Former Pines Golf Course manager Roland Hebert asked the Decatur County Board of Commissioners Tuesday for $4,500 to pay off debt he has on various items and leases associated with the golf course.

The board voted 3-2 to not pay off the fees. Commissioners Russell Smith, Pete Stephens and Rusty Davis were the dissenting votes.

Terminating cellphone contracts, return fees for golf carts and repacking fees for two mowers are the chief expenses that Hebert requested be paid for.

“My request is for $4549.14,” Hebert said to the commissioners. “That will pay these people off and we will be out of debt. That’s why I’m here.”

Hebert originally was looking at a $31,000 lease termination with Yamaha for the golf carts used at the Pines, a contract he signed himself that would last to 2018. Luckily, he said, the carts were in such good shape that the only expense would be around $3,000 in transportation fees.

To terminate the contract for five cellphones that Hebert and other workers used would cost around $530, and two mowers that costed $6,000 were returned for $1,078.

Commissioner Pete Stephens reminded Hebert that the board voted earlier this year to cease operations of the golf course after the Bainbridge-Decatur County Recreation Authority voted to assume responsibility of it.

“If there is any responsibility of these monies, I don’t think it is on Decatur County,” Stephens said. “This was put into (the recreation authority’s) hands, due to service delivery.”

Hebert was asked by Commissioner Rusty Davis if the county was involved in the contract for the golf carts, to which he said that all the contracts he was asking the county for help with were in his name, though all of them were given the OK by the administrator at the time.

“I negotiated the contracts, I signed the things,” Hebert said. “I was personally responsible for it. The county was not responsible for them, and I made all the arrangements to send them back. All we are paying right now is the transportation and the taxes.”

Commission Chairman Dennis Brinson pointed out that it was a reflection of Decatur County to have the bills paid.

Commissioner Butch Moseley was not present at the meeting.

The Recreation Authority voted in February to accept responsibility of the Pines from Decatur County once its fiscal year began July 1. In April, the authority voted to close it after evaluating its financial viability and player usage.