Another story about Walker 911 going down last week. But no mention of the second failure Wednesday morning, which we’ve also verified. The article hints problems may have begun before storms rolled through, which would likely connect the July 5th and July 11th 911 failures to a similar problem yet to be named.

This article, and a similar report on WQCH, claims that the problem only impacted landlines, not cell phones. But we’ve heard accounts of trouble with cells as well. Walker County Coordinator David Ashburn is the ultimate authority responsible for 911 in Walker County, and he’s spinning this story to cover his own considerable butt.

As we said earlier, it’s not a problem with the operators. They can’t answer phones that don’t ring. The person or persons, including Mr. Ashburn, supervising technology upgrades there are the ones at fault here. The center did an intentional software upgrade and did not set up their backups, which should have been done, and as a result at least one person’s life (if not more) came close to ending because they could not get emergency medical attention in a timely manner.

Despite the low-key response, this failure is a big bleeping deal. If 911 goes down again somebody – or somebodies – needs to lose their job over it.

This week’s Walker County Plus came with a free bonus: peelable, reusable Bebe Heiskell stickers that say “CNN Money / WALKER COUNTY / Where Unemployment is Tumbling!” over someone else’s paid advertising.

According to Walker Messenger employees, the paper (or its parent company) has a policy of placing stickers for one advertiser over ads for another, it’s not just about Heiskell or their editorial bias towards her. (This may explain why they’re in financial trouble. Who wants to risk running an ad under that?)

But the stickers are removable and reusable. Here’s where some of them ended up:

In light of the “Unemployment is Tumbling!” lie, this use seems appropriate.

Since upgrading equipment last month, Walker Co 911 has become unreliable. Multiple reports of people calling 911 for 20-30 minutes with no answer before looking up numbers for other emergency agencies. All dispatch for law enforcement, fire, and ambulance in Walker (incl. city agencies) is routed through 911. Major failure of public safety.

Last Thursday on the 5th an elderly gentleman had a heart attack and called Walker 911 for twenty minutes, before giving up and calling the only other emergency number he knew: GA State Patrol. GSP sent an ambulance, and the EMT’s said another half hour he would have died.

Wednesday morning at 2 AM an elderly lady fell and her sister (?) called 911 for a half hour, got no answer, and then called the Sheriff’s Office. After some explanation and discussion, the jail finally sent her an ambulance and said there was a problem with the phone lines at 911.

The first incident may have been related to the storms that came through that night. The one yesterday was definitely a system issue, some kind of upgrade or change that failed in the middle and took things down without a backup. Hopefully it won’t be repeated, regardless of reason or reasons. (911 operators aren’t at fault; You can’t answer a phone that doesn’t ring.)

No idea if they’re working on it or passing blame around from one place to another. But when somebody’s meemaw dies from an old person attack due to no answer at the 911 center, the county will get sued and be on the hook for all kinds of liability. As they should be.

TSPLOST is in trouble. State leaders from both parties are distancing themselves from it, saying they have personally voted down the tax this month even though they supported the bill when it came through the legislature in 2010.

Even some state Republican leaders who initially endorsed the plan are now calling it a tax increase, mainly because they don’t like the projects it will fund:

“The conservative GOP lawmaker [Chip Rogers] claimed many of the projects approved by roundtables of local officials after the bill passed will do nothing to relieve congestion and will burden taxpayers for years to come.

“He urged voters to reject the pre-approved project list, saying lawmakers can still come back in two years to create a better list.”

Especially relevant to us, the mayor of Dalton has come out against the tax too. If Whitfield County and Dalton vote against it, the entire region Walker County is in (including Dade, Catoosa, Whitfield, and Chattooga) will probably defeat the tax increase.

Dr. Shaw has publicly challenged Bebe to a debate with this ad appearing in local papers. Will the Queen accept, refuse, or simply ignore him? The deadline is Friday.

Shaw says he’s paid $500 to use the Civic Center next week and plans to have a discussion with the community whether Heiskell shows up or not. (Check the LU Local Calendar for all upcoming political events and activities, including this one.)

The Steve Wilson campaign has released a radio ad. Doesn’t seem like much to brag about after sixteen years.. We didn’t know the Sheriff’s Office wasn’t accredited – seems like four terms would be plenty of time to get that done already if it was really going to happen.

Let’s compare his accomplishments via this ad to his failures.

He implemented CHAMPS. Because the state Sheriff Association ended DARE so that’s pretty much.. the direction to go in. School resource officers – the only one WCSO provides is at Ridgeland. He promises better dispatch, but all the dispatch upgrades are being handled by Walker County gov’t not the Sheriff’s Office.

During the same time period he also ignored complaints about Tri-State Crematory for two years, let Sam Parker kill his wife after she asked Wilson directly for help, he knowingly let a deputy “date” a 14 year old girl and then did nothing except push the officer to resign when her dad complained about their sexual contact.. He let an officer pepperspray a handcuffed female in the back of a squad car and didn’t investigate the complaint. He let a former high-ranking department employee terrorize a neighborhood without an arrest. He turned a lot of murders into “suicides” and lowered the crime rate by not investigating quite a few reported crimes.

