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Thursday, July 28, 2022 | Volume 135 Number 15 | Jasper, Georgia | 20 pages, 2 sections | Published Weekly | $1-00
Teen arrested after high-speed chase
injures jailer in surprise attack
By Angela Reinhardt
Staff Writer
areinhardt@pickensprogerss.com
More charges have been
brought against a teen in
volved in a high-speed chase
after he assaulted two Pick
ens County detention offi
cers while incarcerated.
The original incident oc
curred on Monday, July 11.
Suspect James Garret
Ritchie, 17, led officers on a
high-speed chase after he
struck a pedestrian in the
Noah Drive area. After
Ritchie hit the person, who
was transported to Kenne-
stone Hospital for injuries,
he drove a Mercury Grand
Marquis to the home of a
former friend on Refuge Val
ley Road where he assaulted
one of the residents.
Ritchie hitched a ride
from a passing motorist on
Highway 108 and was
dropped off at Marco’s Pizza
in Jasper where he stole a
white Ford work truck. A
woman inside the truck was
able to exit before Ritchie
drove away. At some point
witnesses saw him at the
Pickens County Community
Center at Roper Park. The
chase ended with a pit ma
neuver at the four-way stop
in Tate.
The initial incident
spanned multiple districts
and involved Jasper Police,
the Pickens Sheriff’s Office,
and Georgia State Patrol.
Ritchie was taken into
custody at the Pickens
County Adult Detention
Center and charged with
three counts of battery, hi
jacking by motor vehicle,
theft by taking, two failure to
stop for stop signs, fleeing,
attempting to elude an offi
cer, speeding, safety belt vi
olations, DUI alcohol, duty
See Assault on 11A
Two detention officers grapple with a teenage prisoner
after he gave one a concussion in a pre-meditated assault,
according to Pickens Sheriff Donnie Craig.
Schools
open
Monday
but where
are the
students?
By Dan Pool, Editor
dpool@pickensprogress.com
Schools across Pickens
County will open Monday,
August 1, with 4,100 stu
dents expected back on the
six campuses here.
Superintendent Tony
Young said the number of
students this year is pro
jected to be up slightly from
where Pickens schools
ended last year. At closing
last year they were just
above 4,000.
“This is a loose number,
but we are estimating about
4,100 students. That is up
very slightly from where we
closed. Of course that is just
our number on paper, we
won’t know until we see
bodies on Monday.”
Young said the demo
graphics in Pickens are obvi
ously quite interesting with
the trend over the past few
years of a quickly growing
county, but one with a de
clining or stagnant student
population.
At the local school sys
tem’s high point, there were
over 4,300 students and they
were bracing for more with
growth.
Then in the past five
years, the numbers began
steadily falling with what
appears to be more retirees
moving in, not bringing
children with them. Young
pointed to the number of de
velopments that are mar
keted as 55-plus
communities as part of this.
And particularly at the
high school level, students
just didn’t return after
COVID shutdowns.
“[Systemwide] we are
down a solid 200 kids from
[the pre-COVID years],”
See Schools on 11A
New commissioners in action
Last Thursday marked the first official business under
a new lineup of the Pickens Board of Commissioners.
Longtime west end commissioner Jerry Barnes resigned
due to health issues and was replaced by Josh Tippens,
above left. He joins Chair Kris Standi, center, and east
end commissioner Josh Tatum, at right.
Tatum joined the board only weeks ago, filling an un
expired term. This marks the first new faces with district
commissioners in a decade with both Tippens and Tatum
filling seats that hadn’t changed since the county moved
away from a sole commissioner in 2012.
See stories on Page 3A and 9A.
After unexpected death, family wants
to find hatchet sold in yard sale
The family of Bryan Hamby would love to buy back
the five or six handmade axes (like the one above) that he
made and sold shortly before his death.
By Angela Reinhardt
Staff Writer
areinhardt@pickensprogress.com
The family of Bryan
Hamby, a Pickens County
man who passed away unex
pectedly last week, is des
perately trying to find
hatchets he hand carved but
sold in a yard sale just a few
months before his death.
“They’re very sentimen
tal to us now,” said sister
Tracy Chester. “It would
make my mom’s heart happy
to have them, and we can
pass them down to grand
children. He was so creative.
He’d made knife blades, and
had recently made all of his
grandkids and daughter
things out of elk bone. We’d
just love to have them back.”
Hamby sold between five
and six of his hatchets at the
yard sale at his home on
Highway 53 West on April
23, all to the same person.
The family has made numer
ous posts on social media to
try and find the man, with no
luck.
“Our posts have been
shared over 100 times but
we haven’t heard anything,”
she said. “We’ll buy them
back of course. He also had
some old-timey chests we’d
like and would buy those
back from whoever bought
those.”
Hamby passed away in
his home in Ball Ground on
Monday, July 18. He was 50
at the time of his death.
Contact Tracy Chester if
you have information about
the items. She can be
reached at 770-241-2492 or
at chestertj04@gmail.com.
* Tl ' Good Vibes
+ ^ Vered Kleinberger +
Growing food is fun in a tub
By Vered Kleinberger
You’ve probably heard of
a garden tub, but have you
heard of a Tub Garden? For
the past few months, I’ve
been experimenting with
growing food indoors, and
it’s been so much fun.
Here’s how this all
began... As the Keep Pick
ens Beautiful team was start
ing to scale up the Edible
Jasper program, we realized
that if we wanted to add
thousands of edible plants to
our new garden spaces, we’d
need to grow them our
selves. We reached out to
friends to help start our
seeds, but quickly realized
the labor and time needed to
care for all the little
seedlings. Our friends taught
us how they’d been success
ful in their set-up, so I
started investing in lights.
I’d always wanted to step up
my seed-starting game for
my own garden, so this gave
me the needed push.
For their plants, KPB
provided the seed trays,
seeds, and soil, and I pro
vided the lights, space, and
time. It was such a fun, new
adventure. During the fall
and winter of 2021/2022, I
grew more than 1,000 plants
for Edible Jasper in my
house and another KPB
board member grew several
hundred. For a few hundred
Keep Pickens Beautiful President Vered Kleinberger
shows off her array of plants that are grown indoors. She
has heard from other indoor growers that tomato plants can
grow and fruit for two years or more if indoors.
dollars, we grew plants that and other edible plants we
would have cost the organi- grew for the garden spaces,
zation many thousands of we also grew roughly 150
dollars to purchase. tomatoes, peppers, and egg-
In addition to the herbs See Good vibes on -| -| A
Govt, split
“Continential
Divide” between
county and city
of Jasper
on sales tax
allocation
plans
Page 9A
Election
Election board
votes to pursue
recount
Page 5A
Youth
Von Hinton
citizenship
awards
presented
Page 12A
Churches
provide van for
Ruth House
Page 3B
Obituaries - 7A
• Amanda Burrell
• Bryan Hamby
• Janis Stancil
• Linda O’Conner
• Matty Porter
• Rosa Thurman
Contact Us
94 North Main Street
Jasper, Ga. 30143
706-253-2457
pickensproaress.com
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