the roanoke star-sentinel

Community | News | Per spect iveNovember 21, 2008 TheRoanokeStar.com

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I AM THEYMCA

My name is Michelle Logan,I work for Roanoke City schools, and

I’m training to be a massage therapist. I have two daughters who enjoy the

Y’s Teen Center while I’m working out. The Y has just what each of us needs.

The Wright Kids have all the Right Stuff

Photo by Pam Rickard

Selah Wright demonstrates her young talent in her family’s Rocky Mount home, singing Randy Newman’s “You’ve Got a Friend in Me.” She is accompanied by her sister Sage and brothers Baruch and Levi.

“Uncharted waters” ahead for County schools

Seems like every time mon-ey gets tight in the Roanoke County school system and tax revenues are flat, the issue of Bent Mountain Elementary comes up: whether the small school should be closed, with its 70 or so students bused down the mountain to Back Creek Elementary.

But Bent Mountain El-ementary is more than just a county facility: “the school is also our ‘community cen-ter’ with the butterfly garden, park [playground], trail and library,” said local resident Annie Krochalis via e-mail before a community meet-ing on Monday. That’s when Superintendent Dr. Lorraine Lange and Windsor Hills

Principal Karen Mabry (at center) and community members at the playground local residents helped build.

Barrineau speaks to budget crunch

> CONTINUEDP3: Bent Mountain

[Emerging Artists]

“America’s Got Talent” !nalists are the Real DealIt’s about time the “real

true Hollywood story” was told about !e Wright Kids.

You know, the ador-able brother-sister trio from Rocky Mount who recently returned from Hollywood a"er making it to the top 10 on NBC’s “America’s Got Talent?”

You’d have to believe, with all the attention and hype and jetting around, they’d have to be spoiled prima donnas, probably driven by the dreaded overbearing “Stage Par-ents,” right?

Absolutely not.Are they really as tal-

ented, polished, joyful and down-home real as they appear?

In the words of a for-mer vice presidential can-didate, “you betcha.”

On a recent visit to the Wright’s modest home, the family spoke openly about what motivates and drives them.

“We really love to perform,” said 12 year-old Sage, who with her brothers, Baruch, 9 and Levi, 6, comprise the

bluegrass trio.Baruch agreed with his sister. “We

love to play and [our] hard work pays o# when we get to perform and get good results.”

!e Wright’s $rst brush with na-tional notoriety and Hollywood was in 2007, when Baruch won Oscar Mayer’s “Sing the Jingle” contest.

Parents Barry and Suzi Wright admit that while they both come from a “strong musi-cal tradition”, and have a deep love of music, they didn’t inherit the talent genes.

!eir children obvi-ously have.

!e oldest Wright child, Mason, is a soph-omore at Shenandoah University’s Conserva-tory of Music. !e fam-ily says that he demon-strated a natural talent

with the violin at an early age, ultimately earning a part in the Roanoke Sym-phony Youth Orchestra.

Sage has followed suit and is currently playing violin with the RSYO. She also plays the mandolin and sings.

Baruch began to show his musical prowess on a toy guitar, eventually graduating to the ukulele, an instru-ment not typically found in bluegrass music.

Photo by Stuart Revercomb

The Wright Kids performed on Veteran’s Day to a capacity crowd as part of the Emerging Artist Series at the Roanoke Library’s main branch. Fans began gathering hours before the 6:00 PM performance and by the time the Wrights took the stage the Fire Marshall had closed off the mezzanine and it was standing room only below on the main floor. Development Coordinator, River Laker said that it was the most enthusiastic response this year to the very well received series of city promoted concert events.

> CONTINUEDP3: The Wright Kids

One year down, one more day to go

It’s hard to believe that 52 is-sues ago we launched the Roa-noke Star Sentinel under the not-so-modest headline, “A Star is Born!” Counting our quarterly TMC editions like this one, that’s over 660 broadsheet newsprint pages of news, sports, perspec-tive and commentary pieces . . . Not to mention calendars, pictures, captions, crossword puzzles, classi$eds and display advertising.

Did I mention advertising? Imagine the work that has

gone into the production of the creative print ads found on these pages. While we don’t create all of them, we do create many and our lead designers have come up with some remarkably fun and e#ective concepts, o"en meet-ing deadlines in the process that would make a seasoned 1930’s Chicago Tribune editor swallow his cigar.

And conditions in our news-room may closely mirror those of the 1930’s. We work out of a small o%ce with two at a desk on many occasions. !ere are dogs and cats about and some-

> CONTINUEDP4: One Year Down

Center in the Square’s request for $2.5 million from Roanoke City to support a $25.3 million renovation that includes the Science Museum of Western Virginia and the Harrison Mu-seum of African American Art was approved unanimously at Monday a"ernoon’s Council meeting. !e funding will be provided over a $ve-year period and requires that Center in the Square match each yearly con-tribution with equal dollars.

!e project includes $rst &oor façade improvements, an interactive and open atrium area and upgrades to mechani-cal, electrical and plumbing systems. !e most recent recon-

$guration continues $ne-tun-ing of the roo"op. !ese latest revisions were just completed by Spectrum Design, an archi-tecture and engineering $rm at 10 Church Avenue. !e designs will incorporate a butter&y habi-tat and multi-purpose &exible teaching area that can also func-tion as dining space. Interactive green energy education will be integrated and a rainwater cap-ture system is in the works. !e winged structure will be a dy-namic skylight that suggests the wings of a butter&y.

Center in the Square and the

City Council approves 2.5 million for Center in the Square

Spectrum Design concepts for Center in the Square (Render-ings courtesy of Spectrum Design).

> CONTINUEDP2: Center in the Square

DoctorMeet the P5–West African Dr. Oyidie Igbokidi shares her unique knowledge about women’s cardiac health.

Place 2ndTitansP14– The Hidden Valley Lady Titans finish a strong sea-son with a second place finish in the AA state tournament.

LeaderPassionate

P17– Mill Mountain Theatre’s education director loves her kids and her profession.

LifeFilming for

P18– Former Cave Spring grad, Scott Blanding, returns from the Congo to screen his new film in Roanoke.

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| The Roanoke Star-Sentinel | 11/21/08 TheRoanokeStar.com

Council Briefed on capital improvements: a brie$ng on capital improvement projects currently in the pipeline was presented by Roanoke City Commissioner of the Revenue, Sherman Holland, on Monday. !at included Fire/EMS facilities, libraries, the Po-lice Academy, the City Market building, storm water management, parking garages, and technology projects.

City Manager Darlene Burcham pointed out that the Je#erson St. main branch library earmarked as a “Research Branch” is not cur-rently funded and requires a decision on whether to renovate it in place or to relocate it.

Councilman David Trinkle asked about funding for the amphi-theater, now slated for South Je#erson. Burcham said that $4 mil-lion was included in the Parks and Recreation Master Plan.

Council member Gwen Mason asked to be reminded of Roanoke City’s debt limit policy. Director of Finance, Ann Shawver, explained that tax-supported general obligation debt service is not to exceed 10% of General Fund expenditures.

Global Spectrum awarded lease to operate Roanoke Civic Center: a"er much discussion and comment, a resolution was adopted to execute a $ve-year contract and lease agreement with Global Spectrum, LP for management and operation of the Roa-noke Civic Center. !e vote passed 5-1.

!ere was hesitation and questioning on why Red Light Man-agement/SMG was not selected or at least included in negotiations. “Citizens hold each of us accountable … we need to know for sure that they are the best company,” said Vice-Mayor Sherman Lea. Red Light conducted a feasibility study on the amphitheater proj-

ect. !e Roanoke Civic Center

Committee selected Global Spectrum, according to assistant City Manager Jim Grigsby.

Both Lea and Council member Anita Price hesitated in their “yes” vote while Councilman Court Rosen voted “no.” In an e-mail a"erwards Rosen stated, “I would have liked to have seen two con-tracts negotiated on a parallel course to ensure the best deal for the city. We may have still been at the point we are at now but I would have been more comfortable with the decision.”

Still, Rosen was hopeful that Global will run a tight, e%cient ship: “I …will work to make certain that the privatization of the Civic Center is successful and reduces the burden on taxpayers by hope-fully eliminating the subsidy.”

Tax Relief quali!cations adjusted for seniors by City Council: Roanoke City Vice-Mayor Sherman Lea and Councilman Court Rosen introduced a resolution on Monday to increase the qualify-ing limits for real estate tax relief, both for the disabled and seniors 65-plus.

!e annual income maximum for tax relief was raised from $34,000 to $42,000, with maximum net worth raised from $125,000 to $160,000. Net worth does not include home ownership. Ann Shawver, Director of Finance estimated that the revised threshold would result in about $200,000 in lost property tax revenue.

Council member Gwen Mason commented that should the economy improve, “once relief is given you can’t take it back.” Lea countered that, “it was the right thing to do… this is time sensitive.” Rosen suggested that should the economy improve dramatically some of those covered by income level changes would be leaving the program anyway. !e resolution passed unanimously.

Valley View Bus Stop: Mayor David Bowers and Vice-Mayor Lea asked for an update on a Valley View Mall bus stop that was removed because it was creat-ing a hazard for pedestrians, navigating busy road-ways as they tried to reach it. City Manager Darlene Burcham said Valley Metro had made progress on a new bus stop and shelter that would be located at the mall prior to the holiday shopping season.

Legislative Package for Richmond proposed - cigarettes targeted: a seven page legislative pack-age was complete, according to the Chairman of the Legislative Committee, Councilman David Trinkle. Members of the legislature will be at the next Council meeting to discuss the upcoming session. Included is a request to empower the City to regulate or pro-hibit smoking in certain de$ned areas, outdoors and indoors.

Gwen Mason took it a step further, adding a “Ciga-rette Butt Deposits” request that would authorize lo-calities to impose a refundable fee on each cigarette sold. !e refund would be made up on the return of the cigarette butt. Discarded butts are a pet peeve for Mason, who has even o#ered portable ashtrays em-blazoned with the city’s logo to those she spies dis-carding them on streets and sidewalks.

Other requests included extension of the proposed Trans Dominion rail service from Bristol through Roanoke to Lynchburg, support for a Hotel Roanoke expansion and restoration of State budget cuts that a#ect the city.

Science Museum serve 44% of the school districts in the Southwest Virginia region according to Dr. James Sears, President of Center in the Square. Studies show an equal distribution of people, 42% from Roanoke City and 42% from Roanoke County, have frequented the Center. Over nine million paid visitors have entered the complex since it opened.

With the City of Roanoke‘s contribution and the anticipated one million dollar contribution from Roanoke County, Sears projects that renovations will begin in June of 2009. “People expect some-

thing di#erent a"er 25 years,” said Sears. !e 154,000 square foot center will be renovated from the Campbell Avenue side to the Wal-dron Stage entrance on Church Avenue.

!e Harrison Museum of African American Art will be located on the second &oor, in some of the old Art Museum space, a"er money is raised for renovations and moving. !e Roanoke Weiner Stand will be updated and relocated with double the dining space. !e facade will be designed to look as it did in 1917 for historical tax credit eligibility. Open doors will create a seamless view from the market square. !ere will be interactive walls, touch screens, a $sh tank, and an interactive &oor.

Forty-$ve percent of the $20 million construction cost will be covered by tax credits. Private fundraising will take care of what-ever is not covered by credits or grants. !e “new” center will also be LEED certi$ed, providing green technology education bene$ts at the same time.

Honor.

To remember & honor your loved ones.At Oakey’s, we believe it is truly important to commemorate every person’s life. That is why we invite all the families we’ve servedduring the past year to pause and remember loved ones with an annual memorial service. Following the service is a reception tocelebrate the memory of your loved one and comfort each other. We look forward to observing this special time with you.

Saturday, November 22, 3:00 p.m. – East ChapelMemorial service to be celebrated at East Chapel,5188 Cloverdale Road

We’ve always been here for you.

It’s a comfort to know thatOakey’s is here for you.

SAMMY G. OAKEY, PRESIDENT WWW.OAKEYS.COM

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Saturday, December 6, 3:00 p.m. – Vinton ChapelMemorial service to be celebrated at Vinton Chapel,

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> Center in the Square From page 1

By Valerie [email protected]

Capital improvements, Civic Center lease, tax relief top council agenda


Renderings courtesy of Spectrum Design.

TheRoanokeStar.com 11/21/08 |The Roanoke Star-Sentinel |

!e Roanoke Women’s Foundation has awarded the Virginia Western Community College Educational Founda-tion $100,000 to underwrite the pilot City of Roanoke Commu-nity College Access Program, bene$ting Patrick Henry and William Fleming High School 2009 graduates.

!e award is the largest the Roanoke Women’s Foundation has ever granted to an applicant. Patrick Henry and William Fleming High School graduates can attend Virginia Western Community College tuition free through a program established by the City of Roanoke, the Roanoke City Schools and the Virginia Western Community College Educational Founda-tion, beginning in fall 2009.

!e program is need–based and supports as many eligible students as possible based on $-nancial need, identi$ed through the $nancial aid process, and

funds available for the program. It will fund tuition for two years or 72 credits, whichever comes $rst, if federal $nancial aid is not available or does not adequately cover tuition. It will not cover the cost of books and supplies or room and board expenses.

!is program is similar to a pilot program Virginia Western and the City of Salem intro-duced to graduating seniors in June. To be eligible for consid-eration for the Roanoke CCAP, each student must graduate with a 2.0 GPA as a member of the 2009 class of Patrick Hen-ry or William Fleming High Schools, and have attended these Roanoke City schools for at least his/her junior and senior years. !ey must also meet all Virginia Western Community College admission guidelines and demonstrate the ability to bene$t from a higher education by achieving satisfactory scores on the college's placement tests.

"!rough this generous grant from the Roanoke Women’s Foundation and our partnership with the City of Roanoke Public School System, we are demon-strating that we believe in the value of education and want to provide the Roanoke Valley with individuals who have the desire to succeed and become productive citizens,” said Dr. Robert H. Sandel, President, Virginia Western Community College.

For more information about the City of Roanoke Communi-ty College Access Program and eligibility requirements, email [email protected].

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“When restrung and tuned to a mandolin, it [the ukulele] became, perhaps the world’s $rst “mandolele,” they explain on their website.

Today, Baruch adds rhythm guitar to songs in every set. His singing and guitar playing earned $rst place in the youth band competition at the 2006 Galax Fiddler’s Convention. Sage and Levi joined him in the competition.

Barry and Suzi joked that a"er Levi was born, “he had two choices for a bluegrass in-strument, upright bass or ban-jo.” !ey remember watching Levi dance in the play- pen as he enjoyed bluegrass music, and said the banjo seemed to excite him the most.

Levi began playing bass for the trio when they auditioned for “America’s Got Talent.” With the instrument tower-ing over him, he does not ap-pear intimidated. In fact, one of the more memorable parts of the act is when Levi spins his bass.

!ey began their journey to the top 10 in competition this spring with a tryout for “America’s Got Talent” in Charlotte, N.C. From there, they advanced to Dallas and Las Vegas, before making the top 40 and national TV com-petition in Los Angeles.

While the group prefers to stick to the traditional bluegrass and gospel music they’ve grown up with, pro-ducers provided pop songs for them to choose from when they advanced to the national competition of the show.

!ey performed “Day-dream Believer,” “Rockin’ Robin” and the Jackson Five hit “ABC,” respectively. Show judge David Hassleho# told them they had a “special gi" from God” a"er hearing their rendition of “Rockin’ Robin.”

!e Wright Kids made it to the top 10 before being elimi-nated by program viewers via telephone voting.

