PICKENS – The Greater Pickens Chamber of Commerce announced Monday that a new director has been selected to fill that position that has been vacant for about two months, Michael Tate, president of the chamber, said.

Rita-Sue Seaborn of Liberty, and a former reporter for The Easley Progress, The Pickens Sentinel and the Powdersville Post, was chosen from a field of about 13 applicants vying for the director slot, Tate said.

“We hired Rita-Sue because of her journalism skills, background in public service, and her love and compassion for Pickens,” Tate said. “The Chamber Board of Directors believe she will serve the area well.”

Seaborn was born in Pickens County, and was raised on a farm located between Easley and Liberty. The daughter of Juanita Finley Seaborn and the late Carl F. Seaborn, she attended local public schools and colleges, and begin her career in journalism at the one-time Liberty Monitor while furthering her education. After college, she worked as a reporter for The Myrtle Beach Sun News, which led into a second career in law enforcement.

After living along South Carolina’s coast for many years, Seaborn returned to her Pickens County home, working as a police officer and victim/witness coordinator for the Greenville Police Department.

In July 2007, she was hired as the editor and reporter for The Pickens Sentinel.

Recently, Seaborn won three top South Carolina Press Association awards for her journalistic skills, taking top honors for column writing and receiving third place in the spot news reporting and series of stories categories.

Her writing and photography skills, coupled with her love, appreciation, and knowledge for Pickens and the surrounding area, will be an added benefit to the chamber board and members, Tate said.

Seaborn said she is pleased to have been selected to fill the position of chamber director.

“I am excited about being back in Pickens, and am looking forward to working with the Greater Pickens Chamber of Commerce board and chamber members,” Seaborn said. “There is no place lovelier, or an area with any greater or kinder people than Pickens.

“My father worked at Deil, Poinsett, Singer and finally Ryobi, and he always returned to Pickens to purchase any items he needed, because he knew and trusted the people here,” she said. “He believed in supporting the local economy and his neighbors, and he passed that trait along to me.

“I am deeply honored to have been selected to serve this area as director of the Greater Pickens Chamber of Commerce, and I am privileged to have this incredible opportunity,” she said. “It’s great to be back home in Pickens.”