The number of people using the Post-9/11 GI Bill has fallen substantially for each of the past two fiscal years, federal data indicates. About 54,000 fewer people used the GI Bill in fiscal 2017 and 2018, a 7% decline both years, according to data from the Department of Veterans Affairs. Officials of veteran service organizations, and some of the schools that enroll the greatest numbers of GI Bill users, said they’re not overly concerned about the falling GI Bill usage — at least not yet. Fayetteville Technical Community College has been ranked No. 2 by Military Times in its “Best for Vets: Career & Technical Colleges.” Schools like FTCC, which have put the most thought and effort into tailoring programs and policies around veterans’ unique experiences, have experienced growth.

Experts offered several possible explanations for declining enrollments, including more vets earning degrees, GI Bill rules that could be discouraging vets from using the benefit and the strong national economy. Meanwhile, public universities continued to account for most GI Bill students. “A lot more of the public and the not-for-profit private schools are offering distance education now,” said James Schmeling, executive vice president of Student Veterans of America.
For years, the for-profit University of Phoenix has enrolled more GI Bill users than any other institution, but it has seen plummeting GI Bill enrollment recently. In fiscal year 2018, the school shed more than 5,940 Post-9/11 GI Bill students — about 21% — dropping to 22,428 such students. The school declined to answer questions about its falling GI Bill enrollment.

The recent overall drops in GI Bill usage in fiscal 2018, among all universities, mirror a similar trend affecting military tuition assistance, which saw usage rates decline 6% from fiscal 2016 to 2017 and then go down another 2.5% from fiscal 2017 to 2018. The 7% declines charted in fiscal 2017 and fiscal 2018 were calculated by adding all schools’ GI Bill populations and comparing year-on-year changes.

Veterans Affairs did not respond to interview requests to discuss declining GI Bill usage.

In addition to enrollment losses, the amount of money spent on GI Bill benefits decreased by nearly $287 million in fiscal 2018 to about $4.6 billion, a 5.9% drop.

Officials offered a variety of theories to explain the falling numbers. “A reduction in beneficiaries may indicate more veterans successfully complete degrees and are moving into the workforce,” said John Aldrich, a vice president at the country’s fourth most popular GI Bill school, American Military University, a for-profit institution.

Another possible explanation Aldrich offered is that students may be turning away from the GI Bill because it shrinks their housing stipends if they attend school entirely online.

The Forever GI Bill, signed into law in August 2017, allowed anyone who left the military after January 2013 to use the GI Bill at any time in the future. Previously, all benefits had to be used within 15 years of separation. In addition, officials pointed to a common higher education trend: More people go to college to improve their job prospects in bad economies, while fewer go to school when the economy is strong.

Hurricane Florence was a powerful and long-lived Cape Verde hurricane that caused extensive damage in the Carolinas in September 2018, primarily as a result of freshwater flooding. Florence dropped 35.93 inches of rain in Elizabethtown, becoming the wettest tropical cyclone recorded in the Carolinas, as well as the eighth-wettest overall in the contiguous United States. The first major hurricane of the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season, Florence originated from a strong tropical wave that emerged off the West Coast of Africa. The system became a tropical storm on Sept. 1 and fluctuated in strength for several days over open ocean. Rapid intensification occurred on Sept. 4–5, culminating with Florence becoming a major Category 4 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 130 mph.

As forecast models indicated an increasing threat to the Southeastern United States, North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper declared a state of emergency on Sept. 7. Transportation rules for farmers were waived to enable faster harvesting. President Donald Trump declared an emergency in North Carolina, granting the state access to federal funds. Strong wind shear then tore the storm apart, and by the evening of Sept. 13, Florence had been downgraded to a Category 1 hurricane, though the storm began to stall as it neared the Carolina coastline.

An overnight curfew was established in Lumberton for the duration of the hurricane. Early on Sept. 14, Florence made landfall just south of Wrightsville Beach and weakened further as it slowly moved inland. Despite making landfall as a weakened Category 1 hurricane, Florence still had enough wind speed to uproot trees and cause widespread power outages throughout the Carolinas. A ridge of high pressure over eastern North America stalled Florence’s forward motion for several days while making landfall.

