Law enforcement ramping up in Franklin County
At age 77, Eastpoint’s Jackie Sukkau is on limited income and her knees are not as strong as they once were.
She recently bought a new trailer that is twice as high off the ground as her old one, and getting in and out is a challenge.
“The other trailer had three steps, this one has six,” she said. “I keep falling and I’m trying to keep from breaking my neck.”
Enter the crew from the Franklin County Sheriff’s Office.
Two weeks ago, Lts. Wesley Creamer and Steve James, Major Brad Segree, Col. Dwayne Coulter, and Capt. James Hamm stooped by with a load of material, tools and knowhow, and put up a ramp for Sukkau. They’re just a segment of the volunteers, who have included Sheriff A.J. Smith, Chief Deputy Cliff Carooll, and a number of community volunteers, who have made the ramp program such a success for the sheriff’s office.
“I can’t afford the ramp; they cost a lot of money,” Sukkau said.”I’ve fallen so much I need my shoulders replaced. I just plain don’t have money for a ramp.
“I am so thankful to the sheriff’s office for doing this for me,” she said.
Smith said the program began about 15 years ago, before he was first elected sheriff, when he worked with Gene Osburn, Johnny Turner and Dave Farrell to get it going.
It then became an initiative he brought with him to the sheriff’s office.
Smith said that the program hasn’t kept careful track over the years, but that it can be as many as 10 a year based on recent years.
The cost of an aluminum wheelchair ramp runs about $5,000, and unlike the wooden ones, it can be relocated and reused in the event a person moves or passes away.
Funding comes out of the sheriff’s charity fund, but increasing demand on that funding, can mean the sheriff’s office doesn’t have money to build and install one.
“If someone can afford it, we’ll ask for a donation,” Smith said. “And we’ll put it in for free for people who can’t. Most people can’t pay anything.”
The Disability Resource Center out of Panama City last year made two large donations which enabled the program to put in several ramps.
Meet the Editor
David Adlerstein, The Apalachicola Times’ digital editor, started with the news outlet in January 2002 as a reporter.
Prior to then, David Adlerstein began as a newspaperman with a small Boston weekly, after graduating magna cum laude from Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts. He later edited the weekly Bellville Times, and as business reporter for the daily Marion Star, both not far from his hometown of Columbus, Ohio.
In 1995, he moved to South Florida, and worked as a business reporter and editor of Medical Business newspaper. In Jan. 2002, he began with the Apalachicola Times, first as reporter and later as editor, and in Oct. 2020, also began editing the Port St. Joe Star.