News

Pristine, snow-covered landscapes can be wonders to behold. While that blanket of white is idyllic, a lawn’s delicate blades may be paying a hefty price beneath the cold, heavy piles of snow.

What’s underfoot in a home can go a long way toward making residences comfortable and aesthetically appealing.

High blood pressure -- the leading risk factor for heart attack and stroke -- continues to disproportionately affect communities of color. Addressing this health inequity is especially important right now, as people with hypertension and serious heart conditions are at an increased risk for more severe outcomes if they acquire COVID-19.

Forney ISD continues to raise the bar with state-ofthe-art facilities. Thursday, January 28, the FISD Board of Trustees and Forney Superintendent, Dr. Justin Terry, officially cut the ribbons on two more distinctive training centers for local students made possible by a bond approved by citizens in November 2019.

Thursday, January 22, State Representative Keith Bell (R - Forney) filed House Bill 1291 on the 48th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, requiring notice of the right to object to participation in an abortion procedure for health care personnel of a hospital, medical school, or health care facility.

Lydia Polite was a Gullah-Geechee enslaved person in South Carolina. There is really no way for us to know what her given name was, as Gullah slaves were assigned names by traders and never known by the language of their West African mothers. The surname of Polite could’ve been a subliminal sales tactic used by the trader to fetch more money at the slave auction. “This one is so polite that’s what we named her.” By the late 1830s, Lydia had worked her way from the fields into a house servant role. She was enslaved by Henry McKee. In addition to being the wealthy landowner of the Ashdale Plantation on Lady’s Island, historians have also pegged him as the probable father of the child Lydia Polite brought into this world in 1839, in a cabin behind the main house, at the age of 43. How is that for an opening? See, the Gullah-Geechee culture is incredibly interesting. From their folk beliefs, to their story telling, to their beautiful language, dubbed Sea Island Creole, this culture owns a tapestry of beautiful lineage wrapped in the bloody and disgusting gift paper of human enslavement. They are also why I have a haint porch. And, the reason I come to you with this story today is simple. It’s officially black history month. While

Dear Aunt B,

The holy Bible is so written so that a “saved person” can learn how to live a GODLY life studying it, but the “lost” cannot understand it because it is foolishness to them. As natural humans we rely on what we can see with our human eyes and touch with our other senses. To believe the gospel about Jesus Christ is unnatural and cannot be done without the aid of the Holy Spirit opening their understanding. That is when their decision must be made.

In the middle of the first week of public regional hearings on new political maps, lawmakers found out they are going to have to wait even longer to get official numbers showing how Texas’ population has changed over the last ten years. According to the US Census Bureau, the apportionment data, which determines how many representatives each state has in the US House, won’t be available until the end of April. The redistricting data, those figures that drive the process of drawing new boundary lines for statehouse and congressional districts, won’t be available before the end of July. This all but guarantees a special session on redistricting for the Legislature.

The year was 1957, and I was in first grade, but two of the main neighborhood playmates of mine were two girls who were five years older (Barbara and Sherry) and just beginning to “discover boys.” One had a record player and played one song more than often—“Kisses Sweeter than Wine”—and she has probably forgotten all about it. For some reason, I actually rather liked the way the singer emphasized and intensified those four words. I didn’t pay much attention to the rest of the lyrics at the time.

It’s February, and therefore Black History Month, and so I thought I’d share a bit of Forney’s own Black history, that was told to me by one of our longtime Forney citizens and class of 1968, Mr. Chester Davis, Jr.

The Mesquite Metro Airport has a plane land or take-off about every six minutes. The nearly 86,000 operations in 2020 places the airport 164 out of 520 airports throughout the United States with an air traffic control tower. Those accomplishments were part of a briefing on the airport presented to the Mesquite City Council on Jan. 19.

More than 11,000 Iowa State University students have been recognized for outstanding academic achievement by being named to the fall semester 2020 Dean’s List. Students named to the Dean’s List must have earned a grade point average of at least 3.50 on a 4.00 scale while carrying a minimum of 12 credit hours of graded course work.