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Polk County News - Breakout

County undergoes hurricane exercise

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Disaster relief responders with the American Red Cross work with county employees and various first responders in a shelter simulation at the Dunbar Gym during a recent training exercise. Courtesy photoDisaster relief responders with the American Red Cross work with county employees and various first responders in a shelter simulation at the Dunbar Gym during a recent training exercise. Courtesy photo

From Enterprise Staff

In preparation for the upcoming hurricane season that begins June 1, the Polk County Office of Emergency Management (OEM) conducted a training exercise in conjunction with the Texas Division of Emergency Management (TDEM) May 15-17, one of only a few counties in the state that participated.

Fifty people from an array of agencies participated in the exercise, including county employees and representatives from TDEM, Sam Houston Electric Cooperative, Trinity River Authority, CHI St. Luke’s Health-Memorial Livingston, Upper Lake Livingston Wireless Association, Allegiance Mobile Health, Angelina County & Cities Health District, the American Red Cross, several local school districts and other local response agencies.

The exercise tested Polk County’s readiness to respond to a Category 4 hurricane forecast to make landfall near San Luis Pass with 140-mile per hour winds. Tropical storm-force winds were to impact the county, causing devastating damage to homes, businesses, public infrastructure and utilities from high winds, fallen debris and flooding.

OEM tested its shelter capabilities at Dunbar Gym on May 15 by conducting a training exercise and shelter simulation with members of the American Red Cross. Animal shelter procedures were also rehearsed with the Polk County Extension Office.

On May 16-17, OEM worked with staff in the Emergency Operation Center to test multi-agency coordination, direction and control, communications, and information dissemination for response and recovery activities.

For tips on how to prepare for a hurricane, visit https://www.ready.gov/hurricanes. Register for AlertMePolkCounty to receive emergency alerts from OEM, by visiting https://polkcountyoem.com/page/alertmepolkcounty.

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Democratic club scholarship winners

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Ann McDonald and Sandra Overhoff present a $500 scholarship to Onalaska Senior Logan Scott Eagle on behalf of the Democratic Club of Polk County during an awards ceremony May 16.

Livingston High School Academic Advisor Judy Porter presents a $500 scholarship to Connor James Corbin on behalf of the Democratic Club of Polk County during an awards ceremony May 9.

Livingston High School Academic Advisor Judy Porter presents a $500 scholarship to Maci Grace Hill on behalf of the Democratic Club of Polk County during an awards ceremony May 9.

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Talent show winners

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FIRST PLACE —  (Left) Anastasia Wells was the first-place winner in the talent show recently held by the Livingston Leo Club. She is 17 years old and attends Livingston High School. In her free time, she loves to sing, listen to music, play piano, paint, draw, graphic design and play with her younger siblings. She hopes to attend University of Texas-San Antonio after graduation to pursue a degree in music marketing.

SECOND PLACE — (Center) Tinley Lewis was the second-place winner in the talent show recently held by the Livingston Leo Club. She is 16 years old, has been singing since she was nine and has been in many competitions, such as Huntsville Superstar and Tyler County Talent Show. She hopes to pursue her music career, but if that doesn’t work out, she would like to study to become a psychiatrist.

 THIRD PLACE — (Right) Anthony Walls was the third-place winner in the talent show recently held by the Livingston Leo Club. He is a 16-year-old homeschooler from Livingston. He loves meeting people from all walks of life and he aspires to become a successful musician and a truck driver. He has been singing on stage since he was young and still enjoys singing and entertaining people.

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Chamber accepting entries for annual barbecue cookoff

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From Enterprise Staff

Entries are being accepted for participation in the fourth annual State Championship Smoke in the Pines Barbecue Cookoff slated for June 23-24 at Pedigo Park in Livingston. Other activities in conjunction with the event are the auto and bike show, kids barbecue, cornhole tournament and vendor booths. This is one of the big annual fundraisers for the Livingston-Polk County Chamber of Commerce.

Smoke in the Pines is affiliated with the International Barbecue Cookers Association (IBCA). The entry fee for IBCA meats is $200 and the entry fee for the ancillaries such as cook’s choice and beans is $25 each. The payout is $5,500. However, if 75 or more teams participate, the payout will be $7,500. There will be payouts for first through sixth IBCA meats, first through third for cook’s choice and first for beans.

