The Anniston Star from Anniston, Alabama • Page 3

Saturday, January 21, 2006 Page3A Crash: Investigators sorting through evidence Russell: Yearly pretax savings of $40 million NEWS Continued from Page 1 A had cleared onto the side track, and should have sent a signal to replaced in Honduras and Mexico, the company said. Russell said it also would freeze its defined benefit pension plan and "significantly improve" jts 401 (k) plan for 1 Russell plans to begin cutting the first of 550 jobs that will be eliminated in its former headquarters of Alexander City, located in east-central Alabama, over the next two months. After that round of Russell will eliminate another 700 jobs total from operations in Fort Payne, Brundidge and Alexander City. Those positions will be gone by late 2007. Russell said the restructuring would cost as much 9 as $52 million after taxes, with an yearly pretax savings of as much as $40 million, Continued from Page 1A backs necessary.

Young said. Russell stock jumped 1 .07 a share, or about 8 per- cent, to $14,51 in trading on the New York Stock Exchange Friday. Russell said the restructuring will affect about 2,300 jobs globally 15 percent of its 15,000 employees worldwide including 1 ,700 in the United States. Of the U.S. jobs to be cut, about 1 ,250 are in Alabama.

Russell said it also would reduce an unspecified number of workers in Chantilly, and cut about 90 office jobs in Alexander City and Atlanta, where the company has been based since its last restructuring. About 1,200 of the U.S. jobs will eventually be Bill WllsonTha Annfcton Star between Birmingham and remains poorerthan rest of U.S. Living in poverty Selected poverty rates in percentage: Calhoun U.S. Alabama County 1990 2000 1990 2000 1990 2000 Overall 13.5 11.3 18.3 16.1 15.7 16.1 White 10.7 9.4 11.7 10.5 12.3 12.6 Black 31.9 22.1 37.7 31.3 31.5 31.3 Other Races 24.1 18,6 21.1 20.3 6.8 19.8 'Calhoun County's population in this field grew from 89 to 560 between 1990 and 2000.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau; The Picture of Poverty," Alabama Poverty Project a human dispatcherin Birmingham, who would have thrown the switch. Hipskind said investigators still were not sure Fri-day why that did not happen. As cleanup crews picked through the wrecked trains in Lincoln near Lake Logan Martin on the Coosa River, investigators still were sorting through evidence at the scene Friday, trying to determine the exact sequence of events that led to the collision and the resulting fire and hazardous-materials scare. Hipskind said the first train, with 8 1 cars of automobiles being pulled by two Norfolk Southern locomotives, pulled off onto the side track just east of the river Wednesday afternoon.

It had been stopped between 10 and 17 minutes, according to crew accounts and event' recorders, when the second train crossed the river and rounded a bend in the track, heading east at 53 mph, just under the posted limit of 55 miles per hour. The second train was hauled by three Norfolk Southern locomotives. Its 23 cars were carrying what Hipskind called "mixed freight." Among that freight were three containers of sodium cyanide, a highly toxic chemical compound that can release flammable gas when exposed to water. Lincoln police dispatchers got their first report of the collision at 4:21 p.m., and emergency responders were on the scene shortly thereafter. Fire-fighting crews started to battle the flames on some cars, but stopped when a train cre member warned them about the sodium cyanide, Hipskind said Talladega EM A officials said Friday that a small amount of the chemical spilled as workers moved it from the accident site Thursday afternoon.

The chemical quickly was contained, according to EM A Director Nelson Bates, and air monitors never detected any threats to the public. Jerome Hand, a spokesman for the Alabama Department of Environmental Management, said workers removed five boxes of the sodium cyanide from the site Thursday. He expected the remaining seven boxes to be moved by the end of Poverty: State Continued from Page 1 A poverty trends in the state, rather than take a snapshot at the present time. And with poverty remaining stubbornly high in Alabama, he added, educational Opportunities become limited. That may make it more and more difficult for Alabama to attract businesses like Hyundai, Honda and Mercedes-Benz in the future.

"We've got 740,000 kids in public he said. "Fifty-one percent of those kids are on free and reduced meals, and you say, 'This is your labor The state's overall poverty rate dropped from 1 8.3 percent in 1 990 to 16.1 percent in 2000, while the rate of blacks living in poverty fell from 37.7 percent to 3 1 .3 percent and whites in poverty fell from 11.7 percent to 1 0.5 percent. Alabama remains poorer than the rest of the country. The national poverty rate in 2000 was 1 1 .3 percent, according to' the U.S. Census Bureau, with black poverty rates at 22.1 percent and white poverty rates at 9.4 percent.

The Black Belt remained stubbornly poor; almost 40 percent of the population in Wilcox County lived below the poverty line, with the number increasing to 50 percent for the black population. Two tax proposals, both aimed at reducing the tax burden on Alabama's poor, will be taken up the Legislature in this session. Gov. Bob Riley has proposed raising the state's minimum tax threshold from $4,600 to 1 5,000 over a five-year period, which his office estimates would cost the state about $200 million. The governor has not proposed any specific program to fight poverty.

