Stories from Wednesday, June 29, 2011

With no comment from the public or the city council, Shelbyville's property tax rate was raised 22 cents Tuesday evening -- to $1.65 per $100. A public hearing was held, but only five citizens attended the meeting, and none of them offered comments...

A former city manager of Franklin will be taking the same job in Shelbyville starting next month. James R. "Jay" Johnson was selected Tuesday by the Shelbyville city council during a special called meeting. Johnson will begin his duties July 12 at a salary of $80,000...

If you don't know who Alther "Doc" Watson is, you must not be a bluegrass fan. Or gospel. Or blues or country or folk ... The North Carolina flatpicker, blind since childhood, is a legend in the world of acoustic guitar playing, and he's spent the last 43 years or so expanding that legend with guitars made right here in Bedford County...

As a cell phone carrier only under duress, I don't spend a lot of time picking ring tones or customizing the teeny-tiny screen with designer art that make the teeny-tinier writing even harder to see. That doesn't keep me from enjoying other folks' ring tones, though, especially when they are extremely appropriate (Wartrace Alderman Thomas Hurt's "Mayberry" theme) or extremely inappropriate (one of my doctors has "Money, Money, Money" for his tone.)...

The suspect in the shooting of a Shelbyville woman late Tuesday ran away from a traffic stop a short time later and shot himself during a standoff with officers early today, police said. Cassandra Cooper, identified by police as the victim, and Lamonte Williams, who police said shot her in the head at a Shelbyview Drive home, are listed in stable condition today at Vanderbilt Medical Center in Nashville wounds, Lt. ...