Columns

It’s about time someone turned the tables on the state.
Lawmakers and the governor for the last few years have shifted costs onto localities while reducing state funding.
It was almost certainly with some small amount of pleasure, then, that several New River Valley communities said enough is enough.
Carroll and Grayson counties are among the New River Valley Regional Jail Authority’s member localities, along with the city of Radford and the counties of Pulaski, Giles, Wythe, Bland and Floyd.

By Sandra J. Felts, Woodlawn

Brian Spencer is chairman of the Carroll County School Board

The moribund Hillsville Rescue Squad will soon go to its final reward, but the former non-profit volunteer organization deserved a more dignified death than one that lingered for eight years.
It brings to mind a shuffling zombie, still somehow ambulatory but just a shell of its former self.
The first attempt to kill the rescue squad came as far back as 2004.
That’s when Carroll County officials padlocked the rescue squad station on Main Street in Hillsville after it came to light that a member used an ambulance to move furniture from Smyth County.