Newspaper Page Text
Region roundup
Page 7B ^ Commerce News M Wednesday, Sept. 19, 2012
BANKS
HALL
• Homer
• Gainesville
Commerce
MADISON
Flowery Branch
JACKSON
• Danielsville
• Braselton
v • Hoschton
• Jefferson
• Bufori
• Winder
CLARKE
• Athens
GWINNETT
BARROW
Lawrenceville
Watkinsville •
Loganville
OCONEE
• Monroe
WALTON
1 BANKS
COUNTY
Plan changes
Banks Crossing
A consultant recently presented
plans to the Banks County Planning
Commission that included proposed
changes to the Banks Crossing area,
including reduced speed limits.
Consultants from Tunnell,
Spangler, Walsh and Associates pre
sented the plan to county officials.
Transportation recommendations
included adding an optional left-turn
lane onto Tanger Boulevard, requir
ing rear parcel access roads for new
developments and extending side
walks to improve pedestrian safety.
Also, the plan proposed reducing the
speed limit in the Banks Crossing
area.
Infrastructure improvements for the
Banks Crossing area included the
establishment of utility service agree
ments and utility line relocation and
burial.
The planning team also offered
ideas about economic development,
including creating a state-recognized
“opportunity zone” to attract new
investment, aggregating marketing
efforts to attract more retail shoppers,
redesigning the county's recruitment
package, including the website, and
establishing a “community improve
ment district."
CLARKE
COUNTY
Man asks to
withdraw plea
An Athens man who is serving
three consecutive life prison terms
for murdering his brother and two
sisters recently appealed his convic
tion in Clarke County Superior Court,
according to the Athens Banner-
Herald.
In a rambling, often intelligible
hand-written appeal that his attorney,
John David Latimer claims that his
lawyer, without his consent, last year
entered a plea of guilty but mentally
ill.
Latimer blames his attorney for
“allowing (my) plea of guilt to be
unwillingly entered upon said
record and sentenced to life in DOC
(Department of Corrections) at a
para-normal torture facility,” Latimer
wrote in his appeal.
The 55-year-old prisoner, diag
nosed with paranoid schizophrenia
and other disorders, wrote his appeal
while in the Augusta State Medical
Prison.
Authorities said Latimer stabbed
one of his sisters with a sword then
shot and killed her and his other sib
lings in January 2009.
UGA workshops
aim to save water
University of Georgia engineers are
meeeting with hotel and restaurant
operators from across the state to
help them conserve water, energy and
money, the Athens Banner-Herald
reports.
UGA’s College of Engineering has
scheduled four free workshops in in
Atlanta. Tifton and Savannah, with
the final workshop Sept. 25 at Athens'
Foundry Park Inn.
The workshops are an extension of
similar meetings with managers in
other industries such as poultry pro
cessors and electric membership cor
porations, said Jason Perry, a research
engineer in the UGA College of
Engineering's outreach service.
“The bottom line is (that) we’re try
ing to increase the energy literacy in
this constituency, and in every sector.
That's our overall goal,” Perry told
the newspaper.
But the half-day workshop will
cover more than energy conservation.
Attendees will also learn how to
interpret utility bills and rates, learn
about tools they can use to track util
ity uses and costs, and low- or no-cost
ways to cut costs by using less water
and energy.
Students push
for an A+ grade
The University’s Student
Government Association unanimous
ly voted at its latest meeting in favor
of a resolution supporting the addi
tion of an A+ to the grading system.
Will Burgess, the SGA president,
told The Red & Black said it is
important to emphasize this resolu
tion is just SGA’s opinion and is not
an actual proposal or in any way
binding.
“We are still trying to kind of see
where all the students and adminis
tration are, but we are aiming to have
something by October,” he said. “We
don’t have anything officially written
yet.”
But this is a first step toward imple
menting the A+.
Pranay Udutha, a junior from
Acworth and the Franklin College
of Arts and Sciences senator for the
University Council, is the author of
the bill. He said the University admin
istration has been trying to implement
the plus-minus system since 2006.
