Haley Hyatt videoed
yesterday’s Remerton City Council
decision about Strickland Mill.
Citizens pled, unsuccessfully, for it to be saved.
Then the owners made a surprise offer.
Here’s Part 1 of 3:
The final plea
was made by Celine H. Gladwin.
Tag Archives: LAKE
Charter school bait and switch
Proponents of the state-forced charter school constitutional amendment
on the November ballot have a
website
that is full of bait and switch.
Most of it is about what they claim are the benefits of charter schools.
But that’s not what the referendum is about.
Local school boards can already authorize charter schools,
and many of them have.
The referendum would change the Georgia Constitution to authorize
an appointed state board to force charter schools on local elected school
boards that don’t want them,
granting more money per student than in public schools,
with
the difference to be made up from local property and sales taxes.
The most substantive thing I have found on the proponents’ website
says that last is not so, but unconvincingly.
Tony Roberts, President of Georgia Charter Schools Association wrote to All Charter School Leaders and Board Members 7 August 2012, Response to Letter from Herb Garrett of Georgia Superintendents Association,
One final, but important point, local school superintendents and board members were adamantly against any local dollars going to charter schools that were denied by a local school board. The final version of HB 797 was negotiated to ensure that was the case — the language is written right there into the law. So, to recap, they insist on no local money going to state-approved charters, and then get upset about the state money going to charters.
Curiously, he doesn’t cite that purported language. The closest thing I can find in HB 797 is a paragraph I already quoted:
Continue readingRemerton City Council votes today @ RCC 2012-09-10
Tonight the Remerton City Council votes on
the old Strickland Mill at
1853 West Gordon Street,
same item as
discussed 4 June 2012
and
postponed 11 June 2012.
Also, Remerton doesn’t play mysterious about
the Haven.
All that plus signs, water, and alcohol.
I will be there for about half an hour, after which I have to go video something else. Could someone else video the rest of tonight’s Remerton City Council meeting?
Here’s
the agenda,
which for some reason (I’m guessing City Clerk Rachel Tate not being available)
is a scan instead of a text-extractable PDF.
I’ve transcribed it below this time.
Continue readingCITY OF REMERTON
REGULAR SESSION AGENDA
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 10, 2012
COUNCIL CHAMBERS
5:30 PM
Public schools to be treated less favorably than state-dictated charter schools?
Do you want to pay more local taxes for state-dictated and state-run
charter schools?
In
HB 797,
one of the state laws we’re being asked to ratify with the charter school referendum
on the ballot in November,
in addition to the magic accounting rules that would
grant charter schools much more money per student than public schools,
it would create a state-wide charter school board that will take away
all oversight from the local school board for any charter schools the
state imposes on any locality.
Yet it does not provide additional state funding for the extra
money per student for charter schools, and it does
explicitly address assessed valuation of local taxes.
The state takes all control over local chartered schools from the local school board in section 2A(7), last paragraph:
The local board shall not be responsible for the fiscal management, accounting, or oversight of the state chartered special school.
Yet the state provides no additional funding for the additional money per student for charter schools:
2A(5) No deduction shall be made to any state funding which a local school system is otherwise authorized to receive pursuant to this chapter as a direct result or consequence of the enrollment in a state charter school of a specific student or students who reside in the geographical area of the local school system.
(6) Funding for state chartered special schools pursuant to this subsection shall be subject to appropriations by the General Assembly and such schools shall be treated consistently with all other public schools in this state, pursuant to the respective statutory funding formulas and grants.
The bill also inserts each of those paragraphs again elsewhere, in case the point wasn’t clear enough.
So where is the extra money to come from? Here’s a hint:
Continue readingOpen Records Officer at Lowndes County Commission @ LCC 2012-09-10
Apparently the Lowndes County Commission has noticed the
new provisions of the Georgia Open Records and Open Meetings laws
that
VLCIA’s lawyer explained to the Industrial Authority back in May,
seeing these two items on the agenda for Monday morning and Tuesday evening:
5.a. Adopt Resolution Appointing an Open Records Officer
5.b. Resolution Regarding Review & Approval of Minutes of Executive Sessions
Plus infrastructure for two subdivsisions, one of them the famous Glen Laurel, several well/septic rezonings, approval of USGS Funding Agreement for HWY 122 Stream Gauge (one of the four that let us know about river flooding in Lowndes County less than a month ago), a beer license, and approval of the changes to the ULDC that were discussed in the recent Planning Commission meeting, in the public hearing the public didn’t know about. And more.
