The Palm Beach Post from West Palm Beach, Florida • Page 161

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 20, 1988 The Palm Beach Post SECTION I INT Co Martin Mormons plan regional hub in Palm City WPSL's format is golden, but not for oldies I South Fork 03 sfiTV 5 MARTIN 1 I DOWNS 2 2 PALM city Ly Martin Downs Blvd. Tgjfc f0j. 0 14 Mormon 1 I Church County, Davies said, membership in the church is growing faster than any other religion and will number 250 million worldwide in 40 years. "At this point, we're approaching 6.5 million worldwide," Davies said. "The church is growing at a rate of 15 percent a year in this area.

That is a very dramatic growth rate." Davies said there were roughly 75 Mormons attending services when he moved to Palm City six years ago. Since then, the meeting place in Golden Gate has overflowed with about 375 members, he said. The church also is looking for property in Jupiter and Belle Glade, Davies Please see MORMONS4B in tracing their genealogy, Davies said. Mormons are members of a Utah-based church that believes Jesus Christ established one church that collapsed with his death and then was revived by church founder Joseph Smith via messengers from heaven. They are strong believers in genealogy and have a computerized collection of genealogy data at their headquarters in Salt Lake City.

The computerized family-history data will be available to the public once the Palm City church opens, probably in late 1989, Davies said. Although the facility will cost more than $2 million, Davies said, it is being financed with cash from members' contributions. With 400 church members in Martin By EMILY J. SMITH Palm Beach Post Staff Writer PALM CITY After a six-year search inspired by prayer and growih, Mormon church leaders plan to build a $2.5 million regional facility in Palm City to anchor their 10 congregations from Fort Pierce to Boca Raton. The new facility, on Matheson Boulevard in Palm City's upscale Martin Downs development, will be a regular Sunday worship place for the growing number of Church of Jesus Christ Latter-day Saints members in Martin County and will provide a central meeting place within their stake, the Mormon's term for a specific church region, stake President Roderick Davies said.

Construction is scheduled to begin in Is the Treasure Coast growing less gray-haired? Radio station WPSL-AM thinks so. Port St. Lucie's only radio station has changed its format from music meant to appeal to folks 45 and older to a younger sound. The new format features music of the 50s, 60s and early 70s and is de six weeks and will include a recreation and meeting hall that doubles as a basketball court, a chapel, 30 classrooms and a family-history library that will be open to non-Mormons interested li m-innif signed to appeal to a median age of 36. Ray Sherwood, owner and general manager of WPSL, says the average age of families in Port St.

Lucie and St. Lucie County is going down as new homeowners move in. And, Sherwood adds, the younger format drew higher ratings for udge to hear tax-bill argument Sally Swartz Me Knows His Stuff I II Mil I I I II 14,1 I (W -1 biases -4 h(, Hi 'I II I lrJ "'1 Lakewood Park owners cry foul By MARY JO TIERNEY Palm Beach Post Staff Writer FORT PIERCE Property owners in the Lakewood Park subdivision, trying to head off assessments to pave roads and improve drainage in the development, won a reprieve Wednesday when Circuit Judge Scott Kenney decided he would listen to their arguments Friday. St. Lucie County officials, who are worried there would be delays in issuing the tax bills if the contro-J versy is not settled had asked Kenney to dismiss a suit Wednesday filed by Benjamin Par-' tridge, one of the Lakewood Park property owners.

Partridge said in his suit that it was unfair that property owners must pay for the $6.5 million in bonds the county needs to issue to finance paving and drainage improvements in the subdivision. "If this had been put to a vote of the property owners, we wouldn't be here right now," Partridge said after the hearing. Attorney James Alderman, rep-! resenting the county, said Par-' tridge and the other property owners had a chance to express their opposition during public hearings. He said the bond validation hearing was held and the deadline for filing an appeal had passed. "It's legally too late for himi (Partridge) to intervene at this point," Alderman said.

He said further delays that would be caused if Kenney grants Partridge's motion to halt the issu-' ance of the bonds would "be cata strophic for the county." County officials want the case to be settled so Property Appraised James Bass can certify the tax roll and tax bills can be sent to residents. Bass said the tax roll usually is certified by Oct. 15 and the tax bills are sent by Nov. 1. Bass said he is preparing the tax roll as if the judge already had, approved the bond issue and the assessments can be made.

