A Thank You from Tailwaggers

Tailwaggers Thrift Store of Keysville would like to thank and congratulate all who participated in our first spring raffle. It was a huge success!

Email your Letter to the Editor to editor@southsidemessenger, or mail to PO Box 849, Keysville, VA 23947All Letters to the Editor printed in The Southside Messenger are printed exactly as they were received. We make no corrections or changes for any reason. If there is an error in the letter, it will be printed as received and remains the responsibility of the writer.

Congratulations to Claudia Yates who won the handmade bear generously donated by Louisa Money of New Jersey. Basket winners were Barbara Hall, Averette Jones, Jean Spencer and Melissa Sherrill.

Tailwaggers is open Monday, Friday and Saturday 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., operated by an all volunteer staff and totally dependent both on your donations and purchases. All proceeds go directly to our local Southside SPCA no-kill animal shelter.

Thank You!

Dave and Carol Conrad, Antionette Renga, Sarah Lord,
Ann Charlton, Janet Gibson

*****

All Rise!

Oh yes, oh yes, oh yes, the Circuit Court of Charlotte County is now in session, the Honorable Judge Cunningham is presiding.

I just called the Circuit Court into session and I didn’t use a microphone and the people in three counties heard me.

We don’t need a new courthouse, we already have one. If they build a new one, they will have to change the name of the town to Charlotte New Court House. I thought the existing one is on the Historical Preservation List and can’t be torn down or radically modified?

My experience working for an armouring company in Northern Virginia showed me how you can take a Lincoln Town Car and put a three-inch thick windshield in that would stop an R.P.G (rocket propelled grenade) and you couldn’t tell the car was modified. I’m sure you could armour every window in the existing building for a lot less than $7 million. It’s not likely that we are going to have another episode like they did in Carroll County when the Sidna Allen clan shot down the judge, bailiff and two prosecutors. That was a hundred and two years ago. I think the current officials are safer than flying in an aeroplane, and if the judge still feels unsafe the county can buy him a new six-shot revolver called “The Judge.” It shoots 410 shotgun shells and if he prefers, can be loaded with 41 caliber “hot balls.” Yo Honor can pull that out from under his male birka and clear the courtroom.

All kidding aside, beside incurring such a large debt with cost overruns expected for a building which is not going to improve the application of justice one bit, it is going to destroy the ambience of the quaint town I left 32 years ago. I’m soon to retire and am thinking of returning to the area where I still have family and having to join other retired neighbors in paying higher property taxes for something not needed gets my conservative blood pumping.

How about our Seniors rallying around the flag and tell the town how it really is? Because if “we don’t hang together, we will hang separately.” Don’t forget the 19% property tax hike down the road in Prince Edward County.

Yours in Austerity, Michael Valerio, Front Royal

*****

I’ll cut right to the chase and address, through your newspaper, Judge Cunningham and all those promoting a new courthouse complex for Charlotte County.

Using a blend of 2010 and 2012 census statistics, the following facts are known about Charlotte County:

•The population of the whole county in 2010 was 12,586. Sparse given its size.

• In 2012, almost twenty percent of the population of the county was over the age of 65.

• 22% of the county’s population was under the age of 18.

• Almost 71% of the population had obtained a high school diploma. A testament to our outstanding public school system.

• However, only 13% of the population possessed a bachelor’s degree.

• Charlotte County’s per capita income was reported to be only $18,832.

• Almost 17% of the population lives below the poverty level.

When you combine the over-65 and under-18 age groups, 42% of the population is represented. The remaining 58% try to hold down jobs, pay taxes, send their children to school, pay mortgages, and live a meaningful life in rural Southside Virginia.

I don’t have to tell you that employment opportunities are few and far between in the county. Young people can work in the log woods, find a few government-related jobs, but most likely have to move away to find meaningful employment.

Now, can you please justify to me the reasoning behind building an $8,000,000 courthouse complex in this area?

Young families find that both parents must work to make ends meet; that is, if they are lucky enough to find two jobs. They must fund higher education for their children if those children are to make a better life for themselves. According to CareerBuilder, the largest online employment website in the country, three in ten American companies say they’re hiring college –educated workers for jobs that used to be held by high school graduates. Not a good outlook for Charlotte County youth.

Senior citizens can ill afford one more dollar taken from them, especially to fund a project that holds no benefit to them.

What I really want to say to you, Judge Cunningham, is, have you no conscience? How can you justify, even to yourself, laying a tax burden such as this proposed courthouse would be, on people who can barely afford day-to-day expenses as it is?

I’m sure the architects have done a wonderful job planning this building. Already this has cost the county thousands and thousands of dollars. Meanwhile, we’re having to close our Early Learning Center and perhaps the Central High Museum because we can’t afford the upkeep and expenses that go along with the current building.

Judge Cunningham, you would never be regaled for forcing this boondoggle into reality; quite the opposite. The people of Charlotte County should not have to suffer to satisfy your grand schemes.

 Claudia Koch, Charlotte Court House