A Budget Adoption Meeting 5PM before the 5:30 PM Regular Session,
as alluded to at
yesterday morning’s Work Session.
Is this a second Budget Hearing?
Does it count if it’s not advertised as a Hearing?
And it turns out the proposed budget is on the county’s website,
just not where they previously said it would be.
[5:00-5:30PM] Tuesday, June 23 Continue reading
A local citizen got cut off just as he said the county attorney’s
opinion was he could interpret state law about property taxes however he wished,
in the
24 March 2015 Regular Session of the Lowndes County Commission.
9. Citizens Wishing to be Heard-Please State Your Name and Address
Video. Craig Cardella’s concern was that the County Commission does not have enough money to do things that are important to the community. He said he had given a similar talk to Valdosta Mayor and Council recently. He said he had been a city manager in the past, and had worked in and around local government nearly all his career.
In 2009 GA State Senate authorized Continue reading
One citizen got cut off
just as he said the county attorney
thought he could interpret state law however he liked.
In addition to the
Lake Park Fire Department Automatic Aid Agreement
the County Manager asked at the Work Session to add to
agenda,
they also added
Southern Region Traffic Enforcement Network (SRTEN).
Plus not on the agenda there was
recognition of student guests.
See also the previous morning’s Work Session
Keep Lowndes-Valdosta Beautiful cleanup presentation.
They meet again this morning.
Also voted on two weeks ago were changes to the speed zone ordinance, a GEMA grant application, a proposal for engineering services for Exits 22 and 29, HVAC for county buildings, and a liquor license. Here’s the agenda with links to the videos and a few notes.
LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
Continue reading
PROPOSED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, MARCH 23, 2015 8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, MARCH 24, 2015 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor
Sometimes it doesn’t just look like they have something to hide: the FBI found some of what the DeKalb County Commmission was hiding, and one criminally-charged Commissioner promises to sing about the others, while 62 vendors and all the other sitting Commissioners are being investigated. No local elected body around here could have such problems, right?
The DeKalb FBI corruption investigation apparently started with news stories in the AJC. Coincidentally, here’s the board packet for tonight’s Lowndes County Commission meeting that it took an open records request for LAKE to get so you can see it.
20 February 2013, Fireworks erupt in court over DeKalb corruption case, by Jodie Fleischer for WSB-TV,
Only Channel 2’s Jodie Fleischer was there as a judge lashed out at prosecutors who want the public to see a secret corruption report.
The special grand jury investigating DeKalb County corruption Continue reading
It’s time to vote,
today and tomorrow in early voting at
the Board of Elections, 2808 North Oak Street, Valdosta, or
Tuesday May 20th at
your polling place.
Turnout is very low for elections that will affect everyone in Lowndes
County and beyond.
Two of the Lowndes County Commission districts will be decided May 20th (District 5 is a Special Election and District 2 has only candidates in one party): they will affect your water, sewer, trash, rezoning, road building, and taxes. All the Lowndes County School Board elections Continue reading
The
KLVB presentation told us up to three states dump in
the Pecan Row Landfill in Lowndes County,
for which the county gets some unspecified amount of tipping fees,
which go to fund KLVB.
An appointment to
KLVB was added to the agenda,
although nobody deigned to reveal who was “that individual that has
requested to serve on that board”.
The
Homeland Security grant application turned out to be for defibrillators.
Here’s the agenda, with a few annotations and links to the videos.
LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERSContinue reading
AMENDED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, APRIL 7, 2014, 8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, APRIL 8, 2014, 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street — 2nd Floor
A non-competitive no-RFP un-explained change order,
this time for Val Del Road, on the agenda for the Lowndes County Commission.
Would you like to know why county staff doesn’t want to go out for
competitive bids before spending your tax money?
We can guess it’s about that
shoulder paving
they
just approved
$949,493.85 for to Scruggs Company.
But why should we have to guess if that’s it and why they need a change order for a million dollar project
at the very next Commission meeting?
We’d be able to see why if the board packets were online with the agenda, as happens in many metropolitan areas, such as Leon County, Florida, or Glynn County, Georgia, or Richmond County, Georgia. Our own Lowndes County Board of Education often links board packet items in with its agenda.
While much smaller Glynn County Continue reading
Valdosta sure has an effective PR mechanism,
famous all the way to Florida again,
for the second time this month.
Most cities wouldn’t think
to dump stuff into the river to get in the news!
But Valdosta buried the solution at the end of
a traditional press release:
“The city has planned, designed and bid a force main project and will award a $32 million contract in May that will prevent the majority of these overflows from occurring in the future.”
That would be one of the projects Valdosta will use the
$36.7 million GEFA loan to fund.
Other projects are related to the Withlacoochee Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP), which wasn’t the culprit this time.
This sewer spill came from manholes overflowing.
Winnie Wright wrote for WCTV yesterday, Over 1 Million Gallons Of Wastewater Spills Into Local Waterways,
The Florida Department of Public Health is warning residents to avoid contact with water from the Withlacoochee River.
Continue reading
The second day of the Commission retreat is finished. Reporting from location, Gretchen noted:
Chairman Bill Slaughter has a five year goal of making broadband available. Some possibility of creating a fibre ring. He says he’s working with the City of Valdosta.
Well, a year ago in February he said broadband was “one of the number one issues”, but in October he said “we have broadband”, so it’s anyone’s guess what his opinion will be in a few months.
Commissioner Crawford Powell wants to outsource more county services.
That’s working so well, after all; see the next note.
