Tag Archives: Valdosta City Council

Videos of Candidates and Mayor Gayle about SPLOST @ LCDP 2013-09-09



In which we discover one candidate works for the City of Valdosta
and opposes SPLOST.
Candidates took questions directly from the
audience and answered them, unlike at later candidate forums.
Candidates from the smaller cities started their tradition of
not showing up for forums outside their cities.
Here’s the list of
qualified candidates.
See also the videos of the

30 Club forum 2013-10-21
and the videos of the

AAUW forum 2013-10-15.

Opening


Call to Order,

Moment of Silence for Congress,

Pledge,

Approval of Minutes,

Treasurer’s Report.



SPLOST VII

30 Club Candidate Forum @ 30Club 2013-10-21



The candidates were almost unanimous on

SPLOST VII and

how to prevent JK situations,
but more varied on other questions.

Roy Copeland, billed as “Valdosta attorney”
(but perhaps known better to LAKE readers as VLCIA board member and former Chairman)
was the moderator,
assisted by
Valdosta Fire Chief and



Thirty Club member

J.D. Rice.
They took questions from the audience and recognized their host,

Pastor Floyd Rose of Serenity Church.
You may wonder as I do why city council candidates were answering
about graduation rates.

Matthew Woody wrote for the VDT 21 October 2013,

‘Let the games begin’.
Here’s the list of
qualified candidates.
As usual, nobody showed up from the smaller cities, although at least one Valdosta candidate,
Richard Miller,
spoke up for the smaller cities about SPLOST.


Valdosta City Council District 2

Continue reading →

Videos: Nottinghill tabled, Barrington, Whitewater, New Statenville + VLD * 2 + Dasher + Hahira variance @ GLPC 2013-09-30



In last month’s Planning Commission meeting we learned that
developers get agenda items in PDF;
yet the county still doesn’t publish agendas or minutes,
much less agenda packets, online.

Nottinghill (on Orr rather than Cat Creek Road this time)
was

tabled.

Norwood (on Springhill Drive in Valdosta)
got recommended denial by 5-4
and was later

withdrawn,
plus a
a

Hahira variance (5 to 3 against), a

Valdosta conditional use permit (unanimously recommended),
a

Dasher zoning text amendment (unanimously recommended),
and three other rezonings in Lowndes County, on

New Statenville Highway,

Whitewater Road @ Williams Road,
and

Barrington Drive @ Bemiss Road.

Here’s

the agenda, with links to the videos and a few notes.

Greater Lowndes Planning Commission

Lowndes County City of Valdosta City of Dasher City of Hahira City of Lake Park

REGULAR MONTHLY MEETING

AGENDA

Lowndes County South Health District Administrative Office

325 West Savannah Avenue

Monday, September 30, 2013* 5:30 P.M. * Public Hearing

Continue reading →

The SPLOST Debate –Tim Carroll

Received 27 October 2013. -jsq



I have had a number of folks contact me about the upcoming SPLOST
VII referendum and inquiring about a MOST. Trying to talk about all
of this in as few a words as I can is not easy. But to give you
some perspective—the city’s general fund budget is $32M.
$5.9M of the revenue for this fund comes from property taxes. Based
on the city tax digest a mill is worth $1.5M. The experts say
50.2% of the sales tax is paid by out of towners. In the opinion of
some folks, it is closer to 30%. Pick the experts or local guesses
….it still is a significant amount. It clearly is very beneficial
to the citizens of Valdosta and Lowndes County.

By now many have heard about a MOST or Municipal Option Sales Tax.

In the first part of this year—the city of Valdosta was faced
with Continue reading →

Steward, Chancy, VLCIA, Nottinghill, and Teramore @ GLPC 2013-10-28



Why is the Industrial Authority asking Valdosta to

annex
and

rezone
a parcel it apparently does not own?
That plus rezonings in

Dasher
and

Hahira
(see

separate post for more on that one),
plus two in Lowndes County:

Teramore,
and

Nottinghill is

back.

Here’s the agenda.

Greater Lowndes Planning Commission

Lowndes County City of Valdosta City of Dasher City of Hahira City of Lake Park

REGULAR MONTHLY MEETING

AGENDA

Lowndes County South Health District Administrative Office

325 West Savannah Avenue

Monday, October 28, 2013* 5:30 P.M. * Public Hearing

Continue reading →

Cancelled due to lack of agenda items: Valdosta City Council meeting @ VCC 2013-10-24

The internal email from the City Clerk (see below) has a bit more detail
than the

website notice.


