Category Archives: Transparency

How do we vote on T-SPLOST? — Gretchen Quarterman @ SGRC 2011-09-19

T-SPLOST regions are an intermediate level of government in which all the people in the region vote together, not by counties.

Gretchen Quarterman asked:

When the 18 counties vote, is it county by county, say Atkinson votes yes, and Lowndes votes no, and if there were 9 counties that voted yes and 9 counties that voted no, or is it the total of all the voters together, and then we say there were 400,000 voters and it’s a simple majority.

Corey Hull answered:

It’s a simple majority. It’s the latter of how you described it, it’s all the voters together.

Here’s the video:

How do we vote on T-SPLOST?
T-SPLOST Public Meeting, Southern Georgia Regional Commission (SGRC),
Corey Hull,
Nolen Cox, Gretchen Quarterman,
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 19 September 2011.
Video by Gretchen Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE).

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Lowndes County donor county @ SGRC 2011-09-19

Lowndes County would be a T-SPLOST donor county: it would put more money into T-SPLOST than it would get back for projects.

Somebody (I think it was Robert Yost) asked whether Lowndes County would be a donor county for T-SPLOST. Corey Hull said yes, that was the case. Someone else noted:

Atkinson County that’s been coming over here spending our money all these years, gets a little of it back.

And the smaller counties get penalized a lot more if they vote against T-SPLOST, because they depend much more on LMIG. So T-SPLOST among other downsides is a scheme to pit smaller counties against larger ones in the T-SPLOST region.

Here’s the video:

Lowndes County donor county
T-SPLOST Public Meeting, Southern Georgia Regional Commission (SGRC),
Corey Hull,
Nolen Cox, Gretchen Quarterman,
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 19 September 2011.
Video by Gretchen Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE).

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Nydia Tisdale returns to city council where she was thrown out for videoing

Remember Nydia Tisdale, who got illegally ejected from a Cumming City Council meeting for videoing an open meeting? She’s back, in the front row, videoing.

Previously we called Cumming someplace worse than here. But look at this:

A city of Cumming audio-visual recording policy sheet was available outside council chambers.

“Handheld audio and/or visual recording devices may be used from any location within the public seating area,” wrote Gerald Blackburn, city administrator. “No audio and/or visual recording device may be set up in the aisles.”

Hm, that’s better than the Lowndes County Commission, whose chair Ashley Paulk famously said,

Continue reading →

ALEC loses 8 more, including Wal-Mart

Even Wal-Mart ditches ALEC! What about the Southern Company?

ALEC Exposed is keeping a list of Corporations Which Have Cut Ties to ALEC, and since the ten we last counted, eight more have jumped the sinking lobbying ship: Blue Cross Blue Shield, YUM! Brands, Procter & Gamble, Kaplan, Scantron, Amazon, Medtronic, and Wal-Mart. That’s right, even Wal-Mart. Jason Easley wrote for Politicus USA yesterday, Wal-Mart Dumps ALEC and Outs Them as Un-American,

In a statement, Wal-Mart representative Maggie Sans wrote, “Previously, we expressed our concerns about ALEC’s decision to weigh in on issues that stray from its core mission ‘to advance the Jeffersonian principles of free markets…We feel that the divide between these activities and our purpose as a business has become too wide. To that end, we are suspending our membership in ALEC.”

Wal-Mart claimed that ALEC was no longer as interested in Jeffersonian free market principles as they were other partisan political issues. Two of those unnamed political issues are most certainly voter ID and stand your ground laws.

When even Wal-Mart complains that ALEC isn’t “free market” enough, Wal-Mart, which Continue reading →

T-SPLOST: stick or baseball bat? @ SGRC 2011-09-19

Corey Hull explained what the state of Georgia has in store for us if we vote down T-SPLOST:

If the voters do not approve the referendum, then all local governments must match their LMIG funds a rate of 30%. And then we have to wait 24 months to start the process over again. And when I say start the process over again, I mean start the process over to enact this tax.

Nolen Cox, Chairman of the Lowndes County Republican Party (LCRP), remarked:

Is that commonly called a stick?

Gretchen Quarterman, Chairman of the Lowndes County Democratic Party (LCDP), observed:

It looks like a baseball bat.

Now I doubt either were speaking in an official capacity, but I know from talking to them that both individuals oppose this tax, and I’m pretty sure most people in their local parties do, too.

Here’s a longer explanation of what happens, including what LMIG is, April 2011 LCDP meeting.

Here’s the video:

T-SPLOST: stick or baseball bat?
T-SPLOST Public Meeting, Southern Georgia Regional Commission (SGRC),
Corey Hull,
Nolen Cox, Gretchen Quarterman,
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 19 September 2011.
Video by Gretchen Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE).

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Coal ash and political spending transparency shareholder resolutions defeated @ SO 2012-05-23

Defeated, but with increased shareholder support this year, two shareholder transparency resolutions have been introduced year after year at Southern Company (SO), one on coal ash and the other on political spending. Here’s video of the political spending resolution being presented at the meeting, and here’s the text of the resolution. This year as usual the SO board opposed both resolutions, and as you can hear SO CEO Thomas A. Fanning announce in this video, both were voted down, with these percentages:

The reasons the board gave for opposing the political spending transparency resolution include that SO claims it is already disclosing everything it needs to. Much of that disclosure started in 2006 due to shareholder and outside pressure to do so. Center for Political Accountability press release 5 April 2006,

McDonald’s (NYSE: MCD) and Southern Co. (NYSE:SO) agreed to disclose and have their directors oversee soft money political contributions made with corporate funds, shareholder activists announced today. The groups, Washington-based Center for Political Accountability (CPA), socially responsible investment firm Trillium Asset Management Corp., and the Central Laborers’ Pension Fund, are part of a nationwide campaign to bring transparency and accountability to company political spending.

