Newspaper Page Text
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DeVaney grip slipping
B A defiant council calls
for outside investigations
into city financial woes.
One month ago, a similar
request was rebuffed. As
city problems mount,
Augusta Mayor Charles
DeVaney’s clout appears
to be waning.
By Rhonda Y. Maree
AUGUSTA FOCUS Staff Writer
AUGUSTA
Strongman Mayor Charles
DeVaney’s iron-hand grip on the Au
gusta City Council may be slipping.
Monday’s council meeting found the
mayor uncharacteristically subdued
while council members voted for ex
tensive probes into his administra
tion’s affairs.
At the initiation of Councilwoman
Carolyn Usry, council voted for three
investigations of ongoing city contro
versies. Among these is a Richmond
County grand jury probe into the city’s
cash flow problem, which has sparked
questions of the mayor’s handle on
city finances.
According to some members of coun
cil, a $2.45 million deficit that the city
is likely to face at the year’s end has
prompted them to take a more active
Jury still out on merger referendum
Augustans are about evenly divided
between being for consolidation and
being unsure at this time. An informal
phone survey conducted by Augusta
Focus this week revealed that 42 per
cent of the survey participants are un
sure of how they will vote in the June 20
referendum. Participants were asked
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role in city business, even if it means
facing off against the mayor.
Councilman Lee Beard, whose earli
er motion for a grand jury investigation
was voted down, said council is waking
up to the fact that they should be a part
of the decision making.
“Inthe past, they thought it was up to
the mayor to
make deci
sions and
runthecity,”
Mr. Beard
said. “Now
they see how
he’s misman
agedthings.”
Mr. Beard,
who is in his
second year
on council,
said, “I'm
surprised
“I'm surprised
these people.
haven’t been in
tune to things
and have
accepted the
mayor’s rule
for years.”
City Councilman
Lee Beard
these people haven't been in tune to
things and have accepted the mayor’s
rule for years.”
Councilman James Tarver said the
mayor has been “running rough shod”
over council for years, and they are
finally realizing the harm their passive
ness has caused.
“More of them (council members) are
speaking up now because they see that
the mayor has wiggled his way out of so
much of this stuff,” Mr. Tarver said.
“He’s done so much that borders on
being unethical and illegal.”
See Mayor, page 3
“Do you plan to vote ‘yes’ or ‘no’ for the
consolidation of Augusta and Richmond
County?” -
Forty percent of the respondents said
they would vote in favor of the merger
and 16 percent said they would vote
against consolidation.
The bill to consolidate the two govern
RACE MATTERS
Neo-Nazi threat widening
B Klanwatch sees
resurgence of Neo-
Nazi groups. Aryan
Nation spreads to 18
states.
MONTGOMERY, Ala.
(AP) A neo-Nazi group
thought dormant in the United
States has become active in 18
states with a new surge of
growth, according to the Ala
bama-based Klanwatch, which
monitors hate activity.
The Aryan Nations, based in
Idaho, “exploded with a burst
of spectacular growth,”
Klanwatch reported this week.
While groups such as the Ku
Klux Klan and Skinheads were
in decline, the Aryan Nations
showed the surprising growth
duetoanactiverecruiting cam
paign, said Danny Welch, di
rector of Klanwatch, a project
of the Southern Poverty Law
Center in Montgomery.
' Welch said members of other
groups have joined the Aryan
Nations.
The neo-Nazi group is led by
Richard Butler of Hayden Lake,
Your local newspaper sponsored by your local grocer.
April 6 - 12, 1995 VOL. XIV NO. 694
Metro Auguta's ist Weekly Newspaper
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Local postal employees demonstrate for the second time intwo
weeks outside the main office in downtown Augusta. Pickets
charge the post office management with having a ‘plantation
mentality’ in their treatment of black employees. A class
action complaint has been filed witht he U.S. Postal Service.
Photo by Jimmy Carter
ments was passed in the 1995 General
Assembly and signed into law at the
end of March by Gov. Zell Miller. The
June 20 referendum date was recom
mended by the Richmond County Board
of Elections, but will not be official until
it is given the go ahead by the U.S.
Justice Department.
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Idaho. In 1993 there were units
in only three states, but in 1994
itincreasedto 18. Butler predicts
it will increase to 30 states by the
end of this year, the report said.
Welch said the increase in the
Aryan Nations membership was
the major activity among white
supremacy groups. It has a di
rect link with neo-Nazi efforts in
Europe, he said.
“Today with its new interna
tional connection, Aryan Nations
is more powerful and more dan
gerous than ever,” Welch said.
Most of the Aryan Nations
growth has been in the North
eastand Midwest, thereport said.
