The Oconee County Board of Commissioners on Tuesday night granted the request of Butts County developer Bill Jones for a postponement of consideration of a rezone of 32 acres for a commercial development at Mars Hill Road and U.S. 78.
Jones had told the county that he plans to build a JP convenience store and gas station with 20 fueling positions and a Burger King at the intersection where a BP station now stands.
The good news of the grand reopening of the Bogart Library on Saturday morning got even better as the ribbon cutting ceremonies progressed.
“I want to thank you all for coming out and welcome you to your newly renovated and expanded Bogart Branch Library,” Valerie Bell, executive director of the Athens Regional Library System, said at the start of the ceremonies a little after 11 a.m.
A Butts County businessman is asking the Oconee County Board of Commissioners at its meeting on Tuesday evening to approve his plans for a 32-acre commercial development on Mars Hill Road at U.S. 78 that could include a hotel and a big box store–possibly a Publix grocery.
Plans for the initial phase of the project call for a JP convenience store and gas station with 20 fueling positions and Burger King with a drive through lane to replace the BP station and small shops already at the northwest corner of Mars Hill Road and U.S. 78.
The Oconee County Board of Commissioners will consider decommissioning its Land Application System sewage treatment facility on Rocky Branch Road and converting it into a park, Commission Chair John Daniell said at the first-ever State of the County presentation on Wednesday.
The nearly 250-acre site also could accommodate a new fire station and a new facility for the Fleet Maintenance, Water Resources and Public Works departments, Daniell told the nearly 70 people assembled for the presentation.
Oconee County took first steps Tuesday night toward building broadband infrastructure to provide high-speed Internet both in the northern developed and southern undeveloped parts of the county.
The Board of Commissioners told County Administrator Justin Kirouac to go forward with seeking qualified partners to build off a proposed fiber network to provide Internet services to homes and businesses.
A total of 269 people attended the two Open House meetings the Georgia Department of Transportation held in the last two weeks on the widening of U.S. 441 and the bypass of Bishop, including 195 at the Open House last week at Oconee Veterans Park.
Attendees at both sessions got a chance to view maps showing the widening plans for the highway from the bypass in Madison to just south of Bishop and from just north of Bishop to the Watkinsville bypass and the truck bypass on the eastern side of Bishop.
Oconee County’s three legislators in the Georgia General Assembly last week voted in favor of House Bill 316 that selects new voting machines and responds to allegations that voters last year were denied access, absentee ballots were not counted and vote tallies were incomplete.
The vote on the House bill was partisan, and Sen. Bill Cowsert from the 46th District, Rep. Houston Gaines from House District 117, and Rep. Marcus Wiedower from House District 119, all Republicans, sided with the Republican majority.
