Newspaper Page Text
Vol. 131, No. 32 - Waynesboro, Ga. 30830
Established in 1882
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 - $1.00
•S-fntas &
Songwriter Jason White
cuts loose first albrum
By Elizabeth Billips
lizbillips@yahoo.com
I t started with a fifth grader and a fiddle.
“Not a lot of people my age were playing bluegrass,” coun
try musician Jason White muses. "But I just wanted to.”
That’s how a skinny 10-year-old found himself foot tap
ping with old men during riverside jam sessions in Augusta. “These
guys had been playing for forty and fifty years... I'd go hang out
with them and try to pick up stuff.”
Now Jason is 27, with an old Fender and his first album.
“Turns out straight tequila doesn’t mix with regret,” he sings in
"Bloodshot Sunday Morning,” the eighth back on his CD, The
Well Has Run Dry.
But regrets are few these days.
The Burke County native is now a fulltime music man, dedicat
ing his days to writing lyrics about love, loss and wasted time.
Nights are performances with his guitars, slide and old faithful
fiddle.
“I play everything from ear,” he says, looking down at finger
tips grown thick from thousands of hours on acoustic, electric and
bass guitars. “I can read music ... but if I can just hear something, I
play it a lot quicker.”
While songwriting is the crux of his love affair with music,
Jason has been putting his words out there, one-man show style,
for audiences all over Georgia.
It hasn’t gone unnoticed.
His favorite work. Magnolia Waltz, a self described “old timey”
song redolent of bam dances and old men chewing tobacco, shuck
a chord with legendary songwriter Bill Anderson who lined up a
trip to Nashville to talk music and meet the executives at Sony.
Jason would crank out his CD in the same city, taking over a
recording studio after each night’s closing and plugging away until
just before daybreak.
He put out nine original acoustic songs, overdubbing record
ings of himself on the guitar, fiddle, dobro and vocals.
“It’s all me,” he says.
While “Magnolia Waltz” is the sleeper hit on his line-up, fans
are also loving “If Drinkin’ Don’t Kill Me (Dryin’ Out Will).”
“A lot of the research for that song probably came from the
Thompson Bridge Store,” Jason laughs, remembering how he’d
pull up a chan - and play for a few free beers.
The backdrops and audiences have transposed themselves over
the years, as has Jason. But it all sifts down to the same grit.
“It’s something I’ve always loved... but it’s also something I can
give to other people,” he said. “I’d so much rather play for ten
people who are enjoying my music than play for a hundred and be
just background noise.”
QUICK NOTES
First performance: “The Millen Oprey. I was twelve years old and
the fiddle looked bigger than me... I was so young and scrawny.”
Next big gig:Thursday, Nov. 3,9 pm, at the Mill House in Statesboro.
Biggest musical influence: “Merle Haggard... I got his greatest hits
album for Christmas when I was fourteen or fifteen. I put it in my mind
then.. .1 want to do something like this.”’
Song he always goes back to: “Soul Shine” by the Allman Brothers
What’s playing in his truck right now: burned CD with eclectic mix
of Haggard, Van Morrison, Rolling Stones and the Allman Brothers
What’s new: guitar and fiddle lessons for children and adults in
Waynesboro
GET IT NOW
To download one of Jason’s
songs or buy the entire CD,
The Well Has Run Dry, go to
the “Jason White Music”
page on facebook.com or
find him on amazon.com or
itunes.com.
Alum found in filters
Questions remain in Brier Creek fish kill
By Elizabeth Billips
lizbillips@yahoo.com
EPD still doesn’t know what
killed thousands of fish in Brier
Creek.
According to spokesperson
Kevin Chambers, water
samples taken after the Oct. 15
kill in Burke County are still
being analyzed.
All along, Savannah
Riverkeeper Tonya Bonitatibus
has suspected the culprit is alum
- the aluminum sulfate used at
kaolin quarries to separate clay
from water.
Findings at the Waynesboro
Water Plant, which is located
downstream from the affected
area, support the riverkeeper’s
conclusion.
