A year of contrasts [Cordele Dispatch, Ga.]

Dec. 29--CRISP, Dooly, And Wilcox -- It was a year for celebration, but also a year for sadness in the tri-county. It was a year of controversy as well as victory in the governmental arena and in high school athletics, and it was a year for city elections that saw several incumbents ousted.

We celebrated Cordele Intermodal Services' first trainload of merchandise being shipped to Savannah. The announcement that Chexar Networks would be investing $1.9 million in a local facility and hiring up to 500 people within five years brought cheers from the community.

More good news came from Big Tex which got its local operations fired up and hired additional people near the end of the year and from Vega Biofuels which announced plans to open a manufacturing facility in Cordele.

Wilcox and Dooly County school systems received School Improvement Grants totaling more than $3 million each. Wilcox used its funds to begin a "school within a school" that it calls WAVE (Wilcox Academy of Varied Education). This academy will benefit any high school students who are not on grade level.

Dooly's funds are providing an after-school program, also designed to assist students who need an extra academic boost.

Early in the year, Wilcox schools achieved system-wide accreditation, another reason to celebrate. Darton College earned "state college" status during the year, and South Georgia Technical College was one of three finalists for "college of the year" in Georgia.

Crisp Academy won state championship titles both in girls basketball and baseball during the year. Several other teams from the tri-county made the state playoffs and performed very well.

Demolition of the former Holiday Inn on 16th Ave. just west of I-75 nears completion to make way for a Chick-Fil-A and Flash Foods, and downtown demolition should get underway in 2012 to make room for the higher education facility that Darton College will use.

We celebrated the announcement by Crisp Regional Hospital that five new physicians were joining the staff by the end of the year. In this group are a radiologist, two obstetrician/gynecologists, a family practitioner and an internist.

Voters in both Crisp and Wilcox counties passed two SPLOSTs (special purpose local option sales tax) during the year. First Crisp approved a county tax with some $10 million earmarked for the inland port and downtown Cordele higher education center, and Wilcox passed a one cent tax for education.

Later in the year, Wilcox voters okayed a county tax and Crisp put its stamp of approval on an education tax with most of the revenue going toward construction of new school complexes.

Site preparation for the K-2 campus just off Old Hatley Rd. in Cordele began during 2011, and near the end of the year, a bid for actual construction of the facility was approved. A groundbreaking ceremony is planned for early 2012, and steel soon should be going up.

Retired Chief Superior Court Judge Whitfield Forrester was honored as the Chehaw Council Boy Scouts of America's Distinguished Citizen, and retired Dr. Perry Busbee was the Cordele-Crisp Chamber's "This is your life" honoree during the Watermelon Days Festival.

Jay Hilliard was recognized as Crisp County's "exceedingly excellent" teacher and Kristen Stokes as the Crisp Teacher of the Year.

STAR students in 2011 included Katelyn Clements, CCHS; Jeffrey Wessel, Crisp Academy; Sierra Corbin, Wilcox County High School; Stevie Farlett-Dominy, Dooly County High and Garrett Sharpe, Fullington Academy.

Eric Bozeman was named director of the Crisp County Recreation Department, and William R. "Bobby" Hooper was welcomed as Cordele's new chief of police. Tommy Higgs had a brief tenure as Wilcox County's first county manager.

Cordele Circuit Superior Court Chief Judge John Pridgen was elected president of the state Council of Superior Court Judges, Alvie Coes III was selected as the technical college system's statewide GOAL (Goal-Oriented Adult Learning) winner, and William Culpepper was elected president of the Georgia Young Farmers Association.

Lee Campbell joined the Crisp County High School staff as head football coach and athletic director, Tim Rigsby was chosen as the South Georgia Technical College GOAL winner, and Gary Howell became the latest Wilcox Elementary School principal.

Coty Wilcox, an employee of Crisp Fire & Rescue, was honored for saving a life. Tom Carden retired from the Crisp Board of Education after a lifetime of service to the youth of the county, and was honored for 21 years of service as a commissioner for the city of Cordele.

Roger Kingdom was inducted into the USA Track & Field Georgia Hall of Fame, and Ferrell Henry was honored as an outstanding role model and father figure by some of his former players and the Cordele Kiwanis Club.

