TheState.com: Saturday Opinion Extra

The earlier declaration of independence

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:37 EDT

MECKLENBURG COUNTY, N.C. — The impatient patriots here had splendidly short fuses in 1775. Those who tilled the startlingly red clay or who lived in the town named for George III’s wife Charlotte might have been bemused had they foreseen the annual hoopla that commemorates July 4, 1776.

What occurred that day in Philadelphia might have been a Declaration of Independence, but the first such was enacted here on May 20, 1775. Presbyterians, meaning most Mecklenburgers, were incensed by Anglican meddling from London, such as the Vestry and Marriage Acts of 1769, which imposed fines on Presbyterian ministers who conducted marriage ceremonies. Marriage as a political issue is not just a recent phenomenon.

On May 19, 1775, the day before the Mecklenburg convention met to act on such grievances, a rider arrived with news from Massachusetts about the April bloodshed at Lexington and Concord. The next day, Mecklenburg’s convention declared:

“We the citizens of Mecklenburg County do hereby dissolve the political bands which have connected us to the mother country.... We do hereby declare ourselves a free and independent people... to the maintenance of which independence, we solemnly pledge to each other our mutual cooperation, our lives, our fortunes, and our most sacred honor.”

Thus did a settlement on the fringe of the British Empire declare war on that empire. It used language — note, especially, the last nine words — that is echoed in the 1776 declaration, for reasons explained in a new book, The 4th of July and the Founding of America, by Peter de Bolla of King’s College, Cambridge. He is fascinated by Americans’ fascination with the fact, such as it is, that their country had, as few nations can claim, an “originative moment.” But what, and when, was it?

Saturday Letters to the Editor

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:37 EDT

• Metts needs increase to keep growing county safe

I read with interest David Whetsell’s June 18 letter, “Metts’ tantrum shows costly to taxpayers.”

While his Stoptax.org may be a taxpayer’s watchdog, his “old dog” needs to widen his perspective or it may wind up bitten itself!

Sheriff James Metts did and always will show “his true colors” to all us citizens. I recently retired from 30 years of law enforcement in Charleston. The reason my family now resides in Sheriff Metts’ county is the high quality of public safety his department consistently provides.

As Lexington County continues to expand and stretch his department’s resources, the sheriff wishes to not simply maintain our safety but proactively improve it.

Tourism an important addition to Columbia economy

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:01 EDT

Columbia’s economic strength has historically been state government, the University of South Carolina and Fort Jackson. Through a decade-long regional strategy, we have added conventions and visitors as another important economic pillar for the region.

This regional strategy began when the community decided we had to build the infrastructure needed to bring in conventions and visitors. Our goal in 1999 was to build an arena for USC basketball and concerts, a convention center with a parking garage, and a convention center headquarters hotel. The convention center was built under budget, on time and with a record number of minority, female and small-business participation. It has exceeded expectations, as has the Colonial Center. The convention center and the Colonial Center are great projects that could only be done with all governments working together.

Since the convention center opened, all of our largest hotels have gone through extensive renovation. We have added a number of new hotels, including the Sheraton on Main Street, the Columbia Hilton and The Inn at USC. Additionally, more than 2,700 new hotel rooms are projected to be built in the region next year — a 26 percent increase.

According to The State’s Jeff Wilkinson, since the convention center opened in 2004, .the number of rooms has increased from 9,639 to a projected 13,028 in 2009. While hotel occupancy rates were down last year in Charleston and Myrtle Beach, the rates were steady in Columbia. Tom Sponseller, executive director of the Hospitality Association of South Carolina, called Columbia “the bright spot in the state.”

We are adding new attractions for visitors, such as the Three Rivers Greenway on both sides of the river, EdVenture, historic Bethel AME Church Museum and the new exhibitions at the Columbia Art Museum. We are also adding major new economic centers for conventions and visitors, such as Innovista and our hydrogen fuel cell district. The National Hydrogen Association will meet at the convention center this March and will be the largest convention ever for the center. Also, the community under the leadership of Ike McLease at the Chamber of Commerce worked hard during the last BRAC process in 2005 to increase the footprint of Fort Jackson. The city is working with Benedict College, Allen University, Columbia College and Midlands Tech to increase the number of attractions for visitors and conventions.

