Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 10A
-FORSYTH COUNTY NEWS-SUNDAY, JANUARY 26. 19*2
Opinion
A friend comes home
“Effective.”
“Accessible.”
“Totally ethical.”
In this age when some politi
cians have a way of falling prey to
the pitfalls of the job, these
words used by Forsyth County
Commissioner James Harring
ton in describing the political ca
reer and attitude of Rep. Ed Jen
kins serves as a high compliment.
This week Rep. Jenkins an
nounced he would retire from
politics going home to Jasper, Ga.
to practice law and enjoy family
life and friends on the home front
for a change. This soft spoken
mountain man has served eight
terms in office attaining the pow
er position as senior member of
the Ways and Means Committee.
The news comes as a big disap
pointment to constituents here in
Forsyth County. Many see Demo
crat Ed Jenkins as the best friend
Forsyth County has ever had.
During his years of political ser
vice he took the time to pay atten
tion to the area and its needs.
In recent months, Jenkins
| What do YOU think?
■ Do you think the resignation of Ed Jenkins as representative will hurt Nortf
Georgia in the long run? To respond, fill out the space provided below and mail
(or telephone 404-781 -5288 to have your response recorded. You do not have to
jgive your name.
Your name:
I Your phone number:
i Forsyth County News
1 P.O. Box 210
I Cumming, Ga. 30130
On your payroll
CITY COUNCIL
Mayor, H. Ford Gravitt, 212 Kelly Mill Road, Cumming
Mayor Pro-Tern, Lewis Ledbetter, 205 Mountain Brook Drive
Gabriel Dukas, 1560 Magnolia Place
Quincy Holton, 312 Samaritan Drive
Ralph Perry, 1420 Pilgrim Road
Rupert Sexton, 705 Pine Lake Drive
NATIONAL REPRESENTATIVES
U.S. Senator Sam Nunn
303 Dirksen Senate Office Building. Washington, D.C. 20510. Telephone: 1-202-224-
3521. Atlanta number: 3314811
U.S. Senator Wyche Fowler
320 Hart Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20510. Telephone: 1-202-224-
3643. Atlanta number: 331-0697
U.S. Rep. Ed Jenkins, 9th District
2427 Rayburn Building, Washington, D.C. 20515. Telephone: 1-202-225-5211;
Gainesville number: 1404-536-2531.
STATE REPRESENTATIVES
Rep. Bill Barnett, District 10
P.O. Box 755, Cumming, Ga. 30330
Telephone: 887-6582.
Sen. Nathan Deal, District 49
P.O. Box 2522. Gainesville, Ga. 30503. Telephone: 1404-522-9978.
Sen. Sallie Newbill, District 49
7205 Riverside Dr. Atlanta, Ga. 30334. Telephone: 1404-394-5676.
Gov. Zell Miller
203 State Capital, Atlanta, Ga. 30334. Telephone: 1404-656-1776.
Forsyth County News
USPS 205-540
A New York Times Company
(Established 1908)
Forsyth County News PUBLISHER-CHRIS BOND
r,!mln?n a n hl p n^ 9 MANAGING EDITOR-JUDY H. GREEN
Ph C nn^? rTmimnff l rp ADVERTISING-HARRIET H. VINCENT
523-7303 AJanteS CIRCULATION DIRECTOR-GRAHAM B. KIMBROUGH
Published Sundays and Wednesdays by Forsyth County News Company, 121
Dahlonega St. second Class Postage paid at Cumming, Ga. and additional
offices. Subscription rate for Forsyth and Dawson counties, $13.00 per year;
other Georgia counties and out of state subscriptions are $20.00 per year.
Advertising rates and deadlines available upon request. Postmaster: Send
address change to Forsyth County News/P.O. Box 210, Cumming, Ga. 30130.
I * l
pushed through legislation to
preserve wilderness areas in the
Chattahoochee National For
rest, including the 22,600 acre
Springer Mountain National Re
creation Area which lies within
Fannin, Lumpkin and Dawson
Counties which neighbor For
syth County.
