Category Archives: Activism

JLUS Transparency and Videos @ SGRC 2012-06-08

The South Georgia Regional Commission held a public hearing on Wednesday June 6th to give an overview of the current Implementation Phase draft of the Joint Land Use Study (JLUS) for Moody Air Force Base and surrounding communities.

Todd Miller, the project coordinator, gave a power point presentation. When asked if the presentation could be made available on the SGRC web site, he said yes (and then called to make sure I could find it).

The complete draft implementation phase documents are available at http://www.sgrc.us/JLUS/implementation.htm and the comment period is open until the end of June. Comments should be sent to Todd Miller at tmiller (at) sgrc.us.

Here's a video playlist:

JLUS Transparency and Videos
Public Hearing, Southern Georgia Regional Commission (SGRC), Todd Miller,
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, Fri, 8 Jun 2012 10:21:39 -0400.
Videos by Gretchen Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE).

-gretchen

Film your cause for annual local festival

VSU professor and student publish book chapter about films of Lowndes County. You, too, can submit a film about changes in local culture for the whole world to see.

Matthew Richard and Andrea Zvikas wrote Causes Mini-Film Festival: Anthropology for Public Consumption for the book Building Bridges in Anthropology: Understanding, Acting, Teaching, and Theorizing, Edited by Robert Shanafelt, published this month.

The goal is simple: to get all of us who live in Lowndes County, Georgia, to ponder some of our casual habits and to seek better ways of doing things here. The hope is that the collective wisdom and creativity of various community members can stoke our collective imagination—maybe even our “collective conscience”—and generate improvements in our way of life. The hope is that the collective wisdom and creativity of various community members can stoke our collective imagination—maybe even our “collective conscience”—and generate improvements in our way of life. Our somewhat quixotic reasoning is that change has to start somewhere, so why not initiate it right now, right here “in our own backyard”?

On facebook: “Causes”— Valdosta’s (mini) Film Festival. 2010 Causes Film Festival YouTube channel.

Do you have a cause? If so, please make your own 90-second mini-documentary and we’ll see you in Valdosta the weekend between the Martin Luther King holiday and the Superbowl.

Here’s a sample Causes video:

Dear Valdosta City Council, we need….
Submission for Causes Film Festival 2010

-jsq

VLCIA Focus Group meeting 20 June 2012

Today I received an invitation from the Industrial Authority to attend a focus group interview for input to their Competitive Assessment and their Economic Development Strategy. So, dear readers, what do you think I should say to them? Don’t worry; I have some ideas already, but I’m all ears for more.

You may recall VLCIA has been put out an RFP early this year for an organization to do a Strategic Plan process. They selected Market Street Services of Atlanta, and they said in April they were preparing to do focus groups. Now apparently they’ve sent out invitation letters for a focus group on 20 June 2012. I have no idea who else they have invited; I was rather surprised to find they invited me.

What would you say to them?

Invitation from Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority (VLCIA)
to a focus group interview 20 June 2012
Wiregrass Georgia Technical College, Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 1 June 2012.
Scanned by John S. Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE).

-jsq

Videos of Shareholder Questions to Southern Company @ SO 2012-05-23

Slides and sound for Southern Company (SO) CEO Thomas A. Fanning’s main presentation at the 23 May 2012 SO shareholder meeting are available from SO on their website. SO doesn’t seem to have posted videos yet, although they had professional video equipment in use, and I was told just after the event that their videos would be on the web later that same day.

These items have already been blogged about this meeting:

I missed at least one questioner: Colleen Kiernan, Director of the Georgia Sierra Club. I plead unfamiliar cameras. Maybe soon SO will publish its own videos. SO was using a camera in front of the questioners, so you should be able to see them better.

Related blog posts:

Many more blog posts are in the nuclear category in the blog.

Here’s a video playlist for the 23 May 2012 SO shareholder meeting:

Videos of Shareholder Questions to Southern Company
Shareholder Meeting, Southern Company (SO),
Callaway Gardens, Pine Mountain, Georgia, 23 May 2012.
Video by John S. Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE).

-jsq

Why did old US 41 N increase from $8 M to $12 M? —John S. Quarterman @ SGRC 2011-09-19

I asked why the Old US 41 North widening project changed from $8 million on the unconstrained list to $12 million on the constrained list, an increase of $4 million or 50% when the description did not change? The answer indicates GDOT and local governments want to drive development north in the county, leaving pedestrians and bicyclists stranded yet having to pay.

