When the Oconee County Democratic Party asked County Commissioner Chuck Horton to give an overview of the proposed new Dawson Park last week, Horton focused on what he sees as the immediate need for new sports fields and a gym.
The long-range plan for the 250-acre site on Rocky Branch Road that now is the county’s Land Application System (LAS) site includes bike and walking trails, a dog park, ponds, playgrounds, and picnic areas.
All of the current attention, however, is on the 10 sports fields in Phase I and six additional fields and a gym with eight full-sized basketball courts in Phase II.
Horton told the Democrats he wants the county to complete work on both of those phases right away, with the goal of having all those facilities available at the same time.
The county has $20 million in reserves set aside for Phase I, and another $4 million promised from the county’s Industrial Development Authority (IDA) to put synthetic turf on those 10 fields.
Horton said he wants the county to issue bonds, either through the IDA or through a citizen-approved referendum, to move forward at the same time with the plans for the additional six fields and the gym.
To that end, Horton said, he wants the county’s to dedicate much of the $24 million set aside in the Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax (SPLOST) on the May 19 ballot for Dawson Park.
“Hopefully I'll win this,” Horton said. “I have lost sometimes. But I’ve got to keep trying.”
Politics
Horton spoke to the Oconee County Democrats on Thursday of last week (March 5), and on Monday (March 2) he had qualified to run for reelection in the Republican Party Primary to be held on May 19.
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| Horton 3/52026 |
At the end of qualifying on Friday, no other Republican or Democrat had qualified to run against him, but Horton made no mention of the elections during his 35 minute talk to the Democrats. Nor did Democratic Party Chair Harold Thompson in introducing Horton.
Horton did begin his comments by saying he had been asked to talk to the Democratic Party in the past and that “I think we probably, on both sides of the fence, ought to mingle more often because some of the topics that we're talking about, we're dealing with at the level right now, impact everybody in the county.”
“The first one I’m going to deal with is the new county park,” he said, “and I don't ask kids who their mom and daddy voted for. That’s got nothing to do with what I do.”
“This is something that I think both sides can come together on,” Horton said of the plans for the park.
“I know Republicans that say, I don't want to talk to them,” he said, referring to Democrats. “I said, well, I did because they vote and they pay taxes. They might even cross over and vote for me.”
“That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard---You don't want to go talk to them,” Horton said. “We don't have to agree on everything. But there's probably a lot of things we can't agree on.”
Horton spoke to the Democrats at the Piedmont Oconee Health Campus, 1305 Jennings Mill Road. Thirty people attended the meeting.
More On The Park
Horton said the county at present is in “bad shape” in terms of providing sports fields and gym space for citizens in the county.
“The bottom line, is we don’t have any space,” he said.
Horton said the county remains overly dependent on Oconee County Schools for use of gym space.
Horton said the county has been able to set aside $20 million–some of it coming from excess SPLOST revenue–to cover much of the cost of the 10 fields in Phase I of the project.
But the county needs the additional six fields and the gym, according to Horton.
That gym is designed to include eight full basketball courts, or 16 half courts.
Building out the park “will be the most expensive project the county's ever got involved in,” Horton said.
Board of Commissioners Chair John Daniell has estimated that the gym will cost $32 million and the additional six fields will cost $8 million–or $40 million that the county currently does not have.
The $4 million from the IDA will be used for turf for the initial 10 fields rather than grass.
Sports Tourism
The IDA decided to give the county $4 million from its reserves of $5.4 million as a way of promoting sports tourism in the county.
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| Horton 3/5/2026 |
“Now, personally I don't like it,” Horton said of artificial turf. "But when you've got as many kids as we've got, if you don't have something like that, they can't play in the rain on the dirt, and grass fields can't do that.”
“And so it's kind of, well, what are we going to do?” Horton said. “If we don't have it, then the kids don't have a place to play.”
“So the IDA stepped up,” he said, “and that's, I think, going to help make a difference.”
“I think this has been kind of misinterpreted--the term sports tourism,” Horton said. “I have never one time told anybody that I would put premier training leagues ahead of Parks and Rec.”
“So if we can take care of all our kids during the week, and maybe sometimes on weekends,” Horton said, “but other times on the weekends we can open it up to allow people to come into the county” for tournaments.
“That's where that term came from,” he said. “But it was never to slight those kids that sign up for Parks and Rec.”
“Hopefully this will give Parks and Rec a little breathing room, and we can do tournament play when it's okay to do that. And we can help the school system by providing space on weekends where they can do tournament play.”
Time Line
Horton said the time line for development of the park is difficult to provide at present because the county is still using the LAS system for treatment of waste water.
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| Construction Site With Stacked Wastewater Transmission Pipes Across From County Administrative Building 2/2/2026 |
That water is sprayed onto hay fields on the site after the water passes through lined settling ponds.
Work is underway on expansion of the Calls Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant north of Watkinsville and on a transmission line that will carry treated water from that plant to the Middle Oconee River at a site behind Athens Academy owned by the county.
At the IDA meeting on January 13, Board of Commissioners Chair John Daniell said decommissioning of the LAS site will take 12 to 18 months.
Grading of the fields should start in 2027, he said, and some fields could be available late that years.
Final completion date for the first two phases of the park is probably 2030 or 2031, he said.
Questions And Answers
In response to questions, Horton said the county has been hearing complaints about provision of Emergency Medical Services in the county and is considering options.
The Board of Commissioners has scheduled a dedicated Town Hall Meeting at 6 p.m. on March 26 at the county Administrative Building north of Watkinsville to review those options with the public.
“We've got complaints and they're coming in a lot faster,” Horton said.
“What is the long range outlook” for the county’s Volunteer Fire Department, another person asked.
“We don't mess with that,” Horton said. “That's some of the most dedicated people.”
“We don't see a need to go full time,” he said, “because if we do that, when it happens, I'm guessing $5 million we’ve got to come up with every year at least.”
“And these men and women are so dedicated,” he said, “none of us see a reason to go and do it out of county government.”
“I mean, we don't really talk about it,” he said, “because they want to do it.”
Video
The video below is of the entire meeting of the Oconee County Democrats.
The meeting took place at the Piedmont Oconee Health Campus, 1305 Jennings Mill Road, and the speakers were not using microphones.
I moved the camera several times at the beginning to try to get closer to Horton to better pick up the sound. I apologize for the poor video as I moved the camera.
Horton began speaking at 1:48 in the video.
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