The Rant Monthly | April 2024

The RantMonthly

April 2024 | Sanford, North Carolina

A product of LPH Media, LLC

Vol. 6 | Issue 4 | No. 61

Editorial

Gordon Anderson | gordon@rantnc.com

Billy Liggett | billy@rantnc.com

Jonathan Owens | jonathan@rantnc.com

Richard Sullins | richard@rantnc.com

Advertising

Nate Ewing | advertising@rantnc.com | (919) 478-0560

Contributors

Ben Brown, Bill Freeman, Mary Mason

Editorial Board

Gregg Jefferies, Mike Harkey, Steve Searcy, Sandy Alomar, Gary Sheffield, Cecil Espy, Jay Buhner, Dave Gallagher and Walt Weiss

Find Us Online: www.rantnc.com

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The Rant Monthly is located in beautiful Sanford, North Carolina. Please address all correspondence to LPH Media LLC, 3096 South Horner Boulevard #126, Sanford, NC, 27332. Editorial email: billy@rantnc.com.

Advertising email: gordon@rantnc.com.

The Rant Monthly is published monthly.

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Copyright 2024, LPH Media LLC, all rights reserved.

To quote my first column from our first edition of The Rant Monthly, exactly five years ago this week: The newspaper industry has been in decline for 25 years now. Nearly half of the people who were reading papers in 1994 are still reading them today. And on that note, I’m excited to announce The Rant has launched a new print product.

This edition of The Rant Monthly does something no good news journalist should ever do — it makes us the story. But we’re OK with that. It’s our birthday. We’re just happy we’ve made it this far.

Many of you who are reading this have been with us from the beginning. From before the beginning (when we were a radio show, when we were guests hosts on local cable access television and when we were just a fledgling news site). But Sanford is growing — something you’re well aware of if you’ve been reading us over the last five years — and many of our readers are not only new to the area, they’re new to The Rant

Not everybody may agree with this, but we think the story behind The Rant is a story worth telling. Consider the fact that one of the only reasons we even started a news site was to get back at a meddling state representative who had us kicked off the air, and you’ve already got a great origin story that matches any of the Marvel heroes.

It’s also worth noting that The Rant Monthly has found its footing in a five-year

span that has seen hundreds of newspapers across the country fold. That’s not boasting — more and more areas in the U.S. are becoming “news deserts,” and when there’s nobody covering the newsmakers, a lot can go unnoticed and unchecked.

None of this happens without our very generous and very loyal advertisers. And none of this happens without you. Thank you for reading us and supporting local journalism. And thank you for letting us tell our own story this month. Enjoy!

— Billy Liggett

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TIGER WOODS SPOTTED AT CAROLINA TRACE FOR SON’S AJGA DEBUT

Arguably the greatest golfer to ever swing a club was spotted at Carolina Trace Country Club in Sanford to watch his son prepare for his American Junior Golf Association debut in the Will Lowery Junior Championship, which began on March 20.

Tiger Woods, winner of 15 major championships and 82 PGA Tour tournaments, donned a black hoodie, hat and shorts and followed his son Charlie through a practice round on Trace’s Lake Course. Charlie, who just turned 15 last month, received a sponsor’s invite to play in the 54-hole tournament, open to boys and girls ages 12-19.

The younger Woods shot a +21 over the three-day tournament, finishing tied for 32nd in the 51-man field.

Tiger’s appearance on the course drew little fanfare, according to a few witnesses on social media, and only a few poorly angled photos have surfaced. His being in Sanford shouldn’t have come as a big surprise, though. According to Golf Digest in their report today on Tiger’s appearance, he’s “a regular presence at his son’s junior events, even carrying his bag for him during the Notah Begay III Junior Golf National Championship back in November.”

Interestingly, Charlie’s appearance isn’t his father’s only connection with Carolina Trace. In 2012, Tiger’s niece Cheyenne Woods earned a spot in the U.S. Women’s Open after shooting a 2-over in a 36-hole qualifier at Trace. Cheyenne, who played collegiately at Wake Forest, is the daughter of Tiger Woods’ half-brother, Earl Woods Jr.

— by Billy Liggett

A groundbreaking $418 million settlement announced in March by the National Association of Realtors is set to usher in the most sweeping reforms the American real estate market has seen in a century (most notably, dropping the 6 percent requirement on commissions). The move could dramatically drive down homebuyers’ costs. Photo by David Dubov | Flickr

SO LONG, 6%

Agreement between National Association of Realtors in March means home buyers/sellers can go lower than 6% for commission to real estate agents

By Billy Liggett billy@rantnc.com

The thousands of homes that have been bought and sold in Sanford in the last several decades have shared one common thread — aside from the skyrocketing prices. They have all come with a 6 percent commission paid out to the real estate agents who worked behind the scenes to make those transactions happen.

That commission rate is no longer set in stone, a result of the March 15 settlement of a landmark antitrust lawsuit that forced

the National Association of Realtors to pay $418 million in damages to home sellers and essentially end their rules on commissions.

The settlement, which is subject to court approval, makes clear that NAR continues to deny any wrongdoing in connection with the Multiple Listing Service cooperative compensation model rule that was introduced in the 1990s in response to calls from consumer protection advocates for buyer representation.

More importantly to future home buyers and sellers, the NAR has agreed to prohibit agents’ compensation from being included

on MLS listings. Under the current model, sellers are most often required to pay both their broker and their buyer’s broker, which critics say has played a role in the rising costs to buy a home in the U.S.

John Ramsperger, owner of Sanford Real Estate, said he believes the move will make commission rates more competitive. North Carolina real estate agents, he said, have to disclose whom they represent in a transaction (buyer or seller).

“What a lot of consumers don’t know, or

simply ignore in a real estate transaction, is that the buyer’s agent commission is ‘baked into’ the transaction. The seller’s agent and buyer’s agent split the commission on a sale. Most buyers don’t think about the compensation to their agent, because they do not write them a check. The buyer’s agent commission is debited from the seller proceeds on the sale,” Ramsperger said. “If a buyer’s agent has to negotiate and agree to compensation, they should be more shrewd in agreeing to compensation in a transaction. Real estate agents need to be competitive to secure the trust of the buyer in a transaction. This means agents may be getting less money.”

Some experts estimate rates could fall as much as 25 to 50 percent in the new market. But the ruling could also mean bad news for first-time homebuyers, Ramsperger said.

“If they are stretching to afford their first home and qualify for a mortgage, they may not have the additional funds to pay a buyer’s agent,” he said. “For sellers, I imagine they will be relieved to talk with licensed real estate agents to list their home for 3

percent, instead of 5 or 6. The marketing of the home should not change.”

According to a March report by CNN, citing analysis by T.D. Cowen Insights, the average price of a home for sale in the U.S. was $417,000 at the beginning of the year. At that price, sellers would pay more than $25,000 in brokerage fees.

Under the new rules, that fee could fall by as much as $6,000 to $12,000.

There’s fear nationally that the changes could mean the end of smaller real estate companies, but Ramsperger sees positives for agents like himself, particularly those with experience.

“Competition is a good thing, and consumers should have an awareness of all the variables that go into the largest purchase of their life,” he said. “I think some agents who are not skilled at obtaining listings may not like openly negotiating their compensation with prospective buyers… [and] I think newer agents and/or part-time agents may choose to leave the field as their opportunities for making money get smaller. This

favors the agents who have been practicing a long time.”

Another rule change, Ramsperger said, is that the buyer’s agent must enter into a written representation agreement with the buyer before touring the home. That means each agent has to present paperwork and obtain a signature from the buyer prior to looking at houses.

“Up to this point, we have to disclose whom we represent in a transaction but are not required to enter a buyer’s agency agreement prior to showing the home,” he said. “Many consumers will be slow to sign papers with an agent they just met. They simply called about a home they saw on the internet, they didn’t call to meet the agent at the office to discuss agency law and sign papers.”

Cindy Ortiz, Realtor and the managing broker for Coldwell Banker in Sanford, agrees that the big change that will come from the settlement is the prioritization of “up front discussions” between agents and buyers/sellers regarding commissions.

Buyer-agency agreements, she said, have long been standard in North Carolina and will become more common nationally.

“Despite these changes, buyer’s agents will remain essential,” Ortiz said, “necessitating comprehensive up front conversations with buyers and cooperation with listing agents to determine compensation terms. This adjustment aligns with the aim of fostering transparency in real estate transactions.”

Like Ramsperger, she sees the changes as a positive and doesn’t foresee a negative impact on agents like herself, at least not in the foreseeable future.

“No immediate effects have been observed, and it is unlikely to significantly disrupt operations,” she said. “Agents will continue to articulate the value of compensating co-brokering agents to sellers, emphasizing the benefits of working with qualified buyers. Until further clarity emerges, business operations will proceed as usual at Coldwell Banker Advantage, with agents staying informed and adaptable.”

SCHOOLS, TEACHERS STILL GET SHORT END OF STICK

It’s the beginning of budget season for local governments, and if you pay attention to that sort of thing, you’re about to see a lot of almost unfathomably big numbers thrown around over the next few months.

One thing to keep an eye on is the funding request to the Lee County Board of Education from the local public school district. For three years, the schools have asked the county to fund performance bonuses for teachers and staff, and for three years the county has failed to do so. The schools have funded some bonuses out of federal COVID funds in these years, but those dollars dry up in September and we appear to be headed toward a reckoning with regard to whether performance pay continues to exist for educators, and if so, how it’s funded.

It’s our opinion that the county has little to no credible reason to continue denying this funding request. The Republican-led Board of Commissioners increased property taxes for the current fiscal year while hiding behind a rate cut that was dwarfed by a huge uptick in valuations. Long story short, you’re very likely to be paying more this year than you did last year.

And while much of that can be explained by projects that seem massively popular with the general public like the multi-sports complex and a new state of the art public library, the county is still required to fund public education, and wiggling around that obligation can only have negative consequences. If nobody wants to teach here, it’ll be hard to point toward our schools as a positive for children, families, and even business.

Even more baffling is the suggestion from Republican County Commissioner Andre Knecht that the school board should ask the city council to fund performance bonuses, because so many school personnel live in the city limits. Cities explicitly do not have an obligation to fund public schools, which have to serve children regardless of where they live. Counties are administrative arms of the state which carry out state requirements. Knecht’s proposal betrays either a deep misunderstanding of how government functions or an unserious excuse to avoid doing the right thing.

So not only is it the start of budget season, it’s also an election year. Pay attention to who does what.

OPINION

STADIUM PROBLEMS

Engineers who have conducted tests on the structural integrity of concrete pillars supporting bleachers on both sides of Paul Gay Stadium at Lee County High School have told Lee County Schools Superintendent Dr. Chris Dossenbach that a temporary fix to seating on the home side of the field could potentially make it useable for athletic events this spring and possibly even graduation in early summer.

