The Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee has awarded $13,083 in grants to DeKalb organizations to help respond to specific needs of the region.
“The Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee believes in the present and future of Middle Tennessee and supports DeKalb County organizations working to improve the quality of life in our communities,” said Ellen Lehman, president of The Community Foundation. “The people of Middle Tennessee should be very proud of the extraordinary work being done by local nonprofits addressing a variety of needs from public education and animal welfare to children and seniors.”
Specific discretionary grants include:
Freckles Friends Pet Shelter, Inc. has received a grant to provide spay/neuter services to pets of low-income families in DeKalb County.
New Frontiers Challenge Center has received a grant to provide Internet access and laptop computers to young men in residence.
In partnership with the Tennessee Arts Commission and funded by the Tennessee General Assembly, The Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee facilitates two other grant programs – Arts Build Communities and Student Ticket Subsidy.
Arts Build Communities serves to strengthen communities by funding projects that nurture artists, arts organizations, and arts supporters in each of Tennessee’s 95 counties. Those eligible to apply for ABC are tax-exempt nonprofit 501(c)(3) organizations, public or private educational institutions (K through college), school boards, or governmental agencies.
Friends of the Appalachian Center for Craft of Tennessee has received an Arts Build Communities grant to support artist fees for presenters.
The Student Ticket Subsidy program is designed to ensure that Tennessee’s school-aged children have access to live performance. The program is available to public school students, and the Fund reimburses ticket costs for children in the 40 counties The Community Foundation covers.
Smithville Elementary School has received a Student Ticket Subsidy grant to send 206 students to Art Center of Cannon County.
DeKalb West Elementary School has received a Student Ticket Subsidy grant to send 414 students to Wood & Strings Theatre.
These discretionary, Arts Build Communities and Student Ticket Subsidy grants are part of The Foundation’s annual grant making process that will distribute over $1,301,295 to over 300 nonprofit organizations and schools throughout 36 Middle Tennessee counties.
The Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee oversees more than 615 charitable funds. In the past sixteen years, The Community Foundation has distributed $320 million to community programs and institutions. Currently, The Community Foundation manages endowment, unrestricted and memorial funds totaling $426million. It is located at 3833 Cleghorn Avenue, # 400, Nashville, Tennessee 37215. For more information, call 615-321-4939 or visit www.cfmt.org.

The DeKalb County Fire Department will receive a $195,957 U.S. Department of Homeland Security vehicle acquisition grant, U.S. Representative Bart Gordon announced.
“Many communities struggle to maintain EMS and firefighting services,” said Gordon, a member of the Congressional Fire Services Caucus. “Even though demands on EMS providers and firefighters have increased tremendously over the years, the resources they depend on to provide their life-savings services have not.
“That’s why Congress initiated the Assistance to Firefighters Program, which is similar to the highly successful COPS program that put more than 100,000 new police officers on the nation’s streets.”
Chief Donny Green said the department will use the funds to purchase a tanker that can haul 2,500 gallons of water. Currently, the only fire truck that covers the entire 305 square miles of DeKalb County is a 1979 converted milk truck.
“The rural parts of DeKalb County don’t have fire hydrants, so we have to haul water to the fire,” Green said. “This will let us be a whole lot more efficient in the county and in providing mutial aid to the surrounding cities and counties.”
The DeKalb County Fire Department’s 11 substations respond to calls from Smithville and Alexandria and DeKalb and Cannon counties.
In addition to improving efficiency, the new fire tanker should help the department recruit and retain volunteers and decrease homeowner insurance rates.
“Just being able to provide water and a safer truck for the firefighters is one part of it,”, Green said. “One of the things insurance looks at is how the fire department hauls water. Part of the homeowner’s premium is based on how local fire protection is rated.”
The tanker will cost nearly $206,000 with DeKalb County providing 5% matching funds.

The DeKalb County Sheriff’s Department executed a search warrant on Thursday at the home of 39 year old Mark (Truck) Robinson on Anthony Avenue in Smithville.
Sheriff Patrick Ray says officers made at least one drug buy from Robinson’s residence and during the search, they found 193 Xanax pills, 203 empty prescription bottles with numerous individuals’ names on them, hemostats, rolling papers, roach clips, syringes, and a pill grinder.
Another individual, 37 year old Walter Redmon of Sparta Highway, Smithville was also at the residence. Sheriff Ray says Redmon was found to have a syringe in his pants pocket.
Robinson is charged with possession of a schedule IV drug (Xanax) for sale and delivery and
possession of drug paraphernalia. His bond is set at $26,500
Redmon is charged with possession of drug paraphernalia and a bond was set at $1,500. Both are scheduled to be in General Sessions Court on January 3rd.
Sheriff Ray says officers seized the cash from Robinson and more arrests are pending.

