Oak Ridge Today

Gooch, Chinn will seek re-election as mayor, mayor pro tem

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Warren Gooch

Warren Gooch

Oak Ridge Mayor Warren Gooch will seek re-election as mayor later this month, and Mayor Pro Tem Rick Chinn wants to serve again as mayor pro tem.

The Oak Ridge City Council will elect two of their seven members as mayor and mayor pro tem at a meeting on Tuesday, November 27. The mayor and mayor pro tem, who serves in the mayor’s absence, serve two-year terms. Under the City Charter, they are chosen by Council after each municipal election every two years.

While Gooch is currently mayor, Council member Rick Chinn is now the mayor pro tem. In Oak Ridge, the daily responsibilities of running the city are delegated to a city manager, who is selected by Council. The mayor and mayor pro tem cast votes during City Council decisions, and the mayor—or mayor pro tem when the mayor is not available—leads City Council meetings, signs ordinances and resolutions, and serves as the ceremonial head of the city, among other duties.

If he is re-elected later this month, it would be Gooch’s third two-year term as mayor. It would be Chinn’s second term as mayor pro tem. [Read more…]

Booker a Mr. Football finalist

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Oak Ridge senior quarterback Herbert Booker (13), left, is pictured with senior wide receiver Jeremy Mitchell (1) during a 40-23 win at Soddy-Daisy on Friday, Nov. 9, 2018. (Photo by Luther Simmons)

Oak Ridge senior quarterback Herbert Booker (13), left, is pictured with senior wide receiver Jeremy Mitchell (1) during a 40-23 win at Soddy-Daisy on Friday, Nov. 9, 2018. (Photo by Luther Simmons)

 

Oak Ridge High School senior Herbert Booker, who plays quarterback and cornerback, is a finalist for the Tennessee Titans Mr. Football Award.

Booker is one of three finalists in Division I Class 5A. The other two are Deshawn Page of Fulton High School and Cade Larkins of David Crockett High School.

The Tennessee Titans Mr. Football Awards will be presented to the top football players in nine classifications of the Tennessee Secondary School Athletic Association on Sunday, November 25, at Nissan Stadium in Nashville. For the 17th consecutive year, the top kicker in the state will be recognized with a Mr. Football Award, regardless of classification.

Five semifinalists in each classification, including Booker, were announced on November 2. There are six classifications in Division I and three in Division II.

Three finalists for each category were announced by Mike Keith on the Titans website on Monday afternoon. Those three finalists for each award will be invited to attend the awards dinner at Nissan Stadium, where the winner of each award will be announced, a press release said. [Read more…]

Homeowner receives minor injuries in gas explosion in AC

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A homeowner received minor injuries during a gas explosion on Hidden Hills Drive in Marlow early Monday, Nov. 12, 2018. (Photo courtesy Anderson County Sheriff's Department)

A homeowner received minor injuries during a gas explosion on Hidden Hills Drive in Anderson County early Monday, Nov. 12, 2018. (Photo courtesy Anderson County Sheriff’s Department)

 

A homeowner received minor injuries during a gas explosion in Anderson County on Monday.

The possible gas explosion was reported on Hidden Hills Drive between State Route 61 and Laurel Road northeast of Oak Ridge at about 12:39 p.m. Monday.

The Anderson County Sheriff’s Department found significant property damage when deputies arrived, said Tyler Mayes, director of administrative services for the department. [Read more…]

Supercomputers: Summit at ORNL still number one

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Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Summit supercomputer was named number one on the TOP500 List, a semiannual ranking of the world’s fastest computing systems on Monday, June 25, 2018. (Photo credit: Carlos Jones/Oak Ridge National Laboratory, U.S. Department of Energy)

Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Summit supercomputer was again named number one on the TOP500 List, a semiannual ranking of the world’s fastest computing systems on Monday, Nov. 12, 2018. (Photo credit: Carlos Jones/Oak Ridge National Laboratory, U.S. Department of Energy)

 

The 200-petaflop Summit supercomputer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory stayed at number one on the semiannual TOP500 list of the world’s most powerful supercomputers released Monday.

The Sierra supercomputer at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California, climbed to number two from number three. That means the United States now has the top two systems in the world, a position that China held a year ago.

