GBI looking at returning drug operations to Albany

ALBANY — The presence of a Georgia Bureau of Investigation narcotics unit in Dougherty County would be a boost to fighting illegal drugs and crime associated with their use and distribution, local officials say.

The GBI is looking at relocating the drug unit from Sylvester. The agency’s criminal investigation unit would remain in Worth County.

“There has been increased manpower for drug enforcement in the region, and we look to continue those efforts,” officials with the GBI said in an email response to The Albany Herald on Tuesday. “We are in discussions with city and county leader to locate a facility in Albany to house the unit.”

The drug unit was based in Dougherty County in the past, and its return would be a good thing for the community, Albany City Commissioner Jon Howard told The Herald.

“It will be another eye on the street to help all the other police (agencies),” Howard said Tuesday. “That will be some more officers to try to suppress some of the problems.”

Howard did not say that Albany necessarily has more drug use per capita, but he said that, as the largest city in the region, it does have the greatest concentration of population and thus could use the help. Also, Albany has nightclubs that attract out-of-town buyers and sellers, which in the past has resulted in violence at those venues.

“Because we are the largest city and have the population, that leads me to believe that’s why we are so high on the number of cases,” the Ward I city commissioner said.

Albany’s population is greater than Americus, Moultrie and Thomasville — three of the other larger southwest Georgia cities — combined, he said. With the GBI’s drug unit in the same city, it should make it easier for them to perform coordinated operations, and GBI agents will be closer to the courtrooms in the county where it has the largest number of cases.

With the GBI personnel located here, “I believe the city and the county can do a lot of undercover activity in the area,” Howard said.

One possible location for the agency in Dougherty County is across Evelyn Avenue from the Dougherty County Jail facility. The brick building was an office for Sabal Trail Transmission while it was constructing a natural gas pipeline that stretched from Alabama to Florida.

No deal has been made on the property, Albany City Attorney Nathan Davis said on Tuesday. But having the drug unit at that location kind of makes sense, he said.

It would be a “mini law enforcement” area in one location, Davis said.

Staff Photo: Alan Mauldin
AlanMauldin[email protected]
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