Northview Diamond Club To Sell NHS Baseball Shirts
March 19, 2009
The Northview Diamond Club will begin selling t-shirts today as a fund raiser.
The gray shirts have “Northview Baseball” on them with a crossed bats emblem. Adult small to X large shirts are $5.40 each for Diamond Club members, and $2 more for XX and XXX large.
The non-member/fund raiser price is $10 for adult small to X large and $12 each for XX and XXX large shirts.
The shirts will be available beginning this afternoon at Northview baseball games.
Northview Makes It Eight In A Row By Beating Central Christian
March 18, 2009
Northview picked up their eighth win of the year on Tuesday versus Central Christian in Loxley, 16-4 in six innings.
Northview scored five in the first, one in the second inning, four in the third, two in the fifth and four in the sixth. Central Christian scored their four runs in the third inning.
Northview collected 14 hits and committed no errors, while Central Christian had six hits, and committed three errors.
The leading hitters for Northview included Dabney Langhorne going 3 for 5 at the plate, scoring three runs, and collecting one RBI. Brad Lowery was 3 for 3 with a double, a run scored, and two RBI’s. Patrick McPherson was 2 for 2 with a run scored. Scooter Hamilton was 2 for 4 with a triple, two runs scored, and an RBI. Brad Foster was 2 for 3 at the plate with a triple, three runs scored, and an RBI. Dakota Stuckey had a single, scored a run, and had one RBI. Austin Reid had a single and scored three runs. Austin Lowery had one single.
On the mound for the chiefs, Alex Abbott worked 2 2/3 innings to pick up the win. He allowed three runs on two hits, walked one, and struck out two to work his record to 1-0. Brett Hanks pitched 1 1/3 innings, allowing 1 run on three hits. He struck out three batters. Heath Burkett closed out the win working the final two innings. He allowed no runs on two hits, and struck out three batters.
Northview improves to 8-2 on the season. The chiefs host Pensacola Catholic on Friday. The junior varsity will play at 4:00 p.m., with the varsity game to follow at 6:30.
School Board Votes To Close Carver/Century
March 18, 2009
Carver/Century K-8 School will close forever at the end of this school year; the Escambia County School Board has voted 3-2 to close the school.
Less than a dozen Century residents attended Tuesday night’s school board meeting, some making last minute pleas to keep the school open.
“I’ve pleaded every way I know how. I just ask that before you go into your vote that you ask yourselves if you have done everything you can do to save this school,” Century Mayor Freddie McCall told the board. “Spare us if at all possible. Give us that three years that I have asked for.”
But in the end, just two board members — Bill Slayton and Linda Moultrie — voted against closing the school.
“It is very important to this community…very important to the north end of Escambia County,” Slayton said. “I’m concerned.”
“I’m really concerned about the children,” Moultrie said. “Are we doing the right thing for the children of that community?”
School Superintendent Malcolm Thomas told the board that a majority of parents had already decided how they felt about the school, with 56 percent of the parents in the Carver/Century district sending their children to other schools. Of the 473 students in the Carver/Century attendance zone, only 210 attended the school when Thomas analyzed data prior to recommending the closure.
“We struggle year after year to subsidize the school,” Thomas said, noting that the district would save about $600,000 per year by closing the school. Most importantly, the students will be moved to Bratt Elementary, an A-school for five consecutive years, and Ernest Ward Middle, also an A-school. Carver/Century was an F-school prior to rising to a B-school last year.
“They have proven that they can sustain excellence,” Thomas said of both Ernest Ward and Bratt.
Thomas asked the board to support closing Carver/Century for dollars and cents reasons.
“You will save money that will save jobs,” he told the board.
“You would think you were sending the students to something terrible,” board member Jeff Bergosh (pictured left) said. “You are putting them into a situation where they have everything. They students will adapt. They will overcome.”
“We are not turning your kids loose and saying ’sink or swim’,” Jeff Bergosh, board member, said “If you can look to Him,” he said of God, “and expect the best, you can get it.”
“This was not an easy decision,” board Chairman Patty Hightower said. Her church, Trinity Presbyterian of Pensacola, has volunteered at Carver/Century for 23 years. Prior to the meeting, many Century residents saw Hightower as the swing vote that could save the town’s only school.
She announced that she would support Thomas’ recommendation to close the school because of the great educational opportunities provided at Bratt and Ernest Ward.
