Tennessee Governor Bill Lee has appointed Ryan Spitzer to serve as Circuit Court judge for the Seventh Judicial District to fill the seat left vacant when former judge Don Elledge retired at the end of June.
Spitzer’s appointment is effective immediately, the governor said in an announcement Monday.
“Ryan is a dedicated public servant with an extensive background in criminal prosecution,†Lee said in his announcement. “I am proud to announce his appointment and confident he will serve Tennessee with integrity.â€
The Joel W. Solomon Federal Building United States Courthouse is pictured above on Wednesday, June 23, 2021. (Photo by John Huotari/Oak Ridge Today)
 A jury found she had been sexually harassed while working for Anderson County, but the county was not liable. Then, since she did not prevail in the civil trial, she was ordered to pay about $1,800 in costs to Anderson County. Now that’s on hold. The former employee, Gail Harness, has appealed her $7.5 million sexual harassment lawsuit against Anderson County to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in Cincinnati, Ohio.
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The Joel W. Solomon Federal Building United States Courthouse is pictured above on Wednesday, June 23, 2021. (Photo by John Huotari/Oak Ridge Today)
A jury found she had been sexually harassed while working for Anderson County, but the county was not liable.
Then, since she did not prevail in the civil trial, she was ordered to pay about $1,800 in costs to Anderson County.
The Joel W. Solomon Federal Building United States Courthouse is pictured above on Wednesday, June 23, 2021. (Photo by John Huotari/Oak Ridge Today)
 A jury found she had been sexually harassed while working for Anderson County, but the county was not liable. Then, since she did not prevail in the civil trial, she was ordered to pay about $1,800 in costs to Anderson County. Now that’s on hold. The former employee, Gail Harness, has appealed her $7.5 million sexual harassment lawsuit against Anderson County to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in Cincinnati, Ohio.
The rest of this story, which you will read only on Oak Ridge Today, is available if you are a member: a subscriber, advertiser, or contributor to Oak Ridge Today.Already a member? Great! Thank you! Sign in here.Not a member? No problem! Subscribe here:Basic
If you prefer to send a check, you may do so by mailing one to: Oak Ridge TodayP.O. Box 6064Oak Ridge, TN 37831 We also have advanced subscription options. You can see them here. We also accept donations. You can donate here. A donation of $50 or more will make you eligible for a subscription. Thank you for reading Oak Ridge Today. We appreciate your support!
New daily vaccinations have about doubled in Anderson County in the 40 days since COVID-19 cases began increasing on July 12, 2021. However, the increase in average daily vaccinations has not been as large as the increase in average daily cases, according to calculations by Oak Ridge Today. And less than 50 percent of Anderson County residents are fully vaccinated. (Chart by Oak Ridge Today using Tennessee Department of Health data and Flourish)
New daily vaccinations have about doubled in Anderson County in the 40 days since COVID-19 cases began increasing.
However, the increase in the seven-day average of daily vaccinations has not been as large as the increase in cases, according to calculations by Oak Ridge Today. And less than 50 percent of Anderson County residents are fully vaccinated.
The number of new COVID-19 cases reported each day began rising again in Anderson County on July 12 as the United States began experiencing a fourth surge driven by the more transmissible Delta variant.
From July 12-18, Anderson County reported a daily average of five new COVID cases per day. At the same time, there were 98.4 new vaccines per day.
A daily snapshot of COVID-19 cases in Anderson County on Monday, Aug. 16, 2021, includes, among other information, the daily number of new cases and the daily positivity rate. (Graphic by Tennessee Department of Health)
The seven-day average of new COVID-19 cases in Anderson County reached 44.1 new cases per day on Sunday. That’s the highest level since near the end of the winter peak in January.
Three more hospitalizations and two more deaths have been reported in Anderson County in the past two weeks, according to data published by the Tennessee Department of Health.
The average positivity rate remains high, about 17 percent. World Health Organization guidelines have recommended a positivity rate below 5 percent. The positivity rate measures the percentage of positive COVID-19 tests each day.
A total of 9,500 COVID-19 cases have been reported in Anderson County since the start of the pandemic on March 20, 2020. More than 10 percent of the county has been infected. There have been 237 hospitalizations and 181 deaths.
The chart above shows new COVID-19 cases per day in Anderson County in June, July, and early August. (Chart by Oak Ridge Today using Tennessee Department of Health data and Flourish for chart production).