Despite being voted o#, the Wright Kids had only good things to say about their “America’s Got Talent” adven-ture.

“Everyone we met was wonderful,” Suzie said. “!e people from “America’s Got Talent” were all great to work with.”

She said that they made quick friends with other con-testants on the show and keep in touch with some of them via email.

!e Wrights would also agree with Hassleho# that the glory for their talent and

success goes to God. Several tracks on their newest CD, “Playing on the Job” are tra-ditional gospel pieces. Sung acapella, the song “Talk About Su#ering” dramatically show-cases the children’s ability to harmonize.

In the CD’s liner notes, the family says, “Most of all, we are grateful to the one we trust to lead, guide and direct our lives, our Lord and Sav-iour Jesus Christ.”

While not o%cially in the band yet, the Wright’s $"h child, four year-old Selah Grace, shows tremendous promise. With no prompting from her parents or siblings, Selah asked if we “wanted to hear a song.”

All the Wrights immediate-ly pitched in to help set up her stepstool, and microphone stand (no mic yet), and Sage, Baruch and Levi accompa-nied her adorable, animated rendition of Randy Newman’s “You’ve Got a Friend in Me.”

Suzie Wright homeschools the children and manages their practice times. She said the best part of the trip to Hollywood was the vacation time the family was able to

spend together.“We just take advantage of

any opportunity to see and experience things together when we travel,” she said.

Besides playing music, the kids said that their favorite things to do include riding (and racing) their bikes, play-ing board games like Sponge-Bob SquarePants Game of Life and playing with cousins and neighbors.

When asked what they would like to be doing $ve years from now, Sage, Baruch and Levi all said they just wanted to keep performing.

Sage said, “I’d like to be performing in front of larger audiences.”

!e Wright Kids are hop-ing for a large audience for their next public performance scheduled for Friday, Decem-ber 5, at 6:00 pm at the Frank-lin County Public Library, lo-cated at 355 Franklin Street in Rocky Mount.

Visit www.thewrightkids.com for more information.

By Pam [email protected]

> The Wright Kids From page 1

school board member Drew Barrineau met with dozens of concerned citizens at the school.

Barrineau said Roanoke County is in “uncharted wa-ters right now,” when it comes to the impending loss of state funds hinted at by Governor Tim Kaine in next year’s bi-ennial budget, which will be debated in the General As-sembly. Larger class sizes, a central administration reor-ganization and yes, layoffs, could be on the table.

Already Central Middle School in Vinton will be shut down at school year’s end with students that attended for vocational and special studies sent back to their home schools. The school system has sweetened early retirement plans, hoping to induce the more expensive senior teachers to retire ear-ly.

Increasing student class sizes from the mid-20’s to 31 at Hidden Valley High School, in his district, would eliminate eight teaching po-sitions noted Barrineau. He sees non-core subjects as better candidates for larger classes. Make no mistake about it: “everybody will be impacted.”

Closing Bent Mountain

cannot be taken off the ta-ble said Barrineau. He had planned on holding commu-nity meetings later on, once Kaine makes his proposed state budget cuts public, but decided this was a good time to address Bent Mountain with “a lot of rumors going on... a lot of talk and specu-lation.” He’s heard that five to ten percent of the fund-ing Roanoke County receives from the Commonwealth for schools could be slashed, maybe even 20 percent. “We are trying to stay ahead of this the best we can.”

A ten percent cut, based on the current operating budget, would amount to about sev-en million dollars. “Its pretty serious,” said Barrineau, who will hold a larger community meeting in southwest Roa-noke County once the school system has a better handle on proposed cuts in state fund-ing. Lange has been asked to provide scenarios that reflect budget reductions of five, ten and fifteen percent.

Barrineau also claimed that state’s Standards of Quality will be harder to meet with budget cuts; e.g. require-ments that mandate the number of guidance coun-selors, assistant principals or other positions per student

population. “There’s going to have to be some relief.”

Barrineau said the school district has been keeping teachers and other employ-ees in the loop via newslet-ters and additional dialogue, letting them know what could be coming down the pike. He noted that many residents on Monday night at the Bent Mountain meeting did not have children at the school but were concerned about the loss of a commu-nity focal point, should it be shut down. The local Roa-noke County library branch is actually located inside the school, with a community playground and garden out-side. “That building means an awful lot to the people that live up there,” said Bar-rineau.

Monday’s meeting at Bent Mountain Elementary School was all about, “what to expect going forward,” said Bar-rineau. “The first thing that will come out will be Kaine’s budget. We’re planning for the worst and hoping for something less than that.”

> Bent Mountain From page 1

By Gene [email protected]

Women’s foundation awards largest grant to VWCC


times lost children and while it’s usually dry and warm, the publisher has been known to yell, “Cratchet – no more coal on that $re!”

But we all get along . . . Most-ly.

Spirited political and/or theo-logical debate has been known to break out, but that usually gets resolved with wooden pistols at three paces. (Rubber bands hurt like the dickens at three paces.) We also have an old antique brass gong bequeathed to me from my eccentric Aunt Mc-Call that hangs between two tusk-like horns probably taken from some sort of African beast in the 1800’s. We ring it when-ever a large ad is placed. Which isn’t enough, of course, but we’re working real hard to hear it more o"en.

And so, it would seem, are the rest of you.

!e market is tough for every-one these days. Many automo-tive dealers have all but locked their doors and realtors, the $rst

ones to endure the frigid tem-peratures of an increasingly cold market, have dug their trenches deep and settled in to ride out the gathering storm. !is eco-nomic downturn is indeed se-rious and it doesn’t take a Wall Street $nancial guru to guess that it’s likely to get a whole lot worse before it gets even the slightest bit better.

But hopefully, as we wrestle through these trying times, we will all get a better sense of what is most important in life – such an awareness, it would seem, is a blessing that is so wonderfully a part of these times whether we want it or not.

Recently, I sent out a request for subscription and advertis-ing support to friends and ac-quaintances – many of whom had said they’d been meaning to do one or the other over the last 52 weeks but just, “hadn’t gotten around to it.” I got a posi-tive response from several and for that I am most grateful. But one dear old friend who shall

go named because he is a dear old friend and he will forgive me, is Al Watts, who wrote a very thoughtful response that outlined some basic principles for surviving in business during these tough times. He indicated that the following suggestions were just some of the things his management team at Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield focuses on as they seek to maximize their abilities to operate e%-ciently:

- Strategically think for the long term.

- Be brief and keep it simple when possible.

- Stick to the fundamentals.- Remember who you are try-

ing to reach.- Don’t forget your successes

so far.As I pondered each sugges-

tion and applied them to our business model here at the RSS, I couldn’t help but also see them as valuable lessons for the living of one’s daily life.

Re-read that list. Whether we apply them cor-

porately or individually, such basic reminders can help guide us to a place of clarity as we make some of the most impor-tant decisions in our lives.

But I’ve got one more sugges-tion to add to Al’s list that we plan on implementing for the next 52 weeks here at the RSS. It’s an old one to be sure, but no less important:

Take one day at a time . . . Fo-cus on the here and now and on what is attainable and can actu-ally be accomplished.

For the past does not have to de$ne our today any more than we are a slave to any particular future. God is at work in this world and if we can trust him with even the smallest part of our heart, we’re probably far more on our way than we real-ize.

Trust makes all things pos-sible in any relationship. !ank you for giving us yours these past 52 weeks – we pledge to work one day at a time going forward to continually earn it. May we all $nd our share of successes in the challenging, yet surely enlightening, days to come.

Find the answers online: TheRoanokeStar.com

Have a clue and answer you’d like to see? email: [email protected]

Star~Sentinel CrosswordBy Don

Waterfield 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

12 13 14 15

16 17 18

19 20 21 22

23 24 25

26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34

35 36 37 38 39

40 41 42 43 44

45 46 47 48 49

50 51 52 53 54

55 56 57 58

59 60 61 62 63 64

65 66 67 68 69

70 71 72

73 74 75

A C R O S S

1 C h illed 5 P ounds per square inch 8 Thunder __

12 Fee l concern 13 E xcuse 15 A ctive 16 H ero ic 17 W ild dog 18 The la rgest con tinen t w ith

60% o f the earth 's popu la tion . 19 'H e shoots - he ------!' (from

w ayne 's w orld ) 21 O pposite o f cred its 23 C leans a ho le 25 To b roadcast. 26 A ba ll ou t o f bounds (2 w ds.) 29 E xpress ion o f surprise 31 "__ e t decorum est..." 35 A nchorite 37 A nd so fo rth 39 C ountry in S E A sia 40 B e fo re , poe tica lly 41 S andp ipers

44 To transport by bus. 45 Fam ous cookies 47 G irl 48 B rand o f o il 50 R ecords 52 H ang ing shred . 54 Long w inded. 55 To trave l a curved course . 57 G em carved in re lie f 59 P os itive ly charged e lectrica l

partic le 62 R ash 65 C arved P o lynesian pendant 66 D ye by hand 68 T in ts 70 P ang 71 P ick le ju ice 72 D unking cookies 73 A n them 74 O kay 75 V ery la rge trees

D O W N

1 E xpensive jew e lry especia lly

d iam onds. (U S s lang) 2 B ere ts 3 L ittle M erm aid 's love 4 G ood taste in behavio r 5 A n energy source and tv type 6 S ib ling 7 S am e c ite as p rev ious 8 W om anÌs ha ir p roduct 9 T ilt

10 C ar ren ta l agency 11 P od vegetab le 13 R eg ion 14 'Th is w as m aybe no t such a

good ----!' (from The A byss) 20 K eepsake 22 To m ake a b id . 24 W ood varn ish 26 In the lead 27 Ita lian phys ic is t 28 S andw ich cookies b rand 30 S nacked 32 G rind 33 M igh t 34 S choo l ass ignm ent 36 R iver tow er 38 C ircu la r bas in w ith s teep

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Did a doe fall prey to poisonous herbicides used along Crys-tal Creek Drive in southwest Roanoke County last August? Ap-palachian Power said “no” at a public meeting held Wednesday morning at the Roanoke County Administration building. Crystal Creek homeowner David Barudin initiated the dialogue a"er AEP sprayed the herbicides near the creek, on plants in the power com-pany’s right of way. A dead doe near the stream alarmed Barudin, who works for a DC foundation from his home.

“Do you want to defend a potentially dangerous practice?” asked Barudin as the information session got underway. Several residents

said AEP crews ignore their requests to be exempted from spraying. Others said they’ve noticed a marked decrease in the presence of wildlife and $sh right a"er spraying along right of ways and Crystal Creek.

Other residents spoke of safety concerns and the use of toxic chemicals around children, pets and livestock, but AEP stressed that the two herbicides in question were EPA approved. One at-tendee that uses these chemicals for vegetation management in his private business said compounds found under the typical kitchen sink were a lot more dangerous. “I think we’re out of perspective,”

said Lyle Anderson, noting that the oil used in chain saws by crews would be more harmful.

Former Roanoke City Coun-cilman Rupert Cutler, now chair of the Western Virginia Water Authority Board, also sat in. “My concern again is with the e#ect on the water supply,” said Cutler, noting that AEP does not spray herbicides near local reservoirs but uses manual clear-cutting crews instead.

Cutler wondered if AEP could employ more crews in residential areas like Crystal Creek Drive, where herbicides sprayed from a truck are now used to save mon-ey by eliminating crews. He also said the “ecological impacts,” of using certain herbicides may not be fully researched.

“Hopefully we’ve done stud-ies on the stu# we’re using,” said Crystal Creek resident Dan Cos-tello, who did appreciate the work AEP did in keeping tree limbs

from bringing down power lines in the semi-rural area.EPA representative Myles Bartos said he would work through

Cave Spring Supervisor Charlotte Moore with any additional infor-mation he might be able to provide. !e use of any herbicides is all about “risk versus the bene$t,” said Bartos, who asked that emotion not drive discussion of the issue.

AEP spokesman Terry Hall said the power company had “a lot to lose,” if it used chemicals in an unsafe matter. “We use registered products.” Hall did say AEP would work with homeowners along Crystal Creek Drive to address their concerns.

Moore pledged to keep people in the loop as any investigation moves forward. “I don’t think we can ever be too safe. We certainly need to take every precaution we can.” By Gene Marrano

[email protected]

Skeptical residents meet with County, AEP and EPA on herbicide use

Photo by Gene Marrano

Crystal Creek resident David Barudin looks over his shoulder when addressing someone at a public meeting on Wednesday.


Chef-in-training Chris Poff creates saltimbocca.

Culinary delights: Virginia Western Community College culinary arts students cooked and prepared samples for visitors to the Claude Moore Education Complex on Henry Street during the recent Roa-noke Arts Festival. VWCC runs their culinary arts program at the Moore building, across from the Dumas Center. Chris Poff (pictured, preparing saltimbocca) has one more se-mester left and hopes to open a bakery in Roanoke after he graduates. The “Exposition of Culinary Arts” was offered Nov. 8-9 and drew large gatherings to the Claude Moore Educa-tion Complex.


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Heart disease is the number one killer today in America, and roughly half of all heart attacks are su#ered by women. With that and other women’s issues in mind, Lewis Gale Medical Center (HCA South-west Virginia) presented their Women’s Health Beauty Life EXPO recently at the Salem Civic Center.

Among the special guest speakers on the panel deal-ing with women’s health is-sues was Dr. Oyidie Igbokidi. !e thirty-something doctor was born in the West African nation of Nigeria where she studied medicine, met her husband Greg and got mar-ried to the Nigerian-American businessman.

“I moved to the states in 1995, did my residency at West Suburban Hospital in Chicago and my fellowship at the Uni-versity of Iowa,” Dr. Igbokidi said, displaying a glowing smile. “I had initially planned to go back to Africa a"er my training, but my husband and four children eventually con-vinced me to stay a while in America.”

Dr. Igbokidi must balance life with a husband and two young children, plus two older stepchildren - with life as a cardiologist in great demand at Lewis Gale Hospital. Ten months into her position at Lewis Gale, the energetic doc-tor appears to be o# to a tre-mendous start. She’s on the treadmill by about 5:30 am knocking back a fast cup of co#ee before racing to the of-$ce for what o"en turns out to be a stupefying number of hours, particularly if she’s on call.

“I love it!” laughs the doc-tor, “obviously referring to her career and not to the number

of hours involved. “And yes, I would send my own hus-band to Lewis Gale and nowhere else in the world if he were ever to have a heart attack.”

Dr. Igbokidi likes to start most of her conversions with prevention techniques. “One thing that Americans really need more of is portion control,” said Dr. Igbokidi. “You can eat a little of what you like, but ‘a little’ means just that.” Obesity is re-lated to everything from heart disease to cancer, and a host of other serious illnesses.

When asked by her pa-tients how much exercise they should do, she o"en gives the quick retort: “How much are you doing now? Do a little more!”

!e doctor’s best advice is to resign totally from the seden-tary lifestyle. Make it a motto: “If you eat, you will exercise.”

Other risk factors for men, women and teens are the same, and some of them are rather surprising.

“Marijuana is a direct toxin to the heart,” Dr. Igbokidi said. “Pot and other illegal drugs like cocaine may severely damage a teen-ager’s or any-one’s heart; there’s no question about it.”

Other serious risk factors are: smoking, high blood pres-sure (hypertension), high cho-lesterol, a large waist circum-ference, abnormal blood fats such as triglycerides, a fam-ily history of heart problems, prolonged, acute stress, and diabetes.

