday, July 30. Tickets are $5 and may be purchased at the door. The AFSPA is also planning a yard sale for Aug. 20. Booth space is $10. For more info, visit the group’s website at www.powellairplane.org.
Worship in the City will feed the spirit and the hungry By Wendy Smith
4509 Doris Circle 37918 (865) 922-4136
pleading that Southland had pressing work elsewhere. On June 24, the detention pond collapsed, unleashing a wall of muddy water down Copper Ridge. County inspectors who conducted a follow-up inspection July 13 found that some of the erosion control problems still had still not been addressed.
What started 18 months ago as a time of interdenominational worship for a few hundred will blossom into a weekend of praise, service and family fun for thousands at the end of August. Worship in the City will be Aug. 26 and 27 at World’s Fair Park. Lori Klonaris, managing partner of the Square Room and Café 4 on Market Square, created the event after monthly praise sessions, which feature local choirs like Will Reagan & United Pursuit and Collage Choir, maxed out the Square Room’s capacity. “We took that concept, but we wanted to make it a community
event – to expand the walls,” she says. The result is a weekend music festival that will include more than 15 bands, a festival of choirs, a Christian art walk and prayer walk, and a children’s pavilion. The service aspect of Worship in the City is intended to unite, as well as serve, the community. A combination of efforts aimed at alleviating hunger locally and abroad is a major focus of the event. The city of Knoxville is a sponsor of the first “Series of Service” project, which is the packaging of enough vitamin-fortified soy rice casserole to create a million meals.
Attendees will be encouraged to donate an hour of their time during the weekend to help. Klonaris thinks volunteers will pitch in joyfully, given that the project will be housed in the air-conditioned Knoxville Convention Center. The humanitarian organization Kids Against Hunger will oversee the packaging and distribution of the food. Second Harvest Food Bank of East Tennessee will receive 10 percent of the meals produced and $2 from the sale of each festival ticket. A canned food drive during the event is expected to net 100,000 pounds of food for the organization.
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“Hunger is the issue, and we are attacking it locally and in Third World countries, where children are dying every minute,” Klonaris says. The purpose of the monthly Worship in the City praise sessions is to bring the diverse Christian community together, and that theme will continue on a grand scale during the festival. Several popular mainstream Christian artists, like Third Day, Mercy Me and Jars of Clay, will take to the main stage for the weekend festival. Another stage will be entirely devoted to local and regional choirs. Klonaris is especially excited about the children’s pavilion, which To page A-3