About

James Franklin Hicks, III became Franklin County's first public information officer and grants administrator in January 2022. Hicks came to Franklin County after serving as the city clerk and public information officer for the City of Creedmoor where he led the website redesign team and worked with vendors to set up an agenda management system for the city. Before moving to North Carolina, Hicks was a multi-award-winning government reporter for the (Greenwood, S.C.) Index-Journal.

His articles were republished through the Associated Press to newspapers around the country. Within his first year as a reporter, he was awarded first place for enterprise reporting by the South Carolina Press Association for his article chronicling the collapse of a public-private economic development organization known as the Greenwood Partnership Alliance and three awards in the following year: 2nd place in Government Beat reporting, 2ndplace in Business Beat reporting and 3rd place in News Feature writing.