Hometown News For Orange County, Texas
Hometown News For Orange County, Texas
Sorted by date Results 101 - 125 of 572
Santa Claus shares a laugh with one of the OCARC clients at Tuesday's Christmas party put on by GOALS Literacy program and Lamar State College Orange. Each client received a stocking full of candy and other goodies plus gifts like computer tablets and blankets....
The latest real estate acquisition at Lamar State College Orange speaks to how fast things are moving in growing the downtown campus and its offerings. "All we ever wanted to know was, 'Can we go faster?' 77-year-old Quincy Procell recalled, speaking of his time at Procell Brothers Performance Center at 105 Green Avenue, the property sold to LSCO. The lot at the corner of Green and First Street was for years headquarters for a company internationally known for its racecar...
Orange County Commissioners did something Tuesday their predecessors had whiffed on for over a decade. County Commissioners Johnny Trahan, Theresa Beauchamp, Robert Viator and Kirk Roccaforte joined County Judge John Gothia in approving a collective bargaining agreement between the county, the sheriff and his deputies. Gothia added his signature to Sheriff Jimmy Lane Mooney and Dustin Bock, president of the Orange County Sheriff’s Office Employees Association, and the c...
West Orange-Stark senior Elijah Gales was named Most Valuable Player and Cornel Thompson Coach of the Year on the District 10-4A Division II All-District team. Two other Mustangs – Carmello Jones and Keyshawn Robinson – were named Defensive Player of the Year and Newcomer of the Year, and 10 other Mustangs were named first-team All-District, including two in two positions. Cristian Quiteno Polio was named first-team kicker and punter; Dakarion Judge was named first team wid...
Lamar State College Orange just keeps making it rain. The school announced this week it has landed a $500,000 donation from Orange’s Cloeren Inc. to build a mechatronics program. This comes on the heels of the state granting the school $37.4 million to build a new Academics Building on the former site of the downtown Capital One Bank at the end of October. In early November, the Texas Higher Education Board granted LSCO nearly $1 million in grants, including $495,000 to p...
When West Orange-Stark beat Little Cypress-Mauriceville 39-20 on Sept. 3 for what turned out to be the first of 11 straight wins, few knew it was setting up what could be a December to Remember for Orange County football. Both LCM and WOS have made it to the Elite Eight round – the Region 3 finals – of their respective playoff brackets. The Battlin' Bears (11-2) take on Chapel Hill (10-3) in the Class 4A Division I regional finals at 7:30 p.m. Friday at Cy-Fair's Berry Cen...
Orange County Commissioners, led by Judge John Gothia, made it clear what they're thankful for this Thanksgiving. "The county is happy for getting through 2021 without any hurricanes or other disasters," the judge and four commissioners said in unison. And they're hoping to start receiving federal reimbursements for money spent on 2020's Hurricane Laura early in 2022. As usual, much of Tuesday's Commissioners Court meeting revolved around repairs to damage caused by past...
Hard as it is to believe, the rumbling up and down 16th Street and the deforestation of MacArthur Drive bodes well for the city of Orange. Add to it the tractors and large pipes behind the Whataburger on I-10 and it all smells like Progress. The Texas Department of Transportation has a lifetime gig in Orange County, for sure. Just on the interstate alone. But one of the new projects represents a $2 million investment in 16th Street, which city fathers hope will be an uber...
In nearly 34 years working in the District Clerk's Office – 23 of them in the boss' chair – Vickie Edgerly has seen a lot change. "When I came to work here, there were no computers, just typewriters. Everything was paper, written in books. "Now we're electronic and have paperless courts. You have to be tech savvy, not scared of technology." District clerks in Texas serve as the registrar, recorder and custodian of all court pleadings and papers connected with any legal cau...
With just under four months left before the March 1 Republican Primary, it's doubtful that any Orange County candidate will raise more money than County Judge John Gothia already has in the bank. With no big-money opponent in his first County Judge race in 2020, the popular ex-commissioner raised a lot of dough and spent little of it on advertising. Gothia starts the 2022 election cycle with $19,299 left in his political fund-raising account. No opponent has come forward to...
West Orange-Cove schools Superintendent Dr. Rickie Harris has offered a unique approach to deal locally with what he says is a nationwide shortage of teachers. He told his board members Monday night that he is considering shifting the most qualified teachers at West Orange-Stark High School to instruct the younger grade 9 and 10 students. That would leave juniors and seniors to go online to take some upper level classes like government, economics and English 3 and English 4, i...
The 2022 Orange County Election is off and running. Theresa Beauchamp announced Tuesday she will not run for reelection as County Commissioner for Precinct 2. Chris Sowell of Mauriceville, president of the Mauriceville Heritage Association, followed up her announcement during a Commissioners Court meeting by taking the podium and announcing he will be seeking that empty seat. "When elected," Sowell said, "I look forward with working with the Commissioners and other county...
J.B. Arrington only chews on the end of his cigar these days, but the 96-year-old McLewis native is still smoking. He's up all night smoking briskets for JB's Barbecue, the Pinehurst eatery he founded in 1972 and has run ever since. But running a restaurant is just one of many chapters in his life. Like Orange County's other dozen or so living World War II veterans, he's deep into the Book of Life. Thursday, November 11, is Veterans Day, an occasion to celebrate the bravery...
