North Carolina
DG MARTIN COLUMN: North Carolina’s most famous person – The Stanly News & Press
DG MARTIN COLUMN: North Carolina’s most famous person
Published 2:15 pm Tuesday, April 23, 2024
Who is North Carolina’s most famous person?
If you go by who got featured in a front-page article last week in The New York Times, the answer is easy.
Virginia Foxx.
Who is Foxx? She is a U.S. Congressional representative from North Carolina who is chair of the House Committee on Education & the Workforce.
She and her committee led investigations and held hearings in December that were critical of the handling by several universities of antisemitism on campuses. Those hearings led to the resignations of the presidents of Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania.
On April 16, Times journalist Anemona Hartocollis wrote that Foxx’s drubbings are “part of a campaign by Republicans against what they view as double standards within elite education establishments — practices that they say favor some groups over others, and equity over meritocracy. Others see it as partisan attack.”
On the same day, Foxx and her committee focused on Columbia University. In her opening statement, she wrote, “Since October 7th, this Committee and the nation have watched in horror as so many of our college campuses, particularly the most expensive, so-called elite schools, have erupted into hotbeds of antisemitism and hate. Columbia University is one of the worst of those hotbeds and we have seen far too little, far too late done to counter that and protect students and staff. Columbia stands guilty of gross negligence at best and at worst has become a platform for those supporting terrorism and violence against the Jewish people…
“That a taxpayer funded institution would become a forum for the promotion of terrorism raises serious questions. Moreover, Columbia administrators have repeatedly failed in their duty to protect Jewish students from this hateful, retrograde form of discrimination. Don’t take my word for it. In February, Columbia undergraduate Eden Yadegar told the Committee, ‘It is impossible to exist as a Jewish student at Columbia without running face first into antisemitism every single day. Jew-hatred is so deeply embedded into campus culture, that it has become casual and palatable among students and faculty and neglected by administrators.’ ”
The day after Foxx’s remarks, Columbia’s campus exploded with pro-Palestinian demonstrations.
But it was not her tough talk about elite universities that got Foxx and North Carolina to the Times’ front page. Rather it was Foxx’s compelling life story and the beauty of the mountains where she lives that got the attention of Hartocollis. Foxx was born in New York City, but in 1950 her family moved to Avery County in western North Carolina. They lived in the isolated mountains in a house without running water or electricity. There was no outhouse, so, as she told Hartocollis, “we went to the woods.”
Her father was a painter and a paperhanger; her mother worked odd jobs.
Somehow, Foxx pushed through high school, taking a janitor’s job her senior year. She married Tom Foxx, had a daughter, and “working all the way,” after seven years earned a bachelor’s degree in English from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Then she earned a master’s in sociology from Chapel Hill, and a doctorate in education from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.
Meanwhile she and Tom started Grandfather Mountain Nursery and Landscaping, and some of my friends bought their Christmas trees from them.
She became an assistant dean at Appalachian State and then president of Mayland Community College in northwest North Carolina. Although she started poor, hard work made her and Tom millionaires.
After serving in the North Carolina Senate from 1995 to 2005, she was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives.
Foxx took Hartocollis to her home, a “house on a hill with spectacular views of Grandfather Mountain.”
Hartocollis’s front page description of the beauty of these North Carolina mountains and Foxx’s tenaciousness, toughness, and grit made Virginia Foxx, at least for a day, North Carolina’s most famous person.
D.G. Martin, a retired lawyer, served as UNC-System’s vice president for public affairs and hosted PBS-NC’s “North Carolina Bookwatch.”
UBS managing director Jason Katz and Interactive Brokers strategist Steve Sosnick reveal how investors can navigate conflicting messages in the stock market on The Claman Countdown.
President Joe Biden traveled to Wilmington, North Carolina, on Thursday to tout the administration’s water infrastructure investments in a key swing state as the election season draws nearer.
Biden focused the majority of his remarks on efforts to replace lead water pipes that remain in use around the country despite health concerns associated with lead leaking into drinking water. Funding to address the issue was included in both the bipartisan infrastructure law and the American Rescue Plan, a $1.9 trillion stimulus package Democrats approved along party-lines. Both laws were enacted in 2021.
“Today, nine million lead service lines connect water mains to our homes, schools, daycare centers, businesses,” Biden said. “That includes some 300,000 lead service lines in North Carolina alone. The cost to replace them is consequential, but too many families only learn the threat to their children after they get sick.”
“You know, this is for some time why I’m determined, I’m determined to fix it. We’re finally moving. Until the United States of America, God love us, deals with this – how can we say we’re a leading nation in the world, for God’s sake we’re better than this,” Biden added.