They also concluded that damage to the columns supporting bleachers in the visitors’ section is just too extensive to repair, making seating there unsafe.

Rant readers wrote to us about their school and their stadium:

It’s sad we supposedly have billions of dollars to send to places that hate us, but we can’t afford to fix our on infrastructure. Education funding is ridiculous; not to mention others.

Michael Holder

Rebar-in-concrete lasts 50 years. I guarantee you when those bleachers were built, the design specs specified that expected lifespan. The problem is that no one ever actually plans to replace these rebar-in-concrete structures when the 50 years is up.

If you don’t want to have to replace things every 50 years, stop building them out of rebar-in-concrete.

Vanya L.

Oh, they will not put that stadium back like it needs to be. Maintenance should have been done on a regular basis, and if it had, we would not be looking at this. So let’s just give Central Office folks some more raises and forget about everything our staff and students need.

Kathleen Rosser

Why has it been ignored for so long and not maintained all these years? All stadiums, bleachers and buildings should be inspected on a regular basis.

Annette Lilly

The home side alone isn’t enough for graduation. So, what are the plans? [It’s spring] and there isn’t a plan that we know of.

Athena Willett

I would love to have a piece of it when it is torn down. My dad was one of the first classes to graduate from there.

Heather Corbin

That visitor side was in bad shape when I was there 20years ago.

Sean Pechota

PLAN SANLEE CHANGES

Amendments to the Sanford/Lee County Planning Department’s Unified Development Ordinance were made public and pu up for public discussion in March:

We don’t have the infrastructure to support all this “growth.” And example: Traffic will be a nightmare at Tramway and Center Church when those apartments behind Food Lion fill up. Ugh.

Sheila Barber

The city and county are not reading complaints on social media, but if you read The Ran’t sarticle, there is a link to click that allows you to address your opinions directly to the team.

Cathy Griffin

Boys, you’re 5 now. Stop goofing around and make a serious newspaper.

By Billy Liggett

Ihave talked about generative AI at three higher education conferences in the past year, and I’m scheduled to speak at another one in June. Writing a 2,500-word story on the technology about a year ago now for Campbell University’s magazine is apparently enough to make me an “expert” in the field.

Trust me. I’m no expert.

What I am, however, is curious. And I’m realistic. The statistics are ever-changing, but one recent report from the World Economic Forum predicts artificial intelligence will create 12 million more jobs than it will replace by the year 2030. In other words, it’s something we should — in the very least — familiarize ourselves with.

In my presentations — all geared toward an audience of fellow communications and marketing professionals in higher education (when I’m not Ranting, I work in communications and marketing at Campbell) — I introduce text-generating and image-generating programs like ChatGPT and Midjourney and learning programs like Otter, a transcription and AI app that has made my life so much easier and has saved me a lot of time over the past

three years. It’s more than an “introduction” actually. I do my best to show how these programs can make their jobs easier. I show that it doesn’t take an “expert” to benefit today from this technology.

I preface all of this by telling my audience that I’m a writer. Writing is what I’ve done for a living for the past 27 years, and writing is what I enjoy most about my role at Campbell. At no point in my presentation do I suggest using generative AI to replace creative writing.

Now, will AI knock out a quick job posting or mundane report on survey analytics? Absolutely. Can it take the transcription of a three-hour meeting and instantly spit out a one-page summary of all that was said? You bet.

Would I ever use it to breeze through a column like this or any of the cover stories we’ve written for The Rant Monthly over the past five years? Of course not.

After my aforementioned article in 2023, I received a lengthy rebuttal from professors in the English department at Cambpell. Their counterpoint to my article, titled “AI is Dumb and Useless” stated that writing is creation, and it’s too important to leave to our robot overlords. When we write ... we don’t just turn our thoughts into printed words, we discover and create new ideas, the professors wrote.

And they are absolutely right.

The whole idea for the original story was born from a conversation I overheard two other professors having during a faculty/staff orientation that fall. The two talked about essays and other assignments they’d received from students that were obviously written by ChatGPT. The original idea was to do a piece about their cheating concerns and the impact this would have on higher ed as a whole.

But the more I learned about generative AI, the more the story grew (and changed). Those same professors also expressed evolving attitudes toward it. Sure, the concerns were still important, but they saw the writing on the wall, too. Teachers or professors who aren’t introducing AI into their curriculum are doing a disservice to their students. They’re not properly preparing them for the future.

There is a middle ground here. I consider myself an “old school” journalist, and I know there are those out there who’d rather let a computer do all the writing. I’m not here to defend that. But I am saying we can teach this technology — and we can learn to use it ourselves — without chipping away at what makes us human. Many believed the internet would kill printed books. That obviously didn’t happen.

If we just dismiss generative AI as a “killer of creativity,” we’re doing a disservice to ourselves and our students. It makes us all a little dumber and a little less useful.

Email this human at billy@rantnc.com.

THE RANT

FROM SHUNNED RADIO SHOW TO AWARD-WINNING NEWSPAPER | AN ORAL HISTORY

If The Rant Monthly were a person, it’d be starting kindergarten this year. That fact alone might cause a wave of mass resignation from local educators, but we can assure you we aren’t planning on enrolling anytime soon..

Instead, and in keeping with our yearlong theme celebrating Sanford’s 150 years of history (#Sasquatchcentennial) we’re taking this opportunity to talk about our own history, which actually stretches back far longer than the half decade we’ve been in print. Yes, we’re patting ourselves on the back. Blowing our own horn. Sometimes if you don’t do for yourself, no one else will.

So here’s an oral history of The Rant, compiled from interviews with ourselves, friends and other collaborators.

MID 2000S SEEDS IN THE GROUND

o Gordon Anderson, co founder: I started my career in journalism with The Sanford Herald in the summer of 2001 as an intern, and landed with the paper full time upon college graduation a year later. I never dreamed of being a writer of any kind or having a career in journalism as a kid, but it definitely stuck. I spent a few years learning the ropes and figuring out that not only could I do this, but I also sort of liked it. I liked being plugged into whatever it was that was going on, meeting people from all the different institutions and places that make Sanford “go,” and writing stuff that people read. I was on the crime beat to begin with, and later got to do government coverage, so there was always an audience.

The Rant began as a short-lived radio show in 2008 before it was unceremoniously kicked off the air a few years later. The gang decided to start a news site as retaliation, and that site became the newspaper you’re holding today.

o Jon Owens, co-founder: I came to The Sanford Herald in 2004 as a lowly sports reporter fresh out of college. Two weeks after I started, the editor who hired me was fired. Then, there was another guy for a while. Then Billy took over.

Gordon and I had already bonded over various things like nights at Local Joe’s and the occasional concert or house party. We lived together with another Herald reporter in a house on Vance Street we called “The Center for Indecent Living.” We even had a sign out front. We were near the poverty level and didn’t have heat the first winter. But we had fun.

o Billy Liggett, co-founder: I arrived in Sanford a month before my wife did (and two weeks before our furniture). I slept in our two-bedroom apartment at The Oaks on an air mattress that wouldn’t stay inflated for long — I often woke up at floor level. A plastic lawn chair was my living room furniture. At least I had a TV.

I moved to North Carolina from Louisiana, where I was a newspaper editor in a city roughly the same size. I worked there through Hurricane Katrina and a few other memorable events, but working for the Gannett corporation — owners of USA Today and more than 100 other papers — burned me out. I was ready for a change, and when The Sanford Herald called me out of the blue (actually, a hired headhunter) and asked me if I was interested, the answer was “yes” before I knew anything about the city.

This was 2007, and there wasn’t a ton online about Sanford (other than negative news and a few photos of the downtown area). My wife and I visited for my interview a few months earlier, and we liked the location. More than anything, we just liked that it wasn’t Louisiana (no offense, Louisiana).

I met Gordon Anderson and Jonathan Owens — in addition to a newsroom of about 10-12 people at the time — on Day 1. I was 31, but I still looked 18. They were skeptical. They all were.

I recall asking that first day what was going on locally that would pass for “news.” Somebody mentioned that the Dairy Bar had just banned smoking in the restaurant — people were still smoking in restaurants when I came to Sanford. I had no idea what a “Dairy Bar”

was, but I was assured it was a Sanford institution. Not everyone in the room considered it “front page news,” but my training told me that if the story gets people talking, it’s news. We made it a front page centerpiece story, photo and everything.

This was hardly an earth-shaking, life-changing piece. But it did get people talking. And it was a big deal to me at the time. I had to convince a room of strangers that I wouldn’t be a total failure. It felt like this was a decent start.

JULY 2008

THE RANT IS BORN

o Billy Liggett: Sports radio came to Dallas in 1994 in the form of a little station called The Ticket. I was a senior that year, and the idea that I could turn on my truck radio and listen to people talk about the Cowboys or the Rangers 24/7

but with a lighter approach. Bill Freeman and WDCC 90.5 FM on the campus of Central Carolina Community College were game, much to my surprise.

Our first show was aired on June 18, 2008. R.V. Hight, a Sanford institution and the city editor at the time, was our first guest. I recall he talked about chickens.

o Bill Freeman, CCCC Director of Broadcasting and Production Technologies: Billy just called and said he had an idea. And it was like “yeah, sure.” Well, let me rephrase that. It was “let me check.” I’ve learned in life to always say “let me check and get back with you.”

And it got approval through the administration. For us as a radio station, it was going to be positive because of part of your license renewal is outreach to the public and information to the public.

And this was associated with real reporters, which I am not and never have had a desire to be. It wasn’t something we were doing on the station. It was just a great way to include those local issues, especially when it came time to write those reports for the station to file with the FCC and all that good stuff.

was exciting. One of the early shows in The Ticket’s formative years was a weekend show called “The Rant.” That Rant discussed very little sports, instead focusing on pop culture, odd news and strange hypotheticals like “Would you rather live with a lobster claw or a baby arm?”

It wasn’t high-brow radio, but it was right up my alley.

I was a year and a few months into my four-year stint at The Herald, and one thing I discovered in that time was I worked in a newsroom full of people with odd, dark senses of humor. That humor came across in our planning meetings, though rarely in the actual stories (newspapers are meant to be serious, right?).

I pitched the idea to Gordon and Jonathan about approaching a local radio station about giving us an hour or two each week to talk the news. The show would be an extension of the paper — talk radio,

I actually thought it went pretty well, other than the technical side of things, which always takes a little while to learn for somebody totally inexperienced. To go into an audio control room for a radio station and learn how to push the buttons and turn the knobs.

o Jon Owens: When Billy arrived, I think he was able to channel our creative early-20s energy into something productive somehow. The first iteration of The Rant came in the form of a radio show. When Billy first pitched us the idea of a weekly show on CCCC’s radio station, 90.5 FM, I was kind of terrified. I talk like I am from Robbins, North Carolina.

