News-Record.com

Anti-smoking forces are urging Greensboro City Council members to support a measure that would urge the state to let local goverments make their own decisions about smoking in government buildings.

The council has received six letters since Monday on the subject, all from people who want tighter restrictions of smoking (as a frequent reader of the council's e-mails, I can tell you that six in one week on the same subject is worth noting).

Many of the e-mails echo the comments of Mark Dozier, a graduate student in public health at UNCG:

"I believe that our locally elected officials should evaluate the dangers of second-hand smoke and decide about a needed public smoking ordinance.

"The N.C. General Assembly should not have the sole voice to dictate the law of public smoking to Guilford County residents."

To read more about the subject, check out Amy Dominello's story from Tuesday.

We outline some ways to pay for a $105 million jail in today's paper. We also discuss how other counties have handled this issue. (Click here for the story.)

One way to pay for it is through a bond referendum. Voters would basically be supporting a two-cent property-tax increase to build the jail.

Would you vote for it?

Otis Hairston Jr. and many of his neighbors in the Warnersville community oppose a plan by Greensboro College to build a lighted stadium, artificial turf and a softball field on the site of the old J.C. Price School.

Hairston has asked the city to rezone the property, which, if adopted, would end the college's chances of building the athletic complex.

His request is on the agenda for Tuesday night's Greensboro City Council meeting, but Hairston told Scoop this morning that he'll ask for continuance, something he did previously in December. He and other residents have been meeting regularly with Greensboro College leaders, and, according to GC attorney Derek Allen, those meetings have been going well.

The Warnersville residents don't want to lose Price School, the last building left from the old community, which was founded by freed slaves after the Civil War. Greensboro College, which has no immediate plans to build the stadium, says it has an open mind about the building's future.

The spot of land in question is just off Freeman Mill Road, near the Lee Street exchange.

Earlier this year, the News & Record looked into attendance issues facing committees with members often appointed by elected leaders.

A story which followed found that many members had poor attendance and boards and commissions were often unable to conduct city and taxpayer business as a result.

Monday night, the High Point City Council took action to replace the absent members.

The Greensboro City Council just made a 9-0 vote to give HondaJet $600,000 in incentives.

Even Tom Phillips, who often opposes incentives and whose license tag reads "8 to 1," supported the plan.

Next up: The Guilford County Board of Commissioners consider on Thursday another $600,000 for the company.

The Greensboro City Council will meet at 5:30 p.m. Feb. 19 at City Hall with the Greensboro Parks and Recreation Commission.

The hot topic: What to do about War Memorial Stadium.

Scoop expects a lively debate.

Greensboro City Councilwoman Sandy Carmany has a blog entry about a change in the way the council enters into, and exits from, its closed sessions.

A step forward for open government and a victory for local reporters.

A step backward for emancipating Margaret from council meetings.

Score one for the neighborhood.

A developer on Friday announced he is withdrawing plans to build 16 townhomes on Westridge Road, a project that caused an uproar within the tree-filled, large-lotted community.

The move by Ryan Jackson Properties came just one day after the city’s planning staff recommended the Greensboro Zoning Commission turn down the plan, which would have required a rezoning.

The townhomes would have been built near Westminster Drive. For weeks, yellow signs decrying the project have dotted Westridge Road, an upper-middle class community with established woods and a variety of housing styles.

In a letter to the zoning commission, developer Scott Bayer said he met with neighbors this week and "decided that it is in the best interests of all parties to withdraw at this time and review the development with the concerns of the nearby owners in mind."

Click here for more.

Guilford County Commissioner Skip Alston wants Rhinoceros Times scribe Scott Yost to serve on a new county committee looking at ways to reduce the jail population.

Yost argued in a recent story that the county should explore more incarceration alternatives before moving ahead with plans for a new jail.

That sounded good to Alston, who says the county doesn't need the facility, so he convened a panel discussion Wednesday and invited Yost to participate.

The writer acted as sort of half-journalist, half-anti-incarceration activist, taking notes on the meeting while contributing to the discussion. He even read an excerpt from a story that was to be published the next day.

"I'm really glad Skip called this meeting," Yost told the group.

A couple summers ago, Yost followed two commissioners on a conference trip to Hawaii. Scoop feels confident that Yost will push for some committee meetings to be held there, if only because he knows the area so well.

