By David Fisher Staff Reporter

  

    “It was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do,” said Supervisor of Highways Kermit Hopper during Thursday night’s regular monthly meeting of the Weakley County Highway Commission and Public Works Committee, which meet jointly. Hopper was referring to the fact that his department has eliminated seven full-time positions, because of an extremely tight budget year.

 

Employee Layoffs

 

    “We’ve had to do a lot of carving since our last meeting; and it got pretty brutal before it was all said and done,” Hopper said. “By August, we will have eliminated seven positions in our labor force that will be permanent layoffs. It wasn’t mandatory. But I had a choice.”

    Hopper explained that he could either shift funds out of line items for materials in order to have enough money in the budget to pay the salaries of all Highway Department employees, and not have any material to work with, or layoff employees.

    “We had already trimmed materials in order to get the budget balanced and it wasn’t doing it,” Hopper said.

He stated that two of the seven laid-off employees would be retiring in the near future anyway, but the rest would be unemployed. Hopper pointed out that the county would have to pay these laid-off workers unemployment benefits for a total of up to 39 weeks (26 weeks, plus a 13 week extension recently installed).

    “We’re a victim of circumstances,” Hopper said, explaining that the combination of rising fuel and material costs, especially for steel culverts and oil-based road construction products, on the one hand, and a decrease in local and state revenues on the other, has resulted in a very tight budget. This has resulted in a layoff of seven employees, reducing the department’s available manpower, and lowered purchasing power due to inflation.

    As a result of seven fewer positions at the Highway Department, the number of employees, counting Supervisor Hopper and Secretary Landa Harris, will be reduced to a total of 38 full-time jobs and one part-time janitorial position.

 (Read the rest of this story in the July th print edition of the Dresden Enterprise.)

    Court proceedings have been continued for a 30-year-old Gleason man accused of murdering his father during a domestic dispute earlier this year.

    During deliberations in Weakley County General Sessions Court on Wednesday, July 9, Thomas Randall “Randy” Pruitt, had his preliminary hearing date reset for July 30, 2008.

    Pruitt was arrested on May 15, 2008, when a domestic dispute led to the fatal shooting death of his father, 61-year-old James Thomas “Doodle” Pruitt, at the family home located at 2570 East Grove Road, between Gleason and McKenzie.

    According to Weakley County Sheriff’s Department Investigator Randall McGowan, the shooting occurred when James Pruitt attempted to intervene in a domestic dispute between his wife and their son, Randy Pruitt.

    Pruitt, who has remained jailed in the Weakley County Detention Center without bond since his arrest, is charged with second-degree murder, a Class A Felony.

    The Public Defender’s Office, staffed by Public Defender Joe Atnip and Assistant Public Defender Colin Johnson, has been appointed to represent Pruitt.

 

(Read the rest of this story in the July 16th print edition of the Dresden Enterprise.)

   A 20-year-old Martin woman has been charged with child neglect after her two young children were found wandering the streets naked while she was at home asleep.

   At approximately 9 a.m. Saturday, July 12, Patrolman Marty McClure and Patrolman Brad Cook of the Martin Police Department responded to the scene after receiving a call about the two naked children walking alone in the middle of the road in the area of Ralph Street and Fonville Street.

    When Ptl. McClure spoke to the two children, they were unable to give the officers directions back to their home and were too young to communicate very well. However, Patrolman Brad Cook recognized the two youngsters from a call earlier in the week (Monday, July 7), involving the same children walking out of the house at 101 Parrish Street Apt. B, while their mother, Amanda Jean Heisler, was sleeping.

    Ptl. Cook went to the mother’s residence and found that Heisler was asleep again. Upon speaking to the mother, Heisler told the officers she did not know where her children were. She also stated that she had been asleep and was unaware that the children were walking the street alone.

 

(Check out the rest of this story in this week's print edition of the Dresden Enterprise!)