Consolidation

SECTION • C1

MISSING SOLDIERFamily’s search spans generations

S U N D A Y, S E p T E m b E r 30, 2012 • $ 1 . 5 0 w w w. v I c k S b u R G p O S t. c O M E v E r Y D A Y S I N C E 1883

INDEXBusiness ..........B8Classifieds .......C7Puzzles ...........B11Dear Abby ....B10Editorial ...........A4People/TV .....B10

1938: After co-signing the Munich Agreement allowing Nazi annexation of Czechoslovakia’s Sudetenland, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain says, “I believe it is peace for our time.”1962: James Meredith, a black student, is escorted by federal marshals to the campus of the University of Mississippi, where he enrolls for classes the next day;

Meredith’s presence sparks rioting that claimed two lives. In an address to the nation, President John F. Kennedy ex-presses hope that the school, the state of Mississippi and the nation would “return to their normal activities with full confi-dence in the integrity of American law.”1955: Actor James Dean, 24, is killed in a two-car collision near Cholame, Calif.

wEAtHERToday:

chance of rain; high of 77tonight:

chance of rain; low of 68Mississippi River:

2.4 feetRose: 0.1 foot

Flood stage: 43 feetA11

VOLUME 130 NUMBER 2743 SECTIONS

DEAtHS• Julia Reynolds• Joe F. Thompson• GayNell Satterfield

WhiteA11

cONtAct uSAdvertising/News/Circulation

601-636-4545Classifieds

601-636-SELL

E-mailSee A2 for e-mail addresses

ONLINEwww.vicksburgpost.com

tODAY IN HIStORY

High courtto kick offbusy termMondayBy The Associated Press

WASHINGTON — When last we saw the chief justice of the United States on the bench, John Roberts was joining with the Supreme Court’s liberals in an unlikely lineup that upheld Presi-dent Barack Obama’s health care overhaul.

Progressives applauded Rob-erts’ statesmanship. Conservatives uttered cries of betrayal.

Now, the Supreme Court is embarking on a new term begin-ning Monday that could be as con-sequential as the last one, with the pros-pect for major rul-ings about affirmative action, gay marriage and voting rights.

Many people on both the left and right expect Roberts to return to the fold and side with the conservative jus-tices in the new term’s big cases. If they’re right, the spotlight will be back on Justice Anthony Kennedy, whose vote typically is decisive in cases that otherwise split the court’s liberals and conservatives.

But Roberts will be watched closely, following his health care vote, for signs that he’s becoming less ideologically predictable.

It might be that the dramatic health care decision presages “some shift in his tenure as chief justice,” said Steve Shapiro, the American Civil Liberties Union’s national legal director. “Or does it give him cover to continue to pursue a conservative agenda?”

The first piece of evidence could be in the court’s consideration of the University of Texas’ already limited use of race to help fill its incoming freshman classes, which comes before the court Oct. 10. The outcome could further limit or even end the use of racial prefer-ences in college admissions.

Roberts has expressed contempt for the use of race in drawing legis-lative districts, calling it “a sordid business, this divvying us up by race,” and in assigning students to public schools, saying that “the way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminat-ing on the basis of race.”

The written arguments submit-ted by both sides in the Texas case leave little doubt that Kennedy, not Roberts, holds the prized vote. The challengers of the Texas program and the university itself cite Ken-

Idea to merge two high schools on the tableBy Matt Stuartmstuart@vicksburgpost.com

If Vicksburg and Warren Central high schools con-solidated, they would create one of the largest high schools in Missis-sippi with more than 2,200 students.

Plans of such a merger are a long way from becom-ing a reality, but parents, teachers and administra-tors are considering and discussing it.

The combination of ath-letic teams, bands, extra-curricular programs and facilities are just a few of the many issues that would

have to be settled, and the Vicksburg Warren School District will begin broach-ing the subject in two com-munity forums, this week and next.

The first is scheduled for 6 p.m. Thursday at Dana Road Elementary School, and the second will begin at 6 p.m. Oct. 8 at Sher-man Avenue Elementary School. Others will be set at the end of the month at an undetermined time and place, school officials say.

Initially, the forums were planned to discuss such topics as classroom tech-nology and parent-teacher coordination, but Super-

intendent Dr. Elizabeth Swinford said she knows consolidation is some-

thing “everyone is talking about.”

“We’re not actually look-

ing to speak specifically about consolidation, but I know it’s going to come out because it’s all over Face-book,” Swinford said. “I’m ready to let the community address it with me. This is not something I’m bringing up. This is something the community wants to talk about.”

Swinford said the forums provide the right format to begin the conversation publicly and openly so the district can gauge where the community stands on the issue.

“This list of pros and cons

Winschel columns will focus on Vicksburg 150 years agoAs the nation commemo-

rates the sesquicentennial of the Civil War, The Vicks-burg Post will publish a weekly column by a former longtime historian for the Vicksburg National Mili-tary Park.

Beginning a week from today and continuing through July, Terrence J. Winschel will give week-by-week historical

accounts of the Vicksburg campaign 150 years ago.

The columns will cover operations across three states — Mississippi, Loui-siana and Arkansas — that culminated with the fall of Vicksburg on July 4, 1863.

The campaign “was the most complex land and naval operation in Ameri-can military history up to that time,” Winschel said.

The operations cen-

tered on Vicksburg lasted 18 months and involved almost 200,000 sol-diers and the inland water fleets of the Union and Confederate navies. More than 20,000 casual-

ties, from the North and the South, were recorded in the campaign.

Winschel, who retired in the summer after 35 years with the National Park Ser-vice, expects Vicksburg, and especially the national military park, to host thou-sands of visitors who travel to the area during the sesquicentennial.

Established by Congress in 1899, the park also is

home to the Vicksburg National Cemetery.

The columns will focus on leading figures who com-manded Union and Confed-erate forces, common sol-diers and human-interest stories that Winschel said make Vicksburg “one of the most fascinating chap-ters in American history.”

•Next week: The value of the Mississippi River

the seriesIn advance of the Vicksburg Warren School District com-munity discussions of possibly consolidating the coun-ty’s two public high schools, The Vicksburg Post is taking a three-day look at some of the issues.Today — Enrollment, the facilitiesMonday — Athletics and other extracurricular activitiesTuesday — The traditions

If you go• 6 p.m. Thursday, Dana Road Elementary School• 6 p.m. Monday, Oct. 8, Sherman Avenue Elementary School

Terrence J.Winschel

Local enrollment by gradeGrade VHS WCHS TotalFreshmen 392 384 776Sophomores 289 317 606Juniors 239 211 450Seniors 169 230 399

2011-2012 vwSD EnrollmentSchool EnrollmentVicksburg 1,103Warren Central 1,168Total 2,271*

School EnrollmentTupelo 2,142Southaven 1,812Greenville-Weston 1,697Ocean Springs 1,662Meridian 1,630

School EnrollmentNorthwest Rankin 1,613Gulfport 1,559Oak Grove 1,516Harrison Central 1,514DeSoto Central 1,512

Source: Mississippi Department of Education. *Includes secondary GED and special education students

Largest high schools in Mississippi

See Schools, Page A11.

On A2Key cases this term

Onlinesupremecourt.gov

See Court, Page A2.

cOLLEGE fOOtbALL ScOREbOARDAlabama ........................ 33 Alabama State .......54 Texas ......................... 41Ole Miss ......................... 14 Alcorn State ...........14 Oklahoma State ........ 36Louisville ........................ 21 Jackson State ......... 34 LSU ........................... 38Southern Miss ................ 17 Prairie View ............ 13 Towson ..................... 22

vIckSbuRG HIGH

wARREN cENtRAL

A1 Main

The Vicksburg Post Sunday, September 30, 2012 A11

TODAY

Chance of showers and thunderstorms with a high in the upper 70s and a low

in the upper 60s

77°

PRECISION FORECASTBY CHIEF METEOROLOGIST

BARBIE BASSSETTTONIGHT

68°

WEATHERThis weather package is compiled from historical records and information

provided by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the

City of Vicksburg and The Associated Press.

LOCAL FORECASTMONday-WEdNESdayPartly cloudy; highs in the

upper 70s; lows in the mid-50s

STATE FORECASTTOday

Chance of showers and thunderstorms; highs in

the upper 70s; lows in the upper 60s

MONday-WEdNESdayPartly cloudy; highs in the

upper 70s; lows in the mid-50s

ALmAnACHigHS aNd LOWS

High/past 24 hours............. 78ºLow/past 24 hours .............. 68ºAverage temperature ........ 73ºNormal this date .................. 73ºRecord low .............44º in 1895Record high ...........93º in 1904

RaiNfaLLRecorded at the

Vicksburg Water PlantPast 24 hours ................0.6 inchThis month .............2.10 inchesTotal/year ............. 47.47 inchesNormal/month .....3.22 inchesNormal/year ....... 39.72 inches

SOLuNaR TabLEMost active times for fish

and wildlife Monday:A.M. Active ........................... 6:07A.M. Most active .................N/AP.M. Active ............................ 6:30P.M. Most active ...............12:19

SuNRiSE/SuNSETSunset today ....................... 6:49Sunset tomorrow .............. 6:48Sunrise tomorrow ............. 6:56

RIVER DATASTagES

Mississippi Riverat Vicksburg

Current: 2.4 | Change: 0.1Flood: 43 feet

Yazoo River at GreenwoodCurrent: 12.4 | Change: 0.2

Flood: 35 feetYazoo River at Yazoo CityCurrent: 8.9 | Change: -0.6

Flood: 29 feetYazoo River at Belzoni

Current: 10.3 | Change: -0.5Flood: 34 feet

Big Black River at WestCurrent: 1.8 | Change: NC

Flood: 12 feetBig Black River at BovinaCurrent: 6.6 | Change: NC

Flood: 28 feet

STEELE bayOuLand ...................................69.2River ...................................50.0

mISSISSIPPI RIVER FORECAST

Cairo, Ill.Monday ................................. 10.7Tuesday ................................. 11.0Wednesday .......................... 11.0

MemphisMonday ...................................-6.1Tuesday ...................................-5.9Wednesday ............................-6.4

GreenvilleMonday ....................................9.1Tuesday ....................................8.7Wednesday .............................9.1

VicksburgMonday ....................................2.3Tuesday ....................................2.0Wednesday .............................1.6

needs to be presented to the community,” she said. “You can’t just decide overnight.”

District 1 Trustee and Board President Bryan Pratt agreed, saying input is vital to the discussion.

“Well, we have to first quantify what the citizens of Vicksburg want,” Pratt said. “When the school district consolidated itself, in the late ’80s, they had to have a lot of public input. From an edu-cational standpoint, we have to make sure consolidation makes sense.”

Swinford said consolidation would be a lengthy process.

“It’ll take us at least a year to get all the information and get the proper information to the board,” Swinford said. “We’re fact-finding right now to make a recommendation.”

Enrollment numbersOfficial enrollment fig-

ures released by the Missis-sippi Department of Educa-tion for the 2011-12 school year showed 1,103 students at VHS and 1,168 at WCHS. Combined, there were 776 freshmen, 606 sophomores, 450 juniors and 399 seniors at

the two schools.Merging the two high

schools, assuming all four grades were housed at the same facility, could create the largest school in the state with more than 2,200 stu-dents. The numbers would be dependent on the local district and others across the state staying about the same size as they were last year.

In the latest figures avail-able, Tupelo High School, which houses grades 9-12, is the only school in the state with more than 2,000 students.

Many larger high schools in the state have separate ninth-grade schools to cut down on student population.

Overall, the Vicksburg Warren School District is the sixth-largest in the state behind those in Madison, Harrison, Rankin and DeSoto counties and Jackson.

Finance and facilitiesDistrict officials face sev-

eral logistical issues when considering how to house more than 2,000 students.

Swinford said building a new high school likely would

require a bond issue, which would have to be approved by 60 percent of Warren County voters.

The cost to build a new school has not been explored, but in 2011 the Madison County School District spent $35 million on its new Germantown High School campus, which includes foot-ball, baseball and softball fields, a state-of-the-art ath-letic facility and has a capac-ity of 1,200 students.

Along with the idea of building a new high school, Swinford said she has heard several other suggestions for using existing campuses.

One would be to put fresh-men at one facility and soph-omores, juniors and seniors at the other. Freshmen account for more than one-third of the district’s high school students.

Another idea Swinford said she has heard discussed is to continue using VHS and WCHS, one as a technical school that focuses on math-ematics, sciences and voca-tional training, the other as an arts and humanities school.

She said if the public sup-ports consolidation, the dis-trict would have to consider several options for address-ing facilities.

Pratt said whether the schools are consolidated or not, the district will be forced to address the aging school buildings sometime soon. Vicksburg High School opened as H.V. Cooper in 1958, and Warren Central, which merged all the county schools, opened in 1965.

“Our facilities have some age on them, and we are looking to spend our money wisely,” he said. “We have to determine if it would make sense to build one new facil-ity or maintain the facilities built in the ’50s. I do know we’re very challenged with some of our facilities where the wiring is not adequate for current technology.”

In some cases, renovation could cost more than new construction.

“I think we ran into that situation with the field-house they’re building,” Dis-trict Financial Director Dale McClung said in reference to the new VHS fieldhouse. “It

was going to cost more build-ing a new facility than to renovate the old facility, so it just depends on what you’re asking for.”

As for savings, McClung said it’s doubtful consolida-tion would cut down on the district’s largest expenditure — staff.

He said because of accredi-tation requirements and the need to meet teacher-student ratios, the district’s teacher and administrator numbers likely would stay the same.

“The largest single expen-diture of education is salary and benefits for employees,” McClung said. “You have to have a certain number of teachers to support a student population as well as a cer-tain number of principals.”

In June, the school dis-trict passed an $84.8 million budget for 2012-13.

The only savings in staff costs would come from extra-curricular groups and athlet-ics, where only one coach or director would be needed.

This year, VWSD employs 669 certified or licensed employees and 609 non-licensed employees.

SchoolsContinued from Page A1.

DEATHSThe Vicksburg Post prints obituaries in news form for area residents, their family members and for former residents at no charge. Families wishing to publish additional information or to use specific wording have the option of a paid obituary.

Julia ReynoldsJulia Reynolds of Vicks-

burg died Friday, Sept. 28, 2012, at her home. She was 78.

Mrs. Reynolds was a homemaker.

Funeral arrangements are incomplete with W. H. Jeffer-son Funeral Home in charge.

Joe F. ThompsonJoe F. Thompson died

Thursday, Sept. 27, 2012, at Baptist Medical Center in Jackson. He was 81.

Mr. Thompson was a long-time resident of the Rodney community and lived in Vicksburg for the past eight years. He retired after 37 years with Southwest Elec-tric Power Association in Lorman, where he was a meter calibrator. He was an avid gardener and a member of St. Joseph’s Catholic Church in Port Gibson.

Survivors include his wife, Ruby W. Thompson of Flor-ence; stepdaughter, Sherril

Strong of Utica; stepson, Don Curtis of Florence; two sis-ters, Marie Grant of Water Valley and Carolyn Gardner of Baton Rouge; four grand-children; eight great-grand-children; and nieces and nephews.

Graveside services were held Saturday at 11 a.m. at Cane Ridge Cemetery in Lorman with the Rev. John Hancock officiating.

Pallbearers were Don Curtis, David Strong, Char-lie Welch, Daniel Sims, Brad Strong and J.D. Lambrano.

Glenwood Funeral Home in Vicksburg was in charge of arrangements.

GayNell Satterfield Wilson

GayNell Satterfield Wilson died Tuesday, Sept. 25, 2012, at River Region Medical Center. She was 42.

Mrs. Wilson was a longtime Vicksburg resident. She was a Christian. She was a 1988 graduate of Warren Central High School, attended Hinds Community College, and received a degree in medical coding from Antonelli Col-lege in Jackson.

She was preceded in death by her mother, Betty Jean Satterfield; and grandpar-

ents, Robert and Trulie Mae Peaches.

Survivors include her hus-band, Danny Wilson of Vicks-burg; two sisters, Stephanie Brooks and Denetra Jones, both of Vicksburg; a stepson, Deunta Wilson of Vicksburg;

and aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, cousins, other rela-tives and friends, including the Meeks, Price, Peaches, Wilson, Smith and Stewart families.

Services will be at 1 p.m. Tuesday at Greater Mount

Lebanon Missionary Bap-tist Church with the Rev. Curtis Ross officiating. Burial will follow at Cedar Hill Cemetery.

Visitation will be Monday from noon to 6 p.m. at Lakev-iew Memorial Funeral Home.

BEIRUT — A fire sparked by battles between Syrian President Bashar Assad’s troops and rebel fighters tore through Aleppo’s centuries-old covered market Satur-day, burning wooden doors and scorching stone stalls and vaulted passageways. The souk is one of a half-dozen renowned cultural sites in the country that have become collateral damage in the civil war.

The damage to one of the best-preserved old souks in the Middle East was the worst yet to a UNESCO World Heritage site in Syria. Across the country, loot-ers have broken into a his-toric castle, stolen artifacts from museums and damaged ruins in the ancient city of Palmyra, antiquities officials and Syrian experts say.

The Aleppo market, a major tourist attraction with its narrow stone alleys and stores selling perfume, fab-rics and spices, had been the site of occasional gun battles and shelling for weeks. But amateur video posted Sat-urday showed wall-to-wall flames engulfing wooden doors as burning debris fell away from the storefronts. Activists said hundreds of shops were affected.

Algeria at UN:Limit free speech

UNITED NATIONS — Algeria demanded new

efforts Saturday to limit freedom of expression to prevent denigrating attacks on Islam, appealing to the United Nations to take a lead as nations engaged in new debate on the tensions between free speech and reli-gious tolerance.

In an address to the Gen-eral Assembly, Algeria’s

foreign minister Mourad Medelci called for global action under the auspices of the United Nations to respond to violent demon-strations provoked by a U.S.-produced video that mocks Muslims and the Prophet Muhammad.

While Medelci didn’t offer precise details of how he believed the U.N. could inter-vene, his call follows simi-lar demands at the General

Assembly from scores of leaders in the Muslim world who want new laws to ban insults against Islam.

On the sidelines of the annual forum, Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, secretary gen-eral of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, told The Associated Press Saturday in an interview that the deaths of two dozen people in vio-lent protests against the anti-Islam film underscored the

need for new legislation.

Violence eruptsat Spain protest

MADRID — Tens of thou-sands of Spaniards and Por-tuguese rallied in the streets of their countries’ capitals Saturday to protest endur-ing deep economic pain from austerity measure, and the demonstration in Madrid turned violent after Span-iards enraged over a long-lasting recession and sky-high unemployment clashed with riot police for the third time in less than a week near Parliament.

The latest violence came after thousands of Spaniards who had marched close to the Parliament building in downtown Madrid protested peacefully for hours. Police with batons later moved in just before midnight to clear out those who remained late because no permis-sion had been obtained from authorities to hold the demonstration.

Some protesters responded by throwing bottles and rocks. An Associated Press photographer saw police severely beat one protester who was taken away in an ambulance.

Spain’s state TV said early today that two people were hurt and 12 detained near the barricades erected in downtown Madrid to shield the Parliament building.

Syrian fighting torches historic medieval market

Protesters gather near Parliament against austerity measures announced by the Spanish government Saturday.

The associaTed press

WORLDBY THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

A11 Obits