The AJC reports that Atlanta fire officials announced a $10,000 reward for info leading to the arrest of suspects in the Paidiea fire of last week.

He said the persons of interest [2 male, 2 female] were white and between the ages of 15 and 18. He said it was unknown if they were students at the school.

As “Rez” points out, Shepard Smith is appalled by the mere existence of these donut bacon cheeseburgers and gives credit to “a Decatur, Georgia bartender” for discovering them.  That would be ol’ Mulligans in Oakhurst if you’re wondering.

Of course, they probably just pulled the info off Snopes.

Decatur: Conflicted Home of the “Oakhurst Community Garden” and the “Luther Burger”.

Dana fowards a note from CSD’s Sally Dobbins announcing that the scheduled flu clinic at Decatur High School today has been cancelled due to an overwhelming response at Glennwood Academy yesterday.   Here’s the note…

Good Morning,

I wanted to let you all know that unfortunately the flu shot clinic for today has to be cancelled because of a seasonal vaccine shortage at the Board of Health. We had an amazing turnout yesterday at GL and at the end of the clinic I was informed that all the allotted vaccine for the 2 days had been used. I am very sorry and appreciate your help and participation in this endeavor. We will reschedule in November. The BOH health folks expressed their apologies also and will be cancelling other clinics at other community sites as well.

Thanks again.

Sally

Back in August, Creative Loafing’s Scott Henry almost peed his pants when the city of Atlanta put its mayoral candidate disclosures online.  It was an understandable reaction, since the old way of obtaining campaign disclosures sounded like a Baggins-esque journey.

Before now, if you wanted to see who gave money to a mayoral candidate, you had to schlep down to City Hall, find your way to the municipal clerk’s office, park yourself in front of a computer — there’s only the one — that looks like it still runs Windows 95 and click on a PDF file. If you wanted the information printed out, it cost 25 cents a page, as I recall. If you wanted it put on a disc so you could view it using an operating system from this century, it cost $30 a pop.

That originally got me thinking about the Decatur City Commission candidates’ campaign filings and their comparable accessibility.  After failing to find them online, I finally got around to requesting them from the city.  And being the ultra-responsive bunch they are, I received campaign disclosure pdfs from the city clerk the very next day!  (And I’d just like to reiterate that anyone can request this stuff, not just me and my big, fat online reputation.)

So following in the footsteps of the AJC’s Jim Galloway – who announced Atlanta mayoral September campaign disclosures this morning – and in an effort to provide similar ease of access for Decatur residents, here are your city commission candidate’s full campaign disclosure forms in pdf format for September (in alphabetical order)…

• Fred Boykin
• Patti Garrett
• James Radford
• Kyle Williams

After four weeks of rehabilitation at the Chattahoochee Nature Center, the 3 year-old barred owl that was discovered huddled by a light post along Church Street after being hit by a car, was released back into the area where he was found Wednesday evening.

As dusk fell on the quiet, northern edge of the Decatur cemetery, Chattahoochee Nature Center Wildlife Director Kathryn Dudeck explained to Diane (a.k.a. “for the birds”), her son and me, that the owl had had some pretty extensive blunt force trauma when he first came to the Center a month ago, but had since made a full recovery, evidenced by the fact that he had been “catching live mice and rats for the past 5 days in a 140 square foot cage”.

Taken with expert care from his small dog crate, the owl stood alert on Kathryn’s arm, starring at her and occasionally making a clicking noise with his beak, as we walked toward the more wooded eastern edge of the cemetery.  Kathryn explained that owls don’t actually attack anything with their beaks, but only with their talons, meaning that if an owl is injured on the ground all you must do to retrieve it is put out a hand and it will flip over for you.  Then (if you’re a trained professional or being monitored by one) you can just throw a blanket over it and retrieve it by its leg.

Easy as pie!   Right.

As soon as Kathryn let go of his legs, the owl flew up into the nearest tree and sat there for a good bit, staring back at us.  However, this tree must have also been the home of a rather irritated family of mockingbirds, because even after he flew farther out into the forest, three mockingbirds followed, dive-bombing him as he sat perched on a branch still staring back in our direction.  Within a minute or two, even though Kathryn threw a couple of dead mice in his direction, the owl had had enough of the noisy mockingbirds and the photo-taking humans and flew farther into the woods and out of sight.

I must admit that it was an inspiring moment and one that couldn’t have occurred without groups like A.W.A.R.E. and the Chattahoochee Nature Center.  Without any governmental support, these organizations take in hundreds of animals a year and help rehabilitate them so they can return to the wild.  (Kathryn spoke of how the first step in rehab for raptors is a smaller 25 square foot cage with a kiddie pool full of mice and lined with Vaseline to prevent escape)  As an example of expenses, Kathryn mentioned off-hand that the barred owl’s 4 week stint had probably cost the Center around $750.

So, here’s where we can help out. If you’re willing, you can help offset the cost to the Center with a donation, which can be made easily on their secure website.  If you go to the Center’s “Adopt a Friend” donation page, select a donation level, and check off “barred owl”, the Center can even monitor contributions, and I will check in with Kathryn in a week or so and find out how much we’ve donated.

Once again, thanks to everyone that helped save this owl.  It’s been a humbling experience to see firsthand the power of a true community effort.