Hedley Lions recognize Hagars
Blackburn selected to represent Hedley
Chris Blackburn, 2012 graduate of Hedley High School has been selected to represent his school in the upcoming Texas Six Man Coaches Association all-star games.
The Division II football game will be played Saturday, July 21, at Friendship in Wolfforth at 7:30 p.m..
During Chris’s football career, he has been honored with several awards such as All District Defensive end, and All District 2nd Team utility back his sophomore year; All District 1st Team Full Back, All District First Team Defensive End, All Region 1st Team Defensive End- Region 1, All State Honorable Mention Defensive End, and the HHS Fighting Heart Football Award all during his junior year at Hedley.
During his senior year, Chris was All District Defensive End, All District Full Back, and All Region Full Back.
Chris was selected as Defensive End on the Golden Spread Team, and will play in the Six Man All Start game.
And the winner is…..
Gene Odell, Jr.
Gene Odell, Jr.,an educator, coach, and counselor of young people for almost 40 years, whose chance meeting of a young Cleo Shaffer on a tropical vacation turned into a love affair and marriage of 51 years, died of complications from heart failure June 24 at the age of 79 in Amarillo, Texas.
Memorial services will be private. Cremation and Arrangements are by Robertson Funeral Directors of Clarendon.
Mr. Odell (or Coach Odell, as he was known to his players, even years after they graduated) started his coaching/teaching career in 1954, after a distinguished football career at Texas Western, where he was a team captain, All-Border Conference End and, in 1985, was inducted into the El Paso Athletic Hall of Fame.
Across the span of 38 years in education, he was teacher, coach, principal, superintendent and counselor to many young people in El Paso, Marfa, and Fort Davis. His career was studded with honors, including several district championships at Bel Air High School in El Paso in football, basketball, and golf, as well as being a respected counselor. He was principal at Marfa High School for eight years and Superintendent of the Fort Davis Independent School District for three years. Gene was very well known and appreciated by former players and students, so much so that his family teased (and quietly took great pride) that he could not venture anywhere in West Texas without being greeted by a former player or student. He once said winning “wasn’t as satisfying to me as students coming back in later years and telling me I had a great influence in their lives.”
His long and happy marriage to Cleo started after they met vacationing in the Bahamas, he from Texas, she from Pennsylvania.
She joked he used a tropical rum drink to make her to miss her flight, leading to an extended stay and start of a long relationship.
But their children long suspected it was love at first sight for them both. They met in June for a week, both went back to their respective homes, and were married three months later on September 24, 1960. Fifty-one years later, he was still opening doors for her.
Though his primary passion was helping and guiding young people, Gene developed and enjoyed many strong friendships. He made friends through the years, from childhood cohorts to high school and college teammates, to fellow teachers and administrators, to retirement golf buddies. Gene’s friends were dear and important to him, and he enjoyed staying in touch and spending time with all of them.
In addition to Cleo, Gene is survived by his three children and spouses (Lori and Stan Leffew, Cindy and Greg Ward, Greg and Shelly Odell), six grand children (Jessie, Mandy, Matt, Lauryn, Ryan, and Riley), and five great grandchildren (Cole, Avery, Madyson, Titus, and Pierce). Although he is deeply missed, his legacy of hard work, being a good person and treating others as you want to be treated, lives on as a profound example to them all.
Summertime
Aldermen approve $25k water system study
The City of Clarendon will conduct a professional study of city waterlines to try to determine the best way to improve the aesthetic quality of the water and how it’s distributed.
The Board of Aldermen at last week’s meeting on June 26 approved hiring KSA Engineers to conduct the Water Distribution System Study after a spirited debate that included a shouting match between two aldermen.
After listening to about 45 minutes of explanation from Public Works Director John Molder regarding the problems of discolored water in some parts of town and KSA’s Clayton Scales about his company’s proposal, the board failed to pass a first motion to approve the study.
Mayor Larry Hicks, who had asked for discussion prior to taking the vote, asked his board what it proposed to do instead, which prompted a heated exchange between Alderman Terry Noble, who had made the motion, and Alderman Tommy Hill, who did not vote for the measure. Hill and Aldermen Jesus Hernandez and Abby Patten then asked several questions about KSA’s previous work for the city, and ultimately the board agreed have better communications and passed the measure unanimously.