His spokesman. Jef train had been transported to Citizens Baptist Medical Center in Talladega on Wednesday with what officials described as non-life-threatening injuries. A hospital spokeswoman said Wednesday that the crew members were in good condition. Attempts to reach the spokeswoman for an update Friday were unsuccessful. Hipskind said he believed the men still were in the hospital.

Hipskind said the investigation likely would continue at least through the weekend. Bates said all homes near the crash were now" safe for, residents to return. Most residents returned overnight Wednesday or on Thursday, but officials had held off on allowing families to return to the two homes closest to the accident site. Residents of Lomar Drive, where the road serving 22 households was blocked by the wrecked trains, preventing evacuation, said they had asked for years for a second exit from the lakeside neighborhood. "I don't care who has to fork out the money, we want a bypass road out of here," resident Polly Tanner said Thursday.

Lincoln Mayor Lew Watson said he spoke with Gov. Bob Riley about state help for a bypass on Thursday. On Friday, two stateengineers toured the site with Watson and county officials. Watson said he hoped the state and county would be able to help with project costs, estimated at more than $1 mil-, lion. "That's beyond the resources of the city," Watson said.

Contact Ben Cunningham at lxnnningluunaimistonstar.com or at 235-3545. American public is not quite attuned to Miss America as it once was," Stricklin says. "But everything is still there for the contestants, the opportunities are still there, the scholarships are still there, the experience that one gains is still there." Those on the pageant circuit still know it's the golden apple, Stricklin says. Even winning Miss Alabama or another state title can completely change your life, she says. "Once you become Miss Alabama, you are forever known as Miss Alabama, and when you put that on a job resume, it strikes curiosity in the mind of an employer," she-says.

"Often an employer has seen Miss America at one time or another, or they've seen Miss US A or one of the others, and they wonder what the woman's like behind the title. "You gain such experience dealing with the public and deal Emerson, said Riley's, proposed education budget which would spend $1 billion on capital improvements, teacher salaries and other educational implements was an anti-poverty initiative in itself. "The best weapon to fight poverty is education," he said. "Governor Riley's got a record level of education funding in the budget. And he did the same last year, and that was an all-time record." The other proposal stems from the House, of Representatives.

Rep. John Knight. D-Mont-gomery, has introduced a constitutional amendment to repeal the federal income tax deduction for state taxpayers, a provision that benefits wealthier individuals, because they generally pay more in federal income taxes than lower income earners. Knight did hot return a message seeking comment. Don Bogie, directorof theCen-ter for Demographic Research and a member of Alabama Arise, said his group welcomed both plans, but he said Knight's plan, combined with an increase in the minimum income tax to $22,800, like to attach to beauty pageants that all the women are not real bright and being exploited and I don't think it's like that at all, especially in Miss America." Peden says.

"Anybody I've ever talked to, the moti vation was for the (college) scholarship. That was the reason they got involved, not because they were inspired to be the most beautiful girl in David BoneThe Anntston Star would not cost the state government any money. Bogie said Riley's plan would be easier to pass, and he hoped to see a compromise between the plans. "With (the governor's) plan, the legislators must decide." Bogie said. "Ours would have to go to the people, because the.

deduction for federal income tax is in the constitution." Alabama has enjoyed economic growth since a recession in 2001,, but Flyril said legislators need to, look beyond poverty as a half-emptyhalf-full debate. "What the debate needs to be about is why a state so much human resources, and so much natural resources, why is that state half of what it could be?" he said. Contact Brian Lyman at brian.lmangmail.com.or (334)26471 A i Tears Sue 'Bridges IJ tears could Suild a stairway, and memories uVre alone, we would wallright up to heaven to bring you heme again. Vip farewell words were spoken. 'o time to say goodbye.

were gone before we kjuw it. And only Cjod knov'S why. Our hearts still ache in sadness. And secret tears still it meant to lose you, no one will ever lnozv. your Love 'Be forgotten.

Love Always 'forever, CO 'Donald, Opal, 'lara, Ashton, and 'Khnsty Z- btone Pea uravei or Pick-Up! 78 West Closes at 12 noon Wed Miss America: the pageant is like the Super Bowl for women' Rail traffic resumed Friday Atlanta. the day Friday. Hand said containers holding two other potentially dangerous chemicals, amines and ethyl diamines, already had been removed. Rail traffic resumed Friday on the busy line between Birmingham and Atlanta. At 1:30 p.m., a Union Pacific train with yellow locomotives crawled through Riverside and over the bridge across the Coosa River.

It inched past the accident site, where workers in hard hats and yellow jumpsuits picked through the wreckage. Lincoln officials also reopened U.S. 78 between County Road 207 and the Coosa River Friday. In the early afternoon, the highway was busy with trucks and cars rolling over the mud-streaked asphalt. Cleanup crews walked past a checkpoint on the highway down a dusty gravel road.

Work-e'rs used backhoes to pick through the remains of the burned railcars and locomotives. Hipskind said the first seven cars and all three engines from the second train derailed in the accident. Some of the seven cars contained large rolls of paper, which burned through the night Wednesday and continued to smolder Thursday. The rear four cars on the parked train were derailed in the accident. Hipskind said the parked train was 8,277 feet long, and the side track was 8.780 feet long, giving just more than 500 feet of track to spare.