Obama’s latest move to center

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:01 EDT

You’ll notice Barack Obama is now wearing a flag pin. Again. During the primary campaign, he refused to, explaining that he’d worn one after 9/11 but then stopped because it “became a substitute for, I think, true patriotism.”

So why is he back to sporting pseudo-patriotism on his chest? Need you ask? The primaries are over. While seducing the hard-core MoveOn Democrats that delivered him the caucuses — hence, the Democratic nomination — Obama not only disdained the pin. He disparaged it. Now that he’s running in a general election against John McCain, and in dire need of the gun-and-God-clinging working-class votes he could not win against Hillary Clinton, the pin is back. His country ‘tis of thee.

In last week’s column, I thought I had thoroughly chronicled Obama’s brazen reversals of position and abandonment of principles — on public financing of campaigns, on NAFTA, on telecom immunity for post-9/11 wiretaps, on unconditional talks with Ahmadinejad — as he moved to the center for the general election campaign. I misjudged him. He was just getting started.

Last week, when the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional the District of Columbia’s ban on handguns, Obama immediately declared that he agreed with the decision. This is after his campaign explicitly told the Chicago Tribune last November that he believes the D.C. gun ban is constitutional.

Obama spokesman Bill Burton explains the inexplicable by calling the November — i.e., the primary season — statement “inartful.” Which suggests a first entry in the Obamaworld dictionary — “Inartful: clear and straightforward, lacking the artistry that allows subsequent self-refutation and denial.”

The wrong stuff

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:01 EDT

On the way back from Unity, N.H., Friday evening, Barack Obama’s plane got diverted by bad weather. Instead of landing at Reagan airport, it landed farther out at Dulles.

Before he got into his SUV, Obama walked hesitantly toward the press, who were standing nearby.

He looks wary at such spontaneous sessions. He’s still getting used to being covered protectively like a president, with journalists filing probing pool reports about how he “reportedly showered and changed” after his morning workout in Chicago.

He gives the impression of someone who would like to kid around with reporters for a minute, but knows he’s going to be peppered with on-the-record minutiae designed to feed the insatiable maw of blogs and Internet news.

“So, what’s going on, guys?” he asked on the tarmac at dusk. “What’s going on on Friday night? You’ll be back in time to have some fun.”

A ray of hope in Baghdad

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:01 EDT

Whenever I am trying to get a glimpse of what’s happening at street level in Baghdad, I call my friend Abbas.

He is a driver and businessman, and a member of a large Shiite clan from a Baghdad neighborhood called Hay Salaam. A man of wide girth and robust laugh, he comes from a family in which Shiites have intermarried with Sunnis. He is shrewd and tough, with a sharp sense of humor that has survived events Americans can’t even imagine.

His uncle was hanged by Saddam Hussein, and a close relative was killed by militiamen after Hussein fell. He has been receiving written death threats. When I asked if he was scared, he replied: “When I get through every day I say al-hamdulillah (thanks to God), I am OK.”

Yet, in three recent phone conversations, he sounded more hopeful about Iraq’s future than I’d heard him in a long time.

Why hopeful? Because he finally sees some order returning to Baghdad. The Mahdi Army, the militia of the radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, has been expelled from his neighborhood. “The Iraqi people are waking up from the Mahdi Army,” he told me. “Iraqis know now that they are criminals.”

Food versus fuel

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:01 EDT

AL-BURULLUS, Egypt — A gaggle of peasant women, black caftans wafting in the breeze, crouched in the street over a small tray of fish, just caught but already teeming with flies. In their excited chatter, they sounded as if they had acquired a rarified commodity of untold value. By their own measure they had. The worldwide food crisis has spawned high-level meetings and cogent-sounding strategies proclaimed by leaders of the wealthy nations that caused it. But when looking for results, come to places like this, one of the most impoverished towns in an exceedingly poor country. People who live here, like the women trying to mete out the fish, say, simply: We’re hungry. But no one seems to listen — or care.

