Tag Archives: Valdosta

6c. Statewide Mutual Aid Agreement @ LCC Work Session 2012-02-27

Lowndes County has been in a Mutual Aid Agreement for 10 years. This is a renewal of the agreement for 4 years. Having this agreement in place makes cooperating with neighboring counties and municipalities easier.

-gretchen

Here’s the video:


6c. Statewide Mutual Aid Agreement @ LCC Work Session 2012-02-27
Work Session, Lowndes County Commission (LCC),
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 27 February 2012.
Videos by Gretchen Quarterman for LAKE, the Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange.

I didn’t see any commissioners object this time. Instead they didn’t say anything at all. We’ll see tomorrow. Some context in this previous post. Plus this appears to be the actual agreement on the GEMA website.

-jsq

Georgia Power peddling old disinformation about solar power

On the same day as SB 401 revived as SB 459 gets a hearing in a better committee, Georgia Power trots out the same old tired disinformation it’s been peddling for years. As if we didn’t already know that almost all solar installations in Georgia are installed by certified solar installers. Or that pretty much every inverter these days comes with built-in automatic cutoff if the grid goes down to which installers add air-gap cutoff knife switches plus breakers. And as if Georgia Power didn’t know it and EMCs could charge a percentage on electricity arbitraged across their networks, which gapower could use to finance any needed grid improvements, while retaining a hefty profit for doing not much of anything else. Meanwhile, those of us who chose to participate in solar electricity arbitrage would get lower rates for customers. We do know all that, but maybe your state senator doesn’t, so maybe you should call your senator today and tell them you want to be able to buy and sell solar power without having to get it from the utility monopoly.

Greg Roberts, Vice President of Pricing and Planning for Georgia Power in Atlanta, wrote for the Savannah Morning News today, The solar sleight of hand. I’ll only quote part of his concluding paragraph.

Georgia Power is involved in many efforts to expand the use solar energy
Usually dragged along behind reluctantly, Continue reading →

Corrections Corporation of America: A Critical Look at its First Twenty Years

This is the report Bobbi A. Hancock gave Andrea Schruijer Friday:

Grassroots Leadership published Correction Corporation of America: A Critical Look at its First Twenty Years. By Philip Mattera and Mafruza Khan, Corporate Research Project of Good Jobs First, and Stephen Nathan, Prison Privatisation Report International. December, 2003. Here’s an extract from the Executive Summary:
CCA is the leading participant in, and in many ways the embodiment of, one of the most controversial industries ever created—the incarceration of people for profit. While the company is looking back through rose-colored glasses, there is a need for a critical analysis of what CCA has brought to the world of corrections. That is the purpose of this report.

Even by its own standards, CCA has not been a success. Rather than taking the industry by storm, it still manages only about three percent of prison and jail beds in the United States, and its global aspirations had to be abandoned.

Only a few years ago, CCA was being widely vilified

Continue reading →

Community activism had nothing to do with biomass plant not coming here —Andrea Schruijer to Bobbi A. Hancock

Received today. -jsq
Subject: Meeting with Andrea

Just a quick recap of a meeting I had yesterday with VLCIA’s Andrea Schruijer. When asked where we were with the private prison issue, she responded, “we contractually agreed to a 3rd extension with a term of 365 and CCA has until March 13, 2012 to request that extension.” So I asked,” if CCA doesn’t request a 3rd extension, then the issue is over, right?” She replied, “If there’s no response from CCA, then it is up to the board to determine how to move forward.” When I asked her why they would even consider honoring a contract extension to CCA knowing some of the controversy over CCA’s business practices, she replied, “because there is a partnership between the VLCIA and CCA and we are contractually bound to a 3rd extension.”

I pointed out that the private prison industry wasn’t interested in public safety and rehabilitation they simply wanted to make a quick buck off the lives of others. I informed her of the chronic employee turnover, understaffing, high rates of violence and extreme cost cutting which all have been attributed to CCA.