“Women’s symptoms of heart problems tend to be atypical compared to those of

men,” Dr. Igbokidi said. “Women may simply feel extreme fatigue or di%culty breathing; some-times pain in the jaw, neck or arm; and o"en pain, a burning sensation, or pressure in the area above the ab-domen – some-

times a"er eating or exertion.” But according to the doc-

tor, women are programmed to care for others $rst and this has always been a seri-ous problem when it comes to treating cardiac conditions.

“Women will neglect them-selves as they care for their families, so that by the time I see them they have o"en developed advanced heart disease which means that my options for treatment are lim-ited,” Dr. Ikbokidi said. “Also, some family physicians send back tests for cholesterol and other potential risk factors without explaining exactly what those risk factors mean, and they are di#erent for each individual.”

!e doctor said that by age 40, everyone should know their risk score. People with “metabolic syndrome,” (more than three risk factors) should take a proactive approach to treatment and should be seen by a physician at least yearly.

“!ere is a myth that wom-en are not at risk,” Dr. Ikbok-idi said, “but it is a myth and women need to know that by eating properly to maintain their proper weight, stopping smoking and exercising regu-larly, they can lower their risk of a heart attack by between 40 to 50%!”

And as long as women give their heart of hearts to men,

the men they love need to know the risk factors too.

“Risk factors such as alco-hol may rarely be discussed,” Dr Igbokidi said, “but exces-sive alcohol consumption acts as another direct toxin to the heart.”

!e enthusiastic, young doctor has dreams of helping to start a women’s compre-hensive heart prevention and care center at Lewis Gale that would include such preven-tion techniques as meditation, yoga, stress counseling and diet management.

“Along with 81 to 162 mil-ligrams of baby aspirin every-day for people with metabolic syndrome,” the doctor said, “laughter goes a long way too in relieving stress, and that al-ways helps your heart.”

As for advice for girls and boys who might want to be-come doctors one day, Dr. Igbokidi has her own strong opinions.

“Being a doctor doesn’t take a brilliant intelligence,” she said, “But it does require the quality of being very obser-vant as well as a committed persistence. I’ve always had a lot of curiosity about every-thing and of course, lots of persistence.”

Next week Dr. Igbokidi plans to arrange a visit to the local schools.

“I want very much to talk to the young people about the dangers of drugs,” Dr. Igboki-die said. “I have a son in mid-dle school, so it scares me.”

!ere are a variety of cardio-vascular problems caused by a host of factors, but there are just as many kinds of preven-tion. So when a cardiologist like Dr. Igbokidi says that los-ing even 5 lbs. can signi$cant-ly lower your blood pressure and disease risk, you tend to put down the platter of French fries, and listen.

Learn more at Lewis Gales Heart / Cardiac online refer-ence center:

http://www.lewis-gale.com/healthcontent.asp?page=/con-tentSelection/hca/heart/index

West African doctor shares knowledge on women’s health

Dr. Oyidie Igbokidi

By Mary Ellen Campagna [email protected]

City of Roanoke o%ces will be closed on !ursday, Nov. 27, and Friday, Nov. 28, for the !anksgiving holiday. As a result, all residents and business owners are asked to follow the changes listed below in their solid waste collection schedules:

Monday, Nov. 24 - Trash, recycling, bulk and brush will be col-lected on schedule.

Routes normally collected on Tuesday, Nov. 25 - Trash, recy-cling, bulk and brush will be collected on Monday.

Routes normally collected on Wednesday, Nov. 26 - Trash, re-cycling, bulk and brush will be collected on Tuesday.

Routes normally collected on !ursday, Nov. 27 - trash, recy-cling, bulk and brush will be collected on Wednesday.

Bagged leaves will not be collected the week of Nov. 24.!e Central Business District will be worked on schedule all

week with the exception of !anksgiving Day.Regular collection schedules will resume on Monday, Dec. 1.For more information, call the Citizen Service Center at 853-

2000.

Ever wonder just how trees and shrubs should be planted? What goes on a"erwards? What happens to the roots? Just how much water do trees and shrubs really need, and for how long?

Join us for two consecutive FREE presentations on Monday, November 24, 2008

2:00-4:00 pm in the large meeting room at Library Headquar-ters, Rte. 419

(For more information, call Barbara Leach 772-7524)

Virginia Cooperative Extension-Roanoke brings you “Planting Landscape Trees”

Roanoke City holiday collection schedule

Good Samaritan Hospice celebrates the lives of loved ones each year through its “Love Light Tree” program. !e 2008 “Love Light Trees” will be up from November 17-January 2 at both Tanglewood and New River Valley malls.

For a donation of $10, you may sponsor a “love light” in honor or memory of someone. !at person’s name is placed on the tree throughout the holiday season, representing the light that person has brought into the world. For a donation of $25, you can also receive a hand-made porcelain ornament that you can display on your own tree or Good Sam will send that ornament as a gi" to someone you designate to let them know they are in your thoughts during the holidays.

All donations are tax-deductible and allow Good Sam to continue to provide hospice care and grief support programs throughout Roanoke and New River Valleys and Smith Moun-tain Lake. Good Sam is the only not-for-pro$t, community-based hospice in the area, and maintains the belief that anyone who quali$es and desires hospice care should receive that care, regardless of ability to pay.

You can pick up donation forms at either mall or call Good Sam at 776-0198. You may also visit the website at www.good-samhospice.org and download a form.

2008 Good Samaritan Hospice Love Light Tree


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Why we should give now more than ever.

Something funny happened to me recently. I was intro-duced to an acquaintance as a “fundraiser”. !e single most dreaded word in the book. I am not sure who &inched $rst. I believe it was me. “”No, no! Not anymore,” I explained. “….helping area non-pro$ts, but not fundraising”! I had done it again. I had used the second most dreaded word: “non-pro$t”. !is was not go-ing well.

And then it came. !e com-ment about “avoiding me when he sees me coming” - while, gracefully looking for an escape. I stood there silent as the conversation $n-ished. With the same gentle character, he bid us farewell -- indicating how nice it was to meet me. But worst of all – he remembered my name. Great. Now I am tagged. A fundraiser.

Perhaps the most amusing part of the exchange happened

a"er he was out of earshot. “Who was that?” I inquired. I’ll let you all $ll in the blank on who it was – but clearly, I am the only person in town who didn’t know.

While embarrassing sto-ries are amusing – it wasn’t the humor that got me think-ing. Why was I horri$ed at the prospect of such a label? A"er all, I have indeed spent the better part of the last 20 years doing just that….for both the non-pro$ts (where they call it fundraising) and for-pro$ts (where they call it sales). Isn’t the term “non-pro$t” a misnomer? Wouldn’t a better term be “public inter-est” corporation? Why wasn’t this man proud to be in the “sites” of such people? A"er all, it means he is known as a successful and generous man. Why do people celebrate “phi-lanthropists” but avoid “fund-raisers”?

Which brings me to my point.

As the holidays approach

in the shadow of our current economic state, the tremen-dous need in our community comes more into focus.

I have been involved in fundraising my entire life and this personal tradition of phil-anthropic involvement has given me perspective on amaz-ing things happening in the world. More importantly, I’ve had the opportunity to wit-ness $rst hand, the incredible generosity of local businesses and have seen amazing acts of generosity by people who will never likely be termed a “philanthropist”. But my most compelling observation is simple. !ose who have the least give the most. I can say with absolute certainty, this is the case. Perhaps they recog-nize the need because – like a small boat feels every wave of the ocean – they too, intensely feel even the smallest increase in the cost of living.

!anksgiving marks the beginning of the traditional season for giving – when in-dividuals and businesses look for ways to collectively impact the community in which they live. Whether it is supporting inspiring musicians through

the Youth Symphony; dis-covering budding chemists at the Science Museum or pool-ing resources by giving to the United Way -- these “non-pro$ts” are truly making our future a brighter place. !ese organizations thrive on faith and rely on philanthropy. !ey are leveraging every dollar to ensure it is a#ecting meaningful and lasting change in our community. While the trends in giving ebb and &ow, philanthropy is a practice that has been around for centuries and is honored by nearly every religious tradition. It is volun-tary, independent and is root-ed in our basic willingness to help others. !e literal mean-ing of the word is the “love of humankind.”

So, as we enter this “season of giving” -- remember to practice random acts of kind-ness and generosity. Whether you save your change for the Salvation Army bell ring-ers, clear out your closet for Goodwill, purchase grocery store gi" cards for the Rescue Mission or write a check to an annual fund drive…you are changing lives.

If you are a “fundraiser” who &inches with such an in-troduction – take time to rec-ognize your e#orts are deeply appreciated by those you serve. If you are – like the gen-tleman I met on the street – an individual or business that generously supports the many needs in our area -- thank you. !ank you for knowing that an investment in these pro-grams ensures a vibrant future for all of us. It is true -- times are tough -- and like the squir-rels outside my window, we should try to save every acorn we can $nd. I simply encour-age you to also give in to the spirit of giving that moves all of us at this time of year. It is humbling what can be accom-plished when we all work to-gether.

Honestly approaching the Season of Giving

By Stephanie [email protected]

Photo by Valerie Garner

Mayor Bowers presents a basket of apples to Stephanie Doyle while recognizing her. School Board Chairman David Carson stands to the left.Best in the state: Breckinridge Middle School educator Stepha-nie Doyle was recognized as the 2009 Virginia Teacher of the Year by Roanoke City Council on Monday. Doyle received a standing ovation from a full house of supporters at Monday evening’s Council Meeting. Doyle has started a mentoring pro-gram called GROW (Girls Rising Onto Womanhood) and will go to the 2009 National Teacher of the Year selection process.

Scenic Virginia gave its annual watershed protection award to the City of Roanoke, the Western Virginia Land Trust, and the Virginia Outdoors Foundation on !ursday for their joint e#ort in protecting Carvins Cove Natural Reserve.

Scenic Virginia Trustee Lucille Miller presented the partnership with the organization's "Scenic Water Corridor Preservation Award" for the group's record-setting conservation easement in Carvins Cove, which permanently protects 6,185 acres of land from develop-ment, as well as 14 miles of scenic views from the Appalachian Trail. !e easement, recorded in April, protects the largest tract of land ever placed under easement in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

While a private landowner could have received millions of dollars in tax bene$ts for protecting a property of this size, “the City of Roa-noke didn’t place this easement on the Cove for any $nancial gain,” said Western Virginia Land Trust Executive Director Roger Holn-back during the award presentation. “!ey did it because it was the right thing to do for future citizens of the City of Roanoke. We hope the City will protect the remainder of the Cove’s 12,000-plus acres in the near future with a second conservation easement.”

Scenic Virginia chose the Carvins Cove partnership from among a group of more than 150 nominees from across the state. !e award was presented at Scenic Virginia's 2008 Scenic Awards luncheon, held at the Kent-Valentine House in downtown Rich-mond.

Environmental Partnership receives award from Scenic Virginia(Left to right) Scenic Virginia Trustee Lucille Miller, Roanoke City Attorney Bill Hackworth, Virginia Outdoors Foundation Trustee Rupert Cutler, Western Virginia Land Trust Executive Director Roger Holnback, Roanoke City Superintendent of Parks Gary Hegner, Western Virginia Land Trust Project Manager David Perry, Western Virginia Land Trust President Janet Scheid, Virginia Out-doors Foundation Communications and Outreach Manager Jason McGarvey. (photo by Jack Beilhart)

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The Internet is fertile g r o u n d

for 21st century moms. Chat rooms, discussion boards, due date clubs...dig-ital page a"er digital page of breastfeed-ing tips, cra" ideas, recipes, medical advice, and more. And while the Internet has brought people from di#erent walks of life closer together, there's still a comfortable buf-fer between the keyboard and the mommies on the other end of the wire. So it gave me pause when my wife asked if it were okay if a friend of hers that she met online stopped in for din-ner while she and her husband and son were traveling from Chattanooga to Norfolk. Sud-denly, the Internet had gone from being a somewhat ab-stract environment in which one interacts with people in a very non-committal, “here to-day, gone tomorrow” fashion, to a conduit by which com-plete strangers from another state were going to come to my house and eat my food. Strang-ers who may be very well be ax murderers, or who don't even recycle. In my house, at that!

Now, I don't text message and I'm not on Facebook. I do have an MP3 player but not a color iPod. While I'm not completely hip to what the kids are up to these days, I do try to keep a toe in the pool so as not to become an Old Per-son (at least not right away). So instead of balking at the pros-pect of having ax-murdering land$ll killers over for dinner, I quickly warmed to the idea. A"er all, I told myself, meeting an online friend IRL (In Real Life) is a very cool, 21st centu-ry thing to do. And there was no point in being a jerk about it and making my wife angry.

Ironically, the couple that was coming to dinner, Laura and Troy, had a 2-year old named Seth, as do Kelly and I. I was especially curious how Seth Perry would handle meet-ing another Seth (I dubbed him Bizarro Seth). It turns out Bizarro Seth had some food al-lergies. He couldn't eat eggs or gluten and didn't do ice cream.

!is created a major dilemma for Kelly—what to serve for dinner, and perhaps even more impor-tantly (to me), what to serve for dessert?

I o#ered to do burgers on the grill,

but Kelly wasn't certain if hamburg-er buns contained

eggs or gluten, or if Laura was keen on the antibodies and growth hormones in grocery store beef. She had similar concerns about pizza. Being at the end of my personal list of menu choices, I le" Kelly to $gure it out, which she did—beef stew over rice, with the vegetables being organic selec-tions from our CSA member-ship. We decided to take our chances with the beef.

Soon the big day was upon us, and Laura, Troy, and Bizar-ro Seth arrived at the appoint-ed hour, no worse for wear from driving for several hours on I-81. Bizarro Seth turned out to be not so bizarre a"er all, and even had something in common with Seth Perry—a love of toy trucks. Laura and Troy seemed like decent peo-ple too. A"er the $rst few awk-ward moments and the usual exchange of pleasantries about the trip and tra%c, the rest of the evening went well. !e only major glitch was the des-sert choice—non-dairy frozen juice pops, which Bizarro Seth couldn't eat because they con-tained Splenda. Unbeknownst to us, Splenda gives Laura headaches and Troy seizures, and they couldn't take the chance that Bizarro Seth may have a similar a'iction.

At last the evening drew to a close, marked by the arrival of the Perry Boys' Bath Time (7:30 pm sharp) and then by Way Past Bath Time (8:00), so Laura, Troy, and Bizarro Seth said their thank-yous and goodbyes. I drew them a detailed map back to 581, and they were o#. And we had sur-vived our $rst Internet meet-ing, IRL.

Contact David [email protected]

Internet friends meet “in real life”

David Perry

!"#$%!"#$%&$'()*+,-./-'0(1

Parenting is such a public endeavor. If you go anywhere with your children, and hopefully you do, others are watching. !is can both

be pleasing when your children rise to the occasion to make good choices and disappointing when they don’t. How we deal with their behavior says a lot about us as parents. Granted, we don’t always know the best way to react with every situation, but taking time to teach and train is the job of the parent, and we had better do it, for their sake.

I love watching di#erent styles of parenting. Truly there is no ‘best’ formula for successful parenting because every child is di#erent, but there are characteristics of good parenting that help children learn right from wrong, good manners from bad, obedience, and respect for authority.

