Treasurer Ivey Presents Award to Trooper Gilliland Alabama State Treasurer, Kay Ivey, Presents the Billie Gilliland Exceptional Contribution to Rural Accident Prevention Award to Trooper Chuck Gilliland who is accepting the award on behalf of Alabama's State Troopers.

The Billie Gilliland Exceptional Contribution To Rural Accident Prevention Award was established to recognize individuals or organizations for their efforts in preventing rural accidents. The first recipient of this prestigious award was Alabama's state troopers for their continuous and courageous efforts to prevent rural motor vehicle accidents.

This award was been named after Billie Gilliland, a champion of rural health from Choctaw County, who was lost in a rural motor vehicle accident in 2004. When the county's only hospital in Butler closed in 1993 and most of the physicians relocated, Mrs. Gilliland went to work to assure that the residents would have local healthcare available. She was able to secure the services of two physicians and became a founder of 1st Health Treatment Center in Butler.

Mrs. Gilliland was on her way to interview a doctor in Meridian, Mississippi who had some interest in moving to Butler when her full-size pickup truck collided with a utility truck. Her death drew special news media attention because her husband Chuck Gilliland, a state trooper, was the first law enforcement officer on the crash scene.

According to reports, there were no passengers in either vehicle, and both drivers were killed. The driver of the utility truck had been attempting to pass an 18-wheel truck when he accidentally collided with Mrs. Gilliland's truck traveling in the oncoming lane of Alabama Highway 10, a narrow, two-lane highway, between the communities of Yantley and Lisman.