Oconee County, GA Politics

For Immediate Release: February 22, 2008              Contact: Martin Matheny                  678-278-2108 (o)                  706-461-0439 (m)                  martin@georgiademocrat.org     Official Democratic delegate numbers for Georgia   ATLANTA – The Democratic Party of Georgia released the final, official delegate breakdown for Georgia today.   The numbers are:     Senator Barack Obama Senator Hillary Clinton Statewide At-large Delegates 13 6 Statewide Pledged Party Leaders/Elected Officials 7 4 Congressional District 1 2 1 Congressional District 2* 3 2 Congressional District 3 ...

It was a wet Thursday afternoon at Athens restaurant Harry Bissett's New Orleans Cafe when former U.S. Senator Wyche Fowler took time out of his busy day to join a small group of very dedicated Democrats from Oconee County for a lunch and conversation. Fowler has been teaching a class at the UGA Law School and has deep ties to the community. Dr. Neil Priest recalled Fowler's encyclopedic knowledge of the hymnal. I was asked by the former ambassador of Saudi Arabia to recount his announcement before running for Senate involving the such notorious bands as the Bar-B-Que Killers and Eat America at the 40 Watt Club many moons ago. Fowler peppered the spicy meal with lots of anecdotes ranging from deserts the size of France in Saudi Arabia to carrying Castro's machine gun in Cuba while the recently resigned strong man drove him around his island. During the meal former US Congressman Don Johnson came up and talked briefly to Senator Fowler about the forthcoming conference of f...

Lord knows I do not read the Catoosa County News newspaper on a regular basis, and could not have told you if it even was owned my Morris or just subscribes to syndication of their editorial writers. Their Atlanta writer Walter Jones takes on the powerful local legislator and chair of the House Appropriations Committee in Watkinsville Republiucan Bob Smith in his campaign to derail the Board of Regents with countless controversial Constitutional adjustments he thinks can be hammered through this remaining half session of the legislature. Good luck Representative Smith, I do not share your confidence in trying to do to the Board of Regents what Speaker of House Glen Richardson tried to do to local control of property taxes and countless "un" Fair Tax proponents have tried to do the IRS. Professing one's ignorance of the local media does not do one any favors in the eyes of the public or even your voting constituency.

Local soil scientists want to stay put in Watkinsville working at the USDA's J. Phil Campbell Sr. Soil Research Center instead of having it fall to Federal Budget constraints for FY 2009.

Lee Becker hits a homer with Attorney General Thurbert Baker while County Attorney Daniel Haygood continues to ignore requests to open up the sewer probe. Dear Friends, The Georgia Attorney General's office, as part of its mediation program to handle citizen complaints, has asked Oconee County to respond to my complaint about the County’s denial of access to the Selection Committee reviewing bids for the upgrade of the Rocky Branch sewage treatment plant. In the meantime, I received a letter from County Attorney Daniel Haygood again denying me again access to a second meeting of the Selection Committee and to documents produced by that Committee. Haygood has an interesting argument. He said the Committee reviewing the bids is not the Selection Committee called for in the Request for Proposal. Basically, if it walks like a Selection Committee and quacks like a Selection Committee, I’m inclined to believe it is a Selection Committee. For details, go to my blog at ht...