Recently I was privileged to witness good parenting in pro-cess, and I have been waiting to share this story since that time. We were at a church dinner where there were lots of families with young children. !e young ones were playing about while the adults were in conversations with one another. Our con-versation with friends sitting across from us suddenly stopped when they both recognized the sound of their son’s voice from across the room. !eir eyes met and at once con$rmed the oth-er’s hunch that the utterance they heard was inappropriate and needed attention. !e father at once caught the eye of his son, who already had that guilty look, and motioned to the son to $nd the corner and go there. !e young boy, probably four years old, knew better. His guilt gave it away on the $rst meeting of eyes and he knew the score. Go to the corner. Stay there with-out anyone’s attention to think and sort out what he did that was wrong. !e father’s words were few. Silence was powerful. No scolding. No belittling. Just direction from the father, pure and simple. “Stand in the corner.”

Once the time was served, which wasn’t very long, the father called his son back to him. !e father quietly talked to him about what had happened. I couldn’t hear the conversation but could see the quiet words of correction being whispered. Standing be-tween his parents, he sat down at the table to eat his dessert. !e father, sensing his son’s need for reassur-ance, said, “Son, you are okay. You disappointed me, but it is over now.” !e son seemed relieved and hap-

pily $nished his dessert. With the resolution of the con&ict, he experienced the full circle of correction, instruction, and restoration.

!is little boy has a father and mother who want him to know right from wrong. !ey know who they want their little boy to be one day, and they are busy attending to his character with every opportunity to teach, no matter where they are. Public or private, they want his behavior to be above reproach, upright, re&ecting a high standard for respect and honor of others. !ese parents know the beauty and goodness of correction and in-struction.

I marveled at the power of a few words, the strength of charac-ter shown by the parents, and the willingness to shape his char-acter with intentional and deliberate training. It was a breath of fresh air. No harsh words were spoken. No one tried to build his self esteem or coddle him into recognizing his poor choice of words. He knew it deep in his soul. And it happened in the corner.

“Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it.” Proverbs 22:6

Contact Diane [email protected]

Standing in the Corner

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Money is like the tap-water of the economy. Banks are hoard-ing 'water' because they're afraid people will come demand 'water' from them.

--Pete Kyle, Economist,

University of Maryland

Lack of liquidity, sty-mied &ow, a credit drought—what can the

average American do to pump money through our banks and the economy itself? Very little.

Yet under the surface of the world's $nancial woes, lies a bank with assets far more vital to our lives, which we can all do something about. !at we sel-dom hear about this bank and its looming crisis is remarkable, since real liquidity—and our entire economy—depend upon its deeper, rarely-mentioned re-

serves.!is bank holds actual wa-

ter—the unseen, underfoot aquifers and groundwater that feed our springs, wells, rivers—and the economy.

To water crops and entire cities, we've been withdrawing from this underground bank for decades, while increased devel-opment and drier weather have impeded deposits. Hence, water tables across the continent are falling beneath our feet.

“!ere's a common miscon-ception that there will always be plenty of good groundwater available for whatever use any-body wants,” said Scott Bruce, of the Department of Envi-ronmental Quality in Virginia, where droughts continue, reser-voir levels have sunk and wells are going dry.

“We are dealing with a $nite

system. !e general perception needs to be changed to under-stand that we're not groundwa-ter-rich.”

Normally, nature restores her groundwater assets via direct deposit—of precipitation. But if the underground account is closed o# by asphalt and denud-ed landscapes, valuable rainfall runs to streams as storm water. If the land can receive deposits, however, and protect those as-sets from quick evaporation, even minimal rains can be in-vested for a good return.

!at's what perma-culturist Brad Lancaster has done, in a landscape far drier than the mid-Atlantic.

When Brad and his brother Rodd moved to a property in Tucson, Arizona—where rain-fall averages twelve inches per year—they found a barren yard with poor soil and one fruitless, dried-up orange tree. When rains did fall, they tumbled o# a roof and carved a ditch through the yard, eroding the house foundations.

So the brothers dug a drain-age ditch straight to the ailing tree, where they also composted every kitchen scrap to create a

natural “sponge.” !e soil grew rich; the tree &ourished and bombed them with oranges. !ey cre-ated a wider spread of mulch to soak up rains, and planted more trees, none of which require wa-tering.

Today, this once-barren Arizona lot is rich with topsoil, vegetables, &owers, shade-trees, and an orange crop. Neighbors (who formerly didn't know each other) now come for marmalade-making parties and leave with rain-banking ideas that are revitalizing the neigh-borhood.

Lancaster hopes these ideas will keep &owing outward, for human economies depend on the wider bank of groundwater around the globe.

Nowhere is this more obvi-ous than in Africa, where years of drought and famine have etched out the direct link be-tween water poverty and hu-man poverty.

On a visit to drought-stricken Zimbabwe, Lancaster met Mr. Phiri Maseko, a farmer who had

increased his land's water wealth simply by paying attention. When Maseko $rst started farming, his dirt was eroded, dusty and poor. He began observing the rare rainfalls

and ways to bank them back in the ground.

Maseko found that fallen debris, rocks and plant roots impeded run-o# and helped rain to make a long-term, lo-cal deposit. Soon, he created a humus-rich, rooted landscape that welcomed those priceless deposits of water and kept them from evaporating. His methods have allowed him to survive a two-year drought, and in-creased water levels in his well, where his neighbors' have dried up.

Would it pay us, here in the Eastern U.S., to learn this kind of water-banking? With the Southeastern drought now creeping northward and the costs of future water-shortages mind-boggling, we can't a#ord not to.

Lancaster o#ers simple steps,

beginning with “long and thoughtful observation” of the land. Where does run-o# go? !en, “slow, spread and in$l-trate the &ow of water” back into the ground, using berms, grading, compost and mulch.

Next, plan for over&ow and make use of it with life-enrich-ing plants. Trees, for instance, not only protect ground water but provide food, shade a build-ing, bu#er wind and house songbirds. Even the sunlight of a drought becomes productive, he notes, having now installed solar panels.

“As you harvest the water, you start to harvest the sun,” Lancaster says. “You tune in to what's around you, to the sea-sons, the rainfall. It makes you feel a lot more alive, a lot more connected.”

It's a big kind of wealth that “the little guy” can create. And it actually trickles down.

Liza Field is a tree-planter and conservationist. She teaches English and philosophy in the Virginia Governor’s School and Wytheville Community College. Distributed by Bay Journal News Service.

Rescuing another kind of bank

Liza Field

The shock of a piercing alarm in a different time zone and dif-

ferent country is disorienting. When this happened, knowing it was much too loud to be my watch, I checked it anyway. The sound stopped before my roommate for the tour and I could find the source. With relief, we settled back into our beds and went to sleep. Some minutes later, the alarm

pierced the room again. This time, Linda unplugged a bor-rowed phone charger. Though we doubted that was the problem, the alarm stopped, and again, we fell back heavily onto the pillows.

At breakfast the next morn-ing, we learned that the sound was not just in our room; it was a hotel-wide false fire alarm. Mary Alice said she had un-plugged everything she could. Larry waved a hand across his alarm and thought he had stopped it. As much as each of us thought we had some con-trol over the situation, we were powerless.

The approaching holidays may make our blood pressure skyrocket like the adrenaline did from that fire alarm. “Who’s traveling where and when?” “What am I going to give to ____?” “Is Uncle Bob going to be as rude as he was last year?” Family dysfunction jumps to the forefront. Grief is heightened for those missing loved ones. The economic downturn inhib-its generous giving. For some, the holiday season has spiraled out of control so that we feel powerless to reduce our grow-ing anxiety.

Over a large window hangs a set of blinds about five feet

wide. It takes three strong cords to raise and lower them and over time, the cords get tangled in a knot, which magi-cally continues to grow. You can’t untangle it with force, or by pulling one cord tighter; you have to address each area of the knot slowly and patiently, until all dangle freely again.

The cords of the holidays are family and social expectations, traditions, and even good cele-brations and the genuine desire to make other people happy. We are tangled in this great big knot, but we are not powerless. Four things will disentangle us: time, patient work, courage, and help from others.

Time and patience: count on years to make changes. My husband and I recently decided that, instead of buying presents for each other, we will choose a charity to which the other will send a donation. I would like to expand that to our fami-lies, but, for example, since my sister-in-law shops for Christ-mas the whole year, it will be at least next year before we can make that change. In coming years, people will see you more relaxed and will want to know your secret!

Courage: Tony Campolo, speaking at the Roanoke Civic

Center recently, noted that we may wander the aisles of the stores looking for something newly on the market for “the person who has everything.”

“Really” he said, “what do you get the person who has everything?” “Nothing!” re-sponded the crowd. And then Campolo said, “But you haven’t got the guts to do it, have ya?” Have you?

Help from others: Consider yourself lucky if you’ve got someone in your family who will work with you on this. If you have a friend who can help you think through a plan of ac-tion, that’s great, too.

With or without human as-sistance, the unseen yet ever-present Spirit of God within you and around you is waiting for you to ask for help and guidance. When you take quiet moments to listen for God, at bedtime tonight, or just after that alarm in the morning, you eventually will find with God a wisdom greater than any hu-man sage could offer, and cour-age to take a bold step or two. Happy holidays to you.

Donna Hopkins Britt is pastor of Calvary Baptist Church, 608 Campbell Avenue, SW, Roanoke, www.NewToCalvary.com.

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Hard economic times have hit our coun-try to a degree most

of us never imagined, and that makes everything related to money more di%cult, not least the noble task of fundraising for worthy causes.

At the Western Virginia Land Trust, the approaching Christmas season – when non-pro$t organizations bene$t most from people’s generous impulses – is viewed as par-ticularly crucial.

In September, the Land Trust received its $nal $40,000 annu-al gi" from the Colcom Foun-dation in Pittsburgh. Originally $50,000, the money had arrived faithfully since 1996.

It enabled Rupert Cutler, executive director of Explore Park at the time, to become the Trust’s founding execu-tive director in 1997. Now, the $40,000 amounts to 25 percent of the Trust’s $160,000 annual operating budget.

Nowadays, Roger Holn-back, the current executive director, spends about half his time raising funds. Last year, Trust members donated about $80,000, and the rest of the money came from grants and the like.

!e $40,000 gi" – from the foundation of a friend of Cut-ler’s who preferred to remain anonymous – made Holnback’s task lighter.

Now, he’ll have to $ll that signi$cant hole. !e Trust’s Pennsylvania connection is gone – but not without abun-dant gratitude from everyone associated with the non-pro$t

A land trust is a communi-ty-based, private, non-pro$t organization that encourages “balanced community devel-opment” and saving impor-tant local landscapes. As the WVLT’s Website puts it, such landscapes are “the natural and cultural features that de$ne a community’s character and identify.”

!e Trust encourages volun-tary conservation easements to protect open land forever, in exchange for estate and tax advantages, basically.

Why should we care? Be-cause we are surrounded by natural beauty vulnerable to

urban sprawl. Pre-serving the best of it keeps our commu-nity identity – and a signi$cant attrac-tion for outsiders – intact.

It also helps pro-tect our water qual-ity and nourish our souls.

!e Trust’s suc-cess stories include small farms, 6,185 acres in the Carvins Cove Natural Reserve and nearly 250 acres of Read Mountain. !ese places will not be developed – ever.

!e Western Virginia Land Trust covers greater Roanoke and 10 counties. It has some 700 members, or donors, but the $gure has remained steady in recent years.

Without their support, the Trust could not exist. Without Rupert Cutler’s friendship with Cordelia Scaife May, known to her friends as “Cordy”, the Trust probably would not have come so far. Certainly, the task would have been more di%cult.

May died in 2005 but her foundation sta# kept the mon-ey coming to the Trust for a bit longer at her request. !e foun-dation’s priority is southwest-ern Pennsylvania, not South-west Virginia.

Now, Holnback and David Perry, the Trust’s project man-ager, encourage Southwest Vir-ginians to help replace that gi" with donation of all sizes. Ide-ally, they’ll be inspired by May’s example.

Cordy May of Ligonier, PA, was an heir to the Mellon for-tune and in 2005 was named “the single most generous per-son in the United States” by the Chronicle of Philanthropy, Cutler says in the Trust’s up-coming newsletter. She was “as nice a person as you can imagine, with a rich sense of

humor and an espe-cially kind way with young people.”

Last year, her foundations gave $23 million to worthwhile endeav-ors, Holnback says.

Clearly, she thought big and thought ahead. !at’s a good habit

to develop, and the Land Trust is a good place to start.

May’s annual contribution may be gone, but as Holnback says in the newsletter, “all over America, hundreds of land trusts … are supported entirely from the generous support of local donors. Now our land trust will need to be, as well.”

Contact Joe [email protected]

Joe Kennedy

Western Virginia Land Trust now depends entirely on us

If you do what you've always done, you'll get what you've al-ways got" says the old bromide.

And that's just $ne for most of us most of the time.

If we're honest, we tend to abhor change and cherish the $xed and com-fortable routine in the ways we ap-proach our days at work or home and in our relationships. First the pants, then the shoes. Cereal in the same bowl, co#ee in the same cup. News at six.

We structure our thinking about the world on a foundation of assumptions about how things are. We build our realities, values, expectations and beliefs on top of those fundamentals. Year a"er year we hold tight our world views and understandably resist the threat of change that would require us to renovate.

Both of the parties recently competed ad nau-seam to get the word CHANGE into their plat-forms, their pitches and their robo-calls. Chanc-es are, we are all weary of the word by now. But we don't have the luxury to sit on our laurels or other body parts and think the changes that lie ahead can be le" to the next administration.

!ere are changes and there are changes. !e one kind we're used to in the modern era would simply tweak the ingredients a bit--add the celery $rst instead of the onions--or toss in a dash more salt. !at's yesterday's recipe for change. !e sec-ond kind and the one that looms ahead of us to-day is sometimes referred to as "sea change."

From Shakespeare's Tempest we've adopted the phrase to mean a profound transformation--a complete shi" in our world view and way of thinking. Sea change is almost a kind of meta-morphosis--a caterpillar goes in and a butter&y comes out.

What will be required of us if we are to suc-cessfully face the problems and predicaments of the future is this kind of change. (I heard it said recently that problems are matters we can solve,

predicaments are matters we can only deal with. We have plenty of both.)

Our personal, national and plan-etary well-being are at risk in ways and to degrees that human civiliza-tion has never known. How so many thousands of millions of us will eat and drink, heat and cool, travel, build and prosper in an enfeebled and moribund future world seem insol-uble concerns given our old ways of dealing with them.

So why am I hopeful? Because for the $rst time in decades--and maybe to a degree never seen before--even politicians are beginning to grapple with the notion that we can't count on the old kind of change to sustain our future. !ey are remembering that economies are at root built on the soil. Many world leaders now acknowledge that humans must think and act with greater respect toward all races and the bi-ology of the planet if we are to survive as state, nation and species.

I'm encouraged that young people are once again becoming engaged actively in the fate of their future. I am heartened that a world of voic-es, ampli$ed and compounded by the Internet, are speaking out in favor of bottom-up commu-nity-based solutions to many of these problems. Even many heretofore consumer driven Ameri-cans are starting to think in terms of the little they need out of the sum of what they desire.

To reach the distant shore of an uncertain fu-ture, we can't just do what we've always done. As this tsunami of change comes to our here and now, we can &oat like &otsam or sink like a stone; but if we will set our minds to do so, we will pad-dle for all we're worth and the &ow of change will transform us for a future $t for living.

Contact Fred [email protected]

Fred First

“Sea change” may alter the tide of history


My son is so shy, how can I help him?” is a question that I o"en hear. !ere

are some very obvious and appropriate responses such as get him involved in a team sport, take him to youth group, let him join a club at school. !ese are great suggestions and in many instanc-es a child will open up naturally with just this overexposure of the social en-vironment. In a handful of the cases, however, the exposure alone is not enough. It’s the old “you can lead a horse to water but you can’t make him drink” phenomena.

