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January 2008
Angels for newborns
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
I just learned a new word.
“Layette.”
That’s a complete outfit for a newborn baby - clothes, bedding and accessories. I found out what it meant while hanging out with some volunteers for Tiny Stitches Inc. The Gwinnett-based nonprofit sews, knits or crochets baby clothes and burial ensembles. It gives them to needy newborns and preemies in North Georgia hospitals like Gwinnett Medical Center and Union General in Blairsville.
Wednesday was Tiny Stitches’ “pre-packaging” day. The Badie Tour was invited to witness the chaotic, charming scene. It takes place at “Your Extra Attic,” a storage facility in Sugar Hill. The nonprofit rents space there.
A dozen or so women stuffed plastic bags with clothes. Everything from burp cloths and socks to creepers and sleepers. Thirty-five items for each layette tote. All items are hand-crafted. All are donated anonymously to between 55 and 60 birth moms each month.
“If the mother knew it was from Tiny Stitches, she may feel beholden to us,” says Buford’s Gloria Bantekas, a founding member. “We want the mother to have some self-respect. I can’t imagine having a baby and not having any clothing for her.”
Tiny Stitches was founded in February 1996 by Bantekas and four other Gwinnett women. The local group had belonged to the national charity of the same name, but disliked sending money to headquarters. So it became an independent charity.
Today the Gwinnett outfit has a network of more than 200 volunteers. No one gets paid. Money that’s donated or raised pays for fabrics, trim, yarn, patterns and warehouse rent. (The charity recently received its largest donation ever - $15,000 from Jackson EMC.)
In the warehouse Wednesday, the women scurry in cramped quarters. They’re angels.
“Let me show you the beautiful work that’s been done,” says Janet Hornsby of Flowery Branch.
“Look at this.” She holds up a multi-colored T-shirt. “Doesn’t it light your eyes up?”
Hornsby, a volunteer for two years, says she’s found her calling.
“I do it to do something for the community,” she says. “Just to feel like my life is worthwhile, more or less. This is it after all these years.”
Tiny Stitches has its critics.
“Some people say we’re helping illegal immigrants,” Bantekas says. “We’re not a Christian organization, and that bothers some people. We’re simply people who care. Some people say there’s no poverty. Hey, I’ve seen poverty.”
The charity started pre-packaging the clothes after a hospital suffered water damage. The clothes had to be washed before they could be distributed. Hospital social workers determine who gets the layettes.
Georgia Lucas, an at-large board member, told me hospital personnel rejoice when volunteers make deliveries.
“When they see us coming,” she told me, “they say, ‘Here come our angels.’ “
For more information, visit www.tinystitches.org.
Rick Badie’s column appears on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Contact him at 770-263-3875 or e-mail: rbadie@ajc.com.
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Teacher speaking out about beating
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The swelling has subsided, but her head still throbs.
Her nerves are shot. She feels hot and cold sensations in her mouth. She needs new glasses. Her old ones got broken in the attack.
Janie Fair says she was standing in the hallway of Lilburn Middle School. She didn’t see the 12-year-old girl approach her side. The seventh-grader yelled insults and called the teacher names. She punched Fair four or five times.
It was a beatdown.
“I had a ballpoint pen in my right hand,” Fair told me Monday. “I took my left hand and pushed her away from me and tried to restrain her. Another teacher jumped in, grabbed her and took her to the office.”
Last Wednesday, Fair became the county’s poster child for teachers who get assaulted by students. Physical attacks against teachers, or school employees, apparently are rare in Gwinnett.
One incident, though, is too many.
County records show that the assault at Lilburn Middle marked the only case this year in which an employee suffered injuries. Additionally, there have been 15 incidents in which students made physical contact with a school employee but didn’t cause injuries, according to school records.
I suspect that violence against teachers happens more than we realize, more than gets documented. Teachers and campus officials probably shun police reports and prosecution. They don’t want to hurt the child or taint the school.
Fair, though, has chosen to talk about her traumatic ordeal.
“I’m the sacrificial lamb,” the Tucker resident said. “More stuff like this goes on than you would imagine. I have given a face to abused teachers. They can be young, old and of any race.”
Her credentials impress.
