Government

The Bedford County School Board has told the county's supervisors that the school system is still $2.3 million short of balancing the school division's budget. This was last week, before the General Assembly passed a budget which contains more school funding than the governor originally called for. Figures are not yet available on how much more Bedford County's schools will get.

    Bedford City Council has decided it wants the Virginia Department of Transportation to make improvements to US 460, at the intersection of Ole Turnpike Drive and Woodhaven Drive its top priority in the city.

    During its meeting Tuesday, Council adopted a resolution directing VDOT to give the 460 West project the highest priority over all other projects that may be funded by VDOT within the city limits. 

With Bedford County Public Schools looking at as much as a $5.8 million decrease in state and federal funding next year, school officials have been stating they plan to ask the Bedford County Board of Supervisors for additional funds to help make up the difference.

    “We’re going to need our county to step up with local funding,” Dr. Douglas Schuch, Bedford County’s superintendent of schools, said during a school board meeting last month.

Leighton Langford, Bedford County’s director of social services is retiring, effective at the end of this month. Langford has held this post since 1976.

    Langford grew up on a tobacco farm in Forest and graduated from New London High School in 1963. His first experience with the county’s department of social services came in 1964 as a college student intern. Langford said that this was back in the day when the courthouse still had segregated restrooms.