I am an introvert at times, though I hide it well.

I was wrong. The radio show was so much fun. I looked forward to it every week. Billy took the lead as host, and I found a niche playing off him and Gordon. I think we could’ve been the next John Boy and Billy. And Gordon.

The Rant’s first award was as second-place finish by Jon Owens in the 2008 City of Sanford Fourth of July Pie-Eating Contest. Jon would don the “El Uno” eating helmet again in 2010 as art of a stunt for the gang’s short-lived radio show.

o Billy Liggett: Over the next few years, our show developed a small following. We would mix news talk with discussions about our lives (I became a dad in Year 2, and got a call from her boyfriend in the future in one show) and observations on things going on in the world around us.

We performed sketches involving fake versions of local elected officials and even conjured the spirit of a long-dead Civil War veteran in one show. Every time the Lee County sheriff came on, we played him in with “Panama” by Van Halen. We had U.S. Representative Bob Etheridge on. We had the fine folks from Carolina Animal Rescue and Adoption come in the studio with their dogs. Mayors. School board members. People up for election. Reality TV stars. Coaches. Friends.

And we never really knew how many people were listening, but we found out one morning that it was a lot after we were allowed to give away Coldplay tickets and our phones were lighting up.

It was fun. We didn’t get paid for it. It wasn’t award-winning radio. But it was fun. And that’s all I ever thought it was going to be.

o Gordon Anderson: I honestly don’t remember much about the actual genesis of The Rant in radio form. I only know I wasn’t on the first episode. Maybe I was busy that morning, or maybe I wasn’t interested yet. I can only say with full clarity that I came on board for the second episode and didn’t look back.

Like with newspapers, I’d never harbored any ambitions to host a radio show (I guess I never harbored ambitions to do much of anything other than rock, looking back on it), but it must have sounded fun because within a week I was getting out of bed way earlier than I needed to to go be on the radio.

I can’t say I was any good, but I did have some familiarity with talking into a microphone. The Rant was not to be taken TOO seriously. I can’t believe some of the stuff we got away with — it was never mean spirited or offensive or controversial or anything like that, but it WAS kind of ridiculous. I was in a booth separate from the other hosts, so I could turn my mic down and use my cell phone to call the station, and when Billy answered I would put on a fake voice — might have been of country music legend Vince Gill, or some local elected official, or some made up

character — and we’d have a hilarious (at least to us) four or five minute interview.

I mean, we definitely also talked about the news of the week, but it didn’t feel a whole lot like work. It felt very separate from work, even though I was talking about what I’d done at work the week prior and then almost immediately going to work again right after.

o Mary Mason, early radio contributor: My time at The Rant was brief, but unforgettable. I had worked at the small campus radio station in college, and when I moved back to Sanford during a transitional time in my life, I was itching to get back behind the mic. When I discovered a local news radio show, I immediately emailed them and pitched my (admittedly limited) skills (editor’s note: any experience Mary had dwarfed the rest of ours’ combined)

Somehow, I convinced the guys at The Rant to give me a spot on their roster. I was unpolished, but enthusiastic, and I had one hell of a time on those radio broadcasts. I have been thrilled to watch the transformation of The Rant from morning news on the radio to award-winning print journalism.

Photo that went along with a promotional video titled “The Rant: A Typical Wednesday Morning” filmed in 2008 just months after Gordon Anderson, Billy Liggett and Jonathan Owens started the radio show on 90.5 FM WDCC.

FEBRUARY 2010

GORDON IS FIRED

o Billy Liggett: I threw up the day before I fired Gordon from The Sanford Herald. I was supposed to do it on Friday — I won’t get into the reasons and all that led up to it, but will say I wasn’t fully on board with the decision. I asked to put it off until Monday, and I was sick about it the two days leading up to it.

When the time came to pull the trigger, so to speak, it was noon-ish. I wasn’t in any mood to eat, as my stomach was still in knots, but I didn’t take into account that Gordon was hungry. When I approached him to have a quick meeting with me and our HR rep, he was halfway through a Subway sandwich at his desk.

He was unaware of what was about to happen. Like an innocent pup going on that last ride before getting dropped off on a country road. And when it did happen, it was quick. I wasn’t able to go into the details. It happened, and he left with his sandwich still on the desk.

I’d love to say the rest of the newsroom

popped champagne and finished off the sandwich when he walked out the door, but that wouldn’t be true. Everybody was pretty sad and upset. Everybody hated me for a while. I understood.

A few weeks later, Gordon rejoined us on the radio show. It was pretty big of him to do that. Looking back, had he not, I suppose we wouldn’t be where we are today.

I guess I still owe him a half a sandwich. Or he can fire me someday. It’s only fair.

o Gordon Anderson: It was actually the second time I’d been fired. The first time was from a job I had in college that depended on having good grades. Since my grades had been in the toilet for about a semester, I was pretty sure that one was coming.

The Herald firing was more of a surprise. But it didn’t take long to realize I was probably in need of a fresh start anyway. My first impulse was that fresh start probably involved anything other than journalism, and it was that way for a lot of years. I wrote on a freelance basis, spent a little bit of time as the grant writer for a local nonprofit, and continued appearing on The Rant for almost

two years. I don’t remember holding any grudge against Billy (beyond the unfinished sandwich) because before he shuffled me out the door he gave me the names and numbers of people I could call for immediate freelance work. He asked me if I wanted to keep doing the show. It didn’t seem like your average firing.

I left The Rant in November of 2011 after finding myself hired as the campaign communications director for a member of Congress from the Triangle. Pretty wild, huh? I don’t remember whether Billy and Jon kept it going after that, but if they did, it wasn’t for much longer. At that point I guess I remember feeling like it had run its course.

In 2013, I was able to use my experience from the year prior to start consulting with candidates for local office. I was entirely out of journalism, but Billy called and asked if I’d be interested in doing the show again. Apparently the door at CCCC was still open, even though none of us worked at The Herald (or even in journalism) anymore. Again, it must have sounded fun, because it still didn’t pay.

APRIL 2013 THE RANT IS DEAD

o Gordon Anderson: Billy started a website to accompany our radio show and kind of encouraged me to use it as an outlet for further expanding on whatever it was we’d talked about the week before. Because we’d recently discussed then Rep. Mike Stone’s bill to make school board and city council elections partisan, and because we were could now express our opinions more freely, I decided to write a little essay about the topic.

It wasn’t mean spirited or nasty, but I said it didn’t seem like a good idea (it wasn’t, and still isn’t), posted it and forgot about it. The next morning Billy called and said the show had been suspended because Mike’s legislative aide emailed the college with some pointed questions about the show’s funding. It was made clear in so many words that this question arose from my blog post. Whoops (editor’s note: Stone “respectfully declined” a request to be interviewed for this story)

o Billy Liggett: What’s funny (to me, anyway) about us getting kicked off the

air is that I had very little to do with it. When Mike Stone got angry with us for expressing our views on his introducing a bill to the General Assembly to make some local elections partisan, it was based on a blog post that Gordon wrote, and when we discussed it on the air, Gordon did most of the talking, because I knew very little about the subject.

So, basically, it’s all Gordon’s fault.

o Bill Freeman: I thought it kind of took things from the sublime to the ridiculous, in terms of the reasoning behind the complaint that was levied. Because everything was also in writing that you used on the air, and was also factually based. So I didn’t have problem with it, obviously. But due to the fact that the Board of Trustees is a mixed group of individuals that are beholden to the college and the community I understood why the decision was made. I didn’t agree with it.

o Billy Liggett: Part of me wanted to make this a big First Amendment fight — and based on the semi-national exposure the whole ordeal got, it could have been a fun fight. But I also didn’t want to put all of that stress on Bill Freeman and CCCC.

We launched the news site because of all of this. We joke today that The Rant is a product of pure revenge. That’s partly true. But we also launched the news site because — at the time — we were all out of the newspaper industry, and we didn’t fully feel like letting go of the thing we loved to do.

DECEMBER 2015

THE RANT GOES ... VIRAL?

o Billy Liggett: The first story that appeared on our website happened in January 2014. We we wrote about a murder suspect appearing in a WRAL video as a friend of the victim a few months earlier when the news station reported on the murder.

But The Rant was by no means “killing it” (sorry for the pun) as a website in 2014 and 2015. We had barely over 100,000 views both years (we’re well over a million a year now). But in December of 2015, our site became the center of attention nationally for a day.

OK, maybe that’s an exaggeration. But when I decided to write about my experi-

ence in a Cary movie theater for opening night of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, I didn’t think it would get the attention it did. Long story short, my evening was ruined by a nearby church group that put two people at the front of the line to get in and once the doors opened, they ran in the theater and taped off about five or six rows of premium seats for the rest of their 60- to 70-person group.

I wasn’t the only person upset by this. And when I approached the group about their seedy tactics, I was strong-armed by a couple of douchebags who told me it would be best if I returned to the back of the theater.

My anger hit a new level when the center seat was filled in the last-minute by a camera-carrying Penn Holderness of “The Holderness Family” fame. Penn was there with the group and filming his experience for his YouTube channel.

I decided to “pen” my frustration the following day, and the story was picked up by some anti-Holderness writers at Deadspin, back when that site was big and relevant.

The story drew tens of thousands of views to the little Rant, and even spawned an olive branch by the family when they invited my family to watch the movie with them again. I declined, politely, because it wasn’t necessary.

Since then, The Rant or our reporting has appeared on MTV’s “Catfish” (neat story), on Sports Illustrated’s website, in the Charlotte Observer, on WRAL’s Tarheel Traveler and in several other places. The Deadspin experience showed us that “clicks” were possible.

We just needed to have our night ruined by a YouTuber looking for clicks.

APRIL 2017

THE RANT GOES CORPORATE

o Gordon Anderson: Getting attention outside of Lee County hasn’t really been a big goal for me, but when it happened it did prove to me that we were maybe onto something. We were regularly getting stories ahead of anyone else locally, we were realizing we had an audience beyond our friends and families, and we found ourselves spending more and more time on the

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APRIL

The Rant

SANFORD,

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Monthly

The first edition of The Rant Monthly, launched in April 2019, took an in-depth look at the Prince Motel, its poor treatment of residents and the crime numbers in the area over the last decade.

THE PRINCE DILEMMA FIRSTEDITION

website. I thought if we formed an LLC, we could sell a few digital ads ($50/month back then) and at least make a little bit of money instead of doing it purely as a hobby. But it still seemed like less of a career move than it did going with the flow.

o Billy Liggett: This was the precursor to our printed edition, which would happen two years later. I just like the fact that Gordon and I never take our own quotes seriously in these kind of stories. When we reported on our LLC, these were our quotes:

“Forming an LLC, obviously, allows us a paradigm shift, if you will, that we otherwise weren’t able to formulate under our former modus operandi,” said Liggett. “This isn’t rightshoring, per se, but rather leveraging a best practice, at the end of the day. It’s all about core competency. Moving the needle. Opening the kimono, in layman’s terms. It’s not about making hay … it makes us scalable in the long term. Synergy.”

