Category Archives: Law

Videos: Four board appointments, plus Justice, Water, and Alcohol @ LCC 2015-06-23

$16,915

to upgrade a water main to subsidize a developer,
but no approval of

$15,957 to study public transportation and truck routing.

Speaking of subsidizing private developers,
there’s yet more fallout from the failed 2007 mega-mall-and-subdivision Market Street project; see separate post.

And the Chairman

gave an excellent demonstration of why elected officials would benefit
by interacting and even debating with citizens, instead of
jumping to conclusions and preaching at them.

Here’s the agenda,
and the
LAKE videos of

the previous morning’s Work Session
and
the budget hearing immediately before the Regular Session.
Below are the Regular Session LAKE videos with a few comments,
followed by a video playlist. Continue reading →

Videos: Four board appointments, plus Justice, Water, and Alcohol @ LCC 2015-06-22

The Chairman said the Finance Director would make a presentation
about the

Adoption of the Fiscal Year 2016 Budget
Tuesday before they voted; he said nothing about that presentation
being the second Public Budget Hearing.
See LAKE videos of the first Budget Hearing
and of
the second budget hearing.

The

Commercial Driveway for Raceway on James Road.
is yet more fallout from the failed 2007 mega-mall-and-subdivision Market Street project; see separate post.
Also five pre-bidders but only one bid, this one from Scruggs Co., for

Widening of a Portion of Old US 41 N.

Why is the county paying the cost to

Upgrade Water Main at Lake Alapaha Subdivision
from 2 inches to 6 inches?
At least we found out where and why for the

Engineering and Surveying Services for Water and Sewer.

Here’s the agenda.
Below are the LAKE videos of the Work Session with a few comments,
followed by a video playlist. 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 →

Georgia Power starts selling rooftop solar tomorrow

For most of June, Georgia Power has had two ads rotating on the

five LED billboards in Valdosta, saying

Giving you the power to go solar —Georgia Power

When? Tomorrow, July 1st, as

Southern Company CEO Tom Fanning said
at the SO Stockholder meeting 27 May 2015.
Why then?
Because that’s when

HB 57, aka the Solar Power Free-Market Financing Act of 2015,

goes into effect.
As Tom Fanning has made his mantra since that meeting:

“If somebody wants to buy distributed generation, I want to sell it to ’em,”

Herman K. Trabish, Utility Dive, 11 June 2015

Inside Georgia Power’s move into the residential solar market:
The utility says it will offer solar through an unregulated business, but installers fear possible anticompetitive impacts, Continue reading →

Four board appointments, plus Justice, Water, and Alcohol @ LCC 2015-06-22

Adoption of the Fiscal Year 2016 Budget to be considered Monday
morning and voted on Tuesday evening (see LAKE videos of Budget Hearing of two weeks ago), plus
a

GEFA Loan Modification
(thought they approved that 26 May 2015 for the Alapaha Water Treatment Plant),
a
Justice Assistance Grant,
a

SCADA lease-purchase agreement,
and the annual controversial
Mosquito Contract.

Two appointees each to
KLVB
and the
Library Board.
We don’t know who, because the county
posted the agenda only in PDF, with no item sheets.

Public Hearing
approved last month for the

Abandonment of Buck Cato Road: what’s causing all of these in the last couple years?
And they’ve found an excuse for their long-desired Continue reading →

Videos: Budget Public Hearing @ LCC Budget 2015-06-09

For the budget they will vote on Tuesday June 23rd,
two weeks ago
Finance Director Stephanie Black said:

“This is the public hearing”

What happened to the requirement for two budget public hearings?

The County Chairman said they had $7 million in requests above the expected
revenue, so they had had a difficult time coming up with a budget.
For (some of) how they did that, see the
LAKE videos of the 18 May 2015 Budget Work Session.

Half of this budget hearing consisted of the same presentation from
that previous meeting.
Then County Manager Joe Pritchard

added Continue reading →

Videos: Deep South Sanitation litigation resolution, Animals, MAZ, Water, School @ LCC 2015-06-09

Not on the agenda for the 9 June 2015 Regular Session:

settlement agreement for the county’s unnecessary
lawsuit against Deep South Sanitation.
Commissioners had no questions, but I have two:

how much did the county spend on the lawsuit?
how much did the county end up paying DSS?