Director of Schools Mark Willoughby presented his monthly report on personnel to the Board of Education Thursday night.
Those employed since last month include Wallace Caldwell, Gregory Muskopf, and Dwayne Cornelius as substitute bus drivers, Santos Cabellero as cafeteria worker, and Keith Huling in transportation,.
Debbie Parchman was transferred from a substitute teacher position to an educational assistant at DCHS.
Amy Tobitt, DCHS teacher, was granted a leave of absence as requested.
Larry Johnson, Materials Supervisor has resigned.
Willoughby announced that Johnson’s position will not be filled. “I just wanted to let the board know that my intention is to reorganize our supervisory personnel, taking into consideration the fact that we not be filling our material supervisor position. It is my plan to divide the position of curriculum and instructional supervisor (pre-k through 12th grade) into a pre-k through 6th grade and a 7th through 12th grade curriculum instructor supervisor. Michelle Burklow will take over the pre-k through 6th grade and Dr. Carol Hendrix will take over the 7th through 12th grade. At the same time, I will delegate the responsibilities of the materials supervisor position to our different supervisors. I will also post the position for a new federal programs director. We will take applications through the month of December. We will start interviewing in January. I think these moves will be real good for the children of our school system. Our folks (supervisors) will be able to be in the classrooms and into the schools more and I think it will make our education more efficient for the children.”
In other business, the board voted to participate in an energy conservation program, subject to a review and approval by the county commission.
Under the program, the school system could apply for an interest free loan of up to $500,000 and contract with a company to make energy conservation retrofits to existing school buildings, such as heating, air conditioning, and lighting. The loan would be repaid over seven years from the savings in energy costs, due to those improvements. In order to participate, the school system would have to commit $9,500 to have the company prepare a detailed energy study to identify areas that need to be addressed. The costs could be paid for out of the energy savings to the school system.
The board voted to accept sealed bids to sell some surplus equipment including two 1995 Blue Bird buses, a 1994 John Deere 72 inch cut mower, and a Sanborn Blackmax 5 horsepower two stage 80 gallon tank air compressor with motor and compressor (needs to be overhauled). Bids will be opened at the next meeting on January 10th.
The board adopted a policy that authorizes the Director of Schools to obtain credit cards for business travel expense for general purpose and federal programs funds. Credit cards may only be used by authorized employees for legitimate school business expenditures. The issue of credit cards is not intended to circumvent the school system’s policies and procedures on purchasing.
Board Chairman W.J. (Dub) Evins recommended passage of the policy. ” We have a lot of programs that we send different members of the faculty to and they end up putting a lot of these charges on their personal credit cards so I’m recommending that we authorize the director of schools to apply for this credit card. These charges run into several thousands of dollars on personal credit cards and I think we, as a government body, need to get away from that. It will be the director’s responsibility and the credit cards will be maintained by him.”
The board also voted to make a DCHS course change for the spring semester 2008 by changing ‘Problems and Solutions in Technology 3813″ to “Technological Systems 3811″.
In a letter to the board, Brad Leach, Career and Technical Education Director at DCHS, wrote that ” This change is needed because a vast amount of competencies and standards for the “Problems and Solutions in Technology” course requires Internet access in order to be completed. The “Technology Systems” course does not require extensive amounts of research and Internet use to complete the competencies and standards.”
“Due to the limited use of Internet in our Career and Technical Education programs, additional standards and competencies in Career and Technical Education program area courses will be evaluated and additional course changes may occur in the future. The goal of the “Career and Technical Education” programs and the use of Perkins funding we receive is to provide the necessary equipment and technology to teach students the standards and competencies needed, improve, expand, and modernize quality career and technical education programs, including relevant technology, and to provide activities to prepare all students for high skill, high wage, or high demand occupations that will lead to self sufficiency.”
The board, as required by state law, will conduct the annual evaluation of the Director of Schools job performance on Tuesday, January 8th at 6:00 p.m. during an informal workshop. The results of the evaluation will be reported during the next regular meeting on Thursday, January 10th. A board self evaluation will be also be scheduled soon.

Three candidates are in the race for Assessor of Property in the February 5th DeKalb County Democratic Primary.
Democratic Incumbent Assessor Timothy (Fud) Banks will be challenged for the nomination on February 5th by Roy D. Merriman, a former Third District County Commissioner and a member of the DeKalb County Volunteer Fire Department, and Willie Thomas, who is also a Smithville Alderman and a Seventh District County Commissioner.
The nominee selected that day at the polls will face Republican nominee John David Foutch and Independent candidate Sandy C. Brown in the August 7th General Election. Foutch currently serves as the First District member of the Board of Education. Brown is a local businesswoman.
Today (Thursday) at noon was the deadline for candidates to qualify to run for Assessor of Property and Constable in next year’s elections.
Those qualified to run for Constable include:
Republican Incumbent Reed Edge in the Second District, Democratic Incumbent Wayne Vanderpool in the Third District, Democrat Paul Cantrell in the Fourth District, Democratic Incumbent Mark Milam in the Fifth District, Democrat Cantrell Jones in the Sixth District, and Democrats Mary Ann Thomason and Johnny King in the Seventh District.
February 5th is also the date for the Tennessee Presidential Preference Primaries. Each party will select nominees for President and delegates to the National Conventions.
The Presidential Election will be in November, 2008

The DeKalb County Sheriff’s Department arrested a 33 year old Smithville man Wednesday in an undercover drug investigation.
Joseph Scott Barnes of Opossum Hollow Lane, Smithville was charged with attempted possession of a schedule II drug (Oxycontin) for sale and delivery.
Sheriff Patrick Ray says the DeKalb Sheriff’s Department conducted an undercover drug investigation in which Barnes was found to have purchased 120 pills he believed to be Oxycontin 40 milligrams for $3,000.
Detectives seized $3,048 in cash and Barnes’ 1988 Toyota 4×4 pickup truck that he was driving.
Barnes’ bond was set at $10,000 and his court date is January 10th.
More arrests are pending.