Wednesday, May 26, 1976

• In an $18.3 million fiscal 1977 budget approved by the Wicomico County Council, county employees will receive a 4.5 percent cost-of-living increase in their paychecks. Property taxes will remain $1.90 per $100 of assessed value. The county had to postpone $410,000 in capital budget spending as well as impose other cuts to close an $800,000 budget shortfall.
• Schools Superintendent Harold Fulton and school board President Dr. Rufus Johnson led the first meeting of the 12-member Schools Advisory Council. The group held a 9-minute discussion about the county schools’ growing absenteeism rate. The council was created by Fulton to open up lines of communication between the public and schools administration. Fulton has implemented “open door” policies and is set to unveil a new communications policy.
• Richard Shope, a marketing executive for Texaco Oil Co., was slated to speak at the Delmarva Bankers Administrative Institute at the Salisbury Elks Club. Shope was to outline the local economic affects that will come when offshore oil drilling begins off Ocean City. The program chairman is Al Davis of Union Trust in Salisbury.
• Earl Fisher hit a home run and two doubles as Mills Motors beat the Redmen, 15-11, in Fruitland Little League action. Gene Cecil had a double and Doug Wilkerson was the winning pitcher in relief.
• A crab shortage in advance of the Memorial Day holiday has sent crab prices soaring. Cold weather, too much rain and an abundance of baby-crab-eating croakers is blamed for the low harvest. In Crisfiled, watermen have stopped selling crabs by the barrel and are only selling by the bushel, with prices of up to $25 a bushel. Jimmys are going for $8 to $8.50 a dozen.