The Oconee Count Planning Commission, in a 7 to 3 vote last week, sided with the county planning staff and recommended approval of a rezone request of nearly 50 acres on the north side of Barnett Shoals Road east of Watkinsville for a 12-lot residential subdivision.
The county planning staff recommended approval of the rezone only on the condition that lot size be at least three acres–a condition that the property owner opposed.
The Oconee County Board of Education on Monday night received a partial preview of its Fiscal Year 2026 Budget, showing $120.5 million in expenditures, an increase of 4.9 percent from the current Fiscal Year.
Chief Financial Officer Peter Adams told the Board that he will have a complete budget for it to review at its work session on May 5.
Agriculture in Oconee County, as well as in the rest of the state and country, faces a number of challenges--from population growth, climate change, cuts in federal funding, an aging farmer population, and a high suicide rate among farmers.
Agriculture remains important to Oconee County, however, with the farm gate value, or value of the cultivated product, at $64.4 million, according to the most recent annual estimate.
Oconee County Schools sent out a news release nine minutes after the School Board ended its session on Monday night announcing that Superintendent Jason Branch had told the Board that he is retiring on June 30.
School Board Chair Michael Ransom said on Tuesday evening that Branch informed the Board of his decision to retire as part of his personnel recommendations to the Board presented at the executive session at the end of the Board’s regular meeting.
The Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) has acquired, by purchase or condemnation, all of the rights of way needed for construction of the interchange of the Oconee Connector and SR 316, according to an analysis of county property records and published GDOT plans for the project.
It has acquired the sole property to be displaced by the flyover of SR 316 by Virgil Langford Road and all but two of the required rights of way.
Oconee County on Tuesday experienced its second sewer spill in the last two months and third in the last 11 months into an unnamed tributary of McNutt Creek near where the tributary crosses under Tanglebrook Drive at the entrance to Tanglebrook subdivision.
The break in the force main on Tuesday resulted in a release of 17,411 gallons of untreated sewage into the tributary.
The Oconee County Board of Education told the Georgia Department of Education last month that it expects the small decline in enrollment at Oconee County Schools in school year 2023-2024 to be temporary.
The Board predicted a growth in enrollment for the current school year, and for that growth to continue through to school year 2028-2029.
Nineteen vendors set up tents on the lawn in front of the Pavilion at Wire Park in Watkinsville on Saturday as the Oconee Farmer’s Market kicked off its 22nd season.
Vendors offered fresh lettuce and other salad greens, arugula, radishes, mushrooms, spinach, cherry tomatoes, and herbs.
More than 750 people turned out Saturday afternoon for a Hands Off Rally on the steps of City Hall in Athens to protest the policies and activities of President Donald Trump and his advisor Elon Musk.
Oconee County Democrats co-organized the event with Indivisible GA 10 and Athens-Clarke County Democrats, and Oconee County Democratic Party leadership was on-hand–and Oconee County residents were in the crowd–as the 90-minute-long rally played out.
Oconee Farmer’s Market launches its 22nd season at 9 a.m. tomorrow (Saturday) at a new venue–on the lawn in front of the Pavilion at Wire Park in Watkinsville.
Vendors are expected to offer early vegetables, mushrooms, baked goods, artworks, soaps, jewelry, and other products.
Oconee County commissioners on Tuesday approved two zoning changes designed to allow the developer of a shopping center at U.S. 78 and Mars Hill Road in the northwest of the county to move forward with the project.
The zoning changes are to accommodate a grocery store, putting the developer in the position to be first among three shopping centers along U.S. that included a grocery in their plans to actually build the store.
The Georgia House of Representatives on Monday pulled two bills designed to reconfigure the Athens-Clarke County Board of Elections and Registration from its local legislative Calendar and sent them to its Intragovernmental Coordination Committee for further consideration.
Rep. Houston Gaines, who represents one of Oconee County’s four precincts in the 120th House District and is the chief sponsor of the two bills, did not object when Beth Camp, chair of the Intragovernmental Coordination Committee, asked House Speaker Jon Burns to pull the two bills from the Local Calendar.
Oconee County’s two state House representatives, who also represent parts of Athens-Clarke County, have introduced legislation in the General Assembly to change how the Athens-Clarke County Board of Elections and Registration is constituted.
As is the case in Oconee County, the ACC Board of Elections and Registration at present consists of five voters serving four-year terms, with one member put forward by the county’s Democratic Party, one member put forward by the county’s Republican Party, and three chosen by the County Commission from voters in the county who apply.
