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Allsups' Robbery Foiled After Scuffle By Alice Gilroy A clerk at the Lockney Allsup's Convenience Store was held up at knifepoint, early Friday, December 19th. The robber fled after a scuffle with the clerk's husband. According to police a lone male, wearing a toboggan cap and "something black" wrapped around his face, entered the Lockney Allsups shortly after midnight. "He had a knife and approached the clerk and demanded she give him the money," said Lockney Police Chief Jerry Edwards. "She refused, and the robber then pushed her into the walk-in freezer. The man didn't know that the clerk's husband was in the freezer helping her stock items. The husband jumped on the suspect and they got into a scuffle. The assailant then ran out of the store." Edwards said no one was injured. "We are following leads and feel an arrest will be made shortly," said Edwards. This is the second time this year an Allsup's clerk has been robbed. July 14th a man with a knife robbed the clerk of an undisclosed amount of money. In this case the assailant tied up the clerk and locked her in the bathroom. She was able to free herself and call police. The suspect in that case has not been apprehended. City Council Considers Need for Temporary Holding Cells By Darwin Robinson The Floydada City Council met Tuesday, December 16, and discussed the possibility of erecting a new building on the old gin property north of City Hall for the purpose of installing temporary holding cells for City prisoners. Floydada Police Chief Darrell Gooch addressed the council concerning the need for holding cells while waiting on transportation to the Spur facility. Gooch said, "So far the first week hasn't been all that bad. We are issuing a lot of criminal citations instead of taking them to jail. A couple of warrants have been served. We turned them over to the sheriff and sent that bill to the county. There are other warrants that need to be served. Right now we have stopped serving any nonhazardous, or nonviolent, warrants." "The average wait (for transport to the Spur facility) has been anywhere from one hour to two hours, with an officer waiting there with them. The sheriff is allowing us to go into the old booking room and wait there for transport. How long this will last, or if this will be a permanent fix, we just don't know yet," said Gooch. According to Gooch, it takes over two hours of an officer's time to make the arrest and then wait for transport to come from Spur. "The arresting officers must wait with the prisoner, thus another officer must be "on call" for any other needs in the City during this waiting period," Gooch explained. "Right now 91 hours is the average time that all our officers combined are 'on call' for one week. We divide that up evenly among all our officers and each one is 'on call' about 22 to 24 hours. Excluding any overtime, we are looking at about 60 to 70 hours per week for each officer. It would be cheaper to hire one or two jailers at $27,792 per year each, than pay the 'on call' time," said Gooch. Concerning the City needing their own holding cells, Gooch said, "We don't know what the County is going to do. Some of their ideas do not make any sense to me and I don't know how they are going to do it." "(City Manager Gary) Brown and I have discussed, instead of buying an old building, we should build our own barn type building similar to the one built behind the First Baptist Church. If the City employees do the labor, we could probably put it up for less than buying the other building that we discussed at our last meeting," Gooch explained. According to Gooch, there is a local contractor who will put the building up according to the City's specifications, such as, garage doors where the police vehicle could be pulled inside before unloading a prisoner. Also, someone at the Spur facility told Gooch, if the City would buy the materials, then they (Spur) would come and put up the building for free. After more discussion on the size and possible future expansion of such a building, the council approved a motion by Council Member Clar Schacht to appoint a committee of Mayor Bobby Gilliland, Brown and Gooch to put a proposal together to be voted on later. The motion was seconded by Council Member Sheldon Sue and unanimously passed. In other matters, the council approved a motion to advertise and take bids for the replacement of about 4,000 feet of sewer lines and the rehabilitation, or the replacement, of the City's lift station with a 2003-2004 TCDP Sewer Grant of $208,300 applied for by the engineering firm of Parkhill, Smith & Cooper, Inc. In a related matter, the council also approved to renew the service contract of Parkhill, Smith & Cooper, Inc. for the coming year. Upon the recommendations of City Manager Brown and City Secretary Karen Lawson, the council approved a new Code of Ordinances for the City. According to Brown and Lawson most of the changes are in organization and getting into compliance with current regulations. Lawson recommended the council update