County Awards Two for Community Service

March 26, 2024
By: Dwayne Page

Good citizens doing good deeds!

Eddie Ramos and Tara Hunt, operators of Kayaking Adventures of Tennessee were honored by the county commission and county mayor with “Community Service Awards” during Monday night’s regular monthly meeting for the volunteer work they do in collecting, bagging, and properly disposing of litter from the lake and other places in the county.

The effort is part of the couple’s KAT Challenge urging communities to keep waterways clean.

“Eddie and Tara have done some great things for DeKalb County. After the Jamboree they cleaned up around the square and they have taken all kinds of trash out of hollows, etc and have helped clean up DeKalb County to make it a better place. We want to recognize them with community service awards,” said County Mayor Matt Adcock.

The commission voted unanimously to approve the recognition awards.

In December, 2022, Eddie and Tara were recognized by the Smithville Mayor and Aldermen for cleaning up streets in the downtown square area of the leftover candy and debris from the Smithville Christmas Parade. At that time, Mayor Josh Miller and the aldermen thanked and applauded Eddie and Tara for their work in bagging the garbage on a Sunday for city workers to easily pick up the following Monday morning.

Kayaking Adventures of Tennessee offers guided kayak trips to Burgess Falls in Sparta.

From that guided tours experience Eddie and Tara came up with the idea for a KAT Challenge giving participants on the trips the option to carry along a bag provided by KAT to pick up as much trash as possible. The person who collects the most on the trip gets a shiny new KAT Challenge Button and their picture on the KAT website and on the KAT Challenge Page. All who participate also get a special shout-out on the KAT FB and Instagram pages for being protectors of beautiful Tennessee waterways.

Hunt said much of the cleanup effort is done during the fall and winter season.

“We do this cleanup on every kayak trip through out KAT Challenge competition and in our off season we devote as much of our time as possible to cleaning up DeKalb, White, and Putnam counties. We do cleanups all winter long, at least four or five days a week,” said Hunt. “We have a big trailer that we usually have our kayaks in, and we take it out, go all over, and fill it up as well as our pickup truck. I consider it a hobby. I love doing it. The more trash we can get the more fun it is for me. We post our cleanup events in the wintertime on our personal pages and people can join us and they often do. We have had people on kayaks come with us out on the water in some of our organized cleanups. We do a lot with responsible stewardship so they will organize a cleanup and we will go to places like Watts Bar Lake and help with their cleanups,” said Hunt.

“We welcome anyone to join us or to clean up their own part of the lake or neighborhood because it makes a difference,” said Ramos. “When we go back to the places we have cleaned up there is a lot less litter than there had been before. When you start going out in nature and you see how beautiful it is and then you start seeing people throw stuff down or not packing it up and taking it back out, that is something that bothers me,” added Ramos. “We just went to Burgess Falls this last Saturday. We try to keep the base of that clean. It’s a state park. There was a big group of people who had just left and they had thrown all their apple cores and orange peels on the ground. The orange peels take two years to break down. Plus, its not natural to the environment. We picked all that up and left it prettier for the next group who decides to go down there,” said Ramos.

“We started doing recycling on the plastics we were getting,” Ramos continued. “The first time we decided to do recycling was when we went to Four Seasons Marina. We collected tons of plastic. That led us to going to the basketball games and other places and cleaning up their plastic,” said Ramos.

Eddie and Tara said the county’s solid waste department has also been a big help in their cleanup effort.

“The solid waste department is letting us bring tires, etc,” said Hunt.

“Tires is one of the main things we pull from the lake and (County Solid Waste Director) James (Goff) has been a blessing to allow us to pile those tires there,” added Ramos.

In addition to Goff, Eddie and Tara said they appreciate all the support and encouragement they have received from the community and especially to Center Hill Lake Resource Manager Kevin Salvilla, the state parks, the county mayor and county commission, and local businessman and county commissioner Tony Luna.

March 25, 2024
By: Dwayne Page

A seventh district vacancy on the county commission has now been filled.

During Monday night’s regular monthly meeting, Mathias Anderson was appointed to take the seat of former commissioner Tim Reynolds who stepped down from the commission last month. Anderson will serve as an appointee until the August 1, 2024 DeKalb County General Election.

