Oconee County, GA Politics

Former Oconee County Commissioner Don Norris succumbed to a battle with cancer last night. My condolences to his family. He was a fine public servant

Seems like it has been a while since we have had such a meaty post on the onlineathens.com web site from Oconee County correspondent and red headed journalist Adam Thompson. He interviews outgoing Oconee County Commissioner Don Norris about a wide array of issues and this gives much insight into why Norris is no longer an elected official. Norris seems to think that Lee Becker does not like him personally and it was not enough to discharge pollution in the stream in his back yard. I used to see Norris every morning at the downtown Athens U.S. Post Office, but not so much recently, and he was always very polite, had a nice thing to say, and was always cordial. I appreciate his service to his county.

But evidently Mr. Maxey heeded unsubstantiated advice from someone giving him some faulty political intelligence to have (contemplated) switched races at least twice since then. Based upon the overwhelmingly enthusiastic and positive feedback received upon floating a trial balloon campaign against Norris Board of Commissioners' slot for Post with the powers-that-be-and-don't-be around here, Maxey then explored the idea of running against Melvin Davis for Board of Commissioners chair. By then Sarah Bell had been lining up her supporters and much of the non-aligned political players in the county, thus negating any perceived or imagined groundswell of support for a Maxey candidacy. He has run a very high profile campaign, pouring lots of money in multiple billboards and various sized yard signs. I am voting for and actively supporting Chuck Horton for many more reasons than I can list here. Primarily (and this goes across all campaigns and races) there are those who think gover...

Former Oconee County Board of Commissioners chairman Wendell Dawson knows a whole lot more about tax parcels than I ever will, and his homework has very obviously been done well on his A VOC.info site as far as the tax assessments of public officials such as Board of Commissioners members Don Norris and chairman G. Melvin Davis . I fully expect our public officials to take as full advantage of the tax laws as possible, but this does not look very ethical or positive in a political campaign season.