She earned her undergrad degree from Benedict College in Columbia, where Hillary Clinton stumped last week. She has a master’s degree from the University of South Carolina and is working on her doctorate. She’s taught in public schools in New York and South Carolina, her native state. She’s taught in Gwinnett the past four years, all at Lilburn Middle.
I first called her on Sunday. She sounded depressed. She asked that I call back Monday morning when she might feel better. She didn’t. She had several doctors’ appointments scheduled, all for ailments related to the attack.
“Right now, I have to get healed,” she told me. “My head hasn’t stopped pounding. I got punched in the mouth. I feel hot and cold sensations in my teeth.”
Naturally, Fair has strong opinions as to what did and didn’t happen as it relates to her attacker prior to the beating. I won’t share details. It would be unfair to the student. Her name has not been released. Her disciplinary record won’t be made public because she’s a juvenile. And school officials keep facts close to the vest in ongoing investigations like this one. The incident was captured on hallway cameras. The images are part of the inquiry.
The girl has been charged with simple battery and disruption of public schools, according to the report from Gwinnett County School Police. She’ll face disciplinary action of some sort. Maybe she’ll be placed in an alternative program that addresses her behavior.
Fair disliked the way a school district spokesman framed the relationship between her and the girl in an AJC Gwinnett News story that ran Saturday. She told me there was no “history of a difficult relationship” between the two. Fair said the student had been removed from one teacher’s classroom and put in Fair’s science class. She’d been disruptive, hostile and defiant. The child was transferred to another class.
There’s a twist to this whole affair. About four years ago, Fair and a colleague conducted discipline workshops at the school for new teachers. They used a highly touted method of classroom management and discipline developed by Harry K. Wong, a noted educator.
‘It makes students feel valued,” she said.
When Fair compares the students of yesteryear with contemporary charges, she sees little difference. Kids aren’t amoral, she said, but their environments can be.
“The ills of society have a way of being in the school,” she told me. “We have a lot of parents who brought children into this world who were on drugs. We got children who are born into incest, who are abused at home. They bring this to school with them.”
Fair hasn’t returned to Lilburn Middle since the beating. She probably never will. Too traumatized. But the attack won’t stop her from doing what she loves to do.
“I have too much to give to not teach,” she said. “I have too much to offer, and I don’t intend to let this stop me.”
Rick Badie’s column appears on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Contact him at 770-263-3875 or e-mail: rbadie@ajc.com.
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Presenting….’the human trumpet’
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Name a traditional tune.
“Amazing Grace.”
“Auld Lang Syne.”
“When the Saints Go Marching In.”
Terry Barker can play them, but not on an instrument. He just sounds like one.
“I can be sitting in a restaurant and start doing a song,” said Barker, 68, of Stone Mountain. “Everybody will stop. They even come out of the kitchen.”
He discovered his talent nearly four decades ago in Pensacola. Barker, then a aircraft production contractor at the Pensacola Naval Air Station, heard a mechanic trying to emulate a trumpet. Barker gave it a whirl. He nailed it.
Terry “Pops” Barker, the human trumpet, was born.
Locally, he performs in nursing homes, churches and at events — wherever there’s interest. He’s entertained on the national stage, too. Last year, he appeared on “America’s Got Talent.” He performed on the Jay Leno Show two years ago. A scrapbook of his life includes a photo of him and the comedian.
“I was going to do ‘Jingle Bells’ ” he told me, “but Leno walked by whistling ‘Winter Wonderland’ before the show. I asked him if I could change my song, and he said, ‘Sure.’ ”
When he opens his mouth, people listen.
I interviewed him two weeks ago in the AJC Gwinnett News office in Norcross. He performed a few bars of “When the Saints Go Marching In.” Colleagues strained eyes and necks to find the source.
Our paths first crossed during the holidays. I’d written a column about a Duluth man who wanted to give a brand new $500 trumpet to a musically inclined kid whose family couldn’t afford a brass instrument. Jerry Robb’s generosity touched Barker. He, too, had an instrument that he wanted to donate to a kid. It was a trumpet that he used as a prop for performances.
The two men met for breakfast one Saturday. Barker gave Robb the trumpet, then serenaded a waitress.
