The Decatur County Farm Bureau was recently recognized during the Georgia Farm Bureau 9th District Annual meeting for its outstanding member programs.

It received the GFB 9th District Legislative Committee Award for its efforts to establish relationships with area legislative representatives and its work to advocate the legislative interests of Decatur County’s agricultural community.

Gary Wooten is local president. Kim Rentz serves as chairman of the legislative committee, and Bobby Barber Jr. is co-chairman.

In addition to participating in Georgia Farm Bureau legislative activities, the committee also hosted a legislative farm tour to educate local, state and federal officials about the diversity and importance of agriculture and the issues that affect farmers on a daily basis. Committee members also attended numerous water meetings and met with congressional aides and state representatives to discuss ag issues.

Kirkland qualifies for insurance society

Jeanine Kirkland of Bainbridge has qualified for membership in the President’s Cabinet of Woodmen of the World Life Insurance Society. Members of the cabinet were guests of Woodmen of the World President and CEO James Mounce during a recent trip to the Fiestamericana Grand Hotel and Resort at Coral Beach, Cancun. Kirkland, a member of the multi-millionaire star cabinet, was recognized for outstanding insurance sales and customer service during 2007.

IRS seeking taxpayers missing checks

The Internal Revenue Service is looking for Georgia taxpayers who are missing more than 12,500 economic stimulus checks totaling about $7.1 million and more than 3,900 regular refund checks totaling about $3.9 million that were returned by the U.S. Postal Service due to mailing address errors.

The IRS web site makes it easy for taxpayers to track undelivered refund and economic stimulus checks. Taxpayers can update addresses and claim refunds online or by phone.

It is crucial that taxpayers who may be due a stimulus check update their addresses with the IRS by Nov. 28. By law, economic stimulus checks must be sent out by Dec. 31 of this year.

Quickest and easiest way is to go to IRS.gov and click on “Where’s My Stimulus Payment?” tool to update addresses. Taxpayers without Internet access should call 1-866-234-2942.

Those seeking lost refunds should click on “Where’s My Refund?”

Taxpayers must submit his or her Social Security number, filing status and amount of refund shown on the 2007 return. The tool will provide the status of their refund and in some cases provide instructions on how to resolve delivery problems. The number to call for missing refunds is 1-800-829-1954.

Postal Service presenting ‘Click and Ship’

On Thursday, Nov. 13, a U.S. Postal Service specialist will be at Bean Around the World, located at 101 Water St.. from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. to give a “Click and Ship” presentation.

The presentation will only take a few minutes, and the Bainbridge Post Office Quality Work Life/Employee Involvement Team will be there to help with mailing needs for the holiday season and beyond.

This demonstration will show how to save time and money by mailing packages from the business and have local carriers pick them up. For more information, call Rima at 400-5573, or Cindy at 220-5092.

PAB announces third quarter results, plan

PAB Bankshares Inc., parent company for The Park Avenue Bank, announced its consolidated financial results for the third quarter of 2008, and its plan to improve the company’s profitability in 2009 through reductions in operating expenses.

During the third quarter of 2008, the company added $7.3 million to its allowance for loan losses as a result of continued deterioration in problem assets. As a consequence, the company reported a net loss of $2.9 million, or $0.32 per diluted share, for the three months ended Sept. 30, 2008.

“By increasing the allowance for loan losses, we will have more capacity and flexibility to address our problem assets,” said company president and CEO M. Burke Welsh Jr.

For the nine months ended Sept. 30, 2008, the company reported a net loss of $100,000, or $0.01 per diluted share, compared to net earnings of $9.1 million, or $0.93 per diluted share, for the same period in 2007.

The company board of directors approved a plan to reduce the company’s 2009 non-interest expense by at least 12 percent (approximately $3.6 million) of 2008 anticipated non-interest expense and to reduce the company’s workforce by up to 9 percent (approximately 30 positions) by the end of the first quarter of 2009.

As part of the plan, the company will close its offices in Jacksonville and Gwinnett County Ga., eliminate the employee positions in those markets including the two regional president positions, who also served as executive vice presidents of the company, and reduce staffing levels bank-wide through attrition and consolidation of duties.