Ordinance or policy?
That question comes up for at least two items,
Special assessment
and
Speed control devices,
in the
minutes of the 10 January 2011 Work Session
of the Lowndes County Commission.
-jsq
LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERSContinue reading
MINUTES
WORK SESSION
Monday, January 10, 2011
Moody and the Chamber won, rural residents got wasted,
and taxpayers still didn't get to see a single thing the Lowndes County Commission
voted on last night in 45 minutes (very long for them)
in front of the biggest audience I've ever seen there.
They appointed John "Mac" McCall to ZBOA. They revised the alcohol ordinance with some unspecified "changes to the fee schedule", and added another alcohol restriction to the Lake Park rezoning before approving it.
They approved the solid waste ordinance and granted a waste collection monopoly to a company from New York City despite all known public input being against it. Two more people spoke against it in Citizens Wishing to Be Heard.
Gretchen Quarterman recommended adding all the appointed Boards and Authorities to the county's calendar.
Commissioners accepted applicant's withdrawal of the rezoning request near Moody AFB and tabled indefinitely the related zoning code amendment. They approved rezoning for the Naylor Dollar General.
Commission approved four Decorative Lighting Special Tax Districts (forgetting it was supposed to be a public hearing), and a refund for one that wasn't.
Danny Weeks got approved a new netclock and new phones for the 911 center, and he and his staff got an award. The library railroad continues, the bonds renegotation was approved with about $2 million savings and some legal questions, the Annex has asbestos but they'll deal with it, and after Friday's demolition ceremony there will be a going-away reception for Chairman Paulk, and Bill Slaughter will be the new Chairman.
You missed all that and more at yesterday's Commission meeting.
Here's a video playlist of the Regular Session, followed by the agenda with the videos linked into it.
Update 2014-04-09: Fixed embedded video link.
Regular Session, Lowndes County Commission (LCC),
Videos by Gretchen Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE),
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 11 December 2012.
For reference here are the videos of yesterday morning's Work Session. And here is the agenda with links to the videos and some notes.
Continue reading
A surprising amount of discussion at yesterday morning’s Lowndes County Commission Work Session,
on ZBOA appointment, alcohol Sunday sales, rezoning next to Moody,
and more.
They said nothing about the solid waste ordinance, however;
maybe they’ll table that loser again.
They vote tonight:
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, DECEMBER 11, 2012, 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street — 2nd Floor
Here’s a video playlist of the Work Session, followed by the agenda with the videos linked into it.
Work Session, Lowndes County Commission (LCC),
Videos by Gretchen Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE),
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 10 December 2012.
Here’s the agenda, this time with links to the videos and some notes.
Continue reading
Commissioner Crawford Powell may have found solid grounds to deny
the proposed rezoning for a development near Moody AFB,
he revealed at
this morning’s Work Session of the Lowndes County Commission.
County Planner Jason Davenport explicitly linked this rezoning case,
7.a. REZ-2012-17 Lowndes Development, LLC, Davidson Rd MAZ II and MAZ III to R-10, County Water & Sewer, ~23.49 acres
to the zoning text code amendment on the same meeting agenda.
7.d. TXT-2012-02 MAZ II Residential Density
He also mentioned the TRC (the Technical Review Committee composed mainly of Lowndes County and Valdosta staff) had a split vote on this item, although he didn’t say how it was split. And he said the Commissioners had the Planning Commission recommendation before them, although he didn’t mention the Planning Commission recommended against.
Commissioner Crawford Powell brought up a good point:
The fire department and the TRC say in the notes that it fails to comply with fire rescue ingress-egress requirements.
Fire Chief Guyton appeared to confirm that was the case, although since he wasn’t at a microphone, it’s hard to hear. Commissioner Powell continued:
Continue reading
Lowndes County Commissioners had a small amount of open discussion about
the proposed changes to the zoning code related to Moody Air Force Base
at
their Work Session this morning.
However, most of the discussion was not about the changes currently proposed,
which the County Planner once again explicitly linked to a rezoning case
on the same agenda.
At least they discussed tabling the zoning code changes
until there could be more discussion.
They did not, however, say they would make drafts available to the public
or invite the public to discuss those drafts.
County Planner Jason Davenport introduced agenda item 7.d. TXT-2012-02 MAZ II Residential Density:
This text amendment is part of the response to some of the questions that were raised with the additional rezoning. At the end of the day what this text amendment is going to do is to take that very outer blue color, the lightest color, which is the MAZ-3, and recommend change the zoning to 1 acre. Currently it’s 2 and a half acres.
He mentioned they missed the 30 day requirement to inform Moody AFB by about a week, but Moody responded anyway. Hm, that’s not what he said to the Planning Commission; there he said they had allowed 31 days.
Commissioner Richard Raines said he’d prefer to table this amendment until next year, because:
I think there are other issues that we’ve discussed related to MAZ. If you have a mobile home and it becomes unlivable, under the restrictions you can’t replace it….
