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Husband and wife team
as school bus drivers
Each morning when the big yellow
school buses begin their rounds to take
children to school, only 2 are driven by
a husband-wife team.
Don Banks began driving a school bus
as a spare driver, but his wife, Linda,
was the first to get a regular route. That
was 5 years ago.
Three years ago, Don got a regular
route.
Both said they love children and it is a
job that gives the family more time
City voters
turn down
option tax
The local option sales tax referendum
was defeated by 321 votes Tuesday.
Os the 2,463 votes cast, 1,392 Grif
finites were against the one cent tax
and 1,071 were in favor of it.
Approximately 30 percent of the
city’s 8,148 registered voters turned
out.
The measure was defeated in all
precincts except Orrs East at the
National Guard Armory where it
passed 154 to 129. There were a total of
27 absentee ballots.
Here’s the vote by precinct:
Precinct Yes No
W. Griffin 46 150
Fire Station 114 139
Courthouse 476 514
Fourth Ward 43 61
Stuckey Bld. 90 M7
Anne Street 104 175
Armory 154 129
Melrose 34 g 0
Absentee 10 17
Totals 1071 1392
People
...and things
Duck in middle of South Hill street
holding up traffic.
Two minor traffic accidents hap
pening within minutes of each other in
300 block of East Solomon street this
morning.
Woman in dress and heels pedaling
bicycle up Sheridan drive hill with pot
of chrysanthemums in basket.
DAILY
Daily Since 1872
They love children on their routes.
together.
The Banks’ arise each morning at
5:30 and have breakfast with their son,
Glenn, who is a sixth grader at Beaver
brook. They leave home on their routes
at 6:55.
Since neither of the buses is assigned
to his school, Glenn visits with neigh
bors in the morning and afternoon and
rides another bus.
“We leave the house at the same time
and go in opposite directions. We
usually get to the junior high school
about the same time and see each other
there,” Banks said.
Mrs. Banks’ route begins at the
Banks home in the Vaughn Community
and goes north on Vaughn road and on
Highway 92. Banks goes south on
Vaughn road and into the city on the
Ellis road.
Their elementary routes also take
them in different directions. His
elementary route is for Crescent school
and hers is in the Dobbins Mill road,
East Mclntosh road area for students
going to Atkinson elementary.
Mrs. Banks is employed during the
day at Reeves Cleaners. Banks is self
employes and has a small-engine repair
business at Cobb’s Lawn and Garden
Center on the North Expressway.
Banks says one advantage of being a
school bus driver is that he and his wife
have all of the holidays their son does.
“Glenn and I love to fish and hunt and
if we decide to go, we go,” Banks said.
The Banks family loves to travel and
this past summer traveled to Key West,
Fla., and to the west coast and the
western states.
“You really become attached to those
children and you hate to see the sixth
graders move up because they will be
riding another bus. It makes you feel
good when they ask if they can continue
to ride your bus when they move up to
junior high school,” Mrs. Banks said.
Mr. and Mrs. Banks said they have
little trouble with the children who ride
their buses.
“Os course, there occasionally is one
who will misbehave. Generally, you can
tell the children who come from homes
where there is discipline,” he said.
Mrs. Banks, who had open heart
surgery five years ago in Birmingham,
Ala., says the children are as good as
the driver’s are to them. Each year
during the winter months, she has a
wiener roast for the children who ride
her bus. In the spring, she is host to an
ice cream party.
“We get together, wash the bus, play
GRIFFIN
Griffin, Ga., 30223, Wednesday Afternoon, September 28, 1977
ball and just have a good time,” she
said.
Each morning before Mr. and Mrs.
Banks go to their buses, they have
prayer. “We pray that God will direct
us and give us a safe trip. We not only
pray for ourselves, but also for the
other drivers,” they said.
In addition to driving the bus and his
business, Banks keeps busy fishing,
hunting and with other sports. He is
treasurer and songleader for the
Piedmont Baptist Church where the
family has its membership. He also is a
Bible study teacher for young people
and a lay speaker.
Mrs. Banks says that driving a bus,
her regular job and being a housewife
keeps her busy.
Mr. and Mrs. Banks say that driving
a school bus is not as easy as it may
seem.
“There is a lot of responsibility and a
person must have the attitude and
nerves to handle it,” they said.
Banks said one of the biggest
problems is not the students, but other
drivers.
“Everyone feels they ought to be in
front of a school bus and often risk their
own lives and the lives of the students
and bus driver,” he said.
He said the good safety record of the
bus drivers in the Griffin-Spalding
System can be attributed to the alert
ness of the drivers.
Mr. and Mrs. Banks enjoy their jobs
as bus drivers and find a lot of
satisfaction in it. They also have found
there is much more to being a bus
driver than handling a bus.
“Often one of those little fellows will
get on the bus crying and you have to
show your love and give them a hug,”
Banks said.
The Country Parson
by Frank Clark
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“It will be interesting to see
what today’s teen-agers tell
their children they had to do
without.”
NEWS
Recreation hike
bothers leaders
The city and county commissioners
held a joint meeting Tuesday morning
and approved a recreation department
budget for the next 12 months totaling
some $290,494.
The budget shows an increase of
$33,190 over the $257,304 amount for the
present year. Costs are shared equally
by the two governments which will pay
$145,247 or $16,595 more each for
recreation operations.