This led to Florence moving forward at only 2–3 miles per hour; the storm continually dumped heavy rain along coastal areas from Sept. 13, when the outer rain bands first began to be felt, to Sept. 15, when the storm was still stalled out only a few miles west of Wilmington. Coupled with a large storm surge, this caused widespread flooding along a stretch of the North Carolina coast, from Wilmington to New Bern. As the storm moved inland, from Sept. 15 to 17, heavy rain caused widespread inland flooding in Fayetteville, Lumberton and Smithfield as major rivers, including the Cape Fear and Lumber, spilled over their banks.

Most major roads and highways in the area experienced some flooding, with large stretches of I-40, I-95 and US Route 70 remaining impassable for days after the storm had passed. The city of Wilmington was cut off entirely from the rest of the mainland by floodwaters. At least 54 deaths were attributed to the storm. Property damage and economic losses in the United States reached $24 billion. Estimated insured losses ranged between $4.8–5 billion. One preliminary estimate for North Carolina was nearly $17 billion, more than the damage from Hurricane Matthew and Hurricane Floyd combined.

The first major hurricane of the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season, Florence originated from a strong tropical wave that emerged off the West Coast of Africa.

Look down, look down that loathsome road and decide today’s question: Are e-cigarette companies worse than heroin pushers? At least with heroin, the first shot is free. Ponder this issue for a moment to divert you from deciding whether having to buy the ACC network from cable vision is a rip-off or merely an abomination. First, a brief tour through the candy-flavored mists of vaping history. In 2006, a Chinese company brought out an e-cigarette called the Ruyan V8. It was billed as a way to help people stop smoking tobacco. The Ruyan V8 sounds like either a vegetable health drink or a snazzy sports car that James Bond might have driven.

Gentle reader, perhaps you are curious about what vaping involves. The Ruyan began with simple tobacco flavored e-juice. This tobacco juice proved. E-cigs soon begat a variety of flavored e-juices. There are some pretty funky ingredients in e-juice.

Consider the components. E-juice contains sweet-tasting glycerol, which is also used in explosives and antifreeze. It has propylene glycol to create the beautiful and sophisticated clouds of vapor. Oils both natural and unnatural flavor the e-juice. Nicotine rounds out these taste treats. Nicotine provides the bracing addicting element that keeps vapers coming back for more. Fun fact: One e-juice pod is about the equivalent of a pack of cigarettes. The final ingredient is benzoic acid, a food preservative that has the added benefit of increasing the potency of the nicotine.

The ingredients in e-juice could have come from Shakespeare’s play Macbeth. Recall the witches hanging around the stew pot mixing up their own e-juice chanting: “Double, double toil and trouble/Fire burn and caldron bubble/Fillet of a fenny snake/In the caldron boil and bake/ Eye of newt, and toe of frog/Wool of bat, and tongue of dog/Adder’s fork, and blind-worm’s sting/Lizard’s leg, and owlet’s wing/For a charm of powerful trouble/Like a hell-broth boil and bubble/Double, double toil and trouble/Fire burn and caldron bubble.” I would take my chances with the witches’ brew before an e-pod.

Smokers put e-juice into the internal combustion engine of the vaporizer to impregnate their lungs with the deeply satisfying molecules of nicotine and the other delicious chemicals. This process of inhaling witch’s brew of e-juice by the addicted vaper is reminiscent of the scene in “Silence of the Lambs” where Buffalo Bill tells the captive lady in the pit: “It puts the lotion on its skin, or else it gets the hose again.” The vaper puts the e-juice in his lungs, or else he gets the nicotine shakes again.

Vaping is big business. “The Wall Street Journal” reports $7 billion of vaping went on in 2018 by 8 million adults and 5 million children. Unsurprisingly Big Tobacco is all over e-cigarettes. The Altria Group, which used to be named Phillip Morris, owns 35% of Juul — the leading seller of e-cigarettes. Juul runs full-page ads in “The Wall Street Journal,” saying it doesn’t want children to buy its product. Similarly, I, as a UNC fan, don’t want North Carolina State to get rid of a bad basketball coach, either.