A few weeks ago, Cairo appointed a new governor of this northern region, nestled in the Nile River delta where it meets the Mediterranean Sea. He decided it would be more efficient to end the monthly flour ration and give out a few pieces of bread instead. This town’s 80,000 residents greeted the decision with a fury borne not of reasoned principle but of desperate need. Without the flour, most of them simply did not have enough to eat.

“We have our particular circumstances here,” said Taher El-Mahkawi, a fisherman, like most everyone in town. “Without the bread, there is no additional food.”

With the price of grains doubling worldwide, and inflation in Egypt now clawing toward 20 percent, no one here could afford simply to buy the flour. So the people of Burullus rioted; 8,000 of them took to the street. They burned tires and shut down the International Highway that runs from Bardiyah, Libya, in the west, through this town and then east until it stops at the closed gates to the Gaza Strip. That’s when Egyptian riot police stormed into town. They fired tear gas, arrested dozens of town people.

At first the governor, Ahmad Zaki Abdin, hung tough and complained on Egyptian television that, with all the foment, being a governor was “the filthiest of all jobs.” Late last month, he relented — a bit.

Death penalty ruling turns court into legislature

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:01 EDT

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled on June 25 that the imposition of the death penalty upon individuals who rape children is “cruel and unusual punishment.” The 5-4 decision initially stuns regular folks who cannot understand why the death penalty would apply to someone who shoots a person versus someone who uses an innocent child for sexual prey.

In 2006, the S.C. General Assembly stood up for children when it passed legislation providing for the death penalty in cases where someone rapes a child. I lead the fight to include the death penalty in South Carolina’s version of Jessica’s Law, then making its way through the General Assembly. I view no moment of my service in Columbia with more significance than the day we won that vote.

Justice Anthony Kennedy, the author of the latest opinion, rationalizes the rape of a child as a lesser offense by saying that, “‘in terms of moral depravity and of the injury to the person and to the public,’ they cannot compare to murder in their ‘severity and irrevocability.’”

Kennedy frets over the inability to assign aggravating factors to individual cases so that someone who rapes a child might be spared the death penalty. This reflects the height of arrogance as he actually tells us that certain rapists of children are better than others. Only in the chambers of the elite wise men could those who brutalize children have some redeeming qualities.

Some argue that capital punishment must be reserved only for instances when a life is taken. Consider this argument for a moment. Imagine what is taken from the heart and soul of children who has been victims of the horrific crime of rape. I and my colleagues agree that their life is taken away, if not in its physical sense then to a great degree in its spiritual and emotional sense. Indeed, more than 10 percent of all rape victims eventually attempt suicide.

How will Supreme Court look?

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:01 EDT

John McCain calls the future shape of the federal judiciary “one of the defining issues of this presidential election,” a point underscored by the recent spate of 5-4 Supreme Court decisions.

This area also provides one of the starkest contrasts between McCain and Barack Obama. A McCain victory in November almost certainly would enable conservatives to tighten their grip on the court and extend their influence to such issues as curbing or barring legalized abortions.

By contrast, an Obama triumph likely would put a brake on that process, though it probably wouldn’t permit a return to the liberal control that marked the high court through much of the second half of the last century.

The reason is that the justices most likely to be replaced in the next four years are members of the court’s liberal bloc. Obama would be unable to shift the court to the left, but McCain could move it even further to the right.

In a recent speech, McCain joined the outcry against judicial activism, ironic since Republican domination of the White House the past few decades means its appointees dominate the federal courts, including seven of the nine Supreme Court justices.

No more delays on education funding reform

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 15:09 EDT

It’s not often that those of us who support strengthening South Carolina’s commitment to public education find a point of agreement with Gov. Mark Sanford on education issues.

It happened recently when, in a message to legislators regarding his decision not to veto the state’s newly revised school accountability system bill, the governor noted that it is time “to stop studying and start addressing” a revised funding formula for public schools.

We couldn’t agree more. With accountability revisions behind us, the General Assembly should turn its attention to much-needed changes in the way South Carolina funds our public schools.

Numerous committees have studied the state’s education needs — the Education Oversight Committee, a Senate panel and task forces appointed by state Education Superintendent Jim Rex. A special House committee appointed by Speaker Bobby Harrell is studying the issue now.