"There are higher levels of
alum in the filters than usual,”
city administrator Jerry
Coalson said, noting the com
pound is routinely used in the
filter process, but in carefully
measured portions.
The city quit drawing its
usual 200,000 gallons a day
from Brier Creek last Monday.
Coalson said the plant will re
mained closed until EPD de
termines what poisoned the fish
and how the plant filters can
be properly cleaned.
While EPD officials estimate
the dead fish “in the thou
sands,” a firm number has not
been released. Chambers said
Tuesday that it could fall any
where from 1,000 and 9,999.
- See Brier Creek, page 9
Officer fired for refusing taser shock
By Elizabeth Billips
lizbillips@yahoo.com
A Waynesboro police officer
has been fired for refusing to
be shocked with a taser.
Sgt. Curt St. Germaine, Burke
County’s former Magistrate
Judge, was terminated early
Saturday morning after failing
to attend a taser certification
program in which the officers
were shot with electrified darts.
Waynesboro Police Chief
Alfonzo Williams made the
hands-on training mandatory
for all his officers.
"I realize the importance of
realistic training... and while not
required by the taser company
or Georgia POST, I think it’s
necessary to give officers a very
real experience with the
weapon,” the chief said. "The
officers get to see, feel and
know firsthand what the weapon
is capable of and how detrimen
tal it can be in the wrong hands.”
According to Chief Williams,
about an hour before 56-year-
old St. Germaine was supposed
to begin training, he presented
a doctor’s note recommending
that he not participate in taser
activities.
While the note was non-spe
cific, St. Germaine is said to
have heart problems.
-SeeTaser, page9
04420
19122
Plant’s fate unclear
ASTA lays off
employees
By Anne Marie Kyzer
annemariek@thetruecitizen.com
A local manufacturing plant laid off all but a handful of
workers.
According to former employees of ASTA Inc. officials no
tified them last Wednesday morning they would no longer be
needed for production. By noon, they were turning in badges
and leaving the facility, which was set up here in 2008 to
produce a specialized copper wire called continuously trans
posed conductors.
Though a manager onsite said he was not at liberty to say
how many workers lost their jobs, one of the former employ
ees said there were about 30 left before the layoffs. All but a
few of the office staff were sent home by the end of last week
when the last run of conductors was finished. Workers were
told the layoffs were temporary but were given no indication
of when production might resume.
It could be a month before company officials make a final
decision about the fate of the plant, according to an email
Rajan Mittal, executive director of ASTA’s parent company
Metrod, sent to Burke County Development Authority Ex
ecutive Director Jerry Long.
The email, which was requested pursuant to the Georgia
Open Records Act, explained the layoffs were a strategy to
circumvent further losses incurred by the company.
According to Mittal, the company incurred losses of about
$15 million, partly due to the set up costs and a market reces
sion. They had invested roughly $25 million to set up the
facility, their only plant in North America.
“Every effort has been made to reduce the losses and grow
the business but cash losses have continued,” Mittal wrote.
Mittal added that an effort will be made to sell the plant to
another manufacturer in the copper wire industry.
ASTA’s other plants in Austria, China and Pakistan were
sold recently to another company but the buyer did not want
this plant because it had been incurring losses since its start
up. Managers said quality issues with the product made here
were hindering their ability to compete.
Last March, rumors were swarming about the plant’s pos
sible closure, but vice president of operations Karl
Schramboeck had said it was here to stay and they had plans
to better compete in the marketplace. They had changed lead
ership and hoped to ramp up production and hire more em
ployees. At the time, they had 38 employees, down from their
peak of 77.
County development officials said ASTA leaders told them
early last month they were still troubled but were going to try
to hold on until after the recession.
Employees who were laid off last week said the move hit
them hard because they received no prior notice.
“We thought they would let us know what was going on,
but when we finished the final product we were out the door,”
a Waynesboro man who had worked there for a year said.
Long said he has requested help from ASTA officials to
initiate the process for the former employees to receive ben
efits.
“We have asked them to send a letter to commissioners so
we can get the labor department and other agencies involved
to help those people who are now unemployed,” he said.
ASTA’s parking lot is nearly bare following layoffs last
week.
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