May

• Georgia Speaker of the House Jon Burns announced $6.5 million in Georgia DOT funding to rebuild bridges along the Creek on the Blue Mile project, plus a $2.65 million grant for the trail, or promenade, along the creek.  

• Family, friends and colleagues stage local ceremony to celebrate the achievements and contributions that earned Raybon Anderson's enshrinement into the Georgia Agricultural Hall of Fame. 

• Two new 2023 Pierce Enforcer fire engines are ceremonially pushed into Station 1 by firefighters and civilians representing a $1.3 million city expenditure of local sales tax funds to keep the Statesboro Fire Department's front-line apparatus up-to-date.

• More than four years after the Statesboro City Council funded a feasibility study of a public transportation system, Statesboro Area Transit hit the road with four buses along two routes.   

• Hanon Systems, a maker of automotive thermal and energy management equipment, which includes air-conditioning components, commits to build a $40 million factory in Gateway Regional Industrial Park and create 160 jobs. 

June

• Ogeechee Technical College received the largest endowment gift in its history, a $1.5 million, 10-year commitment from the George W. Strickland Jr. Foundation, to fund the establishment of an Associate of Science in Nursing program at the college. 

• Tax appraisals by the Bulloch County Board of Assessors office showed 13% inflation in property values, after 9% inflation the previous year. 

• Statesboro city officials unveiled a draft for an Apartment Security Ordinance that will require security cameras and gates at new or remodeled apartment complexes.

• Bulloch County commissioners unanimously approved an amendment to Smart Bulloch 2040 Comprehensive Plan and its Future Development Map that staked out a big new “suburban neighborhood” character area and “suburban corridors” in the southeastern portion of the county.

• Statesboro Food Bank supporters, including city and county officials, private donors and volunteers, ceremonially broke ground for a 12,000-square-foot food bank facility expected to cost $2 million.

July

• The Georgia State Patrol took out arrest warrants charging Amanda Craven, 28, of Rincon with two counts of felony homicide by vehicle for a May 11 wreck on Zettwell Road near Statesboro that left another driver, Jennifer Jenkins, dead at the scene and fatally injured Craven’s child. Mason Craven, 3, survived the accident but died May 31 at a Savannah hospital. 

• State Route 46 between U.S. Highway 301 and State Route 67 was formally named the E. Raybon Anderson Highway in a ceremony than drew state lawmakers from the area and local elected officials, was well as Anderson and his family.  

• The Bulloch County Sheriff’s Office entered contracts to expand school resource officer services, adding two deputies assigned as SROs at Bulloch Academy and Brooklet Elementary School, with the private academy and the county Board of Education each paying $52,450 per deputy. 

• County officials dialed back the commissioners’ proposed millage rate increase by a quarter mill, to a 1.5-mill hike, but this still amounted to a 28% average increase in the county government portion of property tax when compounded by inflation in real estate values.

August

• The Ogeechee Technical College Foundation Inc. announced a commitment from the family of Anthony Tippins and Charles Tippins Jr. in the amount of $50,000 for the “Charles Gary Tippins Sr. Endowed Scholarship.” 

• Land preparations began for numerous new restaurants coming to Statesboro, including Texas Roadhouse, Jim ’N Nick’s Bar-B-Q and Five Guys on a newly developed site along U.S. Highway 80 East, across from Lowe’s; and Slim Chickens, at the former Hardee’s location on Northside Drive East. A Crumbl Cookies franchise also opened its doors in the Eagles Corner Shopping Center, next to Publix.

• Bulloch County government amended its alcohol ordinance and zoning rules to begin licensing liquor stores in commercial areas along major highways outside the city limits.

• More than 1,000 people came out to a job Fair at Ogeechee Technical College put on by Hyundai Motor Group looking to fill positions at the Metaplant.

• As fall semester classes began, Georgia Southern officials announced its enrollment numbers were up, pointing to a partial recovery of 2% or more after the more than 5% drop in enrollment GS experienced the previous year.

• Despite opposition voiced by dozens of county residents at three public hearings that drew roomfuls of citizens, the Bulloch County commissioners voted 6-0 to approve a 1.5-mill rate hike that compounds with real estate inflation to a more than 28% average increase in property tax.