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By Noah Gardner

The Baxley City Council held a grievance hearing on March 25 at 9:00 a.m. to listen to an appeal filed on a grievance by Milton Shane Crosby. The rules of the grievance hearing followed the same rules as a magistrate court. The council acted as the judge with no jury. A total of nine witnesses were called. These witnesses were Alex Johnson, Joe Reading, Dale Sapp, Gilbert Ellis, David Gore, Reba Cash, Miranda Tanner, Police Chief James Godfrey and Crosby. The witnesses were kept in a separate room unable to hear the testimonies of the other witnesses. This ensured that no testimony would be influenced by another. Mark McManus, Mr. Crosby’s attorney, stated that Crosby had been a well known employee of the city for 20 years, and within those years he had never had a complaint filed against him or had any problems with any other employees. After August 2018 he had multiple write ups and then was terminated. Crosby filed the appeal to allow the council to hear his side of the story and to try to get his job back. Crosby was terminated from his job by City Manager Reid Lovett because he said that Crosby...

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The phone rang late in the evening of April 7 and when I answered the dreaded report came, “Little Max has been involved in a real bad motorcycle accident. I’m on my way to the hospital.” Of course, the first question was to inquire which hospital and whether it was necessary to go there. The reply had me simply hold still until more information was available. With that, I immediately phoned my first cousin, Toya (Toy) Maxwell, to find out the status of hers and Max’s (Michael, Sr.) son.

My first call was to Max in effort to find out the status of their son’s condition but there was no answer at his cell. Next, I dialed Toy to, understandably, receive the same result. The effort continued as calls were placed to anyone connected to the Jacksonville branch of our family tree. Finally, my Aunt George actually answered her daughter’s phone. She spoke with me for just a moment prior to passing the cell to Cousin Toy. The news reported wasn’t good and left little in the line of optimism when all I could suggest was that she try remaining positive and pray. When asked whether my joining them at the hospital was a good idea, Toy noted the only thing anybody could do at that moment was wait. She did instruct of the better option; to simply pray, which was the course of action for the remainder of the night.

When waking Monday morning, I remembered...

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