Georgia House Bill 92, on the desk of Gov. Brian Kemp, would give the Oconee County Board of Education until the end of April to decide to reverse its decision to opt out of the floating homestead exemption approved by voters last November.
If the Board decides to stay the course and not participate in the inflation-adjusted property tax exemption for homeowners, it will have to renew that decision again in 2027, after holding three public hearings, if the governor signs the bill.
Meredith Dean, Director of Community Works, an initiative to build relationships and trust across political differences, asked Oconee County Democrats last week to “think differently” about people living in rural America.
Speaking to the Democrats via Zoom from her base in rural Virginia, Dean said “both major parties have actually failed rural communities,” and this is part of the reason Democrats “are in the situation” they are in.
The Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) has sent letters to property owners between SR 15 and U.S. 441 south of Watkinsville telling them that survey work will begin soon for the design of a truck bypass of Watkinsville for SR 15.
Property owners are told they must allow access to the surveyors and are asked to complete a sketch showing where their septic tanks are located.
Representatives of Jones Petroleum Company and Hand Properties were before the Oconee County Planning Commission on Monday with the most specific plans to date for a grocery store in the U.S. 78 corridor in the northwest part of the county.
The request was to rezone a very narrow strip of land north of and opposite Clotfelter Road on U.S. 78 that will allow for a signalized entrance to a planned shopping center to the west of the JP convenience store and fuel station and Burger King at Mars Hill Road.
Organizers of the Tuesday evening Town Hall Meeting With Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Collins were not able to get Collins to attend, but they did turn out a very large crowd that produced a stack of 163 comment forms to deliver to Collins’s Monroe Office this week.
Selected individuals in the auditorium of the Athens Library read aloud a number of those questions, and the crowd remained engaged and orderly for the more than 90 minutes set aside for the meeting.
The group in Bishop that submitted a rejected application to begin the recall process for that city’s mayor and three member of its Council can restart the process at any time, according to a new interpretation of the state laws covering recalls.
Despite that option, Jacob Spaulding, who picked up the application forms and returned them to the Oconee County Office of Elections and Registration on March 3, said that he and his colleagues have decided to end their recall efforts.
Members of the Georgia House of Representative, led in part by Oconee County Rep. Houston Gaines, are working hard to make life difficult for members of governmental bodies that voted to opt out of the state’s new floating homestead exemption.
In Oconee County, those are the members of the Oconee County Board of Education, who voted 4 to 1 on Feb. 3 to approve a resolution not to participate in the inflation-adjusted homestead exemption.
Oconee County Democrats are going forward with plans to hold a Town Hall Meeting on Tuesday evening, even though they acknowledge invited Republican 10th Congressional District Rep. Mike Collins has said he will not attend.
The meeting will begin at 5:30 p.m. at the Athens Clarke-County Library Auditorium, according to an email message sent out by Harold Thompson, Oconee County Democratic Party Chair, on Friday (March 14).
The Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) is considering allowing its contractor to close the Oconee Connector interchange with SR 316 for 45 days during reconstruction of that intersection.
Construction of the three-interchange bundle consisting of Jimmy Daniell Road, Virgil Langford Road, and the Connector is expected to begin later this year with the Virgil Langford Road flyover of SR 316.
Oconee County Schools has collected 99 percent of its projected revenue from ad valorem taxes and from title taxes, two-thirds of its funding from the state Quality Basic Education (QBE) formula, and 28 times the budgeted amount for investment income.
Oconee County Schools Chief Financial Officer Peter Adams made that report to School Board on Monday, saying that, in the eighth month of the school year “we are on target for the period, maintaining a well balanced financial position.”
The Oconee County Board of Education on Monday approved a state-required five-year facilities plan that projects growing enrollment through the 2028-2029 school year and calls for expanded high school instructional space to address that growth.
The total cost of the construction in the plan is $67.1 million, with $16.2 million of that listed as eligible for state funding and the remaining $50.9 million coming from local sources.
Oconee County Schools is planning the addition of seven instructional units to North Oconee High School in the next five years as well as substantial renovations and modifications of the facility.
The school system is telling the state that the changes at North Oconee High School are its top construction priority for the next five years and asking the state to contribute $4.5 million to those changes. Total costs are expected to exceed $13 million.
The Oconee County Board of Elections and Registration on Tuesday turned down the Application Petition of a group of Bishop residents that would have been the first step in initiating a recall election for the mayor and three members of the Bishop Council.
