Attacking a Good Program in South Georgia

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I was appalled when I read a recent article in the Macon (Ga.) Telegraph titled "Report blasts Bibb County School System’s Handling of Student Discipline." The story was in response to a report published by Safe Havens International that, in part, criticizes the recent agreement between the juvenile court, police and the local school system to reduce the referral of certain misdemeanor offenses to the juvenile court and focus more on meaningful intervention that is long lasting according to the research. The Safe Havens report recommends that the school system withdraw from the agreement. What’s playing out in south Georgia now has no doubt happened in many communities across the country where a group -- at best acting out of ignorance or at worse out of self-interest -- tries to wreck good public policy that is designed to help kids and society. But let’s take a closer look at who is behind this report.

Teen Murder Suicide Leaves Macon Community Baffled

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Families are struggling to figure out what happened to cause 19-year-old Vonn Gibbons to kill his 7-year-old son and then turn the gun on himself Saturday night. The murder suicide occurred at Gibbons home in Macon, Ga at 12:22 a.m., according to police. Authorities determined that Gibbons shot his son in the head and shot himself in the chest, but have not yet determined why Gibbons committed the acts. Gibbons’ neighbor Darnell Cummings saw a cream colored car that may have been leaving the Gibbon’s home between 12:20 and 12:30 a.m Sunday morning, the Macon Telegraph reports. Cummings noticed the car because she witnessed two young men beating Gibbons in his front yard a few weeks earlier.