Although there are noneo-Nazi
groups listed in Alabama, there
Augustans respond to
consolidation query:
Do you plan Y or N on
consolidation?
Yes No Undec
Research by Walter Cole.
are some in Mississippi, Florida,
Tennessee and Louisiana, the
report said.
In all, there are 76 neo-Nazi
chaptersinthe United States, up
from 59 in 1993, Welch said.
Here are the states where
Klanwatch has noted activity by
Aryan Nations: Hayden Lake,
Idaho; Murfreesboro, Tenn;
Polson, Mont.; Lees Summit, Mo;
Camden, Ark.; Largo, Fla.;
Maquoketa, Iowa; Merlin, Ore.;
Hereford, Penn.; Mesa, Ariz.;
Layton, Utah; Austin, Texas;
Dayton, Ohio; Fairdale, Ky.;
Mariposa, Calif.; Minden, La.;
Bryans Road, Md.; and Gendora,
N.J.
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W. »tlr /‘H(‘ Events, p. 4
Augusta’s
national image
pop media
B On HBO and again in USA Today,
the Augusta National, the Garden
City’s millionaire boys club, takes it on
the chin for a history of intolerance,
arrogance and racial bias.
The following article first appeared in the April 5 edition of USA Today.
~ Itis reprinted here in its entirety.
By Ben Brown
USA TODAY
AUGUSTA, Ga.
The azaleas and dogwoods are in full blossom. The
gardeners, chefs and security guards are in readiness.
And once again, it’s time to worship at golf's cathedral, to
strain for new superlatives to celebrate the broad, glisten
ing fairways and the perfect greens of the game’s most
holy place: Augusta National Golf Club, home of The
Masters.
Which means it is also time to note faint, but rising
notes of discord among the hosannas.
“We consider ourselves the golf capital of the world —
for whateverthat’s worth,” says Georgia state Sen. Charles
‘Walker, a Democrat who is a powerful business and
political force among Augusta’s black citizens.
' The trouble is, says the senator, too many Augustans
‘are excluded from sharing the wealth created by the
\ famously exclusive private club that runs The Masters. “I
'hear a lot of anger, a lot of frustration.”
. Afraid they would hear some of that when Georgia is on
'stage during the 1996 Olympics, the International Olym
'pic Committee signaled Atlanta organizers it would be
'best to pass on Augusta National’s offer to host exhibition
golf during the Games.
. And last year, the club’s snootiness attracted derision
‘when club officials demanded commentator Gary McCord
'be banned from future CBS broadcasts of the tournament
'because he suggested National’s greens were soslick that
ithey were “bikini-waxed.”
This year, the Masters is being greeted by HBO’s new
Real Sports program with a segment labeling the club
“The American Singapore.”
“Small and rich, efficient and successful, spotless and
humorless - and totally unforgiving” says veteran sports
writer Frank Deford in his voice-over. The club repre
sents “the last dictatorship in sports —cold and sanctimo
nious, even selfish ... giving little back to its game or toits
community.”
What does the club say about all this? Club officials
respond to requests for interviews with their annual news
conference, scheduled today.
It’s easy to draw a contrast between the paradise inside
Augusta National’s fences and the tacky commercialism
outside, between the world of wealth and privilege exem
plified by the club’s multimillionaire members — almost
all of whom are white and male and from out of state —
and life among the poor black citizens in rundown neigh
borhoods close by.
“The disparity is grave,” says Augusta College business
professor Joseph D. Greene, whose research indicates the
average African-American wage earner makes only 60%
of the average white worker’s salary in the area.
A tour of the “other Augusta” reveals a town unremark
able in its divisions of race and class from other small
Southern towns, still struggling to adapt to a post-segre
gationist era and still laboring in the shadow of the
region’s boom towns, Atlanta and Charlotte.
There are the shanty neighborhoods, embarrassingly
close to the wire and the greenery that wall off Augusta
National. And just as close are the refurbished 19th
century homes, showpieces of ante-bellum splendor.
The city population is just under 45,000. Its metro
population, stretching into -South Carolina, is nearly
397,000.
For naive fans expecting a dogwood-lined fairway from
the city limits to the Savannah River, the ribbon of strip
malls, car lots and fast-food joints that connects Augusta
National with I-20 is reality therapy. The real Augusta,
like the real America, is not a golf course.
And to be fair, says University of Georgia political
scientist Charles Bullock, “golf didn’t create tensions in
Augusta, and golf can’t resolve them.”
If there is local resentment about the way Augusta
National runs its affairs, it is not yet a force to reckon
with. “You don’t bite the hand that feeds you,” says
retired Air Force Master Sgt. Earl Holmes, wholives near
Augusta National.
The annual Masters tournament brings more than
See The AUGUSTA NATIONAL
