Habersham cuts ribbon on agri-science center

MT. AIRY - Habersham County education and business leaders were joined by Habersham Central FFA members Tuesday for the much-awaited Habersham Agri-Science Center ribbon-cutting ceremony. <br /> <br /> The multi-purpose facility has been the works for a few years and Gilbert Barrett, a member of the Habersham Agri-Science Center Committee, said they saw the need for such a facility when the vocational agriculture program in the school system increased from 300 students to more than 1,200. <br /> <br /> Barrett, who has served on the county board of education for the past eight years, said, "This is a laboratory actually. It will be used on a daily basis for students to house livestock products, but we'll have science classes that will meet out there and other classes will utilize the facilities for instructional purposes - and of course it will be a venue for events for livestock expositions as well." <br /> <br /> According to Barrett, when officials designed the new high school, which opened three years ago, this facility as phase two. He said, $750,000 in Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax money was allocated for the building, but it took more and businesses and individuals have stepped up to help provide additional funds. <br /> <br /> Among the special guests for the event was Georgia Agriculture Commissioner Gary Black.<br /> <br /> As Black spoke to the crowd he focused some of his comments toward the FFA students in attendance. <br /> <br /> "I hope you will recognize that this is the day that in a great demonstration you see that your community believes in the future of agriculture in Habersham County," Black said. <br /> <br /> Barrett shared with the crowd that one out of every seven Georgians work in some kind of ag-related field, "so we are not only implementing student achievement and helping that process but we're exposing them to career exploration."