The Town Talk from Alexandria, Louisiana • Page 23

Altxankia Bails Ccfcm SalK CALL ON US Editor: Richard Sharkey: 427-1235 Newsroom: 487-6375 news fax: 487-6488 or 487-2960 obit fax: 487188 or 487-2963 E-mail: metrcKuthetowntalk.com SATURDAY JANUARY 10 1998 Meat's on cajble? 1:1 Jim Tv-, Butler The Town Talk Rapides officials want KNOE back on the air "They've (KNOE) had a lot of tower problems, and once they got the tower back up, local service must have slipped through the cracks." Richard Billings Police Jury president Leigh Flynn Staff reporter Monjuni's of Natchitoches has closed its doors on the La. Highway 1 Bypass, and its owner said the building is being sold for a television station. CP-Tel Broadcasting Inc. has announced plans to bring a commercial television station to the town. Natchitoches to get commericial TV station By Dusty Shenofsky Staff reporter Rapides Parish officials are going to see what they can do about getting the CBS television channel in Monroe back in the TCA Cable TV lineup.

"Undoubtedly, area residents used to be able to pick up KNOE on regular cable," Police Jury President Richard Billings said Tuesday. "But it got lost somehow or another in the shuffle, and we're requesting it get put back on." Billings said the lapse in service is likely because the station, KNOE Channel 8, had tower trouble last year. "They've had a lot of tower problems, and once they got the tower back up, local service must have slipped through the cracks," Billings said. "But we don't anticipate getting it back should be a problem." Billings said the Police Jury is trying to get this station back, along with Channel 2 out of Baton Rouge, at the urging of residents who've called jurors requesting their help. Trying to revive KNOE on the local cable was discussed at this week's jury committee meetings.

Jurors also went on record as supporting Louisiana State University at Alexandria as a four-year community college. "The majority of the people in Rapides Parish would love to see LSUA brought into a four-year academic class," Billings said. "This will take some time and Gov. (Mike) Foster is working on this and thinking it out in every way possible. "I think he wants to do what is right for the people of Louisiana," Billings said.

"I would love to see LSUA made a four-year college, although we, as police jurors, have little to do with that. All we can do is pledge our support." Juror discussed taking over Jurors agreed to accept the streets in Fairway East Extension subdivision for maintenance. This includes approximately 0.2 miles of West Medalist Drive and approximately 0.1 miles of Ridgemont Drive. In other street matters, jurors authorized Billings to sign an Act of Transfer with the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development for the transfer of a parish road for a state road. The act would transfer La.

Highway 1202 in its entirety from its intersection with La. Highway 496 east (4.86 miles) to its termination to the Police Jury for maintenance and transfers McKeithen Drive in its entirety from its intersection with La. Highway 488 north (2.36 miles) to its intersection with La. Highway 28 West. Billings said the jury wanted to swap roads with DOTD for a road less traveled which would be easier to maintain.

"McKeithen Road is a heavily, heavily traveled road," Billings said. "We felt it should have been a state road for many years it is a hard road to maintain and we are glad we've been able to finally make such a swap for a road that sees less traffic. We feel we'll be able to more easily main tain 1202 better than McKeithen." the maintenance of several area roads and the addition of three area bridges to the Federal Bridge Replacement Program Priority List for 1997-99. "Every year, we have to turn in a list of bridges we want to fall under the federal replacement program which is funded mostly by the federal government," Billings said. "The bridges we put on the agenda this year are those we feel are the most traveled and most in need of replacing." Jurors voted to place the three bridges on the federal list, including two bridges on the Cheneyville-Echo Road and one on Varvarosky Road.

Both bridges on Cheneyville-Echo Road are estimated at costing $324,800 each to replace and the Varvarosky Road bridge is estimated at $67,200 to replace. Although these bridges have been added to the priority list, Billings said, it could be years before any work is actually done on them. "It could be five years at least before these bridges are replaced," he said, "because we stUl have bridges to be replaced from previous requests. But it was important for us to get these bridges on the list because they are so terribly expensive to replace and we need federal assistance to make sure they meet standards." By Leigh Flynn Natchitoches Bureau NATCHITOCHES A Natchitoches-based commercial television station could be on the air by March. CP-Tel Broadcasting a subsidiary of CP-Tel Holdings will operate the television station.