Some see Rep. Jenkins as one
of the most effective congress
men North Georgia has ever had.
His record in Congress would
likely have a strong bearing
should Jenkins give in to the pull
of the gubernatorial race which
hangs as a challenge in 1994. But
that is 1994.
Jenkins’ retirement and the re
districting plan should cause a
hubbub of activity with a number
of hopefuls getting hats in hand
for the ring toss. We might be sur
prised at what the outcome will
bring. Whatever is in the future,
the person the voters elect will
have a big pair of shoes to fill
when it comes to following Ed
Jenkins.
( R...E...8...0...U...N...D ) %
H 6
pi I !**
GEE, ZELL, LOOKS
Jmur W'r'V uke YOU ARE
FARSIGHTED!
Letters
Understanding assessing
This is in reference to an article you published
on Jan. 12 concerning a Board of Tax Assessor’s
meeting. In it you reported that a local attorney
suggested that we could simply reduce the value
of all property by a flat 35 percent
First, as confirmed by our attorney, such an
across the board cut would violate the law, thus
voiding our digest
Second, it implies that cutting values across the
board would significantly lower people’s proper
ty taxes, which it would not The only way to
actually lower an individual’s taxes without in
creasing someone else’s taxes is to have the
County Commissioners and School Board reduce
spending. The only purpose in assessing people’s
property is to determine their fair share of the
County’s expenditures. Yet none showed up at
the County’s budget hearing.
To arrive at each property owner’s tax bill, you
multiply the millage rate by the assessed value of
his property. If everyone’s assessed value were
lowered by 35 percent, the millage rate for 1990
would have gone from 18.91 mills to about 28.96.
Therefore, your lower value would have been
multiplied by a higher number getting the same
result.
The millage rate used to calculate the amount
of taxes we must pay is found by dividing total
expenses (County Budget, plus School Budget,
plus 1/4 mill to the State) by the total assessed
value of all property in the county.
Possibly the reason no one showed up for the
County Budget hearing is that the majority of
property owners’ taxes have been lowered as a
result of the county-wide re-appraisal even
though their actual appraised values went up!
What this indicates is that those of you who are
receiving credits on your permanent tax bills for
1989 and 1990 have been paying someone else’s
share of the County expenditures.
A county-wide re-appraisal is sometimes nec
essary to assure that everyone is paying his fair
Outer Perimeter
Below is a map showing the relationship of 1-75 to State Road 371 connector and 1-20 to State Road
316-extended connector to one another and to other approved cross radial proposals. Residents of
Forsyth County and Cumming would be most affected by the gray shadowed part which is already
the approved location section. See Page 1A for additional information concerning a recent meeting
with the Sierra Club and what it anticipates in conjunction with construction of this route.
GORDEN \ I \ DAWSOnS V S
RELATIONSHIP OF THE 1-75 TO S.R. 371 CONNECTOR
AND THE I-20 TO S.R. 316 EXT. CONNECTOR 1
TO ONE ANOTHER AND TO OTHER APPROVED hall k I
f \ CROSS RADIAL PROPOSALS /Jl
BARTOW 3 CHEROKEE - L H
“Vs. 411 EXT. FHo’u’lFS.'a'l 371 f'l *
PAULDING COBB f/l
COWETA j f aBIH * iBI Proposed Connectors \
l Approved Location Sections
1 <CviwC%%vAW.vrtw/ / \ /
j \ FIGURE 3 \ /\J I
share. Even though your appraised value may
increase, in the majority of cases your share of
the expenses will decrease, simply because
someone else’s values increased significantly
more than yours.
Ifyou feel your current appraisal is higherthan
fair market value, I encourage you to file a return
at the Tax Assessor’s office prior to April 1 show
ing what you believe the fair market value to be.
There is a public computer terminal at the Tax
Assessor’s office which allows you to compare
your real property value with your neighbor’s or
with anyone else’s in the County.