The Elections Board took that action after reviewing the application documents submitted the day earlier and determining that Greg Montgomery, designated as the Petition Chairperson on the four Recall Application Petitions, is not a registered voter in Bishop or in Oconee County and had not actually signed the petitions.
Oconee County commissioners, in quick succession on Tuesday night, approved rezone plans for a car wash and oil change shop at Epps Bridge Centre II, for a small office complex just north of Watkinsville, and for a hotel on Parkway Boulevard near Epps Bridge Centre.
No one other than the applicants or their representatives spoke in favor of any of the three rezone requests, and no one spoke in opposition. With almost no discussion, the commissioners approved all three unanimously.
Only a little more than a month after approval of an agreement setting up a School Resource Officer (SRO) program for Oconee County Schools, officers have been assigned to five of the system’s 12 schools.
Kevin Yancey, Director of Student Services at Oconee County Schools, told the Oconee County Board of Education at its work session on Monday (March 3) that, as of that day, the third officer had been assigned to the system’s three middle schools.
Nearly 1,000 students who live in Oconee County were attending private schools last October, up by 85 students from October of 2023.
The largest number of those Oconee County students in private schools in October were attending Prince Avenue Christian School, Athens Academy, and Westminster Christian Academy.
Oconee County Superior Court Judge Eric Norris last month issued orders condemning two pieces of property owned by Deferred Tax LLC that are needed by the Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) for construction of the interchanges of Virgil Langford Road and the Oconee Connector at SR 316.
Norris also granted GDOT additional easements and access rights needed during the construction of the two interchanges.
Twenty eight people, one with a dog on a leash, turned out around noon on Friday at the intersection of the Oconee Connector and Parkway Boulevard to show their appreciation to Costco, which has been steadfast in its support of its Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) program.
The rally, which began at 11:30 a.m outside Epps Bridge Centre and lasted an hour, resulted from the initiative of Pam Davis of the Oconee County Democrats and Karen Covi of Indivisible 10.
Oconee County resident Suzannah Heimel has filed a motion asking Georgia Supreme Court Justice Sarah Hawkins Warren to recuse herself from the Court’s dismissal of Heimel’s appeal of a lower court decision regarding an action of the Oconee County Board of Elections and Registration last August.
The state Supreme Court on Feb. 18 dismissed Heimel’s appeal of an Oct. 24 ruling by Oconee County Superior Court Chief Judge Lisa Lott denying Heimel’s request for a writ of mandamus directed at the Oconee County Board of Elections and Registration.
Oconee County Republican Party Vice Chairman Colby Baker opened the party’s meeting on Monday with a review of the schedule for the upcoming county, district, and state conventions.
Guest speaker Jason Thompson, one of three Georgia members of the Republican National Committee, took the cue.
Oconee County experienced two major spills in the last nine months on its major force main sewer line servicing the county’s commercial hub due to problems during installation of the pipe joints or with the pipe itself, county leaders now believe.
The two breaks occurred about 100 yards apart at joints on the line, which runs along an unnamed tributary to McNutt Creek that separates Tanglebrook subdivision and the Pinewood Estates South mobile home park.
Kalki Yalamanchili, who took over as Western Judicial Circuit District Attorney in January, had a clear message for Oconee County Democrats when he met with them last week.
The staffing problems he confronted when he assumed his job were worse than he had anticipated, he said.
About 100 people turned out at the front entrance to the historic William Daniell House off Daniells Bridge Road on Saturday morning to help Oconee County celebrate its 150th Birthday.
Oconee County Board of Commissioners Chair John Daniell, a descendant of William Daniell, described as an American Revolutionary Patriot, was present to read a proclamation of the Board of Commissioners wishing “our community the very best and happiest birthday.”
The Governor’s Office of Student Achievement (GOSA) last week released the list of 426 schools in the state that fall into the bottom quartile on its weighted index of scores from the state’s College and Career Ready Performance Index (CCRPI).
None of Oconee County’s 12 schools were on the list of “failed” schools, but several schools in neighboring districts were.
The Georgia Supreme Court on Tuesday unanimously dismissed Suzannah Heimel’s appeal of the Oconee County Superior Court ruling just before the Nov. 5 election denying Heimel’s request for a writ of mandamus.
Heimel had asked Oconee County Superior Court Chief Judge Lisa Lott to force Oconee County to hold a hearing on a challenge filed by Victoria Cruz to the registration of 228 persons.