In its own 2012 statement of opposition, the SO board noted shareholder pressure is having an effect on transparency:

Continue reading →

Southern Company Rated Worst of Seven Major U.S. Utilities

Southern Company, Number One! In failing grades, that is. Room for improvement in renewable energy.

Green America press release dated 24 May 2011, Southern Company Rated Worst of Seven Major U.S. Utilities: Southern Gets Straight “F”s in Grading of “The Dirty Seven” Utilities, Also Home to Three of 10 Worst-Polluting Power Plants in U.S.,

On the eve of Southern Company (NYSE: SO) holding its annual meeting of stockholders in Pine Mountain, GA., the nonprofit Green America released a report today ranking the major U.S. power producer as “the United States’ most irresponsible utility.”

Titled “Leadership We Can Live Without: The Real Corporate Social Responsibility Report for Southern Company,” the Green America analysis assigns letter grades to seven major U.S. utilities on four fronts: reliance on coal; pollution; reliance on and expansion of nuclear power; and lobbying expenditures. Southern came in dead last with straight “F” grades in all four of the categories.

The PR and the report have a lot more detail, such as this:

Clean Air Task Force data shows that Southern Company’s coal-fired power plants cause 1,224 deaths, 1,710 heart attacks, 20,770 asthma attacks, and 752 cases of chronic bronchitis per year. The total annual cost of all of this damage is over $9 billion.

Hey, that’s more than the original projected cost of the new nukes! Georgians, do you like trading your health for SO’s coal plants and its nuclear boondoggle?

Or would you rather Southern Company and Georgia Power spend less for more electricity by following Austin Energy and Cobb EMC into solar power, plus wind off the coast, for jobs, for energy independence, for health, and for profit?

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Videos @ GLPC 2012-02-27

Here are videos of the entire February meeting of the Greater Lowndes Planning Commission (GLPC). I would post their agenda, but they didn’t publish one.

They elect new officers annually. The previous chairman, Tommy Willis, handed over to the new chairman, Bill Slaughter. The recognized outgoing members John Bailey from Hahira and W.G. Walker from Dasher and former chairman Tommy Willis and introduced Ryan Warren as the new member from Dasher. (Who’s the new member from Hahira?)

See these two items previously posted:

Here’s a video playlist:

Regular Session, Greater Lowndes Planning Commission (GLPC),
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 27 February 2012.
Videos by Gretchen Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE).

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Conservation at Lake Alapaha: REZ-2012-02 Dinkins @ GLPC 2012-02-27

How did conservation zoning get put on part of Robert Dinkins’ property at Lake Alapaha? County records conflict on that point. Was it important to keep that conservation zoning? Staff thought so, but the Planning Commission thought otherwise, and the Lowndes County Commission decided to agree.

The second county case in the 27 February 2012 Greater Lowndes Planning Commission (GLPC) meeting was REZ-2012-02 Dinkins, Southern Shore, 0264 007 A&B, ~97 ac., R-21 & CON to R-A, well/septic. They spent 8 1/2 minutes on it, mainly listening to the requester, Robert Dinkins, wonder how any part of the subject property was zoned for conservation. Staff recommended the conservation zoning remain. GLPC voted to recommend removing it.

REZ-2012-02 got 2:37 12 March 2012 Work Session of the Lowndes County Commission and 6:49 in its 13 March 2012 Regular Session. The County Commission voted to remove the conservation zoning. Here’s a previous post with more detail about that.

Here’s a video playlist of this rezoning item in all three meetings (GLPC, LCC Work Session, and LCC Regular Session):

Conservation at Lake Alapaha: REZ-2012-02 Dinkins
Regular Session, Greater Lowndes Planning Commission (GLPC), Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 27 February 2012.
Work Session, Lowndes County Commission (LCC), Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 12 March 2012.
Regular Session, Lowndes County Commission (LCC), Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 13 March 2012.
Videos by Gretchen Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE).

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Width, houses, and inheritance: REZ-2012-01 Whitehead/Black @ GLPC 2012-02-27

Housing, driveway width and possible change to the ULDC, conveyance to relatives, number of housing units, and other issues: the Planning Commission discussed all these and recommended a rezoning with a few conditions (limit of 2 houses). The County Commission zipped through making a decision.

The first county case in the 27 February 2012 Greater Lowndes Planning Commission (GLPC) meeting was REZ-2012-01 Whitehead/Black, 218-82 & 82A, ~7.1 ac., 2 lots, E-A/R-A to R-A, well/septic. They spent more than 27 minutes (1:09 + 3:54 + 6:02 + 1:21 + 1:40 + 2:56 + 2:56 + 0:59 + 6:16) on REZ-2012-01.

Compare that to the 5 minutes in the 12 March 2012 Work Session of the Lowndes County Commission and approximately 5 minutes in the 13 March 2012 Regular Session as the Lowndes County Commission approved the rezoning with the limitation on only 2 houses.

Time isn’t everything, and staff did visit the site and clarify some points and Commissioners did ask a few questions in the Work Session, but the Planning Commission spent much more time examining this case.

Here’s a video playlist of REZ-2012-02 in all three meetings (GLPC, LCC Work Session, and LCC Regular Session):

Width, houses, and inheritance: REZ-2012-01 Whitehead/Black
Regular Session, Greater Lowndes Planning Commission (GLPC), Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 27 February 2012.
Work Session, Lowndes County Commission (LCC), Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 12 March 2012.
Regular Session, Lowndes County Commission (LCC), Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 13 March 2012.
Videos by Gretchen Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE).

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