Curious minds turn out for town hall event

Some of the audience seats were empty, but an Oconee town hall meeting proceeded last night in Walhalla — even though three of the dais chairs, as anticipated, went unfilled.  County councilmen Davis and Elliott fielded questions, while councilmen Durham, Hart, and Mize, true to their positions, stayed away.  This was a non-partisan event, arranged by county Republican Party leaders, to let the public pose questions of the county leaders and get answers on issues most prominent, especially the formation on the current county budgets.  But GOP chairman Jim Mann threw out a tea leaf to his Democratic counterparts by welcoming Jody Gaulin, chairwoman of the county Democratic Party. Before the questions began to fly, Davis and Elliott made short opening statements.  District One’s John Elliott used his to comment on Israel’s war with Hamas, displaying outrage over the deaths and urging the U-S administration and the congress to take action.  Elliott proposed sending in commandos to wipe out those who attacked Israel.  With opening statements out of the way, the two county leaders began to wade their way through submitted questions and read by event moderator Riley Morningstar of The Journal.  Planned as a two-and-one-half hour event, Morningstar announced that 118 questions had been submitted and, for time purposes, he would consolidate as many as possible.  The last 30 minutes of the night were reserved for impromptu questions from the audience.