Newspaper Page Text
Page 2 — Wednesday, April 28, 2010, The True Citizen
Chances are
Puppy with rare tumor gets second chance at life
By Elizabeth Billips
lizbillips@yahoo.com
His head was so swollen, he
looked more like a grotesque
cartoon than a puppy.
When Richard Daniels, a vol
unteer for Old Fella Burke
County Animal Rescue, got the
call about an abandoned dog at
the dumpsters off Story Mill
Road, he’d expected the worst
... a snake bite or injury from
being hit by a car.
But when the eight-month-old
lab looked up from the spilled
garbage and wagged his tail,
Richard felt like the air had
been punched out of him.
“It was the most awful sight I
had ever seen in my life,’’ he
said, still recoiling from the im
possible looking image. "It was
unbelievable.”
The puppy he’d soon call
Blackie had once had a home.
Richard looped a finger under
his bright red collar and
watched with relief as he
marched right into the portable
crate and folded himself onto
the floor.
But as they drove to Burke
County Animal Hospital, he
couldn’t help but wonder if the
puppy was headed for a new life
or an early death.
It took Dr. Sarah Ford more
than 90 minutes to remove the
volleyball-sized tumor. It
weighed 4 1/2 pounds and was
bigger than Blackie’s actual
head.
“I’d never seen anything like
that before,” the Waynesboro
veterinarian said, recalling how
she’d initially pegged it as a
traumatic head injury. “At first,
I didn’t think it could be a tu
mor because he’s a puppy - and
that’s usually an old dog prob
lem.”
But Dr. Ford soon confirmed
the rare condition. Blackie had
a fibrosarcoma - a slow-to-me-
tastasize cancerous tumor that’s
not normally seen until at least
middle age.
She considered putting
Blackie down, knowing from
experience that a tumor like that
could come back.
“He was just too nice of a dog
to put to sleep for a what-if,”
Blackie, just after his surgery, with Stacey Brown and Dr.
Ford.
she said. search for the “right family” to
In fact, Blackie made such an adopt him but was hit with a
impression, Dr. Ford took him pang of sadness every time she
home after his surgery and thought of him leaving,
watched with pleasure as he It didn’t take long for her to
became fast friends with her realize that family was her own.
children, dogs and cats. She in- “He’s just a good dog,” she
tended on helping Richard said.
Works begins on old Blakeney school
By Anne Marie Kyzer
annemariek@thetruecitizen.com
Work officially began Mon
day on the old Blakeney El
ementary School building on
College Street.
Over the coming months, the
school will undergo extensive
renovations, mostly along one
wing of the building that hasn’t
been used since the school
closed.
The school system plans to
open the county’s first Early
Head Start program there this
fall to provide enriched child
care for toddlers up to age 3 and
parenting classes and counsel
ing for their mothers and fa
thers.
The school system received a
$2.6 million grant from the
U.S. Department of Health and
Human Services to fund the
program. The improvements to
the building will also be cov
ered by the grant and are ex
pected to be complete by Sep
tember.
Pope Construction, based in
Statesboro, was selected for the
project after submitting the low
bid for the work, which should
ran about $715,000. School sys
tem maintenance staff will also
help with the job to save money.
Though a portion of the build
ing has been used for the Head
Start program for several years,
most of it has remained unused
since the new Blakeney Elemen
tary opened six years ago.
Aside from renovations to the
hall where the new Early Head
Start program will be offered,
additional cosmetic improve
ments are planned for the front
of the building.
The project creates around
two dozen new jobs. Many have
been filled, but openings are
still available for a registered di
etician and a mental health
counselor.
In Midville
Grant will fund sewer project
By Anne Marie Kyzer
annemariek@thetruecitizen.com
Work on Midville’s sewer
system will resume thanks to
federal stimulus funds.
The city received a $394,000
grant to finish sewer improve
ments along several streets in
town.
Work on the system began
five years ago when the city re
ceived a Community Develop
ment Block Grant from the De
partment of Community Affairs.
Although many of the improve
ments were completed in 2007,
some parts of the system could
not be repaired because costs
were higher than expected.
The city was able to apply for
another grant through the same
program when additional funds
were made available through
the American Recovery and
Reinvestment Act, according to
Linda Grijalva of the CSRA
Regional Development Center.
Grijalva said the work will in
clude repairing or replacing
sewer mains, which are in poor
condition and causing issues for
residents along the line. A num
ber of manholes will also be
repaired, and asphalt will be re
surfaced in affected areas.
The project will include a
stretch of Georgia Highway 17
as well as parts of Burton, Mary
and Alice streets.
Correction
Due to inaccurate information
provided to The True Citizen,
the wrong name was mentioned
in the cutline entitled “Livin’ it
up.” It stated that Maci Oglesby
was pictured dancing at Burke
County’s prom. It was actually
Macey Butler who was in the
photograph. The True Citizen
regrets these errors.
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