Friday March 1,
2013
50 cents
Daily Corinthian Vol. 117, No. 52
A shower Today
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44
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• Corinth, Mississippi • 20 pages • Two sections
Local sales tax legislation dies BY JEBB JOHNSTON jjohnston@dailycorinthian.com
Optional local sales tax legislation backed by Corinth leaders is dead for 2013, but Corinth Mayor Tommy Irwin said the issue and the need remain very much alive. This year’s renewed push for giving cities the chance to collect a sales tax for capital projects resulted in House Bill 523 and Senate Bill 2145, neither of which had enough momentum
to survive Wednesday’s deadline to consider bills introduced in this session. The Citizens for Economic Development Act would have required threefifths voter approval for a local sales tax of up to 1 percent for specific projects and for a limited time. Irwin pressed for the legislation as a member of the Mississippi Municipal League’s legislative committee, and the Corinth Board of Aldermen
passed a resolution supporting the idea. “It will continue to be the top priority of the MML,” said Irwin. “What bothers me is when elected officials try to stand in the way of cities having the right to determine the future of their community.” He noted that Tupelo, through special legislation, has had the benefit of a one-quarter percent sales tax for many years to benefit the city’s infrastructure.
Although the Future Fare property tax and the optional sales tax did not meet with approval, Irwin feels it was equally important to raise awareness of the city’s infrastructure needs. “People have got to understand that we the citizens who live in Corinth are going to be the ones who fix this infrastructure,” he said. “We know from the federal and state level there are no grants that fix communities. So the question is, what is
the best way?” He sees it as a key economic development issue. “I know firsthand if a community looks bad and has a lot of infrastructure problems, it makes recruiting very difficult,” said the mayor. “I used to be the guy that was recruited, and it was a turnoff when I would go to a community that was falling apart.” Similar sales tax bills have been introduced for many years but have failed to pass.
Tourism Board interviews new director applicants BY BOBBY J. SMITH bjsmith@dailycorinthian.com
The Corinth Area Convention and Visitors Bureau is getting closing to hiring a new director. Members of the Tourism Board reviewed 31 applications Thursday for the position and conducted interviews with the most promising applicants. “They looked over applica-
The Tin Man (Will Senf) gets a shot of oil from the Scarecrow (Riley Floyd).
‘Oz’ comes home to playhouse BY BOBBY J. SMITH After a week of playing shows in area schools, the Corinth Theatre Arts youth production of “The Wizard of Oz” is coming to the Crossroads Playhouse. The only public performance of the show is set for 7:30 p.m. on Saturday. The show has been a success at Alcorn County and Corinth schools, said CT-A Artistic Director Cristina Skinner. “We’ve been playing to about
70 students at each show and have been playing a number of different places,” said Skinner. “We’re getting used to the different spaces, and this is a big part of our mission — to bring theater to the students around the county and give some experience to our traveling actors.” The non-musical play is based more closely on L. Frank Baum’s novel “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” than the classic Judy Garland movie. “It’s not like what you see in
Please see APPLICANTS | 2A
Malco plans ‘Oz’ event as fundraiser
Staff photo by Bobby J. Smith
bjsmith@dailycorinthian.com
tions and wrote recommendations. Everybody on the board was involved,” said interim administrator Ann Thompson. While it is not certain when the new director will be hired, Thompson said she believes it will be sooner rather than later. In other news from the Tour-
BY JEBB JOHNSTON jjohnston@dailycorinthian.com
The return to the yellow brick road will be celebrated with a charitable fundraiser at Malco in Corinth. Benefiting efforts to combat Rhett syndrome, the event is set for noon to 5 p.m. on Saturday, March 9, the day following the opening of Disney’s “Oz the Great and Powerful,” a prequel to the classic “The Wizard of Oz.” Theater General Manager Jessie Wilbanks said Rhett syndrome was chosen as the charitable focus of the event because a staff member has a family member who has the syndrome.
the movie. It’s more from the book’s perspective,” said Skinner. “And it’s for children, by children, funny and fun.” The production is sponsored by LINK, a non-profit group that works with community groups to provide opportunities for Corinth and Alcorn County students, and Northside Mini Storage. Skinner said the kids at the schools were drawn in by seeing other kids on the stage in Please see ‘OZ’ | 2A
“We are going to decorate the theater for Oz, and we will be giving away some free passes to customers who come in dressed up as Oz characters,” said Wilbanks. “If we are able to get any promotional materials, we will also give that away.” She is encouraging customers to dress up as a colorful character from either of the movies — perhaps the witches Theodora, Evanora or Glinda from the new film, or a classic character such as Dorothy, the wizard, cowardly lion or the tin man from the 1939 favorite. Please see MALCO | 2A
Fishing trip ends with life’s lesson of appreciation BY BRANT SAPPINGTON bsappington@dailycorinthian.com
A recent fishing trip was going none too swimmingly for a Pickwick resident and his grandson until the grandson hooked a catch that led to a whopper of a fish tale. Pickwick Pines resident Bob Jones had invited his son and grandson to join him last Sunday for a day of fishing on Pickwick Lake. His grandson, 16-year-old Adam Jones of Southhaven, has been learning to fish and had heard about the great fishing in the area. Sunday morning dawned cold and misty and it was just before 1 p.m. when the three self-de-
scribed “large men” set out on the lake in their small Jon-boat in search of the big catch. Jones laughed as he described the three of them nestled tightly in the 10-horsepower aluminum boat heading out into the welcoming waters of Pickwick Lake. A fun day of family time had yielded few results as the men continued to cast with no success. The younger Jones then ran into trouble when his line became tangled after his cast and he struggled for several minutes to clear the knotted mess as his lure lay out in the water. Jones said just as he got the tangle cleared out, he felt a
pull on the line. “He said, ‘I’ve got one!’ We couldn’t believe it,” he said. The youngster reeled in a 4 1/2 pound bass. “Adam is so proud of this fish. It’s the biggest fish he ever caught,” said the proud grandpa. They placed the fish in the boat’s livewell to keep it alive until they could return to shore and then pulled it out for the trip home. The fish was out of the water for more than an hour and a half by the time they returned home, took pictures and showed it off to Bob Jones’ wife and the rest of the family. Jones thought the fish would
Index Stocks......8A Classified......4B Comics......9A State......5A
Weather....10A Obituaries......6A Opinion......4A Sports....11A
have died by then, but they soon discovered they’d caught a bass with a will to live. “I couldn’t believe it, but it was still alive,” he said. Adam decided he had to return the strong-willed fish to the lake so grandfather and grandson headed back to the shores of Pickwick and the Please see LESSON | 2A
Adam Jones, 16, shows off the 41⁄2 pound bass he caught recently on Pickwick Lake. After taking the fish home, the teen-ager had a change of heart and released the fish back into the lake.
On this day in history 150 years ago “Old winter has taken his flight and left us deep in mud and water and a dense fog. But we will now look for clear weather and the usual drying winds of March will soon render the roads passable and the armies can move.” Diary of Horatio Taft, a clerk in the U.S. Patent Office.
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