the City Code of Ordinances on a yearly basis. A new comprehensive Zoning Ordinance, financed by a grant, was presented to the council. It had previously been presented to the Planning and Zoning Commission on December 2, 2003 and the PZC board did not recommend it's approval. The City council also voted unanimously not to recommended It. According to Lawson, "The planning company fashioned the ordinance like a large city would use. Unfortunately many things in it do not apply to small towns. One size doesn't fit all and there are some things that did not get done as I would have liked." No action was taken on the proposed rehabilitation of the Farm Labor Housing project as presented in last month's council meeting. Council Members Eric Cornelius and Schacht both expressed their skepticism on the proposed rehab project. Cornelius explained his skepticism. He stated, "The grant proposal to rehab the Labor Camp comes to about $70 per square foot. We could build a new complex like the Duncan Apartments for around $50 per square foot and we would have new units, not old units." Schacht said, "I would like to know who did the study about Floydada needing another 40 units for farm related workers." Brown told the council, "I have not heard anything else on this proposal. I did talk to Paducah and they have had 16 units rehabbed. Those are filled and they have a waiting list. Muleshoe has rehabbed 72 units, plus an activity building. They are 80 to 85 percent filled with ag related tenets." Brown continued, "The Labor Camp is supposed to be rented to ag related workers on a temporary basis for 30 percent of their income." In another matter, Brown told the council the Mackenzie Municipal Water Authority was hiring engineers to look into the possibility of drilling water wells near the Tulia area and bringing the water through the MMWA plant in order for Silverton to have water. "They are only thinking about this," Brown said. No action was taken by the council. The council unanimously approved a settlement agreement between the City of Lubbock and the West Texas Municipal Power Agency. Brown said, "The Lubbock City council and the Tulia City council both have already signed this agreement and I recommend we approve it." According to Brown, all disputed debts by the participating cities would be eliminated and the generator plant would eventually revert back to being the sole property of the City of Lubbock. "The only change we have to work through, that was not in the original proposal, is WTMPA is giving Lubbock approximately $177,000 that is in a reserve fund. LP&L has put most of this money into the account. WTMPA will approve the settlement on December 18," said Brown. Brown discussed with the council the need for the City to borrow possibly $400,000 to $450,000 for the electrical improvements, including replacing old equipment in the old 1920's electrical plant. "We need to get a ten year loan with probably a certificate of obligation to secure it. We want to bid out this job by late January, 2004 and get started on it by March, before the heat of the summer." It was noted that no action was needed by the council. Upon the recommendation of Brown, a grant for trees from the Chapman Forestry Foundation was approved by the council. Following an executive session, the council approved the appointment of Jesse Morales as Electrical Department Supervisor. It was noted that City Hall would close for the Christmas holidays on Wednesday, December 24th at 4 p.m. Ford and Summers Named to 2003 All-State Football Team Two Floyd County high school football players made Class 2A All State Teams picked by the Associated Press Sports Editors based on regular season performance. Lockney Junior Mark Ford was named to the All State First Team Offense with 2,043 yards rushing and 28 TD's, 8.5 yards per carry. Ford was also named to the All-State Honorable Mention Defensive Linebacker position. Floydada Senior D.J. Summers was named to the All-State Honorable Mention Defensive Lineman position.
Obituaries BOBBY GENE SMITH Graveside memorial services for Bobby Gene Smith, 77, of Downey, California, were held at 11:00 a.m. Monday, December 29, 2003 at the Lockney Cemetery. Reverend Neely Landrum officated. Arrangements were under the direction of Moore-Rose-White Funeral Home of Lockney. Mrs. Smith died December 15, 2003 in Downey, California. She was born on September 1, 1926 in Peacock, Texas to the late Robert and Hettie Smith. She graduated from high school in Huntsville. She married Hershel Smith on November 24, 1944 and moved to California from Lubbock in the early 1960's. She was a librarian and records keeper in the aerospace industry until she retired in 1991. Her husband, Hershel Smith preceded her in death on June 2, 1997. Survivors include one son, Dwayne Smith of Norwalk, California; one daughter, April Smith of Norwalk, California; one brother, John Smith of Campbell, California; two sisters, Bonnie Mesina of Elk Grove, California and Winnie Crowley of Fontana, California and one aunt, Armine Tarpley of Lockney.
