Category Archives: Education

Maybe VSU should join this band of Fossil-Free Foundations

Maybe that’s what the VSU Foundation wants to tell SAVE when they dine Monday: VSU gets it (even if Harvard doesn’t) that fossil fuels are a bad investment and solar is where the profits, students, and investors are.

Diane Cardwell wrote for DealBook 30 January 2014, Foundations Band Together to Get Rid of Fossil-Fuel Investments,

Seventeen foundations controlling nearly $1.8 billion in investments have united to commit to pulling their money out of companies that do business in fossil fuels, the group announced on Thursday.

The move is a victory for a developing divestiture campaign that has found success largely among small colleges and environmentally conscious cities, but has not yet won over the wealthiest institutions like Harvard, Brown and Swarthmore.

But the participation of the foundations, including the Russell Family Foundation, the Educational Foundation of America and the John Merck Fund, is the largest commitment to the effort, and stems in part from a push among philanthropies to bring their investing in line with their missions.

“At a minimum, our grants should not be undercut by our investments,” Continue reading →

SAVE to dine with VSU Foundation Monday

The VSU Foundation has invited SAVE to dinner Monday. No agenda is known, but the Foundation gets four attendees and SAVE gets two.

Foundation attendees are to be:

The two attendees from Students Against Violating the Environment (S.A.V.E.), each apparently twice as heavyweight as a Foundation Trustee, will be: Continue reading →

Weather report by Ashley Tye, Emergency Management Director @ LCC 2014-01-28

Lowndes County’s Emergency Management Director reported yesterday on projected icy roads today.

Here’s the video:


Weather report by Ashley Tye, Emergency Management Director
Regular Session, Lowndes County Commission (LCC),
Video by Gretchen Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE),
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 28 January 2014.

All the local schools are closed, public and private, K-12 and college, so the best thing to to is to stay home.

Commissioner John Page said a constituent had just asked him if Lowndes County owned any snow plows. Answer: no, but the county can get access to them if needed.

County Clerk Paige Dukes enumerated ways she had tried to get the word out, including this information on the county’s front web page, which will probably disappear without trace in a day or so, so I’ve copied it below. Continue reading →

Digital Economy Workshop Cancelled Tomorrow

Received just now by email from Julia Shewchuk.

Due to potentially unsafe travelling conditions through tomorrow morning and several people letting us know they would not be attending, we are cancelling the Digital Economy workshop in Valdosta tomorrow. Please feel free to come to the February 6th workshop and we will add an hour before or after to discuss ISP specific issues and review the business survey.

Thank you for your patience and understanding.

Julia

See previous post for details about the other workshop dates.

-jsq

Digital Economy Plan Workshop

Update 3:30 PM 29 January 2014: Thursday 30 January 2014 session cancelled due to weather; come to the 6 February 2014 meeting instead.

Received by email and there’s a facebook event. -jsq

Good Morning and Happy New Year!

We would like to invite you to one or more workshops to help us develop a Digital Economy Plan for our Region.

The Southern Georgia Regional Commission, in partnership with the Georgia Technology Authority, is coordinating and developing a Digital Economy Plan for the 18 counties in the South Georgia Region to identify the unique characteristics of the digital economy in our region, its strengths, weaknesses, its needs and its opportunities.

The focus and intent of the plan is to Continue reading →

South Georgia Farmers Workshop on Solar Power

Bryan Zulko gave me this information about a workshop Thursday in Nashville, Georgia. I don’t know if there’s a fee; none is mentioned on the flyer. Presumably the contact listed can tell you. -jsq

Learn How To:
  • Eliminate Your Electric Bill
  • Create an Additional income stream
  • Use Government Grants and Tax Credits
  • Access Grants Support & Financing
Guest Speakers: Continue reading →

Videos: 2 agreements, education, jail, alcohol, and a health care presentation @ LCC 2014-01-13

They vote tonight at 5:30PM. Probably there won’t be a repeat of yesterday morning’s presentation by District Health Director Dr. Grow. The county wants an architect for a new roof and shower in one jail pod; it’s considering two interagency agreements, one for Valdosta Inspections for Lake Park and the other for the county extension, plus setting election qualifying fees and a Special Assessment Rate for 2014. There’s a beer license and acceptance of infrastructure for part of Grove Pointe Subdivision.

Here’s the agenda with links to the videos:

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
PROPOSED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, JANUARY 13, 2014, 8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, JANUARY 14, 2014, 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street — 2nd Floor
Continue reading →

Change orders in DeKalb County

Manipulating construction contracts landed two former DeKalb County school employees in prison.

Rhonda Cook wrote for the AJC 9 December 2013, Former DeKalb schools COO gets 15 years: Judge rejects former superintendent Crawford Lewis’ deal for no jail time,

Prosecutors allege Reid sent work to her husband by presenting new work at Columbia as an extension of what he was already contracted to do and then Pope allegedly overcharged the district.

Prosecutors also contend Continue reading →

2 interagency agreements, education, jail, alcohol, and a health care presentation @ LCC 2014-01-13

We can probably guess who “Dr. Grow” is and the general topic of his presentation, but why does the county make us guess? The county wants an architect for a new roof and shower in one jail pod; it’s considering two interagency agreements, one for Valdosta Inspections for Lake Park and the other for the county extension, plus setting election qualifying fees and a Special Assessment Rate for 2014. There’s a beer license and acceptance of infrastructure for part of Grove Pointe Subdivision.

Here’s the agenda: Continue reading →

Valdosta Offers 5th Annual Government 101 for Citizens

Received today, with this note.

FYI—this is now open to any residents of Lowndes County, not just City of Valdosta. Please spread the word. It is a great way to learn a LOT more about your local government.

Tim Carroll
Councilman District 5
City of Valdosta

Here’s the application. Continue reading →