County Not Happy With Changes at Whitworth

Last week, Clayton City Manager Cissy Henry gave her take on the Whitworth Detention Center in Hart County, which provides work details all across northeast Georgia, changing from a male to a female population, saying that she does not expect it to affect the city very much; however, Rabun County Administrator Jim Bleckley has a different opinion in their situation.

Bleckley explains that he sees the switch as having a negative impact on the county.

“We weren’t happy happy with it,” said Bleckley. “Not happy with it at all because it is going to have a very negative impact on us because we use the detail from Whitworth to do a lot of work for us and they have provided a lot of labor at a reasonable rate and now we don’t have that.”

Regarding the possibility of utilizing women’s work details, Bleckley says that is a wait and see.

“We understand that they possibly would offer a women’s detail. That’s something we’d have to look very hard at.  I’m not sure we would go that route.”

According to our sister station, WLHR, in Lavonia, a spokesperson for the Georgia Department of Corrections confirmed on Thursday that Whitworth Detention Center is changing to an all female facility, but that work details will still be available.