Here’s
the agenda.
LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERSContinue reading
PROPOSED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 10, 2012, 8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 2012, 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor
Germany Added 543 MW of Solar Power Capacity in July
While we in Georgia were still pouring money down that nuclear pit near the Savannah River, Germany has been getting on with real renewable energy. We could have deployed almost that much solar power with just the cost overruns so far at Plant Vogtle.
Nicholas Brown wrote for Clean Technica 8 September 2012, Germany Added 543 MW of Solar Power Capacity in July,
According to Matt McDermott of Treehugger: “[In] the first half of 2012 Germany has installed just over 4.37 gigawatts of grid-tied solar power. Remarkably just about 1.8 GW of that happened in June alone (perhaps even more remarkable, this isn’t even a record amount for one month in Germany).”
The amount of solar power capacity added in June was much more than July’s, but July’s was still impressive. July’s addition brings Germany’s total installed capacity for the first half of 2012 to 4,900 MW (4.9 GW).
This impressive solar installation rate had a lot to do with Germany’s famous Feed-in Tariffs (FIT), but it also had a lot to do with Moore’s Law, illustrated by that graph of cost per kilowatt rapidly going down.
543 MW?
That’s more than the 330 MW of solar
the $913 million cost overrun at Plant Vogtle in the
first half of 2012 could have bought.
1800 MW in June and 543 MW in July?
That’s 2343 MW, which is more than the entire rated 2200 MW output of Plant Vogtle 3 and 4 put together, if they ever get built.
Sure, the sun doesn’t shine all the time, but in the years until the nukes ever
get built (if ever), how much solar could we deploy at the rate of one Vogtle unit equivalent a month?
Hey, maybe we should cancel Plant Vogtle and deploy solar instead! Maybe Georgia Power and Southern Company will realize their big bet has already gone bad. Or maybe we should elect some Public Service Commissioners and legislators who will get them to realize it.
-jsq
Industrial Authority goes solar, broadband, and conversational!
The Industrial Authority apparently listened to its focus groups, and discovered that broadband and solar energy are important to attract industry. Andrea Schruijer even recommends conversation, which has been sorely lacking in recent years. Congratulations, Industrial Authority!
Jason Schaefer wrote for the VDT today, Authority analyzes Valdosta business: Broadband, solar power, professional services targeted for growth,
The Authority also plans to work toward the availability of more broadband Internet service and solar power in Valdosta and surrounding communities. These amenities would help support local industries as well as draw new ones to the greater Valdosta area for the creation of new jobs.
That’s a good start. Although it’s not clear from the writeup that VLCIA quite got it about Internet access.
As part of presenting Valdosta as an attractive package for
prospective industries, the Authority attempts to ready the land set aside for development before beginning the recruitment process. This means investing in infrastructure, including broadband internet.
“It’s not that we don’t have broadband,” Schruijer said. “What we’re looking at is the technology behind the broadband. We have it in certain areas, but in order for us to grow some of these core targets, such as professional services, we need that infrastructure.”
Well, actually, no,
we don’t have broadband.
6Mbps is the fastest most people can get around here,
and 30Mbps is the slowest you can even buy in many countries.
Plus, it’s not just fast Internet to industrial sites that’s needed:
it’s fast Internet access everywhere knowledge-based employees
may want to live.
But they’re on the right track:
Because the Authority can’t “buy” industries into coming to Valdosta—though it can offer tax abatements—it is necessary to make sure that new businesses have what they will need before ground is even broken, Schruijer said. To this effect, the Authority will “stimulate the conversation” to actively attract more broadband companies to the area.
A conversation! Now there’s something we’ve been needing around here. And it’s a refreshing change from only a year ago when all we heard was
“Debate is not allowed.”
Maybe the Industrial Authority will be the organization that will show the rest of us how to hold civil discussions about things that affect all of us!
