BASSMASTER, Expansion of Amphitheater, Detention Center Highlight Busy Time for County
Greg Wilson/Anderson Observer
Sitting In a second-floor room of the historic courthouse, with Lake Hartwell somewhere just beyond the county maps and framed certificates, Anderson County Administrator Rusty Burns spoke about bass fishing, specifically the Bassmaster Classic’s return to Green Pond Landing—an event that, has become both a mirror and a megaphone for Anderson County’s sense of itself.
Weaving county pride with pragmatic answers Burns traced the layered chronology of someone who has watched a place grow up around an idea.
“Well, the first one was even before Green Pond,” said Burns. “We had to kind of make shifts and do. And so that really began our national presence. Then the second one increased it, the third one, then the fourth one.” The fifth visit, he said, was not just repetition but coronation.
“Now that we’re going to have this one, more than anybody else has ever had it. It is the World Series of Fishing and it is international. And so, it’s going to continue to increase the popularity of our brand in Lake Hartwell.”
“It’s a wonderful event, but it causes all of these other events,” said Burns. High school tournaments, in particular, seemed to move him: “As you know, I really love the high school fishing events because they bring in so many fishermen, two to a boat, and it brings in mammas and daddies and uncles and aunts and brothers and sisters and the same can be said for the college tournaments.” The scale, is startling: “And they’ll have three 450 boats. And so, I think that’s really good.”
The pride here is not abstract.
“I think that just says great things about Green Pond Landing and more importantly about Anderson County and our hospitality,” Burns added,
The geography of that hospitality is regional, not parochial. The joint project between Anderson County and Greenville works so it works well for the two counties to work together, Burns said. “Most of the fishermen stay here. The weigh-ins, everything is really, really good. So, we’re really happy about that and looking forward to it.”
The county has measured some of the economic impact that ripples out, which Burns said has been a boon to local business.
“It’s in the millions of dollars,” said Burns, without ornament. “All of our fishing tournaments do that. But in the meantime, I mean like in the next two months, we have smaller tournaments that are out there every day, local tournaments. So, it’s always something going on out there that’s good for the local economy.”
Burns also praised the cooperative efforts of the county, “Teamwork Without Borders”—signaling a turn toward the mechanics behind the scenes. He sees a county government that imagines itself as a kind of extended family, blurring departmental lines in service of shared water, shared roads, shared days on the lake.
Meanwhile, a new detention center, which is on schedule and budget, and expansion of the County officials have framed the amphitheater at the Anderson Sports and Entertainment Center as something like an underused stage in search of a second act. Under the proposed tourism-backed revenue bonds—up to 12.7 million dollars, limited by a six‑percent interest cap—the amphitheater would undergo “significant renovations” and related infrastructure upgrades, all funded by the three‑percent accommodations tax and designated park fees rather than property taxes.
Promoters have long asked for amenities such as V.I.P. seating close to the stage, and the redesign aims to make the venue friendlier to touring acts as well as local audiences. The amphitheater overhaul joins Green Pond’s expanded ramps and docks, McFalls Landing replacements, and improvements at Dolly Cooper and Wellington parks in a single, tourism‑oriented package meant to put more “heads in beds” and fill the county’s hotel rooms on concert weekends as reliably as on tournament days.
Downriver, Piedmont Riverfront Park is being positioned as both neighborhood refuge and regional calling card. Federal Land and Water Conservation Fund and other grants underwrite part of a roughly $1.21‑million first phase, which includes an ADA‑accessible kayak launch, a new boat landing, 5,000 feet of paved sidewalk, improved parking, and the first loop of nature paths and shoreline trails on thirty acres along the Saluda.
County leaders and state legislators have cast the park as a “key anchor” on the Upper Saluda River Blue Trail, the fifth access site in a network offering more than 70 miles of beginner‑friendly paddling and nearly 50 miles of advanced water. Early estimates suggest Piedmont’s riverfront will generate more than $3 million a year in direct economic activity and upwards of $10 million when indirect effects are counted.
In the logic that now governs Anderson’s ambitions, the amphitheater’s upgraded sightlines and Piedmont’s new kayak launch are parts of the same design: a county that treats its stages and shorelines as engines, drawing strangers in and giving locals more reasons to stay.
Burns discussed these and other countywide updates in this interview with The Anderson Observer.
