Apparently there is some sort of spotted leaf blight, and they were considering what to do about it.
-jsq
Join us 5PM Tuesday March 6th 2012 at the private prison site (Dasher-Johnson Road off US 84 at Inner Perimeter) for a motorcade by Valdosta City Hall to the Industrial Authority offices: for education and against the private prison.
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on the web View Larger Map 
Petition |
Winn Roberson read the newspaper Friday (February 24th) and realized the prison site was down the street from him, so the news finally sunk in. This motorcade was his idea to drive the point across to the Industrial Authority: we don’t want a private prison!
John S. Quarterman lives about as far away from the prison site as you can get in Lowndes County, but realizes it will affect everybody for many counties around. So let’s say CCA Go Away!
-jsq
PS: If you can’t come, you can still sign the petition to the Industrial Authority, or write a letter to the editor, or…
Here are videos of the Hahira Ethics Commission (HEC) on 12 January 2012
considering
complaint #1 against
Mayor Wayne Bullard:
1.) In 2010 permission was given by Bullard to Allgreen, the mayor’s employer, to store Allgreen equipment on city property, 6571 Union RoadHEC decided that while he shouldn’t have done it, the Hahira City Council already met on that subject and he already agreed not to do it again, so there was nothing more for the ethics commission to do on that complaint, although the City Council could take it up again if it wanted to.Dumpsite, without bringing the issue before the City Council.
Regarding the other two complaints, at the insistence of the complainant, Clay Tilman, that he had further evidence to present, Commissioner Marilyn Dye made a motion to consider the other two items in a following session.; the commission agreed to do that: they’ll meet again today, 19 January 2012, at 5:30 PM. Here’s the VDT’s writeup on the substance of the complaints.
Here’s the VDT’s writeup on the 12 Jan meeting, with this Kafkaesque moment: Continue reading
The state of Georgia requires a Comprehensive Plan and collects and approves them through the Department of Community Affairs (DCA). The current plans for all of Georgia are available at the DCA Planning Site.
The current STWP documents that are being reviewed locally are the projects
that the local governments and agencies expect to actively work on in
the next five years.
The ROA documents report on what was done in the past five years:
what was completed, or will no longer be pursued.
Many municipalities and counties file separate reports.
Locally, because there is significant cooperation among the cities and Lowndes
County there is one document with all the projects included and a place that
indicates which agency is participating in the project.
However, their input documents are filed separately, and LAKE
has collected them
on the LAKE web pages.
Also, each local municipality holds its own public hearings.
Reading the STWP and ROA can be a bit tricky but once I understood the format, the process became much easier. The overall topics are prescribed by the state and are in general categories like “Population”, “Economic Development”, “Housing” and “Land Use”. There are sub-categories in each of the ten major categories, like “Secure High-Wage Jobs” and “Address Workforce Adequacy” in the “Economic Development” major category. Then, under each of these items are one or more specific projects that will be done in the next five years to help achieve each goal.
One reason the draft STWP is complex is that it redlines projects that were performed in the previous five years and are now being removed or modified for a variety of reasons. Many projects were completed, some moved from one stage (investigate) to another (implement or market), and still others simply lacked the staff or funding resources to continue being pursued.
The ROA document is in a similar format but the focus of it is to report the status of the STWP for the previous five years. An Explanation Column gives details on the status of each previous project. For example, it says that the “Feed the Elderly Senior Citizen Nutrition Program” has been discontinued because “Budgetary constraints have limited Lowndes County’s role in this supporting action.”.
The STWP and ROA documents are meant to be read as a pair, giving the reader an understanding of where we have been, where we are going and how we are going to get there as a community.
-gretchen
79.07% No Consolidation with 14 out of 16 precincts. All that is outstanding is provisional ballots and military, which are usually a handful. The percentage of no votes kept going up. Also more people voted on the school consolidation referendum than there were validated signatures on CUEE’s petition.
It looked like a landslide, and it was:
In other news, the mayoral vote almost voted that of four years ago. John W. Gayle will be the new Mayor of Valdosta with 57.3%.
Ben H. Norton retains his Valdosta City Council Seat with 76.56%.
Sunday sales of alcohol in Valdosta won with 52.3%. A similar alcohol referendum won in Lake Park with 65.99%.
It looks like Ben Futch will be the new Mayor of Lake Park with 54.85%.
Sandy Sherrill, Russell H. Lane, Paul Mulkey, and Roanald Carter will apparently be on the Lake Park City Council.
In Dasher, Edwin R. Smith will be City Council P3 and Donald J. Bryan will be P2.
In Hahira, Ralph Clendenin retains his City Council seat.