Richard Gill, general manager for the station, said construction of a temporary facility should begin soon, and the station could be on the air by the end of March. Although company officials would not disclose the location of the station, the owner of Monjuni's of Natchitoches has said the restaurant is being sold to a company that is bringing a television station into town. Monjuni's, an Italian restaurant, is located on La. Highway 1 Bypass. Its owners said they are looking for an alternate site for the restaurant.

There is lot adjacent to the restaurant that could be used for expansion of the station. KNTS 17 will initially air syndicated programming, but Operations Manager Gordon Rivet said local news, sports and weather broadcasts will be incorporated into the programming. The station will air programming 24 hours a day, seven days a week, Rivet said. KNTS 17 will initially cover Natchitoches, Sabine, Red River and southern DeSoto parishes. Gill said a station "of this caliber, that focuses on the needs and lives of residents in and around the surrounding parishes, is long overdue." Rivet said the station is hoping to hire local broadcasting people with roots in the area.

"There is a tremendous amount of experienced talent from this area, and it is essential to utilize people who are in touch with the wants and needs of the local viewers. "This is really going to be good for this area," he said. Woman apologizes for murder, will be sentenced Jan. 27 Ml. She was a real person Mabel T.

Johnson was the first teacher I knew who was a real person. She lived in a house, had a family, worked in the yard, and did all the things that ordinary people do. Prior to meeting her, I had never known a teacher away from the classroom and given no thought to what they did when students weren't at school. Mabel's nephew was my age. I ran upon him one day while hoofing it through Cloverleaf Subdivision on my way to a crawfishing spot.

It was a place I wasn't supposed to go, but sometimes youngsters don't listen. Besides that, my sisters wouldn't follow. Anyhow, her nephew was visiting at Mabel's house and invited me over to sneak one of her homemade Popsicles. That summer and the next two, I spent just about as much time hanging out at Mabel's as I did at my own home. She was always puttering with something.

When the sun got highest in the afternoon, she'd stop everything else, break out the cards and challenge us guys to canasta, crazy eight and other card games. In those days of unchecked polio, it was considered preventative medicine to keep children indoors and fairly inactive during the heat of the day. We'd play cards and board games, tell stories, draw, and other things, but she'd never let us turn on the television. I don't know if that was because there was little daytime fare it's too long ago to remember or because she knew the menace it represented. The only time Mabel acted like a teacher was when I'd head out the door.

Rather than say good-bye, she'd call out a city and expect me to correctly respond with its state. Or she'd name a state and insist I respond with its capital. And she wasn't content with the then-48. Every so often she would drop in a foreign country. How many 13-year-olds are expected to know the capital of Hungary before they can get a Popsicle? Mabel taught school for more than 30 years; a generation of students in western Rapides Parish went through her elementary classes.

Perhaps they had a sense of her interest in people and places, perhaps not. Surely they had a sense of her patriotism, though she probably never shared her stories of military service in World War II, a service that shaped her view of the world and sharpened her curiosity about it. Mabel's husband, Johnny, died far too prematurely, leaving her to see that world on her own. And see it she did. We didn't run into each other much over the years, but when I'd meet her at the grocery or the drug store, she was either just getting back from somewhere or getting ready to go.

She mentioned once not long ago that she had not been to Australia or Antarctica, but otherwise had been on all the continents, some of them several times. I feared she would name an isolated country on one of them and expect me to respond with its capital. The twinkle in her eye told me she wanted to but was kind enough not to. Once when I met her she was on crutches, her foot in a cast. She had slipped on a rock in Oregon and broken an ankle.

It didn't sound like extending her stay two weeks was much of a hardship. Another time I saw her in a department store, a tiny woman wearing the largest sombrero I've ever seen. She'd just returned from Mexico and was ready to talk to any and all about the adventure. Mabel made her final journey this week, one we all eventually make. Of all her trips, it is the one I'd most like the details of and surely the one she would most want to tell about.

Executive editor Jim Butler can be reached at 487-6370 or editorthelowntalk.com. A Info-mania Mall's tourist center helps visitors get around Cenla By DeAdrian Alexander Staff reporter Looking for a place to eat, sleep and be entertained? Literature on the sights and attractions which bring so many visitors to central Louisiana may be found at the Tourist Information Center in the Alexandria Mall. Visitors can choose hotels, restaurants and historical places to visit in Alexandria and elsewhere from hundreds of brochures at the tourist information center. Antionette Keys, who works at the booth, said people who stop by mainly want maps of Alexandria and other places in Louisiana. "We have visitors from Lafayette, Baton Rouge, New Orleans, Natchitoches and Shreveport," Ms.

