Commissioners move

to beef up law

enforcement resources
By Scott Nicholson

The Watauga County Board of Commissioners fielded law-enforcement requests and an environmental resolution during their Monday morning meeting in Boone.

Watauga County Sheriff Len Hagaman requested approval of several grant requests that could create new positions but leave the county paying additional salaries in the years ahead.

The grants are part of federal stimulus funds that would add six additional officers.

While the federal funds would pay for the positions, the county would spend about $135,000 for additional equipment, including patrol cars.

A Rural Detention and Jail Operations Grant would fund four detention officers for the jail.

The officer grants are for three years and the detention grants cover two years, and the county would then take over funding the positions if approved.

A grant of $22,550 from the Governor’s Highway Safety Program would fund driving-while-intoxicated checkpoints and education efforts and would require no local match.

The commissioners agreed to consider the positions as part of budget planning and gave approval for the grant applications.

Austin Hall, representing Appalachian Voices, presented a resolution in support of the Appalachian Mountains Preservation Act, which would prohibit state utility companies from using coal that was mined through mountaintop-removal practices.

Hall said mountaintop removal was “strip mining on steroids” and the practice was “inherently unethical.” He said while the state was unlikely to adopt a bill on the issue this year because of the recession, he said the county’s support was one more step and wouldn’t lead to immediate cost increases for consumers.

“This is one more thing that adds to a national dialogue and national opposition,” Hall said, noting that of the many people he’d talked to, most would accept a rate increase in order to eliminate mountaintop mining.

The resolution said mountaintop coal mining had “permanently erased more than 470 peaks from the Appalachian skyline, buried or polluted more than 1,200 miles of pristine headwater streams, and swept away more than 800 square miles of one of America’s most diverse and valuable ecosystems.”

“As a mountain community, this should resonate with us,” Hall said, adding while North Carolina didn’t have viable coal supplies, it was the second-largest user of coal, with about 60 percent of the state’s electricity coming from coal. He said 97 percent of that coal came from mountaintop-removal mining practices in the Southern Appalachian Mountains.

Hall said there were more economical sources of coal mined through traditional means. Commissioner Jim Deal said it would ultimately be a federal legislative issue and asked Hall how much the change would increase residential electrical bills.

Hall said distancing the state from that coal would prepare the state for future changes and eventually lead to savings, though he said Appalachian Voices projects a 1 percent increase to power bills.

Commissioner Tim Futrelle said it was a moral issue as well as an economic issue and he thanked Hall for Appalachian Voices’ work on the issue.

Deal said he didn’t want to take a stand that would increase electricity costs because of the economic climate, though he supported the general idea. The commissioners agreed to discuss the resolution during their next meeting.

The commissioners voted to declare the Edmisten house and property as surplus to be sold through a public upset-bid process.

The property was purchased as part of a larger tract assembled for the new high school in Perkinsville. Under the proposal, the county retains the right to refuse any bids and sell the property through a Realtor if an acceptable bid isn’t submitted.

The commissioners adopted a resolution honoring Glenn Hodges for his service as Clerk of Superior Court. Hodges recently retired after 16 years in the position.

The commissioners discussed a state senate bill that would shift responsibility for funding secondary-road improvements to county governments.

The North Carolina Association of County Commissioners opposes the bill, which would create $9 million in spending burdens for counties. Watauga County has 352 miles of paved secondary roads and 130 miles of unpaved secondary roads. Based on association projections, Watauga would face a tax increase of two cents per $100 of property value to pay for paving and maintenance each year.

“This is going back 60 or 70 years,” commissioner Winston Kinsey said.

“They’ve got the fuel charge (gasoline tax) to make this money.”

The commissioner unanimously opposed the senate bill. Commissioner Bill Winkler said “there were lots of bad bills” being considered that would shift more spending to county governments.

Brian Mueller, representing the Appalachian Skatepark Council, asked the commissioners to put an attendant at the public skate park in Boone.

He said money had already been allocated to pay for an attendant and said the position could be funded privately if necessary.

The parks and recreation commission had voted to recommend closing the skate park. The commissioners took no action on the issue Monday.

The commissioners appointed Brenda Fairbetter as the extraterritorial jurisdiction representative for the Blowing Rock planning board and Gabrielle Micale as county representative on the WAMY Community Action board.