M.C. Colliver services Saturday

McGuire C. "M.C." Colliver Jr., 87, of Poplar Plains died Wednesday, May 28, 2008. Mr. Colliver was a farmer, tobacco warehouse man and founder of Colliver Furniture in Poplar Plains. He was born in Fleming County on May 9, 1921, to the late Garr and Lola Virginia McClain Colliver.
He is survived by his wife, Jo Ann Wyatt Colliver of Poplar Plains; one daughter, Patti Ann (Douglas) Gilbert of Greensboro, N.C.; three sons, Billy Garr (Betty Jo) Colliver of Poplar Plains, David Allen (Mary Claire) Colliver of Lexington and McGuire Conway "Mac" (Cheryl Dee) Colliver of Nicholasville; one niece, Polly Nash Philpot of Deland, Fla.; six grandchildren, Cynthia Hunter Pearson, Elizabeth Stewart Hudgins, Kelly Renee Colliver, Melissa David Fernandez, Kathleen McClain Colliver and Carey McGuire Colliver; four great-grandchildren, William Thomas Pearson, Logan Charles Pearson, Aidan Patrick Cronin-Hudgins and David Paul Fugate.
He was preceded in death by his first wife, Mary Elizabeth Kraft Colliver and his sister Mary Frances Philpot.
Services at 1 p.m., Saturday at the Boone-Nickell Funeral Home with the Rev. Mac Colliver and the Rev. Frank Cannon officiating. Burial in the Fleming County Cemetery. Visitation at Boone-Nickell Funeral Home from 5 p.m.-8 p.m. Friday and until time of the service Saturday.

Services for Duncan Wed., May 28

Spc. Joe Robert Duncan III, 32, of Flemingsburg passed away May 21. Duncan had returned home last October after serving in Afghanistan with the 149th Battalion Charlie Company of the Army National Guard.

Duncan is survived by his wife, Tanesha Baker Duncan; mother, Judy Staggs, Rising Sun, Ind.; father, David (Cindy) Duncan, Danville; sons, Brittan Shae Duncan and David Allen Duncan, Bedford; daughter, Kylie Suzanne Duncan, Bedford; brothers, David Allen Merrill, Maysville, Bradley Joe Duncan, Fairbury, Ill.; sister, Rachel Elaine Duncan, Fairbury; paternal grandmother, Laura Duncan Presley, Flemingsburg; father and mother-in-law, Darrin and Gayle Ridner, Flemingsburg and several aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces and nephews. He was preceded in death by his maternal grandmother, Thelma Staggs.

Visitation is Tuesday evening, May 27 at 5 p.m. at the Denton-Workman Funeral Home.

Funeral services are at 1 p.m. Wednesday, May 28 at Denton Workman Funeral Home with Rev. Steve Hickerson presiding. Burial will follow in the Mt. Pleasant Cemetery

Fleming man dies in accident

A Fleming County soldier died Wednesday after he lost control of his car on Ky. 11 and hit an embankment. Kentucky State Police said Joe Duncan, 32, of Flemingsburg died at the scene. His wife, Tanesha Duncan, 20, was airlifted to University of Kentucky Hospital, where she was in fair condition.

Duncan, a member of the Kentucky National Guard, returned from a deployment to Iraq last October.

Details are incomplete for services but will be reported here when available.

Clinton sweeps county

Hillary Clinton took 83 percent of Fleming County's Democratic primary votes Tuesday, a total of 2,450 compared to Barak Obama's 381 votes or 13 percent. Statewide, Clinton won by a 65 percent to 30 percent margin.

John McCain swept 74 percent of the county's Republican vote; Mitch McConnell took 90 percent; and Geoff Davis took 86 percent. Gerald Puckett tallied 39 votes in Fleming County.

Bruce Lunsford carried the Democratic vote for US Senator with 68 percent of the ballots cast.

Turnout was heavy, with 41.4 percent of registered Democrats voting and 18.4 percent of Republicans.

Celebrating the Armed Forces

This giant flag greeted visitors to the Recreation Park last Saturday as they arrived after the parade for ceremonies honoring veterans and active duty military. The flag was provided by Fleming-Mason Energy. Many more photos are in the May 21 Gazette.

Gazette ads win four KPA awards

Ads published in the Flemingsburg Gazette during 2007 won three first place awards and one second place in the annual Kentucky Press Association competitions judged by out-of-state newspapers.

The Gazette entered only five ads, so all but but one took high honors. We congratulate former staff member Brian Hitch and current advertising representative Kelli Jo Hickerson.

More details will be in the May 21 paper.

Ewing featured in New York Times!!