Summit, a water-cooled IBM-built supercomputer, debuted at number one on the TOP500 list in June. That was the first time since 2012 that the United States had the most powerful supercomputer in the world. The earlier top system, Titan, a Cray machine, is also located at ONRL. ORNL and LLNL are both U.S. Department of Energy laboratories.

Officials celebrated the launch of Summit in a ceremony attended by U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry on June 8. The supercomputer is capable of 200 petaflops, or 200,000 trillion calculations per second. That makes it about about eight times more powerful than Titan, its predecessor.

Besides being the most powerful, Summit has been described as the world’s smartest supercomputer, a machine that can learn. As big as two tennis courts, Summit has 4,608 compute servers. Each has two 22-core IBM Power9 central processing units (CPUs) and six NVIDIA Tesla V100 graphics processing unit (GPU) accelerators. That’s more than 9,000 conventional processors and nearly 28,000 graphics processors, or about 37,000 total. [Read more…]

Updated: Graham’s four TDs help propel Wildcats to state quarterfinals

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Oak Ridge senior Jordan Graham (8) runs behind the blocking of junior Tyrell Romano (21) during a 54-28 win at Clinton on Friday, Oct. 12, 2018. (File photo by Barry Houchin)

Oak Ridge senior Jordan Graham (8) runs behind the blocking of junior Tyrell Romano (21) during a 54-28 win at Clinton on Friday, Oct. 12, 2018. (File photo by Barry Houchin)

 

Note: This story was last updated at 1:45 p.m.

The four touchdowns of senior Jordan Graham helped propel Oak Ridge to a 40-23 win in a second-round playoff game at Soddy-Daisy on Friday and a rematch with Knoxville Catholic in a quarterfinal game at home next Friday.

The Wildcats (10-2) did not score on their first possession on Friday, but then they scored on their next four drives to take a 27-3 halftime lead. Graham, who finished with 134 yards on 10 carries, had two touchdowns in that half. He added two more in the second.

Soddy-Daisy (6-5), which won a first-round matchup against Clinton last week, was more successful in the second half on Friday when senior quarterback Gavin Chambers played. They scored on two of their first three drives in the third quarter. Chambers threw for 170 yards and had two touchdown passes to narrow the margin to 40-23. The Trojans had no passing yards in the first half when senior wide receiver Spencer Gore was quarterback, according to preliminary statistics by Mark Haste.

Chambers did not start due to an injury from three weeks ago against Signal Mountain, and the Oak Ridge defense took advantage of the senior’s absence in the first half, the Chattanooga Times Free Press reported. Soddy-Daisy Coach Justin Barnes told the newspaper that the Trojans, unsure of how Chambers was feeling, wanted to stick with what they’ve been doing the past few weeks because it had worked before Friday. [Read more…]

Man sentenced to 30 years in Oak Ridge shooting

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William Antwon Mollette

William Antwon Mollette

Note: This story was last updated at 4:45 p.m.

CLINTON—An Oak Ridge man was sentenced to the maximum 30 years in prison in an attempted murder case as part of a plea agreement on Thursday after a shooting last year left a woman with life-threatening injuries.

William Antwon Mollette, 44, pleaded guilty to attempted first-degree murder and possession of a firearm during a dangerous felony in Anderson County Criminal Court in Clinton on Thursday.

Mollette, who has a prior felony conviction in Alabama, received the maximum 25 years on the attempted first-degree murder charge, a Class A felony, and he received the maximum five years on the firearm possession charge, a Class D felony. The two sentences are to be served consecutively for a total 30-year sentence.

The victim of the shooting, Cathy Griffin, was agreeable to the 30-year sentence, Tony Craighead, deputy district attorney general in Anderson County, told Criminal Court Judge Don Elledge.