The first meeting of the committee, which will include commissioners and community leaders, is scheduled for Feb. 19.

Some of you may have read about a traffic stop last week involving Greensboro City Councilwoman T. Dianne Bellamy-Small.

Here’s what we know for sure: A blue Dodge minivan with the license tag TDBS was stopped at 11:21 p.m. Feb. 6 by Officer Michael Calvert, who has been on the force about a year. The event report gives us precious few details beyond that, except that the stop took 13 minutes.

Officials with the police department have told Eric J.S. Townsend, our public safety reporter, there won’t be further comment about the incident. We are continuing to press our police sources for more on the record details.

I tried to ask Bellamy-Small about this on Tuesday night, when she was at City Hall for a closed meeting related to the ongoing police investigation. She said I needed to fax my questions to her (this is a standard response; she asks that all our communication come via fax). I asked if I could ride the elevator to the parking garage with her so we could talk. She then asked a security guard to escort her to her car.

So we faxed her several questions: What were the circumstances of the stop? What was the conversation between you and Officer Calvert? What was the outcome of the stop? Have you filed a complaint with Internal Affairs regarding the incident?

Here is her response:

"First of all, Ms. Banks, every aspect of my private life is not up for scrutiny unless it is somehow related to my public service.

"Routine traffic stops happen in the city probably every hour of every day. I am proud of the fact that our Greensboro Police Dept. is out there executing their duty to proved (sic) safety and security for all citizens including me.

"There was not incident (sic) involving this stop. The officer and I concluded our conversation and there was not problem (sic) to report. Thank you."

We’re continuing to work on this story, I promise you.

I've gotten a few e-mails today correcting my definition of "pacing," the method by which Councilwoman Dianne Bellamy-Small was pulled for allegedly speeding on Feb. 6.

Here's how I defined the term in my articles Friday and Saturday: "Pacing is a common practice in which an officer drives beside the suspected speeder and tries to determine his or her speed."

And here's what one retired officer said: "Actually, 'pacing' a speeder is usually done from 'behind' or 'in front of' the violator rather than 'beside' as stated in your articles. The officer simply keeps the distance between the two vehicles constant and reads the speed from his speedometer. The violator is usually not stupid enough to ignore a marked police vehicle beside his/her own."

Sorry about the error, folks. I'll stick a correction in the newspaper tomorrow, and I'll get it right in future stories. If there are future stories!

A few people have said they can't post comments at the end of the story about Dianne Bellamy-Small's traffic stop. They're getting error messages.

I wish I could fix it. But I'm too right-brained to latch onto all this tech stuff. In fact, just today my household upgraded from dial-up AOL to Road Runner. Yeah, it's embarrassing, but we're all friends here so I can be honest.

Anyway, here's a link to the story. You can post your comments on this blog, if you'd like.

Another battle is brewing betweeen Guilford County commissioners Paul Gibson and Skip Alston. This time, it's about plans for a new jail.

Gibson, the board chairman, was a spectator at a meeting Alston led Monday where county officials and other community leaders discussed various ways to ease crowding in the county jail system.

But just after the meeting started, Gibson stood up and said the group was supposed to be only studying the pretrial services program, which helps court officials determine if an inmate should be released pending trial. Pretrial services received more funding from the commissioners earlier this month at Alston's recommendation.

"This thing has warped into something much different than the board asked it to do," Gibson said in an interview Tuesday.

Alston, the board's vice-chairman, has opposed a new jail for years, arguing that more alternatives to incarceration and drug treatment options are needed because most jail inmates have substance-abuse problems. On Monday, the committee discussed pretrial services, but they also discussed treatment and jail-alternative programs.

Gibson agrees additional programs are needed and deserve further study, but says Alston has shifted the committee's focus to suit his intentions.

"This is all a dog and pony show for Skip Alston to prove we don’t need to build a new jail," Gibson said.

At the start of Monday's discussion, Alston said the meeting shouldn't be about building a new jail or not, but afterward he discussed it plenty.

If you think Mitch Johnson made some big news this week, this city manager down in Florida has him beat.

Note the comments at the bottom of the story. Some condemn the manager's decision. Others cheer him on. Still others say the story has no place in the newspaper.

As always, the comment line is open.

UPDATE: Stanton's gone.