Last Minute Pleas
Prior to the board’s 3-2 vote to close Carver/Century K-8 School, a few people addressed the board in support of the school.
“I am a Century Blackcat,” Century native Jewel Canada-Wynn, now a member of the Pensacola City Council and an administrator at Escambia High School, said. “Without a school, that community will suffer.”
Annie Savage, grandmother of a Carver/Century student, has attended every school board meeting concerning the closure of the school. Tuesday night, she told the five member school board that they were placing the Rock of Gibraltar on the outskirts of Century, “putting us out of action in our town”.
“You say no child is left behind,” Savage said. “Do you not mean no child except the children in Century left behind?”
“You are killing our town. We have a prison and we have inmates running around, but no students,” Century is not going to grow anymore when you take away our school…Don’t kill our community; don’t kill our town.”
Carver/Century employee Lillian Robertson told the school board they had put Carver/Century last, providing fewer resources for the school, staff and students.
“You have done nothing but undermine us,” Robertson said. “You are going to lose a lot of money when you close us.” She said 175 Carver/Century students would cross the line and attend school in Alabama. “You have lost Century.”
Leroy Boyd, leader of Movement for Change, said his group “certainly won’t be quiet while you put a padlock on Century”. The Century Town Council voted Monday night to fund Movement for Change lawyer Jeffery Toney in seeking a possible injunction against the Escambia County School Board to keep the school open. Read more here.
Click here for a photo gallery from Tuesday night’s school board meeting.
Pictured top: Century council member Gary Riley, Mayor Freddie McCall, Century businessman Jack Moran, Carver/Century Principal Jeff Garthwaite and Century businesswoman Julie Booth-Moran listed to the Escambia County School Board Tuesday night. Pictured bottom: Century resident Annie Savage addresses the Escambia County School Board. NorthEscambia.com photos, click to enlarge.
Three Suspects Are Named In Burglary Ring
March 18, 2009
The identities are now known of the three people arrested Monday in connection with a string of burglaries.
Jermaine Lamar Patterson, 17, of Cantonment was in the Escambia County Jail early Wednesday morning, being held on $70,000 bond. He faces multiple charges, including burglary, theft and criminal mischief.
Sara Louise Temoney, 22, of Pensacola was granted pre-trial release by the court Tuesday. She was charged with criminal mischief, burglary, grand theft and knowingly giving false information to law enforcement.
Patrick Hosea Bell, 20, of Cantonment was still in the Escambia County Jail early Wednesday morning, charged with multiple counts including theft, burglary, trespassing, criminal mischief and narcotics charges. His bond was at $104,000.
The three will be arraigned in Escambia County Circuit Court on April 8.
Bell, Patterson and Temoney were arrested Monday by deputies after an attempted burglary on Clymil Drive, just south of Williams Ditch Road in the Cottage Hill area. Deputies say at least two more people are expected to be arrested in connection with the burglaries. In all, the suspects are believed to be responsible for about 25 burglaries in the area.
“We recovered a lot of merchandise,” Lt. Tony Jordan of the Escambia Sheriff’s Department told NorthEscambia.com. Property recovered from an apartment complex on Olive Road in Pensacola included a long list of big screen TVs, jewelry, games systems, DVDs, computers and more.
The arrests came Monday after the Clymil Drive resident came home to find a vehicle backed to his home and called for help. Deputies located the vehicle and made their arrests, but not before the female suspect reported that she had been carjacked, Jordan said.
The persons arrested Monday are possibly linked to 25 similar burglaries across the area this year, according to the Sheriff’s Department. In the typical burglary, one suspect would knock on the front door of the home. If no one answered the door, the suspects would back their car up to the home and kick in the backdoor, Jordan said. Most of the burglaries took place in isolated areas, often at homes where trees or shrubbery block the view of the home from the road.
In an incident last week, a man returned to his home in the 4000 block of Chestnut Road in Molino to find one of the burglars inside his home.
Most of the burglaries took place in the Cantonment and Molino areas, Jordan said. Deputies have not been able to determine if an incident late last week on Morgan Road in Walnut Hill was related. In that incident, the resident told deputies that he arrived at his home to find two black males in a white work-type truck in his backyard. They told the resident that they were there to fix a refrigerator.
Pictured above: Burglary suspects (L-R) Jermaine Lamar Patterson, Sara Louise Temoney and Patrick Hosea Bell. Submitted photos for NorthEscambia.com.