Debate remains about whether the various e-cigarette companies are sincere about not selling their product to children. If you go on an e-cigarette website, you have to click on a box that says you are over 21 to buy e-cigarettes there. It’s the honor system. Clicking on the box is as effective as the old stickers on cigarette machines that said minors could not buy cigarettes from the machine. Consider the names of some flavored e-juices that various vaping companies used to entice underage buyers to purchase their products. I am not making these flavors up: Cool Mint, Mango, Crème Brûlée, Cool Cucumber, Fruit Medley, Chocolate, I Love Donuts- Blueberry, I Love Cookies, Vanilla Custard, Cinnablaze, Corn Flake Tart, Blueberry Jam, Baby Clouds, Blueberry Cobbler, Peanut Butter Cup, and Custard’s Last Stand. There are hordes of manly men out there wanting to smoke Baby Clouds e-cigarettes.

Here actual ad copy on an e-cigarette web site that doesn’t appear to be aimed at adults. To wit: “Many smokers who switch to vaping start out with tobacco flavors and move on to find delight in these sugary e-liquids, which are also available in seven or more nicotine levels. Many of these e-cig dessert flavors are available in our high-VG Ultimo Vapor E-Juice, including Napoleon’s Fave. When you vape it, it feels like you’re devouring a cone topped with a triple-scoop of vanilla, strawberry and chocolate ice cream that never melts! Vapers and former smokers can also find e-cig indulgence in our prefilled e-cig cartridges, where these dessert e-juices are among 150 flavors that come loaded up and ready to deliver you pure vaping pleasure.”

As Macbeth’s witches said: “Scale of dragon; tooth of wolf/ Witches’ mummy; maw and gulf/ Of the ravin’d salt-sea shark; Root of hemlock digg’d in the dark; Sliver’d in the moon’s eclipse/ Nose of Turk and Tartar’s lips/ Make the gruel thick and slab;/ Add thereto a tiger’s chaudron/ For the ingredients of our cauldron/ Cool it with a baboon’s blood/ Then the charm is fine and good.”

Take a puff; it’s summertime. Enjoy the pure vaping pleasure of the hell-broth.

The Arts Council of Fayetteville and Cumberland County will host the 41st International Folk Festival Sept. 28 and 29. IFF packs an amazing amount of diversity into the two-day festival.

The longest running festival in the region gives the Arts Council an opportunity to introduce Fayetteville to the unique variety of original artistic traditions from dozens of diverse cultures. Fort Bragg brings many people to our community from all over the world so many of these cultures are represented in the Fayetteville community.

The festival kicks off Saturday at 10:30 a.m. with the Parade of Nations on Hay Street. Experience the distinct and vibrant cultures of more than 30 nations as representatives parade down Hay Street wearing their native dress.

Following the parade, head to Festival Park and take in seven unique cultural performance areas with craft and food vendors. Enjoy authentic cuisine, live performances, arts, crafts and vendors from around the world.

Saturday night’s festivities include Rocksplosion! — the ultimate rock star tribute show. It is one band with four distinct performances, representing Madonna, Tina Turner, Bon Jovi and Jimmy Buffet.

Sunday’s events begin at 1 p.m. with Praise in the Park, a performance of 10 praise and worship dance groups and 10 faith-based choirs. It concludes with the 6 p.m. performance of gospel sensation, Yael Hilton. Hilton, a Fayetteville native, has a powerful voice reminiscent of Nina Simone.

In addition to the cultural performances, the schedule includes live demonstrations from area artist, mimes, aerialists, drum circles, performance art, belly dancers, storytelling, fiddle players, magicians, balloon artists, painters, fire dancers and traditional American blues performances.

This year, the Art Council of Fayetteville/Cumberland County has teamed up with the Grandstand App to provide attendees with the best festival experience. Download the app through your app store to find maps of the performance areas, lists of vendors and show times. The app lets you share information through your social media accounts, add to your list of events and add events to your personal calendar so you don’t miss a single thing. It’s available for iPhones at  https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/grandstand-events/id1196052305 and for Android devices at https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.grandstand.grandstandfa. For more information about the International Folk Festival visit http://www.theinternationalfolkfestival.com

“You shouldn’t be so worried about the transition in the barbecue world.”

Jim Auchmutey was trying to reassure John Shelton Reed and me about our loss of old-time barbecue restaurants, including Wilber’s in Goldsboro and Allen & Son in Chapel Hill.

Auchmutey wrote for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution for almost 30 years, specializing in stories about the South and its history and culture. His new book, “Smokelore: A Short History of Barbecue in America,” is a must-read for barbecue fans and social history students. Retired UNC-Chapel Hill professor Reed is one of North Carolina’s barbecue gurus and co-author of “Holy Smoke: The Big Book of North Carolina Barbecue.”

