Chancellor Reschedules Hearing in Animal Coalition Case Against the City

April 10, 2021
By: Dwayne Page

It may be late June before Chancellor Ronald Thurman has another hearing on the animal shelter issue.

A tentative date is set for June 24.

In the meantime a temporary restraining order will remain in place to keep the City of Smithville from intervening in the operation of the Animal Shelter which is under the control of the DeKalb Coalition for Humane Treatment of Animals, INC.

Chancellor Ronald Thurman extended the order during a hearing in DeKalb County Chancery Court on Tuesday morning, March 30. The proceeding went longer than expected and had to be cut short before all the proof was presented in order that Chancellor Thurman could make it to a noon court session in another county.

Chancellor Thurman kept the temporary restraining order against the city intact until another hearing, now set for June 24, in which both sides will get to finish making their case. Chancellor Thurman also wants the County to join in the hearing because it has a stake in the matter.

The Coalition, represented by attorney Sarah Cripps, is seeking to make the temporary restraining order against the city permanent and for the Chancellor to construe and interpret provisions of both the Coalition’s lease and contract with the City as well as the Coalition’s memorandum of understanding with the County.

City attorney Vester Parsley is asking that the temporary restraining order against the city be dismissed.

Both the city and the coalition claim they are in charge of operating the animal shelter and that the two full time employees work for them.

Chancellor Thurman may sort it out at the next hearing.

April 9, 2021
By: Dwayne Page

A policy for weighting TN Ready and End of Course test scores in determining final grades of DeKalb County students has been suspended this year due to the continued disruptive Covid-19 pandemic

DeKalb Board of Education Meeting Thursday Night April 8 from dwayne page on Vimeo.

The DeKalb County Board of Education made the move during its regular monthly meeting Thursday night.

Weighting is a mathematical calculation used to give more importance to certain assessments when determining an overall score.

In DeKalb County, the policy is to weight students’ TN Ready and End of Course test scores by 15% in grades 3-5, 6-8, and 9-12 in calculating final grades. That portion of the testing policy is being suspended just for this year.

State lawmakers approved legislation this year designed to hold teachers, schools and districts harmless for standardized testing results from the 2020-21 school year and included a provision to allow districts to decide how much this year’s test scores should weigh in on a student’s final grade.

“Due to Covid we had discussed possibly changing the percentage of the weighted scores for TN Ready and End of Course testing. What they (Tennessee School Boards Association) recommended is if we did any changes to suspend lines 3-7 of our (Weighting policy). We did a survey among the staff in our system and the majority voted in that survey to suspend the testing value for this year for the TN Ready and End of Course,” said Director of Schools Patrick Cripps.

Meanwhile, in other business Chris Stites of the Tennessee Risk Management Trust presented a safety grant award of $5,200 to the DeKalb County School District to improve employee safety in the workplace.

“We are your workers comp and property, casualty insurance company but we are also a trust, a public entity and our board voted to include you among the 32 of our 200 public entities to receive a safety grant this year. We are awarding this grant of $5,200 to the DeKalb County School District to help reach some of your safety goals,” said Stites.

Due to DCHS Graduation on Friday, May 14, the Board of Education voted to have the next regular monthly meeting a week earlier on May 6 at 7 p.m. at the Ernest Ray Education Center instead of May 13.

At the beginning of the meeting Thursday night the Board of Education observed a moment of silence for 18 year old Cassie Maxwell, a DCHS senior who died in a car crash Monday; retired teacher Ann Puckett who passed away last week; and Freda Johnson, a school bus aide who died in March.

After the meeting Board Chairman Danny Parkerson told WJLE that one of the three Board of Education scholarships to be awarded to members of the DCHS Class of 2021 next month will be in memory of Cassie Maxwell and will go to a DCHS senior who had attended DeKalb West School.

April 8, 2021
By:

DeKalb County has secured a $500,000 HOME program grant from the Tennessee Housing Development Agency (THDA) to help local families with home repairs.

County Mayor Tim Stribling says the $500,000 grant will be split among those residents who are currently living in substandard conditions. The Upper Cumberland Development District (UCDD) will be monitoring the grant which will have an application process. Once applications are received, a priority list will be formed based on the level of rehabilitation work required and socioeconomic factors of each applicant. This will help determine how many homes can be repaired. “We are very pleased to have received this grant and appreciate THDA’s investment in DeKalb County,” said County Mayor Stribling.

HOME program funding is intended to help families of low income, senior citizens, and individuals with disabilities who cannot afford to bring their homes up to code. Officials anticipate helping homeowners with issues such as leaking plumbing, unsafe flooring, faulty wiring, damaged roofs, and more.

Informational meetings will be held at the following locations to learn more about the application procedures and grant guidelines
April 12: Alexandria- Fairgrounds in the Kenneth Sandlin Building
April 19: Smithville- Community Complex in the Auditorium
April 26: Austin Bottom- Austin Bottom Fire Hall
May 3: Keltonburg- Community Center
All meetings will be held at 6:00 p.m. Please wear a mask and maintain social distancing during these events.

The HOME program is funded by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and administered in Tennessee by THDA. HOME grants must be used for the production, preservation, or rehabilitation of affordable housing for low and very low-income families and individuals.

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