Kenney denied the county's request to settle the matter Wednes, day because he said Partridge deserved more than one-day's notice from the county about the hearing. Partridge, who had 50 property owners in court with him, said he would argue the case Friday. He said the property owners did not hire an attorney "because we don't need one. When you're right, you're right." BARRY C. ALLENStaff Photographer Michael Kirkhart, owner of New Wave Taxidermy Inc.

ternational acclaim for his mountings, has recently in Stuart, puts the finishing touches on an 84-inch raised the ire of others in his profession by supporting sailfish one of several hundred his shop produces the South Atlantic Fisheries Council's efforts to pro- every year. Kirkhart, a Stuart native who has won in- mote the release of billfish. the station when it started three years ago. The music, called "pure gold oldies" is programmed for people ages 26-46 by a station in Dallas and sent by satellite to WPSL. The station started operation with only 500 watts in 1985, and after a year the Federal Communications Commission allowed the station to boost its power to 5,000 watts.

WPSL now broadcasts until midnight, but hopes eventually to become a 24-hour station. As one who before has confessed that I wasn't crazy about the music of Elvis Presley, the Beatles, the Big Bopper and Jerry Lee Lewis even when I was half the median age, I hope those folks in Dallas program some of it as played by Montovani or the Hollyridge Strings. Meet a live author Live Literature, a group that brings prize-winning writers to the area to read from their works and meet local people, has scheduled its second presentation Saturday at Center for the Arts, 333 Tressler Drive, Stuart. 'Novelist Hilma Wolitzer, whose books include Silver, In the Flesh, Endings and In the Palomar Afrns, as well as novels for young people, has won Guggenheim and National Endowment for the Arts fellowships. Her work has been published in the Saturday Evening Post, Esquire, The Washington Post and the New York Times Book Review.

I Doors open at 7 p.m. Robert Steinberg will play jazz on the piano until Wolitzer's presentation at 8, with Harbour Bay Gourmet providing wine and gourmet hors d'oeuvres. Tickets, at $8 for adults and $5 for students and senior citizens, are available at the Center for the Arts and Jolie's Book Store in Stuart. A book-signing reception is scheduled after the reading, and the author's books will be available for sale. Masked prowler The first night, awakened by clanging and banging and the dog's noisy barking, we were certain a prowler was breaking into the shed.

The long-suffering Stuart Police Department sent an officer not once, but twice to investigate. On the second trip, he determined that it probably was the wind making things go bump in the night, and showed us that even the spider webs in the shed seemed undisturbed. I noticed the door to the laundry room, which opens onto the back porch, was open. I closed it. There was, the officer said, a prowler in the neighborhood.

The second night, when strange sounds began past midnight, we were determined not to bother the police again. It was the plumbing, we told each other. It was branches moving in the wind. But that didn't explain the scratchings and poundings and patterings that seemed to be coming from the laundry room. Something or someone was in there.

The officer was, as always, friendly, helpful and polite. He opened the door, looked at the spilled soap, the uncoiled electrical cords, the blanket in a messy heap, the little prints decorating the washer and dryer. "Raccoon mess," he said. The perpetrator had retreated through a hole in the unfinished room to a cubbyhole behind the wall. We left the door open so he could leave.

Boo buttons The people who manufacture those little pin-on buttons have managed to come up with a new good one each Halloween season. My favorite last year was "Ghouls Just Want to Have Fun." This year? "Eat, Drink and Be Scary." St. Lucie hopefuls swap charges at forum Election '88 "I'm proud of my efficient staff and I don't like the idea of them being accused of breaking the law," she said, drawing applause from the audience. Williams said Fenn "makes decisions behind closed doors." "The Sunshine Law, I feel, is being violated," Williams said. "The new (county) office complex has no windows in the commissioners' office doors.

"Fenn spent twice as much as the other commissioners put together in the last two years on vacations disguised as official business. "He went to Paris to see a garbage-burning plant," Williams said. "If you feel you're being exploited as I do, vote for me." Fenn denied the trip to France was at taxpayers' expense. It was paid for by a company that would like to build an incinerator to burn the county's garbage, he said. He also denied there have been any Please see CANDIDATES4B By JIM REEDER Palm Beach Post Staff Writer LAKEWOOD PARK St.

Lucie County political candidates traded charges and fielded questions from some angry voters Wednesday night as their campaigns entered the final three weeks before the Nov. 8 election. Susan Minch, the Republican School Board member who now wants to be supervisor of elections, accused incumbent Gertrude Walker of having registered voters at non-existent houses while Walker accused Minch of running a "smear campaign." Phil Williams, Republican challenger for the District 1 County Commission seat accused incumbent Havert Fenn of making decisions behind closed doors and said Fenn spends too much money on paid vacations at taxpayers' expense. Fenn said the Paris trip Williams mentioned was paid for by a private company, not taxpayers. And some Lakewood Park residents accused County Commissioner Jim Minix of forcing a special taxing district for paving and drainage improvements on them.

