Notes from My Afternoon as a Non-Reporter at a Public Meeting

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As I wrote last week I spent about 5-6 hours listening to people speak at the public forum regarding the proposals by WFU Baptist Medical Center to build a hospital in Advance and Novant to build one just four miles from Advance in Clemmons.  According to the Winston-Salem Journal about 700 people were there, which I think is as accurate a count as any.  Following are some notes and observations from the afternoon:

  • When I first got there I stood in the atrium outside the meeting room and watched the proceedings on a television for a few minutes.  I was holding a steno pad since I wanted to take notes and I also wanted to be prepared if I got an important business-related call.  I guess I looked like a reporter because a tall, snow-haired gentleman in a suit that probably costs more than my annual salary approached me and nodded hello while giving me the stink-eye.  I nodded back and waited for him to introduce himself.  When he didn’t I put out my hand and said, "Hi, I’m Jon Lowder."  He shook my hand and said, "Yes."  That’s when my prick-o-meter alarm started clanging.  Then he said, "You look like you might be a reporter" to which I replied, "No, I just carry this in case I get an important call."  He didn’t seem to be buying it and he just walked off and joined his colleagues from WFU.

    Just after that a nice young lady from Novant approached and asked me if I was there to speak.  I said that yes I was and she gave me a green sticker that all the Novant supporters were wearing on their chests.  I put it on my shirt, but since I hadn’t taken off my jacket you couldn’t really see it.  I went inside and found my cousin, a Novant employee, and made my way to the side of the room where she was sitting.  I decided to lean against the wall and wait until the speaker was done before disturbing anyone to sit next to my cousin and that’s when I realized that I was standing next to a reporter (I could tell by her steno notebook and the fact that she seemed to know shorthand) and when I looked up the snow-haired prick gentleman was watching me.  That’s when I decided to whip out my notebook and pretend to write furiously for a few minutes while glancing at him intermittently.  A guys got to have a little fun in life.  After he left I went ahead and sat down.

  • Listening to 150 people say essentially the same thing is very boring.  The reporter was smart and bugged out after number 20.  I was in for the long haul.
  • If I ever want to be a reporter, or even dream of being a faux-reporter, I need to learn some form of shorthand. If not I’ll be the king of paraphrasers.
  • Two paraphrases leap to mind.  First, when the folks from WFU were given their 10 minutes to respond to some of the citizen comments their VP said that they were shocked when they heard the outgoing mayor of Clemmons say that his citizens welcomed the Novant-proposed hospital and maybe his saying that is an indication of why he got his butt kicked in the election a couple of weeks back. 

    The second was from the Davie county manager who was invited by WFU to use some of their response time to share a personal story to help explain what all this is about.  He said that after they’d publicly announced the deal with WFU he was approached by Novant representatives and he asked them how they could have the gall to approach him after what they did to another local hospital (Stokes County).  He said their reply was that it was all about market share.  He then said he told them that it wasn’t about market share it was about the people of Davie County.  If this had been a Q&A I would have asked the guy if he thought WFU didn’t care about market share as much as Novant, because if they didn’t they would be building the new hospital in Mocksville or another central location in the county and not on the eastern edge that happens to be home to the county’s wealthiest component and just a stone’s throw from the western Forsyth population centers of Clemmons and Lewisville.

  • Yes I was there to back Novant, but I was also there to say that I would like to see both hospitals built and preferably for Baptist to build theirs in Mocksville near the current Davie County Hospital.  I wasn’t the only one of that opinion.
  • The guy running the PR campaign for Novant was Mike Horn of Horn & Stronach.  He’s a former mayor of Lewisville and a current town council member.  It’s probably not a coincidence that several representatives from the town council testified in favor of Novant, but they should anyway since it would be the better option for Lewisville residents (in my opinion).
  • It’s interesting seeing people who’s public lives become entwined in their private and professional lives.  Winston-Salem’s mayor gets questioned every once in a while about his dual roles as mayor and president of the Winston-Salem Alliance, and seeing a town council member like Mike Horn wearing his other hat as PR pro was also interesting.  He didn’t speak himself on behalf of Novant, but since many of the speakers had been recruited by either side (WFU or Novant) it wouldn’t be a stretch to conclude that he probably asked his fellow leaders in Lewisville and Clemmons to appear.  Again, I’m not saying anything untoward was going on, it’s just always interesting to me to see how people who serve in public office balance their duties with their private lives.
  • The people from Novant and Baptist were all well-behaved. No catcalls, no booing, only intermittent boosterism.
  • A few of the public speakers mentioned the astronomical costs of healthcare in their comments, but no one from Baptist or Novant addressed that in their responses at the end of the day.  We need a public hearing about that.
  • One’s butt tends to go numb after four hours of sitting.  And if that’s the kind of thing that’s representative of what reporters do day-in and day-out then they can have it.
  • Finally, I’ve determined that I’ll carry a steno pad where ever I go.  It scares people and it’s a lot easier to lug around than a Fancycam.

links for 2007-11-19

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Jeff’s Ultimate Nightmare

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My cousin Jeff plays a real bass guitar in a real band, so the video below from South Park would probably qualify as his ultimate nightmare.  If you don’t feel like watching it let me give you a synopsis: kids watch each other play Guitar Hero; dad shows them that he can play real guitar; kids say it’s ‘gay’; dad is mystified; later that night dad sneaks downstairs in his tighty-whitey’s to try Guitar Hero; dad sucks at it and slinks off to bed.  It used to be that being able to play a guitar got you the girls, now it gets you humiliation in your underwear.  Times are a-changin’.

