Category Archives: Transportation

Golf club lift station on agenda @ LCC 2014-02-24



Lowndes County’s sewer lift station at a subdivision with a private golf club

apparently needs replacement.
This is the subdivision for which the

Nelson Hill Wells were drilled as possible replacements.
And an abandonment

of some unspecified unopened right of way off of US 41 South.
Plus a presentation

by Industrial Authority Executive Director Andrea Schruijer.

Here’s the agenda:

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS

PROPOSED AGENDA

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

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

327 N. Ashley Street — 2nd Floor

Continue reading →

Weather report by Ashley Tye, Emergency Management Director @ LCC 2014-01-28



Lowndes County’s

Emergency Management Director
reported yesterday on projected icy roads today.

Here’s

the video:



Weather report by Ashley Tye, Emergency Management Director

Regular Session, Lowndes County Commission (LCC),

Video by Gretchen Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE),

Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 28 January 2014.

All the local schools are closed, public and private, K-12 and college,
so the best thing to to is to stay home.

Commissioner John Page said a constituent had just asked him
if Lowndes County owned any snow plows.
Answer: no, but the county can get access to them if needed.

County Clerk Paige Dukes enumerated ways she had tried to get the word out,
including

this information on the county’s front web page,
which will probably disappear without trace in a day or so,
so I’ve copied it below. Continue reading →

Flood mapping and modeling @ VCC 2014-01-09

The Valdosta City Council votes Thursday on
a contract for flood mapping
related to the

series of secretive Army Corps of Engineers meetings,


plus bids for water and sewer and smoke testing sewers.
They’re also swearing in winners of the recent
election and electing a mayor pro-tem (probably the same one),
along with
a change to the
Entertainment Ordinance
and
public hearings to close an alley
and
abandon part of a street,
and the usual

City Manager’s Report,

Council Comments,
and

Citizens to be Heard.



No detail in the city’s agenda about the flood mapping, but
at the Lowndes County Commission

Work Session 11 November 2013
Emergency Services Director Ashley Tye said
the current agreement wouldn’t obligate any payment, merely to reserve the right to contract at a later date if that seemed to be in the county’s best interests,
and at the

Regular Session 12 November 2013

the county approved getting

LIDAR
data from

NOAA Coastal Services Center.
Neither the county nor the city has published this agreement.

Here’s

the agenda: 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 →

Green bonds for rooftop solar?

What if the Industrial Authority used its bond-issuing power
to finance rooftop solar?
And what if it combined that with utility-scale solar projects
on its own industrial park lands, and for example at the airport,
or at the new Withlacoochee Wastewater Treatment Plant?

Here’s the idea, in a report by
Citi GPS,

Energy Darwinism: The Evolution of the Energy Industry,
October 2013,
pages 48-49,



It is not just the technology that is evolving in the solar
industry; the financing of solar projects, both residential and
utility-scale is evolving quickly. The most notable development here
has been in the form of solar leasing, whereby the rooftop panels
are owned by a third party who effectively leases the rooftop from
the home/factory/office owner, the latter receiving payment normally
through a reduction in electricity bills paid for by the lessee.
This provides the benefits of cheaper and cleaner solar electricity
to the homeowner, whilst negating the need for the significant
initial capital outlay. The panel owner or lessee earns their return
via incentive mechanisms such as the U.S. Investment Tax Credit, and
via the sale of the electricity back to the local utility. This
financing mechanism has proved particularly successful in the U.S.
and is gaining traction in the UK, with companies in other countries
looking to follow suit.

This is what

Southern Company CEO Tom Fanning suggested back in May that SO might do.
But we don’t have to wait on Southern Company or Georgia Power.

At the utility scale level, the emergence of innovative financing
vehicles such as green bonds Continue reading →

Inexpensive electric cars



Plug one into solar panels on your roof, and you’ve got a solar powered car.

Zachary Shahan wrote for evcentral.org today,

11 Electric Cars Priced Lower than the Average New Car,
including a list of November prices starting less than $16,000 and
no more than $30,000:

  1. Nissan Leaf – $21,300
  2. Chevy Volt – $26,685
  3. Toyota Prius Plug-in Hybrid – $27,490
  4. Ford C-Max Energi – $28,943
  5. smart electric drive – $12,490
  6. Ford Focus Electric – $27,700
  7. Chevy Spark EV – $19,995
  8. Mitsubishi i – $15,495
  9. Fiat 500e – $24,300
  10. Wheego Whip — $18,995
  11. Wheego LiFe — $25,495

-jsq

Check your Pipeline, Dollar General, 3 special tax lighting districts, and mosquitos @ LCC 2013-11-12



Sabal Trail pipeline presentation
is

December 9th like
the front page of the VDT said.
The online agenda

is still incorrect a month later
about

Green Lane
which is still listed as “For consideration” when it should be listed
as a Public Hearing.
Alapaha Water Treatment Plant
was voted on this time,
as was mysteriously appearing
“Consideration of Back Pay for 911 Employees”.