In the case of a shy child, the problem is o"en lack of skill. While many children have a natural or innate skill level socially, it is not true for every-one. In these cases it is our job to teach our chil-dren how to navigate the social world. Eye con-tact, Facial expression, Greeting others and asking questions are four simple skills that can be easily taught and reap signi$cant rewards for a child.

Eye contact: When a child can learn to walk down a hall and look at those around them, the school is not nearly as scary. !e act of looking others in the eye builds con$dence almost auto-matically. I tell kids to look others in the eye as they walk from class to class and especially when they are in a conversation with someone. !is may sound simple, but is o"en the most di%cult of the above mentioned skills. When a child is unsure of themselves, there is o"en an irrational belief that others will see this weakness in them. !is tends to create an avoidance process that be-gins with not looking at others and avoiding eye contact. In response to this, others o"en view this avoidance as fear or weakness, the very thing that the child wanted to avoid. Just by li"ing up their head and looking at others, a child can begin to feel like “I can do this”.

Facial expressions: I tell kids quite o"en, “If you are trying to be friendly, notify your face.” Putting a smile on your face or having a pleasant expres-sion rarely draws negativity from others. Teach-

ing a child to be aware of their facial expressions and to smile or grin when dealing with others helps to remove negative impressions or misinterpre-tations. As adults we have developed awareness in most cases of what our faces are doing. Children develop this at di#erent rates and a little reminder can help this process along. Even as adults we make judgments based on the facial expressions of others.

Greeting others: Encourage a child to say “hello”, “hey”, “what’s up”, or any number of things as you make eye contact with others. I of-ten have kids set a goal of saying hello to at least two people in every class by name. Using a child’s name is more personal and builds a desire in oth-ers to say hello back and eventually when they see you coming, to say hello $rst. When they see each other in lunch, at practice or at the mall, the hesi-tancy to say hello is already gone and communi-cation happens much easier.

Asking questions: !e most common com-plaint I get from kids about being social is that they never know what to talk about. Kids o"en have this notion that they need to come up with something really “cool” or “funny” so that others will like them. By teaching a child to ask ques-tions of others, this burden is removed. !e topic of conversation becomes the other person. !is not only draws the other person in, but stimulates more questions. !e other child is le" feeling val-ued and typically is motivated to build the rela-tionship more from their end. !is skill can eas-ily be directed by providing a few scenarios from your child’s daily life.

By equipping our children in this way we help them in managing a very signi$cant part of their lives, the social world. So let’s not just lead them to the water, let’s teach them how to drink it.

Contact Keith [email protected]

The Roanoke Star-Sentinel

The Roanoke Star-Sentinel is published weekly by Whisper One Media, Inc. in Roanoke, Va. Subscriptions are available for $44 per year. Send subscriptions to PO Box 8338, Roanoke, VA 24014. We encourage letters from our readers on topics of general interest to the community and responses to our articles and columns. Letters must be signed and have a telephone number for verification. All letters will be verified before publication. The Star-Sentinel reserves the right to deny publication of any letter and edit letters for length, content and style.

All real estate advertised herein is subject to national and Virginia fair housing laws and readers are hereby informed that all dwellings advertised in this newspaper are available on an equal opportunity basis.

Communi ty | News | Perspect ive

Publisher | Stuart Revercomb | [email protected] | 400-0990Advertising Director | Pam Rickard | [email protected] | 400-0990Production Editor | Stephen Nelson | [email protected] | 400-0990Technical Webmaster | Don Waterfield | [email protected] | 400-0990

Keith McCurdy

Do you have a socially thirsty kid?

PERSPECTIVE | The Roanoke Star-Sentinel | 11/21/08 TheRoanokeStar.com

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In a little over a month, four important bills will be intro-duced in the Virginia General Assembly that could funda-mentally change the relationship between Virginians and

their government. A few minutes of your time to lobby to get them passed could mean the di#erence between more power in government’s hands – or more power in yours.

Bill #1: We see billions of our dollars going to Richmond and Washington with little accountability for how it’s spent (anyone remember that $700 billion $nancial markets bailout that was supposed to be spent on shoring up bad mortgages, but is now be-ing used for everything but that?) Virginia’s budget is billions in the hole this year. How did it happen? Where was all the money spent? Why have we already run out?

We are told just to “trust” our political leaders and unelected bureaucrats. No more. Virginia needs to put its budget online in a user-friendly, searchable database which citizens, legislators, and the media can easily access. (I mention legislators because our own legislators readily admit they don’t even know how the billions they vote to budget each year are actually spent!) You wouldn’t just see an agency’s annual budget; you would see exactly what your money is spent on.

Several other states have budget transparency. !at’s just com-monsense, honest government.

Bill #2: We’re told that Virginia’s transportation system has reached “crisis” mode and that there is never enough money to improve things. Yet a majority of our state legislators – to pay for other programs – have raided hundreds of millions of dollars

from the funds set aside speci$cally for $xing trans-portation.

!e Transportation Trust Fund was supposed to be a “lock box” where certain taxes and fees solely dedi-cated to transportation were supposed to go. !e Gen-eral Assembly has had several opportunities to lock the “lockbox” again to prevent further raids, but hasn’t done it. !at’s why a constitutional amendment to prevent the funds from ever being plundered again is being proposed.

Bill #3: We think that our home is our own. But do you realize that by a simple act of the General As-sembly, your city council or board of supervisors can take away your property and sell it to a developer who wants to build a bigger home or business there (because it will bring in more tax revenues)?

Two years ago, a law was passed to prevent this from happen-ing. Unfortunately, a law can be overturned by a simple major-ity of legislators. As Roanoke’s own Sen. John Edwards said, the Roanoke Redevelopment and Housing Authority (a big taker of private property) should be able to “live within the parameters of the statute, and if not, we can come back and look at it another year and see if tinkering needs to be done."

Yes, changing the law to make it easier for government to take your home just involves a little “tinkering.” If this same law is passed instead as a constitutional amendment, it will provide stronger protection for citizens, because it means the people (not

just the politicians) must vote to change the law.Bill #4: New taxes and fees are o"en passed to fund

speci$c, limited-time purposes (so we are told), but then seem to remain forever, with us le" to pay the bill – forever. For example, many Virginians still pay a tax that was instituted to pay for the War of 1812 (in four years, we will “celebrate” its 200th anniversary).

!at’s why a bill is being proposed to require expira-tion dates for all new taxes, fees, and tax increases. If politicians feel it’s necessary to keep a tax a"er the ex-piration date, they will have to publicly debate, defend, and secure the votes to pass the tax again.

!ese four bills can fundamentally change the rela-tionship between the state and the citizens, and return

some signi$cant power to the people, where it rightfully belongs. !ey are being forwarded by Tertium Quids, an organization that promotes the principles of small government and free markets in Virginia. Several state legislators (both Republicans and Demo-crats) are sponsoring the bills, proving this is not partisan legisla-tion; this is balance of power legislation.

You can be a part of this power shi" by signing up to support the agenda at TertiumQuids.org, where you can learn how to help push these bills through the General Assembly.

Contact Brian [email protected]

An opportunity to change the broken government we o"en complain about

Brian Gottstein

!is is how my mother prepared our !anksgiving turkey and I have roasted a !anksgiving turkey this way longer than I can remember. I roast a full turkey every year whether we are home or not because it is just so wonderful, I can’t resist. !is method is a real timesaver but it is also very juicy, I guess the foil locks in those juices. !e greatest thing though would have to be my mother’s stu%ng. IT IS SO SIMPLE. I love stu%ng and all the many variations of it, but in my opinion there is none better than my mother’s. (Maybe there’s none better than your Mom’s too!) How can you improve upon chicken broth, bread and tons of butter mixing with the juices of a beautiful turkey cooking for hours?! So if you are not absolutely in love with your own traditional !anksgiving turkey preparation or have one too many memories of a drier than desired bird, you may want to try this out. You won’t be sorry!

Turkey-Preheat oven to 450 degrees F. Remove neck and giblets from both cavities of defrosted turkey. Rinse turkey, pat dry and brush with vegetable oil.-Tear o# a sheet of 18-inch-wide heavy duty aluminum foil 2-1/2 times longer than the turkey. Place turkey, breast side up, in center of foil sheet.-Bring long sides of foil over turkey; close loosely by overlapping the ends. Turn up short sides of foil to hold in juices. Do not seal airtight. -Place foil-wrapped turkey in roasting pan at least 2 inches deep. Insert meat thermometer into inner thigh for whole turkey or into thick-est part of breast for turkey breast.-Roast until meat thermometer reads 180 degrees to 185 degrees F for whole turkey or 170 degrees to 175 degrees F for turkey breast. For stu#ed turkey, add 30 minutes to roasting time. -To brown turkey, open and turn back foil 30 minutes before roasting is $nished.

-!e approximate roasting times are 1-1/2 to 2-1/4 hours for 8 to 12 lb. turkey; 2-1/4 to 2-3/4 hours for 12 to 16 lb. turkey; 2-3/4 to 3-1/4 hours for 16 to 20 lb. turkey; 3-1/4 to 3-3/4 hours for 20 to 24 lb. turkey.-For easy slicing, cover turkey with foil and let stand 15 minutes a"er removing from oven.

Stu"ng!is is exactly how my mother wrote out the recipe there are no true measurements, I just wing it every year and just mix it all up till it seems moist and yummy and then of course it becomes even more moist as it cooks in the bird…Buy a package of Pepperidge Farm Herb Stu#-ing and mix it with bread that you have torn into pieces and let dry over night. Mix melted butter and chicken broth into stu%ng mix and stu# your turkey.* I use over a half a loaf of bread (more bread than Pepperidge Farm), about a stick of butter and probably 2 cups of broth.

The Recipe of the Week from The Happy Chefby Leigh Sackett

Foil-Wrapped Turkey

It happens every year: Christmas comes ear-lier. !is season, I saw

Christmas decorations in stores in August and it wasn’t a spe-cialty shop. National Public Radio, my usual listening post, played a Christmas song today. Maybe that’s because we had our $rst snowfall last night. It really doesn’t matter when the festivities are supposed to be-gin; everyone is trying to get the $rst oar in the water of holiday shopping.

When my children were small I wondered why my par-ents didn’t buy presents for their darling granddaughters. !e girls were equal opportunity gi" receivers: they liked everything. It wasn’t as though they were real choosy about what they got but my parents always sent a check which evoked little excite-ment from anybody. I resolved that when I was a grandparent, I would be di#erent. I would pick out fascinating gi"s that would cement their a#ection in a nev-er-to-be-forgotten fashion.

How things change! Not only have I never been able to select such a Christmas present for my grandchildren, I have marginal interest in venturing out for a shopping spree. My parents, long since departed, are probably smiling in heaven that I have taken up their easy way out of the feeding frenzy that the holidays have become. My daughters felt treasured by their grandparents despite the paucity of presents. I love my own grandchildren $ercely but visiting the mall for them? Not going to happen.

Alternatives abound. From

the privacy of my own One-Click Amazon account I can get anything and have it delivered to their homes. !e odds that it will be a thrilling package are no more than 50-50.

Why it seems bet-ter than a check I can’t explain, but the Gi" Card does light up their little eyes. Not only that, I can pick up a gi" card for a hundred di#er-ent venues in any supermarket. Place it in a cute little Christmas card and I’m all done.

When my daughters were ap-proaching middle-school age, the number of aunts, uncles, and cousins for which we had to Christmas shop approached the high double digits. Some-one in the family (a wise per-son, indeed) suggested that we (the adults) not exchange presents but rather pick out a charity and send a large check to them. When the children reached twelve years old they joined in and had their names added to the gi". I don’t think we asked them for a contribu-tion, but they got the idea. No one su#ered from lack of pres-ents on !e Day but they grew up remembering that tradition. Last year one of my daughters and her family gave a heifer to a mission project in our names. Glad she didn’t try to wrap it and put it under the tree.

I pick a project in which I am interested and make a contribu-tion in the name of many family members. Deciding where to send the money is fun. !ere

are no shortage of options both locally and beyond.

Giving money to charities is par-ticularly important this year. With the economy so deeply in the tank and sink-ing fast, that’s an area

that is getting hit hard and o"en. Any extra contri-butions will be es-

pecially welcome now.!ere’s a downside to this:

Merchants will su#er from de-creased gi" buying. !ey’re re-ally going to hurt this year and the supermarket-sold Gi" Card idea doesn’t do anything for the locally owned stores.

!ere’s no reason the two approaches can’t be combined. !ere are those to whom we really love to hand a gi"; there are those who would be equally thrilled by a contribution made in their honor.

If you do choose to give a present be certain that you are not “re-gi"ing” the person from whom you received a less-than-useful item last year. By sending money to where it’s really need-ed you can be sure you avoid that embarrassing moment.

Even though it’s not even !anksgiving yet, let’s try to keep the right perspective on each day leading up to the holi-days. It’s not going to be as easy this year but Jewish, Christian, or Muslim we can all walk in the same direction to help others.

Contact Hayden at [email protected]

Hayden Hollingsworth

The Gift ThingNormally, I am a very pa-

tient man. In fact, aside from still having most of my hair, the ability to withstand a substantial amount of non-sense is among my only redeemable quali-ties. Recently, that keen sense of tolerance has been tested by a collection of customer ser-vice professionals who seemed determined to drive me into a stroke induced coma.

All of you have encountered these "helpful" folks. To en-counter an actual human be-ing on the phone you must $rst dial the gauntlet of instructed key strokes on your telephone. Some menus might allow you to speak the numbers into the phone rather than use your dial pad, WARNING, steer clear of this option at all cost. !e site of a grown person repeatedly screaming the number "FOUR" head-faced into a handset is not a pretty sight. In fact, voice prompted phone systems are climbing the suicide charts as a leading cause of bridge jumping in males 35-50, falling third be-hind the economy and the Chi-cago Cubs.

Worse are the phone systems that employ a virtual switch-board person who can only understand the speci$c lan-guage they are programmed to comprehend. I battled such an entity last week, who, here and a"er will be referred to as "Vir-tual Betty." Regardless of what I said Betty responded, "I'm sorry, I am having trouble un-derstanding what you are say-ing". "Really?" I responded (for-getting for a moment that I was talking to a machine), "Do you mean nothing that I have said falls within your 250 word hard drive vocabulary?" To which she

replied "I'm sorry, I am having trouble, blah,blah,blah"….you know the rest. A vein in my fore-head began to take the shape of surfac-ing submarine, as I lashed out at my me-chanical antagonist, spewing a stream of profanity that would make Tony So-prano's crew blush. Perhaps shocked into submis-sion, my in&exible robot friend had apparently heard enough and immediately transferred me to a living breathing person in a matter of seconds. Had I unlocked the passage around Virtual Betty? Was her distaste for colorful language the chink in her amour?

Reaching the next level of customer service evolution (a human), I began my quest to have my issue resolved. I was funneled to a woman, who clearly specializes in foul mouthed customers who began our conversation by chastising me for even reaching her exten-sion. Either Betty had ratted me out or perhaps all of the par-ticularly vulgar calls were sent to my new friend automatically. When she was $nished scolding me, the woman put me on hold and transferred me to another department. A young man an-swered and quickly put me on hold again. Gentle hold music played (it sounded like a so"-ened instrumental version of "Highway to Hell," but perhaps I was mistaken). My Blackberry was beginning to feel hot on my ear. I continued to wait for an-other twelve minutes.

