Tag Archives: Law

Don’t do this to private enterprise —Cary Scarborough @ LCC 2012-11-13



Cary Scarborough of

Deep South Sanitation

told the Commission he and his wife and son and daughters
started a business, but he
“didn’t think it would come down to what we’ve seen here lately.”
He spoke at Tuesday’s

Lowndes County Commission Regular Session.

I understand … that the county has a responsibility for the solid waste….
I understand we have these big corporations, Advanced Disposal,
Veolia.
I know some of these people at Veolia, good people; they’ve got a good company,
and they pick up several thousand cans every day.
What we do offer the citizens here… we offer just a personal service.
I know a lot of these people first hand….

He told a story about a customer whose husband lost his job.
He stopped billing until the man got another job.

Cary Scarborough’s summation:

Don’t do this to private enterprise, to an individual.
If it’s done to me, it will get easier later down the road
to do it to someone else.

Yes, why is the county taking customers away from a local business
and giving them to a company that isn’t even based here?

County Manager Joe Pritchard,

once again,

was mostly not paying attention.

Here’s

the video:

Continue reading

Keep waste sites open and reprioritize SPLOST —William Geyer @ LCC 2012-11-13



William Geyer expressed two widespread opinions,
keep the solid waste disposal sites open, and reprioritize SPLOST,
when he spoke at Tuesday’s

Lowndes County Commission Regular Session.

County Manager Joe Pritchard, the driving force behind the waste disposal decision,
still wasn’t listening.

Keep the solid waste disposal sites open

Saying he was William Geyer of 5474 Union Road, Hahira,
he asked the Commission to
reconsider their solid waste plan, and to keep the waste disposal sites open.

There’s people out there that can’t afford
what y’all are offering.
And with a budget as large as we got, I know there’s some way
to keep them open.
Not only that, Florida has them, and they don’t even man them.
I talk to a lot of people out there,
they don’t come here,
but I wish you really would reconsider,
because it is a plus for this county,
the elderly,
a lot of people here who are struggling, who can’t afford it.
I’m not saying I can’t; I can afford it,
but there’s a lot of people here who can’t afford it.

Reprioritize SPLOST

Geyer noted SPLOST was supposed to be for paving roads, but
lots of roads hadn’t gotten paved.

At that first SPLOST meeting, it was around 1984 or 5
they did my road, Union Road.
What happened to the rest of the roads that are dirt?
We’ve somehow lost our priorities.
We want a new library, we want a new this or that.
What about these people who live on these dirt roads
that were promised they’d be paved.
County Manager, how many miles of dirt roads do we have in this county?



County Manager Joe Pritchard obviously wasn’t listening,
“Pardon me?” he said, after the Chairman prodded him.
He didn’t know, either; he motioned

Continue reading

Video playlist @ LCC 2012-11-12



The Lowndes County Commission invited a developer to speak
about his proposed rezoning at a Work Session
without inviting any opposition to speak.
Plus another rezoning, a proposed solid waste ordinance with exclusive franchise
agreement, and proposed appointments to five boards and authorities.
And at the end an animal event report.

Here’s

a video playlist:


Video playlist

Work Session, Lowndes County Commission (LCC),

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

Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 12 November 2012.

Here’s

the agenda
again,
this time with links to the videos plus a few notes.

Continue reading

Appointments to five boards, two rezonings, and a solid waste ordinance @ LCC 2012-11-12

Monday morning the Lowndes County Commission considers and


Tuesday evening votes on members of five appointed boards.
Who are the candidates?
The agenda doesn’t say.
The two rezonings are the same ones

the Planning Commission recently considered.

Presumably the solid waste ordinance has something to do with

the recent privatization decision.

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS

PROPOSED AGENDA

WORK SESSION, MONDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 2012, 8:30 a.m.

REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 2012, 5:30 p.m.

327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor

Continue reading

Challengers made statehouse incumbents work in south Georgia



Hardly-funded insurgents led by Haley Shank put a scare into turncoat south Georgia statehouse
incumbents.
What would happen with well-funded candidates?

As we’ve already seen,

in new district 177 Dexter Sharper (D)

won 2 to 1 over opponent J. Glenn Gregory (R).
(All election data in this post is from
GA Secretary of State.)

Conversely, Jason Shaw (R-176) ran unopposed, perhaps because
he is the least offensive of the incumbents (he voted
against HB 1162
that put

the Atlanta-power-grab “charter school” amendment
on the ballot,
although

he did vote for HB 797

that will funnel more of your local tax dollars to charter schools
imposed by Atlanta even if your school board doesn’t want them).

Other south Georgia statehouse incumbents, all Republicans, had
challengers, all Democrats.
All the challengers opposed Amendment 1.
Haley Shank did best, in District 173 against Darlene K. Taylor,
8,324 to 12,048 (40.86% to 59.14%).

Next was

Continue reading

Congratulations Dexter Sharper, Demarcus Marshall, Chris Prine, and Justin Cabral!



Congratulations to Valdosta’s new state rep for District 177
Dexter Sharper who won by 67% to 33% over opponent Glenn Gregory,
who fought a spirited and clean campaign.
I look forward to Representative Sharper

meeting with the governor

and working for our community without compromise under the gold dome in Atlanta.

I’ll come back to the other statehouse races in a separate post.
Ditto the other statewide races.
Meanwhile, congratulations to some local winners below.