Several principles have emerged that the S.C. School Boards Association strongly supports and that we believe should guide the state’s decisions on funding reform.

Saturday Letters to the Editor

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 15:16 EDT

• Global warming has no proof to back it up

I am sick and tired of the term “green,” as in buying a product to reduce carbon emissions and save Mother Earth from man’s devastation.

I do not believe in the hoax/myth/religion of man-made, carbon-dioxide-caused global warming. “The Earth does not have a fever,” as John Coleman, founder of The Weather Channel, has stated. What it does have are regular heaves and sighs as it goes through its natural processes and periods of cooling and warming. There is no significant man-made global warming — not in the past, not now and not in the future.

Kudos and congratulations to Coleman and 31,000 of his fellow scientists who have gone on record refuting global warming, which I’m sure many people didn’t hear about, opposing Al Gore and his fabricated brand of economic terrorism.

The only thing detrimental about global warming is Mr. Gore’s campaign, with its damaging effects on the economy and our wallets now and the devastation it will cause in the form of depression and economic collapse if it continues unchallenged.

The Sam’s Club agenda

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 14:40 EDT

Among the many dark tidings for American conservatism, there is one genuine bright spot. Over the past five years, a group of young and unpredictable rightward-leaning writers has emerged on the scene.

These writers came of age as official conservatism slipped into decrepitude. Most of them were dismayed by what the Republican Party had become under Tom DeLay and seemed put off by the shock-jock rhetorical style of Ann Coulter. As a result, most have the conviction — which was rare in earlier generations — that something is fundamentally wrong with the right, and it needs to be fixed.

Moreover, most of these writers did not rise through the official channels of the conservative or libertarian establishments. By and large, they didn’t do the internships or take part in the young leader programs that were designed to replenish “the movement.” Instead, they found their voices while blogging. The new technology allowed them to create a new sort of career path and test out opinions without much adult supervision.

As a consequence, they are heterodox and hard to label. These writers grew up reading conservative classics — Burke, Hayek, Smith, C.S. Lewis — but have now splayed off in all sorts of quirky ideological directions.

There are dozens of writers I could put in this group, but I’d certainly mention Yuval Levin, Daniel Larison, Will Wilkinson, Julian Sanchez, James Poulos, Megan McArdle, Matt Continetti and, though he’s a tad older, Ramesh Ponnuru.

Overdone anger on oil speculation

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 14:40 EDT

Congress has always had a soft spot for “experts” who tell members what they want to hear, whether it’s supply-side economists declaring that tax cuts increase revenue or climate-change skeptics insisting that global warming is a myth.

Right now, the welcome mat is out for analysts who claim that out-of-control speculators are responsible for $4-a-gallon gas.

Back in May, Michael Masters, a hedge fund manager, made a big splash when he told a Senate committee that speculation is the main cause of rising prices for oil and other raw materials. He presented charts showing the growth of the oil futures market, in which investors buy and sell promises to deliver oil at a later date, and claimed that “the increase in demand from index speculators” — his term for institutional investors who buy commodity futures — “is almost equal to the increase in demand from China.”

Many economists scoffed: Masters was making the bizarre claim that betting on a higher price of oil — for that is what it means to buy a futures contract — is equivalent to actually burning the stuff.

But members of Congress liked what they heard, and since that testimony much of Capitol Hill has jumped on the blame-the-speculators bandwagon.

Main Street energy policy

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 14:40 EDT

It doesn’t take a nuclear scientist to figure out the biggest issue affecting Main Street today is gas prices. The skyrocketing cost of oil is impacting every aspect of our daily lives. From the time you get up in the morning to the time you go to sleep, Americans are paying for 30 years of no energy policy. And the cost is high.

Right now, America has an energy portfolio that is critically out of balance. While our dependence on oil increases — and supply decreases — we have failed to address how we can bring sanity back into the process and bridge where we are today to where we want to be in the future.

With world energy demand escalating, we will be forced to compete and pay increasing amounts for imported sources. In addition to exposing the country to elevated costs, a high reliance on foreign oil leaves the United States’ energy expenditures susceptible to spikes associated with political unrest, natural disaster and the growing energy needs of competing nations such as China.