BIDEN ADMINISTRATION PROPOSES TO REQUIRE LEAD PIPES TO BE REPLACED WITHIN 10 YEARS
President Joe Biden touted his administration’s efforts to replace hazardous lead pipes at an event in Wilmington, North Carolina, on May 2, 2024. (Photo by MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images / Getty Images)
“These lead lines are tough and durable and they don’t rust, but we’ve long since learned they leak poisonous toxins into our water,” the president explained. “The science is clear – lead service lines pose severe health risks, damaging the brain and kidneys. In children especially, they stunt growth, slow learning and cause lasting brain damage.”
“One study shows when you reduce lead exposure for children, their test scores actually improve in school as much as if you were to reduce class size by a third at one-tenth the cost of doing that. It pays off across the board,” he added.
BIDEN ANNOUNCES FRESH ROUND OF $6.1 BILLION IN STUDENT LOAN HANDOUTS, BRINGS TOTAL GIVEN TO $160 BILLION
President Joe Biden delivers remarks on water infrastructure at the Wilmington Convention Center in Wilmington, North Carolina, on Thursday, May 2, 2024. (Photographer: Cornell Watson/Bloomberg via Getty Images / Getty Images)
“Let me say what I’ve said many times before, there’s no – no – safe level of lead exposure, none. The only way forward is to replace every lead service line that connects Americans to clean water. That’s why Kamala and I are making sure this administration is the first ever to set out to do it, and we’re going to get it done,” Biden said.
The White House published a press release Thursday that noted that the administration’s $3 billion in funding to replace toxic lead pipes comes as part of a broader $15 billion in funding for that purpose under the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that came from the bipartisan infrastructure law.
BIDEN VOWS TO LET TRUMP-ERA TAX CUTS EXPIRE NEXT YEAR, MEANING HIGHER RATES FOR MANY
Congress approved billions of dollars in funding for the replacement of lead pipes around the country. (Antonio Pere/Chicago Tribune/Tribune News Service via Getty Images / Getty Images)
It noted that the bipartisan infrastructure law included over $50 billion in funding for water infrastructure, while the American Rescue Plan provided over $20 billion in water infrastructure for state and local governments slated for use on water infrastructure projects.
Further, the White House said the state of North Carolina has used $150 million from the American Rescue Plan to test for and remove lead hazards in schools and daycare centers around the state.
GET FOX BUSINESS ON THE GO BY CLICKING HERE
The White House said that with today’s announcement of $3 billion from the bipartisan infrastructure law being allocated to lead pipe replacement projects, the first such project funded under the law began in the city of Wilmington.
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -The North Carolina Senate has approved legislation to set aside roughly $500 million more for programs that provide taxpayer money to help K-12 students attend private schools.
The majority-Republican Senate voted Thursday along party lines to spend the money, almost all of which will cover a surge in demand for Opportunity Scholarship grants since income caps to receive them were eliminated.
The demand has resulted in a waiting list of nearly 55,000 students.
The measure could go to Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper next week if the House votes to affirm the legislation.
Cooper opposes these vouchers, but Republicans hold narrow veto-proof majorities.
Copyright 2024 WITN. All rights reserved.
Colorado family says street racing led to death of beloved grandfather
Early Addition: Meet the Connecticut man who’s eaten pizza every day for six years
Delaware Senate amends captive insurance rule
Are there monkeys in Florida? Videos show sightings in this part of the state
Georgia's Charlie Condon Pursues NCAA Records — College Baseball, MLB Draft, Prospects – Baseball America
See it: Tesla crashes into Columbus convention center at 70 mph
Colorado Rockies game no. 116 thread: Zac Gallen vs José Ureña
Fox News Politics: Georgia the whole day through
Death of missing Oregon girl found in stream ruled homicide
At least 2 dead as tornadoes hit Alabama, damage homes across Southeast
Video: Tanker Fire Shuts Down I-95
House COVID committee calling for criminal probe into gain-of-function virus research in Wuhan
UK has begun mass arrests of potential Rwanda deportees: What’s next?
Biden to award Presidential Medal of Freedom to 19, including Pelosi and Ledecky
Which states could have abortion on the ballot in 2024?
-
News1 week agoLarry Webb’s deathbed confession solves 2000 cold case murder of Susan and Natasha Carter, 10, whose remains were found hours after he died
-
World1 week agoHaiti Prime Minister Ariel Henry resigns, transitional council takes power
-
News1 week agoFirst cargo ship passes through new channel since Baltimore bridge collapse
-
World1 week agoUS secretly sent long-range ATACMS weapons to Ukraine
-
World1 week agoSpanish PM Pedro Sanchez suspends public duties to 'reflect'
-
News1 week agoAmerican Airlines passenger alleges discrimination over use of first-class restroom
-
Movie Reviews1 week agoHumane (2024) – Movie Review
-
Education1 week agoVideo: Johnson Condemns Pro-Palestinian Protests at Columbia University