Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, April 19, 1990 TAG: 9004180257
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV4 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The county, over the objections of property owners and others, condemned several parcels of land to improve the dirt road.
Dan Brugh, state Department of Transportation resident engineer, said the road, Virginia 681, which leads to Ellett Valley, is open to the public.
Concerned Citizens for the Preservation of Nellies Cave Community, meanwhile, has launched a drive to raise $5,000 to hire a Richmond lawyer to research whether the group has grounds to continue its fight in court, said member Tom Howze.
The group has charged that county officials did not look for alternatives to condemning land along Nellies Cave Road and that public policy was influenced by Ellett Valley developers.
\ Crews will begin work this spring to improve the storm drainage system in the Westover Hills subdivision and likely will finish in summer.
Residents had voiced concern at several Blacksburg Town Council meetings that the Department of Transportation project to improve Glade Road would dump more water into their yards during heavy rains.
\ Field work for Montgomery County's real estate reappraisal is about one-third complete, Harold Wingate of Wingate Appraisal Service has told the Board of Supervisors.
The reappraisal should be finished by October or November and will take effect next year.
Asked whether the county should do reappraisals more often than every four years, Wingate said the board might want to consider doing them every two years.
"We haven't been shot at; we haven't had anybody use a pitchfork on us," he said.
\ The number of applicants to replace Gary Elander, assistant Montgomery County administrator, is down to about a half-dozen, County Administrator Betty Thomas said.
The remaining candidates from the original field of 48 are being interviewed this week. Elander has become Dublin's part-time town manager.\ The Blacksburg Chamber of Commerce has gone on record as supporting proposed route No. 6 - a new road from Interstate 81 to the southern town limits - from among the seven routes proposed by the state Department of Transportation.
Chamber President Dwayne Kittle said that route would ease traffic along the U.S. 460 corridor and provide a link to Interstate 81 and the Roanoke Valley.
The Christiansburg-Montgomery County chamber supports tying together the Blacksburg and Christiansburg U.S. 460 bypasses. President Clayton Tinnell said his chamber gives secondary support to a direct link with the Roanoke Valley.
\ Enrollment at New River Community College has topped 3,800 for the first time, according to Floyd Hogue, president of the college.
The total represents a 20 percent increase in students over last year.
Officials had projected enrollment at 3,521, which would have been the highest spring enrollment at NRCC. But additional students signed up, making enrollment the highest it has been for any semester in the past 20 years, said Joyce Taylor, public information officer.
Hogue said the college has enrolled more students in retraining programs for recently laid-off New River Valley employees since the March head count. - From staff reports
by CNB