Gang Violence coming to South Bibb?

I read a WMAZ-TV story in which a gang consultant mentioned gang graffiti on a stop sign along Houston Road. Maybe it was put there by thugs to mark future territory. It makes me unhappy to see this and I hope we have the South Bibb ethic, handed down from generation to generation, which makes everyone make those who want to "trash up" the neighborhood very unwelcome.

I believe much of the gang activity in South Bibb will be bred in the new houses growing where soybeans once did. There is an apartment complex and trailer park between Hartley Bridge and Houston Road to provide fertile ground. I am hoping at some point in the future that a community meeting will bring up this issue.

Warner Robins likely has more of a gang issue than its spinmeister, Detective Karen Stokes of the local police, wants to tell us (per WMAZ TV reports last year). Let's not make the same mistake. Identifiy that the problem exists, and to what extent. Then freeze out the gang members and their permissive parents. It would not hurt for everyone who is compentent to handle a gun to own one- if nothing else for deterring a collateral effect from dope fiends who seek to harm property or person.

Given what happened to Deputy Joe Whitehead I do not see where the Bibb County Sheriff's Department will be leninet in the event of drug and gang apprehensions. They don't need to be. With using deadly force they should stop short of being judge, jury and executioner- but VERY short.

If this were 75 years ago the only gang members you would see in South Bibb would 1)have stripes where people in the neighborhood beat them or 2) be headed out on a wagon with their belongings.

I heard an elderly man tell me some 15 years ago of a crippled WWI vet who drank too much while his kids starved. The locals burned a cross on his front lawn. Yes, he was white. When this failed to modify his behavior they took a stick and beat his butt.

I will say this; if I move to another town with as much or more of a gang issue it will be where intellect and hard work rule whenever the gangs do not. If Middle Georgia does not deal with the issue and keeps on relying on Robins AFB to save its economic hide we will be a festering ulcer much like a dying Steel Belt town.

KAT

03/26/06
I just got back from Charleston. The drive there is a seemingly goofy, down-and-up, path to Interstate 95 via Interstate 16. I went to see the old town though I couldn't buy a whole lot due to my slimline budget. I also have this darned cap on my tooth that precludes me from having sticky or hard candies.

Vacation started on my off day of Wednesday. I slept late like an idiot and woke up in time to take Sam, our newest acquistion to the feline fleet, in to the vet. He gave him a leukemia and rabies shot, prescribed antibiotics for a puncture wound to the ear, and told us to hustle back with him in three weeks for a leukemia shot and a test. Then he would be glad to have him neutered.

I packed and decided to do the darned rail for the hallway late at night. Mom encouraged me to go to bed. I woke up at 10 AM that Thursday and had lunch with Mom and Dad. At 1:00 I left for Charleston. I packed my rucksack for an overnight camping trip in case I went to the park in Aiken. I figured on returning that Sunday.

I drove along Interstate 16. At the old Nike site (missile base) in Jeffersonville I saw a water tower rise up. Its rusty, dark shell looked so much like a relic of the Cold War days. Yet I knew towers and ships made of steel look like a woman without makeup. The radar stands were gone and so was everything else but the metal ground-mounted water tank and generator building left from the Cold War. I regret having the base ripped down but historic preservation won't butter the bread that an industrial park will.

I drove on and made a wee-wee call in the woods near Dudley. I almost fell asleep several times until I got to Metter. I had the strongest stimulant you can get from outside a drugstore- Waffle House Coffee. I got gas and kept going. I turned north at Interstate 95 and went up 17 then back up 95 in a miscue at Hardeeville.

I made it to Charleston at 7 PM or so. I went to Blassinger's (or whatever) the barbecue place is on the Savannah Highway. I drove to the Days Inn off Johnnie Dodds Boulevard in Mount Pleasant. This was after I cursed the remaining skeleton of the old Ashley River bridge and said, "They finally tore the son of a XX down". I hated that bridge and Dad hated it even more; it was designed for Model T's and we had no such vehicle when we went to Patriot's Point in 1980 and 1988.

Next day: Market Street and the cold
Saturday; Yorktown, Laffey, Clamagore, and the cutter Ingham.