The Clarke County Tribune from Quitman, Mississippi • Page 2

Page 2A The Clarke County Tribune Wednesday June 3, 1992 Employee assistance program activated June 1 NWVICE PRESENT WANTS It? BRING BACK THE MICLEAR FAMIW, abuse, and emotional conflicts. The employee assistance counselor will encourage the callers to follow-through on the referrals and to seek professional counseling where it is deemed necessary. All calls will be answered solely by the employee assistance counselor; strict confidentiality will apply. The counselor will attempt to motivate any callers who sound grandparents' home for the last time By: Sue Hathorn Miss. Department or Human Services A woman's four year old child has cancer.

While the medical bills arc staggering, the emotional loll is even greater. She's been told there's no hope. She can do nothing except stand by and watch her child die. But. through all this, she must keep working.

She cannot afford to lose either paycheck or her insurance coverage. A 40-ycar old man is going through a divorce. His wife is seeking custody of the kids. He has had to move out of his house and is currently living in a motel room. To compensate, he has turned to drugs and alcohol.

His physical appearance and psychological demeanor have deteriorated and he's alienated his friends and colleagues. His ability to perform his job has suffered. What can be done? Who can help? These arc not client stories from the files of Mississippi Department of Human Services but examples of problems faced by your own employees. It's tough to respond to other people's needs when your own life is in turmoil. That's why we've recently instituted the Employee Assistance Program for MDHS employees, The program, currently contracted on a pilot basis for Hinds, Rankin and Madison counties ill provide confidential assistance to employees through a telephone referral service.

The employees will not be required to identify uhemselves by name but by geographical location. That way, when they explain the nature of their problems, they can be referred to appropriate agencies in their community. I An experienced counselor will i be on the other end of the phone I life not. only, to listen the employees but' also' to offer responsible and helpful suggestions in dealing with their individual crises. Areas where help will be offered include family matters, alcohol and drug old L'roslcy radio, my grandparents waited for the return of their two sons from that war with one son in Europe and one in the South Pacific.

The house is empty now, the simple furnishings long since removed by their children and grandchildren who cherish those momentoes of the life that was in the simple wood frame house. The smell and feel of the house house has not changed and as I closed my eyes in Mamaw's now empty kitchen last week, potentially violent or suicidal to seek immediate help. In all cases, the identity of the callers will be protected. Only in those instances where it is determined that the caller poses an immediate threat to his or her safety or the safely of others will the employee assistance CfMirKplnr arlnnllv infrrvrrv inH contact the appropriate agencies. Plus, under certain circumstances, the employee assistance counselor will schedule facc-to-facc meetings ith the callers.

What we hope to accomplish through this program is to let our employees know that they are not alone, that the Department cares about their physical and mental well being, and that they are important to us not just as employees but as human beings as well. Again, only the employee and the counselor will be involved. No bureaucratic layers will exist between the two; not even the employee's immediate supervisor will know of the contact The Mississippi Department of Human Services Employee Assistance Program will be activated on June 1. It will be administrated by Francis Harrison, a trained employee assistance counselor. Her mailing address is P.O.

Box 4612, Jackson, 39296. The telephone referral number for MDHS employees is 366-3339. Letters Policy Good Oh BOVS Writer visits By: Sid Salter For what I believe will be the last time, I visited the old house on top of the first high hill rising northwest out of the Pearl River Swamp in Neshoba County last Saturday. The old house, one that has been home to my Papaw and Mamaw Salter, is barely standing now. The front and back porches, which had been the provinces of my grandparents on those long summer days of my youth, have fallen in against the house.

My Mamaw's flower beds and rose bushes have been reclaimed by the weeds and vines she faithfully battled for some 80 of her 101 years on this earth and the fieldsand pastures she and my grandfather cleared and tilled are now covered in young stands of timber. The old oaks and pecans that shaded our days and made rustling music for our nights still standvwatch. put level ftfieyy seem, smaller anq 1 .1 i uiiiimiMieu uuw as uie uiu uuubc -jc now a shell of the home they p. loved-slowly loses its battles with time and the elements. My grandfather and my father lathed the wooden shingles that now scatter the yard likes snowflakes.