Auchmutey understands how we are grieving the loss of our barbecue icons, but he urged us to consider some positive developments. “Young people who have been on the barbecue contest circuit have learned the science of heating and cooking meats. They are better than some of the old masters, and they are opening up restaurants where the barbecue is more consistently good than some of the old masters.”

He pointed out that the young restaurant owners are expanding their menus. And not just with ribs and beef briquettes. They are experimenting with wood-fired dishes from all over the world, adding opportunities for expanding the palate.
Reed and I conceded that there are some fine new restaurants, such as Picnic in Durham, where young owners have delivered outstanding results, thanks to careful sourcing of the meats and consistent cooking methods.

But, we told Auchmutey, there is a problem. The new places have to charge higher prices to cover the increased rent, new cooking equipment, loan payments and compliance with new construction and environmental requirements.

Higher prices and fancier menus mean we do not get the same mix of construction workers, white collar people, students and folks of modest means. Reed held out Stamey’s in Greensboro as the ideal, where a simple barbecue sandwich with fixings can be within the lunch budget of almost everybody who works for a living.

These newer places, Reed said, don’t give us a place where people from all walks of life can come together for a good meal at a modest price.

Something like what is happening to barbecue restaurants here in North Carolina is happening to other diners across the country according to a story by Steven Kurutz in The New York Times last month.
Kurutz describes the Oakhurst Diner in Millerton, New York, as “a living time capsule.”

“Housed in the original 1950s Silk City dining car, it screams classic diner: crimped stainless-steel facade, Formica counter with stools, pink-and-blue neon sign, specials scrawled on chalkboards.”
“But,” he writes, “the nods to midcentury nostalgia mostly end there.”
He explains that the menu includes a bowl of seaweed and brown rice, kimchi, and a hamburger made from “grass-fed and grass-finished” beef. That fancy hamburger costs $16.

It is the “same look and vibe as the classic steel original, but the food has been upgraded to reflect current tastes.”

“And,” mourns Kurutz, “So was born the greasy spoon serving avocado toast and deconstructed chicken potpie.”

Kurutz introduces and quotes Richard J.S. Gutman, author of “American Diner Then and Now,” who explains the current appeal of the old diners. “You feel at home in the diner whether you’ve been there dozens of times or it’s your first time. There’s a buzz inside. There’s a kind of energy when you’re sitting stool to stool, cheek by jowl, asking for the ketchup. That feeling, that place you’d go with your grandpa or your auntie, where is that anymore? There’s something so democratic about diners. They’re part of the community. I think that’s what people are craving.”

It is also what Reed and I are craving and what we are missing as our old-time barbecue places bite the dust.

Westover linebacker Taurienne Freeman was the only Cumberland County football player chosen to this year’s Shrine Bowl of the Carolinas.

“He’s very aggressive, doesn’t take any plays off,’’ King said. King coached in the Shrine Bowl last year as an assistant coach and said it’s an honor to have Freeman representing Westover High School, Cumberland County and the state of North Carolina in this year’s game.

Pictured from top to bottom: Taurienne Freeman, Ernest King 

The state of the political discourse was lousy. “Laws are no longer made by a rational process of public discussion,” wrote one longtime columnist. “They are made by a process of blackmail and intimidation, and they are executed in the same manner. The typical lawmaker of today is a man wholly devoid of principle — a mere counter in a grotesque and knavish game.” The same writer observed that, compared to “a state legislature in session,” a visit to the local zoo would be “informing, stimulating and ennobling.”

His name was H.L. Mencken. He was writing about the contentious politics of 1930, not the contentious politics of 2019. And Mencken was grossly exaggerating.

Our political process is under tremendous pressure, no question. In North Carolina and beyond, politics has been overly coarsened, polarized and trivialized. But the system isn’t irreparably broken.

Lawmakers continue to draft important bills, recruit bipartisan support and make substantive arguments for or against enactment. Political leaders still engage each other without constantly resorting to schemes or insults. North Carolinians of differing views haven’t stopped talking to each other.

We don’t do these things enough, of course. We must do more. But cynicism about our civic dialogue is premature. There are positive examples out there, examples that deserve attention and emulation.