“This is a good idea,” Hill said.
The study is expected to take 120 days to complete at a cost of $25,000 and will include computer modeling of the city’s water system to determine where all the lines are, what problems exist in the system, and suggested long-term solutions for improving the system, including how to fund those improvements. The city has about $15,000 in the current budget for this project and will budget the remainder when the new budget year begins this fall.
Alderman Hill asked about how the project would affect street improvements approved by voters in May, and City Administrator Lambert Little said he would see if the city can hold off on issuing the bonds until after the city can address the water lines first.
Mayor Hicks said he believed the public would support the city making this decision.
In other city business, Aldermen: approved $700 from the Hotel Occupancy Tax to promote activities by the Clarendon Merchants Association this week; heard a report about tax levies and appraisals from Paula Lowrie of the Donley Appraisal District; and heard from Gary Campbell about continuing efforts to get the city’s water wells online and connected to the Greenbelt Water Authority and about a rainwater harvesting workshop that will be held here on July 28.
Editorial: Court runs roughshod over Liberty
The United States Supreme Court shocked many Americans last Thursday when it upheld the controversial Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as Obamacare, delighting liberal Democrats and infuriating Republicans and Libertarians because of the vast power that has now been vested in the federal government. It is a power that, left unchecked, will forever change the relationship between the government and the People.
When the bill was passed two years ago, it was 2,700 pages long and chocked full of spending for new and expanded programs, mandates on insurance companies, and pet projects designed to completely overhaul the American health care business. (By contrast the United States Constitution and Bill of Rights are six pages long and mostly places limits on the government and defines and expands the Liberty of the People.) But the linchpin of the Affordable Care Act is a provision known as the individual mandate.
That provision requires all Americans who can afford it to go buy health insurance. Of course, if you already have insurance, that’s great. But if you’re sitting around doing something un-American like saving your money for retirement or just using it to buy beer, then Uncle Sam now tells you to go buy health insurance. And if you don’t, you’ll face a penalty.
Phrasing is important here because the White House and the Congress insisted this is in no way a tax on the People but just a fine for failure to comply with a lawful order under something called “the Commerce Clause” – a provision of the Constitution that gives Congress the power to regulate interstate commerce. The clause was meant to keep states from putting up barriers to trade between themselves – and basically created a 13-state free trade zone. Unfortunately, it has since been perverted to allow the federal government to stick its foot in all our business on everything from how much water the washing machine you buy uses to what kind of light bulb you can put in your house, but I digress.
The court’s ruling found that the individual mandate would in fact be unconstitutional under the Commerce Clause – because, well, heck the government could then make you buy anything. But five of the nine justices found that mandate was constitutional under Congress’ power to levy taxes. A penalty is a tax, they said, even though the Supreme Court has never ever said that before.
Chief Justice John Roberts, who was appointed by a conservative Republican, President George W. Bush, cast the deciding vote and wrote the majority opinion, in which he basically asserts that Congress can in fact make you buy anything or face a penalty… oops… a tax. Roberts wrote: “Suppose Congress enacted a statute providing that every taxpayer who owns a house without energy efficient windows must pay $50 to the IRS…. No one would doubt that this law imposed a tax, and was within Congress’s power to tax.”
I would doubt it was within Congress’ power, and I would be squealing like a stuck pig about it. But Roberts wasn’t finished with his brilliant ruling, writing that when the government makes rules under the Commerce Clause it brings about its “full weight” on the matter. “An individual who disobeys may be subjected to criminal sanctions. Those sanctions can include not only fines and imprisonment, but all the attendant consequences of being branded a criminal. . . . By contrast, Congress’s authority under the taxing power is limited to requiring an individual to pay money into the Federal Treasury, no more.”
Limited to requiring an individual to pay money? Is he flipping kidding us right now? People go to jail for tax evasion. If you don’t pay your taxes, you can go to federal prison. If you resist arrest for this offense or try to escape from federal prison you risk being shot and killed. Limited to paying money… Balderdash! The Chief Justice has clearly lost his mind.
