By KENDALL OWENS
T-H Staff Writer
Several Forrest City streets and alleys received facelifts last week as part of the city's upkeep program.
Mayor Larry Bryant said several projects completed last week were part of a continuing effort to keep the city's streets in good condition. In addition to resurfacing work on several city streets, crews also paved a pair of streets recently incorporated.
Residents on Ophelia Street, which was a gravel road on the south side of the city near Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Drive, will now have a paved road through Southside trailer park. The street was the subject of city council discussion last year after the road was deeded to the city. St. Francis County Road 202, which is in the Patillo Acres One subdivision that was annexed in 2002, was also paved last week. Crews surfaced the gravel road after a county project to install sewer services to the area was completed earlier this summer.
"This was basically part of our regular maintenance program. Our alleys were in pretty rough condition, and we're trying to make sure that we have all of our roads in good shape, so as part of the maintenance we included several of the alleys in the work. Those that we don't get to this year will be part of our maintenance schedule for next year," Bryant said.
He also commented on some of the city's concrete roads.
"We have some roads that are concrete, and we did some work on some of those. Right now, we're looking at the option of paving over those roads versus continuing to patch them up," he said.
Drivers along North Washington could also see city crews working at the main entrance to the Forrest City Civic Center last week. According to Bryant, citizen complaints led to the widening of the entrance.
"We had received several complaints that people pulling into the parking lot from North Washington were hitting the curb and that the entrance just wasn't wide enough. We sent a crew out and they widened the entrances and hopefully it will make things a little safer there. We're just trying to make sure that we maintain and upgrade the roads here in the city because one of our goals is to have the best streets in the Delta," Bryant said.
A pair of St. Francis County Roads are also seeing work currently through the Arkansas Highway Department's state aid program, according to County Judge Carl Cisco.
"We've got two state aid projects going right now, and they're moving along pretty well," said Cisco.
"Out on Barrow Hill Road on 311, we've got that paving project going and we also have another state aid project out on Highway 261," he added.
While the state aid projects are progressing, Cisco said that the primary concern of the county road department is upgrading school routes throughout the county. According to Cisco, budget cuts slowed work during the summer.
"We cut back on some work during the summer, and now we're catching up on the bus routes. We have to make sure that those roads are in good condition before the winter months get here, so we're having gravel brought in and crews will be working to make sure those roads are in good condition."
Interstate travel to the eastern portion of St. Francis County should be considerably easier after officials with the AHTD cleared construction on Beaver Slough near the Parkin exit. Construction on the Highway 1 bypass is also continuing as expected, and Ray Woodruff, AHTD Engineer, said the completion date is still scheduled for October.
"Right now, the work is progressing well and we're still shooting for a completion date in October, and unless the weather changes considerably we should hit that mark," Woodruff said.
While construction is progressing well on both the interstate and the bypass, the same cannot be said for a project on Highway 1 North in Cross County. According to Woodruff, wet summer weather has held up the earthwork on the project.
By TAMARA JOHNSON
Managing Editor
Two people who had already been given an opportunity to stay out of prison were sentenced to the Arkansas Department of Corrections during circuit court activity Monday at the St. Francis County Courthouse.
Richard Hamblin, 45, and Tonya Lashun Allen, 27, both of Forrest City, were sentenced to the ADC in separate cases presented before Judge L.T. Simes. Both were on probation at the time of their most recent arrests.
Hamblin was sentenced to five years in state prison on a drug paraphernalia charge. He was arrested in April this year after his probation officer found methamphetamine residue on several items inside his home on Cherry Street during a routine home visit. He was originally charged with possession of a controlled substance near certain facilities, possession of drug paraphernalia and endangering the welfare of a minor. The possession and endangerment charges were nolle prosequi, leaving the paraphernalia charge for which he was sentenced.
According to court records, Hamblin was on probation following his conviction on two prior felonies for controlled substance related crimes.
Allen was sentenced to three years in the ADC on forgery charges after she wrote and attempted to cash two checks at local banks in November. Before cashing the checks, officials at both banks discovered the checks had been written on the bank account of a man they knew to be deceased. She was arrested on two counts of second-degree forgery.
In April this year, Allen was arrested again, this time for financial identify fraud after police discovered she had been using the identity of a Forrest City woman to obtain electricity for three residences she had occupied since October 2002.
The victim in the case told police she discovered Allen's activity when she tried to get utility service in her name.
The identity fraud charge was nolle prosequi on Monday.
Allen's criminal history includes a five-year suspended imposition of sentence that she was given in November 2000, and two five-year probation sentences, one out of St. Francis County that began in May 2002, and the other out of Phillips County, which began in June 2003.
Counseling Consultants, Inc. (CCI) has moved from its Kittel Road offices into the former Counseling Services of Eastern Arkansas building on East Broadway.
Rhonda King, the Human Resource Director of CCI, recently discussed the move and the services the company provides.
"We are a private organization that provides outpatient counseling for children and families," stated King. "Our staff includes a child and adolescent physiologist, an early childhood specialist, and several therapists and case managers. We have a large staff, about 90 employees, that is both certified and licensed, and they all service the St. Francis County area.
"We also collaborate with local physicians, community agencies and area schools," added King. "Counseling Consultants actually runs the alternative school for the Forrest City School District. Our company services St. Francis, Lee, Crittenden, Phillips, Cross and Monroe counties. We have several offices and alternative schools in these counties."