He certainly listens and responds to our needs. Just ask Gerry Cook or Theresa Parker how well he responds. Well maybe we can’t ask Theresa..

If you want to vote -or early vote- in Walker County but don’t have a ride, Walker Transit will provide you with a free trip to the Courthouse. 706-375-0803 for information. (We understand they don’t even care who you vote for.)

Early voting begins today all over Georgia. Our unofficial Facebook poll shows residents are more than twice as likely to early vote than vote normally on July 31st, but poll participants are more politically aware and active than the typical Walker County citizen.

Vote early if you need to, but we strongly encourage you to wait until the election is closer. Some information and discussions in the pipeline might very well change your mind, and after voting it’s too late to take your vote back.

Check back here later today this week for a rundown of candidate profiles and quotes from mainstream media.

LaFayette City Council meeting tonight at 7:30. Looks like little will be discussed, but you never know. Here’s the agenda, PDF file. Apparently SunRae Water didn’t bother rescheduling their cancelled appearance from last month’s meeting.

The Shaw campaign reports an unusually high number of campaign signs blowing over, falling down, being broken, or otherwise disappearing in mysterious ways as we head into early voting. What do you think – is this an accident or vandalism?

WQCH Radio, 07/05/12:

“A HUGE DEBIT CARD SCAM HIT LAFAYETTE AND NORTHWEST GEORGIA LAST THANKSGIVING, AND NOW, INVESTIGATORS SAY IT ORIGINATED OVERSEAS.

“LAFAYETTE POLICE CHIEF BENJIE CLIFT SAID INVESTIGATORS THINK A LOCAL EMPLOYEE PROBABLY ACCESSED A ‘COMPANY COMPUTER’ AT WORK, FOR PERSONAL USE. THE COMPUTER WAS APPARENTLY INFECTED WITH A VIRUS THAT RETRIEVED THE DEBIT CARD INFORMATION AND SENT IT OUT TO THE CRIMINALS, OVER THE INTERNET.

“MORE THAN 500 CUSTOMERS FROM SEVERAL AREA BANKS WERE AFFECTED, AND TENS-OF-THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS VANISHED FROM THEIR COLLECTIVE ACCOUNTS. MOST WERE REIMBURSED FOR THE LOSS BY THEIR BANKING INSTITUTION. THE FBI WAS THE LEAD AGENCY IN THE INTERNATIONAL INVESTIGATION.”

They’re being very careful not to say where the “local employee” worked – so what company would have enough credit card numbers on ONE computer at the same time to allow 500+ people’s cards to be stolen?

The same one we’ve said since day one.

LU broke this story on Facebook, and it was initially dismissed as a Facebook rumor. Once it became too big to ignore, law enforcement said it was a card clearing house, not done locally, and definitely not possibly Walmart.

LU Facebook, 11/23/11:

“Check with your bank for unauthorized charges to debit or credit cards in the last few weeks. A local bank confirms cards from ‘almost every’ local bank have been compromised, possibly through a hacked computer system at LaFayette Walmart.”

Turns out we weren’t wrong, at all. And it only took seven months..

LU Blog: Takesgiving Day

Last week Walker County mayors delivered updates on their respective cities. In LaFayette we have new leaders, golf, the airport, street renovations downtown, and a couple of positive changes in the small business community.

The only new info in this about LaFayette is the change at Syntec. Seems like nobody ever mentions Syntec but good to hear they’re doing well.

The TSPLOST sales tax is committed to ten specific projects in Walker County, valued at $34 million. Of that, only one worth $1.7 million, is for the 30728 ZIP code. The rest is for Chickamauga. $20 million is dedicated to the Wilson Rd. extension to nowhere. It also promises FORTY THOUSAND jobs, all in construction, and none local.

Meanwhile, Citizens for Transportation Mobility, a group dedicated to passing the TSPLOST sales tax, has yet to file state required reports about campaign finances. This org is spending tens of thousands of dollars to “sell” you on a tax you don’t need, but they haven’t said where the money is coming from and probably won’t until after the vote.

But apparently it all complies with state law:

“Part of the reason we have campaign disclosure laws at all is so that the public can be informed about who is donating to any particular campaign. The sources of campaign funding are part of how voters form opinions about candidates. But in Georgia, since early voting starts on July 9 and ballot committees are not required to disclose donations received or spent until the July 15th (at the earliest) a good number of voters will not be able to get that information until after they have voted. Citizens for Transportation Mobility did not write the disclosure laws, and they are adhering to them.”

An Anti-TSPLOST group is filing an open records request trying to figure out if the Secretary of State discussed controversial ballot language with any of the groups dedicated to pushing the measure through.