Dear Editor, I have had it with the "Monday Morning Quarterbacks" we have in this community. These individuals think they know more about Floydada athletics than our coaches. We have allowed a few individuals to run off coaches because they do not like the way the games are going or because their child is not getting play time they think he/she deserves. These individuals do not know the strategies of coaching nor do they recognize that perhaps their child is not playing due to the lack of effort or attitude. I am also disgusted when individuals that work for our school district are accosted whenever they go out into the community. Never mind that they might need to buy groceries or visit other businesses in town in order to keep their family life running as smoothly as possible. Some have even found it difficult to go to church and have even stopped going to church because these individuals think they know more about our schools than the professionals and won't even let them worship in peace. Where are these individuals when it comes to supporting other activities for our schools? They don't consider that all students need the community's support, in addition to their parents, whether it is band, drama, ag and building trades, or the numerous UIL events in which our schools compete and often send individuals to the state competition. Last year (and so far this year) we have had students go to state and I didn't see any of these individuals at our school send-offs. My suggestion to them is get off their duffs, go to college, get a degree and begin a coaching and/or teaching career. Perhaps they will find out what it is like to have uninformed individuals get in their face about something they know very little, if anything at all. Mary Garrett
By The Way | by Alice Gilroy This was sent to me by a friend. I thought it was a great Christmas gift and wanted to pass it along. Enjoy! Why He Came in Human Form Author Unknown There was once a man who didn't believe in God, and he didn't hesitate to let others know how he felt about religion and religious holidays, like Christmas. His wife, however, did believe, and she raised their children to also have faith in God and Jesus, despite his disparaging comments. One snowy Christmas Eve, his wife was taking their children to a Christmas Eve service in the farm community in which they lived. She asked him to come, but he refused. "That story is nonsense!" he said Why would God lower Himself to come to Earth as a man? That's ridiculous!" So she and the children left, and he stayed home. A while later, the winds grew stronger and the snow turned into a blizzard. As the man looked out the window, all he saw was a blinding snowstorm. He sat down to relax before the fire for the evening. Then he heard a loud thump. Something had hit the window. Then another thump. He looked out, but couldn't see more than a few feet. When the snow let up a little, he ventured outside to see what could have been beating on his window. In the field near his house he saw a flock of wild geese. Apparently they had been flying south for the winter when they got caught in the snowstorm and could not go on. They were lost and stranded on his farm, with no food or shelter. They just flapped their wings and flew around the field in low circles, blindly and aimlessly. A couple of them had flown into his window, it seemed. The man felt sorry for the geese and wanted to help them. The barn would be a great place for them to stay, he thought. It is warm and safe; surely they could spend the night and wait out the storm. So he walked over to the barn and opened the doors wide, then watched and waited, hoping they would notice the open barn and go inside. But the geese just fluttered around aimlessly and did not seem to notice the barn or realize what it could mean for them. The man tried to get their attention, but that just seemed to scare them and they moved further away. He went into the house and came back out with some bread, broke it up, and made a bread crumbs trail leading to the barn. They still didn't catch on. Now he was getting frustrated. He got behind them and tried to shoo them toward the barn, but they only got more scared and scattered in every direction except toward the barn. Nothing he did could get them to go into the barn where they would be warm and safe. "Why don't they follow me?! He exclaimed. "Can't they see this is the only place where they can survive the storm?" He thought for a moment and realized that they just wouldn't follow a human "If only I were a goose, then I could save them," he said out loud. Then he had an idea. He went into barn, got one of his own geese, and carried it in his arms as he circled around behind the flock of wild geese. He then released it. His goose flew through the flock and straight into the barn -- and one by one the other geese followed it to safety. He stood silently for a moment as the words he had spoken a few minutes earlier replayed in his mind: "If only I were a goose, then I could save them!" Then he thought about what he had said to his wife earlier. "Why would God want to be like us? That's ridiculous!" Suddenly it all made sense. That is what God had done. We were like the geese -- blind, lost, perishing. God had His Son become like us so He could show us the way and save us. That was the meaning of Christmas, he realized. As the winds and blinding snow died down, his soul became quiet and pondered this wonderful thought. Suddenly he understood what Christmas was all about, why Christ had come. Years of doubt and disbelief vanished like the passing storm. He fell to his knees in the snow, and prayed his first prayer: "Thank You, God, for coming in human form to get me out of the storm!" Merry Christmas!
A View From The Lamplighter | by Ken Towery
The Hesperian-Beacon invites you to read a collection of thoughts and memories by Ken Towery. The "Reflections of Ken Towery" can be found on this website by clicking here.
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