They built this house and most of the outbuildings by hand. The old bam, which my father and uncle I said had a foundation of heart -pine, burned after a lightening strike about a decade ago. But the rest of those sheds smokehouses and cotton shacks still stand today. Rusting implements attached to plowstocks worn smooth byC, weather and by my grandfather hands stand in mute testament to Exes on Mississippi Ck'RCk ANNOUNCEMENTS should t)E subviiTTEd by NOON MONCiAy to iNSURE publiCATiON iN TrlAT WEEk'S iSSUE. the days when these 92 acres were all that stood between by father's family and hunger.

I remember the washtubs of field peas, the buckets of com and potatoes, the sack of apples and pecans and the dishpans of blackberries and tomatoes that were the bounty of this land when I was a child. My father remembered the bales of cotton, one of which was the stake his father gave him when he left home to begin his college education. To the north of the old front porch was the field where my father learned to plow behind a team of mules where he insisted that I leam the same lesson behind a gelding horse named Dusty as my dad, my Uncle Claude and I planted the last com patch that soil would produce in Daddy's lifetime. Two lessons came out of that experience for me. One was that no com on the face of the earth would ever taste better to me that produced that summer.

The second was that I soon developed a higher ambition man to stare at the sound end of a north bound mule. In later years, my father told me the second lesson was the one he hoped to impress on Papaw and Mamaw Salter are gone now and so's Daddv. who told me that thoughts of coming home to this house on the hill and to the woman who would become my mother were the two things that got him through World War II. Cut off from the world except by mail and infrequent radio broadcasts when they had batteries for the suspected of having made illegal PSC contributions. Once again, the state of Mississippi is forced to rely on the investigative power of a federal grand jury because the recently ended 1992 Mississippi Legislature refused to enact legislation pushed by Moore to allow creation of a statewide grand jury.

Now it is necessary for the state's attorney general to seek indictments for state law violations uncovered by his office in each individual county where they occur. This requires the cooperation of the local district attorney, who may balk on grounds the state AG is "meddling" in local affairs. While the Bamett case comes directly under existing law on illegal campaign contributions by regulated utilities to PSC candidates, it is believed to presage a broad offensive by the public corruption-fighting Moore against campaign law violations elsewhere in state government. That, of course, is something unheard of in Mississippi and no doubt will spread fear among state politicians who in the past have played fast and loose with campaign funding. Where the biggest problem seem to lie now is in the weak trembles against its, final collapse, I finally came to' see how truly wealthy they were They had a wealth of tirneia wealth of independence, a wealth of friendship and a wealth of love and They never got far from the land, hence they never lost respect for it and respect for the unseen hand of God in weather, in crop failure and in the miracle of birth, death and regeneration.

There was a work ethnic here unparrelled by all the monotony of mass production and there was a simple but undeniable truth for them if you didn't earn it, you didn't get it. 1 I doubt I will return here for a while, for there is an ache in watching the old house crumble. That wonderful life we enjoyed in the orbit, of John and Emma Salter is ganenow, gone with them children arel.nbwifie grandparents to whom my ten cousins and I return with 'our own children. As I walked out of the old house, I was at peace finally with leaving it behind and taking with me the memories ft fostered. For those in memories, the old house will always stand.

And it is to those memories, not to this old house, that I can always return when thereMs a longing to go home again. they provided an election mujst be held to fill out the remaining term on any commissioner who resigns rather than allowing the governor to appoint the replacement for the rest of the term. In 1991, the lawmakers amended the law on contributions purponcdly to orfly insert the word "knowingly" as caveat for accepting an illegal contribution. Now it tumsout the legislature somehow didftt bring forward in the new law trie 1990 language on how vacancies are filled and an donnybrook is about to explode between Gov. Fordice and the legislature.

The governor's office Js saying they now can name a successor to Barnett for the remaining three and a half years of his term. Reportedly, they have in mind appointing Rep. Curt Hcben (R) of Pascagoula. But the legislature is saying the omission in the 1991 law ws unintentional and the election requirement still stands. Moore is apparently goTngto have to be the referee.

