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4A ► TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2003 ®tp>3|3urM OPINION Daniel F. Evans President, Editor and Publisher Julie B. Evans Rex Gambill Vice President Managing Editor Foy S. Evans Editor Emeritus School Board Bites The Bullet The Houston County Board of Education swallowed hard, faced reality and voted to increase the tax rate 1.91 mills to cover the budget that already has been adopted for this school year. The action was necessary. And it was inevitable if the school system continues to provide the level of service that is required. It was a hard decision for the school board members, naturally. One member of the board - Karen Mertens - said “no.” The crisis that is facing the Houston County School System is not of its own making. The state of Georgia, with its own financial crisis, has cut back funding that our system has been receiving to the extent of $16.6 million. When the state cuts back, the local school board must make up the loss. One way or another, taxpayers must foot the bill. The burden of raising the money is just shifted. Federal and state governments have placed so many mandates on local school systems that they really have very little wiggle room. While there is a lot of talk about giving local school systems more authority and leeway in operating, actually the pendulum is swinging in the opposite direction. This is true not only for school systems. It works across the board. Federal and state lawmakers are good at passing laws and dic tating mandates for local governments to carry out and then not funding them. The lawmakers look good because they are “doing something” about problems and local govern mental bodies look bad when they must raise taxes under a gun to pay for the mandates. Taxpayers will have opportunities at three public forums to give their opinions on the school board’s increase in the millage rate. This is required any time there is a tax increase. Anyone with questions or comments should attend one of these forums. Indigent defense funding out of control OK, Kelly, admit it, you were wrong! Well, I would if I was, but I won’t because I’m not. You may remember that in my earlier rantings about the absurdly designed indigent defense bill I com plained that no one knew the cost of the proposed pro gram. So, quoting other sources, I said it was going to cost between SSO-75 mil lion dollars a year. I have since had my head handed to me by several irate public defenders, or their support ers, contending that I over stated the budgetary needs in an effort to simply rail on against indigent defense. An open letter to CentervMe citizens Editor: Well, I have stood back long enough and listened and read all the negative things about the people at Centerville City Hall and especially the candidate for mayor, Ronnie Brand. I have personally known Ronnie Brand for 30 years. We have attend ed First Baptist Church of Centerville together for 15 years. We attend the same Shining Lights Sunday School class on a regular basis. We have served on church committees together and I know Ronnie to be a line Christian man and a good leader. I have observed him as he served on Centerville City Council a number of years and I know he is an honest and well-respect ed person in the Centerville community. I know he is a man of service and I also know that he has nothing to gain from serving as your mayor. He is a dedicated man with high morals and principles and would be a Mayor the people can talk to and trust. Ronnie has a lot to offer as a SERVANT to the people of Centerville. Don’t be misled by the negative slander toward Ronnie Brand. Call someone ' 'w -91 mjn^. Kelly Burke District Attorney distatty@houstonda.org First, just so there is no mistake, let me reiterate my in Centerville that knows him well and I’m sure you will hear the truth about this fine man that is willing to serve his community. He lives only two blocks from City Hall and his work schedule is very flexible. He com pletes much of his career work from home, at night and on weekends. I’m sure that he will give only his best to the people of Centerville. I know Ronnie and I strongly recommend him to the people of Centerville. Do the right thing for the future of Centerville and cast your VOTE on Tuesday, Oct. 7, for the very best man to serve as mayor who is, without a doubt, RONNIE BRAND. Rick Thompson Centerville Rtewsppper should support Bush Editor: I would like to see this newspaper support George Bush for president. He had done more for the security for the people of this country than the last administration did in eight “years” to tear it down. We cannot afford to lose such a strong leader that does Some questions never go away SOME FRIENDS read my column of last weekend and disagreed with some of my reasoning concerning the cities providing police officers for middle and high schools in the county. One friend said, “You just stepped right into the dou ble taxation trap.” I asked how. He said, “Don’t you realize that the cities are being asked to pay the full cost of these officers even though many of the students attending the schools are living in unin corporated parts of Houston County?” It seems this bugaboo never will go away. What, I asked of my friends, do you believe would be right? I should not have been surprised when they unani mously argued that it would be fair for the cities to pay half the cost of the salaries of the officers with the school board paying the other half. Another thing all agreed on was that the school sys- ' \ 11 %§£ 'l' position on indigent defense. I support it. I support indi gent defense programs that provide legal representation to the poor. I support the fact that poor people have the same rights as anyone else