The school referendum details: Continue reading
According to their letters of transmission to the Department of Community Affairs (DCA) Valdosta, Hahira, Remerton, and Lake Park all held public hearings on the Short Term Work Programs and Report of Accomplishment documents.
Here is video of the Valdosta Public Hearing.
The
Lowndes County resolution
does not say that a public hearing was held.
That’s because no public hearing was held, as you can see in the video below.
A public hearing was listed in the agenda of the 11 October 2011 Regular Session of the Lowndes County Commission.
7. Public Hearing
a. REZ-2011-13, Fred’s Dept. Store, 4401 Bemiss Rd., 145c-90a, 2.0 ac., water/sewer, C-H(c) & C- G(c) to C-G
b. Greater Lowndes 2030 Comprehensive Plan Updates – Lowndes County Report of Accomplishments (ROA) and Short Term Work Program (STWP)
However, citizens were not invited to speak for or against the document. In fact, the document was not provided to the citizens for comment and an open records request for the document has not been satisfied by the county. Here is video of items 7a and 7b.
The County’s Resolution to Transmit says in part: Continue reading
The Standards and Procedures for Local Comprehensive Planning,
established by the Georgia Planning Act of 1989, require updates
to the Short Term Work Projects (STWP) list and the Report of
Accomplishments (ROA) every 5 years.
Lowndes County and the cities in Lowndes County have submitted the
documents to the Georgia Department of Community Affairs
(DCA)
An open records request to Lowndes County for the documents was not satisfied. However other government agencies were willing to abide by the Georgia Open Records Law ocga 50-18-70.
The documents are available for review on the Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange website for Valdosta, Lake Park, Remerton, Hahira and Lowndes County.
I encourage you to read carefully what our elected officials see as the future of our community.
-gretchen
Valdosta, Lowndes County and other concerned citizens marched from the Valdosta-Lowndes County Chamber of Commerce building through downtown to Rev. Martin L. King Jr., Monument. There were many speeches given along with the sharing of ideas at this historic event. The marchers were lead by Valdosta Police Department and eneded in peace as we all expected in our beloved community. Peace!
-George Boston Rhynes
Here’s the video:
George Rhynes talks to No Consolidation marchers
No school consolidation,
Vote No for Consolidation March, Friends of Valdosta City Schools (FVCS),
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 22 October 2011.
Videos by George Rhynes for bostongbr on YouTube.
-jsq
The Chamber’s Meet the Candidates Reception provides an opportunity for Chamber members to meet and hear from candidates running in the Nov. 8 general election. All Chamber members and guests are invited to attend this event at the Rainwater Conference Center. There is no cost to Chamber members to attend.Here’s the link to RSVP or if you need directions.
Here’s a list of who qualifed to run. As you can see, most local incumbents are running unopposed. Maybe they’ll show up anyway, and there are at least a few contested positions (Valdosta Mayor and Council At Large, Hahira Council 3, Dasher Post 3, and Lake Park Council At Large. This being an odd year, there are no county-wide posts up for election, but the municipal elections affect everyone around here, even people like me who do not live in any of the cities. Whether at this event or elsewhere, you may want to ask the candidates their platforms and positions on local issues.
Usually there’s also an AAUW Lowndes County Political Forum; I don’t know what’s up with that this year. Usually it’s immediately after the Chamber thing, and the AAUW Forum is open to all.
-jsq
Mayor Sonny Vickers said he thought it was important for children
and grandchildren and proper for the City Council to take a stand
against school consolidation, and City Manager Larry Hanson read
the statement (transcript appended).
For:
James Wright District 1 
Hoke Hampton District 3 
Alvin Payton District 4 Ben Norton At Large Didn’t Have to Vote: 
Sonny Vickers Mayor |
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Against:
Robert Yost District 6 
Tim Carroll District 5 Missing: 
Deidra White District 2 |
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That means Ben Norton changed his vote since since their last non-binding vote related to school consolidation. (Nonbinding because they didn’t have any authority to decide whether the referendum went on the ballot or not.) Council Deidra White of District 2 was absent throughout the meeting, which I find rather odd since she seemed quite aware when I spoke to her the previous day that this vote was going to occur. Back in August she voted against putting the referendum on the ballot. Yes, I know the motion was not exactly the same, so the votes are not exactly comparable. In any case, this time there was no tie and thus no need for the (new) mayor to break a tie.
Here’s the video:
Valdosta City Council voted to oppose school consolidationo
education, consolidation, resolution,
Regular Session, Valdosta City Council (VCC),
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 6 October 2011.
Videos by Gretchen Quarterman for LAKE, the Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange.
Here’s the statement transcribed as accurately as I could from the video: Continue reading