Liveblogging Hospital Debate

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First, full disclosure: I’m at the public hearing for the proposed hospitals in Clemmons (Novant) and Davie County (WFU Baptist) and I’m here to speak in support of the Clemmons Hospital. That out of the way here’s my early observations:

There are at least 400 people here at Cornerstone Christian Church in Advance, NC. The place is mobbed

The breakdown looks like about 60/40 with the yellow shirts (Baptist) being 60 and the green shirts (Novant) being 40

I got here after the two companies made their pitch but in time for the doctors to say their pieces. The arguments break down to two major points: arguments in favor of Davie emphasize the labor and delivery it will provide and the arguments in favor of Clemmons emphasize the fact that 73% of residents in Clemmons and Lewisville use the Novant system (and 63% if you include Davie). Some OB-GYNs argued in favor of Clemmons because of a consolidated agreement between the providers to provide obstetric services and they were worried that the Davie hospital would dilute resources

We’re on to local leaders, politicians and residents. The mayor of Bermuda Run, where the Davie hospital would be located, just had a great line. He said that the residents would not mind the sirens because since they’re all elderly the sirens would mean help is on the way. Love it.

I’m behind over 140 people in line to speak. It’s gonna be a long day. More later Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Apparently It’s Worth the Wait

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Our daughter, an eighth grader, told us tonight at dinner that she didn’t have PE today because they had a woman come in to give a presentation called something like "It’s Worth the wait" to all the girls in her grade.  From our daughter’s description the speaker’s message was simply that it’s worth waiting until marriage to have sex. Not adulthood, marriage. 

She said that the woman giving the presentation was open and gregarious, and was quite explicit in her explanation of the perils of sex like contracting herpes, syphilis, etc.  Then one of the girls asked, "Well, what about lesbians?"  Much stuttering ensued and then the presenter explained that if a boy cheated on his girlfriend with another girl who had herpes then he could give his girlfriend herpes.  Basically it sounds like she dodged the whole lesbian thing, and I guess it’s understandable if you’re asked to address alternative lifestyles and your program is based on waiting until marriage to engage in sex, but you can’t legally get married as a homosexual.  It does present one with a conundrum.

Before I go on I think it’s important to note that while today’s presentation was about abstinence my daughter tells me that the girls have received information on safe sex in past programs.  My understanding is that today’s program was simply another piece of the sex-ed puzzle for the girls, not the end-all, be-all.  Thus my comments here are directed specifically at today’s program and its ilk.

Now don’t get me wrong;  I don’t like the idea of my kids having sex too young and I’d like to think that they’ll wait until they are mature enough and have met a person that they truly love before they decide to have sex.  On the other hand I live in the present and I also remember being 16, 17, 18 years old and full of raging hormones so I’m pretty realistic about the odds of kids waiting until they’re married.  Heck, if I had to choose I’d rather they have sex at the appropriate age before marriage rather than rush into a marriage in order to have sex.   

So realistically speaking I think our kids need information about the benefits of waiting (and there are some, believe it or not) and about how to protect themselves when they think they’re ready.  And believe you me, they’ll decide when they’re ready, not us parents.  As for the kids who are gay, well they deserve the same information the straight kids get.  Just because they’re gay doesn’t mean they won’t benefit from the same message about the benefits of waiting and how to protect themselves when they decide they’re ready for sex.  Heck they probably deserve it more given the added social stresses they face that their straight peers don’t.

Finally there’s the question of whether the state should be getting into sex education at all.  Some folks argue that this is simply the domain of parents, but I tend to think that kids benefit from hearing things from other responsible adults beyond their parents.  It’s the same reason that I think my kids learn more from being taught math, science and English by people who have studied those subjects in-depth I think my kids will learn a lot from someone trained in health services.  We’ll still cover it at home, but as most parents will tell you kids often don’t hear what’s coming out of our mouths because to them we’re just annoying nags.  So if they can get the information from a source they’ll actually listen to then all the better.

links for 2007-11-15

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Proud Dad, Part Gazillion

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Our kids are always giving us plenty of reasons to be proud of them and this time I just have to brag on our oldest, Michael.  He submitted an application to be an "ambassador" to the Weather Channel’s Forecast Earth Summit.  The process involved writing a 200 word essay to be judged and then if accepted to be interviewed by phone for about 20 minutes.  Well, Michael submitted his essay and we received an email saying that he’d been chosen as one of 40 semi-finalists from around the country (the program was open to all 9th, 10th and 11th graders throughout the country).  They then asked that I sign a release so that he could be interviewed by phone, which I gladly did.  This evening he was interviewed and despite being quite nervous he thinks he did pretty well.

I started out being proud of Michael for even taking the initiative to apply, but when he told me that they’d informed him that he was one of 40 kids picked out of over 20,000 applicants I was floored.  He’s taking it pretty nonchalantly but if you were to tell me that I had been chosen over 99.8% of the applicants I’d have gotten an ego the size of Texas.  He just said, "Kinda cool, huh?"

Hopefully the folks who did the phone interview will appreciate his forthrightness. When asked what his motivations were he didn’t just talk about wanting to save the Earth, he also said he thought it would look good on his transcript because he wants to get into a really good college.  Gotta love that brutally honest streak he has.  Maybe we should have coached him a little more, but I kind of like that he was just himself.  If they’re going to pick him I think it’s best if they do it based on the real deal and not some kid spouting off lines provided by overeager stage parents.  One way or another we’ll know the final outcome some time next week.

This post wouldn’t be complete without mentioning Michael’s biology teacher at West Forsyth H.S., Mr. Brendan Leezer.  He’s truly stoked Michael’s interest in science and the kid can’t speak highly enough of him. Michael’s always loved science and Mr. Leezer’s enthusiasm has served to deepen that interest.  He encouraged Michael to apply for the summit and made himself available to offer any advice the boy needed. That’s the kind of thing that Michael will remember well beyond his high school years, and it’s the kind of thing that as a parent I really appreciate.