“Readers should not worry, though,” added Anderson. “We will stay focused on deliverables.”

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APRIL 2019

The Rant Monthly launches; succeeds?

o Billy Liggett: Gordon insists that it was my idea to launch a monthly newspaper. Maybe it was. All I remember about our initial discussions on the idea was that I didn’t think it would work. The reason I got out of the newspaper industry in 2011 was because I saw a sinking ship. My passion for journalism and newspapers was born in college, yet none of those professors had the foresight to warn us about all the layoffs and downsizing and salary freezes that lie ahead.

o Gordon Anderson: Going to print was definitely Billy’s idea, and it also felt like the most substantial step we had taken so far. Beyond the obvious reasons was that we’d have to really start thinking of ourselves as journalists again. That’s not to say we ever published anything but what we understood to be the truth at the time (other than on April Fool’s Day), but we’d built an audience by reporting that truth with a whole lot of ourselves in the mix. My goal at least was to keep doing

so in a way that ensured our product would continue to be taken seriously.

o Billy Liggett: The more we all talked about the idea, the more I saw that it could work. Unlike daily newspapers — which require multiple reporters and editors, a publisher, a circulation staff and an advertising staff — we knew we could start this thing with minimal overhead. In other words, we could put it together, get someone to sell ads for us, pay a few bucks to have it printed and bada-bing, we’re not spending a ton of money.

More than that, though, we had spent the previous 10 years very slowly building a brand with The Rant. From a radio show to a revenge news site that was suddenly getting a lot of hits, the community knew us. It’s different to launch a paper or a news site as a bunch of strangers unfamiliar with the community (which we’ve seen a few try to do over the years).

And we were no slouches, too. The Sanford Herald was the Newspaper of the Year and General Excellence winner in its small daily division for three consecutive years before we left.

The Rant was featured on WRAL’s “Tar Heel Traveler,” hosted by Scott Mason, in the summer of 2020 after it published editions on the pandemic, Black Lives Matter and other hot topics in Sanford that year. Photo: WRAL

o Jon Owens: When Billy and Gordon first pitched me the idea of a printed product, I was skeptical. Newspapers are dying every day. I didn’t have much money to invest in something I thought may not make it. I couldn’t take the risk, but they let me remain a minority partner.

I was wrong again. The Rant has been an enormous hit, and I am so happy for them. As a minority partner, I am proud of what Gordon and Billy have built The Rant into over the last five years. They both work very hard each month to create a product we are all proud of. I’m also glad they let me be a part of it. And I’m very appreciative of Sanford for supporting us.

So, I’m wrong a lot, but it usually works out. The next fantastic idea they have, I will just say yes.

o Gordon Anderson: I got occasional grief in the years before we went to print from people who knew about my past work in campaign consulting. The suggestion was that because I had worked virtually exclusively for candidates of one party, I couldn’t be fair to either side if I continued to write

about politics and government.

But I’ve never tried to hide the fact that I did that work because I don’t see it as disqualifying in any way. If anything, it made me able to do this job even better. And I think our record over the last five years backs that up for anyone willing to take an honest look at our work, what we’ve reported, who we’ve been critical of and who we’ve praised. It didn’t take long for it to become far less of an issue anyway, because we brought someone in to do most of our political and government reporting for us.

o Billy Liggett: Our approach with The Rant Monthly was to build the paper around a strong cover story every month. We knew for that first issue, we needed a strong strong cover story. We decided to write about the Prince Motel, a rundown motel that was the site of several arrests (drugs, assaults, prostitution) over the last several years and a place that we’d heard was taking advantage of those down on their luck with ridiculous rent and terrible living conditions.

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us to go on property (only to be “strongarmed” away by a big guy working what amounted to security that day). We talked to people living there, people who’ve stayed there, government officials who said their hands were tied, local police and groups who have helped the motel’s residents with food, clothes and additional shelter.

The story ran five years ago. Today, the Prince is home to no one, and the building itself faces a very high likelihood of demolition. Who’s to say this could be said in April of 2024 if The Rant didn’t approach this story back in April of 2019?

o Richard Sullins, government reporter for The Rant: Just out of college, in the town where I was living at the time, the local radio station was looking for a news director. So I did that. And that got me involved in covering county commission meetings, town council and school board and those sorts of things that are similar to what I’m doing here.

I’d lived in Sanford previously, back in the mid 2010s. And I came back to Stanford in late 2020, early 2021, when I

married the pastor of the Trinity Lutheran Church here.

I had retired from the North Carolina Community College System a couple of years before that. And I was just married, and my wife was working full time as a pastor, and I was just sitting there all by myself during the day. And I decided that I want to just do something besides read, as much as I enjoy reading.

She had been gifted a subscription to The Sanford Herald, and they would come in, I think, at that time, it was five days a week. She would bring them in and give them to me, and two minutes later, I’d read the whole paper. So we were out at a restaurant, and there was a rack there that had The Rant in it. She picked one up and she said “take this and read it, this is going to be more to your liking anyway.”

I thought, “Well, these guys aren’t taking themselves too seriously. This looks like a fun thing to do.” So that’s when I approached.

After I did the first few stories, I had a few people that I knew from the community and from church and so forth come up to me and say, “Hey, I saw your story on the redistrict-

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ing here in the county or in the city, and I think it was great.”

And so when people would start doing that sort of thing it was like, wow, people actually are paying attention to the work that we’re doing. I have a church men’s group that meets every Tuesday morning for breakfast. And a part of that meeting every week is they will ask me, “What’s going on you that you know about, that we should also know about?”

About once a month I get an email from someone who says, “you know, I appreciate what you’re doing on this particular story. Or another one will say “you know, there’s something going on with this or that.”

Occasionally somebody will come up to me if we’re out to dinner at a restaurant and say “are you, Richard? Are you with The Rant?” And then they’ll say, “I just wanted to introduce myself and thank you for what you’re doing.” Or, you know, “you guys are really terrible.”

o Jon Owens: We often get comments about how we’re taking on The Herald, but that’s not true at all. I’m grateful to the Her-

ald for giving me a chance out of college, for making me learn so much about the business, and for giving us an opportunity to meet and start The Rant.

I guess you could say The Rant is like the cool spinoff of The Herald — like Family Matters to Perfect Strangers. In fact, it’s exactly like that.

We all three respect the role a daily paper has in a community like Sanford. I think, when we worked there, we were so caught up in the grind that we couldn’t do a lot of in-depth features or more off-beat things. The Rant Monthly has given us that outlet.

o Mary Mason: Billy, Gordon and Jon are serious journalists who don’t take themselves too seriously. They tell meaningful stories and terrible jokes. They shed light on stories that would not see the light of day in other publications. They bear witness.

And, as they did for me, they make space for voices that should be heard. As The Rant celebrates this anniversary, Sanford celebrates their continued dedication to keeping our community informed and empowered.

Co-founders of The Rant at Gordon’s wedding. Despite the smiles in this photo, the three dislike each other immensely and are looking forward to the day a large newspaper chain swoops in and buys them out so they can go their separate ways.

The witty headlines don’t hurt, either. Keep it up, The Rant.

o Gordon Anderson: On the one hand, I probably wouldn’t have agreed to go down this road five years ago if I didn’t believe it could be done. On the other, there’s nobody more surprised than me that we’re still here half a decade later. Less than a year after we first appeared in print, COVID hit and everybody got trapped inside for several months. Obviously there was plenty to write about, but I do remember wondering if a pancaked economy would bring down our advertisers and in turn bring down us.

We decided to shift a lot of our distribution to local restaurants who stayed open

for takeout as a way to encourage people to patronize those businesses.

In 2022 we joined the North Carolina Press Association, and won press awards — recognitions from other people in the industry — two years running. We’re gradually increasing our print run to get more copies out to the public. Any time there’s an issue with our website or something like that, the emails I get are a wild reminder that we’re being paid attention to. We’re really lucky to have so much support from the public and from the many businesses in town who make doing this possible.

o Billy Liggett: The Rant was never to be taken seriously. As a radio show, it was a

comedic and creative outlet for three young, underpaid journalists who worked too much. As a news website, it was a form of revenge against the system that kept us from speaking our mind. As a podcast, it was an opportunity to talk about the things going on around us (most of that talk revolved around local concerts).

And as a printed publication, it was a challenge to see if we could create what amounted to an “alt-monthly” — something you really only see in large markets — in a small city that already had an established daily newspaper.

Here we are in 2024, and The Rant Monthly — despite our best intentions — is taken seriously. We’ve reported the news.

Exposed perceived wrongdoings. Celebrated our growing community. Helped those who needed a voice. Provided a message board during a global pandemic.

Yet through it all, we’ve kept the same fun approach to creating this as we had on Day 1 of the radio show. That’s why I still love doing this.

We realize it’s self-serving to dedicate one of our issues to our own history, but we’re proud of what we’ve created, and we’re overthe-moon thankful to the many people who have supported us and advertised with us along the way.

Here’s the past five years, and here’s to what we hope are many, many more.

TAKING ON THE

RURAL TEACHER CRISIS

Researchers from Campbell University look to identify the factors behind North Carolina’s troubling teacher attrition rates, particularly in rural school districts

Story by Billy Liggett | Photos by Ben Brown

“No one goes to college to teach middle school,” Hayley Redding says in a quiet, empty classroom, minutes before 30 eighth graders will march in and turn the silence upside down. “They usually just kind of end up here.” She’s joking, of course. Eighth graders aren’t so bad. But there is an unintentional truth to her words. Fewer people are going to college to teach, and not just middle school.

Across the country, the number of college students interested in a career in the teacher profession has fallen 50 percent since the 1990s and has reached its lowest level in the last 50 years, according to a recent study reported by The New York Times

And job satisfaction among current teachers is also at a low point, especially in North Carolina. The state opened the 202324 academic year with more than 3,500 teaching vacancies in K-12 public schools, and while that was actually an improvement over the previous year, a striking number of new hires in 2023 were considered less qualified. Over the last decade, North Carolina has seen a 51 percent drop in enrollment in traditional teacher preparation programs.

The New York Times referred to it as “The Great American Teacher Crisis.” Their

opinion piece published in September asked: “People Don’t Want to Be Teachers Anymore. Can You Blame Them?”

Yes, the numbers are dire, and the overall perception of the profession is at an all-time low. That’s what makes Hayley Redding such a breath of fresh air.

A Harnett County native who stayed close to home to earn her Middle Grades English Education degree from Campbell University in 2014, Redding returned to Harnett County Schools to teach English language arts and social studies after graduation. Her passion for teaching was sparked, not coincidentally, in the eighth grade when a veteran teacher chose her to tutor classmates who were struggling or those who had missed too many classes.

