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NORWICH Saying it's time for "young and new leadership to steer the city forward," Derell Wilson indicated Thursday he will announce his entry this weekend into the race for mayor of Norwich as a Democratic candidate.

Wilson, 25, said in a news release he "is ready to take on the challenge of reviving and rebuilding a city in desperate need of fresh ideas and new leadership."

He is the first Democrat to announce his candidacy. Wilson is seeking the mayor's seat after Democrat Deb Hinchey announced last month she would not seek re-election.

An employee of the Norwich school system, Wilson servedas both the local NAACP Youth Council president and president of the NAACP State Conference of Youth and College Divisions. He is the brother of Terell Wilson, a former Norwich alderman who died in an automobile crash caused by a wrong-way driver in April 2016 on Interstate 95.

Wilson plans to announce his candidacy at 1 p.m. Saturday in front of the William A. Buckingham House, also known as the Buckingham Memorial, at 307 Main St.

Wilson said he plans to use "Our City, Our Voice," as his campaign's theme, and he will promote "families first, advancing initiatives that invest in our children."

"Wilson wants to bring together all parts of the city as one cohesive unit, working together to be the most efficient city that Norwich can be," Wilson's statement said. It also said he will "move the city forward in an ethical, transparent and inclusive way."

Republican Peter A. Nystrom, president pro tempore of the City Council and a former mayor until he was defeated by Hinchey, announced March 4 he plans to run again for mayor. Alderman Tucker Braddock, a Democrat, also has been mentioned as a possible mayoral candidate.

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Democrat Derell Wilson, 25, to announce run for mayor of Norwich - Norwich Bulletin

WAYNESBORO So now it looks like Del. Richard "Dickie" Bell will have a Democratic opponent this year after all.

Staunton resident Michele Edwards announced her intention Thursday to seek the Democratic nomination for House District 20. Bell has held the 20th District seat since 2010.

The Republican District Committee announced on Wednesday that Bell had secured the GOP nomination for this year's race, and at that time, it appeared his only challenger in the November election would be Libertarian candidate Will Hammer. Bell and Hammer were the only candidates on the ballot in the 2015 race, with the incumbent easily winning with more than 70 percent of the vote.

Now, though, it appears Edwards will make it a three-way race. The Staunton resident works for Partners Worldwide, an organization that seeks to end poverty. She is married to Wally Edwards, has two children, and is a member of Trinity Episcopal Church.

Edwards announced her candidacy at the Augusta County Courthouse on Thursday.

"You know, someone said to me recently that it would be a cold day in hell before an incumbent in Virginias 20thdistrict would be beaten,so I chose a cold day in Staunton, Virginia, to announce my plans to do just that," she joked, injecting some levity in a reference to the fact that unseating a Republican in the conservative district will be no easy task. But Edwards said she is up to the challenge.

Her platform includes creating jobs with good wages, spurring economic development, and curtailing the opioid epidemic that has hit parts of Virginia hard.

"I am profoundly concerned about the challenges our communities face right now,'' Edwards said. "The rise of opioids and other drug abuse, mental health issues and high levels of poverty all have a devastating impact on the health of families."

If elected, Edwards said she wants to ensure full funding of public education, find solutions to bring health care to all Virginians, support local businesses and attract new ones to the area and "protect the rights and dignity of all people." She also said she would work to reach across party lines to collaborate with other members of the Virginia House of Delegates, regardless of their party affiliation.

The 20th District includes the cities of Waynesboro and Staunton, and portions of Augusta, Highland and Nelson counties.

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Democrat announces bid for Bell's seat - The Daily Progress

(1 of ) The Bodega Country Store, known for its kitschy collection of Hitchcock memorabilia and the statue of him out front, closed suddenly last week after the store owner's failure to pay rent. (John Burgess/The Press Democrat) (2 of ) The Bodega Country Store, known for its kitschy collection of Hitchcock memorabilia and the statue of him out front, closed suddenly last week after the store owner's failure to pay rent. (John Burgess/The Press Democrat) (3 of ) The Bodega Country Store, known for its kitschy collection of Hitchcock memorabilia and the statue of him out front, closed suddenly last week after the store owner's failure to pay rent. (John Burgess/The Press Democrat)

MARY CALLAHAN

THE PRESS DEMOCRAT | March 16, 2017, 6:49PM

| Updated 5 hours ago.

A Sonoma County market perhaps most distinguished by the life-size mannequin of Alfred Hitchcock that long stood out front abruptly closed last week, a result of the proprietors eviction from the historic building.

The Bodega Country Store, a roadside fixture in the tiny hamlet on the way to the coast, is shuttered indefinitely at this point, though the buildings owners hope it soon will reopen under different management.

Wed like to find someone to run it, said Tom Bonfigli, whose parents opened the Bodega Country Store in 1985 and bought the gray-blue structure a year later.

But finding the right person, he said, thats gonna be the trick.

Bonfiglis parents, Helen and her late husband, Joe, who died in 2014, ran the store for 20 years, catering to both locals and tourists.

Theres been a store there since 1854 in that space, said Tom Bonfigli, 55.

Under recent owner Michael Fahmie, who has run the shop since 2009 and into the ground, his critics say the market earned renown for a vast collection of kitschy movie memorabilia related to Hitchcock and the British film directors 1963 horror movie The Birds, which was shot in the county.