Corey Hull responded:

Halfway through we received new cost estimates….

GDOT did the cost estimates, in cooperation with the local government that was responsible for that.

A state employee told me after the meeting that GDOT raised some estimates because it thought the local government, in this case the Lowndes County Commission and staff, didn’t put in enough to cover the project. I don’t know whether GDOT was figuring by Atlanta costs or not…. At least the cost didn’t go up further in the final project list; I just checked and it’s still $12 million.

Corey elaborated that some projects increased and some decreased. I asked him which ones did which. He said he’d have to go back and compare. Later he helped me produce a list of comparisons of costs of Lowndes County projects, which shows that one went down by 30% and three went up by 50% or more. One, RC11-000099 St. Augustine at Norman Intersection Improvements, went up by 131.5%.

That $12 million for widening less than 3 miles of one road is more than one item that was in the unconstrained list but cut from the constrained list: $7.5 million for a bus system, with three bus lines that would connect Wiregrass Tech, Five Points, Downtown, Moody, East Side, South Side, West Side, and the Mall. A bus system recommended by the Industrial Authority’s Community Assessment to aid in employee attendance, industry recruitment, and workforce.

You could probably even start up a substantial commuter rail system using existing freight line tracks for less than $12 million. Even though GDOT apparently only believes in roads and bridges, busses and trains are actually more cost-effective, especially for lower-income people. The same lower-income people who will be disproportionately taxed by T-SPLOST as a percentage of their income.

Instead, the description for the Old US 41 North project admits the county is driving Continue reading →

Clean green jobs for community and profit

Tell me who doesn’t want clean jobs for energy independence and profit?

“Environmental sustainability… can lead to more and better jobs, poverty reduction and social inclusion,”

The above quote is Juan Somavia in an article Stephen Leahy wrote for Common Dreams 1 June 2012, For an Ailing Planet, the Cure Already Exists,

Germany’s renewable energy sector now employs more people than its vaunted automobile industry.

No wonder, when German solar power produces more than 20 nuclear plants. How many jobs? According to Welcome to Germany 13 April 2012, Renewable Energies Already Provide More Than 380,000 Jobs in Germany, which cites a report from the German government,

The boom in renewable energies continues to create new jobs in Germany. According to a recently published study commissioned by the Federal Environment Ministry, the development and production of renewable energy technologies and the supply of electricity, heat and fuel from renewable sources provided around 382,000 jobs in 2011.

This is an increase of around 4 percent compared to the previous year and more than double the 2004 figure.

“Current employment figures show that the transformation of our energy system is creating entirely new opportunities on the job market,” said German Environment Minister Norbert Röttgen.

“It is the major project for the future for German industry. This opens up technological and economic opportunities in terms of Germany’s competitiveness as an exporter and location to do business.”

Wouldn’t we like some of that here in sunny south Georgia, a thousand miles south of Germany?

Back to the Stephen Leahy article:

Globally, the renewable energy sector now employs close to five million workers, more than doubling the number of jobs from 2006-2010, according to a study released Thursday by the International Labor Organization (ILO).

The transformation to a greener economy could generate 15 to 60 million additional jobs globally over the next two decades and lift tens of millions of workers out of poverty, concluded the study, “Working towards sustainable development”.

Everyone will benefit. Everyone can benefit starting right now.

Continue reading →

What does Remerton want to be?

Remember, Strickland Mill demolition on the agenda for today's Remerton City Council Work Session, 5:30 PM, 1757 Poplar Street Remerton, GA 31601. I'd post an agenda if they had put one on the web. Meanwhile, here's a question.

The VDT editorialized 1 November 2008, OUR OPINION: What does Remerton want to be?

Remerton is a unique place: A square-mile town surrounded by Valdosta. Remerton is literally a town within a town.

Its history stretches back to a time before Valdosta surrounded Remerton, back when Baytree was a dirt road and what is now the mall and numerous other stores and subdivisions were fields and woods.

Back then Remerton had a unique identity. It was a mill town, a company town to Strickland Mill. The houses that lined Remerton's streets were homes to the mill's employees and their families. Those families shopped at a company store, attended a Remerton church, and their lives revolved around raising families and working at the mill that towered over the small town.