There were 33 days in June and July when Anderson County reported either no new cases of COVID-19 or one. But that changed around July 12. The average number of new cases reported in Anderson County each day has steadily climbed, and the county is now reporting between 12 and 32 new cases per day.
That is still significantly below the winter peak in December and January, when the new daily case average was more than 100, with peaks over 200 new cases per day.
However, it’s not clear when the current increase in cases might slow down or end. Medical workers and health and government officials are warning about the spread of the delta variant of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, especially among the unvaccinated, and they are urging people to get vaccinated. Cases have surged in parts of the United States, including Tennessee and several other states in the Southeast.
On Sunday, the seven-day average of new cases in Anderson County was 18.4, according to the Tennessee Department of Health. That was up from 13.1 on Wednesday, four days earlier. The low point was a seven-day average of 0.4 new cases per day reported July 6.
The longer trend of new cases, a two-week average, was 13.6 on Sunday. That was more than four times as high as the previous two-week average of 3.0.
The charts above show total COVID-19 vaccines in Anderson County and new vaccines by day; total vaccine recipients and new recipients by day; and the total number of fully vaccinated people and number of new fully vaccinated people by day. (Charts by Oak Ridge Today using Tennessee Department of Health data and Flourish for chart production).
After more than seven months, about 43 percent of people are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 in Anderson County–lower than the national average–and the number of daily vaccinations remains far below the peak this spring, according to state data.
The largest increase in vaccinations in Anderson County was between about late February and mid-May. There were eight days with about 900 vaccinations or more during that time period and three days in April with more than 1,000 vaccinations, according to data from the Tennessee Department of Health. The peak was 1,256 vaccinations on April 10.
Now, though, vaccinations are in the range of about 100 per day, with all peaks below 200. At that rate, it could take months, maybe more than a year, to approach a vaccination rate of 70 percent or higher.
The number of new vaccine recipients can vary widely each day, but there does appear to be an increase in the number of new recipients as the new daily case rate rises again in Anderson County.
Haze from wildfires in western states and Canada obscures the Cumberland Mountains north of Oak Ridge in this view from Pine Ridge last week, on Wednesday, July 21, 2021. (Photo by John Huotari/Oak Ridge Today)
An air quality alert is in effect until midnight as smoke from wildfires in western states and Canada continues to blow through the region. The smoke also affected air quality in the region last week.
On Friday, the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation issued a code orange air quality alert for fine particulate matter, including in the Knoxville metropolitan area. The air quality alert includes Anderson County. It went into effect at midnight Friday and continues until midnight Saturday.
The orange alert means the air is unhealthy for people in sensitive groups, according to AirNow.gov. This includes people with heart or lung disease, older adults, children, and teenagers. They should choose less strenuous activities, like walking instead of running, so they don’t breathe as hard. They should also shorten the amount of time they are active outdoors, and postpone outdoor activities if possible to when the air quality is better. Everyone else can enjoy outdoor activities, AirNow.gov said.
A daily snapshot of COVID-19 cases in Anderson County on Wednesday, July 29, 2021, includes, among other information, the daily number of new cases and the daily positivity rate. (Graphic by Tennessee Department of Health)
Anderson County has reported 89 new COVID-19 cases in a week as the infection rate increases and officials across the country warn of the spread of the delta variant, especially among the unvaccinated. The increase in Anderson County mirrors what is happening across Tennessee, where new cases have surged from a few hundred each day to more than 2,500 each day while hospitalizations have more than quadrupled.
The positivity rate, a measure of the positive tests each day, has been 10 percent or higher in Anderson County four times since July 12. It hit a high of 24 percent on July 20, according to data from the Tennessee Department of Health. Ten percent is high, and World Health Organization guidelines have called for keeping the positivity rate below 5 percent.
The county’s 89 new cases in a week, from July 22 to July 28, is an average of 12.7 new cases per day. That average is 32 times higher than the low seven-day average of 0.4 new cases per day reported about three weeks ago, on July 6.
The seven-day new case average is now the highest it’s been about since about March 23. That’s when COVID-19 cases were in the middle of a slow months-long decline after a winter peak in November, December, and January.
A daily snapshot of COVID-19 cases in Anderson County on Tuesday, July 27, 2021, includes, among other information, the daily number of new cases and the daily positivity rate. (Graphic by Tennessee Department of Health)
Note: This story was updated at 12:15 p.m. July 28.