Frank Bishop’s request to be allowed to add an oil change shop and car wash next door to Costco in Epps Bridge Centre ran into some opposition at the Oconee County Planning Commission on Monday night.
Only one citizen spoke in opposition to the request by Bishop for an amendment to the concept plan and allowed uses for a 2.5 acre outlot in Epps Bridge Centre II to accommodate the oil change shop and car wash.
The Oconee County Planning Commission will be asked on Monday night to give its approval to a rezone request for a 107 room hotel on Parkway Boulevard west of the Piedmont Healthcare Encompass Health Rehabilitation Hospital.
The plan is to carve 3.14 acres out of a 28.16 acre parcel currently zoned AG (Agricultural). The request is to rezone that 3.14 acre parcel B-2 (Highway Business) for the hotel.
Oconee County on Friday morning (Feb. 14) reported a major spill of untreated sewage into an unnamed tributary just south of where it flows under Tanglebrook Drive at the entrance to Tanglebrook subdivision and then into McNutt Creek.
The spill resulted from a break in the 12 inch force main that follows the tributary, according to the notification from the county.
Oconee County’s three representatives in the Georgia General Assembly took in $86,040 in campaign contributions in the first days of the year leading up to the opening of the legislative session on Jan. 13, according to campaign finance reports filed last week.
Sen. Bill Cowsert received $42,775 from contributors. Rep. Houston Gaines received $27,065. Rep. Marcus Wiedower took in $16,200.
Oconee County Schools received $1.3 million in revenue from the Education Local Option Sales Tax (ELOST) for December 2024 collections, the largest amount received in the two years the 1 percent tax has been in place.
The December 2024 collections were up just less than 9 percent from the $1.2 million intake for December of 2023 and represents the eighth month in a row that collections have been more than $1 million.
When former State Rep. Chuck Williams asked Board of Commissioners Chair John Daniell at the Town Hall Meeting late last month to provide an overview of transportation projects in the county, Daniell was happy and ready to respond.
Daniell routinely gives road work updates at Town Hall meetings, and earlier that day at a planning session with other commissioners he had gone over the long list of projects funded fully by the Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT), funded jointly with GDOT, and funded by the county alone.
The Oconee County Board of Elections and Registration, in a 3 to 2 vote on Thursday night, reduced the number of precincts in the county from eight to four, with the largest new precinct stretching from the Greene County line in the south to the Clarke County line in the north.
Ten citizens spoke at the consolidation hearing held before the vote, with all of them in opposition to the change.
Kevin Yancey, Director of Student Services for Oconee County Schools, told the Board of Education on Monday that Sheriff James Hale currently is working to fill the positions created by an Agreement approved on Jan. 29 to place a deputy in each of the county’s 12 schools.
Yancey, in his update to the Board, gave no time line for staffing of the school resource officer program within the Sheriff’s Office created by the Agreement signed by Hale and the chairs of the School Board and the Board of Commissioners at the end of the joint meeting on the 29th.
The Oconee County Board of Education, in a 4 to 1 vote Monday evening, passed a resolution to opt out of the statewide homestead exemption approved by voters in November to rein in the impact of increases in assessments on property taxes.
The Board voted in its regular work session following the third of the required public hearings two hours earlier, with only Post 4 Board Member Adam Hammond voting against the decision.
Oconee County is expecting to collect $20 million more than budgeted when it asked voters to approve the current Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax (SPLOST) in November of 2020, and commissioners at their strategic planning meeting on Wednesday discussed how to allocate the funds.
At the top of the list is a plan to pay off the General Obligation Bond voters approved in 2002 for purchase of land and development of what is now Oconee Veterans Park.
Four citizens spoke at the second public hearing on Tuesday (Jan. 28) on the Oconee County School Board’s announced intent to opt out of the statewide floating homestead exemption, all telling the Board they want the exemption.
Two of the citizens emphasized that the clear majority of Oconee County voters (64.3 percent) had approved a Constitutional Amendment in the Nov. 5 election allowing for the new homestead exemption.
The Oconee County Board of Commissioners, the Board of Education, and Sheriff James Hale came together on Wednesday to establish a 16-person division within the Sheriff’s Office to provide School Resource Officers (SROs) in each of the county’s 12 schools.
The Memorandum of Understanding signed at the end of the meeting was the result of discussions among the three entities that began immediately after the Sept. 4 shooting at Apalachee High School in Barrow County that left two students and two teachers dead and seven others injured.