Two hundred and thirty-six years ago this week, our Founding Fathers put their lives and fortunes on the line when they declared that all men are created equal and have certain natural rights from their Creator and that governments are established to secure these rights, and then they wrote:
“— That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government…”
The American people have a chance to stop this affront to our rights. They can vote Mr. Obama out of the White House this November and send all of his allies in Congress packing, too. But the odds are not good. Gov. Romney, who has been foolishly chosen as the Republican nominee by the party establishment, is not the most credible spokesman on this issue, and then, too, Republicans don’t always vote the way they should in Congress. A full repeal of this act is necessary but not likely.
The consequences for either re-electing Mr. Obama or failing to repeal the act in its entirety are unthinkable. The federal government will be left unchecked in the role it can play in our lives. It will have become destructive of our Liberty, and then it well may be time to reconsider the political ties between Texas and the United States.
Sandell even better with new projector
The Sandell Drive-In has gone digital this season with the purchase of a new $68,000 projector that eliminates the need for film.
Movie-goers will notice that the picture at the Sandell is much clearer and brighter than ever before thanks to the higher wattage of the new system, and the Drive-In also has many other new things it can do with the upgrade.
Owner John Morrow says he pretty much had to make the change after Sony, Fox, and Universal studios all said they would be ending support for 35mm film after 2012. So after some research, he decided to purchase the Barco DP2K-32B system.
Now instead of reels of flim, Morrow receives a hard drive that plugs into the system, and a keycode is sent to him electronically that allows the movie on the drive to be accessed for a limited time.
Trailers are pre-loaded digitally instead of having to splice them into the film, and Morrow says the time-saving aspect is the greatest advantage of the new system.
“It used to take one to one and a half hours to get ready to show a movie,” Morrow said. “This loads itself. It used to take 30 to 45 minutes to rewind the film, but I can delete this in seconds.”
Morrow said the projector comes with a 3D option for another $15,000, but he has been told it doesn’t work well at drive-in theatres due to light pollution. He hopes to visit a 3D drive-in theatre in Kansas sometime to see for himself how well it works.
With the new technology, Hollywood productions aren’t the only thing that can be shown at the Sandell. Already two birthday parties have been held that featured a DVD slideshow of pictures of the birthday child, and Morrow said his family put some their old home movies on a DVD and put them on the big screen following his mother’s funeral.
“We got to see her alive the day we buried her,” he said. “There was no sound, but we all added the sound by recalling stories about her.”
Morrow said he hopes to be able to run advertisements for local businesses before the trailers of movies, and the projector can also show PowerPoint presentations.
Morrow said he thinks the late Gary Barnhill, who opened the Sandell in 1955, would like the new system because it is easier on the projectionist. Morrow re-opened the drive-in ten years ago this Labor Day after it had been closed for 16 years. He says he has plans to celebrate his anniversary and will make those known as time gets closer.
Hawkins receives state 4-H alumni award
LUBBOCK – A Clarendon native was recognized during the statewide Texas 4-H Roundup held recently on the campus of Texas Tech University in Lubbock.
At the event, the Texas 4-H Alumni Award was presented to Amy Jarmon, formerly a 4-H member in Travis County, and Dr. Dean Hawkins, formerly a 4-H member in Donley County.
“The Texas 4-H Alumni Award recognizes adults who have made significant achievements in their communities as a 4-H member and have shown evidence of the influence of 4-H into their adult lives,” Boleman said. “This award is administered by the Texas 4-H Friends and Alumni Association.”
As a professor and head of the agriculture department at West Texas A&M University in Canyon, Hawkins gives leadership to the future of agriculture in the Texas Panhandle and beyond, said Brandon Dukes, AgriLife Extension specialist for 4-H and youth development, Potter County.
“As department head, he shapes the agriculture education curriculum and hires faculty to lead and inspire future generations of students,” Dukes said.
“As a parent, he works with the county AgriLife Extension agent to train parents and select swine projects for youth throughout the county.”
“This was a unique program for many reasons, not the least of those being that it was held on the Texas Tech campus instead of the Texas A&M University campus, where it had previously been for several decades,” said Dr. Chris Boleman, Texas 4-H program director, College Station.
Boleman said the 2012 Texas 4-H and Youth Development Program’s Salute to Excellence Banquet during 4-H Roundup provided a worthy venue for award presentations.
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