I told her that Lowndes County already had its own share of air pollution and that amount of air pollution here is directly proportionate to the amount of lung and bronchial caner in our area. I encouraged her to consider sustainable businesses for the future economic growth of our community, not smoke stack business. Her reply, “so what you are saying is that you think the industrial should just close its doors?” I actually hadn’t thought about that but the question did make me ponder.

I left her with a 91 page research report which takes a critical look at the first twenty years of CCA’s operations. I requested an email response of her thoughts about the report and am currently awaiting the response…

Biomass did come up in the conversation and Mrs. Schruijer was quick to assert that

Continue reading →

Ossie Davis, Malcolm X, MLK, 100 Black Men, Roy Copeland, today and tomorrow

Kay Harris wrote for the VDT yesterday, Artifacts exhibit this weekend,
Actor Ossie Davis delivered the eulogy at the funeral of Malcolm X on Feb. 27, 1965. It was a strong statement of support for the life of a man whom controversy followed until his assassination at the age of 39. So why did Davis potentially risk his career to pay tribute to Malcolm X? A letter, written by Davis, explains his decision. The letter will be on public display this weekend.

Davis’ letter will join dozens of other historic artifacts for a special Black History Month observation, sponsored by the 100 Black Men of Valdosta Inc. The Sixth Annual African-American Artifacts exhibit will be on display noon to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, Feb. 25 and 26.

Kind of weird phrasing there, Ms. Editor, given that Ossie Davis’ tribute was after Malcolm X was assassinated….

I’d like to read that letter. How about you?

Here is a video of that eulogy (although the voice is not that of Ossie Davis): Continue reading →

Valdosta Mayor and Council are implicated in the private prison —John S. Quarterman @ VCC 2012 02 23

Valdosta City Council and Mayor, who may not have been following the private prison issue, now know about it and are aware that they are all implicated in the private prison decision, due to events at the Industrial Authority board meeting and the Valdosta City Council meeting, both Thursday 23 February 2012.

After remarking that I’d rather be talking about the additional solar panels recently installed on my farm workshop up here in the north end of the county, I recapped the case against a private prison and referred the Valdosta City Council to my LTE in the VDT of that morning (Thursday 23 February 2012). I remarked that I was disappointed the Industrial Authority hadn’t done anything to stop the prison at its meeting earlier that same day. Since they might be wondering what all this had to do with them, I pointed out that, if I could use the word, they were all implicated as mayor and council in the private prison decision because Jay Hollis, CCA’s Manager of Site Acquisition, in his Valdosta-Lowndes County, GA / CCA Partnership: Prepared Remarks of August 2010, lavishly praised the Lowndes County Commission and Chairman and the Valdosta City Council and mayor. Although the mayor was different now, and maybe some of the council, nonetheless it was the same offices of council and mayor, still implicated. I asked for their opinions on that subject. Per their custom, they did not offer any at that time. So, maybe we’ll hear from them later. Or maybe the Industrial Authority board will hear from them….

Here’s the video:


Valdosta Mayor and Council are implicated in the private prison —John S. Quarterman @ VCC 2012 02 23
VSEB, employment,
Regular Session, Valdosta City Council (VCC),
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 23 February 2012.
Videos by George Boston Rhynes for K.V.C.I., the bostongbr on YouTube.

-jsq

VSEB application is too long — John Robinson @ VCC 2012 02 23

John Robinson told the Valdosta City Council that he thought the application for the Valdosta Small Emerging Business (VSEB) Program was too long and complicated compared to the one-page application to do major construction work.

Here’s the video:


VSEB application is too long — John Robinson @ VCC 2012 02 23
VSEB, employment,
Regular Session, Valdosta City Council (VCC),
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 23 February 2012.
Videos by George Boston Rhynes for K.V.C.I., the bostongbr on YouTube.