Dickie Colburn "could tell a joke like nobody else," Frank Beauchamp said the other day. Beauchamp, who was Colburn's lifelong friend, could never get enough of his friend's company and sadly, won't ever be able to. Colburn, longtime Southeast Texas fishing guide and outdoors columnist for The Record Newspapers, died Wednesday, Oct. 27 in a traffic accident. He was 75. "We lost a good man, that's all I can say," said Beauchamp, the retired heavy equipment salesman who is...
Michelle Burch said had just enough warning of the tornado bearing down on her tied-down double-wide mobile home to make it into her bedroom closet. "We could hear it from about a mile away," she said of the 130-mile-per-hour winds that hit at mid-morning Wednesday, Oct. 27. "It happened so quick. We were flipping through the air. I was, 'Oh my God, oh my God,' and it was over." Burch's home on Farm to Market Road 1130 ended upside down about 20 feet north of the cinder...
What's the secret to living to be 100 years old? Bridge City's Cedric Stout, who turns 100 on Sunday, Nov. 7, is like a cat with many lives. "I've done died so many times," he said the other day. "I died from sea sickness so many times in the Navy. Sometimes I'd go without food for a week, I was so sick. "And it didn't matter if I was up on deck, or below deck, I'd get sick. If you've never been seasick, it's one of the worst kinds of sick there is." Of course, when it comes...
Orange could be getting nearly 200 new hotel rooms and up to 150 new homes. Those were among the items on the agenda for Tuesday night's Planning and Zoning Commission to consider. ISHA Investments LLC is seeking a rezoning request so that it may build two or more hotels and a restaurant south of the Pilot Travel Center on Texas Route 62. The owner, who also owns the Quality Inn and Suites in Bridge City, has told the city he already has a commitment from Marriott to build a...
Sheriff’s Chaplain Mike Eaves opened Tuesday’s Commissioners Court meeting with a prayer thanking God for the easing of the COVID-19 pandemic. He’s not alone. Six weeks ago, new outbreaks of the coronavirus were popping up at alarming rates. And especially in school children. According to reports for Orange County, the number of “new” cases of COVID-19 in patients aged 5 to 18 went from 34 in the week ended Aug. 10 to 291 in the week ended Aug. 31. Bridge City High School had...
Nearly a half-million dollars in hotel-motel occupancy tax was in the process of being distributed to local non-profits Tuesday. Orange County designated $263,000 for 19 different upcoming events or destinations Tuesday afternoon while the City of Orange was looking to spend $185,000 on a dozen good causes. Orange County collects a 2 percent tax on overnight hotel and motel stays, while the City of Orange collects a 7 percent tax. From those funds, the county and city are...
A couple of parents pleaded for Orangefield's school district "to change with the times" Monday night. Ashley Petty and Scott Rollins want their sons allowed to wear earrings to classes, they said in the public forum portion of the October school board meeting. Currently, the school dress code for Orangefield Independent School District says earrings are prohibited for male students. "My 10-year-old little boy has his ears pierced," Petty told the board members. But the...
Donors ear-marking their funds for the March 2022 Republican Primary election in Orange County might want to double check their precinct lines first. The release earlier this year of the 2020 Census figures is causing, as they do every decade, a redrawing of precinct lines. The idea is to have each of the four precincts contain about 25 percent of the county's population, so that the county's resources are spent equitably. County Commissioners, Justices of the Peace and...
A new immunization clinic near Baptist Hospital Orange at 1502 Strickland Drive is opening later this week, county officials say. The clinic will be open daily, from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. and offer a selection of vaccines, not just COVID-19 immunizations, said Joel Ardoin, Emergency Management Coordinator for Orange County. "It will offer all of the immunizations people typically need, like school shots and flu vaccines," Ardoin said. "But you have to call to make an appointment."...
Texans have a chance to have their say on a couple of emotional issues for many that were created by government intervention to fight the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. The eight propositions to be voted up or down in the Nov. 2 Texas Constitutional Amendment Election include one (No. 3) that will, if passed, keep the state or any lesser political entities – counties or cities – from limiting or prohibiting religious services. Another proposition (No. 6) establishes a rig...
The first-year Bridge City schools superintendent looks into the future and sees more and more young people. To make sure the schools have room for them, Dr. Mike Kelly is proposing a building program that will not require any new tax dollars. He wants to add six classrooms at Bridge City Elementary and a new career and technical education building at Bridge City High School. "None of these projects have anything to do with new taxes," Dr. Mike Kelly says. "They would all be...
For at least the third time this year, a business owned by a City Hall insider has been awarded a high-dollar Economic Development incentive by the City of Orange. Everyone involved says there's nothing wrong with it. "We run it by our lawyers. We do everything by the book," Orange City Manager Mike Kunst said. "They're business owners, and just like anybody, they're trying to take advantage of an opportunity for an incentive." Any current or potential Orange business can...
