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(Quilters meet, see p.3)
Volume 118 Number 49 - USPS 225-680
Prairie County, Arkansas
Wednesday, January 17, 2018
Community Events Calendar Wednesday January 17 Friendship Luncheon DeValls Bluff Methodist Church 11:30am- 2:00pm Thursday January 18 Master Gardeners’ meeting 6:00p.m. - 7p.m. Hazen Library Craft Day Noon - 1:00 p.m. Hazen Hornet Basketball @ Brinkley 4:00 pm JG ,JB, SG, SB Hazen City Council Meeting 6:00pm- 7:00pm City Hall Friday January 19 Hazen Hornet Basketball Hornets Nest Jacksonville Lighthouse 4:30pm 7G, JB, SG, SB Monday January 22 Hazen School Board Meeting 6:00pm-7:00pm Thursday January 25 Bingo Hazen Public Library Commodities Distribution First United Methodist Church 10:30am-12:30pm
Community events brought to you by Hazen Chamber of Commerce and the
Please call F&M Bank (255-3042) or The Grand Prairie Herald (255-4538) to list events.
Hazen mayor addresses Quorum Court about 911 dispatches and county prisoner releases Hazen mayor, David Duch, spoke with the members of the Prairie County Quorum Court to discuss a letter received from Prairie County Sheriff Rick Hickman concerning the dispatching of city policemen to 911 incidents happening within the county. The letter, dated December 7, 2017, states, “...as of February 1, 2018, the Prairie County Sheriff’s Department will be only dispatching for the the following: 911 calls, ambulance calls, and fire calls.” The letter goes on to say that the city should establish a dispatch to handle its own routine police radio traffic, including ACIC traffic and warrants entered. The cities of Des Arc and DeValls Bluff also received the same letter. Present at the December 9th meeting were County Judge Mike Skarda and Justices Doyle Sullins, Gary King, Lawrence Holloway, Ronnie Eans, Lucas Childress, Bobby Willeford, Dennis Tipton, Eddie Ciganek, and Mary Sue Roe. Also attending were Prosecuting Attorney Tim Issac and County Clerk Gaylon Hale. Duch informed the Court that he and Hazen Chief of Police Bradley Taylor went to speak with Hickman after receiving the letter about the change and requested that the county go back to its policy of dispatching the closest available officers, be they county or city. In the past, the 911 dispatcher has requested
that city police officers answer the 911 calls if they are closer than the County Sheriff’s Department officers. This practice allowed for shorter response times during an emergency. “We want to help,” Duch said. “We feel that’s part of our job.” Duch related an incident when the Arkansas State Police were asked to cover a 911 call within the Hazen city limits, but the Hazen police department was not called. Hickman said that Hazen could request to go on a 911 call, but he did not say that the dispatcher would be told to send the Hazen city police on calls if they were closer to the scene. Justice Ciganek remarked that he just wanted the first person to answer a 911 call to get there quickly, no matter where they are from. Since its beginning, the county 911 system has been subsidized by the cities within the county. Hazen and Des Arc pay $12,000 per year, while DeValls Bluff and Biscoe pay $6000. The City of Hazen also paid $108,000 to the county for tickets written and processed through the Hazen City Court. Sheriff Hickman’s complaint, and the reason for the letter, was about the number of Arkansas Crime Information Center (ACIC) traffic and warrant calls made by the Hazen Police Department and other police departments. He stated that Hazen posted 2 to 3 policemen on Interstate 40 to write tickets non-
Williams Singers to present concert Choral music will be the emphasis of the day as the Williams Singers from Williams Baptist University, Walnut Ridge, Arkansas will present music on January 21, 2018 at 5:00pm at the Pleasant Ridge Missionary Baptist Church. Members of the choir include Hazen High School graduates Hunter Ingle and Monica Griffith. The Williams Singers, in their 33rd year under the direction of Dr. Bob G. Magee. is a 26 member group which is selected by audition. For church appearances, the Williams Singers’ program features a variety of scared music included classical, spirituals, and
contempory arrangements. The Williams Singers are well known for their adherence to high spiritual and musical ideals. They travel extensively during the academic year representing Williams Baptist University in churches, state Baptist conventions, youth meetings, and civic groups. The program is open to the public and is free of charge.
stop. “I had to reel ‘em in a little,” he said. The city limits of Hazen include the south side of Interstate 40 from the Prairie and Lonoke County line to mile marker 198. When asked about this number, Chief Taylor, in a separate interview, said that 3 officers do usually cover the interstate area, but in overlapping shifts, so that there are never more than two at the interstate at a time. Taylor also said that the Hazen Police Department is often called to assist the AR State Police in the county, and this includes on the interstate. Both Duch and Taylor admitted that the radio traffic is higher on the weekends. According to a log book comparison of the City of Hazen ACIC calls between October 1, 2017 and December 28, 2017 to those ACIC calls made by the Sheriff’s Department that Mayor Duch acquired through the Freedom of Information Act, 962 were made by the city and 891 were made by the county. The chart shows that radio traffic over the weekends vary between the two departments, with Hazen and the county logging as many as 118 calls and as
few as 14 calls for Hazen and 17 calls for the county over different weekends. Hickman admitted that the Hazen Police Department used the radio system about a third of the time, with the county and the rest of the cities making up the other two-thirds. Hickman said that he had told Duch that Hazen should buy radios for two of their cars so that the policemen could do their own ACIC checks. The radios would cost the city $5000 apiece. The Hazen council refused to pass funding for these at their last meeting, saying that the county should buy them, but Duch has since said that he has already budgeted for this expense and will present it at the next city council meeting. When asked by the court how Des Arc reacted to the sheriff’s letter, Mayor Jim Garth said, “After we got our letter, we worked it out.” He did not say what agreement had been reached. Duch also let the justices know that Hazen prisoners taken to the county jail were being released by the sheriff. Hickman defended this, saying that misdemeanor arrests can be released by the sheriff. Skarda thanked Duch
I-4 40 closed at White River Construction for the Interstate 40 White River replacement bridge requires overnight lane closures on I-40 near the White River Tourist Information Center, according to Arkansas Department of Transportation (ARDOT)
officials. Weather permitting; from Monday, January 15 through Friday, January 19 the outside westbound lane will be closed daily from 8:00 p.m. to 7:00 a.m. the following morning. Traffic will be controlled with signage and
traffic drums. Drivers should exercise caution when approaching and traveling through all highway work zones. Additional travel information can be found at IDriveArkansas.com or ARDOT.gov. You can also follow us on Twitter @myARDOT.
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Correction The date for 24th Agribusiness Conference was incorrect in the headline last week. The date for the event is Wednesday, February 14. The Herald apologizes for the mistake.
for the report, but the justices took no action on the complaints. In other business, the judge reported that the newly purchased radio system is expected to be up and running up by January 24th. Skarda also said that money had been received by the county for the sale of the Nichols land, and that $10,146.82 had been received from the pipeline company. He also said that approximately $500,000 had been spent on the Des Arc Library, but none of that money came out of the county’s general fund. All of the funding came from gifts, grants, and in-kind work. He told the justices that another $20,000 was needed “at most” to get heating and air for the building. He plans for the library to pay for at least one-half of that amount from county library funds. There was a mistake in the hourly wages of a county worker, and the court agreed unanimously to cover the mistake without penalizing the worker. The county had accidentally paid $14.71 an hour, when it should have paid only $14.17 per hour. With no other business, the Quorum Court adjourned.
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