{"id":2857,"date":"2013-04-07T13:04:53","date_gmt":"2013-04-07T17:04:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/?p=2857"},"modified":"2013-04-07T13:10:42","modified_gmt":"2013-04-07T17:10:42","slug":"whos-inaccurate-vdt-valdosta-gefa-chamber-county","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2013\/04\/whos-inaccurate-vdt-valdosta-gefa-chamber-county.html","title":{"rendered":"Who’s inaccurate: VDT, Valdosta, GEFA, Chamber, County?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\r\nBoth Chamber of Commerce Chair Myrna Ballard and Lowndes County Manager\r\nJoe Pritchard say the VDT is inaccurate.\r\nThe VDT took offense at Ballard’s assertion.\r\nWhich do you believe?\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\nI believe I’d like to see the evidence, not just the VDT’s assertions.\r\nAnd this junior high school cat fight the VDT insists on is not\r\nhelping fix the real problem with water and wastewater in Valdosta\r\nand Lowndes County: the widespread and longterm damage to our watersheds\r\nthat turned a normal rain in 2009 into a 700 year flood, and caused\r\nanother flooding of the Withlacoochee Wasterwater Treatment Plant this year.\r\nI’m all for investigative reporting, but I have not yet once seen\r\nthe VDT investigate the real underlying issues of longtime clearcutting\r\nand building of roads subdivisions, and parking lots without adequate\r\nconsideration of water flows.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nThe VDT front page today has yet another story attacking the City of Valdosta,\r\n\r\nLoan info from GEFA contradicts City:\r\n$11 million awaits disbursement, loan amounts don’t match<\/a>.\r\nI can’t make much sense out of it, because while Jason Shaefer has \r\ndug up a lot of interesting information, he doesn’t include dates\r\nfor much of the financial detail he attributes to GEFA.\r\nLet’s see the VDT publish the documents they are referring to.\r\nThe city does publish its\r\n\r\nComprehensive Annual Financial Reports<\/a>.\r\nThe VDT has a website, and could publish whatever records\r\nit got from GEFA, which after all were produced using our tax dollars,\r\nand are therefore public records.\r\nOr if the documents are somewhere on\r\n\r\nGEFA’s website<\/a>, the VDT could publish links to the specific documents.\r\nThe VDT did publish\r\n\r\na timeline of correspondence with the City about loans<\/a>,\r\nso it could just as easily publish the GEFA documents and its\r\nown page-by-page and chart-by-chart comparison so we could all see\r\nfor ourselves.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nThe VDT prepended this blurb to its timeline:\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n

\r\nIt has come to the attention of the Times that the Chamber of\r\nCommerce has called a special meeting on Tuesday to address what COC\r\nPres. Myrna Ballard terms as “damage to our community’s\r\nreputation” due to the stories that have appeared in the\r\nnewspaper. The invitation for the 9 a.m. meeting at the Chamber\r\noffice was extended to only a select group of Chamber members, no\r\nmedia, and states that Mayor John Gayle and City Manager Larry\r\nHanson will explain the city’s financial status. The Times takes\r\nvery seriously the implication that the newspaper has written\r\nanything that is “inaccurate,” as stated by the Chamber.\r\nAs such, the Times has chosen to show the public the information\r\nprovided to the newspaper in response to questions posed to the\r\nCity, with no editing, to allow citizens the opportunity to see for\r\nthemselves if what the Times has written is an\r\n“inaccurate” portrayal of the city’s financial status.\r\n<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nWhat was that again?\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n

\r\nThe Times takes\r\nvery seriously the implication that the newspaper has written \r\nanything that is “inaccurate,”\r\nas stated by the Chamber.\r\n<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nHow about as stated by Lowndes County Manager Joe Pritchard?\r\nIn\r\n\r\na letter from him to me of 29 January 2013<\/a> Pritchard stated:\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\n

\r\nThe November 2010 “flyer” you referred to in your email\r\nwas not created by or distributed by Lowndes County. The document\r\nyou are referring to was a special section created by and\r\ndistributed by the Valdosta Daily Times. Lowndes County provided a\r\nphoto of myself and the “letter” that was included on\r\nthe front page as well as the building design images. The graphic\r\nyou are referring to on the right side of the document was created\r\nby the newspaper, not the county.\r\n<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nThe graphic is the one on the right here that says the cost of the\r\ncounty’s Judicial and Administrative complex was\r\n“100% Paid by SPLOST” and “$0 Balance Owed”.\r\nYet there are many millions still to be paid on outstanding bonds\r\non those buildings, as\r\n\r\nPritchard listed in another letter<\/a>, in which he reiterated:\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n

\r\nThere is no paper trail leading to zero dollars owed on any of this\r\ndebt, as the premise that zero dollars is owed is not correct.\r\n<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nLAKE has photographed most of those bond documents, and will be publishing them.\r\nMeanwhile,\r\n\r\nmy further request to the county<\/a> has not yet been fulfilled:\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n

\r\nYes, there are other documents I would like to inspect. Please\r\nprovide copies of all correspondance between you or anyone else\r\n(elected or employed) in the Lowndes County government with the\r\nValdosta Daily Times about the document that asserted “100%\r\nPaid by SPLOST” and “$0 Balance Owed”; this is the\r\ndocument you referred to in your email of 29 January 2013 as\r\n“a special section created by and distributed by the Valdosta\r\nDaily Times.” Please include the correspondance in which\r\n“Lowndes County provided a photo of myself and the\r\n“letter” that was included on the front page as well as\r\nthe building design images.” Please also include any\r\ncorrespondance in which the Lowndes County government attempted to\r\ninform the Valdosta Daily Times or the public that\r\n“the premise that zero dollars is owed is not correct.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nSo who’s inaccurate? The VDT, or both Chamber of Commerce Chair Myrna Ballard\r\nand Lowndes County Manager Joe Pritchard?\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\nThe VDT could help resolve that question by publishing its correspondence\r\nwith the county about that “zero dollars” flyer.\r\n<\/p>\r\n

\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\nOn the bigger issue of why we have so many floods, here are:\r\n<\/p>\r\n