Lawyer Hopes To Change Decision To Close Carver Century
March 18, 2009
The Town of Century and the activist group Movement for Change may seek an injunction against the Escambia County School Board to prevent the closure of Carver/Century K-8 School.
Monday night, the Town of Century voted to spend thousands of dollars to hire Crestview attorney Jeffery Toney to potentially file the injunction after a presentation from Leroy Boyd of the activist group Movement for Change.
Toney told NorthEscambia.com following the school board’s vote that he will immediately begin work to keep the doors of the school open, but he would not specify the exact legal grounds on which a possible injunction might be filed, if an injunction is filed at all.
He said the first job would be to contact the school board’s attorney and see if the matter could be resolved out of court. Then, he said he would meet with the town and discuss “the issues” with them, but he would still look for opportunities to resolve the issue with the school board.
“We could probably resolve this, if the school stays open,” Toney said. He said he was retained by the town because of “lack of what they have been due diligence in resolving this.”
“The fight has just begun,” Boyd said. “This is not about Carver. This is about getting a new school for Ernest Ward.” When Boyd spoke to the Century council Monday night, he was asked by NorthEscambia.com what the basis for a possible injunction against the school board might be. Boyd simply replied that, “It won’t be race.”
“It is our position that the trucks won’t even get close to Highway 29,” Toney said about the trucks that will be used to move the contents of Carver/Century to Bratt Elementary and Ernest Ward Middle schools.
“You have students who have an opportunity to go to school in their city, and that’s where they need to be,” Toney said. “The school has been pretty much down, but they did go from an F to a B. The school board’s knee-jerk reaction was to close the school?”
Toney said he did not know when, or if, he might file for an injunction against the school in federal court.
Pictured above: (L-R) Century Mayor Freddie McCall meets with Leroy Boyd from Movement for Change and attorney Jeffery Toney Tuesday night while a meeting of the Escambia County School Board is conducted in the next room. NorthEscambia.com photo, click to enlarge.
What Will Happen To Carver/Century, Ernest Ward And Bratt Jobs?
March 18, 2009
The work is scheduled to begin today to begin the closure process at Carver/Century K-8 School and find jobs for teachers and staff in a district that is facing a $30 million shortfall and cuts that could mean the loss of nine percent of district jobs.
With the closure of Carver/Century, Superintendent Malcolm Thomas knows he will save money on positions like the school’s principal, curriculum coordinator, cafeteria staff and office staff. Most, or even all of them, might be moved into open positions elsewhere in the district.
The school district’s human resources department will take on the job of finding jobs for the school’s other staff and teachers. In most situations, tenured Carver/Century teachers with several years on the job and certification in their field will land a job at another school, and those criteria will ensure that a teacher at a school like Ernest Ward Middle School or Bratt Elementary School will retain their job.
Additionally, some district level positions will be eliminated, pushing current administrators back into the classroom.
Those factors, Thomas said, could be a problem for non-tenured teachers without certification.
“I don’t know how many from Carver/Century or elsewhere in the district may loose their jobs,” Thomas said. Many positions will be lost by attrition — teachers that might retire, move or resign.
“But closing Carver/Century and another Pensacola school will save some jobs,” Thomas said. “I may never know how many jobs were saved, but it will save jobs.” The district has not named the other Pensacola school to be closed, but Thomas said it is likely to be Edgewater or Navy Point elementary school.
There has been recent discussion in North Escambia about closing Ernest Ward Middle School and moving the students to Molino Park Elementary, which was originally constructed as a K-8 School. Thomas said there is not enough room at Molino Park to house the EWMS student population. However, the possibility exists of rezoning some students from Cantonment north to Molino Park in the future, he said.
Thomas also expressed his thoughts about the Carver/Century closure following Tuesday night’s school board meeting.
Many opponents of closing Carver/Century said that without a school, Century would be unable to attract business or industry. That is an argument that Thomas does not buy.
“What better tool for economic development — you build here and we’ll send your students to the best schools in the county,” he said. “That is a great economic development tool. A CEO wants to know where his children will go to school. Sending the CEO’s children to the best schools in Escambia County will be a great selling point.”
Regardless of what happens, Thomas said the district will work to keep students and employee jobs at the forefront of the district’s goals.
