Alcohol Billboard to be Moved

I used to work for Douglas County, Public Health as a Public Health Educator back in 2013. I must say that I truly enjoyed working with the community leadership in Douglas county when this horrible situation happened. I was honored to speak up for the youth in our community and the blasphemy of the alcohol industry choosing to make such a distasteful decision to place their board underneath our board. I almost lost my job behind the situation. Can you believe that they were thinking about firing me because they thought I talked with the press when in actuality, the information was leaked through an email sent by another and the press just so happen to be in the listserv. LOL What's really important here!

Here is the story below:

Written by John Barker,on the Patch Website, Patch Staff March 11, 2013

I do not own the rights to this article, for it is published on the patch website. I placed it here because I am involved in the story.

On Friday, Diageo Distributors, which happens to be the largest alcohol distributor in the US, placed a billboard for Crown Royal Maple Flavor liquor directly underneath Live Healthy Douglas’ underage drinking message billboard. The billboard company has been notified of this total disregard for this program of Douglas Public Health and the efforts to reduce underage drinking.

It is disturbing and alarming that the alcohol company may have chosen this location because they knew it would cause conversation and in turn attract more attention to their billboard. It is a blatant in-your-face challenge to the Live Healthy Douglas campaign, according to a news release sent out by Douglas County.

The billboard is on Hospital Drive adjacent to Kroger in Douglasville.

"We have notified the billboard company and they are working on moving the ad (today)," Tamekis Williams, Public Health Educator Cobb & Douglas Public Health, said in an email."I have expressed that we are very disturbed by this matter and want the billboard down ASAP! The alcohol company could have chosen this location because they know it would cause conversation and in turn attract more attention to their billboard.

"This is a prime example of why it is important for us to continue our efforts as a strong coalition that care about the health and well-being of the youth in Douglas County. This distasteful matter is a direct message to our work and it shows that we have a lot of work to do in our community and with the  alcohol and advertizing companies. The alcohol distribution company has made a malicious move by deciding to place this ad right under our billboard and this shows that they do not care about our youth or our community. The only thing they care about is advertising at all cost to get to our kids in our community!"