The vote was based on several changes in funding for planned road improvements. "The funding has been delayed because the governor had to payoff some cronies in other districts," said Vernon Ryle, director of the Macon-Bibb County Planning and Zoning Commission. "But we're ready to pave Central City Park if that'll get us some grant money."

"Somebody did not read the concept for this project very well when we put the plan together and published it," said Van Etheridge, manager of the Macon-Bibb County Road Improvement Program. "It's always been part of the project to actually do road work, but some folks got the impression we were just decorating some paper maps to admire in meetings and then discard." Etheridge said he did not know exactly what improvements would be made at the various intersections and roads listed, but that it could involve actually paving some new lanes and widening existing ones. "Of course, whatever plans the public sees will be secretly revised once we really start the work," Etheridge said.

Ryle said during the meeting that another comment period was being scheduled after a public announcement of "We really mean it." "This will give residents a futile chance to gripe before the bulldozers arrive in their front yards," Ryle said. A spokesman for Grasslovers Against Streets (GAS) said of the plans "These plans really reek." A spokeman for CAUTION: Macon said, "We're not agreeing to any plan until our advocate, Rupert Gulosh, can take a red pen and revise everything. We are sincere in our desire preserve the status quo because we just don't like change."

About 50 Bibb County school crossing guards will lose their jobs and school custodians will be trained to fill their shoes next year, school board officials said Tuesday. The shoes will be filled with sand or concrete so that they can be used as doorstops.

As expected, the Bibb County Commission voted Tuesday to adopt a resolution hiking taxes for Bibb County residents and blaming the hike on the school board. The hike took the form of a one-mill increase in property taxes over the current fiscal year; the school board had sought a two-and-a-half-mill increase.

To help make up a projected $4 million budget shortfall, the board may lay off some paraprofessionals and decide not to fill some needs for new teachers with real teachers. "We'll make do without professional teachers this year by redirecting some maintenance and groundskeeping staff to do the teaching," said interim Superintendent Sharon Patterson. "There's no state-mandated salary increases for maintenance and grounds staff. We'll terminate some crossing guards and redirect custodians to handle their duties. Since the County Commission gave us only a bag of peanuts with which to pay the crossing guards, we felt they might find more gainful employment in the private sector. In any event, we will compensate the crossing guards for their shoes we use as doorstops. We'll train the maintenance and groundskeeping personnel during the summer to teach classes," Patterson said. "Then we'll train the cafeteria food service personnel to handle the maintenance and grounds duties. We'll take bids from Krystal, Johnny V's and NuWay for the food service," Patterson said.

Commissioner Bert Bivins said he had hoped the crossing guards would be kept on by the school board once the bag of roasted peanuts was transferred. "I'll even throw in a bucket of boiled peanuts," Bivins said. But Ron Collier, the school system's deputy superintendent for business operations, said the County Commission's fingerprints are all over the bloody axe that's severing the crossing guards. Collier also volunteered to teach some rhetoric classes in his spare time. Larry Justice, chairman of the County Commission, said "We're all kind of tight right now, but for the record, I never touched that axe."

Some school board members have criticized Justice and other commissioners for not giving the schools more money and for the way they style their hair. Since it didn't get the two-and-a-half-mill tax increase it wanted, the board voted 5-1 on Saturday to cut $4 million from its original budget for the coming fiscal year instead of spending from reserves for the fourth year in a row. The board also approved a proclamation which read: "County Commission: Pooh pooh on you tightwads!" Collier is still working to find another $1 million in cuts. "We may have to redirect some teachers to food service if we don't get good bids. We can conscript some naughty students to do the custodial work," Collier said.

Measuring toxic emissions is a year-round job for Riverwood International. Each year the paper-board company must report annual toxin releases to the state's Environmental Protection Division. The state uses that data to make sure Riverwood, and companies like it, are meeting safe standards set in the federal Clean Air Act. Sulfur compounds are the best known among the many measured toxins that residents actually notice. Riverwood's latest emissions of sulfur compounds were measured at 0.35 ppm (parts per million) while the federal standard is a much stinkier 5.0 ppm. "We don't care if the stench is overpowering just as long as the federal standards are met," said EPA official Beauregard Welch.

Evelyn Widebottom, a lifetime Macon resident, says that blaming smells on the Riverwood plant, commonly known as "that stinking paper mill" has been a longtime tradition in her neighborhood. "Our neighbor always fertilized her garden with chicken droppings and horse dung. But since you can't say that a lady's garden stinks, we always said 'Whoa! That stinking paper mill again!' whenever we talked with her over the back fence." Horace Winkle, a resident of Warner Robins, told a similar story. "Our neighbor's LP gas tank was always leaking the smell of rotten eggs but we always blamed it on that stinking paper mill," Winkle said. Downtown Macon resident, Isaiah Smalls says that the offensive smell always coincided with meetings of the city council. "We knew it was that stinking paper mill but I always thought it was an unusual coincidence," Smalls said. "We usually cook collards on city council meeting dates, that usually helps mask the odor," Smalls added.

City and county officials decided to take the Memorial Day holiday off. No bickering whatsoever was reported to the city desk. The county commission did no more deficit spending and did not raise taxes during the holiday weekend. Accordingly, the commission blamed nothing on the school board this weekend, with the possible exception of holiday traffic fatalities. The school board did not acquire any new properties. No new roads programs were introduced. Veteran news reporters expect hostilities to resume soon and continue at least until the All-Star break and the July 4^th holiday.

The Bibb County school board has completed another land purchase, agreeing this week to buy 10,000 acres in an area known as Houston County, south of Bibb, to build an elementary school.

As board officials were responding Wednesday to a citizens group's allegations that they've misused taxpayer funds in buying land for several future schools, their attorneys were closing on a deal to buy property to the south for an undisclosed amount. "We saw this as an obvious way to improve our poor test scores since Houston County has some of the highest test scores in the state," said Janice Rainey-Whitby, the Bibb school system's assistant superintendent for facilities. The purchase may take some residents and officials, especially in Houston County, by surprise. The Houston County school superintendent had not returned phone calls as of press time. Bibb schools superintendent, Gene Buinger, whose last day is today, said, "Dang! If I'd known the empire was going to grow this fast, I would've stayed."

Disclaimer: The accounts, quotes and stories on this page are wholly fictitious and intended as satire and humor. Although real names may be used and all good humor has an element of truth, this stuff ain't real. If you didn't already know these stories were bogus, then you're not too bright. --Steve Scroggins