Congratulations new Lowndes County Commissioner for District 4
Demarcus Marshall, winning 64.91% to 35.09%
after spirited debate and much agreement
with opponent John Gates.
I look forward to Commissioner Marshall

grappling with education, jobs, tourism, and personnel

down at the county palace.




Congratulations on re-election,
Lowndes County Sheriff Chris Prine!
Challenger J.D. Yeager fought a good fight, but the voters said
63.53% to 36.47% they did not
want to go back to the previous administration.
I look forward to Sheriff Prine continuing to protect the safety of
all the citizens of Lowndes County, including those in the cities.



Congratulations Solicitor General Justin Cabral on retaining your post
51.56% to 48.44%!
Very honorable mention to challenger Jason Cain,
who canvassed himself pretty close to winning.

Congratulations Joyce Evans

Continue reading

Most corrupt state sells public education to Waltons


Amendment 1 results

And it wasn’t even close:

2,152,091 to 1,526,959 (58.50% to 41.50%).

Lowndes County went for the Atlanta-power-grab “charter school” amendment
18,606 to 17,619 (51.36% to 48.64%).
The voters of Georgia just sold their children’s educational
birthright for a mess of slick brochures.


Amendment 2 results

The

other ALEC amendment, on multi-year contracts,

passed by

an even wider margin:

2,241,621 to 1,275,809 (63.73% to 36.27%).
Lowndes went for it 20,205 to 14,414 (58.36% to 41.64%).

Apparently Georgia voters will vote for any old thing that’s
submitted to them as a constitutional amendment.


Esau sells his birthright for a mess of pottage

Congratulations, ALEC and Wal-Mart!
You’ve demonstrated money talks and

slick brochures sell.

This was even better for you than

ALEC’s so-called anti-immigration law
which the legislature passed
and

that actually devastates Georgia agriculture
for
the profit of private prison company CCA.
This time you got the people of Georgia to vote directly against
their own best interests to the benefit of school privatizing
corporations in Virginia and Michigan!

Boo Georgia voters.
You’ve just given

the most corrupt legislature in the country

the ability

to commit you the taxpayers to contracts for decades.

And you’ve just traded your children’s educational birthright
for a mess of slick paper.

-jsq

Precincts on Election Day 2012 in Lowndes County, Georgia


Naylor

There’s an election going on!
Here are some pictures of precincts around Lowndes County today.
I’ve seen no lines, and everything seems to be flowing smoothly.
Except there are multiple reports that when people call the Board of Elections
to ask where they vote they’re getting a “this number disconnected” message.
Apparently there are ten phone lines down there but only three people
answering them, and the phone is not rolling over properly.
Given all the recent changes in precincts, this is a problem.


Ready for you to vote at Pine Grove


Sara Crow voted at Pine Grove (Clerk of Court, Lowndes County)

Around 1PM Sara Crow said she heard at Pine Grove that about 900 people had
already voted there today.


Rainwater

I’m not blogging much today because I’m out helping

Gretchen for Lowndes County Commission Chair.

If you’ve got something interesting,

send it in
;
I’m checking in frequently.

Here’s
a slideshow:


Everyone Matters, so go vote!

Pictures by John S. Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE),

Lowndes County, Georgia, 6 November 2012.


Everyone Matters, so go vote!

Everyone matters, so go vote!

-jsq

Most Early Voting Ever in Lowndes County, Georgia


Backed up onto the street

More people have voted early in Lowndes County than ever before,
with cars often backed up onto the street waiting to get into
the Board of Elections.

Eames Yates wrote for WCTV Friday,

Record Breaking Number of Early Voters in Lowndes County
,

More people have now voted early in Lowndes County than any time in
history. Sherrie Luther was voter 22,00[0]…

People waiting to vote

making her ballot the one
that broke the previous record set four years ago.

In the 2008 presidential election, there were 45 days of early
voting in Lowndes County. In this year’s election there were just 16
days. Nevertheless the record was broken.

Sherrie was rewarded

Continue reading

Fair bidding practices and community public input —Barbara Stratton

Received today on

County trash plan already failing
. -jsq

Yet another example of government contracting not following the fair
bidding practices or allowing community public input. Even if you
attend government meetings no bid information is made public & even
if bids are referred to the amounts are always in those elusive
"packets before you" that only the members have access to.

In a recent Hahira City Council meeting the city attorney ruled that
the city council did not have to put out the garbage service for
bids & that it did not even have to have a contract. As of December
31, 2012 the city collection services will not be under contract at
all so who knows what the rates may be or if a lower bid would have
saved citizens money?


Barbara Stratton

I've been involved in government contracting for years & I can tell
you that the recent path government bodies have endorsed is leading
further & further away from the bidding procedures that were enacted
to prevent good old boy politics & kick backs & is opening the door
wide for public/private partnerships that never answer to the
citizens.

The state attorney general's office which should regulate bidding
practices will not interfere with county or municipal issues unless
a citizen is willing to pay $500 to a lawyer to present the case to
them. They justify this as catering to "home rule" but in actuality
they are turning a blind eye because it is within their jurisdiction
to rule on non-adherence to proper bidding practices.

If the state believes in "home rule" why is Governor Deal pushing a
state charter school board amendment that will take away local rule?
The state seems to pick & choose its standards.

-Barbara Stratton

-jsq