The result is we are paying the highest energy costs this country has ever seen. We see the effects walking down any Main Street. The economy has slowed, and families are coping with increased food and clothing prices and decreasing home values. It is estimated that rural Americans will pay well over $2,000 on gasoline this year alone, adding to the already-high cost of living. Our businesses and manufacturers are also bearing the brunt of elevated costs. American truckers are now spending $1,200 to fill up a tank that cost half as much a couple of years ago.

Fortunately, in the United States, we possess the necessary resources to bring our energy costs down. We can balance our energy portfolio, strengthen our economy and increase our security and energy independence. I have been working with Rep. Steve Buyer for months, and we, along with other members, introduced H.R. 6001, the Main Street USA Energy Security Act of 2008. By putting forth a comprehensive energy plan that bridges the gap between our needs today and in the future, it recognizes that energy security and independence go hand in hand.

Meeting the challenge for S.C. seniors

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 14:40 EDT

It’s called the “gray wave,” and it’s headed our way sooner than we think.

Currently, there are approximately 770,000 South Carolinians over the age of 60. By 2025, that number is projected to swell to more than 1.3 million. Will our state be ready to meet the needs of such a rapidly growing senior demographic? And can we accomplish this Herculean task of protecting our seniors while simultaneously protecting the taxpayers?

The answer to both of these questions is a resounding “Yes,” provided we continue to build upon the foundation we have put in place at the Lieutenant Governor’s Office on Aging.

For the past 15 months, it has been my privilege to serve as the executive director of the Office on Aging.

Working with Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer, we have successfully transformed this agency into one of the top-rated governmental units in the nation — dramatically enhancing productivity and service while cutting inefficiency and administrative costs.

Iraqis taking ownership of Iraq?

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 14:40 EDT

Having recently returned from Egypt, I have the Suez Canal on my mind. And looking at Iraq from Cairo, the thought occurred to me that maybe the Iraqis have just crossed the Suez Canal. If so, that’s good news.

What am I talking about? There is no way that Egypt’s President Anwar Sadat could have ever made peace with Israel had he not first launched his lightning strike across the Suez Canal on Yom Kippur, 1973. “The crossing,” as that surprise attack became known in Egyptian lore, was as psychologically important as it was militarily important. It wiped away Egypt’s humiliating loss in the 1967 war and gave Egyptians the dignity and self-confidence to make peace with Israel as military equals. While the military reality was more complex, Egyptians nevertheless felt they had liberated the Sinai themselves.

One of the first things I realized when visiting Iraq after the U.S. invasion was that the very fact that Iraqis did not liberate themselves, but had to be liberated by Americans, was a source of humiliation to them. It’s one reason they never threw flowers. When someone else has to liberate you in your own home, that is humiliating — and humiliation, I believe, is the single-most underestimated force in international relations, especially in the Middle East.

That also helps explain why Iraqis initially never took ownership of their governing institutions, like the Coalition Provisional Authority, or CPA. They never fought for it. It was handed to them. People have to fight and win their own freedom, and that’s what gives their institutions legitimacy.

What seems to have happened in Iraq in the last few months is that the Iraqi mainstream has finally done some liberating of itself. With the help of the troop surge ordered by President Bush, the mainstream Sunni tribes have liberated themselves from the grip of al-Qaida in their provinces. And the Shiite mainstream — represented by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and the Iraqi army — liberated Basra, Amara and Sadr City in Baghdad from both Mahdi Army militiamen and pro-Iranian death squads.

Obama’s newfound flexibility

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 14:40 EDT

“To be clear: Barack will support a filibuster of any bill that includes retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies.”

— Obama spokesman Bill Burton, Oct. 24, 2007

That was then: Democratic primaries to be won, netroot lefties to be seduced. With all that (and Hillary Clinton) out of the way, Obama now says he’ll vote in favor of the new FISA bill that gives the telecom companies blanket immunity for post-9/11 eavesdropping.

Back then, in the yesteryear of primary season, he thoroughly trashed the North American Free Trade Agreement, pledging to force a renegotiation, take “the hammer” to Canada and Mexico, and threaten unilateral abrogation.