in the criminal justice system. What I don’t sup port is the concept that only certain designated people can possibly care about the rights of the poor. The ban ner-carrying intelligentsia says that only government paid lawyers, traditionally with a massive liberal bent, can possibly care about the poor. Anyone else simply doesn’t care, or so they LETTERS TO THE EDITOR .figgE '>wma Foy Evans Columnist foyevans 19@eox.net tern does not need - nor should it have - its own police force, as they do in Bibb County. “Leave law enforcement in the hands of certified offi cers,” one said. As I wrote in my column, it really doesn’t matter to me who pays for the officers. I pay city taxes. I pay school taxes. So it adds up to the same thing for me. And, really, this should not be such a big issue, except that each governmental body would have you believe. Hence private lawyers, paid for with public funds, simply don’t have the well being of the poor in mind, such that they must be inherently ineffective. I dispute that notion and contend that some excellent private lawyers do a wonderful job defending indigent clients. Moving on. The recently-submitted budget request from the Indigent Defense committee set up to run this new pro gram called for an annual ized budget of $63.5 million. Whoa! Didn’t I say between SSO-75 million? Isn’t $63.5 not waffle in his decisions to protect us like the other waffling party has shown every time they debate in front of the American people. We need strong leadership in these dan gerous times of our country to “lead” not follow opinion polls from week to week to decide what polity he will support and put their political future and party ahead of pro tecting the American people which is his pri mary job. I will be looking forward to see your support of this great and strong presi dent, George W. Bush for his second term as our real American president. Curtis Brinkley Warner Robins Partnership salutes (Hi Maintenance leam Editor: On behalf of the Middle Georgia commu nity, the 21st Century Partnership salutes all members of the Robins Air Force Base C -5 Maintenance Team for their historic pro duction of 23 aircraft this fiscal year. This that collects taxes wants to avoid criticism for its spend ing habits. I’m sure this will be dis cussed time and again in the future. But, in my opinion, the time and effort could be better directed toward other things. • • • WHY DO middle and high schools need a police officer on hand? Things just aren’t like they used to be. They’re needed because there are troublemakers and they must be dealt with. Any attempt to delve further into the subject could stir up a can of worms. • • • THE SAME friends had school matters on their minds yesterday. They want ed to know why the interim superintendent of schools was being paid only SI,OOO a year more than assistant superintendents receive. The answer is interesting. When the school board began discussing an interim superintendent they batted million almost exactly in the middle of that? Why, yes it is Kelly. So I was right and the attackers were wrong. Again. A couple of points about that budget request. It does n’t include any lower court funding, such as State Courts, Magistrate Courts, Municipal Courts, and so on. It only covers Superior Courts. So counties will be forced to pick up the rest of the tab for defending in those courts. So this isn’t as comprehensive a system as we’ve been led to believe. Which leads to my next point. quantum increase in annual production over previous production levels of 17 air craft validates in spades what we have all known for years ... the Robins workforce is a hustling, dedicated team serving our nation in the finest fashion. To achieve this spectacular performance, it is clear the C-5 team instituted produc tion improvements that most people only read about. Clearly the power of Gen. Wetekam’s Lean program has paid large benefits as evidenced by this production phenomenon ... dramatically increased pro duction with on-time deliveries. Not only has the Robins workforce provided addition al critical airlift at a most opportune time, they have once again verified the reliance this nation places in their ability to meet and exceed all requirements. So well done, Robins! This community proudly salutes you and anxiously waits to acknowledge your planned continued improvements in C-5 flow days. Keep ’em flying! Eddie Wiggins chairman, 21st Century Partnership THE HOUSTON HOME JOURNAL the compensation back and forth. Nobody wanted to pay the interim superintendent what they had been paying Dr. Charles Holloway. But there was an effort to get agreement on a salary halfway between Holloway’s $145,000 a year and what assistant superintendents earn, which is around $105,000. One member of the school board wanted to pay the interim superintendent $1 a year more than an assistant superintendent’s pay. This got nowhere. So the board eventually settled on a generous SI,OOO a year above an assistant superintendent’s pay. The fact that Danny Carpenter was willing to take on all that additional responsibility for only SI,OOO a year tells me that he is dedicated to the Houston County school sys tem above and beyond the call of duty. In my opinion, we’re for tunate that he took the job. Opting out of the new pro gram was allowed only for single-county circuits. Houston County is a single county circuit. Peach County is not, they are part of the multi-county Macon Judicial Circuit. So under current law, Peach County cannot opt out. But Houston County can. Why would Houston County want to opt out? You’ll have to wait for next week’s column to hear the answer to that one. Kelly Burke is Houston County’s district attorney. He can be reached at (478) 218-4810 or by e-mail at dis tatty@houstonda.org.