Mary Schulken is an Observer associate editor. Reach her at The Observer, P.O. Box 30308, Charlotte, NC 28230-0308, by e-mail at mschulken@charlotteobserver.com, or by phone at 704-358-5518.
I should feel safer.I should feel safer. But I don't. Now I'm really scared. Soon, a group of citizens will patrol the business district attached to the neighborhood where I live. They will be on the lookout for lawbreakers lurking in alleys, doorways and dark corners.
He made the “I don't see no Americans” comment to New York City's Boss Tweed as the two watched a shipload disembark on the city's busy waterfront.
We like to think we're pretty smart here in Charlotte, and we are.
My mother's dining room table is an office with a view. The black-dirt big field on her farm has a sandy crust that sprouts tiny green pigtails this time of year. Watch for a while and you'll see a herd of deer nibbling at the edges, or maybe a roving band of wild turkeys waddling up and down the rows.
It's a ping-ping match gone mad. At one end, paddle in hand, is Scott Ralls, new president of the N.C. community college system. He's working up a powerful sweat swiftly swatting the ball.
Somewhere in North Carolina, somebody in some itty-bitty mapdot is watching a car bumper rust, thinking about buying that new gun and just praying that the family of Latinos here to plant tobacco won't move in up the road.
For the moment, the 49er football crowd has quieted at UNC Charlotte. The next play will be a big one: Chancellor Phil Dubois is expected by June to weigh in to trustees on findings of a study that back it.
Erskine Bowles is not shy about pointing it out when things are accomplished during his tenure as president of the University of North Carolina system. To date, he can claim accountability, more state money and a cap on tuition.