“He’s amazingly good,” said Robb, 61, who played trumpet in high school and college. “And he likes people. That’s why he wanted to make another kid happy.”
Barker doesn’t hide his soiled past. He started drinking when he was 17 and quit when he was 50. He had to make a choice between two loves — whiskey or Elaine, his wife of 24 years.
“This is my third wife, and I didn’t want to lose her,” he said. “I took the bottle of whiskey and poured it out in the sink. That’s when I really started entertaining.”
Hard times have befallen Barker in recent months. His nerves have grown bad. Medicine to treat them caused his legs to swell. He had to quit work at a local Kroger.
The retiree needs extra income. His talent may be the ticket. Barker says he can entertain for most any gathering. He charges a small fee that varies, depending on the length of the show and other factors.
He has a list of about 50 tunes that he can perform. He can even crow like a peacock.
“I love entertaining people, he said. “God has given me an unusual talent.”
Contact Terry Barker at 404-433-7477.
Rick Badie’s column appears on Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. Contact him at 770-263-3875 or e-mail: rbadie@ajc.com.
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“Will Plasma TVs really end the recession?”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
It looked sleek. Sounded even better.
I asked the Bose sales associate how much the home theater system would set me back.
“Four thousand dollars” she said, without blinking.
Throw in the $1,500, 42-inch TV and you’re talking some serious cheese.
But hey, that’s OK. I may have a little extra change in a few months. And if I do what the government wants, I’ll spend every dime.
I’m sure you’ve heard about the bipartisan economic stimulus package. The economy’s a mess. It’s hard to say whether we’re at the beginning of a recession or knee-deep in one.
The one thing that economists, academicians, experts and politicians agree on is that the economy has hit a snag. It needs resuscitation. A targeted, temporary and timely fix.
One element in a $150 billion proposal would give taxpayers money to spend. The amount of the lump-sum refunds hasn’t been worked out yet. It might be up to $800 if single, or $1,600 if married, according to news reports.
The basic premise is this: Consumers, it is hoped, will spend the rebate checks on plasma TVs, stereos and appliances. With the spending surge, the thinking goes, the retail economy will see an uptick that positively affects businesses and the overall market.
So this is the big cure. Spend. Buy a flat-screen.
It’s an idea with a weak track record. Besides, isn’t spending part of the problem?
We accumulate debt, get in over our heads, then struggle when bills come due. For many, it’s become the American way. Now our government stands ready to cut checks and encourage us to consume. Not to save or pay bills, but to be materialistic gluttons. Seems to me we should be encouraged to do otherwise, given, among other things, rising fuel and food costs.
Some experts tout the so-called trickle-down effects of the stimulus package. Say consumers spend most of their rebate checks on electronics. In theory, then, retailers and companies would invest in the market by hiring more workers.
That might happen. It might not. Even if it did, I’d imagine the hires would be temps, given that full economic recovery isn’t expected till 2009 or 2010.
There’s also supposed to be a benefit for U.S. businesses that sell more TVs, stereos and such. I foresee only one clear winner: China, where many of the products we consume are made. And where the U.S. may turn for the billions needed to pay for the stimulus package. More debt. Wonderful.
A friend and I talked about these issues during a workout Wednesday at Gold’s Gym of Lilburn. If we can see it, then surely policy-makers with supposedly impeccable smarts and insight can, too.
Whatever the amount, the rebate money will be a major component of any economic push. Checks probably won’t arrive till this summer. Taxpayers will have to decide whether to spend it, save it or pay bills.
The windfall won’t burn a hole in my pocket, though the Badie Tour saw some desirable merchandise at Discover Mills on Wednesday. Like a pair of black Kenneth Cole boots ($119).
I’ll pass. Same goes for the Bose home theater system. Too expensive, even with the Bose credit card, which advertised an 18-month, no-interest plan on purchases for qualified buyers.
Rick Badie’s column appears on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Contact him at 770-263-3875 or email: rbadie@ajc.com.
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“Bowl of caring a ‘souper’ effort for community”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
I know you’ve heard of the Super Bowl.
But what about the Souper Bowl of Caring?