Fahmie said a string of personal challenges, including the decline and death of his father in Florida and a prolonged, serious infection of his own, along with unwise management choices, contributed to operational losses that made it impossible for him to keep up with his financial obligations, despite extreme patience on the part of his landlord.

I gave it a good shot, Fahmie said Thursday. I think I made the area more of a destination location. And now whoever assumes control of it can take it to the next level.

Some of the posters, photographs, Hitchcock busts, stuffed crows and myriad other items were for sale. Others werent and were on display to draw attention to the unique place of the town in movie lore, said Fahmie, 53.

Fahmie, who has a culinary background, said highlighting the Hitchcock connection put the store and surrounding village on the map, along with the crab mac n cheese and clam chowder he served up.

The Bonfiglis adjudged it cheesy overkill that crowded out basic groceries that would be useful to the local community and help sustain the markets business during the months when fewer tourists are around.

But the major issue lay in Fahmies continued trouble making rent for the main store, as well as a second retail space where he operated Birdland in Bodega, which was dedicated to more Birds collectibles, and a large upstairs apartment that he rented, though two other men mostly stayed there.

One of them was at the center of a high-profile law enforcement incident Feb. 19 in which Sonoma County sheriffs deputies and the agencys heavily armed SWAT team closed the road through town for three hours while they tried to persuade a domestic assault suspect they mistakenly believed was inside to surrender.

It turned out the suspect, Sean Aloysious Cameron, also known as Spartacus, was somewhere else, but two people who were at the apartment had not been forthcoming with what they knew about his whereabouts, sheriffs officials said.

Fahmie, it turns out, was not around that night and, in fact, had not been staying in Bodega much, even leaving the store largely unsupervised, which, he conceded was part of the problem, along with his accounting struggles.

Bonfigli and his mother, Helen, are motivated to reopen the business under a new purveyor, continuing the stores legacy.

We ran a tight ship, Tom Bonfigli said. Im not going to lie. But we tried to help people, and we tried to be fair, and we were.

You can reach Staff Writer Mary Callahan at 707-521-5249 or mary.callahan@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @MaryCallahanB.

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Bodega Country Store closed after proprietor booted by owners - Santa Rosa Press Democrat

Belleville News-Democrat

Adult dies in Glen Carbon fire but 6 kids escape; baby rescued from SUV in lake, body found Belleville News-Democrat A neighbor's surveillance camera on Dogwood Lane captured the Nissan Armada SUV leaving the house at 15 Dogwood Lane in Glen Carbon, IL, and the flames reflecting on surfaces. Then the Campbell children are seen fleeing down the street. and more »

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Adult dies in Glen Carbon fire but 6 kids escape; baby rescued from SUV in lake, body found - Belleville News-Democrat

A top House Democrat argued Thursday that "even a fraction" of President Trump's proposed spending cuts would be "an absolute disaster" for the State Department.

"[T]he White House wants to cut nearly one-third of the international affairs budget next year," New York Rep. Eliot Engel, the top Foreign Affairs Committee Democrat, said Thursday morning. "That obviously would be a disaster. In fact, slashing our international engagement by even a fraction of that, at a time when we're facing serious challenges around the world, would be an absolute disaster."

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson disagrees, and has said recent State Department budgets have run at "historically high" and unsustainable levels. But Engel countered that rising threats around the world make this year a uniquely bad time to cut diplomatic spending, and urged lawmakers to assert their congressional power under the Constitution.

"Congress, as we all say many times, is a co-equal branch of government, and, according to the Constitution, we appropriate funds or you appropriate funds," he told a House Appropriations subcommittee panel. "We don't just have to roll over because any White House says so. This year, we're going to have to put that idea to the test."

Trump asked Congress to cut diplomatic funding by nearly one-third, a $10 billion reduction that would lower spending to levels below George W. Bush's budget requests at the end of his administration.

"What the President is asking the State Department to do is, I think, reflective of a couple of expectations," Tillerson said while traveling in Japan. "One is that as time goes by, there will be fewer military conflicts that the U.S. will be directly engaged in; and second, that as we become more effective in our aid programs, that we will also be attracting resources from other countries, allies, and other sources as well to contribute in our development aid and our disaster assistance."

Engel accused the Trump team of indulging an "isolationist" outlook.

"History has shown us what we can get by retreating into a defensive, isolationist crouch," he said. "If we aren't carrying the mantle of global leadership, make no mistake, someone else will pick it up, and we may not like what we see. Don't want Russia picking it up, don't want China picking it up, don't want any of these countries that don't share our values picking it up, and they will if we retreat."

Also from the Washington Examiner

Rep. Sean Duffy, R-Wis., said Friday he supports the Trump administration's tougher new policy against North Korea, and said using pre-emptive military force could end up alleviating some of the threat posed by the hostile country.

Duffy said on CNN that North Korea's continued development of nuclear weapons and intercontinental ballistic missiles might not be a threat to the United States at the moment, but given a longer leash the regime might end up trying to kill Americans on American soil.

"There's a real threat from North Korea," Duffy said. "Not only do they have nuclear weapons, but they're advancing their ballistic missiles technology and if they advance it further, they can be a real threat to Europe and, if we take

03/17/17 8:08 AM

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Top House Democrat: Any State Department cuts 'an absolute disaster' - Washington Examiner