Too ambitious, technology untried, like Katrina and the BP oil spill: that’s Southern Company’s Kemper Coal plant, according to a Mississippi Public Service Commissioner.
Geoff Pender wrote for ClarionLedger.com yesterday, PSC member slams Miss. Power,
“This is the greatest transfer of wealth from customers to a monopoly in the history of the state of Mississippi,” [Brandon] Presley said. “Where are all these so-called conservatives on that?”
Maybe Mississippi, like Georgia, Continue reading
Update 7:45 PM 4 June 2013: 8:30 AM Wednesday 5 June 2013.
Rumor has it that the Lowndes County Commission has already had one budget
meeting and is going to have a meeting tomorrow about the
GA Supreme Court LOST decision.
Yet there’s nothing on
the Commission’s public calendar
and under Special Events
their website says
There are no events at this timeHow is meeting where the people don’t know doing people’s business?
-jsq
Local Lowndes County and city officials are awaiting breathlessly the news from Atlanta today about new rules on LOST negotiations. Currently, negotiators have to choose one of the positions submitted by the contending parties. The GA Supreme Court may decide to let negotiators pick some other division of LOST funds. Valdosta Mayor John Gayle cancelled a meeting here yesterday so he could be in Atlanta for this court decision. Lowndes County Commissioners are rumored to be planning a meeting tomorrow morning after the decision.
Fox 31 posted 30 May 3012,
Supreme Court of Georgia to hear Turner County LOST case
There’s much more detail in that article. Also, Tim Omarzu wrote for timesfreepress.com 9 May 2013, Georgia top court to consider LOST negotiations.On June 4th, the Georgia Supreme Court will hear the case between Turner County and three cities over the distribution of Local Option Sales Taxes. Below is the entirety of the facts in the case as released by the court:
In this dispute between the governments of Turner County and three cities over how Local Option Sales Tax (LOST) proceeds should be distributed, the county is appealing a superior court ruling which picked the cities’ plan for distribution over the county’s.
-jsq
I could see our Commissioners using this reasoning. -gretchen
Erica Byfield reported for WSBTV yesterday, DeKalb commissioners declare most of county a slum,
What’s this urban redevelopment zone about? Tax breaks for businesses that produce new jobs, leaving taxes to be paid mostly by… Continue reading
Cancelling a nuke is what’s really in the best interests of utility customers: Southern Company and Georgia Power take note. MidAmerican Energy just added another to the long list of nukes permanently closed or not to be built. Time to add Plant Vogtle to that list.
In the DesMoinesRegister.com yesterday,
MidAmerican decides against Iowa nuclear plant:
MidAmerican Energy says design plan isn’t approved; environmentalists celebrate
MidAmerican Energy has scrapped plans for Iowa’s second nuclear plant and will refund $8.8 million ratepayers paid for a now-finished feasibility study, utility officials said Monday.
The utility has decided against building any major power plant. That’s because there is no approved design for the modular nuclear plant it envisioned, and there are too many questions about limits on carbon emissions from a natural gas plant, the company said.
“We opted for what was in the best interest of our customers,” MidAmerican vice president for regulatory affairs Dean Crist told The Des Moines Register.
The decision ends, Continue reading
The facts don’t match County Chairman Bill Slaughter’s assertion
(according to the VDT Thursday):
That decision was made in a good-faith effort to find the lowest possible rate for garbage service for the citizens of Lowndes County, he said Tuesday.
Commissioner Richard Raines moved and the Commission voted to approve 9 October 2012 Proposal D and awarded it to the lowest bidder for that specific proposal, which was Veolia. But that wasn’t the lowest-priced proposal, according to the sheet of choices they were using in that meeting:
Continue readingFormer Chairman Ashley Paulk may say he didn’t tell Cory Scarborough of Deep South Sanitation that any contract by the county for curbside pickup would be non-exclusive (VDT 30 May 2013), but David Rodock reported for the VDT from Ashley Paulk’s guest house at a Lowndes County Commission retreat chaired by Ashley Paulk that:
Commissioners decided that getting out of the “trash business” was best and that a non-exclusive agreement with current curbside pickup companies (which about 12,000 citizens already employ) would provide service without putting any people out of business.
The VDT reported
(
Commission tackles key issues:
Waste management, tax lighting districts and SPLOST discussed at retreat
by David Rodock, 31 March 2012)
Commissioners “decided”.
Yet there is no vote recorded, in contravention to Georgia open meetings law
and a recent
Georgia Supreme Court decision.
How is this doing
“the people’s business”?
Maybe if they took a vote and recorded it properly we’d all know what they said.
-jsq
Counter to state law, Lowndes County did not hold public hearings within 45 days before the decision to close the waste collection centers.
ยง 12-8-24.2. Public hearing prior to entering contract regarding landfillThe governing authority of any county or municipal corporation and the directors or managers of any local authority or special district shall hold a public hearing before entering into a contract for the sale, lease, or management of a landfill or solid waste disposal facility owned by such county, municipal corporation, local authority, or special district. The party responsible for holding such a public hearing shall cause notice of the hearing to be posted at the site of the landfill or facility and to run in a newspaper of general circulation serving the county, municipal corporation, local authority, or special district not less than 30 nor more than 45 days prior to the date of the hearing.
Can anyone argue that “or solid waste disposal facility owned by such county” does not include Lowndes County’s former solid waste collection centers? Continue reading
I’ve thanked Bubba McDonald for
being serious about solar.
However, 500 MW by Georgia Power in several years is nowhere
near enough, when
New Jersey has 1,000 MW already installed.
What we need in south Georgia is distributed solar power
for local jobs and direct reduction of electricity bills.
Making
a solar monopoly as in HB 657 wouldn’t solve that problem;
it would actually hinder
a real distributed solution.
Instead we need to reform that antique 1973 Territorial Electric Service Act
to enable financing for distributed solar.
Jim Galloway wrote for the AJC yesterday, GOP revolutionaries push Georgia Power to embrace solar energy,
Lauren “Bubba” McDonald Jr. has spent more than four decades in and around the state Capitol. That fact alone should automatically disqualify him as a rabid revolutionary.
And yet here he is, attempting to force real, radical change upon one of this state’s most staid and revered institutions. McDonald is the leader of a new and very Republican effort to require that Georgia Power give solar energy a chance.
Continue reading
Nothing gets the attention of the incumbent duopoly of telcos and cablecos
like an upstart doing it 10 times faster for a lower price,
and claiming that can be profitable.
Dan Graziano wrote for BGR yesterday, Google expects Fiber to be profitable, hints at new markets,
Google Fiber is seen by many as a regional experiment that will push current Internet service providers to offer faster speeds at more affordable speeds. Google Fiber head Milo Medin countered that perception at an event on Wednesday, however. Speaking at a Fiber-to-the-Home Council meeting, the executive explained that the company’s fiber-optic broadband network isn’t just an expensive research project but a great and profitable business for Google, CNET reported.
Medin noted that Google has kept costs down by partnering with cities that are interested in bringing the company’s gigabit fiber network to its residents. Partners help Google build a less expensive and less time-consuming network.
Any local cities around here interested in partnering with Google?
-jsq
