Police Department Warns of Hurricane Relief Scams

October 10, 2024
By: Dwayne Page

The Smithville Police Department is warning residents to beware of donation scams claiming to support hurricane victims.

“We are seeing more and more good, honest people being scammed out of the money they work hard for, sometimes in the thousands, right here in Smithville. We should help our neighbors out, but the police department also wants people to be aware that there are crooks that prey on good hearted people. We see it regularly,” said Captain Steven Leffew.

After Storms, Watch Out for Scams,

Natural disasters and severe weather can create opportunities for fraud in their wake, occurring at a time when people may be especially vulnerable, or targeting charitable intentions. Scammers use phone, text, mail, email, and even go door to door to target residents of affected areas following hurricanes and damaging storms.

Watch Out for Red Flags

First, know that officials with government disaster assistance agencies do not call or text asking for financial account information, and that there is no fee required to apply for or get disaster assistance from FEMA or the Small Business Administration. Anyone claiming to be a federal official who asks for money is an imposter.

Remember that phone scams often use spoofing techniques to deliberately falsify the information transmitted to your caller ID display to disguise their identity or make the call appear to be official.

If someone calls claiming to be a government official, hang up and call the number listed on that government agency’s official website. Never reveal any personal information unless you’ve confirmed you’re dealing with a legitimate official. Workers and agents who knock on doors of residences are required to carry official identification and show it upon request, and they may not ask for or accept money.

Steps for Avoiding Post-Disaster Insurance Scams

If you get a phone call about an insurance claim or policy, don’t give out any personal information or agree to any payment until you can independently verify that the call is legitimate. If the caller says they’re from your insurance company, hang up and contact your agent or the company directly using the number on your account statement. Policyholders with the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP Direct) can call 1-800-638-6620.

Contractors and home improvement companies may also call claiming to be partners with your insurance provider. Never give policy numbers, coverage details, or other personal information out to companies with whom you have not entered into a contract. If your state requires licensing, verify that any contractor you are considering is licensed and carries adequate insurance. Many states have online databases you can check.

Disaster Relief Charity Scams
Consumers should also be aware of scammers posing as representatives of charities seeking donations for disaster relief. There are several steps you can take to protect yourself from this type of fraud:
▪ Donate to trusted, well-known charities. Beware of scammers who create fake charities during natural disasters. Always verify a charity’s legitimacy through its official website. If you have doubts, you can check with Better Business Bureau’s Wise Giving Alliance, Charity Navigator, Charity Watch, or GuideStar. You can also check with the National Association of State Charity Officials whether charities must be registered in your state and if the charity contacting you is on file with your state.

▪ Verify all phone numbers for charities. If you need to contact a charity by phone, check the charity’s official website to see if the number you have is legitimate. If you’re using text-to-donate, check with the charity to ensure the number is legitimate before donating.

▪ Do not open suspicious emails. If you receive a suspicious email requesting donations or other assistance, do not click on any links or open any attachments. Scammers regularly use email for phishing attacks and to spread malware.

▪ Verify information in social media posts. Double-check any solicitation for charitable donations before you give. Crowd-funding websites often host individual requests for help but they are not always vetted by the site or other sources.

To report suspected fraud, call the FEMA Disaster Fraud Hotline toll free at 1-866-720-5721. If you need to report other fraudulent activities during or following a natural disaster, please notify FEMA at 1-866-720-5721 or disaster@leo.gov.

You can also file a complaint with the FCC about phone scams, or with the FTC about fraud.
Consumer Help Center.

FCC consumer guides provide tips on avoiding caller ID spoofing and robocalls that may help you avoid being scammed. To learn more about scams and how to avoid them, check out the FCC Scam Glossary or visit the FCC Consumer Help Center at fcc.gov/consumers.

October 9, 2024
By: Dwayne Page

Democrats and Republicans don’t agree on much but when it comes to the theft of political signs they are on the same page. It must be stopped.

Both parties have recently been victims of theft or vandalism of political signs.

Each of the local party leaders has spoken out about the concern.

“Every single one of the large signs we put up in DeKalb County has been vandalized in less than a week,” said Jonathan Bradley, Chairman of the DeKalb County Democratic Party.

“It is unfortunate that some folks have decided that theft and vandalism are their response to other people’s free speech. I believe that most of the members of our community are willing to freely discuss ideas, and that only a small, misguided minority are responsible for these acts. If their goal was to intimidate or silence us, they have failed,” said Bradley.

“Unfortunately, we’ve had a number of our signs stolen or vandalized this year, many just in the last few days,” said Ryan Mollinet, Chairman of the DeKalb County Republican Party. “It’s one thing to show support for your candidate, but it’s never acceptable to destroy or steal an opponent’s sign. We encourage anyone who witnesses theft or vandalism of campaign signs to report it immediately to the local Police or Sherriff’s Office. It’s wrong, and illegal.”

