THE DAILY
MISSISSIPPIAN
Tuesday, October 18, 2016
Volume 105, No. 41
T H E S T U D E N T N E W S PA P E R O F T H E U N I V E R S I T Y O F M I S S I S S I P P I S E R V I N G O L E M I S S A N D OX F O R D S I N C E 1 9 1 1
WHAT’S INSIDE...
Fall leaves seem fun – but looseleaf textbooks are not
Today at Square Books ‘The Statue of Fury’ author tells his story
Freeze attempts to keep team motivated after loss
SEE OPINION PAGE 2
SEE LIFESTYLES PAGE 4
SEE SPORTS PAGE 8
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Connecting with Oxford’s Hispanic community Plaque
contributer responds to lawsuit LYNDY BERRYHILL
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Associate Rector for Hispanic Ministry Bruce McMillan opens St. Peter’s Episcopal Church worship service Sunday evening.
LASHERICA THORNTON
E
lthornto@go.olemiss.edu
ach Sunday evening, before 6 o’clock strikes at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, Associate Rector for Hispanic Ministry Bruce McMillan brings Spanish Bibles and hymn books to the sanctuary.
PHOTOS BY: ARIEL COBBERT
Other members hang a Spanish banner in the pulpit and bring in a guitar for worship service. Retired Ole Miss Spanish professor and current vocational deacon of 15 years Penny Sisson remembers when she and others began the Spanish-speaking service. In 2000, Hispanics made up
1.39 percent of Mississippi’s population. Since then, the population has doubled. According to Pew Research Center, 80,000 Hispanics live in Mississippi, making up 3 percent of the state’s entire population. In July 2015, the nationwide Hispanic or Latino percentage was 17.6 percent, a 1.3 percent rise
from April 2010. In 1998, Sisson and Kathy Gray, who both taught English as a second language, saw an influx of Hispanics coming through the Oxford School District. This lead to starting a worship service for Spanish-speaking residents.
fore drinking. There have been nine water line breaks in Lafayette county this year, according to Karen Walters, director of compliance and enforcement with the state Bureau of Public Water Supply. In regards to Twelve Oaks, Walters said the utility company has taken precautionary measures to prevent another break from occurring after the restrictions were retracted on Sept. 24. “It’s our understanding,” Walters said. “that [Twelve Oaks Utility Company] have provided an additional construction entrance that could keep some of the heavy equipment from damaging water lines in some areas.”
Since January, water utility companies such as Anchor Water Association, Twelve Oaks Utility Company and Harmontown Water Association have issued boil water alerts for their systems. These utility companies supply water to thousands of residents within each district, and when their systems malfunction, their residents are affected. “We received phone calls related to residents being without water, which is why we initially contacted the water system officials,” Walters said. “Most of the boil water alerts issued are precautionary due to line breaks or other conditions that cause a pressure loss,” Walters
said. “On rare occasions, some are state-imposed and are issued due to E. coli found during routine sampling.” On March 11, the 2,000 residents using the water system of Anchor Water Association were affected during a boil water alert. On Aug. 17, several line breaks caused system wide pressure loss for Delta Rain, the Wellsgate Water Association company, which resulted in 1,200 residents having contaminated drinking water. Walters said many of the water companies are working toward fixing the issues that cause boil water alerts. “If there is a problem with their treatment, they obviously work
SEE CHURCHES PAGE 3
The Mississippi Sons of Confederate Veterans have rekindled a lawsuit against Ole Miss over a plaque placed on the Confederate memorial statue on campus this week. The original lawsuit was filed in Sept. 2014, but two days after a revised version of the plaque was placed on the monument, the suit moved to circuit court. “We’re confident in our position that the university has not done anything improper or that violates,” University lawyer Lee Tyner said. Tyner has served as chief legal officer for Ole Miss since 2003. “We ultimately believe the lawsuit will be resolved in our favor,” Tyner said. When the original plaque language was released, many groups on and off campus were dissatisfied including the Confederate group, Ole Miss English faculty, Ole Miss history faculty, Ole Miss history graduate students and the Ole Miss chapter of the NAACP, as well as others. “I find it remarkable that a group that claims to be dedicated to preserving the legacy of those who fought to establish the Confederacy would find issue with the plaque as it currently stands,” Ole Miss History Professor Anne Twitty said.
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14 water lines break over seven months in Oxford BRYCE DIXON
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There have been 14 documented water line breaks since April 2016 in Lafayette County, according to County Supervisor David Rikard. When the Mississippi State Department of Health issued the boil water alert for Twelve Oaks Estates on Sept. 9, most residents did not expect the restrictions to last more than two weeks. Twelve Oaks residents were instructed to follow health safety guidelines and advised not to use or consume their tap water without boiling it first or adding a small amount of bleach to it be-
to correct the problem,” Walters said. “If there are line breaks, they try to repair using a hot tap rather than shutting the water off, but sometimes this is not possible. With both of these scenarios, they would likely do additional flushing prior and check chlorine residuals throughout the system prior to collecting samples. Often providing a better product incurs cost to their customers, and often their customers are not willing to pay a premium for quality above the minimum standard.” Wells for the City of Oxford received moderate-to-high rankings of susceptibility to contamination,
SEE WATER LINES PAGE 3