The North Carolina Institute of Political Leadership has been doing this kind of work for decades. I have long been on its faculty and currently chair the board of directors. Its signature program is the IOPL Fellowship. Twice a year, IOPL selects a class of promising leaders — North Carolinians aspiring to be public servants in some capacity — and provides extensive training to prepare fellows to fill those roles effectively.

The participants, faculty, and board of IOPL are carefully balanced by party, ideology and other characteristics. Fellows learn the nuts and bolts of political campaigns, to be sure, but they also learn how to govern wisely, in either elective or appointive office, as well as how other institutions such as associations, interest groups, think tanks, and media outlets help to shape political events and issues.

Four years ago, IOPL decided to take its message to a larger audience by cohosting a series of hometown debates, along with local chambers of commerce. During election years, the series focuses on statewide offices or referenda. In nonelection years, IOPL and its partners assemble panels of elected officials and policy practitioners to debate critical issues facing North Carolina.

The 2019 series of hometown debates  began on Tuesday, Sept. 24, at the 119 West Third Event Center of the J. Smith Young YMCA in Lexington. Former Rep. Nelson Dollar, R-Wake, and former State Insurance Commissioner Wayne Goodwin, current chair of the North Carolina Democratic Party, joined two other panelists to discuss Medicaid transformation and expansion.

On Oct. 1, Rep. Carla Cunningham, D-Mecklenburg, and Sen. Carl Ford, R-Cabarrus, will headline a panel at the Norvell Theater in Salisbury on health insurance issues. On Oct. 8, Sen. Jim Perry , R-Lenoir, and Sen. Don Davis, D-Greene, will be part of a debate at East Carolina University’s Black Box Theater on how to improve health care access in rural areas. Finally, on Oct. 17, Reps. Maryann Black, D-Durham, and Donna White, R-Johnston, will discuss issues of health care delivery at the Civic Center of Vance-Granville Community College.

All four one-hour debates begin at 7 p.m. and will be moderated by Loretta Boniti, senior political reporter for the cable channel Spectrum News. Each will be broadcast on the Spectrum website and, in edited form, as an episode of Boniti’s weekly public-affairs show “In Focus.”

Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina, the Independent Insurance Agents of North Carolina, the North Carolina Association of Health Underwriters and the North Carolina Rural Center are among the series sponsors. If you want to elevate the political conversation, attend or watch the hometown debates — and help organize similar projects in your community. We all have a part to play in improving the practice of self-government in the state we proudly call home.

The 2019 series of hometown debates  began on Tuesday, Sept. 24.

The Shrine Bowl of the Carolinas announced rosters for this year’s game last week, a move that caught some people by surprise. In past years, the announcement has been held until closer to the end of football season.
Ronnie Blount, who is general chairman of the game and lives in Cumberland County, said there was logic behind the decision to move the announcement date up a month.

Pictured: L-R Former Pine Forest assistant football coach Jimmy Teague, Shrine Bowl of the Carolinas general chairman Ronnie Blount and Dean Boyd of York Comprehensive High School in York, South Carolina announce this year's Shrine Bowl of the Carolinas teams live on Facebook. Teague is head coach at Reidsville High School and North Carolina head coach this year. Boyd is the South Carolina head coach.

Most people begin to worry about hurricanes when the weather reports grow ominous as a major storm advances on the place that they live.

Harris said it’s also a good idea to be aware of what rescue personnel with the fire department can and can’t do when a storm hits.

The Hope Mills Parks and Recreation Department is in the third year of a program to make sleeping mats for the homeless from plastic bags.

“It’s great to see someone who has never done anything like this before. There’s something for everyone in this program.’’

Pictured: Paula Ray, center, a Hope Mills volunteer, delivers mats to staff at the Veterans Administration Stand Down Center last August

Inappropriate adult behavior at high school athletic events throughout the country has reached epidemic proportions.

The secret to eternal youth is a lot simpler than we make it. It's not found in some rejuvenating elixir or dietary plan. The only remedy to growing old is to simply stop waking up. Because the fact of the matter is that every time we wake, we are certain to have aged — at least a little.

