City of Waycross officials held the first of what will be an ongoing gathering of citizen volunteers Thursday, October 3.
Led by City Manager Ulysses “Duke” Rayford, the purpose of the meeting was to create a city-wide volunteer team.
One of the priorities of the meeting was to encourage people to contact officials such as police, fire, city hall or district commissioners if they have knowledge of citizens in of need assistance, do not have power, do not have access to transportation or do not have the ability to receive communication about relief efforts.
Among the volunteers present were Sara Ker and Eddie Folker of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter- Day Saints in Waycross. The church has organized over 550 volunteers to help with clean up.
Of those, 300 are assigned to Douglas, and approximately 250 arrived Friday evening prepared to work from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m., Saturday and Sunday. They will return this weekend to further assist.
“A lot of these guys will be coming in with backhoes, skid steers, trucks and chain saws,” said Folker. “They’ll be self-sufficient.”
Team Rubicon, a veteran-led volunteer organization, and the Georgia National Guard are also in Ware County to assist.
Rayford used this opportunity to warn citizens about a scam using the city’s name.
“The City of Waycross and the county have not signed any contracts with any vendors to provide services,” warned Rayford. “This includes tree services, water, cement, anything. No citizen should share their personal information, social security number, or give checks or cash to anybody saying they’re a representative of the city.”
Rayford also addressed citizen concern about the lack of a community center.
“We do have some buildings we think could be community centers,” he said. “We’re going to look at cleaning those buildings out next week. Once they’re cleaned out, the commissioners are going to do a walk-through and we’re going to make a decision on how to better purpose those buildings.
“For general knowledge, the armory is considered a park, meaning general use. The city cannot provide people to manage it. That’s one of the stick ups of using that building. We cannot put a city employee there to open it, close it, work it. See it as a park and not as a building.”
The volunteer group is scheduled to meet Thursday, October 10 at 6 p.m., at C.C. McCray Auditorium. Any citizen or group is welcome and encouraged to attend.