Investigators have interviewed the crew of the parked train, and hoped to interview the second train's crew Friday. The three crew members from that with a healthy laugh. "They run, run, run." Such interest in Miss America has several root systems sinking deeply into the Calhoun County soil. First of all, the region has a couple of direct connections to Miss America. Besides Stricklin, there's Heather Whitestone, Miss America 1995, who began her march to the top by winning Miss JSU in 1992.

Jane Rice, a student at JSU, reigned as Miss Alabama in 1 973. The reigning Miss America, Deidre Downs, is from just down the road in Vestavia Hills. Overall, three Miss Alabamas have won Miss America Downs, Whitestone, and Mobile's Yolande Betbeze in 195 1 But the state has landed 34 contestants in the Top 10 and 1 8 in the Top Five over the pageant's 85-year history. Cheering for that down-home flavor is required at the Jacksonville pageant party. "If Miss Alabama doesn't win, we always shift to one of the other Southern states," Peden says.

But there's more to the fascination with Miss America than just Calhoun County attachments. The appeal is far wider than that, stretching all across the South. "There is no question that, pageants and the idea of tradition al American woman being beautiful is something that's very predominant in the South," says Stricklin, who has emceed the Miss JSU pageant since 1 979. "More than likely it always will be. It's within our Southern culture.

We like to look our best, it's very important to us as women." "We're always told to be a lady, to act like one and to look like one," Gossett says. But that connection doesn't seem as tight with women in other parts of the United States. After years of declining ratings and years of folks questioning whether it was sexist and demeaning the Miss America pageant was dropped by ABC after last year's event.It has since moved to cable network Country Music Television. The general population has been enticed by American Idol and other reality shows, so the ing with people, once the door's open toyou. all you have to do is walk in and Very often you nail the job." Getting both of her jobs at JSU, first in public relations, recruiting and admissions for the col lege and later as voice instructor, were related to being Miss Alabama, she Says.

"Everything that I've done has been directly affected by the title," she says. Those girls marching across the stage tonight or at least most of them are no dummies, Gossett says. "You can tell from the interview who is going to make a really good role model," she says. The girls may be really pretty, but when they speak, you think, 'Mmhmm, maybe You don't want some bubblehead or airhead up there; you want someone who's intelligent." "There's a stigma that people i M.ii.waifj;i.Mrfjjii-j-Jwm Top Soil, Sand, Gravel, Cypress, Pine, Red Mulch, rf Pine Nuggets, Marble For Delivery A IT 3155 Hwv (4 miles west of Quintard mall on Hwy 78 Westl Pine Straw $3.79 Wheat Straw $4.49 Phone: 835-0350 Cell: 310-6343 Owner Jimmy Long Winter Hours Open 8am "VI 7 Relay For Life of Calhoun Continued from Page 1A whatever comes to mind about whoever happens to be on the tube." "Some are more brutal than others," says Stephanie Gossett, who'll be at the same party as Stricklin. Do swimsuits come in asbestos? While there will unddubtedly be many local gatherings tuning in tonight to watch Miss America being hosted in Las Vegas, the first time the pageant has ever been held outside AUantic City, N.J.

perhaps none will have the legs (sorry, pun intended) of the one that Stricklin and Gossett attend. Held this year in the Jacksonville home of Diane Peden in Jacksonville, this bash has been going on for years and attracts anywhere from 1 0 to 20 women. "I've watched Miss America since I was little We're South-em girls, we love to get dressed up and wear sparkly jewelry," says Peden, who figures she's been to the party for at least six straight years. "The Miss America pageant is like the Super Bowl for women," says Stricklin, a former Miss Alabama who was first runner-up in the 1 978 Miss America pageant to Miss Virginia Kylene Barker. "This gives women a chance to speak their minds with other women without offending.

You know. Southern women and Southern people in general are not prone to walk up to someone and say, 'You look rotten even if they might be thinking that." No such hindrances when the ones being dissed are thousands of miles away, coming at 'cha through the TV. You look bad, you get both barrels. "We're not mean," Gossett insists. "We just enjoy having a girls night and getting Teresa's insights into the pageant and what she thinks is going on behind the scenes." And, for those who are asking the question: No, there are no men at the party.

"Oh, heavens no," Gossett says Who knew raising money for a great cause could be so much fun? county is sponsorea ny AlADAf.tA nk POWER ASeVTMIIM (Tljc anmston Star CABLEnfvr-- (( RELAY 11 FOR LIFE II SUNNY KING I I WACHOVIA And Other Area Businesses Businesses. Schools. Churches. Organizations. WE NEED YOUR HELP! 'Teams are forming for the American Cancer Society Relay For Life of Calhoun County! To start a Relay team call Lisa Waldrop at 831-6652 ext.

1 18 or Martha Mitchell at 782-5363 or visit acsevents.orgrelayalcalhoun today. You've thought about starting a it happen in 2006!.