It’s a nationwide fund-raiser that utilizes Super Bowl weekend to raise money and goods for charities. It started in 1990 at Valley Presbyterian Church in Columbia, S.C. A seminary intern gave a prayer.
“Lord, even as we enjoy the Super Bowl football game, help us be mindful of those who are without a bowl of soup to eat,” he prayed.
An idea was born. Capitalize on the big game. Help the needy.
That year, more than 20 Columbia-area church youth groups participated in the inaugural Souper Bowl. It raised nearly $6,000.
Today, it’s huge. Souper Bowl of Caring became a South Carolina-based nonprofit in 1997. Since its inception, school and church groups across the country have collected $41 million. Last year’s take was a little over $8 million, according to the nonprofit’s Web site.
The youth ministry at Pleasant Hill Presbyterian Church has taken part in the Souper Bowl for several years. They’ve set a goal for this year’s drive - collect 1,000 canned or dry food items and money to buy gift cards.
The food will be donated to the Duluth Cooperative Ministry. Some of the money will be used to buy toiletries and paper towels for the Clifton night shelter in Decatur. Family Promise of Gwinnett County Inc., a nonprofit network of churches that provides shelter, meals and assistance, will receive the gift cards.
Super Bowl XLII takes place Feb. 3. Pleasant Hill Presbyterian will host its “souper bowl” during that day’s service. Big boxes with the names of the NFL Super Bowl teams will be placed in the narthex. Kids, with soup pots in hand, will walk the halls before and after Sunday school for donations. Later that day, they will count and load the items, then haul them to the recipients.
Some education takes place before “game day.” The youths have learned about the county’s homeless population. It’s estimated that 60 percent are children, and 50 percent are under the age of 6, according to Family Promise.
“That’s just crazy,” said Alex Reinecke, 13, a Presbyterian youth. “And recently it’s been really cold.
It’s one thing to know the hungry and homeless exist in the world. It’s something else to know they live in your community.
“They see how easily they could be in those positions,’ said Beverly Ostrowski, interim associate pastor. “They see that they are not that different from those with needs in the community.
I don’t have a dog in the Super Bowl hunt, but I hope you enjoy the game. While you’re at it, cheer for the Souper Bowlers to reach their fund-raising goal.
In their game, there are no losers.
For more information about Souper Bowl of Caring, visit www.souperbowl.org.
Rick Badie’s column appears on Sundays Tuesdays and Thursdays. Contact him at 770-263-3875 or e-mail: rbadie@ajc.com.
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“From the back of the line”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
She got arrested four times.
She slept on cold, concrete jail floors. Jailers cursed her.
She was a teen at the time, a 16-year-old protesting state-sanctioned segregation in Albany, her hometown. Gloria Ward Wright, now 61, doesn’t think she suffered all that much.
Others, she said, fared worse.
“I rode the paddy wagon,” she told me, “but I didn’t get hurt like some of my classmates. One girl went to a mental institution, and she hasn’t been the same since.”
On Monday, the country pauses to observe the first and only black man to be honored with a federal holiday. There will be parades, marches, songs and sermons. Yet it seems like the essence of the holiday, reflection on the civil rights era, rings hollow.
Maybe it’s because we’re fat, jaded, content. Maybe it’s because we’re taught so little history about anything, much less what truly transpired back then. We lack knowledge of the unnamed and unheralded folks who risked life and limb for a moral movement.
Or as the oldtimers call it, “the struggle.”
“After a while, it’s going to be hard to believe it even happened,” said Wright, a retired high school teacher who holds master’s and doctorate degrees in theology/pastoral studies.
“We say keep Dr. King’s dream alive. Well, we have to keep the kids alive. The things that happen to kids today - it’s mind-boggling.”
Wright wants youth of all hues to know America’s civil rights history. Most important, she wants them to understand they can be agents of change. She’s written and self-published a book about the Albany Movement. It’s called “From the Back of the Line: The Views of a Teenager From the Civil Rights Movement.” It includes a poignant foreword written by a white Albany native on a path of reconciliation and redemption. (More on that later.)