When "Noel" arrived back

on the phone he vol-leyed a series of ques-tions my way, trying to understand who I was and why I was calling. I explained that my last name was Kaufman and spelled my name for him. !is astonishing exchange followed.

Noel: Sir was the second letter of your last name an "a" or

an "eight?"Me: (laughing) An eight?

What am I a part number? No, it's an "a".

Noel: !ank you Mr. Co#-man

Me: Actually it's pronounced "Cowf-man".

Noel: (indignantly) No its not, its pronounced "Co#man!"

Me: Noel, are you telling me that I am mispronouncing my own name?

Noel: I guess.Me: (becoming a tad heated)

You guess? Maybe I should scare-up a séance, contact my Dad and let him know that NOEL has discovered that we have been saying our name in-correctly for all of these years?

Noel: Sir, can you hold for a moment?

Before, I could answer I was whisked away to phone purga-tory once again. Nine minutes passed and a familiar voice re-turned to the phone, it was my earlier nemesis, Virtual Betty. Betty's smiling voice prompted tears to well-up in my eyes, I had gone full circle. I tossed my phone down and placed a bag of ice on my throbbing head.

A wise fellow once said that patience and fortitude conquer all things, however, I doubt if that fellow had ever been sum-marily pummeled by a com-bination of technology, apathy and stupidity all in the same phone call. Patience has since tumbled o# that short list of Jon's virtues. On the bright side, I still have my hair.

Contact Jon [email protected]

Jon Kaufman

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CALENDAR> Nov. 21 & 22Northside Middle School PTA Annual Spaghetti Din-ner and Craft ShowFriday, Novemebr 21, 5 p.m. - 9 p.m., Craft Show. Spaghetti Dinner, 5 p.m. - 8 p.m.Saturday 22, 9 a.m. - 2 p.m., Craft Show, light refreshments, door prizes & silent auction.More crafters welcome, call NMS at 561-8145.For more- call Sheree Ander-son at 366-7048.

Compost WorkshopThe Roanoke Community Garden Association would like to announce a compost work-shop Saturday, November 22 When - 1:00pm. Where- The workshop will be held at one of the RCGA plots at 655 Highland Av SE.

Crystal Spring Silent Auc-tion fundraiserCrystal Spring will hold their annual fundraiser/Silent Auc-tion event. The proceeds will be used to fulfill the teachers’ wish list which includes items such as video projectors, digital camera supplies, and computer software.Where - Crystal Spring El-ementary School

> Nov. 21-24

Grandin Court Elementa-ry Book FairCome join for a coffee and tea tasting, musical performances by Beggars’ Circus, Bill Lininger, Stacy Hobbs, Cyrus Pace and Second Wynde. We have au-thors Leonard Adkins, Nelson Harris, Chris Manning, Tristan Perry and Scott Reighard avail-able for book signing. “Minds in Motion” students will be performing as well as Fourth Grade Spanish students and the Grandin Court Children’s Choir. Storytimes with teach-ers and student artwork will be displayed throughout the store.Where- Tanglewood Barnes & Noble

> Nov. 22Annual Grandin Village Holiday Children’s ParadeThe Grandin Village Business Association is sponsoring the Annual Grandin Village Holi-day Children’s Parade, Saturday November 22nd. Held the Sat-urday before Thanksgiving each year, this is a neighborhood fa-vorite and includes Santa on a Fire Engine and much more. No registration is required to participate and children of all ages are welcome. If you’d like to enter a float, come to the parking lot of Christ Lutheran

Church between 10:00 a.m. and 10:30 a.m. As this is a chil-dren’s parade, only small floats will be allowed (wagons, etc). No motorized vehicles, please. Scout groups, dance groups and baton twirlers are encouraged to participate as well. If music is needed for this type of group, then a motorized vehicle will be allowed for that purpose. Boy Scout Troop 8 will be col-lecting canned goods for char-ity so please bring a donation. When - 11 a.m. Where - The parade starts at Christ Lutheran Church (2011 Brandon Ave) on the corner of Grandin Road & Brandon Avenue and proceeds through Historic Grandin Village, ending at Mick or Mack (1312 Win-borne St.)

Concert with Jim MalcolmThe Scottish Foundation pres-ents in Concert JIM MAL-COLM performing the Songs of Robert Burns in celebration of Burns’ 250th anniversary. Jim is from Perth Scotland. When - Doors open at 7pm and concert is at 7:30 pm. Cost - Tickets at the door-SFVH and CPC members & seniors $12, non-members $15, students $8, and under 10 free.Where - Colonial Presbyterian Church, 3550 Poplar Drive,

Roanoke VA 24015. For more - Maggie at [email protected] or Charlene at [email protected] 540-982-2430

> Nov. 25Open Projector Nightn November 25, the historic Grandin Theatre will continue this trend of reinvigorating the valley’s arts scene with its fourth Open Projector Night. This event, held quarterly at the theatre in Raleigh Court, is open to the public and will consist of a screening of short films made by local filmmakers. However, Open Projector Night is more than just an ex-hibition of local artistic talent. Audience members are invited to give feedback and choose a crowd favorite, which will then be screened at the annual Best of Open Projector Night Showcase in December.When - 7 p.m.Where - Grandin TheatreCost - Tickets are $5.75For more - www.grandintheatre.com

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Neglected buildings make the 2008 Endangered Sites list

Neglect of seven vacant buildings, a century-old steam locomotive forgotten in a scrap yard and a city-owned stone wall was charged by the Roanoke Valley Preservation Foundation in its annual listing of Endangered Sites, announced recently.

When buildings are unoccupied and main-tenance stops, they deteriorate and lose value, the preservation group said. Ongoing neglect o"en raises the cost of renovation to more than the building is worth, creating white elephants. !e foundation is concerned that structures are maintained and cared for at a minimum level so they survive for renovation.

Leading the list in downtown Roanoke are the apparently abandoned Patrick Henry Hotel, closed last year, and the former Heironimus de-partment store, closed in 1996, brie&y reopened as an emporium of shops and $nally shut down in 2005. !e hotel could be auctioned if a tax bill is not paid by the end of the year,

!e threat of neglect is a bit unusual, said Mike Kennedy, foundation president. “So o"en, nowadays, it’s development that threatens our built heritage. With the slowing economy, I sup-pose we’ll see more neglect and fewer bulldozers tearing holes in our historic fabric.”

#ese neglected sites were selected by a foundation committee:

-A locomotive made in the old Norfolk & Western Railway East End Shops in 1911, le" in the former Virginia Scrap Iron yard since 1950. Its owner, the Transportation Museum, wants to sell two other old engines to pay for moving the locally made locomotive to the museum.

-!e former Adams, Payne & Gleaves livery stable was once used for storage by Virginia Scrap Iron. A brick, two-story structure probably built around 1900 near South Je#erson Street is the last known livery stable in Roanoke. Horses were kept there for the Adams, Payne $rm, a building materials supplier.

-!e 117-room Patrick Henry Hotel, opened in 1925, was closed in 2007 by its New York owner a"er being charged with inadequate $re protection. !e classic building, listed on the Na-tional Register of Historic Places, was purchased by investors in 1990. Ceilings have fallen and wa-ter has leaked. Proposals for senior living in the building failed to materialize.

-!e Heironimus department store build-ing has been vacant since 2005 when the last of several emporium shops closed. !e downtown store closed in 1996.

-A stone wall, in need of repair by the City of Roanoke, on Wasena Avenue

-Horton Building, on the southeast corner of Kirk Avenue and 1st St reet, SW, sold to a Char-lottesville $rm; is in need of exterior repair. A restaurant, !e Judge’s Chambers, is under de-velopment in one area but three other building fronts are o#ered for lease.

-1222 Campbell Avenue, SW, a cra"sman style house labeled as “a public nuisance…un$t for

human habitation,” by the City Code Enforce-ment o%ce. !e long vacant house has elephan-tine columns, a chimney of stone rubble and decorative notched ra"ers.

-Buena Vista, an 1850 mansion and former Southeast city recreation center, listed for sale; in need of a new roof and exterior repair.

-!e Burke cabin, also known as the Tanyard House a"er it was built in the 1850s. !e cabin, at Clay Street and !ompson Drive, is owned by Roanoke College. !e 11/2-story frame building has been vacant for years.

!e structures are in di#erent stages of ne-glect. Financial problems and uncertainty in the nation’s declining economy are expected to limit development even more in the future. Financial uncertainties are o"en blamed for neglect but the last decade has seen developers thrive.

Lack of adequate concern and commitment by landlords, especially absentee owners, o"en holds up repair and restoration. !e National Trust for Historic Preservation said that neglect of historic properties may be caused by “im-poverished owners, di%culties arising from un-settled estates or simply an uncaring attitude by owners.”

!e Trust also identi$es “a more disturbing trend…an owner’s intentional use of ‘demolition by neglect’ to circumvent legislation aimed at protecting historic properties.” If owners neglect properties by choice, their attitude may be, “If you won’t let me tear it down, then I’ll let it fall down.”

All six of the 2007 Endangered Sites remain under threat. !ey were the village of Bonsack, Elmwood Park, Buena Vista and Villa Heights, former recreation centers, Patrick Henry Hotel and the valley’s tree canopy.

In recent years, two of the endangered sites saved are the Fellers house on Hollins Road, soon to be a new campus for Blue Ridge Behav-ioral Healthcare unit and the Oliver Hill boy-hood home on Gilmer Avenue, now a Washing-ton & Lee University legal center.

On the other hand, a house at 806 Marshall Ave., SW, has been removed and log structures at Green$eld Plantation in Botetourt County, the corridors of Route 220 south and Route 122 in Franklin County and Roanoke Valley tree cano-py remain endangered. A Georgia developer has missed several timelines for a Bonsack project so a threat to that village may have been averted.

!e foundation’s aim is to call public attention annually to endangered sites in the fall and to se-lect successful preservation projects for awards in the spring.

!e annual meeting also featured a panel dis-cussion of protection of Roanoke Valley moun-taintops by Janet Scheid, county greenways planner; Ron Crawford, founder of the Read Mountain Alliance, and Gail Burress, a leader of the Mill Mountain Conservancy. !e meeting was held at the Discovery Center on Mill Moun-tain.

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Faith Christian School has hired Roanoke College gradu-ate Jacob Parr to be their new boys basketball coach. Parr takes over for Leon Caldwell, who resigned earlier this fall.

Parr was a student assistant for the Maroons’ varsity team during his time at Roanoke College, as well as an assistant coach for the junior varsity. A!er graduating in 2006, he attended Virginia Common-wealth University, where he received a Master’s degree in Sports Leadership and Coach-ing. He has also coached at the AAU level in Salem.

“One of my goals has always been to be a basketball coach,” Parr said. “I’m really excited about this opportunity.”

Parr inherits a young roster with no seniors. However, Parr remains optimistic about his team’s chances this season. "e Warriors boys squad struggled

last season under Caldwell, while the girls team went on to capture an independent small school state championship.

“"ey are very teachable and coachable, and they catch on to things very quickly,” Parr said.

As for his coaching style, Parr said he prefers to adapt it to the makeup of his roster.

“I like to base the way we play on my team, and do whatever best suits them,” he said. “For example, we’ve been working constantly on being tougher, and on our fundamentals, so that we do all the little things well.”

Parr let the players come up with their own goals and team rules, none of which focused on wins or losses.

“"e goals they made have nothing to do with how many games we win this year,” Parr said. “We talk a lot about just doing our part, controlling

what we can control, and let-ting the rest work itself out.”

"e Warriors tip o# their season on November 25 at home against Gateway Chris-tian Academy.

By Matt [email protected]

Faith Christian School hires new boys basketball coach

Sure, he talked about it in training camp last summer and every coach wants one, but winning the Virginia Independent School Division III title was a goal North Cross players set for themselves early on. So says Lee Johnson, the second year head coach who just led the Raiders to a state title last weekend.

“Its one thing to talk about it, its another thing to get there and do it,” said Johnson several days a!er North Cross beat Blessed-Sacrament 21-6. “I don’t think people realize how hard it is to get one. Everything has to come together.”

Good health, a dash of luck and dedicated play-ers were all part of the mix. "e Raiders defense, “probably the most underrated thing about our program,” said Johnson did the job when the explosive o#ense wasn’t on the $eld. “We got so much better defensively. It was hard to score points on us.”

Johnson said his Raiders were itching for a re-match with Blessed Sacrament a!er losing to the Knights in the opener. "e title game on hostile

turf was “very business-oriented,” said the win-ning head coach, who le! a public school job at Glenvar to succeed Jim Muscaro at North Cross. "e Raiders (11-1 overall) didn’t get frazzled when they fell behind 6-0, something the team talked about with Johnson and his coaching sta# earlier in the week. “We stayed the course…and stuck with the game plan, and ended up taking it over. It was a good night,” said Johnson.

Johnson said he loses a great group of seniors “that really bought in to this thing two years ago.” But, many younger players on the roster gained valuable experience in 2008, especially in some of the Raider’s blowout wins.

“I’m proud of the way they went a!er it week a!er week a!er week.” "ere will be a banner hoisted at North Cross and probably a rally, then said Johnson it will be time to look ahead: “we can enjoy it for a little bit, then we’ve got to get to work for next year.”

Winning a state title was player’s goal says Johnson


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(Above) North Cross coach Lee Johnson prowls the practice field early in the season. (Top Right). Standout North Cross wide out Sidney Brown hauls in a pass against Blessed Sacrament Hugenot. (Bottom Right) After falling behind 6-0 in the first half, the North Cross defense stiffened and held the Knights to less than 40 yards in the second half – half of which came on a single play.

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SPORTS | The Roanoke Star-Sentinel | 11/21/08


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State runners-up: in their $rst trip ever to the Group AA volleyball $nal four in Richmond, the Hidden Valley Titans came up just one match short. Hidden Valley lost to Loudon County last weekend a!er beating Salem in the $ve-game semi$nal on Friday. "e Titans, under head coach Carla Ponn Po#, $nished 24-5 on the season.

Photo by Cheryl Hodges

The Hidden Valley Titans celebrate their second place finish in Richmond last Saturday. Gath-ered around the trophy are Samantha Ringer (on crutches), Sam Klostermann, Emily Gooding (#4),Liz Burke, Eva Delaney, Jessica Church, Lottie Meadows, Kathryn Reichel, Kimberly McDow.

Titans take second place

What started with now-Yankee farmhand Mikey O’Brien in the spring contin-ued recently as Hidden Valley High School sees three more of its senior star athletes put their name on the dotted line this year for college scholar-ships. Swimmer Lauren Hines is headed to the University of Richmond, while both Ben Boggs and Abby Redick are Virginia Tech-bound.

Boggs caught the eye of Vir-ginia Tech men’s basketball coach Seth Greenberg during a summer camp he attended even before he came to Hid-den Valley. He knew he could be a Hokie at that point.

“I really liked having made my decision at the start of last year,” said Boggs a!er a cer-emonial signing with Redick and Hines. “I didn’t have to worry about who is in the crowd watching. I think it’s the best $t for me.”

Boggs said his relationship with Greenberg is probably the best of any coach that re-cruited him.

“I think he is a players coach [although] he’ll be tough on you at times.” Greenberg said. Boggs will work on quickness, getting stronger, the longer three-point shot and the over-all speed of the college game while spending his last season on the court for Hidden Val-ley.

Hines has been at Hidden Valley for just a year-plus a!er transferring from Brookville High School in the Lynchburg. “I just couldn’t picture myself doing anything else in college,” said Hines, a sprinter who also competes for the Gators club, about her decision to keep swimming with the Spiders program. “I’ve always wanted to swim at a D1 school,” said Hines.