According to Recreation Director
Larry Neill, the increases are due
mainly to the addition of 3 employes
and the opening of the new Fairmont
Recreation Center.
Salaries are being raised an average
of some 5.9 percent and capital ex
penditures include outdoor restrooms
at the ball fields on Airport road,
resurfacing and lighting tennis courts
and other improvements in the city
parks.
Henry Carr, an Olympic medal
winner, has been employed to operate
the Fairmont Center, Neill announced.
County Commissioner Frank Thomas
disagreed with Neill’s report that the
Griffin Golf course is paying its own
way.
“The golf course is paying for itself
and is not being subsidized with tax
payers’ money,” Neill said.
Thomas noted that the budget does
not show full costs of maintaining the
course. According to the National
Golfing Foundation, the average
maintenance costs are about $8,442 per
hole. Even though the Griffin course
shows a profit, maintenance costs are
not shown in the budget, Thomas said.
He said that he was concerned about
the “magnitude of the increases” of the
total recreation budget.
Neill said that all golf expenses are
included in the budget and that
maintenance costs are placed under
capital outlay costs.
“Everything spent at the course is
paid for by fees, cart rentals and sales
and if the weather keeps up we will
make money this year,” he said.
The golf course was in the black more
than $4,000 at the end of August, he
explained.
Neill also announced increases in
greens fees. Beginning next year the
fees will increase to $4 and to $5 the
following year. Also girls’ ball fees will
go up from $3 to $4 next year and to $5
the following year.
Boys’ football fees will increase to $9
next year and to $lO the year after, he
said.
“There are 22 full time employes at
City Park now and there were 22 people
there 13 years ago when I joined the
department,” Neill said.
Bearden
announces
for post
Thomas A. Bearden, local electronics
equipment dealer, became the third
person to announce his candidacy for
county commissioner.
Earlier David Elder and Frank
Gunnels announced they would run.
They’ll be seeking to fill the vacancy
created with the resignation of Reid
Childers. The election will be held Nov.
8. Qualifying will be between Oct. 4 and
Oct. 21.
Bearden moved to Spalding County 4
years ago after retiring from the U. S.
Navy as a Chief Electronic Technician
with 22 years of service. He was em
ployed by Southern Bell and Robins
Air Force Base until 1976 when he
established his own business.
Bearden, 43, is a native of Bir
mingham and resides at Wildwood
circle in Spalding County with his wife
and 5 children.
He said he would campaign on the
platform that commissioners should be
more responsive to the needs of citizens
and inform them about the cost of
county services and revenue raising.
Vol. 105 No. 230
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Senators struggle
with energy bill
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Senate
struggled today to break a deadlock on
natural gas pricing after holding its
first allnight session since the battle
over the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
Lawmakers worked past daybreak as
Senate Democratic Leader Robert C.
Byrd waged an around-the-clock battle
to break a filibuster led by two senators
who want to block a vote on an industry
supported plan to lift price controls
from natural gas.
“We’ve had about enough of this
foolishness,” Byrd declared at dawn.
But the West Virginia Democrat did not
appear to be making headway in
steering the Senate toward a final vote.
The Senate faced a decision on
whether to vote to replace President
Carter’s plan for continued price
controls with a deregulation plan
Hloney woman
NEW YORK (AP) - Bette B.
Anderson, the Savannah, Ga.,
housewife who doubles as the nation’s
first female under secretary of
treasury, says she didn’t get to where
she is by being timid.
But she warns other professional
women not lose their femininity.
“Those women who cannot
distinguish between assertiveness and
agressiveness are ultimately crippled”
in their personal and professional lives,
Mrs. Anderson told a gathering of
business and professional women
Tuesday.
Although she supervises the U.S.
Mint, Fort Knox, the Secret Service and
120,000 treasury department employes,
Mrs. Anderson said she still finds time
Weather
FORECAST FOR GRIFFIN AREA —
Fair and cool tonight with lows in upper
50s. Partly cloudy Thursday with
chance of afternoon thundershowers
arid highs in upper 70s.
LOCAL WEATHER — Low this
morning at the Spalding Forestry Unit
62, high Tuesday 84, rainfall .29 of an
inch.
Sen. Henry Jackson takes a break.
She’s not timid
favored by the industry.
Unlike earlier talkathons, where
senators could steal away for several
hours of uninterrupted sleep, this
filibuster was being waged with votes
instead of words.
Nearly all of the senators had been
present, at least from time to time,
during the night.
Sens. James Abourezk, DS.D., and
Howard Metzenbaum, D-Ohio, leaders
of ' the stalling action, called for
repeated rollcall votes, forcing
legislators to engage in the arduous
task of taking up separately some 500
amendments to the bill.
As the morning wore on, senators
primed themselves with coffee and
shuffled back and forth between the
Senate floor and nearby rooms where
cots were set up. But few caught much
sleep.
to fly home to Savannah each weekend
to plan meals and do her own grocery
shopping, “even though it drives the
housekeeper up the wall.”
Mrs. Anderson rose from a teller
trainee to vice president of the Citizens
and Southern National Bank in
Savannah, but her rise was far from
meteoric.
It took her 27 years, and she said she
had to earn every promotion.
“I learned early in my career that a
man in a leadership role is assumed to
have authority until he proves himself
unfit or unwilling to perform. A woman,
on the other hand, usually has to .prove
her competence and her right to
authority,” she said.