Wright’s story doesn’t end with the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. She chronicles her life from the back of the line to current roles of activism. She taught high school for 25 years; she’s been a minister for 20, and is former pastor of Simmons Chapel AME Zion Church in Lawrenceville. She’s currently on tour for her book.
“The clarion call is to help - to help the homeless, to help the hurting, to help the hungry, to help the lost, to help the least, and yes, to help those left behind,” she writes in the book.
It’s a mindset shared by Robbie S. Moore, president of the United Ebony Society of Gwinnett County. This civil rights group recently lobbied hold-outs Snellville and Grayson to observe King Day. Wright’s book made Moore cry.
“The desire was in her heart to make a difference,” she said. “If only young people had that same feeling today.”
In 1962, a rally in Albany drew national media. Wright, then 16, was in the thick of it. An Associated Press story about the protest quoted two opposing views - those of Kay Smith, an 18-year-old white girl, and Wright’s. Their photos appeared with the article. The girls didn’t know each other; they attended segregated schools.
“I will give up my life for freedom and the children I hope to have someday to have,” Wright told the reporter.
Smith expressed an opposing view, one learned from her racist family, she told me.
The marches were “useless” and “just for publicity,” she told the reporter. She proclaimed she was a segregationist.
Those words haunt Smith to this day. She’s a Pedrotti now, but there’s been a profound change in her life aside from the name.
For decades, Pedrotti tried to find Wright. The women found each other through a mutual acquaintance. They met for the first time in 1997. An apology was given. Forgiveness offered. Foes became friends.
In 2000, Wright invited Pedrotti to Simmons Chapel AME Zion Church in Lawrenceville for a service of racial harmony. Journalists who attended the event wrote and photographed the women just as they’d done decades ago.
“Everyday of my life I regret saying what I said in that story,” Pedrotti told me. “I know I’ve been forgiven for it a dozen times by the Lord, Gloria and other friends, black and white.
“But it still hurts.”
Pedrotti, a former AJC reporter, lives in Lamar County. She, like Wright, shares the mission to educate.
She said young people, black or white, aren’t taught to respect people responsible for positive racial change. The fact that schools trivialize events like the civil rights movement and Holocaust doesn’t help.
“There has to be an intensive study,” she said.
Pedrotti gives workshops that help (mostly white) congregations understand their own prejudices. She’s a trained “anti-racism facilitator” for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
“Ask any 10 white people you know if they think they are privileged,” she said. “They will tell you, ‘no.’”
In the foreword she wrote for the book, Pedrotti praises Wright for her activism, past and current.
“The back of the line, the cold concrete floors of the jails, the swelling songs of the march - these things helped to shape her into the vessel that overflows with love,” she wrote.
“I’ve been splashed again and again. “Thank you Mrs. Gloria Ward Wright.”
For more information about Gloria Ward Wright’s book, visit www2.xlibris.com. Rick Badie’s column appears on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Contact him at 770-263-3875 or e-mail rbadie@ajc.com.
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“A lovely example of honoring, cherishing”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
She donated the overhead lift, wheelchairs and shower trolley to the Shepherd Center.
A paralyzed Secret Service agent got the bed, exercise mat and standing table.
The equipment had been Christopher J. Smith’s lifeline for nearly three years. Thirty-three months and two days, to be exact. He suffered a heart attack in March 2005. It left him in a vegetative state.
Kathy Smith, his wife of 17 years, didn’t put him in a nursing home, though. She retrofitted their Lawrenceville home so she could care for her husband, also a U.S. Secret Service agent.
She trained at the Shepherd Center to learn what to do. To sit him up. To stand him up. To exercise him from head to toe.
:We took it to the nth degree,” she said. “It’s what you do when you love someone.”
I first wrote about the Smiths in July 2006. That year daughter Caitlin ran the Peachtree Road Race to honor her dad, an avid jogger. Last June, I revisited the family to see whether there had been any improvement in Chris’ condition, something Kathy held out hope for. He’d begun to occasionally smile, hold his head up and lift his arms and legs. Kathy found joy in each small step.
Now, hope is gone, but not necessarily the way you might think.
It’s 6 a.m. Dec. 27. Time for Chris, 44, to get his morning liquid nourishment. He had the hiccups. Kathy prayed.