As for the future, Thomas said the possibility of reopening Carver/Century would always be there as long as the school district owned the property.
“Who knows? In five years, Century might have new industry and growth, and we might look at reopening the school,” he said.
Community Reaction To Carver/Century Closure
March 18, 2009
Disappointment — that was the recurring word used by Carver/Century K-8 School supporters following the Escambia County School Board’s decision to close the school.
“I am disappointed; I thought we had a chance,” Century Mayor Freddie McCall said. “I thought (board member) Patty Hightower might change her mind. We finally got a good principal, and he needs the chance to finish the job he started. We just had that cloud of closure over our heads. We needed that three years without that cloud of closure that I asked the board for.”
“It’s a sad situation that this had to happen,” said Carver/Century Principal Jeff Garthwaite. “They are dismantling our family; we all share a common bond.”
“Now we must look forward; we can’t look back,” Garthwaite said. “The primary thing is our students and now we must focus on them.”
“They are totally doing Century wrong,” Annie Savage, grandmother of a Carver/Century student, said. “But it is not over. I feel that the school board has done us wrong.”
Savage said the majority of the tax dollars in the northern part of Escambia County are from Century, and she said people in Walnut Hill and Bratt choose to visit the doctors and drug stores in Century, adding to those tax dollars.
But that tax dollar majority has been ignored, Savage said, in the closing of Century’s only school.
“And taking them out of Carver and putting them in Ernest Ward is segregation,” Savage added, saying that moving black students from the predominantly black Century school to the predominantly white Ernest Ward was a problem. “I still say that is segregation.”
“I am mad and frustrated,” said Michelle Richmond, mother of Carver/Century sixth grader Olivia Richmond. “I am not looking forward to sending my child to a new school.”
Richmond said she moved her daughter from a larger Santa Rosa County school to the smaller Carver/Century because she felt it was a better opportunity for her child, an A-B honor roll student.
“I hate to put her back in a big school. She will be lost,” Richmond said.
Board Approves Nearly $1 Million In Renovations At Bratt Elementary
March 18, 2009
The Escambia School District has approved $946,407 in renovations at Bratt Elementary School.
The renovations will take place in the front/west wing of the school and will include new windows, doors, and floors for the building that was constructed in 1980. It will also include the installation of a central heating and cooling system. The main portion of the renovation contract was $770,500.
The board approved additional renovations at the school, including:
- replace restroom fixtures in the west wing, $3,425
- replace lighting and ceilings in west wing, $36,500
- renovations in guidance and administration areas, $26,000
- replace air handling units in cafetorium, $82,600
- replace water meter and piping for increased water pressure, $27,382
The total bid of $946,407 was awarded to low bidder Morette Company of Pensacola. There were a total of nine bidders on the project, with five bids coming in at over $1 million.
School Superintendent Malcolm Thomas noted that the funds for this project were from funding sources that could not have been used to keep Carver/Century K-8 School open. The funding for the Bratt Elementary improvements was only available for building improvements, not salaries or educational materials.
Blog: Century Council’s Actions Were Just Plain Stupid
March 18, 2009
Irresponsible. That’s probably the best word to describe the actions of the Century Town Council at their Monday night meeting. At least it is a better word than stupid.
The Century Town Council spent more time debating and put more apparent thought process into hiring a man to clean ditches with a shovel than they did to hire an attorney to take on the Escambia County School Board.
Less than 24 hours before the school board was to make the final vote to close Carver/Century K-8 School, the council listened to a short presentation from Leroy Boyd of the group Movement for Change. Boyd told the council that they could hire lawyer Jeffery Toney for $7,500 to $8,000 to file an injunction against the school board in an attempt to save the school.
Boyd told the council that he had been “asked to come here”, but declined to say who asked him to speak to the council. He told them that the school board had already made their decision, and in order to save the town’s only school “you will have to file a legal challenge”.
With that little information, the council was ready to whip out the checkbook and sign a blank check over to an attorney they apparently did not know; Council President Ann Brooks even had to ask Boyd how to spell Toney’s name.
Boyd cautioned the council that the up to $8,000 to file the injunction might not be the end of their expenses. He warned the council that Toney had told him to expect an appeal on whichever side lost the injunction hearing, plus if an injunction were obtained there were be additional fees for fighting a case and any appeals.
