Where, oh where, can it go? — coming soon!

A Hillsborough resident and former volunteer at the Orange County Rescue Squad recovered a plethora of memorabilia from the OCRS after the building was sold. Stowing it in his shed for now, the man hopes to find somewhere in the county to display this little slice of history—some of the items date back to the 60s!
Photo: trophies and plaques the OCRS won throughout the years
Stay tuned for more details in Wednesday's paper (Feb. 2)! In the meantime, any ideas as to where the memorabilia could be displayed?

coming soon! — shopping saves lives

Every girl's dream! Paws4Ever recently opened a thrift shop, Paws4Ever ReSale Store, at 115 John Earle St. Paws4Ever is a non-profit, no-kill animal shelter. The organization takes animals from county animal shelters in danger of being euthanized and keeps them until they can be adopted. The thrift shop will help support the shelter's animals and programs, saving the lives of hundreds of animals a year and funding educational outreach programs focused on preventing future abandoned pets. See the paper Wednesday, Feb. 2, for more!
Sneak peak — Paws4Ever Board of Directors President Caroline Green sits in the thrift shop with Cardinal (available for adoption!), a 2-month-old boxer-lab mix puppy.

More pictures - K-9 training

Hillsborough Police Department's two K-9s, Sampson and Talon, went through a series of training exercises with their human partners Cpl. Michael Foushee and Cpl. Scott Foster so that I could photograph them for the paper. Unfortunately, not all of the pictures could fit in the paper, so here's a more comprehensive view of what our police K-9s are trained to do!

TIP: To slow the pictures down and fully read the captions, click on the slideshow. It will bring you to a new site (in a new tab) with the slideshow and more viewing options. Click on Gallery View (to the right of the picture) and you'll be able to scroll through as you please!

The stop signs are coming down

The Town Board voted to approve an ordinance to remove three stop signs on Cameron Street on Feb. 10.
The stop signs are part of Hillsborough Police Department's traffic study on Cameron Street, inspired by traffic complaints in the neighborhood. The first phase consisted of three stop signs placed along Cameron Street, at Union, Caine and Orange Streets. HPD has been analyzing traffic flow with the stop signs in place as part of phase I and will take down the signs on Feb. 10. After allowing a month for locals to adjust, the HPD will analyze traffic flow without stop signs and compare the two scenarios.
What do you think?

grady a. brown lock-in

 Teachers and staff at Grady A. Brown Elementary School will be locking themselves into the school Thursday, Jan. 27, starting at 2:45 p.m. They will stay inside the school until the community helps them win a Pepsi Refresh Grant worth $50,000 to aid in their efforts to get a new playground for their third- through fifth-graders. Currently, those students must play on a cracked blacktop.
To learn how you can vote (up to three times per day), visit www.refresheverything.com/playgroundforgab until Feb. 1

ch-ch-ch-changes

The New Year has come and gone. With a new editor and a new reporter, we thought it would be a good time to ask you, the reader, what you'd like to see in your newspaper. Do you want more photos or fewer? More features? Or perhaps you'd like to see something else entirely. Let us know! Comment here or shoot us an e-mail at editorial [at] newsoforange [dot] come. We'd love to hear from you.

Coming soon - getting to know your K-9s

Get ready to see and read about the interesting lives of Hillsborough Police Department's two K-9 dogs, Sampson and Talon, as we learn about their lives from birth to their working years. Most people know very little about what police dogs actually do, where the come from, how they learn their skills - and I must admit, I was one of those people. But after meeting Sampson and Talon, after seeing the incredible way they interact with their handlers, I've realized that these great teddy-bear-like dogs have a lot to teach us!
Above - a picture preview! Sampson (top) and Talon rest after an hour's worth of rigorous training.

new reporter

Welcome our new reporter, Erin Wiltgen!

She joins us from the Thomasville Times, where she did a little bit of everything, though I'm sure she'll post more about that in the next couple of days. She's got a ton of experience in social media, so look for her posts here, on Twitter and on Facebook.

Erin jumped right in, and she has a ton of stories ready for this week's paper, so look for those on Wednesday. Erin will be taking over the Hillsborough beat, and we'll both be looking to step up our coverage of the county—county government, events and feature stories outside of Hillsborough.

Feel free to stop by and say hello or contact her or me with your story ideas. We can be reached at 732-2171.

school board meeting tonight

The Orange County school  board will hold its first meeting of the new year tonight at 7 p.m. at Central Office, which is located right at the end of King Street. The agenda includes audit and literacy reports, a school capital needs work session and a student reassignment discussion. The latter will be the fourth such discussion the board has had as they seek to determine whether redistricting is necessary at this time. It's bound to be an interesting discussion, and I'll try to live blog it, either here or on Twitter (we're @NewsofOrange) for those who want to know what happens but can't make it tonight.