“I asked the Blessed Mother to cradle Chris in her arms and to make his hiccups go away,” she told me. “I told the Blessed Mother to whisper in sweet Jesus’ ear and ask him to take care of Chris.”
The hiccups lasted about 30 minutes. Kathy lay down on the couch to nap. She was awakened at 7 a.m. by a nurse arriving for duty.
“My hope is gone,” she said, “but I’m at peace. I’m not at peace with his death. I am at peace with how he went. That 30 minutes of prayer gave me peace. My hope is gone, but my circle isn’t broken because I know I will be with him again.”
I got an e-mail about Chris’ death during the holidays, while I was on vacation. The Badie tour stopped by to offer condolences Wednesday. I find Kathy’s commitment to her husband, their marriage, remarkable. Great love. Great strength. Great example. She kept her vow to honor and cherish till death.
Could you?
The Smiths enjoyed all types of music, especially rock. That’s what Chris listened to whenever he went jogging. “He was a headbanger,” Kathy told me.
He had a pair of boxer shorts that had “ACDC” printed on the front. A line from one of that band’s most favorite songs (and album title) graced the back: “For those about to rock …” The boxers were a gift from Caitlin, 16. She wanted him buried in them.
He was, on Jan. 2, in Hendersonville, N.C.
“I think [the boxers] were appropriate,” said Kathy, who asks that the community pray for her family. “He’s going to heaven to be with the angels. What beautiful music he’ll hear.”
Rick Badie’s column appears on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Contact him at 770-263-3875 or e-mail rbadie@ajc.com.
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“Who needs city life?”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
I’ve tried to remember the last time I drove to Atlanta for dining or entertainment.
I’ve been thinking about this since big news broke Monday on ajc.com that the Class AAA Richmond Braves, the minor-league team of the Atlanta Braves, may move to Gwinnett. The team has played in Richmond, Va., since 1966. A formal announcement is expected today.
This is huge.
It’s huge even if it fizzles and the affiliate stays put or looks elsewhere for a stadium. It’s huge because of what it says about the county. It’s huge, really, because of what it says about suburbs in general. So often they get painted with a brush so broad it could fill Turner Field.
You hear it ad nauseam.
The suburbs lack entertainment and sophisticated (translation: pricey) dining. Nothing but racists live “out there.” The burbs are vast, disconnected wastelands. They’re a mess of cookie-cutter subdivisions and strip malls. Soul-less sprawl, some of which I’ve criticized.
But hey, this isn’t Decatur. Over-development is a metro Atlanta problem, not just a Gwinnett one.
Where you live depends on who you are, your needs. City living isn’t better than suburban living, and vice versa.
I love Atlanta. Have nothing against it. The city, though, caters generally to young, professional singles, kidless couples and urbane empty nesters.
The new Gwinnett appeals primarily to folk like me: married with children. Fortunately for us, the county has long stopped playing second fiddle. More and more, there’s scant reason for me, any of us, really, to take I-85 south. Let’s talk food.
Think independent, international eateries, not Taco Bell and not Buford Highway. We’ve got it all. Indian. Thai. (My family and I had some from an organic joint Friday.) Chinese. Caribbean. Dominican. Vietnamese. Korean. Blangladeshi. Pakistani. And American, of course.
Let’s talk sports.
The Gwinnett Gladiators, a minor-league affiliate of the Atlanta Thrashers, play here. The Georgia Force, the Arena League football team, recently announced it will return to the Gwinnett Arena after playing for several years in Philips Arena. The ABA Atlanta Vision basketball team had its home opener at the Gwinnett Center on Friday. And, don’t forget high school athletics.
Let’s talk entertainment.
The Gwinnett Arena draws A-listers, from Elton John to Bruce Springsteen. Wild Bill’s, a colossal nightclub and performing arts hall, has found an audience. And smaller club venues - some offering live entertainment - are starting to find a niche.
Let’s talk shopping.
The mall options are mind-boggling, shamefully so. Discover Mills. Mall of Georgia. Gwinnett Place. The Forum. The Avenue Webb Gin. Huge.
You might argue there’s one area in which Gwinnett lags behind Atlanta: arts galleries, museums, the performing arts. Theater groups are closing the gap, though. And let’s be real: Not many of us pine to see a Picasso original or a Bearden collage. Maybe once every five or six years.