Keys said. "They're looking for something to do here, like taking their kids to the zoo." The Tourist Information Center has more visitors during the summer because people are taking their vacations and are looking for places to go, said Ms. Keys. Approximately 500 visitors sign the visitor list each month, but many more stop by for information, said Kandi Bachman, of the Alexandria-Pineville Area Convention and Visitors Bureau. Most people come for the recreation at Kisatchie National Forest and the Indian Creek Recreation Area in the summer, Ms.

Bachman said. "A lot of people also want to see plantations and we have a number of them in the area that we send them to." Please see INFO, D-2 MAS Torn J4P HuM 9 1 Suzy Powell Staff photographer Lucille Dean of Natchitoches reads a tourist brochure Friday in the Alexandria Mall while waiting for her car to be repaired. By Steve Bannister Staff reporter MARKSVILLE Vickie Coco cried for the death she helped cause, but doesn't think the murder was her fault. At a court hearing Thursday, Ms. CocO tearfully testified she never believed 82-year-old Clarence Robin would be murdered when she went to his Hessmer house in January 1996 to steal more of his money.

She also testified that the reason she wavered in pleading guilty to a reduced charge of manslaughter is because "in my heart I knew I didn't know what was going to happen." How much 12th Judicial District Judge Billy Bennett believes her may be reflected in her. sentencing, which is set for Jan. 27. The most she could get is 40 years in prison. Her attorneys, Harold Van Dyke III and Michael Brewer, said they think she is likely to receive less than the maximum because of the nature of her involvement in the crime and her cooperation with the prosecution.

Was going to perform Ms. Coco, a cocaine addict who sold her body for drug money, testified she thought she would be performing for Robin that night. "I was going to have sex with him, dance with him, get some money," Ms. Coco testified. It's something she had done before, including earlier that day, when she stole $900 of Robin's money and spent $500 of it on cocaine.

By that night, "I wanted more," Ms. Coco testified. She returned to Robin's home, this time accompanied by three men. Although Ms. Coco heard her companions talk about knocking Robin out and she saw one of them with the murder weapon, she insisted she never believed Robin would be hurt.

Robin was left for dead after being beaten in the head with a lug wrench in his bathroom. "I didn't see any need for it, I didn't believe it I told them it wouldn't be necessary," Ms. Coco testified. Ms. Coco testified she thought the men were just "acting big shots" with their talk and she mostly ignored it.

She testified she assumed she would steal Robin's money the same way she had in the past, but "they never gave me a chance." All three in jail The three men, Winfred Davenport Norman Dozier and Clinton Ray Brackens, are each serving sentences of life imprisonment without parole after being convicted of murder. Ms. Coco was allowed to pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter for her cooperation with the prosecution. One of Ms. Coco's uncles testified that both her parents were alcoholics and that she received little supervision.

Ms. Coco, now 26 and the mother of four children, said much the same, testifying her drug experiences began at age 5 when she smoked marijuana. She also testified she had been sexually abused by two male relatives. With several of Robin's family looking on, Ms. Coco described Robin as "a very kind, giving man." "I'd like to tell the family that I'm sorry," Ms.

Coco testified. "I never meant for this to happen to him I hate it. I just wish it had never happened." Before testifying, Ms. Coco had to listen to Melaine R. Moreau, one of Robin's daughters, testify to the devastation caused by the murder.

Never be the same "I know I'll never be the same because of that," Mrs. Moreau testified. "For him to have died in such a brutal manner, no animal deserves to die a death like that. That's what's been hard to accept. "It's hard to express in words how we feel," Mrs.

Moreau added. "The suffering, the brutality of his death, our family will never be the same." Mrs. Moreau testified her father, a retired school teacher, "was always a very generous, a very caring person." Please see WOMAN, D-2 3 i -'TM 1 it1 i i 1-- 4 1 c7- si II" 1 1 Suzy Powell Staff photographer Antoinette Keys is all smiles when visitors come to the tourist information booth in the Alexandria Mall..