May 13, 2008 – New York Times

Ewing Journal

A Tax Quirk Holds Out Promise for a Hard-Pressed Town

By ERIK ECKHOLM

EWING, Ky. — Leaders of this town in the bluegrass country of northeast Kentucky are facing a problem any mayor would envy: how to spend a windfall.

Well, a small-town windfall at least. Ewing, population 300, has limped along for decades with no independent revenues, and its residents are fed up enough with having to pay county property taxes. But later this year, it will start collecting a grand total of $12,000 a year or more from a new tax that came about through quirks of fate and law.

For a place with dreams of recovering its former bustle, or at least staying on the map, the revenue opens enthralling new vistas.

“We hope it will be $18,000, but we’ll take $12,000, since we’re not used to having anything,” said Elzie Price, 53, the town treasurer, who works for a farm supply company by day and raises tobacco, hay and cattle on evenings and weekends — and now will be happily busier in his city job, too.

Should the money be used to create a park, where families could picnic and regain some of the social space lost when the barber shop, the beauty shop, the grocery store and the pool hall all closed? Or should it be used first to build sidewalks along streets to the elementary school?

At some point, many agree, Ewing must replace the tattered Christmas decorations that it took as hand-me-downs from the county seat, Flemingsburg, six miles away.

“We used to have a lot of history here,” said William Jolly, 71, a retired logger now on disability who recalled when the trains stopped here several times a day and the town had a lumber yard and a coal yard along with the other lost businesses.

Ewing remains a place where the keys to the volunteer firehouse hang outside the home across the street and where two tidy churches provide community. Its residents, virtually all white, range from prosperous farmers and businessmen to poor families living off disability and a few elderly people who never learned to spell their names.

But the town has visibly ragged pockets. Like many other rural towns, Ewing, founded in the late 19th century as a railroad stop in tobacco and cattle country, has seen most of its shops close and its doctors and dentist move out. In the 1970s, a factory making teddy bears to sell at truck stops employed 50 people, but business sagged and the owner died.

Amid tailored white houses are some crumpling old structures that no one has bothered to tear down. Even if officials wanted to force demolition of hazardous eyesores, “we wouldn’t have money for a lawyer,” Mayor Wally Thomas said.

The lawns are emerald these spring days, but a few low-lying spots are a little too lush: there is no sewage system, and when it rains, wastewater rises to the surface from overworked septic fields. Everyone knows when a certain woman does her laundry because her washing machine drains right onto Main Street.

When Fleming County decided in 2007 to impose a 6 percent tax on insurance — home, business and car insurance and the first year’s premium of life insurance, basically anything but health insurance — town officials discovered they could turn this to their advantage.

Luckily, because of a previous odd twist, the town had officially incorporated itself years earlier. Under state rules, by adopting the same tax for the town, they could pre-empt the county. So later this year, Ewing will start receiving all insurance taxes collected from its residents. Since the residents would have had to pay the tax anyway, local officials feel they got a political pass.

“If we tried to adopt a tax, there would be a rebellion,” said Mr. Thomas, who runs a construction and renovation business.

“But the county passed it, and we just diverted it, so we weren’t the bad guys,” he said with a hearty laugh.

The prospect of unrestricted income “feels terrific,” he said.

As for the county executive who will lose expected revenue, “he was not exactly pleased,” Mr. Thomas wrote in an account of the maneuver on a rural affairs Web site, Daily Yonder.

The biggest single need is a sewage system but that will cost at least $6 million. Ewing is applying for federal and state grants and may have to consider (shudder) borrowing part of the money.

One thing Ewing does have is reliable street lights, an unusual story in itself.

When Champ Clark, a prominent local businessman, died in 1978, he left Ewing a trust of $109,000, on the condition that it incorporate and spend the earnings from the trust on electricity for street lights. (He left similar amounts to the Masons, who built a new lodge, and to a few other pet causes.) Now the mayor, the four commissioners and other residents are pondering how to spend the stream of unrestricted revenues.

Mr. Price said the first project should be sidewalks to the school, and he is also sure that the town will prudently save part of its income.

Some residents encountered on a stroll said the first need was better control of the traffic that races through Ewing.

“We need more law enforcement; they’re speeding through here at all hours of the night,” said Mr. Jolly, who lives with Linda Miller in a large, borderline-decrepit wood house they have been trying to sell for two years because they cannot keep it up.

Officials say, however, that a town police officer would cost too much.

Susan Flannery, a town commissioner whose parents used to run a grocery store here, said: “People say they’d like a community park, a place where you can have a picnic and kids can ride bikes.” Many talk of somehow luring back a beautician and barber.

Despite the needs, many residents say they love the town for its intimate and unfrenetic feel.  Mr. Thomas, the mayor, often drives out of town for work but said, “There’s no better feeling than coming back to a small town like this to lay your head down at night.”