We’d much prefer to have a local baseball shrine, a pitch that helps define a broader sense of identity.
In a few years, a team and stadium might be right in our backyard.
Rick Badie’s column appears on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Contact him at 770-263-3875 or e-mail rbadie@ajc.com.
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“Housing counselors hopping in Gwinnett”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The car broke down.
Then the water heater tanked.
Big-ticket items. Right around Christmas, no less.
The homeowners fell behind on the mortgage payments. So they turned to the Consumer Credit Counseling Service of Greater Atlanta. It’s been hopping lately. The agency just announced a hiring blitz to help handle the thousands of clients trying to save their homes.
In Gwinnett, CCCS has two locations. One handles local walk-in clients. The other is a call center of 60 counselors who work with clients with issues like the couple above from Massachusetts.
The housing market has hit tough times. People are losing homes and falling behind on payments. Reasons vary. Some homeowners, though, are victims of material excess. They signed on to legal but risky financial schemes. Then the mortgage rates reset. Their monthly payment ballooned. Trouble.
I sympathize with anyone who loses a home. One group tangled up in the foreclosure crisis gripes me, though. It’s those folk who bought more house than they could afford. And knew it.
What makes a married couple that earns $70,000 a year think they can swing payments on a $275,000 house? With no down payment? The lender, mortgage broker or whoever tells said couple that they “qualify” for that amount should be ashamed.
Last year, the CCCS held 23,000 counseling sessions aimed at accessing finances and helping people avoid foreclosure. Just this December, they handled 3,500, wrote Scott Scredon, the agency spokesman, in an e-mail.
“In 2006, we did 6,579 foreclosure prevention sessions,” he wrote. “The number of counseling sessions has increased significantly … since President Bush’s program to help people with subprime adjustable rate loans was announced Dec. 6.”
CCCS “housing counselors” speak to people from all over the country. Generally, homeowners who contact the nonprofit have missed at least one mortgage payment. Typically, they are 42 years old, with households of three. Gross annual income is about $38,000. Monthly net income is $2,900. The mortgage payment tops $1,500.
And they have thousands of dollars in credit card debt.
On Friday, I listened as Kevin Weekley, a CCCS counselor, talked by telephone to the Massachusetts couple. They have two house loans. One’s for $998; the other $262. They were trucking along just fine till the car and hot water tank conked out.
Weekley collected information about their net monthly income ($2,802) and expenses ($2,119). It’s a good thing, he tells the wife, they have a decent discretionary income. The mortgage holder will be more amenable to working out a payment plan for the past due amount.
In fact, she says they’d already been contacted about such a plan and awaited the details. The past due amount probably will be divided, Weekley tells her, then tacked onto future monthly payments for a certain period of time.
He tellls her to contact him before agreeing to anything, though. The plan has to be an amount the family can withstand.
The wife asks one final question at the end of the 45-minute call.
Could they lose their house for missing one payment?
“They don’t want your house,” Weekley explains.
“They want your money.”
Rick Badie’s column appears on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Contact him at 770-263-3875 or e-mail rbadie@ajc.com.
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” A community embraces its home”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
I love that new car smell.
A sparkling new gymnasium smells pretty good, too. Must be the finish on the basketball court.
I inhaled it in Wednesday when the Badie Tour stopped by the new community recreation center at Lucky Shoals Park. It’s off Britt Road, near Tucker. A grand opening for the facility on Saturday attracted nearly 2,000 people.
And from the looks of things, the excitement and enthusiasm oozing from residents is expected to grow.
The park’s new face cost $6.5 million. Outdoor basketball courts and tennis courts were relocated, while volleyball and badminton courts were added. The gem of the project, though, is the community center/gymnasium. It’s expected to be the activity hub for an area that’s needed a recreational outlet - and equity from the county - for some time.
“It’s beautiful,” Steve Hunter wrote in an e-mail. “But it’s been on the drawing board for [several] years.”
Maybe that explains why residents are so jazzed up.
“Since Saturday, there have been people here everyday,” said Beth McWilliams, the programs supervisor. “As soon as the building opens at 9 a.m., people are here.”
