Category Archives: SPLOST

Videos: Garbage falling off trucks @ LCC 2014-03-25



If the County Commission hadn’t privatized garbage collection,
Frenchie could have registered his complaint about

garbage falling off trucks
through the new

turnkey government website service once it’s online.
No mention of the

annexation request by the City of Hahira from the Work Session.

Commissioner Powell
noted the three SPLOST VII projects were

“a direct reinvestment into the community of those funds”.
The

road resurfacing of four roads
is actually mostly from a GDOT LMIG grant,
but the other three,
shoulder paving on

Val Del Road
and

Boring Pond Road
and a

bridge replacement on Cat Creek Road
are all from SPLOST VII funds.
Plus

some trucks for Animal Control and

tablets for the Fire Department,
an

alcohol license, and some alphabet-soup agreements,
one of which turned out to be for

a grant for a victim advocate position in the Solicitor General’s office.

Here’s

the agenda.
See also
the previous morning’s Work Session.

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS

PROPOSED AGENDA

WORK SESSION, MONDAY, MARCH 24, 2014, 8:30 a.m.

REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, MARCH 25, 2014, 5:30 p.m.

327 N. Ashley Street — 2nd Floor

Continue reading →

Videos: Mostly Paving and Bridges @ LCC 2014-03-24


Yesterday morning they discussed a

turnkey government website service.
And an

annexation request by the City of Hahira.
And they may actually be serious about coming into the 21st century with

online county services.

Turns out the

road resurfacing of four roads
is actually mostly from a GDOT LMIG grant,
but the other three,
shoulder paving on

Val Del Road
and

Boring Pond Road
and a

bridge replacement on Cat Creek Road
are all from SPLOST VII funds.
Plus

some trucks for Animal Control and

tablets for the Fire Department,
an

alcohol license, and some alphabet-soup agreements,
one of which turned out to be for

a grant for a victim advocate position in the Solicitor General’s office.

Here’s

the agenda.

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS

PROPOSED AGENDA

WORK SESSION, MONDAY, MARCH 24, 2014, 8:30 a.m.

REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, MARCH 25, 2014, 5:30 p.m.

327 N. Ashley Street — 2nd Floor

Continue reading →

Animals, Alcohol, Alphabet Soup, Paving, Bridges, and Fire @ LCC 2014-03-24



Got to spend those SPLOST dollars widening roads and bridges
to promote development farther out in the country!
Plus some trucks for Animal Control and tablets for the Fire Department,
an alcohol license, and some alphabet-soup agreements.
It may be healthy as food, but I wonder if opaque acronyms
unexplained in the agenda is good for local government.

Here’s

the agenda.

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS

PROPOSED AGENDA

WORK SESSION, MONDAY, MARCH 24, 2014, 8:30 a.m.

REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, MARCH 25, 2014, 5:30 p.m.

327 N. Ashley Street — 2nd Floor

Continue reading →

Valdosta sewage PR reaches Florida



Valdosta sure has an effective PR mechanism,
famous all the way to Florida again,

for the second time this month.
Most cities wouldn’t think

to dump stuff into the river to get in the news!
But Valdosta buried the solution at the end of

a traditional press release:

“The city has planned, designed and bid a force main project and
will award a $32 million contract in May that will prevent the
majority of these overflows from occurring in the future.”



That would be one of the projects Valdosta will use the
$36.7 million GEFA loan to fund.
Other projects are related to the Withlacoochee Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP), which wasn’t the culprit this time.
This sewer spill came from manholes overflowing.

Winnie Wright wrote for WCTV yesterday,

Over 1 Million Gallons Of Wastewater Spills Into Local Waterways,

The Florida Department of Public Health is warning residents to
avoid contact with water from the Withlacoochee River.

Continue reading →

Manhole overflows –City of Valdosta



Maybe that SPLOST money will build that force main and stop this.
Meanwhile, they don’t call it Sugar Creek for nothing.
And Twomile Branch flows into Sugar Creek, which flows into the Withlacoochee
River, which flows into the Suwannee River through Florida into the Gulf of Mexico.
Today we’ll probably see stories from Florida about river water warnings.