STAYING RURAL

Hayley Redding teaches ELA and social studies at Western Harnett Middle School near the Barbecue community in Harnett County. The 2014 Campbell University graduate said she chose to teach in a rural school district close to home because it’s where she feels she can make the biggest difference.

Redding chose to concentrate on middle school education in college, and she chose to start her career at Western Harnett Middle School (just minutes from Sanford) not just for its proximity, but because it was a rural district with a diverse population of students with similar backgrounds as hers. Now in her fourth year, Redding calls it her dream job.

“Eighth graders are a very special breed, and I mean that in the best way possible,” she says. “You see so much growth and transition from a sixth grader to an eighth grader. And every single day is completely different. Every class period is completely different. I get joy in knowing that I’m not only teaching them skills, but I’m helping them grow as learners and grow as people.

“These children are my heart and soul. They bring me so much joy,” she adds. “That’s why I’m here.”

A study led by professors from Campbell University’s School of Education & Human Sciences seeks to learn more about teachers like Redding and the many on the opposite end of the spectrum who are fleeing the profession in record numbers.

Led by Dr. Laura Lunsford, the former assistant dean of psychology and social work and current adjunct professor of psychology (who just joined the National Science Foundation as an evaluator), “Leading Workforce Effectiveness: Teacher Retention Study” looks at the many factors leading to higher-than-normal teacher attrition during and since the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly in rural school districts in North Carolina.

Campbell was one of two independent universities to receive a grant from the North Carolina Collaboratory as part of the N.C. Recovery Research Network. The organization joined the N.C. Department of Instruction to award $6.73 million to 20 academic research teams to understand the effectiveness of existing state and local programs supported through federal emergency relief legislation.

Lunsford and her colleagues Dr. Kathleen Castillo-Clark, Dr. Terrie Hampton-Jones and Dr. Justin Nelson have worked with undergraduate research students Rebecca Roope, Jeannie Biggs, Anya Campbell, Randi Agnew, Anna Barnak, Sarah Elizabeth Hall and Allison Cortes Rojas over the

TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE

“You can make a difference, and you can see that difference right in front of your eyes. It can happen in a class, in the hallway or even after school. You’re really making a difference in these children’s lives, and they are going to remember you for the experiences that you created for them.” — Hayley Redding, eighth-grade teacher at Western Harnett Middle School

last year interviewing teachers, focus groups, school leaders and principals from rural public schools. Their goal is to learn more about the factors that influence a teacher’s decision to leave (or stay) and the challenges that arose or were revealed during the pandemic.

Their research is currently ongoing, and a final report isn’t expected until at least later this year. But already, Lunsford and her team have published three briefs on their findings.

What they’ve found so far is that the pandemic had a profound impact on the teaching profession, exacerbating existing issues regarding staffing shortages, lack of support and mental stresses while exposing deficiencies in available technology that allow teachers to do their jobs effectively.

“Simply put, we’re looking at the supporting and inhibiting factors — beyond just salary — for teacher retention,” Lunsford says. “What is it that makes teachers want to stay, and what are the barriers or factors that make them want to leave? Which of these factors can be influenced by school leaders? We’re looking at how districts handled a crisis like the pandemic and the lessons we can learn to help our rural school districts be more resilient in the future.

“And it’s hard to learn any of this without going to the districts and talking to the teachers themselves.”

PREPPED FOR SUCCESS

The wall behind Hayley Redding’s desk in her classroom at Western Harnett Middle School is adorned with anywhere between 75 and 100 photos of her and her students from the past two years. Selfies, group shots and photos from school events. Smiles and hugs are everywhere.

Above the photos are four big letters, “LYSM.” Asked what they stand for, Redding laughs.

“It’s my ‘Love You So Much’ wall,” she says. “I only get these children for a year, but a great thing about working here is most of my babies are right up the hill at [Western Harnett High School] and I get to keep seeing them.”

Babies?, she’s asked.

“Well, I don’t have children of my own yet, so yes, these are my children,” she says. “And they just … they impress me every

they desire to teach. Residency licenses can be renewed twice while the other types are limited and renewed on a case-by-case basis by the school district.

According to a 2023 article on edsurge. com and data collected by Kansas State University, North Carolina ranks in the Top 5 for states with the most “underqualified teachers” — in 2021, 14.7 percent of the state’s teachers were considered underqualified.

“The lack of quality-trained teachers is impacting our students,” Castillo-Clark says. “Many teachers are coming in without a teaching license and have never taught in a classroom before. We’ve spoken to HR directors who used to never hire teachers without a license, and now they’re bringing in just about anyone who turns in a resume. They arrive unprepared for the workplace conditions and added demands of the job, and that pressure trickles down to their classroom instruction and interactions with students in the classroom.”

She adds, “At Campbell, we’re developing professional skills outside of teaching. We’re setting our graduates up to meet the workplace demands of the profession by offering resiliency workshops and embedding trauma-informed practices into our curriculum. Additionally, we have redesigned our teacher preparation coursework and prioritized social emotional learning.

single day. I love watching them learn, and I love giving them a platform to experiment, be creative and become a leader. They’re just so impressive.”

Redding loves her job, but that doesn’t mean it’s always easy. Staffing shortages — everything from teachers to bus drivers — have a domino effect and weigh down current teachers with extra burdens. Redding has had to take on planning lessons for classes other than hers in the past because those positions weren’t filled or were taken over by long-term substitutes with little to no training.

And training is a key to job satisfaction (at least to hers). Being in a class is a much different experience than any new teacher can anticipate, she says, even for college graduates.

“I feel like many feel overwhelmed with all of the responsibilities,” Redding says. “My degree at Campbell prepared me for this — especially the writing — but I’ve seen other new teachers come in and quickly realize teaching is not for them. It’s not

what they envisioned, or it’s not what they prepared for.”

One of the three research briefs published by Lunsford’s team at Campbell deals with lessons gleaned from teachers and the effectiveness of Educator Preparation Provider programs (EPPs) like Campbell’s School of Education & Human Sciences. The big question they ask is, “What can these programs do to better prepare teachers for the challenges they’re currently facing in the post-COVID era of American public school education?”

“The end goal, of course, is to address our state’s teacher retention crisis, because that affects so much when it comes to educating our children,” says Castillo-Clark, author of the most recent research brief and Campbell’s elementary education program coordinator.

The shortage of qualified teachers with bachelor’s or master’s degrees in education has led to a spike in one-year emergency (and “residency”) licenses in North Carolina that allow teachers to apply as long as their degree includes 18 hours in a content area

“Social emotional learning is no longer considered a ‘soft skill’ in this profession. You need to learn it so you are better prepared.”

THE NEED FOR SUPPORT

Under-qualified teachers are just one of the factors addressed in the three research briefs the group has published since last fall. They’re also the most recent.

The first brief addressed the need for support for rural teachers and how that support not only keeps teachers happy, but leads to student success as well.

In that brief, the Campbell research team listed ways principals and other school leaders can influence factors to reduce teacher turnover, aside from pay raises, bonuses and incentives (which are decided by local and state governments).

Among their insights: District leaders and principals can make an immediate impact on teacher satisfaction by increasing resources and reducing job demands.

Dr. Laura Lunsford, assistant dean of psychology and social work for the School of Education & Human Sciences at Campbell University, is leading a team of professors and students in research to determine the factors behind troubling attrition rates in North Carolina’s rural schools.

The study also suggests policymakers can make investments in resources that minimize disruptive behaviors from students. One elementary teacher they spoke to lauded moves by her school to hire an instructional coach and an “interventionist” for students with behavior issues. Another teacher said her school saw “more and more … severe behavioral and emotional problems” when students returned to classrooms after the pandemic.

“One thing that became very clear to us about the pandemic was that teacher retention actually increased in the first year,” Lunsford says. “We asked a lot of teachers about this, and it looks like this happened because [when they were teaching remotely], they didn’t have to perform all the extra duties required of them in a normal school setting. Certainly, they had to prepare more [to teach remotely], but they actually had time to prepare.

“Many of them were happy to just have a job, too, because they saw their friends and family members losing jobs when businesses were closing in that first year. So, many stuck it out.”

While pay may not be an overriding factor in the Campbell study, it’s not to be dismissed. The National Education Association ranks North Carolina 46th in the nation in beginning teacher pay and 34th overall in average teacher pay.

Harnett County Schools had a teacher attrition rate of 14.9 percent in 2022, losing 185 of its 1,313 teachers that year. Harnett’s rate is nearly double the state average of 7.78 percent, but lower than some of the hardest hit districts like Northampton County Schools (18.92), Hertford County Schools (16.67) and others in the highly rural northeastern part of the state.

Of all the challenges for teachers the pandemic exposed in 2020, perhaps the most glaring was the digital divide when schools transitioned to emergency remote teaching. According to the second research brief published by Lunsford and her team in January, rural school districts were unprepared for the transition (as were many families), and many suffered as schools worked through those issues.

As one superintendent in their study put it, “We were forced into the digital age.”

More than 1 million K-12 students were forced into fully remote or hybrid learning in the early months of the pandemic through 2021. At home, remote learning requires access to a computer (many districts provided laptops) and access to reliable high-speed internet for video streaming.

According to Public Schools First NC — a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization focused on public education issues in the state — 30 percent of K-12 students in North Carolina don’t have a reliable internet connection at home, and 24 percent don’t have the equipment necessary for remote learning (though the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction says every student had access to a laptop by 2021-22).

Not surprisingly, the digital divide is greater in counties that also experience the highest rate of teacher attrition. In Northampton County, which leads the state in attrition rate, roughly 57 percent of homes don’t have high-speed internet.

Castillo-Clark says a big part of their study is to reveal the big lessons learned from going remote.

“Which districts had good infrastructure for technology and support, and how did they transition when everything went online?” she says. “We’re finding that in schools that had a solid infrastructure and in-house tech support in place, teachers had an easier time transitioning to emergency remote teaching and reported greater job satisfaction compared to schools with less support.”

Other insights from their research: Districts should invest in developing teachers’ Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge — or TPACK skills — to make them better equipped and to lower the chances of job burnout and emotional drain. State leaders should also accelerate broadband access and uniform tech support across all counties.

Said one superintendent: “Hotspots [in

cut out for that. I don’t think [teachers] enjoyed delivering instruction the way they were delivering instruction. It was like a tidal wave. It just swept a lot of people up.”

COURSE CHANGERS

When Lunsford, Castillo-Clark and their team of professors and students set out to conduct their research, the goal was simple: Address North Carolina’s teacher attrition problem — particularly in rural districts — and get to the heart of why teachers are leaving for other schools or leaving the profession altogether. “We saw trends, but we didn’t know enough,” Lunsford says, “so we thought it would be interesting to get out and actually talk to the teachers.”