Any information regarding the removal and destruction of candidates’ signs, should be reported to the Smithville Police Department, Alexandria Police Department, DeKalb County Sheriff’s Department, or the Tennessee Highway Patrol office.

October 9, 2024
By: Dwayne Page

The county commission may be getting serious about funding construction of a new elementary school.

(Click link below to view plan)

School Plans

During a joint meeting Tuesday night with the Board of Education and Director of Schools, the County Commission and County Mayor heard from Brian Templeton of Upland Design Group, the school board’s architect on plans to build a new 800 student Pre-K to 2nd grade elementary school to replace the existing Smithville Elementary complex. The construction would be on property adjacent to Northside Elementary School.

Templeton conducted a power point presentation showing a rendering of the proposed new school as well as the schematic design and floor plans. The commission had first been shown the plans in a joint meeting with the school board two years ago.

According to Templeton, the plans are exactly the same except for the cost. In September 2022 the projected cost to build this proposed 124,207 square foot facility was $46,199,875. Today, the projected cost is $53,414,825.

“We have seen that within construction, material costs have stabilized over the last little bit. We are not seeing the volatility that we were seeing two years ago but what we still see is that labor is really the thing that is hard to pin down,” said Templeton. “ In the costs, we have taken what we had previously and added some inflation. We’re targeting roughly around a $375 square foot value. I did make some calls a couple of weeks ago to contractors that had some recent projects, and they reaffirmed that to be a pretty good reasonable number to base an estimate upon,” said Templeton.

Still, the county commission may be poised to proceed with the project through the issuance of a 30-year bond using available local option sales tax funds and interest income on bond proceeds without an increase in the property tax rate if the four municipalities agree to extend their sales tax agreements with the county for the life of the bond. Under those agreements, which are set to expire in 13 years on July 16, 2037 the cities turn over to the county for schools a greater percentage of their local option sales tax collections than they would otherwise be required to do. That money goes into what is called the Local Purpose Tax Fund for Schools to help fund school operation and debt.

Some city leaders have apparently been reluctant to commit to an extension until the county gets serious about new school construction.

Commissioner Tom Chandler said his concern was that issuing a long-term bond to build one school might limit available funding for maintenance and future infrastructure needs at the other four schools.

Since this was only a workshop the county could take no vote on moving forward with the project, but the county budget committee will take up the issue soon and will need a commitment from the cities on extending those sales tax agreements.

“It seemed to be quite evident at this meeting that everybody on the county commission and school board thought that the new elementary school was in fact a good idea and definitely needed. We didn’t have any opposition tonight. We had full support for this project from the county commission, school board, the director of schools and myself,” said County Mayor Matt Adcock.

“We will send this back to the budget committee for them to review. Any time we deal with our debt service fund we always like to take that to our budget committee and let them review our debt forecast. We do believe with a sales tax agreement extension with the municipalities this will probably not need a property tax increase,” Adcock explained. “Through those sales tax collections we believe we could fund a new elementary school at the $53 million price tag if it’s a 30-year bond. A large step in this process now is going to be getting the municipalities including Alexandria, Liberty, Dowelltown, and Smithville to extend the sales tax agreements for at least the life of the bond. Right now our sales tax agreements with them will end on July 16, 2037. We will need to extend those agreements for up to 30 years from when that project begins for that bond,” said County Mayor Adcock.

Director of Schools Patrick Cripps said he likes what he heard from the county commission Tuesday night “It was a very productive meeting. I appreciate the county commission and County Mayor Adcock for having this meeting and allowing Upland Design Group to come and present our project and what we see as a need. This is exactly the same building we originally proposed. Nothing has changed except for the costs. Its gone up considerably but it is the same building. I really love the footprint and layout of it. I think the people of DeKalb County would be proud of it. I think it would be very efficient for our students and our teachers. It keeps everything under one roof and limits the foot space that students would have to travel from one place to another,” said Director Cripps.

The new project budget estimate according to Upland Design Group:

Building & Sitework: 124,207 square feet x $375: $46,577,675

Additional bus and car drives to connect the two schools-10,000 square yards: $650,000

Survey: $32,000

Additional Subsurface investigation: $10,000

Construction Testing: $200,000

Construction Contingency: $1,250,000

Architectural & Engineering Fees: $2,360,000

Fire Marshal Review Fee: $85,000

Loose Furniture/IT & AV Equipment: $2,250,000

Playground: Not Included

Total Estimated Project Cost: $53,414,625

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