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UNIV OF GA
ATHENS GA 30602 vhuhIH
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Vol. No. 119 tissue 23 JUNE 20, 2007 www.fvltaderfribune.eom 2 Sections, 20 Pages 500
Serving Peach County For Over 100 Years
m
Quadruplets
need first-class
delivery home
By Rob Pavey
Morris News Service
AUGUSTA, Ga. — After 11
years of marriage and numer¬
ous attempts at having children,
Deborah and John Kalume
ended up with quadruplets.
Now all they need is a
ride home from California to
Warrenton, Ga.
“Initially, we didn’t know
there would be four and we fig¬
ured we’d just drive,” Kalume
said.
But it wasn’t that simple.
After a miscarriage and five
attempts at in-vitro fertilization,
the couple spent several years
seeking a surrogate mother who
could give birth for them.
When a willing surrogate,
Robin Funes, was located in
California, Kalume was dou¬
bly delighted to learn that the
woman was a fellow member
of her Seventh-day Adventist
faith.
“It was like my sign to know
God had blessed us to be able to
do this,” Kalume said.
The blessing soon became
greater than anyone had imag¬
ined.
Although just two embiyos
from Deborah and her husband
were implanted in the surrogate
mother, one embryo split into
three, forming a trio of identical
boys to accompany the girl who
formed from the other embryo.
The quadruplets - Abraham,
Jeremiah, Azariah and
Kristianna — were bom May 17
at Sutter Memorial Hospital in
Sacramento, Calif.
The smallest of the four,
Azariah, weighed just 1 pound,
3 ounces at birth, Kalume said.
He has since gained weight
steadily and weighed in Monday
at 2 pounds, 3 ounces.
For the past month, the cou¬
ple has lived in a camper trailer
in the hospital parking lot, but
doctors say they will need a pri¬
vate jet or similar means to get
the newborns back to Georgia.
Sutter Memorial Assistant
Nurse Manager Wendy Stover
said it will require a three-per¬
son medical team and complex
equipment to transport the qua¬
druplets back to Georgia for
further care.
The estimated costs could
range from $33,000 for a
chartered flight to as much as
$130,000 for two smaller jets.
“We were hoping that, per¬
haps, some benevolent soul with
a corporate jet might be able to
help them out, too,” she said.
The hospital had worked
with the Fetal Hope Foundation,
a charitable group based in
Colorado, to help cover some
of the costs. The infants could
be discharged during the next
month.
Being blessed with four chil¬
dren after years of praying for a
family together is a dream come
true, said Kalume, who also has
a son from an earlier marriage.
She and her husband, a com¬
puter analyst and a native of
Congo, Africa, also adopted
Kalume’s teenage sister, who is
being raised as their daughter.
“Sacramento’s been very
nice, but we definitely miss
home,” Kalume said.
HSIDi $
World History —2A
ObitS 4iA
Faith Matters.—.. 7A
SpOrtS*»«tMMM*»MMM« 1B
Food 2B
Legals >•••••••• 3B
Classifieds 6B
Peach Festival
kicks off in
By Em Fergusson
Tribune Writer
Byron’s Peach Outlet shops
had an intriguing view this past
Saturday, June 16.
The parking lot of the outlet
began filling with cars once
festivities began. Families gath¬
ered to enjoy a day of fun and
festivities organized by a dedi¬
cated group of volunteers.
Children of various ages par¬
ticipated by jumping on rides,
enjoying ice cream and listening
to live music with their parents,
grandparents and friends.
Jennifer Mullins, mother of
three children, is visiting from
Japan. “(The plane ride was]
very long,” she said, “It took us
12 hours to get here.” Mullins
added she is looking forward to
seeing more of the festival next
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■ Rich Bennett, the chef
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week in Fort Valley.
Towards the evening, a free
concert took place, featur¬
ing Terrence Lonon and the
Untouchables. The group per¬
formed a mixture of country
rock tunes, showcasing the
band’s talent with a rugged
eclectic sound.
Celebrating its 21st anniver¬
sary, the Georgia Peach Festival
is held yearly in Byron and Fort
Valley. The festival is held in
honor of the peach farmers in
Georgia.
The festival will be in Fort
Valley on Wednesday, June 20
to 23. Scheduled events include
more free concerts, a 5K walk/
run, contests and much more.
For more information on this
week’s events at the Georgia
Peach Festival, visit www.
gapeachfestival.com.
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Photo by Em Fergusson
The 21st Annual Georgia Peach Festival’s official debut drew crowds to Byron last
Saturday, June 16, for a day of food, rides, dancing and more.
Fort Valley suffers impact
from lost workers
By Jenny Jarvie
The Los Angeles Times
Food Depot is slower this summer. A hot, frazzled mother lin¬
gers in front of a tower of banana moon pies; a man in overalls
pecks change for a 77-cent bag of ice. Cashiers gossip, then sigh.
They miss the Latinos who loaded their checkout belts with flour
tortillas, thick golden comhusks and tamarind sodas as sweet as
iced tea.
Nearly 80 percent of Georgia’s peach crop was destroyed when
a severe frost spread across the Southeast in early April. Without
peaches, the orchards clustered around this sleepy railroad town
100 miles south of Atlanta have little work for Latinos.
In April, nearly 1,500 Mexican laborers who were supposed to
come to the United States legally on the federal H-2 “guest worker”
program were told there were no jobs for them at peach farms
across Georgia, South Carolina and Alabama.
Georgia has relied on Mexican workers to pick and pack its state
fruit for almost a decade. Some Mexican towns are so dependent on
these jobs that they hold peach fiestas when the men return.
But in Fort Valley, the county seat of Peach County, few of the
8,000 residents got to know these Latino workers. Many came here
every summer for the last nine years but made few connections;
They lived on government-approved camps, did not own cars and
spoke little English.
Still, their absence is felt.
“1 used to look forward to Friday nights” when school buses
see 5 B
FVFD robot a hit
with Peach kids ■
.
By Brian Shreve
News Editor
V or
No firehouse is complete o
without a Dalmatian, but 05
few have a spotted friend
quite like the one found sr Ji
at the Fort Valley Fire rs
Department.
Meet Patches, the Fort Valley Fire Chief Otis
robotic firedog of the
21st century and the Daniel demonstrates the
city’s newest tool in department's latest addition,
teaching children the Patche ^ and Pumber, a robot
lessons of fire preven¬ used in lessons of fire safety.
tion.
The talking, flash¬
ing and spinning Patches rides
his own mechanical fire truck
called Pumper, the two of them
representing an approximately
$10,000 investment by the City
of Fort Valley.
“It’s a major educational
tool,” said Fort Valley Fire
Chief Otis Daniel. “He talks
back, squirts water—anything
under the sun, and he really
gets the attention of kids. It’s
a real crowd pleaser—even for
adults too.”
Daniel decided to pursue fund¬
ing for the robot after observing
a similar model belonging to the
Patches and Pumper’s price tag
is modest compared with other
robots used by police and fire
departments across the country,
some of which cost more than
$30,000.
“I was at the mall, and I saw
one how it had the attention
of the crowd,” said Daniel. “I
wanted to see something like
that here in Peach County, espe¬
cially in our school system.”
Patches and Pumper were
designed by Robotronics out of
Springville, Utah.
see ROBOT pg. 5B