Funding for the digitization of this title was provided by the Oconee Historical Society.
About The Oconee enterprise. (Watkinsville, Oconee County, Ga.) 1887-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 26, 2013)
*****************‘ AU T O **3- D IG rT 306 0002018 21 1134 In Our 129th Year GEORGIA NEWSPAPER PROJECT 320 S JACKSON ST MAIN LIBRARY - UGA ATHENS, GA 30602-5002 Serving Oconee County ttigrpriag 50 CENTS • VOLUME 130 • NUMBER 52 THE HOMETOWN NEWSPAPER OF Millie Harris THURSDAY • 26 DECEMBER 2013 NOHS honors Ginny Channell Lady Titans senior scored her 1,000th career point. Sports, A10 Retail center opens doors The opening of Epps Bridge Centre was big news. Business, A6 Children buy family gifts Elementary schools hold special holiday sales. Lifestyles, A16 Coming next week We will be looking ahead to 2014. Inside ONE SECTION 18 PAGES 26 DECEMBER 2013 Business A6 Classifieds A14 Crossword A14 Forum A4 Legals A13 Lifestyles A15 Obituaries A8 Police Reports A2 Public Matters A7 Sports A10 This issue was mailed Tuesday, December 24 from Watkinsville and Athens, GA. Please inform your post office if it arrives late. Special Issue This is a special edition of The Oconee Enterprise where we take a look back at the big stories of the year. Scan these stories to see what you remem bered and what you forgot. The stories on this page are probably the stories you did not need to be reminded of: a woman’s murder, the constant rain, the heroism of a young teen and her classmates. If your big story is not in here, send us a note. Man awaiting trial for murder by Michael Prochaska Misty Michelle Myrick was a devoted mother before anything else. Her 15-year-old daughter, Tabitha Taylor, made that message clear before a crowd of reporters and Sheriff’s deputies on Saturday, June 1, when she praised her mother’s life in the wake of her tragic death. That day, Chief Deputy Lee Weems announced that the Oconee County Sheriff’s Office arrested Talmadge Edward “Bud” Powell, 78, who told authorities he killed the 38-year-old Waffle House waitress and mother. Powell was later indicted by an Oconee County grand jury for mal ice murder, felony murder and aggravated assault. He pleaded not guilty and currently awaits trail. The day following Powell’s arrest, Weems laid out the timeline. Myrick left work at the Waffle House on Clayton Street in Athens around 1 p.m. and met with Powell at his Oconee County residence. Less than an hour and a half later, someone located her body alongside Simonton Bridge Road and called 911. GBI crime lab later determined that the cause of death was a single gunshot wound to the back. “Misty always cared about my kids,” said Shay Howard, a longtime friend and coworker. “She gave my girls Tabitha’s old clothes. She had a heart of gold.” “I knew her for 18 years and she was never in a bad mood or said a negative thing about anyone. She will truly be missed,” said Waffle House Division Manger Ronnie Lynch. Taylor left balloons for her mother at a roadside memorial days after her death. One balloon she signed with a per sonal message: “I love you. I always will. I’m going to make you proud mama.” A family member of Misty Myrick comforts her grieving daughter, Tabitha Taylor. [Photo by Michael Prochaska] Rain, rain, go away by Blake Giles Weatherwise, 2013 was a nutty year. Unless, you were growing pecans, and then it was not very nutty. Like much of the state’s pecan crop, Oconee County residents have been a little moldy around the edges this year after nearly twice as much rain as in 2012. October was dry, but it was the only month this past year that could safely qualify as such. And even then, what little rain fell in October, it picked Saturday, Oct. 19, as one of the days to rain. That would be the annual Oconee Chamber Fall Festival when it driz zled off and on, putting only a slight damper on the enthusiasm of the day. But by then, after June and July, local residents had grown duck feet. It rained close to 25 inches in those two months alone. All year, rain played havoc with holidays and special events. In May, movie in the park is one of the big events of the year. Families had to dodge raindrops at Oconee Veterans Park. “I know everybody has kept their eye on the dark cloud behind us,” Persistent rain throughout 2013 had residents often seeking shelter, such as here at the movie in the park at Oconee Veterans Park in May. It rained on the Fourth of July Spectacular too and complicated farming. [Photo by Michael Prochaska] Parks and Recreation Director John Gentry announced at the event. “Just to let you know we are watching that storm closely, and it’s about to pass out of here in a few minutes.” But not before a harsh 15-minute downpour. The grand Fourth of July Spectacular was not