Chairman Ashley Paulk responded that he didn’t have a problem with that, and:
Continue readingAt the 8:30 AM Work Session this morning, will the Chairman
Clint Joyner (speaking) and J.D. Yeager (seated on right) of Joyner Realty at LCC Work Session 2012-11-12 |
invite Clint Joyner of Joyner Realty to speak like he did last month, without inviting anybody else? Will Chairman Ashley Paulk invite J.D. Yeager of Joyner Realty (and formerly Sheriff Paulk’s lieutenant at the Sheriff’s office) to speak? That plus solid waste (if privatization is bad for Moody, why is it good for a county public health and safety service like solid waste collection?), Dollar General (where’s the marketing plan to indicate whether tiny Naylor needs the area’s nineteenth Dollar General?), Library, (Houston County’s SPLOST passed in a landslide after they held public hearings; maybe Lowndes County should try that), and Alcohol (county staff say they’re coalescing previous changes into the body of the ordinance), all at the Lowndes County Commission Work Session this morning; here’s the agenda.
When he spoke 12 November 2012, Clint Joyner started by referring to a nearby subdivision “In 2007”. 2007 was the year Mr. Joyner got (according to the Commission’s minutes of 26 June 2007) $130,000 in road construction labor from the Commission because of “an unforeseen Department of Transportation requirement regarding a costly intersection improvement.” Why couldn’t the County Engineer or Mr. Joyner forsee such a requirement?
This time many people do forsee that rezoning to develop in the Moody Activity Zones would be a bad idea. Houston County is using state and local tax money to buy up houses in similar zones around Warner Robins Air Force Base. Doubtless Houston County would love it if Lowndes County encroached enough on Moody AFB that Moody’s missions moved to Robins AFB.
-jsq
Updates 9 Dec 2012: Marked with *.
Will the Lowndes County Commission Tuesday evening
finish railroading through their non-solution to solid waste disposal,
without shouldering its legal responsibility to protect
the environment and the public health, safety, and well-being from solid waste,
and what’s this about a vendor change?
Will the Chairman once again invite a developer to speak in Monday morning’s
Work Session without letting anyone else speak?
Will the Commission change the zoning code and rezone inside and against
the Moody Exclusion Zone for that same developer they already
provided $130,000 in road construction labor to back in 2007?
Does Naylor need the area’s nineteenth Dollar General, and who’s behind it, anyway?
How come the Five Points library is still on the agenda even though SPLOST VII failed?
And what are they doing to the Alcoholic Beverage Ordinance this time?
Come Monday morning at 8:30 AM and Tuesday evening at 5:30 PM and see!
Better yet, also call or write your Commissioner before then.
6.b. Solid Waste Ordinance
Will the Commissioners finish
railroading through their
already-failing non-solution to solid waste disposal
in the last session of this Chairman?
The plan for which they held
zero public hearings while any of
the Commissioners who voted on it this October were on the Commission,
yet someone down there feels free to
anonymously ridicule concerns about that plan failing?
Two citizens
spoke up anyway,
even though
Citizens Wishing to Be Heard
was after the scheduled vote last time,
and
another on this blog,
all willing to state their names, unlike the anonymous pro-trash-railroad
ridiculer.
What was that
unspecified new information
that caused them to table it last time, anyway?
8.b. Exclusive Franchise Agreement for Residential Solid Waste Collection Services with Advanced Disposal Services of Central Alabama, Inc.
What happened to Veolia; Continue reading
After briefly discussing or at least hearing items at the previous morning's Work Session, the Lowndes County Commission voted on them at its Regular Session of Tuesday 11 September 2012.
Here's the agenda, and the copy below has links to the corresponding videos or previous blog posts. Here's a video playlist.
Call to Order
Adopt Resolution Appointing an Open Records Officer
REZ-2012-12 Parker Place, 4842 Parker Place Rd., 0070 015; 3.4 ac., 3 lots, E-A to R-1,
well/septic
-jsq
Yesterday morning’s County Commission Work Session
started on time!
In addition to the open records and open meetings items,
it included a report from KLVB, two rezonings, typo fixes and date changes
in the ULDC, a vanity road name change, an alcohol license and an
alcohol ordinance change, a USGS river gauge, surplus vehicles,
purchase of a new fire truck, and more!
They vote on all this tonight at their Regular Session, 5:30 PM.
Here’s
the agenda.
5.a. Unsurprisingly, the County Manager suggested the County Clerk be appointed the Open Records Officer now required by state law. 5.b. They also have a resolution before them about review and approval of minutes of executive sessions, but of course they don’t allow we the taxpayers to see that before they vote on it.
They considered adopting subdivision infrastructure for 5.c. Glen Laurel and 5.d. Crestwood.
6. Videos of the KLVB report and of applicant Emily Macheski-Preston are in a separate blog post.
7. Public Hearings:
Continue reading
Apparently the Lowndes County Commission has noticed the
new provisions of the Georgia Open Records and Open Meetings laws
that
VLCIA’s lawyer explained to the Industrial Authority back in May,
seeing these two items on the agenda for Monday morning and Tuesday evening:
5.a. Adopt Resolution Appointing an Open Records Officer
5.b. Resolution Regarding Review & Approval of Minutes of Executive Sessions
Plus infrastructure for two subdivsisions, one of them the famous Glen Laurel, several well/septic rezonings, approval of USGS Funding Agreement for HWY 122 Stream Gauge (one of the four that let us know about river flooding in Lowndes County less than a month ago), a beer license, and approval of the changes to the ULDC that were discussed in the recent Planning Commission meeting, in the public hearing the public didn’t know about. And more.
Here’s
the agenda.
LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERSContinue reading
PROPOSED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 10, 2012, 8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 2012, 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor
