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Forsyth County News
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Vol. 95, No. 022
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Photo/David McGregor
Instructor Brianna Sellers explains a karate stance to 5-year-old students Holden Roop and Kyle McKee during
a class at the Central Park Recreation Center Wednesday. See more photos on page SA.
County broadcasting locally
produced cable programs
By Todd Truelove
Staff Writer
The Forsyth Coijnty government
is filming various programs to broad
cast on Adelphia’s local access
Channel 4 and has hired independ
ent cameraman Jim Dean to produce
them, according to Public
Information Officer Bill Johnson.
Due to financial constraints,
Adelphia quit producing local news
stories, meetings of the board of
commissioners and high school
sporting events last year firing
company staff in the process.
Dean, who used to work for
Adelphia, is now under contract with
the county on a freelance basis
working for S3OO per episode. His
duties include filming the commis
sioner’s meetings and other county
programs.
Dean said Wednesday that he has
been charging for the commission
er’s meetings, but not for additional
programming the county has been
filming.
Charges filed in wreck
that killed Deputy Land
By Colby Jones
Staff Writer
A Buford woman faces misde
meanor charges in connection with
the death of a Forsyth County sher
iff’s deputy during a traffic accident
last March on Hwy. 20 in Cumming.
The Georgia State Patrol has
charged Wanda Ann Sells, 51, with
second-degree vehicular homicide,
failing to yield for an emergency
vehicle and making an improper left
turn in connection with the March
2003 collision that killed Sgt. David
P. Land. Land, who was 32, was a
13-year law enforcement veteran and
member of the agency’s motorcycle
unit.
Under Georgia law, a person
commits second-degree vehicular
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“My main thing is, I worked at
the radio station for years. I hated it
when that left,” he said, adding it was
worse after Adelphia quit producing
local programs.
“I wanted to see something back
on the air, and I’m willing to do what
I can to make that happen,” he said,
adding at some point in the near
future he will have to start charging
for the county’s television shows.
The shows are broadcast begin
ning at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesdays,
Thursdays and Saturdays. Meetings
of the board of commissioners are
broadcast on Thursdays immediately
after other half-hour shows, Johnson
said.
Those shows include information
from the Keep Forsyth County
Beautiful program and a production
for the Sheriff’s Office which offers
public safety information, as well as
a list of Forsyth County's most want
ed crime suspects.
Wednesday morning, filming was
completed on the county’s third pro-
homicide when a person is killed as a
result of a minor traffic offense. It is
punishable by a SI,OOO fine and up
to a year in the county jail. The mis
demeanor charge means state troop
ers found no evidence that Sells was
under the influence of alcohol at the
time of the wreck.
Sells was booked into the Forsyth
County Jail on Tuesday evening and
released the same night on a $2,200
bond, according to jail records.
The Forsyth County Solicitor’s
Office advised the state patrol on
what charges to file and will handle
the prosecution of the case, said a
state patrol spokeswoman Thursday.
Solicitor Leslie Abernathy could not
be reached for comment on the case
See WRECK, Page 2A
INDEX
AbbySß
Church events7A
Classifieds...6B
Deaths2A
FoodßA
Horoscope6B
Opinion
Sportslß
FRIDAY February 6, 2004
gram, “County
Magazine.”
Hosted by
Johnson, the new
program features
information from various county
departments.
“The whole idea is to put county
based programming on television to
inform the people what their govern
ment is doing for them,” he said. “All
of the programs are going to be 30
minutes in length.”
“We’ll run them for a month, and
then we’ll update those programs,”
Johnson said.
Adelphia has agreed to let the
county broadcast the programs
through March 31 for free. Once that
deadline is reached, if the county
wants to continue televising pro
grams, Johnson said Adelphia may
charge an amount that has not yet
been determined.
The Board of Commissioners
See CABLE, Page 2A
Food
Casserole recipes
friends and family
will devour.
RageßA
Johnson
Downtown by night
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Photo/David McGregor
Passing traffic on Cumming Square is portrayed in a different
light during a timed photo exposure Tuesday. ,
Religion
Legislation may buy time
for low scoring third-graders
By Nicole Green
Staff Writer
State legislation to deter unmerit
ed promotion of third-graders would
not go into effect this year, as
planned, if a bill introduced Tuesday
becomes law.
State Rep. Bob Holmes, D-
Atlanta, presented House Bill 1310
“to delay the implementation of the
Georgia Academic Placement and
Promotion Policy for third-graders
for one year.”
This year is to be the first in a
three-tiered policy to defeat social
promotion. Under the current law,
students in third grade this year who
do not pass the state criterion-refer
enced competency test (CRCT) in
reading and do not meet grade level
standards would have to repeat third
grade.
Fifth-graders will be accountable
for grade level standards beginning
in 2004-2005 and eighth-graders in
2005-2006.
In preparation for this new poli
cy, which was established in 2001,
See what’s
happening in
local churches.
Page 7A
Panel OKs up
to S2O million
for expansion
Bonds sought for Scientific Games
By Todd Truelove
Staff Writer
The Forsyth County Development Authority recom
mended Wednesday that Scientific Games be granted
as much as S2O million in bonds to expand its local
facilities. The expansion is expected to create more
than 100 jobs in the county.
“This is the [company’s] second expansion within
the last six months,” Joni Owens, the president and
CEO of the Cummig-Forsyth County Chamber of
Commerce, told members of the Development
Authority.
She said the first expansion added more than 80
jobs to the county.
“Most recently, in November, they acquired a com
pany in New Jersey ... an on-line lottery company,” she
said, adding the company decided to close that facility
and relocate it at its facilities off McFarland Road.
The expansion, she said, will add about 90,000
square feet onto Scientific Games’ current facility
creating a 350,000-square-foot facility once construc
tion is complete.
She said about 35 families have decided to relocate
from the New Jersey operations to Georgia.
Phil Bauer, an attorney representing Scientific
Games, said the company employs about 2,500 people
worldwide 2,000 at its south Forsyth-based facili-
See BONDS, Page 2A
Rain
LAKE LANIER LEVELS
1 Date Level
WLfMfertfay Jan. 31 1067.90 ft
rnnTnT Feb. l 1067.92 ft
I IIIIUII ? Feb . 2 1067.96 ft
if Feb. 3 1067.98 ft
////////// Fu || 1071.00 ft
High in the high 50s.
Low in the low 40s. x
MH
B
ORTS, 1B
syth sweeps Central
6*
"In Forsyth we have
really put in some safe
guards. IVe don't put
the weight all on one
test"
- Ellen Cohan,
Forsyth County Schools
99
schools planned to use the second
grade CRCT scores from 2002-2003
to target those students who need
extra help to meet third-grade
benchmarks.
However, the CRCT tests for
grades one, two, three, five and
seven were faulty and deemed
invalid last year.
“Most systems had to rely on
older data and internal testing which
See LEGISLATION, Page 2A
National
group blasts
science plan
By Nicole Green
Staff Writer
The National Science Teachers
Association (NSTA) said Wednesday
that the proposed Georgia science
curriculum “does a disservice to the
students of Georgia.”
The NSTA is another name on the
laundry list of notables who have
criticized the substitution of “evolu
tion” for “biological change over
time” in the drafted Georgia
Performance Standards. State
Superintendent of Schools Kathy
Cox said the Department of
Education omitted the “buzzword”
See GROUP, Page 2A