Category Archives: Incarceration

Videos: Sabal Trail and no-bid private Carter Way, no-bid Old US 41 N, Animals, VLMPO, Bemiss Road * 2, sewer, safety, and incarceration @ LCC 2016-04-12

In these LAKE videos you can see the Commissioners and staff didn’t mention the contractor for the emergency no-bid $67,822 to fix the Carter Way Culverts owns property on Carter Way. They never said how much the no-bid Old US 41N paving project would cost. Citizen Judy Havercamp thanked the Commission for the recent animal ordinance. She clapped, but did not get shouted down by the deputy; I guess his instructions only apply to people not complimenting the Commission. Citizen John S. Quarterman, president of WWALS Watershed Coalition, Inc., asked for wastewater spills to be posted on the county’s website and sent out by their alert system, and with a written letter updated the Commission on many recent pipeline developments and asked them to rescind their recent Sabal Trail easement or to help in other ways to stop that boondoggle.

See also Continue reading →

Videos: No-bid Old US 41 N, private Carter Way, VLMPO, Bemiss Road * 2, sewer, safety, and incarceration @ LCC 2016-04-11

The Old US 41N paving project is no-bid. If they bid, they would actually know which was the most cost-effective….

In his Report, County Manager Joe Pritchard asked them to add to the agenda an item about fixing a private road off US 84, Carter Way. Most of the Commissioners previously seemed to be unfamiliar with this issue, although we had seen Chairman Bill Slaughter and Commissioner Joyce Evans listen to what seemed to be a request for this same road at the Lowndes County Democratic Party Meet the Candidates meeting the previous Monday.

See also Continue reading →

VLMPO appointment, Bemiss Road * 2, sewer, safety, and incarceration @ LCC 2016-04-11

A very busy agenda, for Monday morning’s Work Session and Tuesday evening’s Regular Session of the Lowndes County Commission. See also the LAKE videos of the three county cases from the recent Planning Commission meeting.

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
PROPOSED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, APRIL 11, 2016,  8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, APRIL 12, 2016,  5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor

Continue reading →

Video: Project Max rezoning public hearing @ LCC 2016-01-12

The secretive Project Max container company better not be like when the Industrial Authority bragged about a prospect that would bring in 300 clean jobs and it turned out to be a private prison, which fortunately (after much public opposition) never happened. At last Tuesday’s Lowndes County Commissioner Regular Session, nearby landowner Mike Paine said he is afraid of many things, because it’s a rush job and nobody has told him anything concrete. The Industrial Authority, now called the Development Authority, says we should trust them. It would help if they wouldn’t say things like no emissions but steam, when burning natural gas produces CO2, and if they would admit that methane often leaks, and then it’s a far worse greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.

5.a. REZ-2016-01 Project Max, Rocky Ford Rd, E-A to M-2 123 acres

Video. About the public hearing for rezoning from Estate Agricultural (E-A) to heavy-duty manufacturing (M-2) for the hush-hush Project Max, the big-fish container manufacturing plant proposed for Rocky Ford Road, next to the protected watershed of Mud Swamp and near Valdosta Airport, see Continue reading →

Want to help stop racism? End the failed war on drugs!

If we’re tired of arguing over pieces of cloth, how about we do something about one of the main tools of racist oppression in the U.S.? Legalize drugs, thus stopping paying for 75% of the U.S. prison population, which is far more black than white, and is often rented out for literally pennies. Remember, slavery is not illegal in the U.S., as long as it is punishment for some crime. Second clause, 13th Amendment:

except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted

More black men are in jail, prison, probation, or parole now than were enslaved in 1850, as Michelle Alexander has noted. Anyone who says Continue reading →

Atlanta TV station exposes ALEC lobbyists in Savannah

Caught on-camera: ALEC’s off-duty sheriff’s deputies getting TV reporters thrown out of their own hotel for “taking pictures in the hotel”, after ALEC’s marketing droid denied any lobbying going on, nevermind the lobbyist and legislator in a bar spelling out how it works: ALEC gives “scholarships” to legislators who then meet in closed rooms with corporate reps (including all the companies involved in the Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline) who have equal votes on draft bills for legislators to get passed as law in many states. Bills promoting fracking, pipelines, LNG export, and against solar power, renewable portfolio standards, not to mention for private prisons and privatized education and against municipal broadband and country-of-origin labelling, plus many other corporate give-aways subsidized by the taxpayers and the environment. It’s time for the IRS to revoke ALEC’s 501(c)(3) status. And for the Georgia legislature to apply the state’s sunshine laws to itself.

Brendan Keefe and Michael King, WXIA-TV, 22 May 2015, Legislators and corporate lobbyists meet in secret at Georgia resort, Continue reading →

Videos: Bottled water, prisoner details, board appointees, and Easter Seals @ LCC 2015-05-11

One appointee bowed out, architect selection and public defender to the courthouse were clarified, and dog kennels were discussed, in these LAKE videos from yesterday morning’s 11 May 2015 Work Session of the Lowndes County Commission, with a few notes. See also the agenda, plus a new item 6 f. Server Replacement/Network Core Replacement. Continue reading →

Bottled water, prisoner details, board appointees, and Easter Seals @ LCC 2015-05-11


Picture by Michael Rivera, CC

Why is the county accepting Bids for Bottled Water Service? If its own water, or Valdosta’s, is good enough for the taxpayers, shouldn’t it be good enough for Commission and staff? They’ve also got a Bid for Coffee Service, but we don’t grow coffee here, as far as I know, so that’s not the same issue.

With many local people needing jobs, why does the county continue to renew an Annual Contract Renewal for Prison Work Details?

Looks like Joseph G. Stevens will be reappointed to the Lowndes County Public Facilities Authority. Both G. Norman Bennett and incumbent Anthony Payton want to be appointed to the one slot opening on the Valdosta-Lowndes County Airport Authority. Their applications were not included with the agenda, so who can say which one is most qualified?

I guess they didn’t decide to relocate the Public Defender’s Office into the historic Lowndes County Courthouse, since on the agenda is a three-year Lease Agreement for the Public Defender’s Office at its present location.

Looks like J. Glenn Gregory will provide the Architectural Services for the Lowndes County Civic Center Renovations and the Architectural Services for the Naylor Community Center, both funded via SPLOST VII. Both apparently without competitive bids.

Here’s the agenda, which also has Declaration of Surplus Items and Authorization for Sale/Disposal and Easter Seals Southern Georgia Presentation (Work Session Only).

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
PROPOSED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, MAY 11, 2015  8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, MAY 12, 2015 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor

Continue reading →

Videos: Peggy Green apologizes to Nydia Tisdale to avoid jail time

Tuesday morning assailant Peggy Green apologized a year after Nydia Tisdale asked. The judge remarked he was happy at the outcome so nobody had to face jail time. So, if you want your meeting to be private, don’t advertise it as “open to the public”. And when someone shows up with a camera, don’t try to throw them out, especially not physically.

From Nydia’s blog post here’s the video: Continue reading →

Videos: Day 2 of Budget Hearings @ LCC Budget 2015-03-04

Maybe Georgia should fund mental health facilities instead of local jails having to act as mental hospitals. On a positive note, Agriculture is an $81M industry in Lowndes County. Law, taxes, and education, in the second day which was only in the morning, of the three days of “Budget Hearings” which aren’t really hearings because nobody from the public can speak and they don’t have a budget to hear yet. See yesterday for the agenda. Here are links to videos of each item with some notes by Gretchen, followed by a video playlist. And one more day to go today. Continue reading →