Author: Dick Mangrum

This is National Promposal Day, and Oconee County high school students may make dates, knowing that proms are being planned this year.  Jennifer Dodd, spokesman for the Oconee district, says each of the county’s three high schools is working out the details. Proms last year were a casualty of what then were rising cases of COVID-19.

The Army Corps of Engineers resumes collecting day-use and boat launching fees starting tomorrow at Lake Hartwell, including the Twin Lakes recreation area in Pickens County.  No longer will cash be accepted.  Automated fee machines have been installed at seven Lake Hartwell locations.  The automated stations, paid for by CARES Act  funding, eliminate the need to collect cash and reduce […]

  There’s still fire on the mountain.  Here’s a 101.7/WGOG NEWS clarification.  The highway 28/Callas Mountain fire is contained, but not quite out.  A fire fighter tells us this is a key day to finally stop the fire that apparently started by the side of the highway yesterday afternoon, 1.5 miles north of the Mountain Rest Post Office.

The 1.9T COVID bill has gained the approval of both houses of congress, and awaits the signature of President Biden.  There’s money in it for relief checks to many Americans, money to benefit those who’ve lost employment in the pandemic.  But South Carolina’s Jeff Duncan, who voted no, warns the public not to be fooled.  The U-S Republican representative to […]

Seneca fire fighters put out a large trash fire late yesterday afternoon in the backyard of a Utica home on Humbert Street.  No one hurt.  According to the fire department, the fire originated from some kind of dispute, which the sheriff’s office is looking into.  A large wild fire that burned at mid afternoon north of SC 28/the Highlands Highway […]

Special DHEC announcement this afternoon: COLUMBIA, S.C. — South Carolina has received federal approval to update visitation guidelines for nursing homes and community residential care facilities, announced the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control (DHEC) and Governor Henry McMaster. These updated guidelines require facilities to use DHEC’s percent positive by county data to help determine their visitation status. […]

All sorts of resources are being applied to a sizeable Oconee County wild fire this afternoon in the Mountain Rest area.  The fire is reported on one side of SC 28 north of the 107 juncture in the vicinity of Callas Gap.  U-S Forest Service personnel are assisting volunteer Oconee County fire fighters, and we’ve learned air support has been […]

Lovers of additional daylight during the evening hours will welcome the time change this weekend, when this part of the country will “spring forward”.  On Sunday, we’ll all need to move our clocks and timepieces ahead one hour, which means that between Saturday and Sunday, 60 minutes of sleep will be lost.  According to Prisma Health, preparation is key to […]

After hearing about rats that have caused major problems to the machinery of Seneca’s Department of Public Works, Mayor Pro-tem Ronnie O’Kelley has an idea to better protect the city’s dwindling fleet of garbage trucks.  After hearing the account given by Scott Moulder last night, O’Kelley suggested the city store its sanitation vehicles at the city-county industrial park property on […]

New confirmed cases of COVID-19 in this afternoon’s DHEC report:  an additional 507 in South Carolina, eight of which are in Oconee County.  Statewide, 17 people have been added to the virus death toll, including a middle-aged Oconeean who died last Saturday.  Of 17,134 test results, the South Carolina positivity was 4.7%.