Griffin read a statement in court during the plea agreement hearing. She described being shot and stalked by Mollette at a home on Walsh Lane last year, having her lungs collapse and blood stream from her abdomen, and knowing that she, a nurse, was dying. [Read more…]

Reminder: Planning Commission, City Council meet to discuss Main Street, Phase 2

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The access road from this roundabout to Rutgers Avenue, pictured above on Tuesday, Oct. 23, 2018, could be closed and a retail store built here as part of phase two under a revised master plan for Main Street Oak Ridge. (Photo by John Huotari/Oak Ridge Today)

The access road from this roundabout to Rutgers Avenue, pictured above on Tuesday, Oct. 23, 2018, could be closed and a retail store built here as part of phase two under a revised master plan for Main Street Oak Ridge. (Photo by John Huotari/Oak Ridge Today)

 

A reminder: Oak Ridge officials will meet this evening to discuss proposed revisions to the plan for the second phase of Main Street Oak Ridge, the redevelopment of the former Oak Ridge Mall.

It will be a joint work session between the Oak Ridge Municipal Planning Commission and Oak Ridge City Council. The meeting is scheduled to start at 5:30 p.m. today (Thursday, November 8) in the Oak Ridge Municipal Building Courtroom at 200 South Tulane Avenue.

City officials hope to make progress and help produce a good plan, although they don’t expect to vote on anything today.

Oak Ridge officials have had concerns about the proposed revisions to the master plan for Main Street as the developer, RealtyLink, prepares to welcome a second wave of tenants. The Planning Commission postponed a vote on the revised master plan and requested today’s work session during a meeting on Thursday, October 18. [Read more…]

ORHS Masquers presents ‘Our Town’ this week

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Image courtesy ORHS Masquers

Image courtesy ORHS Masquers

 

Oak Ridge High School Masquers, the school’s drama program, will present Thornton Wilder’s Pulitzer Prize-winning “Our Town” for three performances this week.

The performances are scheduled for Thursday, November 8, at 7 p.m.; Saturday, November 10, at 7 p.m.; and Sunday, November 11, at 2 p.m., at the Oak Ridge Performing Arts Center. [Read more…]

DOE Oak Ridge has Veterans Day program on Thursday

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James L. Campbell

James L. Campbell

The U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Office will host a Veterans Day program on Thursday in honor of the courageous men and women who serve and have served in our nation’s armed forces, a press release said.

The program is scheduled between 10-11 a.m. Thursday, November 8, in the American Museum of Science and Energy Auditorium at 115 Main Street East in Oak Ridge. The new museum is near JCPenney.

The program will include keynote speaker Lieutenant General James L. Campbell, who is retired from the U.S. Army. He will share his thoughts on “Sacrifices of Service,” the press release said. [Read more…]

Tonight: Public meeting on DOE landfill

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There is a public meeting about the Environmental Management Disposal Facility in Oak Ridge tonight (Wednesday, November 7).

The meeting is scheduled from 6 to 8 p.m. in the New Hope Center auditorium at the Y-12 National Security Complex on Scarboro Road. Presentations are expected to begin around 6:30 p.m., and a question and comment period could start around 7:15 p.m. [Read more…]

Four incumbents re-elected to Oak Ridge City Council

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Warren Gooch

Warren Gooch

Note: This story was last updated at 12 a.m.

The four incumbents—Mayor Warren Gooch, Council members Kelly Callison and Ellen Smith, and Mayor Pro Tem Rick Chinn—were re-elected to four-year terms on Oak Ridge City Council on Tuesday, according to unofficial election results in Anderson and Roane counties.

The final results mirrored the results of early and absentee ballots in Anderson County.

There were four City Council seats up for regular election and five candidates for those seats.

Gooch had the most votes Tuesday, a total of 7,916 in the two counties (6,774 in Anderson County and 1,142 in Roane County). Gooch also had the highest number of votes in the transitional 2014 election, his first City Council election. [Read more…]

Oak Ridge police host ‘Ask an Officer’ on Wednesday

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The Oak Ridge Police Department will offer an educational “Ask an Officer” session focused on ways to prevent identity theft and fraud at the Oak Ridge Civic Center on Wednesday, November 7, at 1 p.m.

“Join Oak Ridge Police Investigator Wendy Zolkowski for this special program sponsored by the Oak Ridge Senior Center,” a press release said. The event will be held in the B Room and is open to participants of any age. Everyone is invited to attend and learn ways to protect themselves against identity theft, the press release said. [Read more…]