Joel Adair, president of the Belfair Homeowners Association, was deliberate and measured as he offered his 12-minutes of comments to the Board of Commissioners on Tuesday night.
Adair said he recognized that the proposal before the Board for a reconfigured Meadowlands shopping center and Continuing Care Retirement Community fronting on U.S. 78 was a significant improvement over the one approved by the Board in 2009.
The Oconee County Board of Education has extended the term of Superintendent Jason Branch’s contract for another year until June 30, 2024.
The Board took this action after its executive session at the end of its open work meeting on Aug. 2.
Deliberations in executive session are private, and the Board reconvened and held an open meeting for only one minute to vote unanimously to approve the new contract, which has a start date of July 1, 2021.
Walton County Commission Chair David Thompson did not file an application for federal relief funding of a water treatment plant and distribution system for Hard Labor Creek Regional Reservoir on Aug. 19 as he had promised, or on Aug. 31, the original application deadline.
Walton Board of Commissioners Clerk Rhonda Hawk explained Thompson’s decision by noting that Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp has extended the deadline to Oct. 31 for applications for allocation of federal funding for pandemic relief.
A draft of the Walton County application shared with Oconee County officials after the Aug. 11 meeting of the Hard Labor Creek Regional Reservoir Management Board states that the treated water is needed to serve “the emerging industrial corridors” along Interstate 20, U.S. 78 and SR 316.
Oconee commissioners agreed on Tuesday to take steps to dispose of two properties bordering the Courthouse in downtown Watkinsville that will become surplus once the planned administrative building is opened on Watkinsville’s northern edge.
One of those building is familiar to many voters because it houses the Elections and Registration Office at 10 Court Street south of the Courthouse and has been used as an early voting site in the past.
The other, at the corner of North Water Street and South Third Street on the opposite side of the Courthouse, is home to the county’s Operations and Facilities Office.
The 10 county Northeast Health District added 3,331 new cases of COVID-19 in the week ending on Friday and 24 new confirmed deaths from the disease.
Three of the confirmed deaths were in Clarke County.
The 3,331 added cases of COVID-19 and 24 deaths compare with the 3,218 new cases and 12 confirmed deaths added in the week ending Aug. 27.
The Oconee County Board of Education on Thursday selected Vice Chair Kim Argo to move into the open position of Board chair and, without considering seeking applications from the public, appointed former Board Member Wayne Bagley to replace Argo.
The Board also selected Board Member Amy Parrish as vice chair to replace Argo.
Argo, whose term would have expired in 2022, will now fill out Tom Odom’s terms as chair, which ends in 2024. Odom, re-elected only last November, stepped down on Aug. 9, citing health reasons, with his tenure ending on Wednesday.
Oconee County Schools has been granted more than $5 million in Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) monies, according to a report presented to the Board of Education in June.
At that time, Oconee County Schools showed $1.8 million of that money allocated, with a little more than $1 million for distance learning.
None of the $3.3 million granted to the schools as part of the last of the three of the ESSER grants had been allocated in that June report.
