Teapot Museum Creates Tempest

RALEIGH — A proposed Alleghany County museum that would display 6,000 teapots worth more than $5 million has become the poster child for pork barrel spending in the recently passed state budget. A $400,000 earmark for the Sparta Teapot Museum was frequently mocked in the media in the past week, and by Republicans in the legislative minority. But Rep. Jim Harrell III, an Elkin Democrat who sought the funding in the state budget, said the museum's critics don't know enough about the project to evaluate its worth.