DOWN LIFE’S HIGHWAY
Orange County
Roy Dunn- Columnist Page 7 Section A
Gerry L. Dickert Page 1 Section B
FOOTBALL HIGHLIGHTS
KAZ’S
ORANGE COUNTY
FEARLESS FOOTBALL FORECAST
FISHING Capt. Dickie Colburn Page 2 Section B
Page 1 Section B
County Record TheRecordLive.com
Vol. 60 No. 14
The Community Newspaper of Orange, Texas
Week of Wednesday, September 4, 2019
County judge candidate throws out challenge $85,500, and donate the rest of what is set to become a $107,140 county judge salary for 2020 to Orange County non-profits. After working for Orange
County’s maintenance and operations department as an HVAC specialist the past four-plus years, Young has filed papers with the Orange County Elections Adminis-
tration necessary to run in the 2020 Special Election for County Judge. As of Labor Day, two other CANDIDATE Page 3A
Lions begin unpacking 2019 Carnival
Orange County welcomed the arrival of an 18-foot AirRanger airboat for use by the Emergency Management Department in rescue operations. From left to right are Commissioner Robert Viator, County Judge John Gothia, Emergency Management Coordinator Joel Ardoin, Commissioner Theresa Beauchamp, Special Projects Director Michelle Tubbleville, Commissioner Johnny Trahan and Commissioner Kirk Roccaforte. Behind Trahan is Faron Floyd, American Airboats vice president. RECORD PHOTO: Dave Rogers
Dave Rogers
For The Record
Jeff Young wants to be the next Orange County Judge and he’s making it personal. “I don’t consider this to be
an election. This is a fight between me and him [John Gothia, the current officeholder],” he said. And Young says if he’s elected, he’ll work cheap – relatively speaking.
The 49-year-old, an Orangefield High grad and a retired Army infantry sergeant, said on Facebook recently that, if elected, he would not take a salary higher than the 2017 level,
Overtime stretches Sheriff’s budget Dave Rogers
For The Record
A short-handed Sheriff’s Office is costing Orange County $43,000 and a lot of budget shuffles. Sheriff Keith Merritt told Commissioners’ Court Tuesday that he is short three deputies in Patrol Division and four people short working in the jail. “We have been short as many as nine in the jail, based on our jail population,” Merritt said. In earlier court meetings, the sheriff explained how the Orange County Jail will hold as many as 300 prisoners but
is holding about 50 more than its usual 165 prisoners in recent months. The higher the jail population, the more jailers are required by law. The sheriff said his deputies have responded to the shortages by working overtime. He appeared in court with two agenda items, a line item transfer to put $62,000 in his overtime budget for Patrol Division, and another to transfer $113,000 from Jail Division regular salaries to overtime. Merritt asked for and received permission to swap money from five Patrol Divi-
sion accounts to pay Patrol’s overtime. But he also needed $43,000 from the county’s unassigned “Contingency” budget. That represents new money going into the Sheriff’s budgets to make it to the end of the current fiscal year Sept. 30. More than half of the action items – 11 of 20 -- on Tuesday’s agenda were lineitem transfers. Only one other involved tapping Contingency funds and that was a $235,000 request from the County Auditor that was lumped with
Orange Lions Rodney “Bubba” Davis and son Jonathan Davis, pitch in to help set up the 2019 Lions Club Carnival on Tuesday at Orange Lions City Park. The 79th Lions Club Carnival will kick off on September 25-28 and October 2-5 starting at 6:30 PM each night. The annual event features rides, games, food and family fun. RECORD PHOTO Pam Honeycutt
COUNTY BUSINESS Page 3A
Lions playground possible end raises builders’ ire Dave Rogers
For The Record
An Orange landmark could be headed to the trash heap without a change of priorities at City Hall. The giant wooden Lions Den children’s playground at Lions Den Park, between Adams Bayou and 16th Avenue off MacArthur, is in need of repair or replacement 20 years after it opened. Kelvin Knauf, acting city manager, says it will cost between $650,000 and $750,000 for the City of Orange to replace it with a similar structure. “But if we go with a cheaper playscape, like the other city parks, we can have money left over to do things at the new [Boat Ramp] pavil-
ion,” he told city council members in August. He estimated a composite playground like the city recently installed at Navy and Sunset Parks would cost about $200,000 and have a lifetime of 30 years. If approved in the city’s 2020 budget, it could be installed any time in the next fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1, he said. The city is also looking at playground updates at Northway Park and Memorial Park, the latter getting a hardy boost from Dow Chemical for its ballfields. “Playground equipment is
expensive,” Knauf said. So are memories. “Did any of those people volunteer to raise money or come out and volunteer their labor when we built it?” former city council member Deborah Mitchell asked about the people who sit in council chambers today. Memories were made by the thousands at Lions Den Park, which was opened in 1999. The community-built project designed by local school children with architectural assistance and projLION’S PARK Page 3A
Pam Honeycutt inspects Lions Den playground on Friday, Aug. 30. She helped head up the efforts to build the playground in 1999. RECORD PHOTO: Dave Rogers
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