Author: Dick Mangrum

The public school year has been anything except normal.  But there’s hope for 2021-22.  At their meeting Monday, Oconee school trustees will talk about two different suggested calendars.  One would have the next school year start on August 11; the other would have it start on August 16.

The contracting economy is beginning to feel the increasing COVID lockdowns.  The lockdowns are believed to having an effect across Upstate South Carolina when it comes to displaced workers.  According to the latest chart from the Department of Employment and Workforce, every Upstate county, Oconee included, reported triple-digit numbers for first-time claims covering the week November 29-December 5.  Oconee’s new […]

Oconee School District has a report fraud hotline.  There might be one on its way to regular county government.  Amanda Brock, county administrator, confirms to 101.7/WGOG NEWS that the county has explored several possibilities and is “reviewing implementation options.”

The police in Walhalla are announcing arrests and charges against two city residents as part of the investigation of incidents last month at a Greenwich Drive residential address.  Multiple charges, including petty larceny and assault and battery third degree, were placed against Megan Cheyenne Summerlin, 25 years old.  A second woman, Alicia Brooke Wilbanks, 20 years old, was charged with […]

The need to replenish the blood supply remains urgent, and Prisma Health has made plans for a community blood drive Saturday in Easley.  According to the Blood Connection, donors are encouraged to make an appointment before arriving.  Face masks are required.  If you’d like to donate, and possibly save someone’s life, the place to be Saturday is the City of […]

State troopers say a driver near Seneca was sent to the hospital this morning with non-life threatening injuries after she took evasive action to avoid hitting a deer on the Singing Pines Road south of the city.  Initial information provided by the patrol indicates that, shortly before 6 o’clock, the driver swerved her car to miss the deer, but then […]

Oconee School District over the last year took up the recommendation of its outside auditor and implemented a telephone hotline to report cases of fraud.  It takes millions and millions of dollars to run a school district the size of Oconee’s, and there could be opportunity for someone to commit an act of fraud.  The fraud hotline number is 864/718-5798.  […]

A traffic stop begun by the Walhalla police yesterday at an intersection wound up in the parking lot of a nearby school.  It was in the James Brown Elementary School parking lot where the driver eventually stopped.  And there police officers called for a K-9 unit and arrested and charged the driver with drug offenses.  Although the traffic stop took […]

The Oconee County public school days of Monday and Tuesday, December 21 and 22 have been re-scheduled as eLearning days.  The school district this afternoon gave the following explanation:  “Factors leading to this decision included difficulty in finding substitutes to cover both COVID-19 related absences and normal requests for leave on those two days, along with conflicts with some events […]

For the sixth consecutive reporting day, South Carolina DHEC counts in excess of 2,000 COVID-19 cases.  Today’s number:  2,139, along with 26 additional deaths.  Of the new confirmed cases, 48 from Oconee County.  Total test results received:  10,411; the positivity was 20.5%.