That was then. The mill closed 30-some years ago. Over time, the houses which were once homes became shops. In the 1990s, fire destroyed the church which was replaced by commercial property. Unused land within Remerton's square-mile was developed into residences or businesses until no space was left. Older, long-time residents were replaced by college students. The mill-house shops increasingly became bars, pubs and restaurants. Amidst all of these changes, Remerton became a historic district, meaning that it must maintain the look of once being a mill town though it had become anything but a mill town.

And that is the problem facing Remerton today: What exactly has Remerton become?

The VDT details Remerton's current multiple personalities. Then it asks the question that has come up again today:

What does Remerton want to be?

Strickland Mill is the very symbol of Remerton. Is that what the people of Remerton want, or not?

-jsq

St. Augustine and Gornto Road in Final T-SPLOST list @ SGRC 2011-09-19

Maybe you’d like to know what are the T-SPLOST projects and how much they cost, so you can decide whether you think the tax is worth it (in addition to all the other considerations). That can take some work. Here’s an example.

Since Gretchen Quarterman asked what $5 million for one intersection would buy, T-SPLOST plans have been filed and a constrained list and then a final list approved by GDOT. Price tags jumped wildly up and down in the constrained list. For example, widening less than 3 miles of Old US 41 North from North Valdosta road to Union Road jumped from $8 million in June 2011 to $12 million in August.

In the final list, this item seems to be the one Gretchen was talking about:

RC11-000100 St Augustine Road at Gornto Road Intersection Improvements

You can find that one line on www.t-splost.com, which seems to be the state’s propaganda site for pushing T-SPLOST.

To find the current dollar amounts, you have to rummage around elsewhere until you find Continue reading →

Last Year’s Southern Company Stockholders Meeting —Steve Willis @ SO 2011-05-25

Received Thursday about last year’s Southern Company (SO) 2011 Annual Meeting of Stockholders. -jsq

Questions for Southern Company:

  1. Virtually all empirical evidence for decades indicates that climate disruption, related ocean acidification, sea rise and global warming are not only happening, but consistently occurring at the highest range of modeled projections. Events which were projected within 100 years twenty years ago, and within 50 years 10 years ago, are happening now. Instead of fighting a delaying, rear-guard action against big, dynamic change in energy production, wouldn’t it be better for our company to set the standard for transformation? It seems we have the most to lose, and, therefore, the most to gain.
  2. Unless there is some unexpected reversal in the climate change trends which have been occurring for decades, it seems inevitable that National Renewable Energy Portfolio Standards (RPS) will be legislated well before the end of this decade. Moody’s cited this likelihood in their recent credit downgrade of Southern Company. Since it seems highly unlikely that biomass and nuclear will be considered renewable energy sources under a RPS, where will Southern Company acquire mandated renewable energy — perhaps 20% or more of the total mix by 2020? And will the PSC allow us to load our full profits to rates for this energy on top of the big profits to the probable merchant suppliers, such as West Texas Wind?
  3. I have heard reports that Santee Cooper in South Carolina and

    This one has happened. -jsq
    Duke Energy in North Carolina are exploring the possibility of a joint venture to develop off-shore wind. Wouldn’t it be advantageous to ally with them in a joint venture? The Carolinas have a very long coast and very good wind resources, and a combined effort could reduce risk for all of us and significantly increase our combined political leverage. If we do not create some credible Georgia renewable energy resource, isn’t it possible that we will be forced to buy wind power from the Carolinas at an exorbitant rate within the next decade?
  4. Between the likelihood of carbon pricing and a National Renewable Energy Standard, it seems almost certain that Southern Company’s extreme reliance on coal fired power generation will be significantly reduced, voluntarily or by fiat, this decade. Nuclear seems more unlikely and expensive a salvation than ever. Isn’t it time we changed course and embraced proven and rapidly improving solar and wind technology before we are forced into them by National mandate?
  5. According to the information on your climate change Web site, Southern Company supports the target of an 80% reduction in carbon emissions by 2050. Can you tell us the approximate mix of nuclear, renewables, and efficiency that you envision to reach that goal?
-Steve Willis

Not a special Local tax: it’s a Regional tax —Nolen Cox @ SGRC 2011-09-19

T-SPLOST is a misnomer: it's not a Special Location Option Sales Tax, since it's voted on as a region.

I think maybe we should have a gasoline tax to pay for roads.

Here's the video:

Not a special Local tax: it's a Regional tax –Nolen Cox
T-SPLOST Public Meeting, Southern Georgia Regional Commission (SGRC),
Corey Hull,
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 19 September 2011.
Video by Gretchen Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE).

-jsq