Redick may be out all year for the Titans while she mends a torn ACL in her right knee, but Tech coach Beth Dunken-

berger o#ered her a scholar-ship anyway.

“It’s a huge blessing. Not many coaches would do that,” said Redick, who can see her-self playing both forward posi-tions in college.

“Its obvious Virginia Tech is the place I’m supposed to be with [that] support.” Redick said she got an “awesome vibe,” from the whole Hok-ies coaching sta# and “chills” when Dunkenberger o#ered her a scholarship.

Redick was able to start run-ning recently for the $rst time in three months. While on the mend she may help do a little coaching from the Titans, something she hopes to do af-ter college. With new Hidden Valley coach Brenda King bat-tling cancer a quartet of people led by Bobby Beecher will $ll.

“Its going to be a good expe-rience, at least to see what goes on,” said Redick, who is the last of $ve children in the family to earn Division I athletic schol-arships. “You can de$nitely learn from older brothers and sisters. For my parents not having to pay college tuition, it’s a huge blessing.”

Proud father Ken Redick said it was “truly by the grace of God,” that all $ve children earned scholarships. “Abby is the culmination of a lot of hard work by all the kids. She has learned from all of the ob-stacles they had to overcome.” Older brother J.J., a Cave Spring High School graduate, now plays pro basketball for the Orlando Magic.

Jeannie Redick said her youngest daughter has been on the phone with older sister Catie, who also tore an ACL: “I think she’ll be able to make the transition [to college] re-ally well.” "ere are no more Redick children – but an in-fant granddaughter is already about four inches longer than normal, says Ken Redick, who played small college basket-ball. Stay tuned.

Hidden Valley athletes see hard work pay o#

Lauren Hines, Abby Redick and Ben Boggs.

"e William Fleming Colo-nels’ season ended with a thud on Saturday a!ernoon at Patrick Henry Stadium a!er a lackluster 35-6 loss to Liberty-Bealeton in the semi$nals of the Northwest Region Tournament.

"e proli$c o#ense that car-ried William Fleming for most of the season was nowhere to be found on Saturday, as the Colo-nels were held to under 50 yards of total o#ense.

“We didn’t play very well across the board,” Coach Rob Senseney said. “We had some mistakes and missed opportu-nities, and just didn’t play a very good game.”

Defensively, the Colonels were unable to contain the

Eagles balanced attack, which rolled up over 400 yards.

Liberty-Bealeton took con-trol of the game a!er a mistake by William Fleming early in the $rst quarter. On the Colonels’ $rst possession of the game, an errant snap from the shotgun sailed over quarterback Derek Brown’s head. Brown recovered the ball and tried to make a play, but was hit and fumbled in the end zone. "e Eagles recovered for an early 6-0 lead, and would not look back.

A!er Eagles’ quarterback Nick Potts threw for one of his three touchdown passes to make it 14-0, the Colonels’ of-fense $nally showed signs of life, putting together a nice drive that culminated in a short touchdown run by LaCalvin Hickman that closed the mar-

gin to 14-6. But the Eagles of-fense marched right back down the $eld and scored again, this time on the ground, and led 21-6 at the half.

Despite the loss, Senseney remains proud of his team and hopeful for the future.

“"ey’re a good football team,” Senseney said. “It was one of those days. We told the boys that losses like this only hurt if you don’t learn anything from them. We still had a re-ally good season, and we have a solid core for next year, so we’ll see what happens.”

"e Colonels $nish the sea-son with a record of 9-2, and as the champions of the Western Valley District.

Colonels successful season ends in Northwest Regional Playo#s

Photos by Bill Turner

The Colonel defense strips the ball from an Eagle ball carrier (Left). Fleming running back #17 LaCalvin Hickman (Above) breaks into the open. Hickman man-aged just 34 yards on the day.

By Matt [email protected]

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Puzzle on Page 4

SPORTS 11/21/08 |The Roanoke Star-Sentinel |


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The Roanoke Star U 17 Boys Premier Blue soccer team recently completed their Blue Ridge Classic League season finishing first in their division with 8 wins and no losses. Only 4 goals were scored against the team in league play. Pictured are: First row: Scott Harriman, Tim Henderson, Tyler Farrar, Andrew Strauss, Collin Overacker, Marcus Rosti, Michael Farmer, and Ryan Armitage. Second Row: Coach Matt Neale, Ben Harris, Eric Bartocci, Jamison McCarty, Will Dooley, Chris Cook, Eric Imhof, Landon Epperly, Ben Nowak, Pratik Mody and Joe McAvoy. Not pictured is Evan Johnson. Goalkeepers are Will Dooley and Chris Cook.

Salem general manager John Katz joked that any o#ended New York Yankee fans can sit on the visitor’s side – they are still welcome at the ballpark – but there was no denying the excite-ment as the newly-christened Salem Red Sox welcomed local baseball fans to Tanglewood Mall last Saturday. “Sawx” supporters lined up in a queue a 75 feet long or better to meet 2009 Salem Red Sox Manager Chad Epperson, sev-eral ball players who may not even be here and, most importantly, to have their pictures taken with the 2004 World Series trophy while wear-ing a championship ring.

“We’re really excited about being here,” said Epperson, who is familiar with the Carolina League and Salem Memorial Baseball Stadium from 2006, when he managed rival Wilming-ton. “Its great to come out here and see people excited about [being] part of "e Nation.”

Katz said several curious Yankee fans that did show up refused to have their picture tak-en with the 2004 trophy. "at was the year the Boston Red Sox overcame a 3-0 Yankee playo# series lead to advance to the $rst World Series they would win in 86 years. "ey won another last year. Kristi Maupin, who attends Radford University, had no problem posing with the trophy and ring. “I’ve always been a Boston fan,” said Maupin, who hails originally from Waynesboro.

Fenway Sports Group, which owns the ma-jor league club, purchased the Single-A fran-chise in Salem a year ago, when the Houston Astros had a year le! on its agreement. Nancy Griggs was on hand in part as a stand-in for her husband Douglas, the real Sox fan in the fam-ily. Douglas is from Boston and “his dad took him to [Fenway Park] when Ted Williams was playing,” said Briggs. “He’s just been waiting for them to become the [Salem] Red Sox. He can’t wait to get out there.”

Katz said he notices people all over the val-ley wearing Red Sox gear, but the outpouring of enthusiasm at Tanglewood Mall was a pleas-ant surprise. “"is certainly exceeded our ex-pectations and was a whole lot of fun.” Some season ticket prices will be rolled back to 1995 levels next spring and Katz promises other fan-friendly innovations. “From the moment they pull into the parking lot until the moment they leave [the ball park experience] is going to be taken to the next level.”

"e name change was not a shocker, since the

Red Sox brand has been the most marketable in all of baseball for the past few years. Most of the fans at Tanglewood Mall were younger, although at least one on hand, George Sloane, remembered the Roanoke Red Sox, a Boston farm team that played at Maher Field on Re-serve Avenue, and recalled when "e Splendid Splinter himself - Ted Williams - made an ap-pearance here for an exhibition game in the late ‘40’s.

Sloane remembers Williams taking a poor kid through the gate when he played here, a game he didn’t see himself because he couldn’t a#ord the admission fee. "e 74 year old “thought I was gonna die before I ever saw them win a World Series. I’ve been a Red Sox fan all my life.”

Baseball is a family thing; Sloane’s daughter in suburban New York City paid a visit to Babe Ruth’s grave when the Sox were down 3-0 to the Yankees in ’04, asking for a miracle. Ruth was a star pitcher for Boston before the Sox sold his contract to the Yankees. Sloane’s daughter took beer and hot dogs to the Bambino’s grave as an o#ering, and well, the rest is history as they say.

Roanoke City Councilwoman Gwen Mason and 6th District Congressman Bob Goodlatte, both transplants and ardent Red Sox fans, also showed up for the festivities at Tanglewood. “I think this is very cool,” said Goodlatte, who knows some of the older Sox fans in the area, their interest kindled long ago by the Roanoke Red Sox. “Its great to have them back in town,” added Goodlatte.

Red Sox franchise comes to the valley

Salem Red Sox manager Chad Epperson (bottom right) and several ball players sign autographs at Tanglewood Mall.


Raiders fullback Brent Ring (#5), shown diving across the goal line in a semifinal playoff win against Isle of Wight, was incor-rectly identified in last week’s Star-Sentinel edition. No doubt Ring was all smiles last Friday as the North Cross School varsity football team defeated Blessed Sacrament-Huguenot Catholic School by a score of 21-6 to win the VISAA Division III State Football Championship. Blessed Sacrament had beaten North Cross (11-1) to open the regular season but coach Lee Johnson’s team stormed back last Friday after trailing early to pull away for the title victory.

Correction … and congratulations:

Photo by Bill Turmer

During the month of October, the Hidden Valley High School community learned one of its own was diagnosed with cancer. Recently appointed Girls Basketball Coach, Brenda King, was about to undergo the toughest battle she has ever faced.

"e community has since rallied together, hosting many dif-ferent fundraising activities to help with the costs Brenda and her family have incurred. HVHS hosted a Student vs. Faculty Bas-ketball Game on October 31st with ticket donation money going to the family. In addition, Marketing students and Relay for Life members asked for donations at the HV vs. Pulaski and HV vs. Cave Spring football games. Other activities sponsored by di#er-ent organizations include selling HV4BK t-shirts and Fight Like a King bracelets as well as a “Jeans Week” option for the faculty at HVHS with a donation to the family. "e total so far for these ac-tivities has been $10,699.78. T-shirts and bracelets are still avail-able and can be ordered by contacting the school.

"e Hidden Valley community has not been alone in its en-deavors. Cave Spring High School sold “Boograms” on Hallow-

een, raising over $1200. An 8-team Girls Jamboree is scheduled at Pulaski High School on Saturday, November 22. Coach King previously coached at Pulaski HS. "ere will be no charge for ad-mission; however, donations are being accepted. Pulaski County HS is also selling tshirts. Finally, the Brenda King Hoops Bene$t will take place at Roanoke College December 20 and 21. For more information, or to get your AAU team involved, go to www.slam-dunkbasketball.com/.

"e Hidden Valley community would like to thank everyone in the Roanoke Valley and surrounding areas for its support over the past month. "is has truly been a tremendous e#ort from many di#erent people as we help Brenda to Fight Like a King.

For more information, please contactHidden Valley High School

Katrina KishPhone: (540) 776-7320

E-mail: [email protected]

Still “Fighting like a King”

Varsity Volleyball On Fri., Nov. 7, the North

Cross School Varsity Volleyball team defeated Southampton Academy in $ve games to ad-vance to the $nal of the VISAA State Tournament. A!er losing the $rst two games to South-ampton in the semi-$nals, the Raiders fought back and won the next three games. ""e girls did not roll over and give up. "ey pushed every point, one at a time, until the match was over," said Varsity Head Coach Heather Donaho. "e Raiders advanced to the $nal match be-tween Blue Ridge Conference rival Grace Christian School on Sat., Nov. 8. "e Raiders battled on and played a close match. Unfortunately, the girls could not get a run on their rival. Grace Christian went on to win their seventh straight State title. "We had taken two games from Grace earlier in the season, so I knew it would be a close match.

"e girls played their hearts out, and I could not have asked for more than that," said Donaho. "We look forward to meeting up with Grace again next year and bringing the title home." "e Raiders ended the season with a 19-8 record, taking second in the State with two members, Sarah Jessee and Marli Daba-reiner, making the VISAA All-Tournament team.

Varsity Field Hockey"e Varsity Field Hockey

team ended their season in Fredericksburg, VA, falling to the number one seed Freder-icksburg Academy. Although they fell short (2-4), the Raiders scored two goals on Fredericks-burg Academy and held their opponents scoreless in the sec-

ond half. “"e team had a great season,

and I’m so proud of their deter-mination and positive attitude. We look forward to repeating our success next year with a strong returning group of play-ers,” said Varsity Field Hockey Coach Emily Phillips.

"e young $eld hockey team had a slow start to their season but $nished strong. "e team ended with an overall record of 7-8 and a Blue Ridge Confer-ence record of 6-2.

North Cross Varsity update

VALLEY BUSINESS | The Roanoke Star-Sentinel | 11/21/08 TheRoanokeStar.com

For over an hour Monday afternoon Roanoke City Council bantered about three options relating to the time extension for the Ivy Market Walgreen’s.

On October 23, Council tabled the resolution in order to better assess consequences the developer would undergo should the April 30, 2009, Phase One extension request result in default and/or the Phase Two completion date is not met.

This was the fourth extension to the performance agree-ment of November 18, 2004, which gave IMD $9 million of incentives over 15 years for two Phases. The opening of Wal-green’s along with Ukrop’s would be considered completion of Phase One. Additional retail space, parking, and infrastruc-ture for a Phase Two with a completion date of November 18, 2009. was determined to be unattainable.

On voice vote the resolution was taken off the table. Mayor Bowers after some discussion with the city attorney, William Hackworth, entertained a motion to remove the original op-tion from the docket. This motion passed.

This left two options before Council - Option “A” and op-tion “B“. Option “A” would have reduced the $9 million of incentives to approximately $6.5 million assuming that Wal-green’s (Phase One) completes by April 30, 2009 with default of Phase Two. Option “B” would have extended the maximum

yearly grant of $600,000 that IMD could receive out through the 15 years without completing Phase Two and would result in much less revenue for the city. If IMD did not meet the Walgreen’s completion date then default would result in no grant funds being honored.

The attorney for Bland Painter, III, owner of IMD was Neal Keesee, Jr., of Woods Rogers Attorneys. Keesee said that his client preferred Option “A” with amendments. This resulted

in lengthy discussion between attorneys, client, and Council. Mayor Bowers attempted to table the resolution to give the City attorney, administration, and developer time to work it out. The motion to table failed. Council member Alvin Nash suggested that the December 1st deadline be extended to December 17th resulting in another motion to table which barely passed.

The resolution was taken off the table at the 7:00 PM meet-ing and according to Brian Townsend, Assistant Manager for Community Development, Phase One and Phase Two were “essentially decoupled” and that a Phase One only agreement will continue for the next 14 years upon the opening of Wal-green’s by April 30, 2009. In addition the agreement will only allow IMD to request one half of the revenue derived in the form of a grant request beginning July, 2010, for the remain-ing years. The resolution passed unanimously.

Townsend said, “if the City wants to contemplate an agree-ment for Phase Two [then] that will be its own agreement” and added that the IMD had not yet purchased any of the Phase Two property.

IMD granted extension for Walgreen’s Completion


The 9th annual Green Living & Energy Expo this past weekend at the Roanoke Civic Center’s special events hall featured special-ized contractors, energy management ser-vices, manufacturers with products that help conserve energy and several localities show-ing off how they have gone greener. Skip Decker, who spearheads Roanoke City’s solid waste recycling efforts, was there to with an award the city government has received for its drive to become greener.

There were wind turbines, solar panels and electric bike kits from Roanoker Brent Baker, whose e-Power Wheels company was

showing off $500, 70 lb. packages that turn a manual cycle into one that can be powered by electric battery. Baker gave out information explaining that as of January 2009 employ-ers can give workers $20 a month tax-free for expenses related to bike commuting - which can then be written off by the firm. The new law was actually part of the $700 million bail-out package passed in Congress, according to Baker. The Association of Energy Conserva-tion Professionals stages the Green Living & Energy Expo.

Green Living expo offers alternatives, ideas


Skip Decker mans the Roanoke City booth at the 9th Annual Green Living and Energy Expo


"e Hotel Roanoke and Conference Center has been honored among the Best of the South, an award that is bestowed by readers of the prestigious Meetings South, a publication read by thousands of meet-ing planners and meetings industry professionals.