Anderson was the only person to step forward who had expressed an interest in the position. He was nominated for the appointment by Commissioner Greg Matthews and because no other name was placed in nomination Commissioner Larry Green moved that Anderson be appointed by acclamation. Commissioner Tony (Cully) Culwell offered a second to the motion and Anderson’s appointment was approved by a voice vote of the commission.

After the meeting Anderson was sworn into office by County Mayor Matt Adcock.

During Thursday night’s committee of the whole meeting of the county commission, Anderson introduced himself.

“My name is Mathias Anderson and I live in District 7. I was selected on Saturday, March 16 to be on the ballot in August for the (vacant) commissioner seat for District 7. I have lived here for about 8 years and have been involved as I can be between kids sports and schools, etc. I try to help out where I can. I saw where there was an empty seat for my district and I thought this would be a good opportunity for me to help out and contribute. I work for Nissan. I am a senior analyst for the claims risk department so a lot of my job is budgeting dollars, figuring out where money is going and where it has to go and where to get the money for those expenditures. I think I would really enjoy helping out and hopefully be a benefit to everyone in the county as well,” said Anderson.

A Republican, Anderson was nominated by the DeKalb County GOP on Saturday, March 16 by caucus to be the party’s nominee in the August election to serve out the remaining two years of former commissioner Tim Reynolds’ unexpired term.

March 25, 2024
By: Dwayne Page

A man has been named in a superseding indictment in child sex crimes.

The DeKalb County Grand Jury Monday returned indictments against 42-year-old George Daniel Evans for three counts of rape, four counts of sexual battery by an authority figure, two counts of continuous sexual abuse of a child, and two counts of incest. Evans had been indicted for the same offenses involving the same two alleged victims in July, 2023 but the superseding indictment returned Monday added “by an authority figure” to the four counts of sexual battery against him.

According to the indictment, Evans allegedly had sexual contact with two children under the age of 14 on several occasions from October 2015 to October 2021. At the time of the first offenses the children were 7 and 8 years old.

Evans was among twenty-four people indicted by the new term of the Grand Jury Monday. Ten sealed indictments were also returned. Persons named in those have not yet been served.

Those indicted and their charges are as follows:

Theodore Aguayo: Possession of a schedule II drug (Methamphetamine) over 0.5 grams with intent to sell or deliver.

Ricky Allen Ashford, II and Gabriel James Hesson: Aggravated assault

Ernest Paul Barnwell: Possession of a schedule II drug (Methamphetamine) with intent to sell or deliver and simple possession of schedule II drugs (ANPP) and (Fentanyl)

Alexander Kyle Barrett: Boating while under the influence

William Andrew Cantrell: Possession of a schedule II drug (Cocaine) over 0.5 grams with intent to sell or deliver and evading arrest with a motor vehicle

Jennifer Kaylene Carter: DUI, DUI per se, violation of the implied consent law

Billy Joseph Elder: Domestic assault

George Daniel Evans: Rape (3 counts), sexual battery by an authority figure (4 counts), continuous sexual abuse of a child (2 counts), and incest (2 counts)

Ursula Andreana Ketchum: Disorderly conduct

Bryan Duane Miles: Possession of a schedule II drug (Methamphetamine) over 0.5 grams with intent to sell or deliver

Melinda Beth Murphy: Theft of property over $1,000

Willie Ray Murphy: Possession of drug paraphernalia and driving on a revoked license

Tanner Cole Myers: DUI, DUI per se, Possession of a handgun while under the influence

James Harmon Roberts: Boating while under the influence

Amanda Marie Rowland: Tampering with evidence and evading arrest

Ethan Joe Kelly Sargent and Toby Lynn Young: Theft of property over $10,000

Rachel Lynn Spurlock: Simple possession of a schedule II drug (Methamphetamine)

Michelle Ann Stevens: Possession of schedule II drugs (Oxycodone) and (Hydrocodone) with intent to sell or deliver, and possession of a weapon by a convicted felon

Carlos Edward Lopez Stiff: DUI and DUI per se

Brandon Keith Thomas: Possession of a schedule II drug (Methamphetamine) over 0.5 grams with intent to sell or deliver

Elijah Malik Walton: Aggravated assault and reckless endangerment

Kevin Ray Wilson: Unlawful possession of a weapon and simple possession of schedule II drugs (ANPP) and (Fentanyl)

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