About Barrow journal. (Winder, Ga.) 2008-2016 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 21, 2009)
Barrow Journal www.BarrowJournal.com •r Read all over... Wednesday, January 21,2009 Vol. 1 No. 13 20 PAGES 2 SECTIONS A publication of MainStreet Newspapers, Inc. WINDER, BARROW COUNTY GEORGIA 30680 250COPY •New Piggly Wiggly Express opens in Statham page 2A •Appeal filed in hos pital battle page 2A •Winder man named GEFA director page 2A Opinions: •State's situation is bad and getting worse page 4A •Overlooked candi date set for another try page 4A •Where was that again? page 5A Sports: •WBHS boys basket ball team emerging as subregion contender page 1B •Mat Wildcats set for return to action for coach Jim Stoudenmire page 1B •Lady Bulldoggs look to shake off recent two- game losing streak page 3B Other News: •Church News page 8A • Helen Person col umn page 5A •Public Safety pages 6-7A •Obituaries pages 4-5B •School News pages 9A To subscribe, call today: 770-867-NEWS (6397). The Barrow Journal is delivered every Thursday. BOC slashes county pay ‘Can’t postpone it any longer’ BY SUSAN NORMAN In a split vote decided by its chair man, the Barrow County Board of Commissioners put a sharp ax to the county’s projected $2.5 million bud get deficit Tuesday night by slashing pay and other expenses. Commissioner Steve Worley proposed the cost-cutting plan at Tuesday’s called BOC meeting. Supporting Worley’s plan were com missioners Larry Joe Wilburn and Eva Elder. Voting against it were commis sioners Isaiah Berry, Billy Parks and Ben Hendrix. BOC Chairman Danny Yearwood broke the 3-3 tie by voting in favor of the proposal. Those against the plan said they were concerned about the fairness of the percentage salary reductions. But none of the opposing commissioners came to the meeting with a firm alter native plan for cutting the deficit. After the split 3-3 vote, Yearwood asked County Attorney Angela Davis to again read the proposed resolution and then voted to support it. The chairman said it was not an easy decision but one that needed tc be made. “We can’t postpone it any longer,’ he said. The plan approved by the BOC will: •cut county workers’ pay by 3-1C percent depending on pay level. continued on page 3A Auburn council Comment time is debated BY CHRIS BRIDGES How — and when — Auburn leaders want to hear from the public was discussed by the Auburn City Council last Thursday night. Currently, no time is set aside for public comments at work session meetings. Public comments are now only allowed at the end of regular meetings and during public hearings. “Right now, citizens don’t have a chance to say any thing until after we vote,” council member Sally Brown said. “I’m not say ing we want to be here until 11 (at night).” But Mayor Linda Blechinger said the temp tation would be to start a back-and-forth dialog and the council needed to be “careful about that.” “We have two weeks between work sessions and regular meetings where we can receive phone calls, e-mails and set up meet ings,” the mayor said. “I do like the idea of discussing in a work shop and then opening the floor up for comments.” Council member Dorissa Shackelford said she would be willing to try it and if the meetings got out-of-hand to modify it. The council is also con sidering allowing citizens the opportunity to speak before regular meetings on issues that would be voted on that night. Comments on other issues would still be limited until after the business meeting is held. Historic Day: Obama takes office, local citizens attend Inauguration By SUSAN NORMAN A mong the ocean of faces along the Mall in Washington D.C. wit nessing President Barack Obama’s Inauguration Tuesday were a hand ful of Barrow County residents who traveled to the nation’s capitol to lay claim to their personal piece of American history. Winder bank man ager Kenny Lumpkin, after obtaining tickets to both the Inauguration and an inaugural ball, flew up with his wife and daughters for an expe rience of a lifetime. Then at 1:05 a.m. Monday, retired educator Ina Brothers of Winder, and her friends Mary Lay and Brenda Wells, boarded a chartered bus at the K-mart in Athens and rode for two days, not sure of what they would see when they arrived in Washington, but wanting to be a part of what for them would be the culmination of a journey that began decades ago. And Statham truck driver Willie Russell on Monday called the Barrow Journal on the way to Washington to say he was driving a chartered bus filled with folks from Stone Mountain and that he was about to cross into the Carolinas. “I feel good about it, that at least one time in my lifetime, I’m getting to go to an Inauguration,” Winder observes MLK holiday — I2A Russell said. “It’s excit ing. Everybody on the bus is excited about it.” Lumpkin said in an email Monday night that the Lincoln Memorial concert had been deeply stirring. “The songs were so uplifting and the people were on fire despite the enormously cold weather. Nobody seemed to care that it was below freezing,” he wrote. continued on page 10A WITNESS TO HISTORY Young Carlie Lumpkin (top) is in Washington, D.C. this week with her parents for the Barack Obama swearing in. (Right) These Barrow County ladies, Mary Lay, 72, of Winder, Ina Brothers, 77, of Winder and Branda Wells, 61, of Statham, were ready for their bus ride Sunday to the Inauguration. Bethlehem woman gets liver transplant BY LORIN SINN-CLARK Special to the Barrow Journal Incurable liver cancer - a bless ing? That is exactly what the diagno sis turned out to be for 58-year-old Bethlehem resident Kim Corbin. After years of suffering from a virtually unbeatable form of Hepatitis C, which resulted in cirrhosis of the liver, Kim “thanked the Lord for the cancer” because it lead to the liver transplant she had at Emory University hospital on December 30. “For the first time in a long time, I can look forward to feeling good again,” Kim said. “A transplant is hope, and having cancer meant I could have a transplant.” It’s been a whirlwind ride for Kim, her husband, family and friends, since she was diagnosed with two cancerous liver lesions on October 2. “I went in for a routine MRI on September 30,” she states. “I could tell by the tone in the nurse’s voice when I called to get my results the next day that something was wrong...She said KIM CORBIN she’d have the doctor call me back. And when he did, the next day, he told me it was cancer.” Years of medical bills, a 20-per cent co-pay required by Medicare, and a strong family and social sup port system allowed Kim to qualify to become a client of Georgia Transplant Foundations’ Transplant Fundraising Program. GTF is a non-profit organi zation that assists transplant patients with fundraising, certain expenses, and provides a variety of educational and support services. As a GTF client, Kim must raise $10,000 within a year of the time her name went on the transplant list. GTF matches funds for every dollar raised for the first $10,000 and disburses the funds as Kim’s medical bills and pre scription costs arise. So far, Kim says she’s “behind on donations,” having raised only $2,000 of the $10,000 required. “This all happened so fast,” she says. “By the time I qualified for GTF and got on the transplant list, it was November 15, and then the holidays hit, and the economy’s so bad...I understand that people are busy with the holidays and have their own problems...I don’t expect them to care about me being sick over the holidays...Praise God, I was transplanted anyway.” continued on page 3A Unemployment filings climb locally in Dec. First time unemployment insurance claims jumped again in December in Northeast Georgia. Barrow County had 763 make first time unemploy ment claims in December, an increase of 67 percent from December and 120 percent from the year before. In Jackson County, 696 peo ple applied for unemployment for the first time in December, a 107 percent increase over November and a huge 309 percent jump over December 2007. Banks County had 213 peo ple file in December, up 72 percent from November and 204 percent from December 2007. continued on page 3A
