Archive

NSBNEWS.net photo by Sera King. Because of Volusia County School District budget cuts, several elementary schools were closed for this school year, including Samsula Elementary, which reopened as a charter school renamed Samsula Academy.

DELAND -- Nowhere has the downturn in the economy had a stronger effect locally in 2008, than the Volusia County Schools with $45 million-plus in state budget cuts that forced the district to lay off more than 200 teachers, close several schools and legal sparring between the schools superintendent and the president of the teacher's union.

 NSBNEWS.net video by Sera King. New Smyrna Beach resident Bill Koleszar gave city commissioners an ultimatum: Either cut the budget by $1 million or face voter wrath. The commissioners did as he asked.

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- A retired police chief armed with 40 years of budgeting experience and backed by more than 200 supporters told the New Smyrna Beach City Commission at a Set. 24 public hearing that an 11.2 percent mill-rate increase was not going to fly and that there would be hell to pay come election time or even sooner through voter recalls for any of them who didn't heed his warnings. He got his way with $1 million subsequently cut "

Courtesy video. Ryan Newman won the Daytona 500 on the final lap with drafting help from teammate Kurt Busch to beat Tony Stewart coming off turn 4.

DAYTONA BEACH -- With four laps to go in February's 50th running of the Daytona 500, Tony Stewart had the lead, which he kept, until coming off turn 3 of the final lap when Ryan Newman took the high side and with a push from teammate Kurt Busch, beat Stewart to the checkered flag at Daytona International Speedway.

OAK HILL -- A 34-year-old Oak Hill man was arrested Monday night after a woman came forward over the weekend with allegations she was raped and sexually molested 16 years ago by the accused when she was 9 years old.

Oak Hill police Chief Guy Grasso said the victim came forward after all this time, telling Sgt. Robert Walker that the unwanted sexual activity by the then 18- to 20-year-old attacker between 1993 and 1994, was now causing problems in her marriage.

"She was very brave," Grasso said this afternoon. "A lot of this stuff goes on and a lot of it is unreported."

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- A $350,000 boat was destroyed by fire late Sunday at 100 Lincoln Avenue, the New Smyrna Beach Fire Department reported.

Firefighters were dispatched at 8:23 p.m. and arrived within four minutes. The large craft was suspended on a boatlift upon fire departments arrival with the fire visible in the rear area of the fiberglass boat, owned by Steve Dougherty.

Courtesy photo. A stretch of U.S. was closed for an hour this afternnon so firefighters could put out a brush fire just north of the police station.

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- A brush fire this afternoon consumed 1.5 acres on the east side of U.S. 1 just north of the New Smyrna Beach Police Department and forced a stretch of the roadway closed while firefighters battled the blaze.

DELAND -- Due to the dry conditions throughout the county, Volusia County Fire Services has issued an outdoor burn ban for the county’s unincorporated area effective Wednesday, Jan. 21. The ban also applies to the cities of DeBary, Oak Hill and Lake Helen, and the Town of
Pierson, said county spokeswoman Shelley Szafraniec.

Vela Marie Ryle, 54, of New Smyrna Beach, a former project manager in the information-technology industry, died Sunday, Jan. 18, 2009.

Thomas John O'Hara, 88, Nof ew Smyrna Beach, former owner/operator of a commercial moving business, died Sunday, Jan. 18, 2009.

Ruth I. Fairbanks, 89, of Edgewater, a former clerical secretary for the Volusia County Department of Elections, died Saturday, Jan. 17, 2009.

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- Walter Henry Glenn, founder of the North Bridge Yacht Club in New Smyrna Beach, which now boasts 567 members, died unexpectedly at his New Smyrna Beach home Sunday, Jan. 11, 2009. He was 72 years old.

Born in Concord, N.C., Glenn came to this area in 1992 from Tampa. He was a 1955 graduate of Greenville (South Carolina) High School, and a 1959 graduate of the University of Georgia, where he was a member of Sigma Alpha Epsilon Fraternity and pitcher for the varsity baseball team, holding the record for the school's second lowest earned run average.