Endorsement of Don Druitt for Commission District 6

The District 6 Macon-Bibb County Commission race features the old — the not as old, and the old but new. The district encompasses most of west Macon-Bibb County. Commissioner Ed DeFore has been serving this community, first as a Macon City Councilman and now as a commissioner for 44 years. At 85 years of age, he’s given more than half his life helping to govern this area — and, he says that if he wins this time around and his heart is still strong, he’ll run again in 2020.

DeFore can point to many accomplishments in his more than four decades of service. He’s always been a champion of recreation, but for many years residents have known Defore as the go-to guy on City Council. If you were having a problem, particularly with Public Works, no matter where in the city you might live, you called Ed DeFore. He’s always had the right perspective about his job. While he might be elected by district voters, he was working for the entire community.

Commissioner DeFore has served under nine different mayors starting with Ronnie Thompson back in 1971. He’s proud of being part of the team under Buck Melton that paved many of the streets in Macon. However, he’s drawing fire from his opponents for the number of dirt roads that exist in parts of the county he now represents and for not utilizing, quickly enough, the $1 million in blight funds allocated to the district.

Though baseball is the sport he loves, we can’t tell whether he’s in favor of a minor league team and stadium or not. He begins by saying fans would support it for a couple of months and then disappear, to when asked if the county should subsidize a stadium’s operations? he said, “Yes, we should, we should. We subsidize and do other things.”

Joe Allen has also had a long political career. He was first elected to the District 4 seat on the Bibb County Commission in 1989. He ran for chairman and lost in 2000. In 2002 he won a seat on the Macon Water Authority and two years later he won his old commission seat back. He ran for mayor of the new consolidated government three years ago.

Allen says he wants to go back on the commission to “finish what he started.” He cites storm-water runoff as the most pressing issue facing the county and says it will take several special purpose local option sales tax proposals to pay for it. Storm water, he says, has to be dealt with before entertaining ideas about a baseball complex.

He laments that little has been done by the county in District 6. The intersection of Eisenhower and Fulton Mill Road, the site of many serious accidents, remains in need of signalling as an example.

Don Druitt is a political newcomer. At 62, he’s slightly younger than Allen at 66. DeFore is 85. Druitt is no stranger to Macon-Bibb County serving as its Emergency Management Agency director for six years before retiring. He’s a 20 year military vet and served in other communities in the emergency management field.

Druitt navigated the FEMA paperwork minefield to get it to reimburse $3 million to the city and county for damages suffered during the Mother’s Day tornadoes; he managed the rebuilding of the operations center, Internet upgrades and helped to implement the computer-aided radio dispatch system. Unlike his opponents, he clearly supports the baseball stadium effort because it something “the entire community can get behind.”

He’s well read on the One Macon strategic plan and wants to get behind the tourism efforts already in place. He believes there are a lot of things on the horizon for the county that need fresh eyes.

This race is a tough one. It’s difficult for this Editorial Board to choose between two well known veteran commissioners and a newbie. Our purpose, as always, is to recommend who we think will do the best job of helping this county move forward. Our choice is Don Druitt. He is one of those people with the skills and perspective that can help the board move through the treacherous waters ahead.

This story was originally published May 12, 2016 at 9:00 PM with the headline "Endorsement of Don Druitt for Commission District 6."