Category Archives: Government

Who is ZBOA?

The current members of the Valdosta-Lowndes County Zoning Board of Appeals (ZBOA) are:
City of Valdosta
Allan Strickland, Chair
Laverne Gaskins
Scott Orenstein, Vice-Chair
Nancy Hobby
Paul Alvarado 		Lowndes County
Gretchen Quarterman
Dr. William Houseal
Dave Kirk
Here they are at their 14 Sep 2010 meeting:

Left to right: Laverne Gaskins, Gretchen Quarterman, Paul Alvarado, Allan Strickland (Chair), Scott Orenstein (Vice-Chair), and Dr. William Houseal. (Nancy Hobby and Dave Kirk were not present at that meeting.)

According to the city’s web page about them:

The ZBOA is a joint board consisting of eight appointed citizens, four each for the City of Valdosta and Lowndes County. Members are appointed for three year terms. City board members are appointed by the Mayor-Council based on their experience in land development, their familiarity with the City of Valdosta Zoning Ordinance, and their willingness to commit sufficient time to the board in order to be an effective board member.
What do they do? Continue reading →

McDonalds Denied Sign Variance for Foxborough Store

Update: Videos are here.

Fast-food giant McDonalds applied for a sign variance so they could have signs the same size as everywhere else, so they wouldn’t have to do a custom job. The Technical Review Committee (TRC) recommended against. Attorney Gary Moser summed up the opinions of 200 Foxborough residents who don’t want the added light from the sign and headlights. He also mentioned Vince Schneider is being deployed to Afghanistan and doesn’t want the added lights when he gets back in six months.

Surprise speaker Gary Minchew, a well-known local developer, spoke against the variance, citing the arrogant behavior of McDonalds, which he said insisted on keeping a variance through his property he had granted First State Bank, even though he had not intended it to be used by a fast-food buyer of the bank property.

The Valdosta-Lowndes County Zoning Board of Appeals voted unanimously to deny the variance. Pictures and videos to follow.

-jsq

Video of Biomass Air Quality Hearing, Valdosta, 27 April 2010

A video of a hearing about the biomass plant Wiregrass Power LLC proposes to build in Lowndes County just outside of Valdosta was held in Valdosta on 27 April 2010 by the Air Protection Branch (APD) of the Environmental Protection Division (EPD) of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources (DNR).

Eric Cornwell of APD explains location, process flow, and specific items covered by the permit (soot, SO2, NOX, CO, VOC, HCL, etc., but not CO2). He remarks that Wiregrass Power LLC is building a small plant with a “lower emission limit in order to avoid some of the red tape” by getting a minor permit instead of a major permit. The first half hour concludes with Bob Turner, the plant manager, presenting similar material, ending with:

“No new carbon is added to the atmosphere when burning woody byproducts.”
I beg to differ on that: in the time it takes trees to grow back, there is indeed new carbon dioxide added to the atmosphere. More from Dr. William Sammons on that.

Back to the video of the hearing. Questions start at 00:29:44. Here are some time markers and very brief summaries of Q and A; see the video for the full questions and answers. Continue reading →

Sprawl to ruin, or dense with green space for quality of life

Jeffrey H. Dorfman, Professor, Dept. of Agricultural & Applied Economics, The University of Georgia:
Local governments must ensure balanced growth, as sprawling residential growth is a certain ticket to fiscal ruin*
* Or at least big tax increases.
See The Economics of Growth, Sprawl and Land Use Decisions.
  • Green spaces increase property values of surrounding land
  • Green and open spaces can provide environmental amenities for free
  • If green spaces contribute to quality of life, you attract people and jobs to community
Note and jobs, not just people: jobs so the people can work and afford the houses they live in.

But this doesn’t mean exurban subdivisions with big yards: Continue reading →

Water Planning

In 2004 the state of Georgia adopted a water planning system, and in 2008 adopted a water plan, with regional councils appointed in 2009 by the governor, lieutenant governor, and Speaker of the House. While I wonder why this organizational setup inserted a regional layer of government that is unaccountable to the people in the region, it’s good somebody is doing some water planning.
In the event “gaps” between available water and future (or current) demands are identified, the Council will determine which water and land use management practices should be employed to ensure there is sufficient water and assimilative capacity to meet future needs. EPD will use computer models to test the ability of the recommended practices to close any identified “gaps.”
If you remember Atlanta running out of water a few years ago Continue reading →

On behalf of local workers

From: George Boston Rhynes
Date: Sat, 14 Aug 2010 16:21:27 -0400
Subject: Citizens To Be Heard At Valdosta City Council Meetings, Mr. Roy Taylor on behalf of local workers!

August 13, 2010

George Boston Rhynes (229-251-8645) Valdosta, Georgia 31605

TO: All Editors and Beyond

The Valdosta Daily Times Article on Aug 11 that read; “Order in the Court, a look at the Lowndes County Court House.” It highlighted the history and benefits of the old 1905 Lowndes County Court House but did not address diversity, gender, and who mostly benefited through employment from building this new facility. That is except for the employers and immigrants from Mexico. Continue reading →

Candidates, Lowndes County Commission, District 2, at LCDP BBQ

Every year the Lowndes County Democratic Party (LCDP) has a barbecue to which it invites candidates for public office. These include local candidates. Here we have the two Democrats running for Lowndes County Commission in District 2, in alphabetical order: Debra M. Franklin and John S. Quarterman. Notice the two candidates dining amicably side by side.

Debra M. Franklin: Continue reading →

Biomass Town Hall Part 2

This is part 2 about the July 8th town Hall meeting about the biomass plant proposed for Valdosta.

First let’s hear George Rhynes explain that it’s never too late to reregulate our minds:

Here I’ve selected videos of local County Commission candidates: Continue reading →

Results of lack of education

Juarez, Mexico, is farther down the road of emphasizing law and order over education and jobs, as Melissa del Bosque reports in the Texas Observer abo ut Mexico’s Lost Generations:
When Juarez’s (soon to be outgoing) Mayor Jose Reyes-Ferriz visited Austin last April something he said stuck with me.

He told the audience that a failure to invest in schools and other public infrastructure had led to the lawlessness in his city. Instead of schools and daycare centers, city leadership only invested in maquila parks and roads. Children were left on the streets to fend for themselves as their parents worked in the maquila factories for meager wages.

Mexican president Calderon, previously consumed by the drug war, finally noticed and did something:
“More than 5,000 residents have received job-training grants or temporary work sprucing up parks and sidewalks and planting trees. Officials added thousands of families to a government insurance program and handed out 6,000 scholarships in a city where few students were receiving such help.”

“It’s not enough to analyze it only in terms of public safety. You have serious gaps in the social and economic [areas] that have to be closed,” said Antonio Vivanco, a Calderon advisor overseeing the development effort.

Todos somos Juarez (We Are All Juarez).

-jsq

Foxborough Anti-McDonalds Banner

The VDT writes about Foxborough two days in a row:
Several dozen residents of the Foxborough subdivision came to the Lowndes County Commission meeting Tuesday to again express their dismay at the possibility of having a McDonald’s fast food restaurant located by the neighborhood’s entrance.

Resident Pete Candelaria said he has been living in Foxborough for six years and was speaking on behalf of the residents.

Candelario (I believe that’s the actual spelling of his name) provided a list of suggestions to the Commission, which Chairman Paulk addressed, including: Continue reading →