About 200 people attended the forum, which gave all the candidates running for office in the county a chance to speak to the voters and answer question. Minch said St. Lucie County voter registration lists contain too many errors and that candidates receive misinformation when they make inquiries at Walker's office. "Walking through Lakewood Park last week, I noticed some names and addresses on the precinct list, but there was no house there," she said. "If there are non-existent addresses, the U.S.

post office hasn't told us," Walker said. "In April we sent cards to every registered voter and any whose cards were returned by the post office were removed from the voter list. The news at Channel 34 is news with station losing network ties Mother guilty of scalding boy, gets 32 years Elsewhere In The Post i 1 Channel 34 plans to adopt a local news-', intensive format similar to WSVN-Channel 7 in Miami, which also will lose its network affiliation and operate as an independent as a. result of a six-station affiliation swap. "News now will become the focal point of our programming, in much the same way Channel 7 plans to adjust to its independent status in that market," Morford said.

"We-intend to make ourselves the premier station for local news from Vero Beach to Boca' Raton." i Channel 7 previously announced its intention to become "the CNN of South by increasing its news staff by 20 percent and airing a three-hour daily morning newscast, a half-hour of news at noon, two hours of. news beginning at 5 p.m., a half -hour current affairs program at 7 p.m. and an hour of' news beginning at 10 p.m. At Channel 34, Morford said, "only the 6:30 a.m. show is in doubt, but the rest of our newcasts will remain as is.

The only thing we're debating now is whether to do our late' news at 10 or 1 1 o'clock each night. "We also have two or three other news, things I can't talk about yet, but we're in an excellent position to add half-hours of news and community affairs programming here Please see CHANNEL 3448 By BOB MICHALS Palm Beach Post Staff Writer FORT PIERCE Employees at WTVX-Channel 34 have been assured that despite the station's impending loss of network television affiliation, everyone's job is safe. News director Bob Morford gathered his staff Tuesday to announce Channel 34 had failed in its bid to become the new ABC affiliate for Palm Beach County and the Treasure Coast and would begin operation as an independent station on Jan. 2. Channel 34 lost its CBS affiliation in August to WPEC-Channel 12, and Morford said the station's news staff was shocked when ABC awarded its affiliation to as-yet-unbuilt WPBF-Channel 25 over Channel 34 and existing West Palm Beach independent WFLX-Channel 29.

"The room went dead silent. I think they wondered at first if I was kidding, but even I couldn't be that cruel," Morford said. "Everyone was very concerned about their future, and I absolutely guaranteed them we're not cutting our staff. We're looking to add staff. The only thing we're trying to decide now is how far to expand and how fast." Channel 34, owned by Frank Spain of Fort Pierce, employs 108 people, 35 in tbfi news operation.

SEEKING AN IMPACT Port St. Lucie City Council members want the city not the county to determine the way road impact fees will be used. STORY, 2B PALM CITY MAN SENTENCED Phillip Black gets 10 years in the shooting death of his wife despite his pleas that it was an accident. STORY, 2B 'j MISS HIM EVERY DAY' The daughter of a man electrocuted in a accident testifies about the change in the family in a suit against FPL. STORY, 2B By PAT PLARSKI Palm Beach Post Staff Writer STUART An Indiantown woman accused of forcing her 3-year-old son to sit in a tub of scalding water in May was sentenced to 3 years in prison Wednesday.

Chief Circuit Judge Dwight Gei-ger declared Sylvia Dortch, 24, guilty of aggravated child abuse and ordered her to pay $32,461 in medical bills for her son, who was rushed from Martin Memorial Hospital to Shands Hospital in Gainesville for treatment of second-degree burns. Dortch, who lived at Ninth and Magnolia streets in Indiantown, told investigators that her son, Gel-vin, had stepped into a tub she had filled with hot water to soak laundry. But Dr. Charles Bagwell, who treated the child at Shands Hospital, said the burns were uniform, with no splash burns, which indicated a "classic case of forced immer- Sylvia Dortch has four children, including a 3-month-old baby. sion." The boy could not have stepped into the water one foot at a time because he would have instinctively pulled his foot out after touching the hot water, the doctor told investigators.

According to court records, Dortch said her two other children a 4-year-old son and 1-year-old daughter were in the trailer when the 3-year-old was burned. 'IN BRIEF 2B STREETWISE 31 AREA DEATHS SB hniifcuiftiiiii j. A A il A rihijiiiiui.