Category Archives: Education

Videos: Pipeline, health, insurance, library, and alcohol @ LCC 2013-10-22

The big event was that citizens speaking about the pipeline got four of five Commissioners to come down and listen afterwards. And in a surprise addition to the agenda D.A. J. David Miller asked for and got approval for a victim assistance program. All this and insurance plan, health plan, a road closing, a grant proposal to renovate the Library (did the Commissioners get the whole board packet this time?) and let’s not forget a special performance on fire by Chairman Bill Slaughter, plus apparently the County Commission is in charge of rain like it’s in charge of alcohol.

Here’s the agenda with links to the videos, and a few notes. See also the previous morning’s Work Session.

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
PROPOSED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2013, 8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2013, 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor
Continue reading →

SAVE fossil fuel divestment on Spectator front page twice in two weeks

Winning PR by losing initial decisions: SAVE‘s doing it right.

Will Lewis write for The Spectator yesterday, SAVE fails to persuade Foundation,

“Compliance with your well-intentioned request is impractical for a number of reasons and perhaps even a breach of the fiduciary responsibility that all of our trustees take very seriously,” the refusal read.

Here’s SAVE’s request, and here’s SAVE’s president’s comment:

Danielle Jordan, senior anthropology major and president of SAVE, said, “There’s a lot of disappointment but we are not going to stop, we don’t see this as the end of our campaign. It lets us know where we stand with the Board of Trustees.”

The VSU Foundation’s Investment Objectives in the Investment Policy and Guidelines states that “Foundation funds should be invested to produce maximum total return consistent with prudent risk limits.”

On the other hand, the VSU Trustee Handbook says the Mission Statement of the VSU Foundation is: Continue reading →

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 →

Open House at Mildred Hunter on Common Community Vision @ VLMPO 2013-10-23

“We have broadband”, said Bill Slaughter, while other people had different opinions on that and other topics Wednesday night at the Mildred Hunter Community Center.

Corey Hull introduced the session and a small but vocal group of citizens discussed all the main topic headings. He noted that there are more than twelve plans already in place in the various cities and counties in the Valdosta Lowndes Metropolitan Planning Area. Yet there were many common themes in those plans, and VLMPO was looking for other common areas in these meetings and online, and more specifically strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. If you have a community group of any size, VLMPO can come talk to it. They’ve been to the Chamber, to Rotary, to churches, etc. They expect to wrap this process up in December, with common vision and goals for the next ten or twenty years.

Matt Martin Local officials present included Matt Martin, Planning and Zoning Administrator for the City of Valdosta, and Lowndes County Chairman Bill Slaughter. Martin didn’t say much, but Bill Slaughter was quite vocal. I thanked him for speaking up, even though I didn’t agree with everything he said. He helped clarify current county codes for stormwater retention, and Martin helped clarify the city’s codes.

As a long-time participant in local development (he’s CEO of Waller Heating and Air) Slaughter said when people are buying houses all they look at is Continue reading →

Solar SAVE goes to SGA about fossil fuels @ VSU

SAVE‘s fossil fuel divestment request made the front page of The Spectator at VSU, and Danielle Jordan of SAVE was pullquote about fossil fuels in another front page story, about solar panels on the Odum Library. The student government didn’t vote to support SAVE’s request, but many senators said they didn’t understand the subject and the student government asked to get educated about fossil fuels and divestment.

Jordan Barela and Von Kennedy wrote for The Spectator 24 October 2013, Solar panels bring green energy to Odum,

VSU is moving in a greener direction.

A solar canopy was recently built behind Odum Library.

“We cannot address climate change without decreasing our dependency on fossil fuels and solar is one way we could change that.”
—Danielle Jordan

The canopy is a 10 kilowatt solar array. The canopy produces energy that goes directly to Odum Library, and does not go to the Georgia Power grid.

Construction of the solar canopy began in September, and was finished earlier this month.

“It is exciting,” Danielle Jordan, president of Students Against Violating the Environment, said. “We cannot address climate change without decreasing our dependency on fossil fuels and solar is one way we could change that.”

The solar panels were manufactured by Continue reading →

Videos: Health, insurance, library, and alcohol @ LCC 2013-10-21

Vice Chair Richard Raines ran the work session, calling the meeting to order and moving briskly through the first item (minutes for approval). Commissioners asked questions on most of the other items. -gretchen

In the Library item Commissioners discovered even they didn’t get the whole board packet. After the meeting, Gretchen filed an open records request for the agenda packet, but if the county runs true to form she won’t get it until after they vote in the Regular Session tomorrow evening at 5:30 PM. Insurance plan and health plan took more than 20 minutes, with many questions from Commissioners.

Here’s the agenda.

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
PROPOSED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2013, 8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2013, 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor
Continue reading →

Health, insurance, library, and alcohol @ LCC 2013-10-21

The county is considering an insurance plan ( Section 125 or cafeteria or flexible benefit), presumably related to the health plan they’re also considering. They may abandon Green Lane. The only family living on Green Lane appears to be Alphonso Simmons Jr.

Here’s the agenda.

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
PROPOSED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2013, 8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2013, 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor
Continue reading →

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 →

Spectra maps @ Pipeline 2013-10-16

Lowndes County The path of the pipeline through Lowndes County (and part of Brooks and Hamilton) is shown in these maps that were on easels at the Spectra presentation at Wiregrass Tech last night.

Brooks @ US 84 and Withlacoochee River:

Brooks @ US 84 and Withlacoochee River

Lowndes @ Spain Ferry Road:

Continue reading →

Next Deep South Sanitation court date: 25 Nov 2013

According to Deep South Sanitation, their next court date is Monday 25 November 2013 at 9:30 AM, presumably at the Lowndes County Judicial Complex, 327 N. Ashley Street, Valdosta, GA 31601. The longer you drag this out, Lowndes County, the more good press DSS gets out of it. DSS reports 25 new customers for the fourth quarter, providing $125 to Lake Park Elementary School.

Oh yes, the alleged county attorney spending our tax dollars to sue Deep South Sanitation was the attorney for many of the cities that sued about LOST and just lost before the Georgia Supreme Court, resulting in many cities and counties scurrying around to make rapid agreements, including Lowndes County and Valdosta.

-jsq