“Campbell University is a teaching institution,” she adds, “but we [as professors] are also scholarly active. This study is a nice example of applied scholarship with an interdisciplinary team, which is something I think Campbell truly values.”

Dr. Chris Godwin, assistant dean and chair of Professional Education, adds that the program at Campbell places “value add” on faculty “teaching future teachers applicable skills and research-based pedagogies in ways which move these skill sets from theoretical research to actual classroom practice as students teach real “humans.”

rural areas] have provided some measure of mitigation for lack of internet at home. It’s not going to solve everything, but it does help to kind of level the playing field for those families who do not have serviceable internet.”

The big takeaway from the research is that leaders should pay attention to the increased job demands in rural schools that come with emergency remote teaching or hybrid learning. The pandemic led to higher levels of burnout, particularly among older teachers with less tech savvy, because their schools placed little to no emphasis on TRACK prior to the shutdown.

An anonymous superintendent in the study said the pandemic was a lot of weight to bear for teachers and students.

“I think there were a lot of people who got discouraged because they weren’t cut out to work in a virtual environment,” they said. “Our kids weren’t cut out to work in a virtual environment. Our parents weren’t

Their work will really begin when the study is complete. Lunsford says her team is working with the state’s Department of Public Instruction to not only gather data, but share their findings. They plan to attend the North Carolina Association of School Administrators’ Conference on Educational Leadership in Wilmington in March to strengthen their partnership with that group and advocate for teacher support.

An immediate effect from the study is already visible in classrooms at Campbell’s School of Education & Human Sciences. According to Godwin, the biggest hurdle in teaching right now is “erasing” the learning loss which occurred across the board among students during the pandemic.

“Educator preparation programs have had to strengthen training in literacy and mathematics to address these learning losses and prepare preservice teachers in understanding how to scaffold instruction based upon the learner’s readiness,” Godwin says. “School districts across the state are creating more pathways and support programs to address

From left: Associate Professor and Director of the Teaching Scholars Academy Dr. Terrie Hampton-Jones, student research assistants Jeannie Biggs and Rebecca Roope and Dr. Laura Lunsford have spent the last five months researching rural school districts throughout North Carolina to address high teacher attrition rates in those areas.

teacher recruitment and retention efforts. Based on recent data, North Carolina is making gains in addressing our students’ learning losses due to the pandemic.”

Castillo-Clark says courses at Campbell are preparing teachers for a post-COVID career in the field by focusing on social emotional learning and other areas — outside of just “teaching” — so the surprises of the profession are kept to a minimum. But the study, she says, could also mean modifying current courses based on their findings.

“Teachers are saying they could be better prepared, so we have to look at how this impacts what we’re doing at the teacher preparation level and how we can modify what we do to meet those demands,” she says. “Because these post-pandemic trends, they’re not going away.”

The numbers currently aren’t telling a positive story, and they — combined with the divided political climate and clashing

views on public education in the state — were bad enough for North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper to declare a “state of emergency” for public education in 2023.

But for the professors and students involved in the research at Campbell University, there is a unanimous optimistic outlook. Castillo-Clark learned a new phrase at a recent conference she attended that she’s kept with her throughout the study — “COVID keeps.”

“They’re not always easy to see, but there were silver linings to the pandemic when it comes to education,” she says. “It’s helped shine a spotlight on the workplace demands of our teachers. Now, we are talking about it. It’s important to have these conversations so we can change how we prepare teachers to meet those demands and impart real change.”

Learn more about the rural teacher attrition study at cukeepncteachers.com

Western Harnett Middle School teacher Hayley Redding said she promotes creativity and critical thinking in her classrooms. “When you’re a teacher, you can make a difference. It’s so rewarding to see them grow right in front of your very eyes.”

SANFORD LOSES BID FOR RAIL CENTER GRANT

Sanford city leaders learned in March that their bid for federal funding that would have supported the construction of a commuter rail and mobility station along the proposed redevelopment corridor called the Sanford Central Green was not successful.

The North Carolina Department of Transportation had applied on behalf of Sanford and other communities that would make up a revitalized commuter railway service stretching from Norlina near the Virginia border southward to Sanford. The goal of the corridor is to better connect rural and urban communities, expand freight and passenger services, and reduce travel times for passengers headed in both directions.

U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg announced on March 13 that $3.3 billion in federal grant funding will be awarded to 132 communities across the country for planning, capital construction, and regional partnership grants designed to repair harm caused by infrastructure choices of the past. The NCDOT S-Line project, a 95-mile rail corridor that is described as the missing link in modern rail transportation in the southeast and of which Sanford is a part, was not selected for funding during this round.

DOT had requested $107.3 million for the project, and Sanford would have received almost a third of that amount if the federal government had funded NCDOT’s proposal. Without the $33 million in funding that would have been Sanford’s share of the project, city hall’s plans for the greenspace are suddenly thrust into doubt. Mayor Rebecca Wyhof Salmon told The Rant that city officials were “disappointed,” but already looking for other funding options.

“We were disappointed, obviously, but we are playing the long game here. We are going to continue searching for other potential sources of funding to make this vision come to life,” she said. “The Ag Marketplace will go up soon, and work will begin on returning Little Buffalo Creek to its original banks. We are still very optimistic that the resources needed to make this transformative project a reality are out there and that we are going to be able to win them.”

— Richard Sullins

COMMISSIONERS GET PREVIEW OF SCHOOL BOARD’S $25.3 MILLION BUDGET REQUEST

By Richard Sullins richard@rantnc.com

Six of the seven members of the Lee County Board of Education attended the March 18 meeting of the county’s Board of Commissioners and gave a preview of the school board’s priorities for the 2024-25 fiscal year that will begin on July 1, and, more importantly, how much county money the school board believes will be necessary to operate the system during the coming school year.

School board Chairman Eric Davidson, now in just his fourth month of holding the gavel as the board’s leader, also brought with him his new Superintendent, Dr. Chris Dossenbach, Chief Finance Officer Kelly Jones and other key members of the district’s central staff to be available for any questions that commissioners might have about the budget request that they plan to submit sometime in April.

Funding for Lee County Schools is the single largest ticket item in the overall county spending plan each year and accounts for almost a fourth of the entire county budget that last year topped $100 million for the first time.

The PowerPoint presentation provided to the commissioners on March 18 shows that Lee County Schools intends to ask for a budget of $25,287,490.16 for the operation of its 17 campuses through June 30, 2025, representing an increase of $5 million over the budget awarded to LCS last year.

Of that amount, almost $3.5 million would go to support a new pay plan for teachers and support staff, $203,000 to restore the payment of supplements to teachers possessing a master’s degree, $981,000 for operational increases, and $512,500 for personnel requests that would include positions in Behavior Support, English as a Second Language, and the two existing positions in school health now paid from ESSER funds.

The General Assembly ended state-funded additional pay for new teachers holding a master’s degree who started work after 2013. A full decade after that, Wake County began

using local funds last year to restore that benefit for their employees, and Chatham and Harnett counties are said to be considering similar action. Non-payment for advanced degrees has historically been among the top reasons given by some teachers who leave the county to seek out employment in districts that do provide financial incentives for higher levels of education.

But if early responses among some commissioners are indicative of where their feelings lie on the issue, it could be an uphill struggle to gain support for it. Democratic Commissioner Cameron Sharpe, for example, said that he believes in the concept, but also that there are other items in the school board’s request that should be given higher priorities.

Republican Commissioner and Vice Chair Dr. Andre Knecht said there are some items in the board’s request that don’t fall within the county’s area of responsibility and more appropriately should be issues of concern for other units of government, including the city. Knecht had suggested to the school board one year ago that it should set up such a meeting, and he asked Rummel when the school board planned to share their budget presentation with the city this year.

“We actually did talk about that,” Rummel answered, “and I think we can huddle up — myself, the chair, Mr. Laudate with Finance — because I think that would be a good exercise for us to take and go have a talk with the city on record.”

Knecht went on to say that many of the school district’s teachers live within the city and he believes that there are things that city hall could do to help them that are, at least for now, beyond the reach of what county government can do.

The school board faces challenges for the coming year’s budget that are new in some instances and all-too familiar in others. Inflation, how to attract and retain a high-quality workforce, and a trend towards increased services and higher levels of funding that are trending towards the state’s charter schools are near the top of the list. But its most pressing and immediate

problem, though, is the rapidly approaching sunset of federal ESSER (Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief) dollars this Sept. 30.

Since they began to flow to the states with the passage of the first federal COVID relief bills in early 2020, school districts across the country have used ESSER funding to help pay for additional teacher, teacher assistant, nursing, guidance, and other positions that were suddenly in high demand because of circumstances created by the pandemic. At the height of ESSER funding usage in Lee County Schools, those federal dollars were supporting 26.2 positions across the district. Today, the number of positions dependent on federal funds is down to 14, and by the time the funding ends at the end of September, only two positions will not have been covered by funding from other sources.

The school board is asking that the commissioners pick up the costs for those two employees, both of which are school nurses. If these funds could somehow be made available, Lee County Schools will have one nurse on-duty at each of its campuses across the county, and that would be a substantial improvement from where things stood before the pandemic arrived four years ago.

Showing Up Early

The school board especially wanted to get out of the gate quickly so that the super-sized request it submits each spring has time to be fully digested before decisions are made. In the election in November of 2022, Republicans gained control of the board and they felt good one year ago about their chances of getting their priorities fully, or mostly, funded by the board of county commissioners because it, too, is dominated by a Republican majority.

Well, that didn’t happen.

The school board had asked last year for an increase of more than $2.5 million over the previous year in its current expense accounts (current expense includes new construction, furniture and equipment, technology, and vehicles). The increase they actually received from the commis-

sioners was just $523,500 more than they had been awarded in FY 2022-23, leaving the board with no money to pay for programs that had been promised during the campaign, like a “bridge” plan that would have given a one-time supplement of $1,200 to every full-time employee while a new program was being developed.

The county also cut in half the school board’s request for eight classroom pods at Southern Lee High School, giving them enough for only four, and chided them for never considering reassigning some SLHS students to Lee County High School, which had capacity for an average of 230 more students than were enrolled the previous term. The school board’s new majority was so shocked to come away with just 20 percent of the increase it asked for that its Finance Committee chair, Alan Rummel, appeared at the meeting where the commissioners were set to take a final vote on the proposal and urged them to reject it.

But much has changed over the last year. Former Superintendent Dr. Andy Bryan resigned in May, ending a struggle between the board and its hired CEO. In Decem-

ber, the board quietly replaced controversial Sherry Lynn Womack by installing Davidson as its new chair.