Our The Clarke County Tribune encourages our readers toexpress theiropinions and observations in the public forum of this page. All letters submitted for publication must be signed by the writerand include Attorney General Mike Moore brings down miscreant public official if rfi the only thing missing was the incessant, inviting creak of her rocking chair and the cluck of the chickens in the yard. In one comer, I found an old Prince Albert tobacco tin, one of hundreds that my Papaw has carried in his pocket. There was one of Mamaw's old broom, made from sage brush and tied with baling twine. Until she was 94 she kept this house clean and tidy homemade brooms.

like this one. And as I took what I know will be my last long look around the ofd house and my six-year old daughter took what I know will be her only look at where her grandfather grew up, I was taken witn the fact that until this moment, I had missed something important about this place and about my family. As a child and as a college student, I could not help but take stock of all the things my grandparents didn't have or did without and the overwhelming simplicity by which they lived. Now. as this house literally campaign financing laws that the Legislature puts on the books.

Incredibly, the Legislature two years ago totally reversed a 40-year old state ban on candidates for the State Highway Commission receiving campaign contributions from road contractors. With two-ex-legislators on the Highway Commission lobbying for repeal of the ban, the Legislature blithely obeyed it. Moore, charging that repeal of the road contractor campaign contribution prohibition was "absolutely wrong," said he hoped that the Bamett case will serve as a pry-pole to get the Legislature to restore the former ban on such contributions to Highway Commission candidates. Coming on the heels of two Public Service commissioners being sent to federal prison for masking bribes from regulated companies as campaign contributions, the Barnett episode only reinforces the Alice in Wonderland quality of Mississippi politics. The Legislature in 1990 purportedly tightened the law barring utility contributions to PBC candidates or commissioners.

At the same time for verification, but not for publication, a mailing arMm unH tpIpnhnnAniinihpr 'ncinnwl Irftprr unll not be published nor will names be withheld from publication. The Clarke County Tribune reserves the right to edit or reject any letter. Address letters to: The Clarke County Tribune Letters, P.O. Drawer Quitman, MS 39355 Tel. 776-3726 FAX 776-5793 THE CLARKE COUNTY TRIBUNE The official newspaper of Clarke County Editor Jane Kramer By: Bill Minor Atty.

General Mike Moore has brought down yet another miscreant public official and for ihe first time in state political history successfully attacked the heretofore sacrosanct domain of illegal campaign contributions. When Southern District Public Service commissioner Sidney Bamett resigned last week, only five months after taking office, ii was as a result of chargek brought by Moore in January that Bamett took some $24,000 in illegal contributions during his election campaign last year. Bamett, a lawyer, was charged under a specific law forbidding PSC candidates or commissioners from taking contributions from utility companies the state Public Service Commission regulates. His resignation was the key requirement of a plea bargain Moore made with Bamett. Pleading guilty to the specific charge of accepting a $6000 contribution from a North Gulfport (Orange Grove) water company.

Bamett was given a 2-year probationary sentence. But another essential pan of the bargain is that Barnett will provide full cooperation as state's witness in a federal grand jury investigation into other private utility "-nies MEMBER I SSI I Staff Writer- Michelle Davis AdvertisingLayout Cindy Baxley and Laurie Pruitl ClassifiedsiLegals Manager Rose Lightsey Secretary: Bookkeeper Lisa Graham The Clarke County Tribune is published each and every Wednesday and mailed as Second Class Matter at the Quitman, MS Post Office 39355 (Publication No. ISPS-1 1 5S40). The Clarke County Tribune is hotly owned by The Clarke County Tribune, Inc. The Clarke County Tribune is located ai 101 Main Street, Quitman, MS.

Mailinf address: Clarke County Tribune, P.O. Box J. Quitman, MS. Phone 776-3726. POSTMASTER: Send change of address to: Clarke County Tribune, P.O.

Box Quitman, MS 39355. SUBSCRIPTION RATES: Clarke and Wayne counties -J 1 6.00 per year Within Mississippi SI 00 per year Outside Mississippi.