Editor’s Note: This is the last of a series of stories looking back at significant progress in Moultrie and Colquitt County during 2016.

MOULTRIE, Ga. – Not many national championships take place in what is known as rural Georgia. Those kind of events are reserved for the metro towns, especially Atlanta.

But it’s not an uncommon occurrence in Moultrie. What’s uncommon is the time crunch brought on by a last-minute change of venue.

In August, the USA Diving AT&T national championships were held at the Moss Aquatics Center, facilities that are described by everyone involved as “world class” for diving training and competition plus are maintained by the Moultrie-Colquitt County Parks and Recreation Department. But local recreation officials only had two-months notice to get things ready, for USA Diving made that switch from the originally planned location in California.

Moultrie-Colquitt County Recreation, along with the board of the Moss Farms Diving Tigers, pulled off the two-week long championships which brought more than 600 divers along with their coaches and families from 33 states to southwest Georgia.

It’s not the only reason, but certainly a milestone event for Moultrie-Colquitt County Recreation in 2016, that earned the department the Georgia Recreation and Parks Association District 3 Agency of the Year award.

“USA Diving officials hailed the meet as extremely successful,” said Recreation Director Terry Peek in his letter of application to the GRPA. “Local officials have projected that the national diving event had a $4 million impact to the area economy.”

Peek said it was a big collaborative effort between Moultrie-Colquitt Recreation, Moss Farms Diving and the community as a whole. It was a case for the Department of facilitating all of those people and making sure the pool was available to all and in good condition. It also involved staffing lifeguards who were put to the test on a couple of occasions.

And Moss Farms Diving, Peek said, handled coordinating the volunteers, some who took vacation time in order to help at the meet. Peek added other departments in the city came in to help in such areas as clean-up each day.

“There were so many details,” he said. This was the first time USA Diving held its national championships over a two-week stretch.

Moultrie-Colquitt County Recreation continues to grow in other areas. Baseball and softball tournaments are hosted at local facilities 32 out of the 52 weeks in the year, which increases the economic impact even more.

The backbone of sorts for local recreation is, according to Peek, the partnerships. Going back to 2015 numbers, Peek said these partnerships helped secure grants of around $146,000 and services of around $213,000, all of which were additions to annual program revenue the department receives from both Colquitt County and the City of Moultrie.

“So many are heavily involved,” said Peek. “Colquitt County is blessed.”

An example he gave is the Main Street Park Group. He said this shows people are willing to work hard to improve things in the community, and an amount like $150,000 is something you can’t predict.

The Department has six full-time and 26 part-time seasonal workers with a maintenance staff of eight handling both indoor and outdoor facilities.

How much in terms of facilities is that? Approximately 200 acres with a five-field lighted baseball complex (Magnolia Park), a four-field lighted multipurpose complex (Knuck McCrary Park), a four-field lighted softball complex and an eight-court lighted tennis complex (both at the Jim Buck Goff Complex), two gymnasiums (Tommy Meredith and Shaw), one community center (Ryce) and one youth center (R.D. Smith).

In addition to the diving well, the aquatics facilities for Moultrie-Colquitt County has an interactive play pool and two public laps pools. The Memorial pool is the home of the Moultrie Sharks swim team, is heated, and stages major competitive meets.

There are a total of 14 acres of passive parks, a 7.23-mile bike trail and a 200-linear-foot interactive trail.

Youth athletic programs are offered in football, basketball, softball and baseball. In 2016, Moultrie-Colquitt County hosted GRPA state tournaments in both baseball and softball. The 2015 numbers for youth were 402 in baseball, 152 in softball, 45 in tennis, 295 in football, 40 in swimming lessons, 81 in cheerleading, 81 in basketball and 183 in T-ball. The adult numbers were 104 in church softball (2016 participation numbers won’t be made public until January, 2017).

In the area of youth development, there is a United Way funded program for homework assistance, art classes and dance classes at the RD Smith Center. Senior citizens – the Shaw Gym Gladiators – socialize and plan community projects three times a week.