“The A+ has been a part of that
movement,” he said. “My freshman
year, we were working on the A+
idea, trying to put that in place in the
plus-minus system on the Academic
Affairs Committee.”
Udutha told the newspaper the dif
ference between this approach and
previous ones is the way the A+ is
weighted.
He said all the schools in the
University System of Georgia must
have uniform grading scales. The
addition of an A+ weighted more
heavily than a 4.0 would require a
serious push in the Board of Regents.
3 GWINNETT
COUNTY
Hundreds caught
in crackdown
Gwinnett County authorities say
mor ethan 300 people have been
arrested for a variety of offenses dur
ing a month-long crackdown on crime
in the southern part of the county.
Gwinnett County police Cpl. Jake
Smith tells WSB Radio that the oper
ation known as “South Surge” is in
response to an increase in crime in the
department’s south precinct.
The operation, which began Aug.
18, involved several police check
points around county roadways.
Police say 65 of the arrests have been
for felony offences.
The most recent checkpoint
along Ronald Reagan Parkway in
Lawrenceville last week resulted in
several arrests of suspects on charges
such as drunken driving and drug
possession.
Arrest makes
No. 19 for man
A Lilbum man was arrested recent
ly for allegedly robbing a local cell
phone store, marking his 19th arrest
in Gwinnett County since 2003.
The Gwinnett Daily Post reports
that Frankie Lee Wright, 26, was
arrested Sept. 7 and charged with
armed robbery and first-degree bur
glary, both felonies. Gwinnett County
jail records show he is being held
without bond.
According to warrants issued by
Gwinnett police, Wright is accused
of robbing SI Communications, a
cellphone dealer at 3375 Sugarloaf
Parkway in Lawrenceville, on the
afternoon of Oct. 25.
“The defendant came in the store
and held the employees at gunpoint
while he stole money and cellphones,”
the warrant said.
County jail records show last
week’s arrest was Wright’s fifth in
Gwinnett since July 2011, and his
19th since 2003. Wright was most
recently arrested in April, on charges
of criminal trespass, loitering and
prowling and disorderly conduct.
Other charges from various arrests
include theft by deception, theft by
receiving, theft by taking, driving
without a license, marijuana posses
sion. probation violation and giving
false information.
Walmart scam
involves iPads
Three Gwinnett men have been
charged with stealing financial
account information in a scheme to
buy iPads at Walmart, police tell the
Gwinnett Daily Post.
Lawrenceville police believe the
suspects — Christopher Hamilton,
20, of Snellville; Kadeem Robinson,
20, of Lawrenceville; and Martevius
Watkins. 18, of Lilbum — accessed
the banking account information of at
least seven victims, and then encoded
that information on Walmart debit
cards and other cards.
Police were notified Aug. 7 by
an employee of a Walmart at 1400
Lawrenceville Highway who thought
“something didn’t seem right about
their IDs. credit cards and the number
of iPads” the suspects were trying
to purchase, according to a police
report.
Hamilton told police he bought two
iPad 3 s valued at $528 each that day,
and officers allegedly found three
similar devices in a car they were
traveling in.
When approached by police in the
parking lot, Hamilton and Robinson
said they had bought the iPads to sell
to friends in Tennessee. Hamilton
was arrested after he admitted to
police the cards he used were coded;
the other two were released pending
a more extensive investigation, the
report states.
HALL
COUNTY
City’s bonds
get high rating
Gainesville’s City Council heard
good news at their called meeting
Thursday afternoon from
Dianne McNabb, Director of Public
Financial Management, Inc., report
ed good news about Gainesville’s
finances to the City council last week,
reports WDUN.
McNabb, whose is contracted by
the city for financial advice and ser
vices, said the city recently received
some positive ratings from the capital
markets. Moody’s gave the city a
credit rating of AA2, while Standard
& Poor’s “affirmed a plus rating but
assigned a ‘positive outlook' to the
rating ... which basically means we
can expect an upgrade from them in
the near future.” she said during the
special called meeting.
