The Newton County BOC held their first meeting of 2015 last week and among its agenda items was its annual appointments. One of those appointments was that of county attorney, and the reappointment was Tommy Craig.

We don’t particularly care that he was appointed; we don’t think anybody can question his legal skills.

We do, however, have a problem on how he was appointed.

Craig has become the lightning rod for those that are discontented with county government.

To not let the group discontented by his appointment not have their say before the appointment, was a shame.

To have long-time Craig puppet J.C. Henderson nominate him and then spend his time in an almost incoherent way calling out the name of Jesus and referencing the bible was disgraceful.

Here is the bottom line; Tommy Craig is the Newton County attorney for the year 2015. If you didn’t like this appointment you can continue to complain, you can threaten to take the BOC to court or you can do nothing.

However what you should do, is know that 2016 is an election year with current commissioners Levi Maddox, John Douglas and Nancy Schulz and Chairman Keith Ellis up for reelection, and gather your energy and recruit and/or support some qualified citizens to run for those positions.

It does not do any of us who would like to see Newton County grow in a positive way to groan and moan about things that happened in the past. It is a positive thing to do by working together to see that good things are done now to insure our future.

The ballot box is still the sure fire way to insure that happens.