The Oconee County Board of Education was following the procedures set out in law when it announced on Jan. 2 that it intended to opt out of the statewide floating homestead exemption, Board Member Ryan Hammock said on Monday evening.
“In reality, what we are doing is trying to make a decision on do we want to opt out or not,” Hammock said.
The Oconee County Board of Commissioners and Board of Education have called a joint meeting for 6 p.m. on Jan. 29 to discuss a $1.4 million Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to put school resource officers (SROs) in the county’s schools.
The MOU calls for Sheriff James Hale to employ up to 16 deputies “as quickly as is reasonably practicable given the qualifications required of SROs and their availability” in order to provide one SRO in each of the 12 Oconee County School District schools.
Oconee County Schools Chief Financial Officer Peter Adams led off the first hearing on Thursday evening on the floating property tax exemption for homeowners, making the case to the Board that it should opt out of implementation of the exemption.
Adams took seven minutes for his presentation, telling the Board that financial obligations are continuing to increase annually and opting out allows the Board to maintain local control to best meet the needs of Oconee students.
Athens State Rep. Spencer Frye, visiting with Oconee County Democrats last week fresh from hearing Gov. Brian Kemp give his State of the State Address in Atlanta, did little to hide his disappointment.
“Massively hypocritical, in my book,” is how Frye, a Democrat, described what Republican Gov. Kemp had said in his address to the General Assembly late that morning.
Frank Bishop wants the county to allow him to change the concept plan for a 2.5 acre parcel in his Epps Bridge Centre as well as the list of allowed uses for the land so he can add an automotive oil change and lubrication shop and car wash to the acreage.
The 2.5 acre parcel, owned by Bishop’s Epps Bridge Centre II LLC, sits in front of a 13.8 acre parcel also owned by Epps Bridge Centre LLC and occupied by Hobby Lobby.
The Georgia Supreme Court has received and recorded an appeal of the decision by Oconee Superior Court Judge Lisa Lott in October to dismiss an attempt to force the Oconee County Board of Elections and Registration to review challenges filed in July of last year to the registration of 228 Oconee County voters.
Oconee County resident Suzannah Heimel filed a notice of appeal with the Georgia Court of Appeals on Nov. 26 of Judge Lott’s Oct. 24 ruling dismissing Heimel’s case, arguing that Lott had “misinterpreted the law” and “did not give due process of the law to the Petitioner.”
Beth McIntyre, currently executive director of the Piedmont Regional Library System, will become executive director of the Athens Regional Library System effective March 17.
The Athens Regional Library System Board of Trustees on Thursday selected McIntyre after a search by its Personnel Committee to replace Valerie Bell, who stepped down as executive director of the Athens Regional Library System at the end of last year.
The Oconee County Library Board of Trustees on Monday approved the placement of a sculpture by Lawrence Stueck, a Watkinsville environmental sculptor and art teacher, at the Oconee County Library in Wire Park.
The artwork, labeled “You Are Here,” is multidimensional to reflect the intersection of the United States, Georgia, and Oconee County.
From the very beginning of the Oconee County Board of Education meeting on Monday evening, there was no doubt whom the Board was going to elect as its new chair.
When the five Board members, one after the other, entered the Board public meeting room from the smaller executive board meeting room, Ransom took the chair position, next to Superintendent Jason Branch.
Oconee County School Board Member Michael Ransom said he contacted Board members Amy Parrish and Ryan Hammock before he decided to announce on Jan. 2 that the Board intends to opt out of the statewide homestead exemption approved by voters on Nov. 5.
Ransom said he made the opt out decision after the Dec. 9 meeting of the Board and that he received the approval of Parrish and Hammock for the decision.
Oconee County Commissioners on Tuesday unanimously approved Tony Townley’s request for rezones for a 120-lot residential subdivision on 300 acres north of Hog Mountain Road between Rocky Branch and Hodges Mill roads.
It also approved, again unanimously, a request by Dixon Family Trust of 2012 for a special use allowing the Trust to add 10 rental cabins on part of 356 acres it owns that front on Hog Mountain and Lane Creek roads.
The Oconee County Board of Education does not intend to join in a homestead exemption approved overwhelmingly by voters--statewide and in Oconee County--in November that would limit increases in the assessed value of property that is a homestead.
Taxing authorities in the state are allowed to opt out of what is referred to as a floating homestead exemption based on inflation designed to limit increases in the assessed value and tax of homestead property.