Kathy Totten
Board of Tax Assessors
Great attendance
We had record attendances at SCORE’S “How
to Apply For An SBA Guaranteed Bank Loan” on
Jan. 10, 1992 and at the Business Workshop on
Jan. 15, 1992. Several of the people attending
learned about these events from your publicizing
these in Cumming Events.
All of us at SCORE are most appreciative of
your announcing our Seminars and Workshops
many, many thanks.
If we can ever be of any assistance to your
paper please give me a call.
Cordially,
M.G. Weber, Jr.
Publicity Director
Bob Hambys:
Thanks so much
We would like to express our sincere apprecia-
Please see LETTERS, Page 11A
i
Judy
Green
Editor-
What
counts
isn’t the
baloney
THURSDAY MORNING when I
ran over what looked like a water
hose stretched across Pilgrim Mill Rd.
just before you get to the city park, it
reminded me that the State Hwy. De
partment crews were installing count
ing cables across the access and exit
lanes of Ga. 400 Exit 10 area of the
Buford Dam Road.
At the time I assumed it was to get
an idea of the amount of traffic there,
in preparation for the approaching
roadwork that is going on between Bu
ford and Cumming.
Construction is getting nearer that
intersection leading on to our newest
shopping centers. (This in itself is go
ing to mean easier access to our busi
nesses for those people east of here.)
The Outer Perimeter however
makes me wonder now if the informa
tion those counters are going to give
up is really intended for the use of
those who are developing that ap
proved location section which is in
Forsyth County.
THANKS to NAOMI WILLIAMS
for her delightful letter last week.
Here’s a reprint of it. I don’t think she
will mind:
“Dear Mrs. Green
“I got a laugh from the headline on
the enclosed article. (Forsyth County
News editorial Page Jan 5,1992: Par
ents are for bussing) According to two
of my dictionaries bussing can mean
either kissing loudly or traveling by
bus. Technically this is not an error
but the preferred spelling in this in
stance would be busing."
Signed: Naomi Williams
Opportunities to deliver a sublimi
nal message come few and far be
tween. This time I just happened to
get lucky. One of my pet peeves is see
ing the use of bussing when the writer
actually means busing. However,
driving to Duluth the other day I
passed a sign on front of a church that
said something like “Kids need hugs
but they also need parents who hug."
So when the bus/buss choice came
up, I was given a golden opportunity
to go for it. From my soap box it seems
that we could all do with more dis
plays of affection where the family is
concerned: parents for children and
children for parents - regardless of
the ages of either, probably the older
the more it’s needed.
It’s an aggravation to read and hear
so much about the breakdown of the
American family. Granted, we’re all
living in the fast lane from delivering
day care to the nursing home. We
need to give the gift of time and the
gift of a hug and a kiss more often.
Thanks to Mrs. Williams for catch
ing the message and thanks for the
letter. You and I both know boo-boos
escape our spellcheck and our nu
merous reads. This one was by choice.
It’s good to know we have readers who
care about making a good newspaper
better. That’s our goal too.
BARBECUED SPAM has been a
topic of conversation in the office this
week thanks to GRAHAM
KIMBROUGH.
One thing leads to another and it
turned to fried baloney. HARRIETT
VINCENT said it was impossible to
make a sandwich with fried baloney
unless you cut the slits in the edges
while it cooked so it would flatten out.
Back in the 70’s at my house the kids
wanted it fried without the slits cut so
it would make a cup for their pork ’n
beans. CHRIS BOND added that
when his boys were little they called it
cowboy hats.
Who’d have thought something like
fried baloney would prove to be a
common denominator for so many
people. Because I know you have your
own thoughts on fried baloney. It has
been a staple of life in making ends
meet at more than one house and
that’s no baloney.
(Judy H. Green is managing editor of
The Forsyth County News.)
Driver’s License:
Midway Park
5100 Post Road
Cumming, GA 30130
Information: The office is open ev
ery Wednesday and the first, third,
and fifth Tuesday of every month
from 9-4:30, the phone number on
those dayjf is 781-6814.