ALBANY, Ga. (WALB) - Newly updated and developed safety protocols have just been released to us by the city of Albany. Those protocols were put in place after the deaths of two public works employees last year. When we interviewed Albany City Manager Terrell Jacobs back in February, he admitted to systemic failures by the city in these cases.

An internal death investigation revealed, quote, “a lack of proper safety equipment, inadequate training, and repeated dismissal of safety concerns by management” in the death of public works employee, Sebastian Dykes Jr.

Dykes was buried alive while working on a sewer line in December of 2024.

Sebastian Dykes Jr.’s death “highlighted a culture of negligence, cost-cutting, and disregard for worker safety that created an environment where such tragedies were inevitable,” according to an Albany Police Department memo.

“There’s no one person that is at fault for those two lives. It’s just, you know, we failed that those two young men and not having certain things and not practicing certain protocols that we should have been practicing, you know, but, you know, hopefully as we look to put these new things in place we should not have those type of challenges. We want everyone to come home at the end of the day. We don’t want anyone who won’t go home and we have to tell loved ones that they have succumb,” said Jacobs.

The city admits that there was no trench box in use while Dykes was working on the sewer line, and that the job site had well-known hazards, including soft ground and flowing water.

The old Standard Operations Procedures (SOPs) from 2014 on sewer lines do not mention the use of trench boxes at all, just general safety devices.

The 2025 updates now require employees to use trench boxes when required, wear other PPE, and follow safe excavation practices.

The memo on Dykes’ death also states, “Crew supervisors raised concerns about unsafe working conditions and the need to contract out dangerous jobs, but their recommendations were ignored by upper management due to cost considerations.”

WALB is still waiting on the final investigative report into the death of another public works employee, Darrious Stephens, who died after being swept into the Flint River in February 2024 while collecting water samples.

On the day Darrious Stephens died, it was raining heavily and the employee who was supposed to be with Stephens was waiting in the truck.

Now, the city’s newly released SOPs require that sample collectors must wear certain gear and:

• Avoid working in inclement weather or low visibility unless necessary.
• Use a buddy system whenever possible.
• And use whistles, radios, life preservers and grab lines during an emergency.

Al Watts worked for Albany Public Works for 13 years.

He says these protocols sound good on paper but are too little, too late for his dear friend, Darrious.

“The life jackets, you know, for collecting samples, that that’s a great thing that should have already been in place, but still... them addressing the stability of the platform to where you collect samples for, that’s not even addressed because they’re still collecting samples on unstable ground. My issue is jobs being too big that need to be contracted out that are not being contracted out. You’re forcing your employees to do jobs that they don’t have the right equipment to do,” Watts says.

Jacobs was not able to discuss who, if anyone, was fired as a result of the employee death investigations.

He did recently get it approved, though, to hire seven new safety officers to enforce safety protocols at work sites, saying “They will be in charge of training as well, but also safety inspections and things of that nature because we want to put safety at the forefront of everything that we do.”

Two potential start dates provided to us by the city for these seven officers include Aug. 4 and Aug. 18, with interviews starting next week.

Jacobs also says they have identified current staff who will be repurposed to an organizational development department.

He says they’ll be responsible for overseeing the training and development of the city’s nearly 1,100 employees.

Since January of this year, the city has documented four trainings and certifications in the public works department.

WALB once again requested the final death investigation report for Darrious Stephens from the city attorney’s office.

We were told, “City Attorney Custer advised that to her knowledge, there is no report regarding the incident concerning Mr. Stephens.”

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