Posthumous awards went to Don Tucker who was remembered for his service to the Crisp County Power Commission and Stanley Gambrell who was honored for his contributions to the success of the BIG PIG JIG through the years.

Tragedy

Alongside these celebratory events were tragedies that took the lives of at least 23 people in the tri-county area. Several of those were from other communities, but they perished in local accidents.

There were six homicides with one attracting national attention. An Ohio woman had been missing several weeks when her body was found in Dooly County. Also, two individuals who were charged with having a part in the deaths of two men in Crisp County in 2009 were sentenced to life imprisonment.

At least five of the accidental deaths happened on Hwy. 300, and two of those were twin infants less than a year old. Wayne Castleberry lost his life in a plane crash, and most of the other fatal accidents involved one or two vehicles in different parts of the tri-county area.

Controversy

In late 2010, Wilcox voters elected four new commissioners, who took office in January with high hopes for solving the county's financial woes. Almost immediately, they asked their Emergency Medical Services director to eliminate overtime in his department. Instead, the director and his entire staff resigned.

Within days, Crisp County's EMS had taken over the operation of Wilcox's emergency medical services, and that transition has been almost seamless as far as the county's citizens are concerned. Emergency medical service has been provided continuously.

In another cost saving effort, however, Wilcox officials could have gotten themselves into legal hot water. They decided to cut off health insurance coverage to a retired physician who had been providing medical care for the county's inmate population with no compensation other than the insurance.

They neglected, however, to inform the physician of their plans, and in June, he presented them with a bill for medical care that he had received while he thought he was covered by the county's insurance, but he actually was not.

In a split vote, commissioners agreed to pay his bill, but the next month, the chairman declared that he would not pay the bill. After several contentious meetings, both with the physician in question and the county's insurance broker, all the doctor's bills were paid and his insurance coverage was restored.

Solid waste and sheriff's office expenses also have haunted the new commission. Supposedly because of a lack of cash flow, the newly appointed county manager had failed to pay countless bills that came into his office for three or four months. A newly hired city clerk found those bills and brought them to the attention of commissioners in October. Shortly thereafter, the manager resigned, and the clerk is now handling the day to day operations of the county office.

In Crisp County, Commissioner Clark Henderson publicly indicated that county credit cards and vehicles had been used illegally by fellow commissioners. Before the end of the year, however, one of the commissioners reported that all county credit cards had been turned in to the finance department.

Henderson wants those cards taken out only when commissioners are making trips on behalf of the county and used only for legitimate expenses that are incurred in the line of duty.

During December, Vienna's mayor terminated two long-time city employees for failure to carry out their duties, he said. Later, Council members reinstated them, but suspended them with pay pending an investigation. Georgia Bureau of Investigation is involved in that probe.

Also in the waning weeks of the year, Warwick's police chief resigned under pressure from council members. Council reportedly was dissatisfied with his performance and their attorney cited several reasons for their dissatisfaction.

Athletic controversy

Upset that private school members of the Georgia High School Association (GHSA) seem to have an unfair advantage, a large group of Class A public school administrators and coaches including those in Wilcox and Dooly counties have organized themselves. They are talking about withdrawing from the GHSA and forming their own association if some changes are not made in the GHSA rules.

Decisions on that issue will be made in January.

Elections

Two cities in the tri-county will have new mayors in January. Former Councilman Eddie Daniels will be replacing Emerson Lundy at the helm in Vienna, and Dr. Bobby West, a Unadilla councilman at one time will be taking the mayor's seat formerly held by Charles West in Unadilla.

Those two communities also have new councilpeople -- Henry Johnson and Randall Almond in Vienna and Chester Thomas, Lant Taylor and Tay Lester in Unadilla.

Veteran Cordele City Commissioner A. J. Rivers retained his seat for another term, and Jamie Fernandez was elected to succeed Jimmy Black who chose not to seek re-election. Abbeville voters put one incumbent councilman, Michael Estes back in office, but elected two new ones, Ronald Culpepper and Robert Webb.

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(c)2011 the Cordele Dispatch (Cordele, Ga.)

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