The VDT’s writeup skips quickly over another big change:
Continue readingVZ 4G vs. AT&T DSL, Lowndes County, Georgia, 2012-09-08
It turns out you can’t yet buy Verizon’s HomeFusion Broadband 4G wireless Internet service
The MiFi I’ve got is a slightly older model of the one pictured above, because for years
AT&T DSL |
|---|
Verizon 4G |
The tables show results using SpeakEasy Speedtest a few minutes ago.
| Megabytes/sec | Megabits/sec | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| down | up | down | up | |
| AT&T DSL | 2.66Mbps | 0.31Mbps | 322KB/sec | 38KB/sec |
| Verizon 4G | 10.88Mbps | 7.14Mbps | 1360KB/sec | 893KB/sec |
Verizon’s 4G LTE is way faster, as in Continue reading
Duke Dump ALEC @ DNC 2012-09-05
Leaving another event, I saw this on the street in Charlotte.
Whit Jones said they’d just had a demonstration demanding Duke Energy dump ALEC.
Also that he had encountered Duke CEO Jim Rogers and asked him when
Duke would dump ALEC.
Rogers was uncommittal.
Here’s
Jones’ blogged account of that encounter:
In short, I asked Duke’s CEO Jim Rogers if he would listen
to the over 100,000 people who are calling on him to have Duke Dump ALEC and stop funding voter repression. He responded that “he’d be listening,” and when I pressed him for a commitment to drop ALEC he said “I’m not going to give you [a commitment right now] but you can trust that I’m paying attention to what you’re saying, and you’ll know in due time.”
Here’s video of the event.
Continue readingNRC rejects nuke permit for EDF in Maryland
French nuclear operator Électricité de France (EDF)
was denied a license last week for the proposed Calvert Cliffs
nuclear reactor in Maryland, because the
Atomic Energy Act of 1954 prohibits majority foreign ownership
of nuclear plants.
EDF now has 60 days to find a U.S. partner, or give up the project.
Who could the possible suitors be?
Hint: think southeast.
The handwriting was on the wall two years ago when Constellation Energy pulled out of the project. Jim Polson and Alan Katz wrote for Bloomberg 10 October 2010, Constellation Drops Nuclear Plant, Denting EDF’s U.S. Plans,
Constellation Energy Group Inc. pulled out of negotiations on a $7.5
billion loan guarantee to build a nuclear reactor in Maryland with Electricite de France SA, potentially damaging the French utility’s U.S. expansion plans and the companies’ partnership.
The cost of the U.S. government loan guarantee that the companies’ joint venture, UniStar Nuclear Energy, would need to build the Calvert Cliffs 3 reactor is too high and creates too much risk for Constellation, the Baltimore-based utility said in a statement yesterday. The statement said the next step is up to EDF. Enlarge image U.S. Deputy Energy Secretary Daniel Poneman
In a letter Oct. 8 to Daniel Poneman, deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Energy, Constellation said it received a government estimate that the venture would have to pay about $880 million to the U.S. Treasury for the loan guarantee, “dramatically out of line with both our own independent assessments and of what the figure should reasonably be.”
Constellation’s decision may make it more likely that the U.S. utility will exercise a put option forcing EDF to buy as much as $2 billion of Constellation’s non-nuclear power plants, said Ingo Becker, head of utilities sector research at Kepler Capital Markets.
“EDF very clearly said if they exercise the put, this thing is over,” Becker said. “Constellation may have just turned around the calendar and pulled out of the new build before exercising the put, anticipating EDF’s reaction.”
In a letter Oct. 8 to Daniel Poneman, deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Energy, Constellation said it received a government estimate that the venture would have to pay about $880 million to the U.S. Treasury for the loan guarantee, “dramatically out of line with both our own independent assessments and of what the figure should reasonably be.”
Meanwhile, Southern Company is still trying to reduce what it has to pay for its $8.3 billion federal loan guarantee.
Back in Maryland, the news got worse for the nuke last year. EDF asked for the state’s help, but didn’t get the answer it wanted. Scott Dance wrote for Baltimore Business Journal 16 December 2011, EDF: Constellation-Exelon settlement hurts Maryland nuclear industry,
Continue reading