The Peanuts characters come to life in Clark Gesner’s adaptation of Charles M. Schultz’s classic comic strip in the musical, “You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown.” Audiences will enjoy the regular Peanuts storyline with the ever-bossy Lucy, who is still trying to get Schroeder’s attention regardless of whether or not he notices her. Then there’s Sally who’s still picking on her crush, Linus, who of course doesn’t go anywhere without his blanket. And finally, there’s Snoopy and Charlie Brown. Snoopy still has his doghouse and still lives out his dream of being the Red Baron, and Charlie Brown is, well, his lovable self. And they will all be at Gilbert Theater Sept. 20-Oct.6. 

Gage Long plays the Schroeder. Long is thrilled to be in this production because it’s fun and the cast is great. He’s excited to bring the character of Schroeder to life.

The production of “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown” runs Sept. 20-Oct. 6. Ticket prices range from $14 to $16, or $10 with groups of 10 or more. Visit www.gilberttheater.com for tickets and information.

The town of Hope Mills scored the ultimate win-win for its police department last week as the Board of Commissioners voted unanimously to add a specialized armored vehicle to the rolling stock of police chief Joel Acciardo’s department.

 

The best news about the acquisition is the vehicle won’t cost the town a cent.

 

The commissioners voted 5-0 to accept an Oshkosh M-ATV from the U.S. Military Law Enforcement Support Program. Estimated value of the vehicle is $767,360.

 

“We are eligible to receive equipment from the federal government as long as it’s used for law enforcement purposes,’’ Acciardo said.

 

In addition to being lightly armored, Acciardo said the M-ATV has what’s called deepwater fording capabilities. “We’ll be able to use it for deep water rescue operations,’’ he said.

 

Acciardo said the town already experienced a situation where a vehicle like the M-ATV would have been helpful — during Hurricane Matthew in 2016. Residents of the retirement center on Cameron Road had to be evacuated because of rising water there. “That pretty much cemented the usefulness of vehicles like that for us,’’ Acciardo said.

 

But deepwater rescue isn’t the only thing the vehicle could help with, and Acciardo is hopeful it never has to be used for this purpose.

 

“One of the things we identified early on that we needed was a vehicle that would allow us to get closer to victims and place officers closer to where an active shooter is,’’ he said. “The M-ATV matches all those requirements. You have high ground clearance, deepwater fording capabilities and it’s lightly armored.

 

“That kind of checks a whole bunch of blocks.’’

 

Acciardo said there are other companies that make vehicles similar to the M-ATV, but they are extremely expensive and out of the price range for a smaller agency like the Hope Mills Police Department.

With the donation of the M-ATV from the military, Acciardo said the only cost to Hope Mills will be to get it here, license it and paint it.

 

While Hope Mills has mutual aid agreements with other local police departments and would get their cooperation in an active shooter situation, Acciardo said time is of the utmost importance, and having its own specialized vehicle here improves the Hope Mills police’s chances of responding quicker.

 

Acciardo said the M-ATV the town is getting is about nine years old and has less than 60,000 miles on it.

 

The vehicle’s cab has room for a driver and four passengers. The rear area of the vehicle can be used to carry either cargo or more people.

 

A training program will be required for those who will operate the vehicle. He estimates anywhere from five to six senior police officers will be trained as drivers so the department can assign one driver per shift to be available if the vehicle is called into service.

 

He estimated it’ll take about 90 days to be able to put the vehicle in service, hopefully by mid-November or mid-December.

 

With proper care and maintenance, he estimates the town could get up to 20 years of service from the vehicle.

 

“You won’t see it in a parade, you won’t see it at a demonstration, you won’t see it on patrol,’’ he said. “You’ll see it when there is a weather event, a natural disaster or, God forbid, an active shooter situation.

“That’s the whole purpose of it, to have the resource and hope you never have to use it. You have to be prepared in today’s world.’’

Picture 1: Chief Joel Acciardo 

Picture 2: M-ATV similar to the one Hope Mills is getting 

There is a party happening here in Fayetteville that you do not want to miss! Rising to the challenge yet again, Cape Fear Regional Theater, under the auspices of Artistic Director Mary Kate Burke, kicked off the 2019-2020 theater season with “Mamma Mia!” easily rivaling last year’s “Music City” opener.
 

Among the night’s outstanding performances were those turned in by Scenic Designer Sarah Harris and Scenic Artist David Rawlins, who managed to make an entire Greek island resort, including the surrounding sea, come breathtakingly alive. The movie version’s soundstage didn’t do it any better. And the movie version didn’t offer theatergoers an onstage bar, which really got the party going.