City Manager City Mitchell Johnson met Friday morning with a group of bloggers. Here's my story, which also will appear in Saturday's paper.

Ed Cone has already weighed in. Other attendees probably will soon:

David Hoggard
Ben Holder
Janet Wright
Bob Grenier

Or check out Roch Smith Jr's site for a window into the minds of most local bloggers.

Update: Someone has got it in their head to try this. Via Hoggard, who has more.

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This story from my colleague Margaret Moffett Banks has prompted a lot of discussion in the local blogsphere, including a question by Laurie in the comments at Ed’s joint:

"Lord, if there is a way to recall her, I'd sure like to do it."

My current bailiwick is the state capital, but back in the not horribly distant past I covered the city council and got to know the city charter a little bit during the downtown baseball debate. For those of you curious about the answer to Laurie's question, click here and look up Chapter II of the City Charter, Subchapter D, Article 2, sub-section ( c ):

(c) (1) The voters of the city shall have the power, which shall be known as the recall power, to remove from office any member of the City Council.

More after the jump.

Today's dead-tree version of Scoop has a piece about John Shore, the retiring social services director who's hiking the Appalachian Trail.

Linkage:

Shore's trail journal.

Foster Friends of North Carolina, for which Shore is raising money.

The Appalachian Trail Conservancy, for AT trivia.

On Monday, a bunch of reporters (including me) cornered City Councilwoman Dianne Bellamy-Small after a meeting to ask her about Florence Gatten's call for resignation. Bellamy-Small read a statement, and she read fast. So I asked her for a printed copy.

She gave me one today, after the city council briefing session. Here it is:

"I have not to my knowledge in any way abused the position of my office on the City Council. I have never be the source of leaks or asked for personal favors.

"I have spent the past 3 years working to represent the citizens of my district and the City of Greensboro and I work very hard at it. To demonstrate my efforts, I have for each of you a copy of my annual reports for the past 3 years and a flyer (sic) for my second Community Preparedness Workshop which shows my commitment to service on the council.

"As for the call for my resignation, I was elected by the people of District 1. I will continue to serve with honor, dignity and integrity until the people not the press or a council member say otherwise.

"I will not entertain questions, my statement and handout should be sufficient. If you have other questions submit them in writing and if I chose to respond, I will.

Thank you."

Steve Arnold is the elder statesman of the Guilford County commissioners, having served on the board since 1990. But he's been missing some county functions lately, and that's raising some eyebrows.

"He is, for sure, A.W.O.L.," Commissioners Chairman Paul Gibson said in an interview last week. “There’s no doubt about it.”

Arnold hasn't been completely out of touch. He's been attending regular board meetings, which are usually held on Thursday evenings.

But so far this year, he's missed special meetings on interviewing the two finalists for county manager (the board hired David McNeill) and considering incentives for HondaJet. And while Gibson has been pushing for more afternoon work sessions so commissioners can learn more about various issues, Arnold says he purposely avoids them because that business should be conducted in the evenings when the public can participate.

"If we don't have enough regular meetings, then we need to have more," Arnold said in an interview Tuesday. He added that he thinks the push for more work sessions is coming from McNeill.

"And I think the chairman is not willing or either able to challenge the manager's desire to have these so-called work sessions," Arnold said.

Yesterday, I decided to give Luther Falls Jr. a call while I was writing a story about the recall campaign against Greensboro City Councilwoman T. Dianne Bellamy-Small. Falls, you might remember, ran against Bellamy-Small in 2005 and lost by only 50 votes. There’s some talk he might run again. Falls will make an announcement about that in a few weeks, he said.

And Bellamy-Small, you might also recall, will only communicate with the News & Record via fax machine. And most times that doesn’t get us anywhere.

Anyway, Falls and I had a roughly 10-minute-long conversation Tuesday about what he believes is poor performance by Bellamy-Small. A portion of that interview made it into the article.

Earlier today, Falls told me on the telephone that if I don’t quote him in his entirety, he will no longer communicate with me.

I told him I couldn’t make that promise. The story in today’s paper wasn’t so much about him as it was the effort to have Bellamy-Small recalled. I also said there would be few, if any, times where I quoted everything he said to me in an interview – mostly because I'm a reporter, not a stenographer. We include the clearest, most interesting parts of interviews. And besides, not everything said by the people we interview is newsworthy.

My guess is Falls will come around come campaign season.