Monthly Archives: August 2020
School board incumbents to run unopposed
By Bru Nimmons
Staff Reporter
bnimmons@thepccourier.com
COUNTY — Barring any major write-in challenges in the coming months, the Pickens County 
School Board should remain stable following the general election after only incumbents filed for the three seats up for grabs in November.
When filing closed Monday, Betty Bagley, Shannon Haskett and Betty Garrison were the only candidates with their hats in the ring for the right to represent Districts 1, 3 and 5,
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Testing reveals possible unmarked black graves on Clemson campus
CLEMSON — Ground-penetrating radar has revealed the possible locations of more than 200 unmarked graves in Woodland Cemetery on the Clemson University campus believed to date back more than a century.
The graves are thought to be those of enslaved people who worked from about 1830 to 1865 on John C. Calhoun’s Fort Hill Plantation and later as sharecroppers and black laborers, including convicted individuals involved in the construction of Clemson College from 1890 to 1915. All are believed to be African Americans.
The university has reached out to leadership in the
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County departments working on capital improvement plans
Officials also dealing with county comprehensive plan
By Jason Evans
Staff Reporter
jevans@thepccourier.com
PICKENS — Maintaining a conservative budget was one of the goals Pickens County Council gave to county administrator Ken Roper and staff.
During his report to council at its Aug. 10 meeting, Roper said conservative budgeting was one of six goals council developed, “which we have used to focus our efforts as a staff over the past few months.”
“We’re now at the halfway point in the year since you gave us the goals,” he said. “We’re making good progress on many of them, and on others we’re taking a six-month (look) and saying ‘Are we doing
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Duke Energy set to return to regular billing practices
PICKENS — Duke Energy is suspending service disconnections for non-payments until October, the company announced Monday.
Customers experiencing financial hardship will have until that time to pay previous balances on accounts or make payment arrangements. Duke is set to begin standard billing and payment practices in South Carolina in “the coming weeks,” a company release said.
“Many of our customers are facing unprecedented adversity during this pandemic, so for months we have expanded the ways we can help them avoid power interruptions,” Duke South Carolina state
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Easley council talks stormwater, grass clippings and recycling
By Jason Evans
Staff Reporter
jevans@thepccourier.com
EASLEY — Easley officials are considering allowing the city’s new courtesy recycling drop-off center 
to accept grass clippings, in order to keep them out of the stormwater system.
During city council’s Aug. 10 meeting, Councilman Kent Dykes reported on a public works committee meeting held July 22.
The city’s list of stormwater projects for the next couple of years totals $1.7 million, “of which we’ve got funds to do $1.3 million,” Dykes said.
Those funds are a combination of budgeted funds, a $400,000 grant and a recently approved bond issue, he said.
“So we’ve got much of it covered in the short run,” Dykes said.
Later in the meeting, council unanimously approved a resolution
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Steese: Silos developers need to own property for financing
By Jason Evans
Staff Reporter
jevans@thepccourier.com
EASLEY — Ownership of a development underway in downtown Easley could be officially changing hands sooner than expected.
During its Aug. 10 meeting, Easley City Council passed first reading of an ordinance to sell 122 Folger Ave. to Silo Holdings LLC.
That is the address of The Silos, a major new development taking shape in downtown Easley.
The address was once the home of the Dixie Milling Company.
“The city purchased these back in February 2019 for $80,000,” city administrator Stephen Steese said of the property.
The developers, Stacey and D.J. Desrosiers, plan to move their restaurant, Inky’s Authentic
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Cover up, Pickens — masks stop the spread
With each new disease or infection that is identified, there is always a fairly steep learning curve that goes with solving it and finding a cure, a treatment or a vaccine, in case of a viral agent.
We all know too well about this, having gone through the ups and downs of daily briefings on the current COVID-19 pandemic. At times, the information has been very confusing. Should we wear a mask, should we not? Should we shelter in place, should we not? We can go to a big box store, but we can’t go to church. We should physically distance ourselves, but it is OK to gather in the thousands to protest. What data is really
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Courier Letters to the Editor 8-19-20
Recycling changes a positive step
Dear Editor,
I want to thank the county administration and council for listening to the public, and praise the Courier for last week’s story entitled, “Recycle centers back to six days a week.” The council has reopened all recycle centers on Wednesdays, so they are again operating with a Monday through Saturday service schedule.
During my campaign for county council, I was happy to add my voice to the chorus of those who were already saying the county was growing and closing the centers on Wednesdays was a bad idea. The county does an extensive audit each year, and solid waste tonnage grew from 36,545 to 44,554 — or 21 percent — from 2015 to 2019. As a result, it should not be cutting back on this essential service, nor cutting manpower at the centers.
As part of the six-day schedule, though, the council cut the hours from 7:30 a.m. to 7:20 p.m. to the
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A record years in the making
It has been touted as “the No. 1 most highly unanticipated release in over a decade.”
Coming from an artist who hasn’t put out a record since 1981, it’s no wonder.
I’m talking about the new, just-released album by Jim Van Buskirk and the AVANT GARDE recording project, and I am proud to have been a part of it — both in 1981 and 2020.
With a gap of 39 years between releases, this album, called “The Shellers,” ranks No. 5 on Wikipedia’s list of longest gaps between studio albums. (Yes, there really is such a list. If we’d waited four more years, we could have tied the Strawberry Alarm Clock’s gap of 1969 to 2012.)
And, yes, this album, like its predecessor, actually has been pressed into vinyl discs that are played on old-fashioned machines that use a needle to wondrously
Our highest quest is to know God
The Christian worldview of life is about learning what God requires and willingly accepting the call to become a devoted disciple of Christ. This life-changing decision has everything to do with 
yielding mind, body and soul to the Creator of heaven and earth. It’s definitely worth considering since He has promised with all certainty that He is the way, the truth and the life.
Most Bible scholars are convinced there are two categories of judgment that are commonly referred to as the saved and the unsaved. Even though there are levels of good and bad behavior, the basic concept describes a certain number of souls who are spiritually born-again and are declared as being a child of the Most High, and on the other side of the fence, there are those who willingly reject the invitation to
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