Lee County’s school leadership has become more fully engaged with the commissioners and County Manager Lisa Minter. They can be seen meeting for breakfast these days at restaurants across the city, and each now has appointed a liaison member assigned to attend the other’s meetings.

For the first time ever, Lee County government’s overall budget topped $100 million last year. By the end of 2025, some demographers are predicting that the county will be home to 65,000 people, with single-family homes and apartments being filled as quickly as they are being built. If that trend continues, the pressure on county services to keep up with that growth will only get stronger, and the decisions on how that gets done will become harder to make.

The decisions on how the big pie chart that represents the county’s budget for next year will eventually get carved up — well, they are only going to get harder, too.

TIME FOR FINANCIAL SPRING CLEANING?

Just as you may decide to tidy up your physical surroundings this spring, you might want to spruce up your financial environment, too.

For starters, think about how you clean windows to help you see the world more clearly. You can also bring more focus to your financial vision, such as reviewing your overall investment strategy to determine whether it’s still appropriate.

And just as you de-clutter your home by getting rid of duplicate objects, you can improve your portfolio by selling redundant investments, such as nearly identical mutual funds, and using the proceeds to help diversify your portfolio.

Also, similar to how gardeners plant flowers and vegetables in the spring, you can plant seeds of opportunity by owning investments that could provide sufficient growth potential for your goals.

Finally, just as spring cleaning may include getting rid of dangers such as toxic chemicals, you’ll want to protect yourself against threats to your income that could derail your financial future.

Spring is a great time for brightening your physical space — and your financial one, too.

SHARPE, JOYCE, LOVICK MOVE ON IN DEMOCRATIC COUNTY COMMISH PRIMARY

Democrats Cameron Sharpe, Bob Joyce and Mark Lovick will advance to the general election for the Lee County Board of Commissioners, according to unofficial results released by the Lee County Board of Elections following March primary election.

The three will face Republicans Samantha Martin, Bob Quilty and David Smoak in the general election for three at-large seats on the board of commissioners in November.

Sharpe led Democrats with 2,444 votes (27.69 percwnt), while Joyce finished with 2,203 (24.96 percent) and Lovick earned 2,055 (23.28 percent). Fellow Democrats Kenneth Cole and Lloyd Smith each got 1,455 (16.48 percent) and 670 (7.59 percent), respectively.

AVERETT FAMILY LAW OPENS OFFICE IN LEE COUNTY

Averett Family Law has opened a new office in Lee County to serve its clients. Practice areas for the Sanford office include divorce, child custody, child support, equitable distribution, adoption, surrogacy, step parent adoption, termination of parental rights, prenuptial agreements, domestic violence protection orders, estate planning and international family law issues.

“Our service area has included Lee County for a while,” says Melissa Averett, founding member of the firm. “Establishing a permanent physical location in Sanford was the next logical step in making sure we can best provide service for those clients.”

The office, located at 1600 Elm St. in Sanford, will be staffed by attorney Chris DeLambert and his legal support team. In-person or virtual meetings are available by appointment only. Call (919) 903-9442 to schedule an appointment.

INDIE FEST LINEUP

Growing concert series returns to downtown Sanford in May with eclectic lineup

Courtesy of Hugger Mugger Brewing

The free, fun music festival that is Carolina Indie Fest returns to downtown Sanford on May 10 and 11.

This fourth annual event features 10 bands playing a variety of musical genres on stage on the lot behind Hugger Mugger Brewing in downtown Sanford.

This May’s lineup features bands from Raleigh, Chapel Hill and Durham, as well as more far flung locations like Nashville and Gatlinburg, Tenn. and Dallas, Texas. It’s a diverse set of genres represented by these

bands including Celtic rock, country, blues, pop and that elusive genre known as Americana. Some of the acts have performed together for decades, some are new to the scene and one was a contestant on NBC’s The Voice.

Artists include:

o Newspaper Taxis, hailing from Raleigh. This rock band is relatively new, having formed in 2022. Their music is a mix of influences and you’ll recognize a bit of British Invasion, a dash of post-punk, and a little power pop.

o Blue Cactus, who make “Cosmic Americana,” blending classic country sounds with vintage 70s pop sensibilities and a sobering sense of honesty. Led by long-time collaborators Mario Arnez and Steph Stewart, the Chapel Hill duo creates songs that range from gritty honky tonk to tender, heartbreaking balladry.

o Chris McGinnis, who writes songs existing somewhere between a hiccup and a heartache. Through tales of stolen Winnebagos and hip-shaking grandbabies, Chris’ music is Appalachian absurdity.

From top left, clockwise, Blue Cactus, Katie Basden, Tuatha Dea and the Newspaper Taxis are among the bands scheduled to perform at Carolina Indie Fest at Hugger Mugger Brewing in downtown Sanford May 10-11.

o Gooseberry Jam rocks out with a sound influenced by classic rock and roll, blues, country and more. Their music is for anyone looking for American rock and roll at its finest.

o Tuatha Dea combines primal rhythms, melodic and ethereal ballads, screaming guitar riffs with an Appalachian/Celtic vibe. This family born of a drum circle delivers an authentic tribal and clannish feel that not only draws the audience into the music but into the moment and clan as well.

o Southern Americana artist Katie Basden, with deep roots in Durham, grew up immersed in a home full of diverse musical influences. Her journey as a solo artist began at 15 and she moved to Nashville at 18 to hone her craft — a move that proved pivotal and led to the biggest stage of her career as a top 20 finalist on NBC’s The Voice.

o The Culper Ring is a self styled “Dad Punk” band from Dallas, producing upbeat rock with entertaining videos.

o Originally hailing from Chapel Hill, Julia describes themselves thusly: “Dr. Funkenstein walks the Earth once more, and by his side are his chosen few: Count Slapula, the Creature from the Groove Lagoon, and Moon Dog himself. With their combined powers, the world will know the funk once more.

o Paleface is an American singer, songwriter, musician, and artist who has been active in the music business in the United States since 1989. He tours on a full-time basis as a duo with longtime girlfriend,

o Hailed as “retro nerd-core supreme,” Nashville-based Jive Talk began making a name for themselves through high energy live performances and are known for an anthemic, synth-rock sound.

From Hugger Mugger Brewing:

“A big thank you to artist Corey Harmon, who continues to develop the concept of Indie Man and the artwork for the festivals. The festival is a labor of love for all of us who help guide and develop it and Corey’s creativity, patience and persistence have played a major role.

“Carolina Indie Fest wouldn’t be possible without the sponsors who make the event completely free to the public — this is not a common occurrence anymore. That includes presenting sponsor Visit Sanford, fest beer sponsors Wilkinson Chevrolet Buick GMC and Ting, and beer garden sponsor Tacos El Primo, which will have a fun promotion planned that will be revealed in good time.

“VIP sponsors Windstream have been on board from the beginning, and real estate and auction company Harris Realty took time from their busy year to sponsor the festival. Downtown neighbor Raven Forge Games joined last year, and Craft 3D jumped on board this year. Shirt sponsors include Comfort First, Sanford Real Estate, as well as Express Employment Professionals, Dan Martin Jewelers, the Sanford Area Growth Alliance (SAGA) and Central Carolina Hospital. Other sponsors include the Hampton Inn, Bankers Insurance and Fidelity Bank.

National recording artist Paleface and drummer Mo Samalot return for their third Carolina Indie Fest. Photo by Ben Brown

Puerto Rican drummer Monica “Mo” Samalot.

LOCAL BRIEFS

FIREWORKS RETURNING TO DOWNTOWN SANFORD ON JULY 4

Fireworks are making a return to Sanford this July 4 as the highlight of a day of celebrations marking America’s 248th birthday.

The City Council gave its blessing in less than two minutes on Feb. 6 by adopting a budget amendment that authorizes funding for the illuminations. Unless you were looking closely while the council was taking care of business that night, you might have missed the significance of what could otherwise have been another routine action.

Assistant City Manager Beth Kelly presented the item, an appropriation of $14,500 to pay for fireworks on July 4 by moving funds from the city’s General Fund account to line items in the Parks Department budget. In recent years, the city has chosen not to fund pyrotechnics on the Fourth of July, leaving StreetFest in the fall

as the only public event of the year that ended with rockets bursting into the air.

But with the Summer Concert Series happening during the months when the weather and the calendar usually align to create the best times of the year for outdoor activities, a decision was made to have fireworks at the end of the day on July 4 and, if all goes well this time, there is hope that the Independence Day display can become an annual event that can be built into the city’s calendar and budget.

Much of what has traditionally attracted people to Sanford’s central business district for this holiday that also marks the year’s midpoint is also very much in flux. The historic Depot building will be closed as renovations to preserve its lifespan will be taking place. The Summer Concert Series is moving to Kiwanis Family Park and with July 4 falling on a Thursday in 2024, having a fireworks display as a way to cap off the day’s celebrations is another way to bring crowds back to the downtown area.

The teachers and staff at Tramway Elementary School celebrated the school’s 25th year of year-round education in March.

Zon Resueno, Kailey Edwards, Julia Heifert, Trey Edwards, Tristan Edwards, Sophia Cooper and Tony Muller were among the cast of Lee County High School’s stage production of “The Addams Family,” which ran March 21-24.

But the question of whether an annual fireworks celebration gets added to the calendar is still very much up in the air. Much of it will depend on how this year’s display goes, particularly with safety concerns and potential fire risks that might be created and how they could best be mitigated. It’s hard to predict on a year-to-year basis how significant the impact of a fireworks show could be on the city’s budget for 2025, or whether changes in insurance rates could potentially make such an event cost prohibitive.

CITY’S SESQUICENTENNIAL BASH SET FOR APRIL 6

Sanford will officially celebrate its sesquicentennial year with a 150th Birthday Bash at the Sanford Lions Club Fairgrounds on April 6.

Sanford was first incorporated as a town on Feb. 11, 1874. That incorporation went into effect on April 1, 1874. While the incorporation date was recognized with a proclamation in Council Chambers, the goal for April is to celebrate with everyone who makes Sanford so special.

The 150th Birthday Bash will begin with remarks and special recognitions at 10:30 a.m., followed by an afternoon of history displays, train rides, live music, games, inflatables, a petting zoo, food trucks and more. Free birthday cake and ice cream will be available while supplies last.

“The sesquicentennial gives us a wonderful opportunity to honor our past and celebrate our future,” said Mayor Rebecca Wyhof Salmon. “I am excited for everyone to come together at the Birthday Bash to celebrate the city and community we love.”

For more information about the bash or to volunteer to help that day, visit sanford150. com or contact Kelly Miller at (919) 7184658 or kelly.miller@sanfordnc.net.

DOWNTOWN FARMERS’ MARKET RETURNS ON APRIL 20

The Sanford Farmers’ Market returns to downtown this month.