Counseling Consultants, Inc. is located at 1825 East Broadway.
To make an appointment, call the Forrest City office at 870-630-2328
or 1-877-610-1410.
By DAVID NICHOL
T-H Staff Writer
Working for a company like Entergy Arkansas means you might be called at any time, and not just for local emergencies.
Two men who work out of Forrest City recently spent just over two weeks in Florida, doing their part to help folks dig out from the devastation left by Hurricane Charley. They were among 122 Entergy Arkansas workers who made the trip. In all, a group of 525 linemen, tree trimmers, safety coordinators and support personnel from Entergy Arkansas, Entergy Mississippi and Entergy Louisiana made the trip to Florida.
Luke Peeler is a second year apprentice lineman. Ronald Miller is an engineering associate. They arrived back home Saturday after seeing first-hand what a hurricane can do.
"We started out from Orlando. That's where we stayed," said Peeler. "And we bused an hour to Lake Wales."
Lake Wales didn't take the brunt of the hurricane, but had plenty of problems nonetheless. The visiting workers helped Progress Electric rebuild the system.
"Lake Wales was more inland," said Peeler. "But it had a lot of tree damage. Most of the problems were caused by trees (falling across wires). We stayed there for a week and then transferred down to Port Charlotte."
Port Charlotte was a different story, with more than tree damage. Florida Power and Light asked crews for help in the Port Charlotte and Punta Gorda areas. These two locations, on the coast, bore much of Charley's destructive force directly.
"Port Charlotte was right on the brunt of it. It caught a lot of wind damage," he said. "A lot of lines down, a lot of poles down, a lot of houses torn up."
To the uninitiated, the first question would be, where in the world do we start?
Both men said utilities have to organize quickly in a disaster.
"Basically, we go down to help the other utilities. As far as I can tell, by the time we get there they usually have something mapped out for you to go by," said Peeler.
"You're generally assigned a circuit or certain parts of a circuit," said Miller. "And your objective is to get the main feeder lines back up and operational first, and then start working on the laterals after that."
The problem in the wake of a major hurricane is the amount of destruction that must be overcome.
"The big problem down there, it was almost a week before some of the substations even got hot," Miller continued. "So we were building back in, getting services run, wires back up, but still couldn't get any lights on because there weren't any substations"
He was asked if it was like starting over.
"In some areas, it WAS starting over," he said.
Peeler said they worked "four and a half or five days (in Lake Wales) before we saw the first light bulb burning."
One might expect residents of an area to become impatient, but both men said that wasn't the case.
"Folks were nice," said Peeler.
"A lot better than expected," agreed Miller.
"We never ran up on anybody who was irate," said Peeler. "They were questioning, they were curious, but they understood that they weren't the only ones without power and they knew it was going to be a while."
"And most that we talked to said they weren't expecting power for another week," said Miller. "We got it back on faster than they expected."
Sixteen hour days were the norm, but they said it was worth it, partly because of the reaction of the folks.
"It was my first major storm experience," said Peeler. "And to me it was amazing. The feeling you get when you're driving down the road and people are waving and honking and giving you the thumbs up. They're appreciative that you came so far to help."
Both Miller and Peeler said they're glad to be back home, but even as this article is being written, yet another powerful hurricane (Frances) is heading toward Florida.
"I'm ready to go back if I have to," said Peeler.
The time all football fans have been waiting for is approaching -- not just the beginning of the season, but the beginning of Professor Pigskin.
The popular weekly contest will commence with today's edition of the Times-Herald.
Each Tuesday, a special page in the Times Herald will feature 21 ads, each of which will have a game listed. This includes Arkansas high school games and college games from around the country.
Entrants will also be asked to predict the score of the Forrest City Mustang game for that week, to use in case a tiebreaker is needed.
Entries must be postmarked before noon on Friday after the games are listed, or entries may be brought by the Times-Herald office before noon on Friday. The winner will be announced the following Tuesday, when new games will also be announced.
An attentive gas station employee helped police recover a stolen vehicle Monday night after the driver left without paying for his gasoline.
The Forrest City Police Department was contacted by an employee with Murphy USA on Deaderick Road about 11 p.m., saying that the driver of a 2004 Chrysler Sebring had left without paying for $13.90 in gasoline. After describing the suspect and the vehicle to police, officers stopped the car in the 1800 block of South Washington a short time later. The car was driven by Mark Steve Walker, 40, of Kansas City, Mo.
The employee told police she was cleaning the parking lot when she noticed the subject watching her while he pumped gasoline. After a while, the suspect allegedly got back into his car, acting like he was looking for something, and then drove away, according to the report.
A routine check on the vehicle showed that it had been reported stolen by the Kansas City Police Department.
Walker is charged with theft by receiving over $2,500, gasoline drive off and no driver's license.
St. Francis County had sales tax receipts of $131,152.92 in July, according to the Arkansas Municipal League.
In addition, cities in St. Francis County received the following amounts from the county sales tax: Hughes, $25,993.90; Forrest City, $205,695.68; Wheatley, $5,179.28; Palestine, $10,316.80; Madison, $13,741.82; Caldwell, $6,474.10; Colt, $5,123.60; Widener, $4,664.16.
Also, cities with their own sales taxes had the following receipts: Forrest City, $146,277.41; Hughes, $11,036.63; Madison, $1,123.65; Palestine, $7,870.72; Wheatley, $3,062.61.