News
Areas along Highway 160 in Gainesville saw flash flood conditions Sunday morning after several inches of rain fell quickly and saturated low spots in town. This photo was taken by Holly Hannaford at the White Oak Station on First Street (formerly J-Mart).
Downtown Gainesville saw a bout of flash flooding Sunday morning, April 27, when a torrent of rain fell, leading to Lick Creek quickly rising and flooding its banks in a fashion that many residents remember only in the “1,000-year” flood of 2017.
Thankfully, the creek wasn’t up long and receded...
The new Mexican restaurant in Theodosia is now open. Owners, from left, William Bairez, Elena Cruz, Natti Cruz and Alberto Salinas are pictured in front of the El Tule Oaxaca Mexican restaurant in preparation of their opening last Friday. The family also owns the same restaurant in Ava.
Residents of Theodosia who have been eagerly awaiting the opening of the new Mexican restaurant, El Tule Oaxaca, no longer have to wait. The restaurant officially opened its doors to the public last Friday, April 25, and was warmly welcomed by the local community.
The business owners, William...
Covenant, Sword and Arm of the Lord leader James Ellison
Editor’s note: This is the second installment of a series detailing the Covenant, Sword and Arm of the Lord, a religious commune located south of Pontiac in the 1970s and 1980s. The anti-government, paramilitary and white supremacist group of more than 100 people lived together on a 224-acre...
Times photo/Jessi Dreckman This drainage ditch alongside the Ozark County Volunteer Library’s side wall on Second Street in Gainesville is causing water issues with the library. Representatives of the library were at this month’s city council meeting asking the city to help find a remedy.
Joanne and Ken Krupp attended the April 8 Gainesville City Council meeting, asking the council members to help find a remedy for a water issue that is continually causing the Ozark County Volunteer Library building to flood.
“There’s a situation that has been going on for many, many years and that...
Times photo/Jessi Dreckman City council members sworn in From left, Gainesville city councilman and councilwomen Dana Crisp, Treva Warrick and Amanda “Mandy” Rodgers were sworn in to new two-year terms during the April 8 Gainesville City Council meeting. Crisp (east ward) and Warrick (center ward) were already serving on the board when their seats came up for re-election this year. They both chose to refile for the positions, and no one filed against them. Rodgers filed as a new candidate in the west ward, filling an empty seat vacated by former city councilman Seth Collins, who resigned last year. They will each serve a two-year term.
The council continued a discussion that has been ongoing since early this year when the city received correspondence from a company that is seeking a partial sales tax refund on behalf of the Gainesville Health Care Center.
The company (who is hired by businesses to help them save money) believes...
City Maintenance Supervisor Mike Davis said that contractors have begun the process to build the city’s new wastewater treatment facility.
“They’ve started laying blocks on the new building and making pretty good headway. They have a new generator pad poured and pad for other electrical stuff...
The Gainesville City Council approved Gainesville Fire Chief Kevin Piland’s request to spend up to $1,000 for a required ladder truck certification.
Piland was at the meeting and said that the National Fire Protection Association requires that all ladder trucks be tested and certified each year...
photo submitted As Dan Schmucker from White River Valley Electric Cooperative was driving around the Gainesville square Friday morning, he noticed one of the large phase switches on the pole was hanging down by a wire. The phase switch had been hit by lightning sometime during the recent bouts of severe weather. The crew from WRVEC was able to change all three phase switches on the pole at the southeast corner of the courthouse, preventing a city-wide power outage.
As Dan Schmucker from White River Valley Electric Cooperative was driving around the Gainesville square Friday, April 11, he looked up at the power lines and noticed that something wasn’t right, said Eastern District Commissioner Jim Britt on Monday.
“He was just driving around the square that day...
Around 10 a.m. last Saturday, April 12, local first responders and emergency personnel came to the aid of a man who was trapped inside his car after driving over a curb at Town & Country Supermarket in Gainesville and overturning the vehicle on the steep embankment below. The responders pulled...
This photo shows the entrance to “Silhouette City,” where survivalists practiced shooting at cardboard enemies at the Covenant, Sword and Arm of the Lord compound, south of Pontiac in the late 1970s. This photo was published in the Los Angeles Times in 1981.
It has now been four decades since hundreds of lawmen stormed a 224-acre compound located on a peninsula just across the Arkansas line near Pontiac, home to the far right wing, anti-government and white supremacist religious group, the Zarephath-Horeb Church, otherwise known as the “Covenant, Sword...