Doug Bolton has lived a life of service.
Before retiring and moving to Covington, Bolton worked for 31 years at the DeKalb County Police Department after serving in the Navy. The Atlanta native held the rank of major before he stepped away from policing in 2004. He was in charge of the department’s South Precinct.
At the conclusion of his days in law enforcement, Bolton became active within the Covington community. He joined the Rotary Club, and he has voluntarily served in just about every role imaginable for the club on local and district levels.
This past spring, Bolton was named Rotary International District 6910’s Rotarian of the Year for 2021 and winner of the district’s five Avenues of Service awards.
Bolton currently serves as Covington’s Club Administration Chair and serves on the district leadership’s board of directors. Over the past several years, he has remained at the forefront of the club’s efforts in giving back to the community through various outreach programs, living up to the club’s mantra of “service above self,” to which Rotary Club of Covington Past-President Thomas Kephart and District Governor Tina D. Fischlin cited as their reasoning for his nomination.
“Doug is the embodiment of what a Rotarian should be,” Kephart said.
Rotarian of the Year is presented to a Rotarian within the district who is in good standing with the club, active within the club and its respective community, and exemplifies the club’s Four Way Test.
The Avenues of Service Awards are given to Rotarians at the club level who participate in service activities in one of the five Avenues of Service — club, vocational, community, international and youth service. At the district level, the award is presented to a Rotarian who serves in all five categories.
Bolton did just that.
This past year alone, Bolton coordinated Farmers to Families — a USDA program created in response to COVID that provides food truck deliveries for free through local charitable organizations like Rotary. Bolton coordinated deliveries across the district, which encompasses nearly 50 counties and more than 70 clubs across the north and central portion of the state.
About six years ago, Bolton helped oversee another Rotary project involving the fundraising and purchase of hundreds of wheelchairs to send to Morocco for people in need.
Outside of Rotary, Bolton is active within his church — First Presbyterian Church in Covington — where Bolton helped start a program called Family Promise, which is an initiative to house homeless families. The model is to have the families stay at a different church from week to week. The church provides for each family, providing food and a place to stay, while getting themselves back on their feet. Since the pandemic began, the church has been limited in how it can help these families, but Bolton said they are provided “move-in kits” to give families a helping hand.
Bolton currently serves as board president for Covington’s Police Who Care, Inc., which is a nonprofit organization that was created over 30 years ago as a means to help Covington Police Officers with medical bills and other financial difficulties.
Bolton was the first director of Hands on Newton. Hands on Newton was established in 2007 as a program of the Newton County Family Connection to foster volunteer service and civic engagement that address issues resulting from Newton County’s sudden and rapid population growth.
Bolton was a 2009 recipient of the “I Have a Dream” Martin Luther King Jr. Award from the Newton County Ministers Union for his work in Hands on Newton.
Despite being retired, Bolton believes it’s important that he remain active within the community and put in work to help see it continue to grow and progress.
“I just feel like I’ve been given so much in life, I like to give back however I can,” he said. “And it’s like one of the slogans we used to have for Hands on Newton: ‘You get more than you give when you help.’ And you do. That’s the way I feel. When I help someone, or some organization, it feels good … it helps you sleep at night.”