The entry fee for the auto and bike show is $30 and for the kids barbecue is $25. Vendor booths are available for $65 and the cornhole team entry is $50.

IBCA judging rules will apply and may be viewed at https://ibcabbq.org/organization-documents/. For additional information about Smoke in the Pines contact John Clifton at 936-328-9864 or email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. For information about any of the above events, contact the chamber office at 936-327-4929 or go to polkchamber.com.

In other activity, the chamber is also currently accepting goodies and promotional items for the teacher bags. Two hundred of each item are requested.

Each year the chamber accepts promotional products and materials from local businesses and individuals for inclusion in the goodie bags that are distributed to new schoolteachers throughout Polk County. The annual project is an opportunity for local businesses and service providers to promote themselves. A variety of promotional products are placed in the bags, including welcome guides, pens, pencils, rulers, nail files, notepads, coupons, flyers and other items and information. Chamber representatives ask that any letter, legal or big size paper be folded in half. The deadline to deliver these items to the chamber office is July 6.

The chamber’s website may be found at polkchamber.com. The chamber office is located at 1001 U.S. 59 Loop North in Livingston. The phone number is 396-327-4929. For additional information email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

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Superintendent addresses challenges of public education

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By Emily Banks Wooten
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Dr. Brent HawkinsDr. Brent HawkinsLivingston ISD Superintendent Dr. Brent E. Hawkins discussed the current challenges to public education when he spoke to the Rotary Club of Livingston recently.

“We are very passionate about our school system. On behalf of the district, I want to express our appreciation for your support of the Green and White Scholarship Program. Each year y’all support it. That thing continues to grow, and we appreciate your part in it,” Hawkins said.

“Today the greatest challenge in public education is staffing,” he said, remarking that school finance was previously always the greatest challenge of public education.

“I’ve been in the business 32 years. I’m ending the tie of being the longest-serving superintendent in the history of this district. I’m proud of that. I’m finishing my ninth year here. We’ve worked on staffing every day for the past nine years and we’ll continue. We’ve made improvements but we’re still working on it.”

Hawkins encouraged the Rotarians to go to texasisd.com where he said there are “hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of articles” that talk about teacher shortage.

Hawkins said the district starts off every school year fully staffed, that seven teachers were hired during the Christmas break and that there are 10 openings presently, far fewer than surrounding area districts.

“We don’t necessarily have a bigger turnover rate. There are just fewer people going into the profession, fewer people answering the calling. One of the things we’ve been able to do over the last nine years is drop our attrition rate which we’ve reduced by a third. We have one of the lowest turnover rates of anyone on the I-69 corridor,” he said.

Hawkins referred to the teacher task force the governor put together that basically revealed what is already known – the three concerns of teachers are compensation, support and training and working conditions.

“Moving forward is the great challenge. It’s important for every community to ensure that their school district is operating at a high-level state of effectiveness. We have to have human capacity capital, not just facilities. That’s our greatest challenge. And it’s a phenomenon across the state.

“Values are up. The school district doesn’t set values. The current school finance formula of $6,100 per student that we’re working under is what the legislature approved in 2019, the last funding that public schools got. It raised a billion dollars and what we got was zero. What the local taxpayer pays, the state taketh away. If we look at the $6,100 we get on the basic allotment, we would need about a $1,000 increase on that just to meet inflation which is 17% for us,” Hawkins said.

“These are grave issues for public education. There are 5.5 million students in the State of Texas that we need to educate and there are 4,062 kids in our district. In any education program that’s ever been, the number one thing that makes it effective, or a failure, is the capacity of the people standing in front of those kids.

“People may say that COVID is over but we’re seeing the residual effects of COVID, the hangover effect, that leeches its way into our schools. Over the last two months, we’ve had eight kids arrested for making threats. We have a societal problem that’s going to take everyone working on and that is mental health. And we have a large population of low socioeconomic kids. We have poor, and then we have people who are hungry.

“And school safety is always an issue. We’ve entered an era that’s very challenging and very strange. We have to take everything seriously. The lesson learned is somebody said something and somebody didn’t take it seriously and then we’re standing over the graves of kids and community members.

“And it all goes back to home life. That’s why we’re implementing a new curriculum next year called ‘Capturing Kids’ Hearts.’ It’s basically character education.”

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