From: Teresa Bolden

Sent: Friday, October 18, 2013 4:26 PM

Subject: COUNCIL MEETING CANCELLED

Good afternoon — I just wanted to let you know that the
Council Meeting scheduled for October 24th
has been cancelled due to a lack of Agenda Items.

If you have any questions please don’t hesitate to contact me.

Thanks! Teresa

Teresa S. Bolden, CMC

City Clerk

P. O. Box 1125

Valdosta, GA 31603-1125

Phone: (229) 259-3503

Fax: (229) 259-5411

-jsq

Videos, AAUW Candidates’ Forum @ AAUW 2013-10-15



Water was a popular topic, as you can see in these
videos of the

Candidates’s Forum by AAUW.
Same location (VSU Continuing Education Building)
as the one

Chamber held,
but this time the audience got to ask questions.
Yes, Virginia, they do all live in their districts, and some of them have widely divergent views about what cities or school boards should do.

Local

AAUW President Diane Holliman gave a welcome, and then
Dr. Luke Fowler moderated.
Here’s

the list of qualified candidates.
Here’s

Matthew Woody’s writeup in the VDT.


Valdosta City Council District 2

John Hogan and Calvin Graham Sr. were present; Sandra J. Tooley was not.


John Hogan pointed out that a road issue could really be a drainage issue,
so it’s necessary to look at context.


Calvin Graham Sr.
said he was retired military, lived in the district, and had
been spending a lot of time volunteering.
He indicated the Continue reading →

OK LOST status quo –Valdosta City Council @ VCC 2013-10-17

Yes we’ll take the 2002 percentages

offered by Lowndes County, voted the
the Valdosta City Council this morning at a Special Called Meeting.

The vote result is from Council Tim Carroll, who says they will revisit the percentages
after the Georgia legislature does whatever it’s going to do about LOST in January.
Here’s

the notice of the meeting on Valdosta’s website:


Notice of a Special Called City Council Meeting

Posted Date: 10/16/2013

The Valdosta City Council has scheduled a Special Called City Council Meeting for Thursday, October 17, 2013 at 8:00 a.m. at City Hall, 216 East Central Avenue, Council Chambers. The purpose of this Special Called Council Meeting is to discuss the Local Option Sales Tax (LOST).

For more information, please contact Teresa S. Bolden, City Clerk, at 259-3503 or tbolden@valdostacity.com.

-jsq

Spectra met Lowndes and Valdosta @ Pipeline 2013-10-16



Spectra Energy subsidiary Sabal Trail Transmission held

a landowner one-on-one at Wiregrass Tech last night.
Matthew Woody of the VDT was there, as was one Valdosta City Council
member, one Lowndes County Commissioner, and at least two county staff,
plus some landowners (“might as well get something out of this”,
several said at the food bar), one of whom was a match for Andrea Grover.

Matthew Woody, VDT:

Continue reading →

County lost LOST; now has 120 days to negotiate with cities



So all our tax money the county spent on the

alleged county attorney
arguing
before the state Supreme Court was wasted.
The remaining law seems to say by 120 days from Monday
the cities and the county need to come to an agreement.

Kay Harris wrote for the VDT yesterday,

Lowndes LOST in limbo:
Supreme Court tosses key amendment,

In a ruling issued Monday, Oct. 7, the Supreme Court of Georgia
declared a 2010 amendment to the Local Option Sales Tax Act
unconstitutional, reasoning that the amendment would delegate a
legislative function of allocating tax proceeds to the judicial
branch of government, a violation of the Separation of Powers clause
of the Georgia Constitution.



For Lowndes County, the ruling effectively renders the lawsuit moot
that was filed by the five cities against the county in September
2012.

The Supreme Court’s ruling came in the case of Turner County vs. the
City of Ashburn over a dispute in splitting the proceeds from the
one cent sales tax, the same issue in the Lowndes lawsuit. By
declaring the portion unconstitutional that would allow a judge to
decide how to allocate the tax dollars between the entities, the
issue is now in limbo for several counties in Georgia.



You may recall that

former Chairman Ashley Paulk
wasn’t interested in discussing proposals from the cities,
and said from before

the LOST negotiations began
that he expected it to go to arbitration.



This was the same Chairman Ashley Paulk who put SPLOST VII on the ballot
a year early and

lost it.
I wonder how much input County Manager Joe Pritchard had into these two losing decisions?

At least SPLOST VI hasn’t expired yet
and there’s time for the voters to go again on

SPLOST VII in November.

What happens now with LOST? Continue reading →