The park is the home of The Mustangs, a recreational league for 4 to 14 year olds that has 17 basketball teams. More than 200 kids are expected to play soccer this season. Sports participation hasn’t always been high. My son played soccer there a few years back. His coach had to combine age groups to make a full team.
But sports aren’t expected to be the vehicle that makes or breaks the renewed park. The community center has a game room with a foosball table, air hockey table, pool table and board games. There’s room for meetings, classes and programs. An inaugural schedule graced the most recent edition of “Gwinnett Life,” the county parks publication.
“It will take time to tweak things to find out what the people want,” said Jim Cyrus, who oversees the county aquatics program.
This park’s physical amenities have always been popular. The playground stays packed. The 1.25-mile walking trail sees foot traffic from walkers, joggers and pet lovers.
Unfortunately, crime has found a home, too.
In 2003, a slaying took place in the parking lot. Just last year, a man attacked three women on the walking trail. Police described the attacks as attempted robberies; the suspect was not caught.
County officials downplay crime. They don’t think it will deter the renaissance.
“We have a good police presence, bike patrols,” said Cyrus. “I don’t think any of that will be an issue, really.”
I hope he’s right.
McWilliams, the programs supervisor, thinks patrons will behave.
“The community has been wanting this for so long,” she said. “Now that it’s here, they want to keep it nice. The best part of all of this is that people have embraced this. They’ve watched this building go up.
“It’s their home.”
Rick Badie’s column appears on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Contact him at 770-263-3875 or e-mail rbadie@ajc.com.
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“Pool-less Summer”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
It’s the gathering spot, the happening place.
Friday night movies. Themed dinner nights. July Fourth cookouts. Parties. Or no special reason at all.
It’s the swimming pool. My family practically lives at one during the summer time. And if you have young kids and a thin budget, yours probably do, too. Cheap, easy entertainment.
My Gwinnett neighborhood doesn’t have a neighborhood pool, so we joined the Mountain Creek pool. It’s located in a DeKalb neighborhood off Hugh Howell Road. It’s minutes from our house. Many of our friends either live there, or they’re people like us. We pay association fees for the right to enjoy the amenities and socialize. At the pool, everything happens.
Maybe not this summer, though.
You, like me, may have been taken aback by the headline on the front page of Saturday’s Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “Drought may outlaw pools,” it stated.
The staff-written story outlined the possibility that 2008 may be “The Summer Without Pools.” Four months ago, the state indefinitely banned most outdoor water use in North Georgia to conserve water. The ban will remain in effect if the state’s historic drought worsens or stays the same. That means thousands of public and private pools in metro Atlanta can’t be filled or have water added to them.
Of course, we might get enough rain between now and June to negate the need for the ban. Carol Couch, the head of the Environmental Protection Division, could grant an exemption to pools, but that would only serve to tick off entities that must still adhere to the ban. It’s not life-threatening to have a pool-less summer. It’s worse to titter on the fringes of running out of drinking water. Much blame has been laid on Mother Nature. The drought may be historic, but there’s a player in this water crisis that’s been just as dry: state leaders past and present.
A Dec. 12 Atlanta Journal-Constitution story detailed how Georgia’s water shortage was three decades in the making. It’s been fueled by false assurances of rainy years, state feuds and inaction. Potential solutions have died or gone uncompleted, the article showed.
“Drought-proof” regional reservoirs weren’t built. Dam plans were discarded. Georgia, Florida and Alabama engaged in a water war over withdrawals from Lake Lanier and Lake Allatoona. Environmentalists opposed solutions like new treatment plants and reservoirs.
One element has held steady in droughts past and present, though. Development. It’s drought-proof. The impact growth has on a dwindling water supply doesn’t get any consideration when projects are proposed in Gwinnett and other counties. Water doesn’t carry weight in building approvals.
So subdivisions and residential complexes continue to rise. Some have swimming pools, potential gathering spots, places to socialize.
How much those pools get used remains to be seen.
Right now, though, they can’t be much of a selling point.
Rick Badie’s column appears on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Contact him at 770-263-3875 or e-mail rbadie@ajc.com.
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