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Chairman Danny Yearwood on Tuesday night agreed to allow the Barrow County Board of Commissioners to begin looking for a top administrator to help him run the day-to-day operations of the county government.

The position of “chief of operations” has been vacant since Keith Lee’s resignation in early February, but Yearwood has resisted board members’ private inquiries about hiring anyone, saying it would be a waste of money because he didn’t need the help.

The issue became public last week after four commissioners, led by Ben Hendrix, asked for the issue to be put on the board’s meeting agenda.

Hendrix said that with the resignations of the county’s top administrators and the departure of other managers, that left no less than 10 vacancies in senior staff positions.

He said he doesn’t want to hire anyone “to circumvent his authority or to run the county for him or this board,” but he thinks Yearwood needs assistance. [Full Story »] 

Teachers in the Barrow County School System are looking at three furlough days in the fall as a result of a mandate from the Governor’s office.

With Barrow County school officials having to deal with the Governor’s mandated three-day furloughs, superintendent Ron Saunders recommended last Thursday during a called meeting that the three days be in November. Saunders had recommended to the board that Nov. 3 be the first of three furlough days for 190-day employees with the next two being during Thanksgiving holidays.

The Thanksgiving holidays would now be extended to a week with two of the days being unpaid for teachers.

“We met with the principals, some assistant principals and staff about what approach to take,” Saunders told board members last week. “Some wanted to take the days during pre-planning but I didn’t feel good about that.”

The three furlough days must be taken by December and Saunders cautioned there may be more in the future.

“What we have to consider is this is just a start,” the superintendent said. “We have a fund balance we have gone into. We are going to have to survive the next two budget years without counting on revenue coming in.” [Full Story »] 

Four members of the Barrow County Board of Commissioners are on the agenda of Tuesday's upcoming BOC meeting to discuss hiring a new top administrator to help manage the county.

Commissioners Ben Hendrix, Isaiah Berry, Billy Parks and Steve Worley are on the agenda to discuss “chief administrator/county manager or chief of staff position.”

The issue has been discussed privately with Chairman Danny Yearwood since February, when the county’s two top administrators and several other department managers resigned. But this will be the board’s first public discussion of filling the top-administrator slot.

Also at Tuesday’s meeting, Dr. Stan Coley, chairman of the Barrow County Water Authority, will present a newly completed study of the county’s long-term drinking water needs. The study will recommend the expansion of some existing water sources into large reservoirs.

The meeting is at 7 p.m. Tuesday in the board’s meeting room on the second floor of the county administration building at 233 East Broad St.

Some 29,000 property reevaluation notices were sent out last week by the Barrow County Tax Assessors Office.

If you received a notice, the Barrow Journal would like to hear from you. By posting the following information as a comment to this story, you can share with your fellow taxpayers how the reevaluations affected you.

Simply add a comment to this story with the following information:

1. Last year's evaluation.

2. This year's evaluation.

3. The type of property (residential, commercial, agricultural, undeveloped, etc.)

4. The area of Barrow County you live in.

5. Comments you wish to make.

First Piedmont Bank, Winder, was taken over Friday night by the FDIC and Georgia Department of Banking.

First American Bank and Trust Company of Athens assumed all deposits of the bank.

The bank is the second area community bank to be closed this year by the FDIC. Freedom Bank based in Commerce with a branch in Winder was taken over by the FDIC in February. Fifteen Georgia banks have been shut down this year due to the recession.

Customers who have questions about the First Piedmont transaction can call the FDIC toll-free at 1-877-367-2717. The phone number will be operational Friday evening until 9:00 p.m., Eastern Daylight Time (EDT); on Friday and Saturday from 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., EDT; on Sunday from noon to 6:00 p.m., EDT; and thereafter from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m., EDT.

Interested parties can also visit the FDIC's Web site at www.fdic.gov/bank/individual/failed/piedmont.html.

According to the FDIC, First Piedmont Bank's two offices will reopen on Monday as branches of First American Bank and Trust Company. Depositors of First Piedmont Bank will automatically become depositors of First American Bank and Trust Company. Deposits will continue to be insured by the FDIC, so there is no need for customers to change their banking relationship to retain their deposit insurance coverage, officials said.
Over the weekend, depositors of First Piedmont Bank can access their money by writing checks or using ATM or debit cards. Checks drawn on the bank will continue to be processed. Loan customers should continue to make their payments as usual.

In addition to assuming all of the deposits of the failed bank, First American Bank and Trust Company agreed to purchase approximately $111 million of assets. The FDIC will retain the remaining assets for later disposition, officials said.

First Piedmont, founded in 1998, had assets of $115 million as of July 6. It had long been viewed as a bank likely to be closed by the FDIC.

In the first quarter of this year, the bank lost $680,000 and was not in compliance with capital requirements. The banks “non-performing asset ratio” was over 439 at the end of the first quarter, an extremely high number. Banks with troubled asset ratios over 100 are viewed as candidates for serious problems.

The bank's core problems revolved around real estate loans that had gone sour during the economic downturn.

The Barrow County Tax Assessors Office is reducing the assessed value of almost all of the properties owned in the county.

By the end of this week, the county will mail 29,000 reassessments for real and personal property owned in the county. That represents more than 90 percent of the 31,150 parcels in Barrow County, said Chief Appraiser Cecil Highfield. And 90 percent of those are going down.

Property owners have 45 calendar days — until the end of August — to either accept their newly assessed values or to appeal. Highfield said he could not estimate the total impact of the lower assessments on the county’s tax digest. However, the total impact is expected to be below the 20-percent shrinkage of the tax base that he had earlier given the county administration as an estimate.

The number is critical to the FY2010 budgets because it will determine how many other spending cuts will have to be made by county governments. A large drop in the tax digest could dramatically affect both the county government and school system, forcing the millage rates up to offset the drop in values.

A Barrow County mother and son who waged brave battles against cancer died just two days apart last week.

Visitation for Melinda (Missy) Morgan and Ryan Morgan will be held Friday, July 17, from 2-4 p.m. and 6-9 p.m. at Smith Memory Chapel in Winder. Services will be held Saturday, July 18, at Bethlehem First Baptist Church at 2 p.m.

Missy, 46, died Wednesday, July 8. She was a speech pathologist at Bethlehem Elementary School. Ryan, 10, died Friday, July 10. He was a student at BES and participated in swimming and soccer.

Ryan was diagnosed with Stage IV Neuroblastoma in 2004 and had undergone multiple treatments in Atlanta, New York and Vermont.

Missy was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2007 and had waged a tough battle while also helping Ryan with his fight against cancer.

Ryan and Missy are survived by father and husband Les Morgan; brother and son Will Morgan; and sister and daughter Heidi Morgan.

Memorial contributions may be made to The Lighthouse, P.O. Box 847, Marietta, GA 30061, or C.U.R.E. Childhood Cancer, 1835 Savoy Dr., Ste. 102, Atlanta, GA 30341.

COMMUNITY SADDENED

Both Ryan and Missy were well-known not just in Barrow County, but also around the state. For many people, Ryan had become the face of childhood cancer, appearing on television and doing radio fundraising to fight cancer. He was active in the Barrow County Relay for Life and participated in a number of special events for children with cancer.
[Full Story »] 

The county government’s budget crisis became very personal over the past several days for 112 Barrow County employees who learned that their salaries are being cut anywhere from $94 to more than $10,000. [Full Story »]