Career Achievement Award

MOULTRIE, Ga. — The threat of coronavirus has canceled an awards banquet scheduled for Thursday.

The Colquitt County Career Achievement Award was to honor Roger Hunter, program manager for NASA Small Spacecraft Technology, who was born in Moultrie. Thursday’s banquet was also to include a posthumous award for W.C. Vereen, an early leader of Moultrie and Colquitt County who was largely responsible for founding the hospital now known as Colquitt Regional Medical Center.

The coronavirus, also known as COVID-19, has sickened thousands around the world. So far only a handful have been diagnosed in Georgia, and none of them near Colquitt County.

The same can’t be said of western California, where Hunter works at the Ames Research Center, according to Brooks Sheldon, chairman of the committee that presents the Career Achievement Award. While Hunter himself is not sick, others at the facility have tested positive for the virus, Sheldon said on Tuesday, and all employees have been told to work from home and not to travel.

Sheldon said the plan is to skip this year’s award and present Hunter and the Vereen family with the awards at next year’s banquet. He’s been reaching out to those who have purchased tickets to the event to notify them of the cancelation.