The COVID-19 case and positivity rates are rising in Anderson County as school resumes in Oak Ridge. More than 100 new COVID-19 cases, four hospitalizations, and three deaths have been reported since mid-July. The positivity rate, a measure of how many COVID-19 tests are positive each day, is about 10 percent, which exceeds World Health Organization guidelines.
Cases in Tennessee have surged from a low of a few hundred new cases per day about a month ago to roughly 2,100 new cases on Tuesday. Current hospitalizations across the state have climbed from a low of a few hundred to 762. Fifty-one hospitalizations were reported Tuesday.
In the past two weeks, the rate of new COVID-19 cases per day in Anderson County has steadily climbed from a low of about one new case per day in Anderson County to 7.6 new cases per day. The county reported 112 new cases of COVID-19 between Monday, July 12, and Tuesday, July 27, according to data from the Tennessee Department of Health. (See also here and here.)
There were 74 new cases of COVID-19 reported in the week between Tuesday, July 20, and Monday, July 26. That’s an average of about 10.6 new cases per day. The one-week average of 10.6 new cases per day was higher than the 14-day case average of 7.6 reported by the state.
Two new deaths due to COVID-19 were reported in Anderson County on Monday, although that doesn’t necessarily mean the deaths occurred Monday because the state reporting can lag a few days behind when the deaths occurred.
Also in the last two weeks, the positivity rate has climbed from about 2.3 percent on Monday, July 12, to 9.3 percent on Tuesday, July 27. The WHO has recommended a positivity rate below 5 percent.
A daily snapshot of COVID-19 cases in Anderson County on Wednesday, July 21, 2021, includes, among other information, the daily number of new cases and the daily positivity rate. (Graphic by Tennessee Department of Health)
The COVID-19 case rate in Anderson County remains low, but it is rising quickly–and the positivity rate has spiked over 20 percent, according to information published by the Tennessee Department of Health. There has been another death due to COVID-19 in Anderson County.
In late June and early July, the number of new cases of COVID-19 per day in the county had dropped to an average of roughly one new case per day. That was the lowest level observed in a year or more, since the first peak in July 2020.
In the past week or so, though, the new case average has climbed past two, then three, and now four new cases per day.
During the past 14 days, Anderson County has averaged 4.4 new cases per day, according to the Tennessee Department of Health. That was up from 0.8 new cases per day in the previous two weeks.
The positivity rate, which measures how many patients test positive out of those tested each day, has climbed even quicker. It had been in a low range of around 2 percent to 3 percent, lower than the World Health Organization guideline of 5 percent. But Tennessee Department of Health data shows the positivity rate has spiked past 20 percent, which is high, and the seven-day average has climbed quickly to 10.2 percent in about a week or so. The number of tests per day remains fairly low, however, and it’s not clear what part the low test rate might play in the high positivity rate. When the case count was higher, Anderson County was testing several hundred people per day.
A daily snapshot of COVID-19 cases in Anderson County on Monday, July 19, 2021, includes, among other information, the daily number of new cases and the daily positivity rate. (Graphic by Tennessee Department of Health)
The number of new cases of COVID-19 remains low in Anderson County, but the rate of new cases per day is rising again. Also, the positivity rate has climbed back over 5 percent, and there have been four new hospitalizations due to COVID-19 in the past week.
About a week ago, the number of new cases per day was at about one. That was the lowest it had been since cases first started rising more than a year ago, before the first COVID-19 case peak in July 2020. The case average has been low for weeks after a slow decline starting in January.
In the past week, however, the new daily case rate has slowly climbed again. In the past two weeks, Anderson County has averaged three new cases of COVID-19 per day, according to the Tennessee Department of Health. That is up from an average of 1.1 in the prior 14 days.
Anderson County attorney Matt Tuck is running for election to serve as Anderson County General Sessions Court judge in Division II in Oak Ridge.
Tuck said he will seek the nomination as a Republican Party candidate in the election next year. He is running against the incumbent, Roger Miller. Miller has announced he is seeking re-election to a second eight-year term in 2022.
In a press release, Tuck said he has practiced civil and criminal law in Anderson County for more than a decade and currently operates the Tuck Law Firm in Oak Ridge’s historic Jackson Square.
After receiving his undergraduate degrees from the University of Tennessee, Tuck obtained his law degree and master’s of business administration from the University of Memphis in 2006, the press release said.