Also unscheduled:

Recognition of Leadership Lowndes Attendees.

Citizen

Billy Rowland
had some comments about road grading and wondered how Animal Control
could come take his dog from his posted property yet not do anything
when he reported barking dogs.

They approved a Scruggs Co. contract for

Paving on Coppage Road, which includes curb and gutter to
save some of the tree canopy.
They approved a

Bid for Bemiss Road Mowing even though it’s a state highway, plus
a

Bid for a Zero-Turn Mower for the Public Works Department from Nashville Tractor.
They
approved the

Bid for a Fire Pumper for Lowndes County Fire Rescue
and the

LCSO Patrol Car Laptops Lease Purchase and
tabled the

Lowndes Middle School Utility Service from Valdosta utilities.

Via LAKE open records request,
see the

board packet item
for the complicated

Moody Activity Zones
Text Amendments to the Unified Land Development Code
that were tabled for more time at the Tuesday June 9th 2015 Regular Session
of the Lowndes County Commission.
See the LAKE videos of the Planning Commission
meeting that considered the MAZ and the rezonings on this agenda.
The

Shiver
and

Kinsey
rezonings were
were approved unanimously
with no speakers from the public and no Commissioner comments.
The

Orchard at Stone Creek
rezoning discussion about a retirement home lasted for 14 minutes, including updated maps
that were only provided to LAKE on paper, despite a request for
electronic copy.
See also the
agenda
and the
LAKE videos of the previous morning’s Work Session.

Continue reading →

Most of June electric bill for overbudget nuke, yet the sun rises

While electric bills still are tilted against local solar generation

and Georgia Power continues to levy its stealth CWIP tax for its
nuke boondoggle, yet solar power is rising this year on
Southern Company and Georgia Power.

Bret Wagenhorst posted on facebook 9 June 2015:

I find it decidedly ironic that a large portion of my last month
electric bill went toward paying for a nuclear power plant that is
hundreds of millions of dollars over budget, and which will no doubt
cost millions of dollars a year to run and to manage its potentially
deadly waste. I wonder if the money spent on the nuclear plant were
used to purchase rooftop solar panels for all certified energy
efficient Georgian homes if we citizens might not be better off in
the long run. Thoughts?

Look for

Nuclear Construction Cost Recovery Rider on that bill: Continue reading →

Videos: MAZ, Water, School @ LCC 2015-06-08

Through a LAKE open records request, now

you can see
the complicated

Moody Activity Zones
Text Amendments to the Unified Land Development Code,
which affect everything from animals to retirement homes.
In these LAKE videos you can see the Lowndes County Commission
consider that and other matters at their Work Session of Monday 8 June 2015,
including

Lowndes Middle School Utility Service from the City of Valdosta,
two water well and septic rezonings on
Mt. Zion Rd
and
Touchton Rd,
and
water and sewer for 24 acres of The Orchard at Stone Creek, Tillman Crossing Rd.
Plus
Utility Relocation for the Replacement of Franks Creek Bridge on Morven Road
and
many bids, including for
Paving on Coppage Road;
staff recommends the Scruggs bid.

County Manager Joe Pritchard noted
many of the bids were
related to SPLOST in an effort
“to get those projects up and running as quickly as possible”.

Here’s the
agenda.
See also the LAKE videos of the Planning Commission
meeting that considered these rezonings and the MAZ. Continue reading →

Board packet item for MAZ ULDC Text Amendment TXT-2015-01 @ LCC 2015-06-08

It’s no wonder the Planning Commission wanted more time for these complicated
proposed county code changes to the Moody Activity Zoning Districts (MAZ).
The county could have just as easily put

the PDF of this item online with

the agenda.
They didn’t, so LAKE filed an open records request, which no only makes
these maps and text available to the public, it demonstrates
the county can supply electronic format via email.

Here’s plain text for the
Board packet agenda item sheet
and the
Planning Division Amendment Notes,
and images of all the other pages from the PDF.

On the LAKE front

Citizen dialog for transparent process by the Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange