Dissatisfied with the current form of representation, South Boston native Carter Hicks plans to circulate a petition to establish a ward system for town council members in South Boston.
At present, the South Boston Town Council consists of seven members and Mayor Glen Abernathy who are elected at large by popular vote, an arrangement that does not adequately represent the entire population, according to Hicks.
"While all of the members of the South Boston Town Council are of the highest character and are honorable gentlemen, I feel they live too close together to adequately represent the expanded town," Hicks said Thursday. "When South Boston converted to town status and annexed all that land, it caused the minority population to go up by 40%, making the town blacker than ever and justifying a change in the structure of the Town Council."
Hicks said he has contacted the Virginia Justice System and plans to circulate a petition to change the current form of at large representation to a ward system as soon as he receives the paperwork through the mail.
But in order to change from an at large form of representation to a ward system, the Town Council would have to vote to change the town's charter, said South Boston Town Clerk Jane Jones.
"Our town's charter sets up the way the government is - a town manager form of government with seven members elected at large. He (Hicks) would have to get the town council to vote to change the charter and then present that to the General Assembly for approval," Jones explained.
Hicks, however, feels the general population would be in favor of changing the system, especially now that the town has annexed several predominantly black neighborhoods.
Records in the town office show that in January of 1998, the Town of South Boston annexed approximately 4,000 acres in the Sinai community, a portion of the county near Berry Hill, a portion of Riverdale, and the Five Forks area, and increased the town's population by some 3,000 people.
In Hick's opinion, these new residents are not represented effectively by the current board because none of the council members are from those communities.
"Not only are the people in the annexed areas without adequate representation, there is also a question whether all the people in South Boston are adequately represented, or is it just the people living in the council members' neighborhoods. Currently, there is no way to pinpoint representation for the whole town, "Hicks said. "I was aware that the people in the annexed areas had no representation, but after sitting through several council meetings, I realize I'm in the same predicament. It's not that we necessarily need to get more blacks on the council, but that we need to get representation from each ward."
But while Hicks said the number of black members on the South Boston Council is not as important as securing representation for individual communities, he also feels that the black population does not have a strong enough voice with only one black council member, Edward Owens, on the board.
"If you look at the numbers, basically we have an all-white council. It doesn't matter if the one black member, Edward Owens, speaks out, because he's just one voice against six, and there's no way he could adequately represent the minority population," Hicks said. "This was successfully done in the Town of Halifax years ago (1990), when they went to the ward system because they couldn't get any blacks elected to council, and that was a fairly easy process."
But unlike the Town of Halifax, South Boston has a long history of black representation in its government, including former Mayor William Kent, who served from 1969 - 1992.
Hicks said he thinks South Boston residents, especially those in recently annexed areas, will support a change to the ward system, and that any opposition from council or other citizens will be minimal.
"When you elect a council at large, what you get is 'at large at nothing.' It's simply unfair. It's not just black people that are unrepresented, but white people in those areas as well," he said.
Should Hicks' attempt to alter the election process fall short, there will be an opportunity to change the face of the council during elections next May.
According to Jones, South Boston Council member C.W. Rorrer is running unopposed for a seat on the Halifax County Board of Supervisors, which will leave his town council seat open, and Dick Pond, who was appointed in 1998, does not plan to run for re-election next spring.

Rabies test results proved negative on a fox that attacked two dogs Monday in the Halifax area near Cowford Road.
The attack by a suspected rabid animal follows two confirmed cases of rabies in wild animals, one in Halifax and another in the Clays Mill area near Newbills School Road.
In Halifax on May 26, a rabid raccoon attacked several dogs while at Clays Mill, it was a skunk that proved to be infected.
While the three incidents of confirmed rabies occurred within a month, health department and animal control officials agree that it does not signal any outbreak of the dreaded disease that is caused by a virus found in the saliva of infected animals.
Officials did use the occasion to urge owners of dogs and cats to have their animals vaccinated against rabies. Should a rabid animal attack an unvaccinated dog or cat, that animal must be destroyed.
Rabies can be transmitted from infected animals to other animals and humans by bites or contamination of an open cut. Carriers can include bats, foxes, raccoons, skunks, groundhogs dogs, cats, and even farm animals. Squirrels, rabbits and rodents are seldom infected.
Treatment of an infected person is critical and if untreated, rabies can cause a painful death.
What should you do if you are bitten by a wild animal:
An animal control officer should sacrifice the animal. All biting wild animals should be tested for rabies as soon as possible.

If you are bitten by a cat or dog:
Obtain information about the pet animal. Include a description of the animal and licensing number or identification, owner's name, address and telephone number and the rabies vaccination status whenever available.

What next?
Immediately cleanse the wound thoroughly with soapy water. Get medical attention. Go to your family doctor or nearest emergency room without delay. Report all bites to your local health department or animal control agency.

Self defense against rabies:
Discourage wildlife. Minimize your chance of exposing humans and pets to rabies. There is a human rabies vaccine available for preexposure and a globulin treatment with vaccination for postexposure prophylaxis. However, prevention is of major importance. Start by reducing human and pet contact with wild animals.
If wild animals visit your property frequently, they are probably looking for food and shelter.

Remove welcome signs:
Check your house and property. Eliminate sites that can be used by animals for sleeping or raising young. Cap all chimneys. Plug all holes in roofs, eaves, or sides of buildings. Block any means of entry to foundations, porches and steps. Trim tree limbs that extend to or over your roof. Provide bright exterior lighting to discourage nocturnal animals. Encourage your neighbors to do the same.

What to do if they are already in residence?
1. If they're already raising young, it's best to wait for the young to leave the den. 2. When you're sure that there are no young or that the young ones are gone, watch the entrance at dusk and block it up after the animals leave for the night. 3. If you can't watch the hole, mount a flap of wood or heavy gauge wire on a hinge over the hole so that the animal can push it out to leave, but can't push it back in to re-enter. 4. Arrange a bright light so it shines into the den during the day, or place a loud playing radio there all day to discourage an animal from sleeping. 5. If the animal persists in remaining, call your local animal control officer. 6. Report any stray domestic or wild animals behaving strangely to your local animal control officer.

South Boston Police are searching for a man who attempted to rob the Super 8 Motel in Riverdale early Thursday morning.
Lt. Rick Loftis with the South Boston Police Department said the female desk clerk at the Super 8 on Bill Tuck Highway told investigators that a clean-shaven black male around 20 or 21 years old entered the motel around 12:30 a.m. and demanded money.
The clerk reportedly told the man, described as standing about five-foot, ten-inches tall, to leave twice before he ran out the front door.
At the time of the incident the suspect was wearing a gold earring and a green and black striped shirt.
No weapon was displayed.
Police are also investigating a break-in at the Owens Avenue home of Lloyd Smith.
Loftis said the perpetrators kicked in the back door to gain entry to the home at 1219 Owens Avenue sometime between June 21 and June 23.
Missing from inside was a Toshiba VCR, a change jar containing and unknown amount of cash, a Uniden scanner, a non-functioning gold pocket-watch and a few old coins.
Police request that anyone with information about either of these crimes call Crime Stoppers at 476-TIPS or 575-TIPS.
Callers are not required to identify themselves or testify in court and are eligible for up to $1,000 in reward money should their information result in an arrest and indictment.

Shots rang out along Hamilton Boulevard Wednesday evening, leaving one man injured.
According to reports from the South Boston Police Department, two motorists flagged down South Boston Patrol Officer D. Fallen Wednesday shortly after 5:30 p.m and told him that people were shooting at each other along Hamilton Boulevard across from Ernie's Restaurant.
When he arrived on the scene, another man waved him down and told him that he had been shot in the leg.
Police reports indicated that the shooting victim, Mugo S. Tate, 24, a resident of the Honeytree Apartment Complex, told Officer Fallen that he was crossing Hamilton Boulevard when someone started shooting at him from a passing vehicle.
Tate reportedly could not describe his assailant or the vehicle, and was taken to the Halifax Regional Emergency Room for treatment.
At this same time, police received a report that an individual had been robbed in the same vicinity and was being treated for injuries in the Emergency Room at Halifax Regional Hospital.
However, when police arrived, the alleged robbery victim, Sheron L. Norwood, 20, of Ridge Street, South Boston, told police that he had cut his eye and received additional bruises and scrapes when he fell off his bicycle.
South Boston Police are asking that anyone with information regarding these or other crimes call Crime Stoppers at 476-TIPS or 575-TIPS, or contact the police department at 575-4271.

An Alton trucker remains in fair condition at Duke Medical Center in Durham, N.C., following a single-vehicle accident near Scottsburg Monday morning.
According to Virginia State Police reports, Donald Franklin McKinney Sr., 43, of Alton, was driving a 1988 International for Virginia Power when he wrecked around 7:45 a.m.
The report filed by investigating Trooper D.O. Cooper II indicated McKinney was traveling along MacDonald Road (Route 344) when he ran off the right side of the road about three-tenths of a mile west of Terry's Bridge Road (Route 613), overcorrected, and then ran off the left side of the road striking a bank and overturning before striking a pole and a tree.
Damage to the truck was estimated at $50,000.
McKinney was taken to Halifax Regional Hospital in South Boston and later transported to Duke Medical Center where he remains in fair condition, according to a hospital spokesperson.
Charges are pending.
A Nathalie teen was injured Sunday after reportedly being run off the road by an unidentified vehicle.
Trooper Cooper reported that the 17-year-old youth was driving along Chestnut Road (Route 628) about two and a half miles west of Route 501 when he was run off the road by an unknown vehicle, causing him to lose control and strike a tree.
Damage to the1992 Ford driven by the young man was estimated at $2,000.
No charges were filed.

It was the quiet before the controversial hog storm for planning commission members Tuesday night as they zipped through two public hearings on elderly housing and set the rules for the July 12 hog setback public hearing.
The Monday, July 12, hog hearing is set for 7 p.m. in the Conference Room at Mary Bethune with the planning commission's regular session set for Thursday, July 29.
No action was taken Tuesday on a request for a conditional use permit for the Golden Age Care Center site just outside the Town of Halifax when Daniel McDuffie failed to show up.
In the first public hearing for elderly housing zoning amendments in business zones, no one spoke for or against the issue.
Planning commission members endorsed the zoning amendments, sending their recommendation to the Board of Supervisors.
However, the commission postponed action on McDuffie's application when several commission members said they had questions for the applicant and thought he should be present. Efforts to reach McDuffie during the Tuesday commission meeting were unsuccessful.
Supervisors may, if they wish, take action on McDuffie's request when it comes before their Board next month, according to assistant county administrator Jerry Lovelace.
In other business, Lovelace advised commission members the county has received a $12,000 grant for an architectural history survey for properties in the county. Supervisors also are supporting the survey and Lovelace said South Boston had indicated interest.

Four drug arrests resulted this week from the newly formed partnership between the South Boston Police Department and the Virginia State Police.
A press release from the Halifax/South Boston Regional Narcotic Enforcement Task Force indicated that agents were able to make four drug or weapon-related arrests this week as the result of investigations conducted by the State Police and South Boston Police Department as part of Governor Jim Gilmore's New Partnership Commission.

According to the release, Task Force agents arrested 20-year-old Joseph Nathaniel Davis of Mountain Road, Halifax, and charged him with two counts of possession of marijuana.
The Task Force also obtained juvenile petitions against one youth on charges of carrying a concealed weapon and two other juveniles charging them with possession of marijuana.
Task Force Coordinator, Sgt. R.S.B. Pulliam advises that active investigations in the Town of South Boston are continuing in support of the Governor's New Partnership Commission.

It has been almost six decades since Japan's sneak attack on Pearl Harbor issued a chilling call to World War II arms for America's young men.
But the nation's young nurses also answered the call, following America's soldiers into the fray.
Eleanor Audrey Mills Gieselman was one of those young nurses.
Decades later, scanning Vernon Hill's gentle summer landscape from her window, Gieselman winced as she recalled assisting in her first operating room duty in India, brain surgery.
The Rappahannock County native had wanted to be "a real part of WW II," a feeling sparked, she speculates now, by her brothers involvement. Two were in the Navy and one served in the Army.
Some war memories remain crystal clear, like the band playing "Sentimental Journey" as she and the others boarded the General E.T. Collins in Los Angeles.
"Army nurses were dressed in fatigues, field shoes, helmets and carrying out loaded backpacks as we went up the gang plank," recalled Gieselman.
"Oh, yes, there were Navy nurses and Red Cross workers, all dressed in their best dress uniforms with a sailor carrying their luggage. Really precipitated war was about to begin," quipped the former Army nurse.
There was another ship- a sister troop ship, joining the General E.T. Collins at the California dock.
"We left Los Angeles at sundown for overseas," she recalled. "These ships carried 6,000 troops plus naval working personnel.
"Somewhere we passed the Figis and New Zealand, however we didn't know when - this was war."
The ships later docked in Perth, Australia and the nurses had eight hours shore leave to see the city. For the nurses it was simply a treat to walk on soil and concrete once again.
"Later that evening we sailed - watching the phosphorus flicker on the water. We were traveling again only to be ordered to our quarters with the triple thickness curtains drawn to eliminate any glimpse of light to the outside world. Even our wrist watches were exchanged for those with protective dials so that enemies could not detect our ship."
Still, those aboard ship had no idea where they were heading until the money exchange. It was rupees and anas. Those aboard knew the China, Burma, India theatre of war was their destination.
"Our ships docked at the Calcutta port," continued Gieselman. "For an overnight we waited for a tide to bring the ship in on the Ganges River (also known as the Hoogley).
"This is where our shipment divided. Many went to China, Burma or other areas of India. I was assigned to the 142nd General Hospital in Calcutta, a great city of wealthy British people plus the most poverty stricken with beggars - the dead in the streets waiting to be taken to the ghatts for creation. This was indeed a city of extremes."
The young Virginia officer was assigned to the 142nd General Hospital in Calcutta, which she described as "a big hospital of tents, burlap windows, mosquito nets over the patients beds ( everyone's bed) for protection from the vast mosquitoes." But Gieselman said that was only helpful if the nets were tucked snugly in before sundown.
She and the others wore shirts with long sleeves, slacks and field shoes to minimize the stings.
"Polio was prevalent," recalled the nurse. "Patients were on respirators waiting for ships to come in equipped to bring them home. Amebic dysentery, jaundice, fevers of undetermined origin plus many other illnesses" were also prevalent, according to Gieselman.
Calcutta
The Virginian remembers walking to work or riding rickshas.
"Cabs were not the thing, only if we went into Calcutta in a group. The cabs were open tops (like touring cars) and cow dung was burned for fuel purposes. Residuals (from the burning) were not the best treatment for our hair or skin," added the nurse.
When V.J. Day came, prisoners were liberated from Rangoon and other places to be billeted at the 142nd and for re-orientation to G.I. life.
"This was a difficult assignment for personnel and a challenge for the POW's," recalled Gieselman.
And she still remembers one of her favorite poems, one written by a POW, a doctor from San Antonio, Texas, which was entitled "An Ode to a Bedbug".
Even with all the activity at the hospital, Gieselman did take one rest leave, flying to Agra to see the Taj Mahal, Fort Agra and the Fire Worshippers.
In 1946 the trip home took Gieselman from Dum Dum International airport via Casablanca, Cairo, Dakar, Natal Brazil, Georgetown and West Palm Beach.
Ultimately, she was reassigned to Valley Forge General Hospital in Pennsylvania. She later chose separation from the military and went to work for the Veterans Administration in Washington, D.C.
It was there she was to meet her husband, Ken Gieselman, who was in hospital administration. During WW II he had served in Europe.
Eleanor Gieselman's career following WW II would include 24 years of Public Health Nursing in Fairfax County, Culpeper, Fauquier, Madison, Orange and Rappahannock with the state.
The Gieselmans , who live in the Vernon Hill community, are the parents of two sons.
She remains active in the CBI Theatre Veterans Association, which will hold its annual national convention September 1-8 in Cincinnati, Ohio. Those interested in joining the CBI may write P.O. Box 780676, Orlando, Florida, 32878-0676.

Eleanor Gieselman is a member of the Halifax Woman's Club and a supporter of the club's effort to purchase land in Halifax to extend the courthouse green.
The Halifax Woman's Club will give the land to the county. A monument to honor all Halifax County residents killed during war in service to their country is be placed at the site by the Halifax County War Commission.
"I think it is a wonderful, wonderful idea," said the WWII nurse. "It is too bad it took this long to start these projects because so many WWII veterans are not here to help."

Lelia Howerton White, 86, of Chase City died Wednesday, June 23, 1999 in Halifax Regional Hospital.
Mrs. White was born in Charlotte County and was married to Rev. Robert Alfred White. She was a retired secretary and minister's wife.
A funeral service will be held at 2 p.m. today, June 25 at Hebron United Methodist Church in Wylliesburg with burial in the church cemetery.
Survivors of Mrs. White include a brother, Dan Howerton of Red Oak; nieces, Georgia Ann High of Scottsburg, Daisy Jane Garner of Lynchburg and Rosa H. Griffin of Buffalo Junction; and other nieces and nephews.

Those wishing to give memorials are asked to consider the Chase City Rescue Squad or Hebron United Methodist Church Building Fund.

Eugene Myers Francisco of 5029 Clays Mill Road, Scottsburg died Wednesday, June 23, 1999 at Halifax Regional Hospital. He was 75 years of age.
Mr. Francisco was born in Halifax County on October 9, 1923 the son of Edward James Francisco and Eva Franklin Francisco and was married to Gertrude Williams Francisco. He was a member of Bethel Baptist Church, was a veteran of WWII, retired inspector with the Virginia Department of Transportation and a retired farmer having been named Farmer of the Year in 1961 and again in 1991.
Survivors include his wife of 56 years; one daughter and son-in-law, Dianne and Merritt Reagan of Rustburg; three sons and daughters-in-law, Joseph F. and Mary Jane Francisco of Scottsburg, Donald R. and Melissa Francisco of Poquoson and Alfred E. Francisco of GA; five sisters, Louise Fallen of Rice, Ruby Williams of Scottsburg, Rebecca Hodges, Peggy Press and Margaret Bowman, all of Richmond; three brothers, Ronnie Francisco and Raymond Francisco of Scottsburg and Harry Francisco of Richmond; five grandchildren, Victoria Reagan of Rustburg, Brooke and Charles Wiley of Halifax, Ashley Francisco of Scottsburg, Joelenne Francisco of Quantico, and Adam Reagan of Rustburg. He was preceded in death by two sisters, Edna Williams and Josephine Stevens, and two brothers, Oscar and Clinton Francisco.
Funeral services for Mr. Francisco will be held today, June 25 at 11 a.m. at Bethel Baptist Church with Rev. Tony Brooks conducting the service. Burial will follow in the church cemetery.

Those wishing to give memorials are asked to consider Bethel Baptist Church or Halifax County Cancer Association.

Annie Saunders Newby of 360 Poplar Creek,South Boston died Monday, June 21, 1999 at Community Memorial Health Center, South Hill. She was 81 years of age.
Mrs. Newby was born in Halifax County on December 26, 1917 the daughter of John S. Saunders and Sarah Lou Wallace Saunders. She ws a member of First Baptist Church of Millstone.
Survivors include one daughter, Anna M. Cairns of San Francisco, CA; one granddaughter, Kristen Bender Goyette of Seattle, WA; two great-great-grandchildren; two sisters, Sterling Wilborn of South Boston and Lacy Guthrie of Altavista; and a special friend, Charles Bray of South Boston. She was preceded in death by one daughter, Sarah Elizabeth Bender.