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If you follow this blog, you know there are many local issues, most having to do with transparency. And that’s the big issue: lots of small groups going at individual issues, and not getting very far. Let’s talk about that.
-jsq
Continue readingLOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
PROPOSED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, JULY 11, 2011, 8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, JULY 12, 2011, 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor
VDT is not quite right when it says Only city can stop biomass. The Lowndes County Commission could do it.
According to Ashley Paulk, a few months ago 
VLCIA approached the Lowndes County government, asking them to ask VLCIA not to extend Sterling Planet’s contract for the biomass plant. Chairman Paulk refused to accept that hot potato and instead laudably told the community what was going on. Yet there was a bit of a good idea in what VLCIA was asking. Lowndes County could pass an ordinance such as VDT is suggesting banning the incineration of human feces.
Remember, Lowndes County rezoned the land for the plant. It’s time to review that rezoning to see if in light of new information it should be rescinded. According to the VDT, Wiregrass Power LLC supplied a fake timeline, so it wuld not be interesting to know what else they said wasn’t true?
For that matter, wasn’t the rezoning to build a certain biomass plant according to a certain plan which has no expired? Maybe the rezoning is already null and void and the Commission just needs to declare it so.
Short of that, the Lowndes County Commission could demand transparency from VLCIA:
Continue readingVDT editorial yesterday: after the
Compelled? Give me a break! VLCIA has an attorney, and one of its board members is an attorney. If they can’t find a way to break a land purchase contract because conditions have changed, they need new legal counsel.In a recent Valdosta council meeting, longtime councilman Sonny Vickers asked if there was any way to put the biomass issue to rest once and for all. The good news, Councilman Vickers, is that there is and it’s all in the city’s hands.
The Industrial Authority signed an agreement with Wiregrass Power LLC which allows the company to purchase the land from the Authority and proceed with the project on its own. Although the Authority hasn’t yet voted on the issue, it appears that they don’t have a choice and may be compelled to honor the agreement.
Why didn’t they discuss that in their yet another special called meeting Thursday morning, in which they apparently discussed that offer from Sterling Planet to buy the proposed biomass plant site?
VDT continued:
And once the land is purchased, as long as the company complies with existing zoning laws, there is not a way to prevent the plant from being built.Continue readingOh, but there is.
The industrial authority’s spending of money seems to have no end. They don’t seem to budget appropriately or have a long range plan for the land they have acquired. Yet another industrial park when the Hahira park is still without any leasers.This looks like gambling with my tax dollars. I don’t gamble with my own money for the reason that I am likely to loose. The board & staff feel no responsibility to the taxpayers. so, it is clear that they would ignore our demand for a no biomass clause and support of clean air for our families.
-Karen Noll
Several hundred people, mostly labor union members, rallied Saturday at the Georgia Capitol against the state’s new law targeting illegal immigrants. It was the latest in a string of actions by opponents to protest the law.The Washington Examiner included a byline, by Kate Brumback, and an AP photo:The Rev. Al Sharpton told the crowd the law violates civil and human rights and will lead to racial profiling of U.S. citizens and others who are in the country legally.
“We’re going to stop it here before it goes any further to other communities,” the New York-based minister and civil rights activist said. “We cannot have a nation where, based on your language or your race, determines your rights. Your rights must be determined by the fact that we’re all equal.”
Weekly rallies; an interesting development on a subject that unites urban union members and rural farmers.Ben Speight, a local Teamsters organizer, echoed those sentiments and said labor groups must get involved.
“Let’s get in the way of hate. Let’s build a social movement,” he said, to loud cheers. “Labor cannot be isolated. We’ve got to reach out to the community and stand up against hate.”
-jsq
Marian Wright Edelman wrote 13 December 2010, Strength to Love: A Challenge to the Private Prison Industry:
Continue readingA few months ago a group of earnest and determined stockholders traveled together by bus from Washington, D.C., to Nashville, Tennessee, to attend a shareholders’ meeting for the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), the largest private prison company in the country. The group included ex-offenders who now each hold one share of stock in the same prison company that once held them captive, and they attended the meeting in the hopes of sharing their perspective on how the privatized prison industry can better serve society by rehabilitating inmates, rather than just serving its own profits by perpetuating the prison cycle.
The group, part of Washington, D.C.’s Church of the Saviour, is named Strength to Love, after the title of one of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s sermon collections. Members explain their mission this way:
Sam Allen asked in various ways:
“What about the children?”He made it clear he doesn’t think school consolidation will help the children, and it will definitely hurt current Valdosta teachers and staff, so he says don’t do it.
Continuing the FVCS press conference, Sam Allen asked some good questions,
“If the school system was good enough for them, why isn’t it good enough for us?”and
“If there’s not going to be any change, why are we doing it?”
Here’s Part 1 of 9: Continue reading
I remember when Lowndes County consolidated two high schools into one, and the rationale was cost saving and more resources for science classes. What it was really about was football. And it worked: Lowndes High School now often wins the state championship, and Valdosta hasn’t in a decade. While education lags behind.
I think the Lowndes County Board of Education is doing the right Continue reading