Winnie Wright wrote for WCTV 18 March 2014,

National Flood Preparedness Week Comes to Valdosta, Along With The Rain,

It’s pretty ironic that National Flood Preparedness Week has come
right alongside 5 inches of rain in South Georgia, but for residents
of Valdosta who remember the flood of 2009, that much rain can be a
real problem if you don’t have flood insurance.

“Many people don’t realize that flood is not covered in their
homeowners policy. It’s important to know what is and isn’t covered
in your homeowners policy”, says Christi Marsh, a State Farm Agent
based in Valdosta.

Winnie Wright reports homeowner Carrie Eager found flood insurance preferable
to evacuating by boat like before.

Continue reading →

Retreat 2014 pictures @ LCC 2014-02-27

Gretchen is posting still pictures while videoing the retreat.

SPLOST and website @ LCC 2014-02-27



Retreating again this week, but not very far this time:
next door to the Commission chamber, tomorrow (Thursday) and Friday.
In addition to SPLOST (now that they’ve got it, they
have to determine how to spend it),
what’s this about website on

the agenda?

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS

2014 Commission Retreat Agenda

Lowndes County Judicial Complex, Administrative Wing

2nd Floor, Overflow Room next to the Commission Chambers

327 North Ashley Street, Valdosta, GA 31601

Continue reading →

Secret meeting of Lowndes County Commission and state reps @ LCC 2013-12-20


Dexter Sharper (District 177)
The VDT report doesn’t say when or where, and doesn’t say whether
Dexter Sharper (District 177) wasn’t invited or chose not to attend.

There’s nothing about this meeting in the online

agendas
or

calendar,
even though that calendar lists

Pictures with Santa at the Historical Courthouse (12/19/2013).

There is this undated

public notice with no agenda:


Paige Dukes, Lowndes County Clerk
The Lowndes County Board of Commissioners will meet with members of
Lowndes County’s Legislative Delegation on Friday, December 20,
2013, at 4:00 p.m. in the Commissioner’s Conference Room located on
the 3rd floor of the Judicial-Administrative Complex, 327 North
Ashley Street, Valdosta, Georgia.

K. Paige Dukes, County Clerk

pdukes@lowndescounty.com 229-671-2400


Tim Golden (District 8)
Matthew Woody wrote for the VDT 22 December 2013,

Commissioners host local delegation,
oddly omitting the when and where and much of the why from
the traditional

who, what, when, where, and why of journalism.


Amy Carter (District 175)
The Lowndes County Commission hosted Continue reading →

Maybe county should check its work about other budgets @ LCC 2013-11-14



Who’s responsible for the recent partiality in budget reports?
The newspaper, or its source of information, namely the county government
at its secretive retreat on the Chairman’s private property that even the VDT reporter had trouble finding?

When

the Coroner
and

the Sheriff
(often

at odds lately)
agree that

the VDT’s version
of

the county government’s remarks about their budgets
was at best partial,
where is the source of that partiality?
Who’s responsible for budgeting for the county, reporter Matthew
or editor Kay Harris or Dean Poling?
Or is it the local government our taxes pay to do that job,
namely the Lowndes County Commission and its staff,
which is managed by County Manager Joe Pritchard?



Maybe somebody down at the county palace should,

as Gretchen suggested recently,
“check our work”.

-jsq

Coroner responds to County Commission about budget @ LCC 2013-11-14



Like

the Sheriff, the Coroner reports
that something’s rotten in the

Lowndes County Commission and staff’s version of his budget.

Dean Poling write for the VDT today,

Coroner responds to county budget issues,

Lowndes County Coroner Bill Watson explained Friday that comments
calling him one of the county budget’s “worst offenders”
did not explain why his office’s expenses change from year to year.

“I have no control over the number of people that dies each
year,” Watson told The Times, “and I have to fund the
transportation for autopsies. Any time there is an autopsy, it costs
my office about $750.”

These costs include Continue reading →