The Oconee County Planning Commission voted a second time on Monday night to recommend that the Board of Commissioners not rezone 47 acres at the corner of Mars Hill Road and the Oconee Connector for a major shopping center.
The vote on Monday had six Commission members recommending denial and three voting against that recommendation.
The vote on Jan. 19, when the rezone first came before the Commission, had been unanimous, with all eight voting members in favor of denial.
The Northeast Health District added 39 new cases of COVID-19 with the release of the Department of Public Health Daily Status Report on Monday, resulting in a small drop in the seven-day rolling average of added cases.
The District reported no new confirmed deaths from the disease, resulting in a drop in the seven-day rolling average of added deaths from 1.7 confirmed deaths added each day to 1.4.
Oconee County, for the second day in a row, did not add any new cases of COVID-19, and the seven-day rolling average of added cases remained unchanged at 3.4 cases per day. The county had not added any new cases last Monday as well.
Boswell Properties, owned by State Transportation Board member Jamie Boswell, is at the center of the rezone involving his client Maxie Price that is before the Oconee County Planning Commission on Monday night.
Boswell not only is listing the 47 acres owned by Price, but he has been informed of a decision by Georgia Department of Transportation senior officials to overrule regional engineers who had rejected Price’s request for access to the Oconee Connector from his property.
The rolling average of added cases of COVID-19 in the Northeast Health District declined on Sunday after a six-day run of increases. The District added no deaths from the disease in the Sunday Department of Public Health Daily Status Report.
With the addition of 33 new cases of COVID-19, the seven-day rolling average of added cases decreased to 59.9 from 61.6 on Saturday.
Oconee County did not add any new cases, and its seven-day rolling average of added cases dropped to 3.4 added cases per day from 4.6 on Saturday.
Clarke County added four cases and its seven-day rolling average of added cases dropped to 15.4 from 15.7 on Saturday.
Oconee County voters are likely to be asked to approve a new 1 percent sales tax later this year to help the county meet its public works needs, Oconee County Board of Commissioners Chair John Daniell said in the State of the County address.
Daniell said last week that no decision has been made on when the referendum will be on the ballot, but he said that he expects to have the issue on the agenda of a Commission meeting in May or June.
The seven-day rolling averages of both added COVID-19 cases and confirmed deaths from the disease increased in the Northeast Health District with the release of the Saturday Daily Status Report of the Department of Public Health.
The increase of the rolling average of added cases was the sixth in as many days.
The District added three confirmed deaths, and the seven-day rolling average of added deaths increased to 1.7 deaths per day from 1.3 deaths per day on Friday.
The rolling averages of added COVID-19 cases and deaths in the Northeast Health District changed only slightly with the Friday release of the Department of Public Health Daily Status Report.
The District added 66 cases of the disease, and the seven-day rolling average of added cases increased to 57.0 from 56.9 on Thursday. That rolling average has increased, albeit by small increments, for each of the last five days.