The Market, located at 115 Chatham St., operates weekly from 8:30 a.m. to noon on Saturday mornings starting April 20, and celebrates local agriculture, food, and artistic talents. Each week local farmers, ranchers, fishermen, bakers, food entrepreneurs, beekeepers, and artisans gather downtown to

Southern Lee’s Men’s Bowling team received proclamations of congratulations from the Lee County Board of Commissioners and the Sanford City Council on successfive nights in March. None of the team’s members chose to speak at either ceremony, but head coach Vickie Wilkins took advantage of the opportunities to talk about the experience and the journey this team has had on its way to winning the title. “If you make it to a championship game,” she said, “it’s something that is just very hard to grasp. They just didn’t give up that day.”

bring a wide diversity of locally-grown, raised, caught, and made foods and products.

There will also be recipes to inspire eating in-season, samples and cooking demonstrations from local chefs and nutrition educators, as well as educational activities. There will also be special monthly events on the second Saturday of each month as part of the “Art Meets Ag” event series to celebrate seasonal foods and the community’s artistic talents.

Market season lasts from April 20 to Nov. 9. Follow the Sanford Farmers’ Market on social media (@sanfordfarmersmarket) or visit sanfordfarmersmarketnc.com for more information.

JAPANESE PHARMACEUTICAL COMPANY COMING TO SANFORD

Japanese pharmaceutical research company Kyowa Kirin announced in March it will bring 100 new jobs to Sanford’s biotech sector.

In exchange for the jobs and millions of dollars in promised capitol investment in Lee County, Kyowa Kirin will receive approximately $2 million in tax breaks and other incentives from the state government.

FINDERS KEEPERS

As part of the City of Sanford’s 150th anniversary celebration, the city is hiding a commemorative sesquicentennial coin in a public location each week. If you find it, it’s yours. The city only asks that you follow the directions that are attached to the coin once it is found. Follow DSI or the City of Sanford on social media to learn more.

EVENT CALENDAR

APRIL 25-28

SOUTHERN SIDE BY SIDE

The 25th annual Southern Side by Side Championship and Exhibition returns to Deep River Sporting Clays in Sanford. The event draws shooters, gun makers, outdoor enthusiasts, artisans and historians from around the world to celebrate the rich tradition of wing shooting over a thrilling weekend of friendly competitions, exhibitions and fellowship.

SEND YOUR EVENT

The Rant Monthly's community calendar has returned, and we're doing our best to track down everything going on in Sanford and Lee County. Send us your events by email at billy@rantnc.com and include the date, time, location and a brief description.

JANUARY

APRIL 4-21: Million Dollar Quartet will run on the Temple Theatre mainstage. The musical tells the story of an extraordinary twist of fate that brought Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins and Elvis Presley together at Sun Records in Memphis for what would be one of the greatest jam sessions ever. Relive the era with the smash-hits including “Blue Suede Shoes,” “Fever,” “Walk the Line,” “Sixteen Tons,” “Great Balls of Fire,” “Folsom Prison Blues,” “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On” and “Hound Dog.”

APRIL 6: Wild Dogs Brewing in downtown Sanford will host “Karaoke Trolley Party,” presented by Sandhills Trolley Company. Get ready for an unforgettable night of singing, dancing and brewery hopping on their iconic trolley. Hop on the trolley, sing your favorite songs and

visit Sanford’s breweries throughout the evening (beginning at 7 p.m.).

APRIL 6: Sanford will officially celebrate its sesquicentennial year with a 150th Birthday Bash at the Sanford Lions Club Fairgrounds on April 6. The 150th Birthday Bash will begin with remarks and special recognitions at 10:30 a.m., followed by an afternoon of history displays, train rides, live music, games, inflatables, a petting zoo, food trucks and more. Free birthday cake and ice cream will be available while supplies last.

APRIL 6: The second annual Toss for a Cause double elimination cornhole tournament benefiting the Partnership for Children & Families will be held at 10 a.m. at the Dennis A. Wicker Civic Center in Sanford. Amateur division and pro division teams. Registration is $50 per team. Visit www.pfcf.org/toss to register.

APRIL 7: Hugger Mugger Brewing and

the Sanford Yoga Center present Yoga & Beer at the brewery every first Sunday of the month at 11 a.m. Cost is $20 and includes the beer or drink of your choice. Register at linktr.ee/sanfordyogacenter.

APRIL 13: The third annual Brews, Blues & BBQ Fest is coming to Hugger Mugger Brewing from 3 to 9 p.m. This free festival has it all including an old fashioned cook-off, six hours of blues music, dessert options and beer to aid in the enjoyment of each. The beer hall opens at noon, blues musicians start playing at 3 p.m., and BBQ starts being served at 5. It is free to attend the fest, but the only way to get BBQ is by buying a ticket ($25).

APRIL 18: Lee County High School will host An Evening of One Act Plays at the LCHS auditorium beginning at 7 p.m. Tickets are $10 for adults, $5 for students and can be purchased at gofan.co.

APRIL 20: The Sanford Farmers Market returns to downtown this month. The Market, located at 115 Chatham St., operates weekly from 8:30 a.m. to noon on Saturday mornings and celebrates local agriculture, food, and artistic talents. Each week local farmers, ranchers, fishermen, bakers, food entrepreneurs, beekeepers, and artisans gather downtown to bring a wide diversity of locally-grown, raised, caught, and made foods and products.

APRIL 20: Doll, Me & LiberTea will be held at the House in the Horseshoe from 1 to 4 p.m. Bring your favorite doll and gather around the table on the lawn. Costumed interpreters will serve tea and a selection of sweet and savory treats, inspired by the 18th century. After tea, play lawn games and sip refreshing lemonade. Tickets are required for each guest. This event is part of the “Revolutionary NC” for America 250 NC, directed by the North Carolina Department of Natural & Cultural Resources.

APRIL 20: The Mary Jane Flower Festival comes to Ole Gilliam Park for 4/20. Local herb, hemp, flower and other business artisans will be showcasing their products alongside your favorite local food/beverage vendors. Admission is $20. Learn more at allevents.in.

APRIL 26: The So Much Fest (a “Festival of Peace, Love and Music”) comes to Ole Gilliam Mill Park with a day filled with fun, music and excitement. Whether you’re a music lover, a foodie or just looking for a good time, So Much Fest has something for everyone. Tent camping is $7, and RV camping is $20. Learn more about the event at somuchfest.com.

MAY 3: Relay for Life returns to the Lee County Fairgrounds from 5 to 10 p.m. The theme is “We’re Back for a Celebration of Hope.”

MAY 9: Join Downtown Sanford Inc. in the streets of downtown Sanford as they welcome the return of spring weather with their Downtown Alive! concert series. Bring your lawn chairs and settle in for some great music or wear your dancing shoes for some serious fun. This free concert is located on Steele Street (free parking can be found throughout downtown with accessible parking located at in the public lot across from Temple Theatre or the Cole Street lot). Food trucks and breweries will be on site.

APRIL 20

BROADWAY OUR WAY

The annual Broadway Our Way street festival returns to the town of Broadway. Featuring 120 street vendors, a food truck rodeo, a main stage with all-day music, children’s zone, barbecue cookoff and evening dance party, this day is not to be missed.

MAY 10-11: The free, fun music festival that is Carolina Indie Fest returns to downtown Sanford. This fourth annual event features 10 bands playing a variety of musical genres on stage on the lot behind Hugger Mugger Brewing in downtown Sanford.

MAY 11: Join Downtown Sanford Inc. for Strawberry Jammin’ — a weekend of all things strawberry. From events at the Sanford Farmers’ Market to cocktail crawls and food strolls, downtown Sanford is the place to celebrate the fruit of the season. This year’s event will also feature fun at the Carolina Indie Fest.

MAY 18-19: The Lee County Community Orchestra will perform at the Mann Center in downtown Sanford at 7:30 p.m. on May 18 and 3 p.m. on May 19. The orchestra will perform the majestic Symphony No. 1 by Russian composer Kalinnikov and premieres a LCCO commissioned piece from composer Ash Stemke. Plus, the audience favorite Armed Forces Medley.

THURSDAYS: Wild Dogs Brewing hosts a “pop-up bookstore and bottle shop” every Thursday from 4 to 10 p.m.

CROSSWORD: Finish the lyrics

ACROSS

1. Swell up

6. Pendulum’s path

9. Type of salmon

13. *Steve Miller Band: “I want to fly like an ____”

14. Simon & Garfunkel, e.g.

15. Popular winter boot brand

16. Ohio city

17. Lodge

18. Squirrel away

19. *Glenn Frey: “The pressure’s high just to stay alive ‘cause ____ ____ is on”

21. *John Travolta in “Grease”: “I got ____, they’re multiplyin’”

23. Automated teller

24. Clarified butter

25. Bad-mouth, slangily

28. Stag

30. Tartans

35. “I’m ____ you!”

37. Commies

39. Monocot’s alternative

40. Road’s edge

41. Living room centerpiece?

43. Prefix meaning “left”

44. Deadly snake

46. Sasquatch’s cousin

47. Court petitioner

48. Blood infection

50. Indian flatbread

52. Opposite of post-

53. Sound of impact

55. *Duran Duran: “Her name is ____, and she dances on the sand”

57. *The Beatles: “Take a sad song and make it ____”

60. *Elvis: “We’re caught in a trap, I can’t ____ ____”

64. Relating to a mode

65. Scrooge’s exclamation

67. Memory failure

68. Bouquet thrower

69. Number of candles on a cake

70. Musketeers’ weapons

71. Picnic invaders

72. “Just kidding!”

73. Did, archaic

DOWN

1. *The Go-Go’s: “They got the ____”

2. 100,000, in India

3. Cameron Diaz’ Fiona, e.g.

4. Hula dancer’s hello

5. These are held to be true

6. Miners’ passage

7. *Tainted Love: “Once I ran to you, now I ____”

8. “Lord of the Flies” shell

9. Like the other side of the pillow?

10. Certain kind of exam

11. Not his

12. Antiquated

15. Protection from a sword

20. To death, in French (2 words)

22. ____ B vaccine

24. Manna from heaven

25. *Bon Jovi: “Tommy used to work on the ____”

26. Habituate

27. Spaghetti ____

29. *Don McLean: “Drove my chevy to the ____”

31. Pains

32. Frost over (2 words)

33. Capital of Delaware

34. *Tennessee Ernie Ford: “I owe my soul to the company ____”

36. Geishas’ sashes

38. “____ ____ good example”

42. Royal topper

45. ____-tattle

49. Pronoun

51. Refused to act, archaic

54. City-related

56. Giraffe’s striped-legged cousin

57. *Bruce Springsteen: “Tramps like us, baby we were ____ to run”

58. Change a manuscript

59. Small amounts

60. Make sharper

61. Newspaper piece

62. Applications

63. Midterm, e.g.

64. Wharton degree, acr.

66. Back then