New reality show will be about Montgomery County animal cruelty

Montgomery County will serve as the setting of a new reality show about fighting animal cruelty that will air on Animal Planet next week.

The show, ?Bully and Sugar: Southern Justice,? will feature Scott ?Sugar Hill? Hill, one of the county?s animal control officers, and Christopher ?Bully the Kid? Bennett, a former animal control investigator for the state of Georgia.

The premise of the show is that Bennett, bringing his city experience from Atlanta, rides around with Hill, a native of Montgomery, to help with animal control and cruelty problems throughout the county.

The show is being produced by 44Blue Productions. If the pilot episode, which was filmed this summer, is successful, the company will film 15 episodes. The pilot will air at 10 p.m. Nov. 10 on Animal Planet Network.

Michael Briddell, the city?s director of public information, said what will really make the show work is the personality contrasts and chemistry between Bennett and Hill.

?I think the show is going to show we do have animal cruelty in Montgomery, but we?re serious about it. We?re going to fight it every day,? Hill said. ?We don?t play around with this stuff here.?

The city worked closely with the 44Blue Productions, the Montgomery Humane Society and its attorneys to make sure they have some control over how the city and county are portrayed in the show.

?All of us had some serious reservations,? Briddell said. ?We don?t want Montgomery, Alabama, to be portrayed in 96 million homes as a place that has a lot of problems.?

After seeing the footage and working with the company, Briddell said he has no doubt that the city and county will be represented accurately.

Steven Tears, executive director of the Montgomery Humane Society, said he hopes the show will educate other cities and counties that don?t take animal cruelty crimes seriously.

He said Bennett?s unique skill set ? and the fact that he won?t be in a uniform ? will help improve the investigations. He said individuals involved in animal cruelty cases who wouldn?t normally talk to the county officers have spoken to Bennett.

?We?re really excited on behalf of the Humane Society and the city and the county that we?re going to be able to showcase the hard work that we do and the successes we have, whether it?s using education to prevent people from having to visit our jails or we actually have to force them to go to jail,? Tears said.

Montgomery Mayor Todd Strange said the show does depict animal cruelty, but it also shows that the city and county are trying to eliminate it with the resources they have.

?We took a leap of faith and we decided to go forward with this,? Strange said.

Bennett, who said he came to Montgomery to make an impact, said the South is often misrepresented as a ?backwoods place? where people don?t care about animals.

?I know this is the new South and the new Montgomery,? Bennett said. ?I thought this show was a way to showcase who we are as people and individuals and as a community.?

 

Autauga County woman dies in house fire

An elderly Autauga County woman died early Friday when fire raged through her rural home in one of the county?s northernmost areas.

According to Autauga County sheriff?s office reports, 82-year-old Nell Taylor Logan was the victim of the fatal fire, which was reported to sheriff?s office dispatchers about 2:30 Friday morning.

A deputy arrived at the Autauga County Road 21 North scene first to find heavy smoke and flames coming from the dwelling.

The county officer tried to force his way into the burning structure, but the advanced state of the fire prevented him from gaining entry.

The sheriff?s office call sheets show that volunteer fire departments from Billingsley, Marbury, Pentecost, Pine Level, White City and Old Kingston responded to fight the fire, but the phalanx of firefighters and rescue personnel were unable to prevent the total loss of the house and the death of its only occupant.

The victim?s son, William Logan, and daughter, Charlotte Moore, also were called to the scene, as was Autauga County Coroner David Golson.

An investigator from the office of State Fire Marshal Ed Paulk was at the site early Friday, continuing to gather evidence of the fire?s cause and origin.

The investigator is reportedly concentrating on the bedroom where the woman slept, a room in which a space heater was reportedly employed to ward off the overnight chill.

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Different city, county voting precincts will not impact Nov. 6 election

Although the city of Montgomery and Montgomery County currently have different voting precincts and polling places, that will have no impact on the Nov. 6 election since there are no municipal elections on that date.

The Montgomery City Council on Tuesday appointed a committee to consider whether it wants to adopt municipal voting precincts and polling places that coincide with changes the county made last year.

Last October, the Montgomery County Commission drew new districts based on the 2010 census. The commission adopted new precincts and polling places that were approved by the Department of Justice and went into effect Jan. 13, said Justin Aday, director of the Montgomery County Election Center.

But the next municipal election is not until 2015, providing the City Council ample time to decide if it will use the same voting precincts and polling places that the county has decided on.

?Regardless of what any entity ? city, county or otherwise ? chooses to do with voting precincts or polling places, it won?t have any impact on the Nov. 6 election,? Aday said.

City Council President Charles Jinright said the committee will start discussing whether the city will draw new precincts or use the county?s after the November election is over. The committee members include Jinright, Tracy Larkin, Jon Dow and Arch Lee.

?We want to study (the county precincts) more and make sure we?re on track,? Lee said. ?We don?t want to confuse the public any more than we have to. We?re not in a big hurry. We just want to double check since we have time on our hands.?

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