Etheridge checking recovery of Katrina areas

U.S. Rep. Bob Etheridge is joining other Democrats from Congress in a trip through the coastal regions of Mississippi and Louisiana early this week to visit communities hit by Hurricane Katrina.

This is the third trip to the region for Etheridge, a Lillington Democrat. He planned to be there from Sunday through Wednesday. While there, Etheridge and other Democrats are visiting local officials in town hall meetings, meeting with residents and attending church services in New Orleans and St. Bernard's Parrish.

Etheridge said Wednesday he wants to see how well the region has recovered as it approaches the one-year anniversary of Katrina's landfall.

"Just being on the ground, it's amazing what you see on the ground that you don't pick up in reports," Etheridge said. "You see the passion, the pain."

He said he has returned several times in part because of what North Carolina has been through in past years.

"I feel a kinship and almost a sense of debt to them," Etheridge said. "In '99, a lot of those people came and volunteered with our storms. ... The least I can do is go listen to them."

Etheridge, a member of the House Homeland Security and Agriculture committees, said he's interested in seeing the new levees and in how well area children are adjusting to the new school year.

His trip comes as reports are released showing little progress in the region in the past year. A report released Wednesday by the international humanitarian group Oxfam American showed that no houses have been rebuilt with the $17 billion that Congress appropriated for the cause.

"If it's been a year -- not to have any houses built in a year, that's unacceptable," Etheridge said, though he added that he hadn't seen the report.

Etheridge is the only member of the North Carolina delegation making the trip. The trip was arranged by the House Democratic Caucus, and Etheridge's expenses will be paid with his campaign funds.

Think stamps, think Gardner

Come Thursday, it's official: Smithfield's downtown post office will be named in honor of movie star Ava Gardner.

President Bush signed legislation in March renaming the post office for the Johnston County native and darling of the silver screen.

U.S. Rep. Bob Etheridge will present a plaque to local officials during a ceremony at 10 a.m. Thursday at 201 N. Third St. in Smithfield. Etheridge, a Lillington Democrat, sponsored the bill in the House of Representatives at the request of Smithfield's town council and former mayor.

"There's a lot of support for her in Johnston County," Etheridge said last week, explaining why he submitted the legislation. "She was not only a national, but an international star. She was quite a lady."

Gardner was born the youngest of seven children in Brogden, near Smithfield, in 1922. She moved to Hollywood as a young woman, appeared in 64 films and made high-profile marriages to Mickey Rooney, Artie Shaw and Frank Sinatra. She died in 1990. Smithfield also is home to the Ava Gardner Museum.