Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
Issue link: http://www.epageflip.net/i/1277456
4 UCW AUGUST 12-18, 2020 WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM STAFF PUBLISHER Bill Bowman Bill@upandcomingweekly.com ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER Stephanie Crider editor@upandcomingweekly.com OPERATIONS DIRECTOR Paulette Naylor accounting@upandcomingweekly.com EDITOR Jenna Shackelford jenna@upandcomingweekly.com ASSISTANT EDITOR April Olsen april@upandcomingweekly.com GRAPHIC DESIGNER Dylan Hooker art@upandcomingweekly.com REPORTER Jeff Thompson news@upandcomingweekly.com MARKETING ASSOCIATES Linda McAlister Brown linda@upandcomingweekly.com DISTRIBUTION MANAGER/SALES ADMINISTRATOR Laurel Handforth laurel@upandcomingweekly.com CONTRIBUTING WRITERS D.G. Martin, Pitt Dickey, Margaret Dickson, Karl Merritt, John Hood, Jim Jones, Shanessa Fenner, Prudence Mainor, Avery Powers, Crissy Neville ––––––––––– Up & Coming Weekly www.upandcomingweekly.com 208 Rowan St. P.O. Box 53461 Fayetteville, NC 28305 PHONE: 910-484-6200 FAX: 910-484-9218 Up & Coming Weekly is a "Quality of Life" publication with local features, news and information on what's happening in and around the Fayetteville/Cumberland County community. Up & Coming Weekly is published weekly on Wednesdays. Up & Coming Weekly welcomes manuscripts, photographs and artwork for publication consideration, but assumes no responsibility for them. We cannot accept responsibility for the return of unsolicited manuscripts or material. Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher. The publisher reserves the right to edit or reject copy submitted for publication. Up & Coming Weekly is free of charge and distributed at indoor and outdoor locations throughout Fayetteville, Fort Bragg, Pope Air Force Base, Hope Mills and Spring Lake. Readers are limited to one copy per person. © 2020 by F&B Publications, Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction or use of editorial or advertisements without permission is strictly prohibited. Various ads with art graphics designed with elements from: vecteezy.com and freepik.com. PUBLISHER'S PEN The July 31 edition of The Fayetteville Observer ran an opinion piece by Dr. James Anderson, former chancellor of Fayetteville State University, rebutting a Publisher's Pen printed in Up & Coming Weekly July 21. Former contribu- tor to UCW, Karl Merritt, took issue with some of Anderson's points and reached out to both The Observer and UCW. He shares his thoughts below. On Sunday evening, Aug. 2, I read an opinion piece by Dr. James Anderson, former chancellor of Fayetteville State University. His comments appeared in the 31 July edition of The Fayetteville Observer. Primarily, Dr. Anderson very strongly condemned what Bill Bowman, publisher of Up & Coming Weekly news- paper, wrote in a column titled, "Leadership: What Fayetteville needs now." It ap- peared in the 21 July issue. Almost five years ago, Bill Bowman invited me to write a column for his newspaper. We agreed that I would do so. My column was in the paper every other week until just recent- ly when I ended it in order to take on some other projects. Over the years, I got to know Bill Bowman; got to see his love for others and for Fayetteville. I also quickly grew to ap- preciate his willingness to speak forthrightly regarding the challenging issues of our time. Consequently, reading what Dr. Anderson wrote was a gut-wrenching experience. The following paragraph from Bill's column gives a good feel for what apparently sent Anderson on his tear. Bowman writes that there is "… plotting to take away our freedoms and our country." The next paragraph says: "Fayetteville is only one micro- cosm of that malicious movement, and it boils down to our leadership. Or, in Fayetteville's case, our lack of leadership. Mayor Mitch Colvin and Police Chief Gina Hawkins have perpetrated a harsh injustice on our community by not implementing and demonstrating leadership that is rep- resentative of the safety and well-being of all the citizens of the Fayetteville community. By encouraging, endorsing and siding with the protesting Black community, they left the white, Asian, Hispanic and Native American Fayetteville citizens wondering what happened to their representation and assurance of safety and protection?" Anderson starts by accusing Bowman of "confounding several things." I read the publisher's point to be succinct. He says Mayor Colvin and Police Chief Gina Hawkins failed this community when they did not allow police and other appropriate personnel to stop the damage to property that took place during a protest downtown on May 30. That is a statement of fact. Mayor Colvin has made it clear that a decision was made not to attempt to stop the damaging of buildings. His argument was that the consequences would likely have been made worse by police intervention. The prob- lem with that assessment is that government had a responsibil- ity to protect those downtown properties. Failure to do so rightfully allows for questioning city leadership. Then comes three comments from Anderson regarding Bow- man's statement that the actions "perpetrated a harsh injustice on our community." The first contends that "leaders should be evaluated on their com- plete portfolio of work and not single incidents." I contend that failure to protect those properties was so egregious that, taken alone, there is sufficient reason to question the quality and fairness of city leadership. However, go on to consider the chaos created by how city leadership has, and is, handling calls for tearing down the Market House, build- ing the North Carolina Civil War & Reconstruction History Center, protesters camping out at the Market House to the detriment of downtown businesses, and promoting a cli- mate conducive to economic growth. None of these issues are being addressed in a productive and unifying fashion. Then Dr. Anderson writes, "Second, we have no right to assign motives for their actions if we have not asked them." For all the time that I have been writing for publication, it has been my practice to give individuals about whom I write an opportunity to give me input. I have gone so far as to allow subjects to review my text for accuracy. I have consistently followed this process with Mayor Colvin. After the first couple of exchanges, when the mayor obviously disagreed with my opinions, he stopped responding to my A response to Dr. Anderson's 'Attack on city leaders was unwarranted' by KARL MERRITT HIGH 89 LOW 72 HIGH 89 HIGH 86 HIGH 86 HIGH 88 LOW 73 LOW 72 AUG 17 AUG 16 AUG 14 AUG 18 AUG 13 THURSDAY FRIDAY SUNDAY MONDAY HIGH 87 LOW 73 LOW 73 TUESDAY LOW 73 Scattered Thunderstorms Isolated Thunderstorms Scattered Thunderstorms Scattered Thunderstorms Scattered Thunderstorms Scattered Thunderstorms AUG 15 SATURDAY