Like the

the Planning Commission,
they tabled
Nottinghill.
With much less discussion than the

Planning Commission,
they approved
yet another Dollar General.
Plus
three decorative special tax lighting districts,
mosquito control,
pump replacement, the annual

MIDS bus service
contract,
a

beer license,
something about

NOAA, and an agreement with the Lowndes County
Board of Elections
for paying employees.

Here’s

the agenda.
See also the

videos of the previous morning’s Work Session.

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS

AMENDED AGENDA

WORK SESSION, MONDAY, NOVEMBER 11, 2013, 8:30 a.m.

REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 2013, 5:30 p.m.

327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor

Continue reading →

Check our work, esp. about the pipeline –Gretchen Quarterman @ LCC 2013-11-12



Fan of local government Gretchen suggested it
“check our work” before whipsawing citizens in for items
that didn’t happen or failing to schedule a public hearing
even after the Chairman asked for it, plus failing do deliver
what was promised in open records requests,
at the

12 November 2013 Lowndes County Commission Regular Session.
Today she’s checking their work at
their secretive Retreat Work Session.

At the Regular Session she noted that the

Sabal Trail item
that was misscheduled for the previous morning
caused several citizens to take off work to come
in for something that didn’t happen.
(You can find out more about that pipeline
Saturday morning at 10AM at the
SpectraBusters Informational Meeting.

She mentioned the

Green Lane item that the Chairman had asked Continue reading →

No Sabal Trail, Dollar General, 3 special tax lighting districts, and mosquitos @ LCC 2013-11-11



“We apologize for any inconvenience.”

No Sabal Trail pipeline presentation this time;
yes it really is December 9th like
the front page of the VDT said.
So the online agenda was incorrect, and

it’s still incorrect
about

Green Lane
which is still listed as “For consideration” when it should be listed
as a Public Hearing.
And another item was listed so obscurely on the
agenda that a Commissioner had to ask “exactly where is this?”
A report turned into an agenda item for the
Alapaha Water Treatment Plant,
and an item for
“Consideration of Back Pay for 911 Employees”
has appeared on

the amended agenda with no public discussion.
How are citizens to know what their elected officials are going to
vote on tonight at 5:30 PM if the agenda changes all the time
yet is still incorrect?

Plus they could take up Nottinghill even though

the Planning Commission recommended tabling,
there’s yet another Dollar General proposed
(see

Planning Commission video,
three decorative special tax lighting districts,
mosquito control, pump replacement, the annual MIDS bus service
contract, a beer license,
the return of Green Lane (why isn’t that one

a pubic hearing as promised last time?)
something about NOAA, and an agreement with the Lowndes County
Board of Elections:
will they stop

changing the precincts every year?

Here’s

the agenda.

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS

AMENDED AGENDA

WORK SESSION, MONDAY, NOVEMBER 11, 2013, 8:30 a.m.

REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 2013, 5:30 p.m.

327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor

Continue reading →

Sabal Trail, Dollar General, 3 special tax lighting districts, and mosquitos @ LCC 2013-11-11



Nevermind what the front page of the VDT said
about December 9th:
the Sabal Trail pipeline presentation is on the agenda for Monday morning, 8:30 AM.
Or maybe Tuesday evening, 5:30 PM; it doesn’t say, but if they’re sticking
to at least the Work Session part of the request from Demarcus Marshall,
it’s tomorrow morning.

Plus they could take up Nottinghill even though

the Planning Commission recommended tabling,
there’s yet another Dollar General proposed
(see

Planning Commission video,
three decorative special tax lighting districts,
mosquito control, pump replacement, the annual MIDS bus service
contract, a beer license,
the return of Green Lane (why isn’t that one

a pubic hearing as promised last time?)
something about NOAA, and an agreement with the Lowndes County
Board of Elections:
will they stop

changing the precincts every year?

Here’s
the agenda.

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS

AMENDED AGENDA

WORK SESSION, MONDAY, NOVEMBER 11, 2013, 8:30 a.m.

REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 2013, 5:30 p.m.

327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor

Continue reading →