Opinion

Mary Jane Bailes Watson, who died in December, was a longtime friend. Our families shared good times together. We were Lancaster High School classmates.

She left us for a faraway Pavilion gleaming amid the glow of a full moon, the incoming tide foaming over a sandy shoreline and those ever present salty breezes blowing through your hair.

The sounds of 1950s beach music resounds as she moves across the dance floor with effortless ease as in days of old.

Save a dance for us.

Mary Alice Rankin Evans and W.B. Evans Jr., LHS Class of ’51

Lancaster

The Heath Springs Senior Council on Aging lunch bunch, both in-house and home-delivered meals, local community seniors and Mount Calvary Outreach Seniors in Kershaw wish to express their gratitude to the Hillside High School Class of 1970 for remembering us in such a warm and special way.

We only wish you could have been present to experience the thrill and excitement as we received our gifts.

Our thanks also to Bright Light Baptist and Mount Tabor AME Zion churches who had a part in making this mission possible.

A year ago, several members of Lancaster County Council said a new county courthouse was a top priority.

The process takes time, but some steps were taken to move forward on the issue over the last year.

The next step in the process is hiring an architect.

County Council Chairman Rudy Carter said the council committee working on hiring an architect is in the final stages of the selection process, but an announcement on the architect won't be made until a cost for the courthouse is determined. The goal to determine that figure is early spring.

In a letter published in both The Carolina Gateway and The Lancaster News, D.J. Carter comments that zoning notice practices have changed and he feels that this is an attempt to hide the facts in bureaucratic red tape.

Being a relatively new county employee, I inquired from staff regarding this allegation. Lancaster County has only had zoning in place for about 15 years so there haven’t been too many years of “past times” to review.

Seems County Council’s 2008 agenda includes a brand spanking new courthouse. I read there is some talk about having a vote on the issue. But we all know when the powers that be get a burr under their saddles it’s the tax-paying riders who will have to hang onto the saddle horn. So, it’s pretty much a foregone fact that a new courthouse is on the way and the old Mills designed building will become a possible museum containing some rusty textile equipment to celebrate our heritage, no doubt.

Apparently, it is the feeling of a minority of people in the Indian Land community that it is perfectly appropriate to issue a threat of a $4-5 million dollar lawsuit, which if carried through, would have a significant impact on every property taxpayer in Lancaster County.

However, it is not appropriate for any potentially impacted taxpayer to question the poor choices of those persons making that threat.

A permit was issued several years ago for a concrete plant in the Indian Land community. There were residential units in the area at the time.

Early Christmas morning, Lancaster lost a good citizen, Rita Johnson. To her family and friends, Rita was special. Rita was a successful business woman, a devoted mother and wife, a civic leader, a wonderful friend. Rita held many offices in St. Luke United Methodist Church.

It was an early Christmas present. The Greater New Hope Christian Association soup kitchen.

It was rainy, dull day when it officially opened on Dec. 15. But the dreary day did little to dampen the spirits of the soup kitchen’s champions – those who had the vision and those who helped make it become a reality.

I knocked on the window rather loudly in an effort to arouse a small dog laying motionless in my back yard. His head didn’t rise when I knocked louder which led me to believe there was something wrong. I slipped on my shoes and went outside to take a closer look.