At no point did any council member or the mayor ask what the legal basis for an injunction against the school board might be. At no point did any council member or the mayor ask about Mr. Toney’s qualifications or experience as an attorney.
It took a question from NorthEscambia.com, not the council, for Boyd to say he did not know what the legal basis for a court case might be, other than “it won’t be race”.
It was nearly a year ago that NorthEscambia.com broke the story that Carver/Century could be targeted for closure, nearly a month before the topic was brought up at a school board meeting. We even ran an investigative piece in May that detailed where students that live in the Carver/Century attendance zone actually attend school, one of the primary sets of data used by the school board in their closure decision.
The council has known for at least almost one year the the school board would eventually vote to close the town’s only school. But the council decided to hire an attorney they knew very little, if anything, about less than 24 hours before they knew the ax would fall on the school.
We are not going to discuss the school closing; what is done is done. We are making no insinuations about the legal expertise of Mr. Toney; we frankly know very little about him. It’s not about Mr. Toney’s rates for his services; he’s got as much right to make a living as the next guy. And we are indifferent toward Movement for Change, also knowing little about their group. This is not an opinion about whether or not the council should be fighting the school board, that’s why you get legal advice before deciding if you should announce you’ll try to seek an injunction against somebody. (Oops.)
Our problem with the Century council’ s stupid (sorry — irresponsible) actions Monday night would be the same if the lawyer were Mr. Toney or Pensacola’s Fred Levin, the well known attorney for which the law school at the University of Florida is named.
The council spent nearly 10 minutes discussing if they should hire a laborer to clean ditches. The candidate, chosen from a field of 28 applicants, had qualifications that the mayor and department supervisor felt were adequate for the job. The mayor and a supervisor interviewed him. The gentlemen passed his criminal background check. The mayor recommend that the council hire him.
But after much discussion, the council decided that they wanted to meet the man that will clean their ditches for $10 an hour before they hired him.
But when it came time to hire an attorney to file for an injunction against the Escambia County School Board for legal reasons unknown to the council, the council made a quick and irrational decision 5-0 to hire Toney for perhaps $8,000 plus. But wait…don’t fill in that check yet because there might be appeals and other expenses. We think the legal terminology is “blank check”.
This is the same council that, also at Monday night’s meeting, was unable to approve a $500 donation to the American Cancer Society’s Relay for Life until they could find a budget category where they had the money. The council has made a great effort this year to play by their own rules and spend no money until it was in a budgeted category. There was no discussion where the council will get the funds to pay Mr. Toney.
Perhaps there is enough money in the town’s legal expense category. The council does, after all, have a town attorney. And they did save money by not bothering to discuss their legal concerns over the school closure with their own attorney. Why would you know there was an issue for a year and not discuss it with your own attorney, but instead hire someone unknown to you 24 hours before the school’s D-day?
Where was the thought process on the part of the council? They apparently did not learn from their past mistakes that making quick decisions of a major nature based upon a fast presentation can come back to bite them.
A few months ago, the council approved a resolution supporting the creation of a commission to study consolidated government in Escambia County. A special interest group make a slick presentation, and they were soon smiling and signing a resolution they had never seen before that was prepared by that special interest group.
It was not long before they learned that perhaps what they had signed so quickly might not have been what they thought it was, and they were soon rescinding the resolution much to the delight of the Pensacola media that made them look worse than foolish.
Let’s hope the young man that has applied for the $10 an hour job to clean and dig ditches in Century passes the scrutiny of the of Century council and gets his job. He’s willing to bust his butt to have a job if he’s willing to clean ditches for $400 a week. What a responsible man.; we like him already. And he can be proud to know that he will undergo more review than a lawyer hired on an unbudgeted whim by the council.
The council’s actions were not irresponsible, the first word we used in this blog. It’s that second term we should have used — stupid.
We welcome your appropriate on-topic comments below.
Deputies Looking For Shooting Suspect
March 17, 2009
Escambia County deputies are looking for a suspect in the shooting of a Pensacola man last week.
Investigators are looking for Tracy Lynn Konewko, 45, in the shooting of 81-year old Charles Moore.
Moore was shot last Thursday inside his home on Emory Drive in an early afternoon robbery.
Deputies say Konewko (pictured) is considered a suspect in this case.
Anyone with any information is asked to call the Escambia County Sheriff’s Department at 436-9620 and ask for Investigator James O’Hara, or call Crime Stoppers at 433-STOP.