 With music and lyrics by Bjorn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson and Stig Anderson and a book by Catherine Johnson, credit the able direction of Suzanne Agins, along with the choreography of Ryan Migge, and the sterling performance of Zeek Smith and his orchestra for keeping the show fast-paced, lively and fun. Along with the accessible bar, using the theater’s aisles to help stage several dance numbers further engaged the audience as active party participants. And those ABBA songs never grow old, some of them being a party unto themselves.

Joanne Javien played Donna, Sophie’s mother, with the dramatic passion one would expect from the lead of Donna and the Dynamos, her throw-back 70s trio. Her rendition of “The Winner Takes It All” was superb. Heather Setzler played Tanya, the seductive member of the trio, and had fun with her “Does Your Mother Know” number. Nicki Hart played Rosie, the third Dynamo, and managed to be funny, sexy and a little bit vulnerable as she propositioned Bill, one of Donna’s former lovers, to “Take a Chance on Me.”

Graham Stevens, Brent Schraff and Jock Brocki, playing Donna’s past loves and Sophie’s prospective fathers, worked well in the backup male roles as did Simon Schaitkin, who plays Sophie’s fiancé. The Ensemble, composed of multitalented players, delivered stellar vocal backup and dance moves.

The entire production consistently drew cheers and thunderous applause, and the finale had the entire theater audience up and dancing in their seats.

“Mamma Mia!” runs through Oct. 6 with both evening and matinee performances scheduled. Also, there will be bonus preshow features such as Greek Night, 70s Nights and discounts for Military and Teacher Appreciation Nights. For bonus and discount details, as well as a schedule of performance times, dates and ticket prices, visit www.cfrt.org.

Music and food trucks? Yes, please. Especially after a long week of adulting. Get your planners out now and mark Sept. 20 as a night out — either with friends and family or just by yourself. The Dogwood Festival’s Fayetteville After Five is the perfect place to spend a Friday night, being entertained while eating some great-tasting food truck fare. Gates open at 5 p.m., and food trucks will begin serving food at 5:30 p.m. The opening band, Throwback Collaboration Band, begins playing at 6 p.m.

Plus, we are all family men. Our wives and families are friends. They go with us on as many trips as possible. We are huge advocates of our military and first responders and tend to sing the National Anthem in many of our shows, acapella. We love to sing harmonies as a hobby.

I do the booking and contracts and am a full-time musician. We are booked through three agencies as well. We are always thankful for what we’re blessed with and are very receptive to fans everywhere. As far as genre, we play everything from Eagles and Journey to Earth Wind & Fire and Bruno Mars.
 

Check our updated schedule at “http://www.rivermistband.com/tour-dates”  www.rivermistband.com/tour-dates.

“Early in my teaching career, one of my coworkers told me that my kids would never care to learn until they learned how much I care,” Cumberland County Schools’ 2020 Teacher of the Year Maureen Stover wrote in her nomination portfolio. “In my 10 years in education, I have found that one of the most important parts of being a teacher is the relationships I form with my students.” The teacher of the year presentation took place at the Embassy Suites’ Richard M. Wiggins Conference Center.

Stover received an award and flowers from the Cumberland County Schools, $300 from the Cumberland County Board of Education, $300 from the Communities In Schools of Cumberland County, $3,000 from Lafayette Ford Lincoln — $2,000 of which is for use at her school and $1,000 for her personal use — a commemorative custom-designed CCS’ Teacher of the Year ring from Jostens, an engraved clock from Herff Jones, season tickets to Fayetteville Marksmen hockey and a free weekend stay at Embassy Suites.

Other winners were first runner-up Katelyn Lovette from Gallberry Farm Elementary School, who received an award and flowers from the CCS, $100 from CISCC, and $200 from the CCBOE and second runner-up Tracy Hill from Douglas Byrd High School, who received an award and flowers from the CCS, $100 from CISCC, and $100 from the CCBOE. As Cumberland County’s teacher of the year, Stover advances to compete for the regional title.

Cumberland County Schools Superintendent  Marvin Connelly Jr. and  Cumberland County Schools’ 2020 Teacher of the Year Maureen Stover.