Today, the hammer is holstered. Obama calls his previous NAFTA rhetoric “overheated” and essentially endorses what one of his senior economic advisers privately told the Canadians: The anti-trade stuff was nothing more than populist posturing.

A balanced budget with balanced priorities

Sat, 21 Jun 2008 09:45 EDT

Americans are calling for a new direction, and Democrats in Congress are delivering. This month, we passed a plan to balance the budget by 2012.

When President Bush took office seven years ago, we presented him an advantage that few presidents have ever enjoyed: a budget in surplus by $236 billion. His economists looked out 10 years and saw nothing but surpluses — $5.6 trillion in all.

Democrats warned against betting the budget on a blue-sky forecast, but President Bush insisted we could have it all — guns, butter and tax cuts too — and never mind the deficits, we would actually pay down the debt.

Well, by 2003, the surplus was gone, and by 2004, it was replaced by a record deficit, $413 billion. Under the policies of the Bush administration, our national debt has exploded, growing by 80 percent from $5.7 trillion in 2001 to $10 trillion in 2009.

Faced with these grim facts, what does the president’s budget for next year propose? More of the same and a mountain of debt.

Saturday Letters to the Editor

Fri, 20 Jun 2008 18:14 EDT

• Pols exhibit religious, fiscal irresponsibility

Cindi Ross Scoppe, an associate editor at The State, wrote a column May 29 titled “Lawmakers trip over line between pandering and insulting” about the S.C. Legislature passing bills allowing invocations to open their meetings, the Ten Commandments to be part of public displays and the production of an “I Believe” license plate. I applaud her comments, and felt compelled to add mine upon hearing that Gov. Mark Sanford signed the bill to allow the Ten Commandments and the Lord’s Prayer to be part of displays at public buildings, while vetoing a bill encouraging businesses and homeowners to install fire sprinkler systems just a week before the anniversary of a Charleston blaze that killed nine firefighters.

The justification of the former seems to be that the Ten Commandments is a historical document and state Attorney General Henry McMaster said displays including religious items and documents such as the Magna Carta and Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech would survive a court challenge. Sanford said he vetoed the sprinkler bill because it was so big it amounted to a government subsidy rather than an incentive. So the former is historical and the latter demonstrates fiscal responsibility.

I have read (and written) editorials arguing about religion being included in opposition to the Establishment Clause of the Bill of Rights, and most people’s minds are rigid for that argument. The Ten Commandments can be argued to be a historical document, but inclusion of the Lord’s Prayer negates that argument and demonstrates gross fiscal irresponsibility. This new law is obviously in opposition to court precedence and will undoubtedly be challenged successfully in the courts at taxpayer expense.

Does it make any sense that saving firefighters’ and citizens’ lives is too expensive, but inviting lawsuits that will embarrass South Carolina is acceptable? Our legislators and governor demonstrate both political and fiscal irresponsibility (the vote for the license plate was 109-0 and the vote for the Ten Commandments — including Lord’s prayer, just to make it more controversial — had a single vote against) with these actions.

CanalSide first step to residential renaissance

Fri, 20 Jun 2008 15:42 EDT

CanalSide will have residents this summer with the completion of 175 apartments at the former site of the Columbia Correctional Institution. This is a historic step for Columbia.

CanalSide and other residential projects are the result of more than a decade of effort to jump-start the redevelopment of our downtown. CanalSide is the first new mega-development to come out of the ground.

A decade ago people did not believe that downtown residential development could be successful, but the market is here now. The CanalSide construction fulfills a vision set by the city in 1995, when we purchased the old Central Correctional Institution from the state. We kept the faith and believed that the old CCI site could be a new urban neighborhood.

CanalSide would not have been possible without the hard work and effort of Charlie Way, John Darby and Dan Doyle of the Beach Company, and of Joe Sapp, Kirk Finlay and Jim Gambrell. Also, we must thank Tom Prioreschi and his family for believing in downtown residential development before anyone else.

In addition to the residential development, CanalSide will have a one-acre park adjoining the city’s Esplanade trail along the riverfront, which will provide the public access to the river and a place for concerts and shopping and dining as more retail outlets and residential units are built. The park is expected to be complete in about two months, and the Esplanade, which will connect to the Three Rivers Greenway, is slated to be completed this November.