McNabb added that in the current
economy rating agencies (such as
Moody's and S&P’s) are not gener
ous with upgrades, receiving a “posi
tive outlook” is a good sign.
McNabb also explained that
Gainesville’s 2012 tax-exempt 7-year
bonds received a rate of 0.99 percent,
including all underwriting costs, and
that the City’s 15-year taxable bonds
received a rate of 2.56 percent.
The taxable bonds will be used to
finance the purchase of the former
Hall County jail. Taxable bonds are
required for this transaction because
the property is leased to a for-profit
company. Using the improved inter
est rates will allow bonds issued in
2004 to be redeemed, with a net
saving to the city of almost $55,000
a year.
5 MADISON
COUNTY
Club builds
its 500th ramp
The Madison County Rotary
Club recently built its 500th ramp
at the home of Annie Mae Jarrells,
the Athens Banner-Herald reports.
Jarrells’ daughter and sole caregiver,
Phyllis Jones, can now help her elder
ly wheelchair-bound mother move
beyond the front porch of their home
on Jot Em Down Road.
The building of the 500th ramp
was recognized by Georgia Lt. Gov.
Casey Cagle, who attended the event
and even helped stack lumber after
the job was finished. This example
of Madison County Rotary as a civic
organization filling a need, Cagle
said, speaks to the character and
integrity of Madison County citizens.
Cagle said that when things come
across his desk about community
accomplishments, “There are often
things that catch your eye, but seldom
things that catch your heart.”
6 OCONEE
COUNTY
Lawyers save
secretary’s life
When Karen Hemphill suddenly
collapsed unconscious on the floor
of the law office where she works,
Shannon Coffey rushed to the wom
an’s side and felt for a pulse. There
was none. Nor was she breathing.
Brian Cathey and Blaine Norris
entered the room and Cathey later
recalled Coffey’s words: “We have to
do something.”
And what happened next, according
to the Athens Banner-Herald, saved
the life of Hemphill, a 54-year-old
Jefferson woman who is married with
a son and two grandchildren.
Hemphill, a secretary, had a heart
arrhythmia, a condition that can
stop the flow of blood to the brain,
the afternoon of Aug. 17. On many
Friday afternoons, Hemphill was the
only person in the office. Fortunately,
others were there the day she momen
tarily died.
Cathey called 911, Norris started
chest compressions and Coffey began
mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.
“It was like 14 minutes before the
ambulance got here, but we did it
until they came,” said Coffey, whose
last CPR class was in high school
when she was in training for a life
guard job.
When an Oconee County first
responder arrived, he told the pair to
continue their CPR while he hooked
up a machine to give Hemphill elec
trical shocks designed to restore a
heart beat.
When paramedics arrived, Hemphill
was soon on board and as they left for
the hospital, paramedics told them
their patient’s heart was now beating.
7 WALTON
COUNTY
Church groups
help at shelter
Members of two Walton County
churches helped fix up the facili
ties recently at The Alcove, a
nonprofit home for troubled youth
that is working its way off a sus
pension from the state.
According to the Walton
Tribune, local parishoners from
Graystone Church and First
Baptist Church of Monroe came
over two consecutive weekends to
do a variety of small jobs around
the house, including landscaping
work, patching holes in the walls
or pressure washing the exterior.
They were great,” said Tephra
Fields, executive director of The
Alcove, on their church volun
teers. “It was just wonderful.”
Fields and the board of directors
for The Alcove are working to get
the house back in working order
while the facility is under suspen
sion from the state’s Department
of Human Services for infractions
dating back to last year.
According to documents
obtained through the Georgia
Open Records Act from the DHS,
The Alcove was first suspended
last August for a variety of con
cerns, including a failure to main
tain youth and staff records, lack
of food and severe deficiencies in
both the inside and outside of the
structure.
The suspension was lifted in
October after a follow-up review
found the concerns were addressed,
but then-Director Dorothy Morrow
reportedly struggled to keep docu
mentation up to date.