quite so spec tacular. It rained an inch that day alone. It washed out all but the fire works. But even that was compro mised because it was impossible to park on a nearby field set aside for overflow parking. Too wet. Too wet, indeed. Ask a farmer. Grass may have loved the rain, but it was often too wet to get into the field to cut it for hay. see Weather page A16 An artist painted a portrait of Kajel Patel during a memorial service in the Athens Academy gym in March. [Photo by Blake Giles] Teen’s brief life inspired many by Blake Giles The year held so much promise for 13-year-old Kajel Patel. In January she received a bone-marrow transplant from her brother, nine months after her Athens Academy classmates had set a world record for collecting cheek swabs for marrow matching. Meanwhile, the drive found a match for a child in Georgetown, Md. The instructions written by a classmate for assembling swab kits was so thorough it began to circulate nation ally. And the whole heroic effort by the students was the inspiration for a documentary on leadership among school students. But in late February, Patel died. “When I got the news she passed away, I was mad,” said Ellis Edwards, a business major at the University of Georgia. He was the donor for the Georgetown recipi ent. “That was not how the story was supposed to end,” Edwards said “It was supposed to crescendo. But I think Kajal’s story is about hope and living life with joy and exuberance.” And that was the mood that prevailed in the Athens Academy gym on Sunday March 3 when hundreds of students, parents and friends gathered amid a sea of red balloons. Bob Chambers, retiring as head of school at Athens Academy, quoted from the best-seller, “Tuesdays with Morrie.” “As long as we can love each other, and remember the feeling of love we had, we can die without ever really going away,” he read. “All the love you created is still there. All the memories are still there. You live on—in the hearts of everyone you have touched and nurtured while you were here. Death ends a life, not a relation ship.” The brevity of her life was evident in the comments of her friends, not yet adults, about their shared experi ences, the common fodder of adolescence and pre-ado lescence. Yet the depth of her life was evident by those who talked of her uncommon courage in the face of grave illness. The drive the previous year was incredibly successful, setting a world record with 3,300 swabs in a 24-hour period. Over a week’s time, 4,004 swabs were collected. Others might have been submitted via an online effort. Even weeks later when her classmates gathered to cel ebrate a girls of the new millennium mass birthday, another $1,000 was raised for Be a Hero. Renovation plans improve at OCHS by Michael Prochaska The multi-million dollar improvements to the Oconee County High School football stadi um launched with a torrent of skep ticism but ended this year with a satisfied lobby of solicitous par ents. “We just want something for our kids to be proud of,” said Carol Catoe last spring at a public view ing of renderings that depicted a featureless concessions and rest room building. Attending parents overwhelmingly disapproved, and they put forth their own recommen dations, such as a facade of school emblems or colors, a sloped roof and more transparency of the plan ning process. School system administrators lis tened and changed several features of the designs to the liking of stake holders. Six months later, the architectural drawings and blueprints for an upgraded field house were detailed and reflective of a system effort to collect public input. see Renovations page A16 Lots of hands out for SPLOST dollars by Blake Giles “A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you’re talking real money.” Contrary to popular belief, there is no documentation that the late Sen. Everett Dirksen ever said that. But the principal is apropos for the hands reaching into the next special purpose local option sales tax. With the current SPLOST set to end in 2015, it is time for the county and cities to put forth their wish lists of how to spend the money, if citizens vote themselves a 1-percent sales tax again. The Board of Commissioners has scheduled public meetings in January and February when pre sumably they will hear from the public at large how they would like to spend the proceeds. Get in line. Still months before the vote, the commissioners have received plen ty of suggestions of how to spend the money. Parks and Recreation wants $5.5 million. The Industrial Development Authority would like $4.6 million. And the courts could like $25 mil lion. That is the guestimate of how much it will cost to either build a new courthouse or renovate and expand the existing one. see SPLOST page A16 I MHMli