"e Hotel Roanoke and Conference Center was chosen from hundreds of hotels throughout the South, and was one of just 56 properties to be designated Best of the South and one of three from the state of Virginia.

"e Meetings South’s award is voted upon by the publication’s meeting planner readers who are in-vited to vote for those properties that delivered the highest quality of service and expertise, and pro-vided %awless, memorable meetings. "e publication asked readers to choose their favorite properties based on certain criteria, including the quality of meeting space, guest rooms, sta#, service, food and beverages, amenities, activities and value. Planners who voted were required to choose properties they had used within the last two years.

“We're extremely proud of this award and the presence that the Hotel Roanoke has created in Vir-ginia and the South,” said Gary Walton, general manager of "e Hotel Roanoke and Conference Center. “"ese awards are earned through the hard work and dedication of our sta# and by the support of our guests and customers. It is especially gratifying to be the recipient of this industry award.”

"e Hotel Roanoke & Conference Center wins Best of the South Award

"e Clean and Green Business Coalition held a press conference on Friday, Nov. 21, at Orvis on Campbell Avenue, to announce the emis-sions target set out by its members. "e Coali-tion has set a target to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from each business' operation by a total of 20 percent over a period of $ve years (at 4 percent per year).

""e purpose of the Business Coalition is to provide leadership across all sectors in the re-gion. By setting goals that are double the com-munity standard, we are making a signi$cant commitment to the greening of the Roanoke Valley," says Stan Breakell, president of Breakell Inc., one of the Coalition's charter members.

In March, a number of Roanoke's top employ-ers and businesses joined e#orts to create the Coalition. Co-chaired by City Council Member Gwen Mason and Stan Breakell, the Coalition's mission is to identify and implement environ-mentally sound business practices, including the development of sustainable business plans, the tracking of carbon emissions, and recy-cling.

"As an employer in the Roanoke Valley and a provider of a green energy source, natural gas, we believe it is important for our company to take a leadership role in protecting the environ-ment. Not only are we taking steps within our company, we encourage our employees to be conscious of the environment in their personal lives as well," says Dale Lee, vice-president and secretary at RGC Resources.

By joining the city in monitoring green-house gas emissions, encouraging green plan-ning, and practicing conservation responsibly in business routines and processes, the private sector is demonstrating true leadership in envi-ronmental stewardship.

Member companies of the Coalition in-clude: Berglund Chevrolet, Breakell Inc., Car-ilion Clinic, Fralin and Waldron, Gentry Locke Rakes and Moore, HSMM AECOM , J.M. Turn-er Company, Lanford Brothers Co. Inc.,Orvis, RGC Resources, SunTrust Bank, Steel Dynam-ics, Virginia Western Community College

Environmental business coalition to announce emissions target

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ARTS & CULTURETheRoanokeStar.com 11/21/08 |The Roanoke Star-Sentinel |

Australia: Land Beyond Time is a breathtaking jour-ney through the exotic, sur-real and dramatic natural en-vironment of Australia. With its endless coastline and vast expanses of parched, sandy desert, this continent harbors unique inhabitants and strik-ing scenery.

At the Science Museum of Western Virginia’s MegaDome "eatre (Center in the Square), moviegoers will watch kan-garoos bound larger than life across the museum’s 40-foot dome.

"e giant screen brings to life koalas, burrowing mice, thorny devils, platypus, giant

lizards and an assortment of $sh, frogs, birds and dingoes—with survival skills that sur-pass any TV reality show. "e $lm explores the continent’s incredible landscape and its inhabitants’ amazing ability to adapt, overcome and even %ourish in the most threaten-ing and tumultuous of condi-tions. "e didgeridoo sounds throughout the score and nar-

ration is by Alex Scott, a well-known Australian Shakespear-ean actor

Australia: Land Beyond Time is produced by Living Pictures (Australia) Pty Lim-ited, in collaboration with the Houston Museum of Natural Science; Museum of Science, Boston; Cincinnati Museum Center; Denver Museum of Nature & Science; and the Museum of Science, Museum Victoria (Australia). Austra-lia: Land Beyond Time meets Virginia Science Standards of Learning requirements for many grades. For show times, visit www.smwv.org or call 540/342-5710.

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Well-known Roanoke painter Eric Fitzpatrick is one of many artists hoping that the excitement and buzz associated with the Taubman Museum opening doesn’t end. He hopes it will help create more art patrons for local galleries, and street fairs like the one in which he recently exhibited just three blocks away from the museum ribbon cutting.

“I think it will good for everyone,” said Fitzpatrick. “Any time you ratchet up the excitement in the arts community …its good for all of us. Something’s percolating in the air now. You can see the new galleries cropping up [and] the Art Walk on "ursday nights. “I think the museum was indirectly and now directly is responsible for that energy.” Fitzpatrick will teach a class for the Taubman next summer and sees it as a “great resource in terms of knowledge.”

"en there is the Taubman’s unique design: “I’m in love with the building, I think its just the most amazing structure,” added Fitzpatrick, whose brother Bev runs the Virginia Museum of Transportation and was a member of City Council. “Its such a great thing for Roanoke – its not oversold ... the most outstand-ing thing we’ve ever had around here.”


Eric Fitzpatrick calls the Taubman “a great thing” for Roanoke.

Local artist encouraged by Taubman’s arrival


Mill Mountain "eatre Education Director Ginger Poole said she would “prob-ably characterize myself as an actor-dancer-singer.” Hired last spring for that post, Poole has acted in or choreographed at number of productions at Mill Mountain and will do so again during the 2008-2009 season. "is is her third season at MMT; she’s acted in “Don’t Dress for Dinner” and “Hank Williams: Lost Highway.”

Poole has choreographed “Into the Woods,” “Stinky Cheese Man,” “Big River,” “Arabian Nights” and the most recent production, “Spit$re Grill.”

“I’ve always been drawn to the stage,” said Poole, a profes-sional dancer in her teens who was “burned out,” before she went to college and became motivated again to pursue act-ing.

"e education post, where she conducts classes for ev-eryone from small children to adults, provides a “great blend, as far as my …background. To put all elements that I love into one career, it’s been really wonderful.” She has added classes that focus on dance and movement. Some of her students have acted before or have taken classes, but many have not.

“It’s a good balance,” said Poole. Fostering an apprecia-tion of the arts and building self-con$dence are her two primary goals.

Poole’s predecessor at Mill Mountain, Pat Wilhelms, has now started an educa-tional theater program based at the Taubman Museum of Art. Poole and Wilhelms had worked together on several productions previously.

"e South Carolina native grew up in Atlanta, earned a Master’s of Fine Arts for act-ing in Mississippi, and then lived in North Carolina, where she was involved with the Flat

Rock Playhouse before com-ing to Roanoke. Poole had worked previously with Mill Mountain’s producing artistic director, Patrick Benton, when he was at a theater in Jackson, Ms., so there was a comfort level there. Benton brought her to Roanoke several years ago for “Don’t Dress for Din-ner.”

“I really love it,” said Poole of the Star City, “it’s really easy to move here.”

“Roanoke is very lucky to have [live] theater right here,” says Poole, who marvels at all of the cultural o#erings con-centrated downtown. “It really is an amazing city. We’re very lucky.”

Poole is challenged by her young students and tries to challenge them. During one nine- week class geared to-wards middle schoolers she remains lively and animated, trying to keep the small group’s

attention. During the course (priced at $150) they will memorize lines, learn where to stand (blocking) and put on a small skit for parents at the end, complete with curtain calls and playbills. Getting to that point can be a formidable task.

“"ey [challenge] me every day. It does require a lot of en-ergy,” she said.

Ten year old Zachary Essig is one of those taking part in a class titled “Monologues, Scenes and Everything in Between.” "e North Cross School student is drawn to acting and has been in several Mill Mountain productions: “I get to be someone else that I’m not.”

“I like people looking at me and I like being a di#erent character,” said Jessica Leon-ard, who attends Read Moun-tain Middle School. She also says Poole is “great.” "e act-

ing experience has also helped her in school with poise and con$dence issues. A fondness for the limelight seems to be a prerequisite: “I love being in front of people, acting, sing-ing, dancing, whatever,” said Layla Harless, who travels from Franklin County to take Poole’s class.

If nothing else, being in a live theater environment may spur young students to return later on to watch a play – or it may bring back the parents for a class.

Poole says her love for chil-dren and for the profession provides all the motivation re-quired. If some of them wind up in Mill Mountain produc-tions that’s even better. “I want to grow our own so to speak. I would love to see [students] come back as an intern, or as a professional.” (see millmoun-tain.org for more on upcom-ing classes)

Zach Essig, Jay Forehand, Layla Harless, Jessica Leonard, R.J. Ragland and Eleanor Sizemore with education director Ginger Poole.

Mill Mountain "eatre education director loves her kids and her profession

"e Arts Council of the Blue Ridge recently announced this year’s People’s Choice Award winner. Betsy Hale Bannan of Roanoke received the award for her piece, “Our Girl in Tinian.” "e People’s Choice Award was chosen by votes cast by visitors to the show. "e award is sponsored by the City of Roanoke. "e 2008 Roanoke City Art Show was comprised of 43 works by 32 regional artists.

"e juror for the exhibition was Helen Frederick, Professor and Coordinator of Printmak-ing, and director of Naviga-tion Press in the Department of Art and Visual Information Technology at George Ma-son University. According to

Frederick, “Our Girl in Tin-ian falls into the symbolic cat-egory. Both large in scale and impact it speaks of seasoned hands that know what to do with color and form to convey powerful content. Betsy Hale Bannan is fearless in her oil on linen rendition of 'Our Girl…' who embodies mythical pro-portions”.

“Our Girl in Tinian.”

Art Show People’s Choice Award Winner announced

Land Down Under comes to Science Museum of Western VA

Just in time for the holidays, local jazz guitarist Je# Todd has released “Season’s Greetings,” a Christmas CD featuring a com-bination of traditional hymns and secular songs. Vocalists Deborah Liles and Ashleigh Judd, described by Todd as “two close friends with very di#er-ent styles” can be heard in sev-eral of the pieces. Both Todd, a cardiologist by trade, and Liles, perform in locations across southwest Virginia throughout the year, occasionally joining forces to perform at venues held nearby such as Center in the Square, to the mountain set-ting of Chateau Morrisette, and many places in between.

“Season’s Greetings” is Todd’s $rst foray into producing, which he did here locally at Flat 5 Stu-dios in Salem. Todd and lifelong friend Craig Howland, a drum-mer, had wanted to put together a CD for years, and with the advent of digital technology, it

became easy and a#ordable to do so. Todd observes that one of the neat things about the process was “being able to do exactly what I wanted, and how I wanted.” He looks forward to putting out a new CD every two years or so, allowing him to continue to focus on his music, which he considers to be an im-portant and meaningful part of his life.

“Season’s Greetings” is avail-able at CDBaby.com and locally at Barnes and Noble. For more on Todd, visit www.myspace.com/je&oddjazzguitar

Local doctor releases holiday CD


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Holiday Jazz on the Mezzanine

Tuesday, Dec. 9, 6-8 pm

Roanoke Main Library

Lenny Marcus Trio performing the works of Vince Giraldi (Charlie Brown’s Christmas), among other jazz classics and originals.

information 540-853-1057free seasonal refreshments dancing

Scott Blanding attended Cave Spring High School in Roanoke County, then went on to study $lm and media arts at Temple University in Phila-delphia. Several years ago Blanding and another Temple alum, Brad Labriola, began shooting a documentary in Africa as part of a school proj-ect: Women in War Zones- Sexual Violence in the Congo.

"ousands of women have been victims of violent gang rapes in the Eastern Democratic Re-public of Congo since Hutu rebels, known as the Interahamwe, %ed Rwanda a!er the genocide in 1994.

“"e most devastating loss of life since World War II,” said Blanding. “We just don’t hear about it.” As many as 20 rebel military factions remain, preying upon poor villagers, especially women, for their survival. "ese women are o!en aban-doned by their husbands a!er being raped, le! to raise children, some a byproduct of the sexual as-sault.

Scott Blanding’s sister Melanie, who shot still pictures used in the documentary, $rst interested her brother in the project- and the plight of these Congolese women. She had been there the year before and visited Ponzi Hospital, where many of the abused women were recovering. “She was determined to go back to Congo and do a bigger project,” said Scott Blanding. Small grants, church congregations and their families supported the trio’s mission.

Blanding is the co-director, producer and the cinematographer of Women in War Zones, which was $lmed in 2006 and then edited. It will be screened in Roanoke this Sunday, November 23 at 3pm, at First Presbyterian Church on Je#erson St. “Giving a voice to the voiceless,” said Blanding about what he hopes the 63-minute $lm does.

Blanding, a 2008 Temple graduate, is now look-ing at graduate school $lm programs in New York and Los Angeles. He would like to continue mak-ing documentaries but also wants to explore the world of feature $lms. He spent several weeks a!er arriving in Congo making sure the women at Ponzi Hospital were comfortable with having a $lm made about them. “"ey [were] still sort-ing through a lot of psychological and emotion-al wounds,” said Blanding, “but we found out it wasn’t a problem.”

In fact what struck Blanding about his trip to the Congo was how optimistic many of these women were about the future. “"e ability of the women and girls … to keep hope alive despite everything they’re going through and really unite together.” Women in War Zones is “a really sad project in a lot of ways, but we also think it’s really inspirational.”

Women in War Zones- Sexual Violence in the Congo: November 23 at 3pm, at First Presbyterian Church on Je#erson St.

Local $lmmaker screens “Women in War Zones”


Scott Blanding works with women and children while filming on location in the Congo.

Author CeCe Bell gained some notoriety a while back with the Sock Monkey book series, based on a homemade toy that brought her some comfort years ago. Now she returns with another chil-dren’s book she also illustrated. “Bee-Wigged” is all about a bee that didn’t want to scare the kids he went to school with. Jerry $nds what he thinks is a wig, and $gures that wearing it will make him appear more like a boy, enabling him to $t in better. “Because he’s a bee everyone is afraid of him,” says Bell, who is married to another author and local journalist, Tom Angleberger.

“Jerry looked at himself in the mirror. He had a wonderful thought – if he looked like a boy instead of a bee, maybe people would $nally like him,” reads a passage from the book. Bell wrote “Bee-Wigged” from personal experience, having grown up with a hearing problem. She reads lips to get by because her hearing is very poor.

"e Montgomery County author, who studied illustration and design at Kent State University in

Ohio, will hold a launch party for “Bee-Wigged” this Saturday, November 22nd, at the Meadow-brook Community Center in Shawsville, from 1 to 5pm. "e book will also be available at Ram’s Head bookstore (Towers Shopping Center) in Roanoke.

"e mother of two small children says “Bee-Wigged” is a book about “$tting in and discovering that if you are nice and kind and helpful to other people you can actually make friends that way.” Bell said she tried harder to $t in as a child when attending elementary school in Salem, something made more di'cult 30 years ago since the cumbersome hearing aid devices of the time made her stand out and subject to teasing.

Bell was determined to make good grades and be nice to fellow students, using her sense of hu-mor to bridge the gap. It wasn’t all about appearance, as Jerry the boy-sized bee $nally realizes in “Bee-Wigged.” “I hope [young readers] learn that lesson early on.”

Roanoke “Sock Monkey” author is back with “Bee-Wigged”

By Gene Marrano • [email protected]

the roanoke star-sentinel

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