-jsq

Mutual Aid at Lowndes County Commission 2012 02 27,28

The Lowndes County Commission will consider
6.c. Statewide Mutual Aid Agreement
at its work session Monday morning and will vote at its regular session Tuesday evening. This is about emergency response calls, such as for the fire in Remerton, when Remerton called Lowndes County, which called Valdosta, which sent fire trucks to Remerton. Why the indirect time-consuming call while a fire doubles in size every minute? Remerton didn’t have a mutual aid agreement with Valdosta, but did with Lowndes County.

This is the same Commission that went on for 11 minutes in the 21 February 2011 work session about a Homeland Security grant for an emergency vehicle, worring that the county might have to pay to maintain it and might have to share it with other municipalities. And then rejected it the next day, if I recall correctly. What will they think of this mutual aid agreement?

Here’s the agenda.

-jsq

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
PROPOSED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 2012, 8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 2012, 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor
Continue reading →

Crickets, or what the Industrial Authority didn’t say about the private prison

Silence speaks volumes. Your tax-supported Industrial Authority wants a private prison in Lowndes County, Georgia.

After Tuesday’s conversation with VLCIA Executive Director Andrea Schruijer, I went to Thursday’s Industrial Authority board meeting expecting to hear something from the board about the private prison. What I heard:

Crickets.

The only thing a board member said about it was Chairman Roy Copeland reminding me that the board didn’t answer questions in Citizens Wishing to be Heard.

Earlier, Col. Rickets did say that the current contract with CCA for the private prison expires March 13th, and that meanwhile CCA can either request a third extension or CCA could send a Notice to Proceed (NTP) to VLCIA before March 13th. Remember, CCA has, according to the contract, CCA has

“absolute discretion”
for issuing that NTP.

Col. Ricketts added that in staff’s discussions with CCA, CCA had indicated they were mulling it over internally, and VLCIA should “stand by” for CCA’s next move.

That’s right, your local Industrial Authority, whose staff and land purchases are funded by your tax dollars, should stand by waiting for a private prison company to tell them what to do.

And the Industrial Authority board’s silence is an answer: they said nothing different from their previous vote for the contract to bring in this private prison; nothing different from their previous acceptance of the first and second option extensions; and nothing in objection to what Col. Ricketts said.

So your tax-supported Industrial Authority wants a private prison in Lowndes County, Georgia.

Do you want that? Do you want a private prison with fewer guards per prisoner Continue reading →

Did they know it would be considered for a private prison at that time? —Barbara Stratton

Received today on News about CCA’s private prison Project Excel expected at Thursday’s VLCIA board meeting. -jsq
Do you know why the county sold this property for less than the assessed price to the current owner in 2007 minus the wetlands that interject? Did they know it would be considered for a private prison at that time? Now the current owner will make the million dollar profit instead of the county. Since this is considered industrial park acerage owned by the county why would the county sell it if an industry/business was not promised at that time? What is the 100 acres the development agreement says the owner will be given? Is that the 119 acres of wetlands? If the county decides not to allow the private prison what happens to the earnest money that has been deposited to date since that would not be an action by the buyer or the seller?

-Barbara Stratton

According to the online information from the Lowndes County Tax Assessors Office, parcel number 0156D 005 on W/S Perimeter Road was sold by “VALDOSTA-LOWNDES COUNTY” to “BASSFORD N L JR” on 14 November 2007 for $1,463,512 as fair market value :

Sale Information
Sale DateDeed BookPlat PagePriceReasonGrantorGrantee
11-14-2007 3967 072 PC A 3852 $ 1,463,512 Fair Market – Vacant VALDOSTA-LOWNDES COUNTY BASSFORD N L JR
02-13-1998 1514 0327 $ 0 Non-Market VALDOSTA-LOWNDES COUNTY

The seller was not the Lowndes County Commission, which would start with “LOWNDES COUNTY”, and it’s not the City of Valdosta, which wouldn’t be hyphenated with the county name like that. Could it be the Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority?

-jsq