Category Archives: Lowndes County Commission

Videos: Annual Planning @ LCC Plan 2019-02-07

Here are the LAKE videos of the first day of the two day Annual Planning Meeting of Lowndes County Commissioners and staff. Gretchen is back down there today, videoing the rest.

Below are links to each LAKE video of each item, with a very few notes, followed by a LAKE video playlist. See also previous post for the agenda (which was not posted publicly) and a few previous comments.

Annual Planning @ LCC Plan 2019-02-07

Lowndes County Commissioners and staff are meeting for two days to discuss strategy, as they do every year.

Commissioners and senior staff, Participants

They didn’t post an agenda on lowndescounty.com, but Gretchen photographed the one they had at Chairman Bill Slaughter’s pond house, so here it is:

Lowndes County
Georgia
lowndescounty.com
Annual Planning Meeting
6926 Simpson Road ~ Hahira
February 7-8
8:30 a.m.


Agenda
Audit Continue reading

Service Delivery Strategy (SDS) Meeting: Lowndes County and cities @ SDS 2019-02-04

Update 2019-03-04: WWALS videos.

At least some elected officials from at least Lowndes County and Valdosta will be gathering Monday on neutral ground to discuss tax revenue allocation. Apparently this is a public meeting which anyone can attend.

In its usual laconic manner, this is all the county says in its online calendar:

SDS Meeting

Date: February 4, 2019

Time: 5:00 PM

Location: Valdosta- Lowndes County Parks and Recreation Authority Offices

Address: 1901 North Forrest Street
Valdosta, GA 31601

Street View, Image
Google Street View, VLPRA, 1901 N. Forrest Street, Valdosta, GA 31601

A usually reliable source says this meeting is for voting Council and Commissioners, and the Mayor and Chairman were not invited. I don’t know if elected members of Council would only be from Valdosta, or also from Remerton, Lake Park, Hahira, and Dasher. If a quorum of any Council or Commissioners for any of these elected bodies is present, Georgia law requires it to be an open meeting which the public may attend. I can’t imagine the county would have posted it publicly if it wasn’t.

The offices of the Valdosta-Lowndes County Parks and Recreation Authority (VLPRA) are neutral ground, because Continue reading

Videos: Mystery Simpson Road paving, taxes, alcohol, emergency, roads, and law @ LCC 2019-01-22

They vote 5:30 PM this evening on what they discussed this morning. Longest at two minutes was 5 g. Abandonment of McLeod Road, followed by 5 i. Speed Zone Ordinance (apparently something was not right at exit 2), and then at just under a minute: 6 a. Paving on Parker Road and Simpson Road. Will Scruggs or Reames get the $2 million-plus contract for paving? (Hint: Reames is the low bidder.)

Oops, sorry: the unscripted 7. Reports – County Manager actually came in second at 1 minute and 44 seconds.

Finally, after 9. Adjournment, there was a reminder of some mystery swearing in at 5PM.

Below are links to each LAKE video of each agenda item, followed by a LAKE video playlist. See also Continue reading

Mystery Simpson Road paving, taxes, alcohol, emergency, roads, and law @ LCC 2019-01-22

Due to Monday being Martin Luther King Jr. Day, both the Work Session and the Regular Session will be on Tuesday, January 22, 2019, at 8:30 AM and 5:30 PM. Last time they approved paying for right of way on Simpson Road. This time they’re approving Paving on Parker Road and Simpson Road. Why does Simpson Road get this exception to their decade-long custom of never paying for road right of way? Will Scruggs or Reames get the $2 million-plus contract for paving? (Hint: Reames is the low bidder.)

Qpublic-lowndes,
Simpson Road in Lowndes County Tax Assessor Maps.

Meanwhile, the county apparently borrowed money for paving, and is tinkering the Special Assessment Rate for 2019 from 6.5% to 7.5%.

Hm, the county “currently receives $32,770 annually” Continue reading

Videos: County paying for road right of way @ LCC 2019-01-08

They added two items to the agenda they didn’t even mention in the previous morning’s Work Session: purchase of some real estate on Davidson Road near Moody Air Force Base, and “just compensation” for right of way on Simpson Road.

Wait a minute! For ten years we’ve been told the county no longer buys rights of way: if you want your road paved, you have to donate the right of way. So why this exception? And why sneak it in like this?

Will Kamisha Martin get paid for right of way if the county paves Black Road? Will Rev. Berlinda Hart Love get paid for right of way if the county paves Williams School Road? They were the two citizens who were heard.

Not on the agenda were Continue reading

Videos: Retreat! Appointment to Development Authority, Abandon Reed Road, Ed Hay Lease, Forestry Speaks @ LCC 2019-01-07

Longest Monday morning was Chief Ranger Stephen Spradley’s Georgia Forestry report, a copy of which, scanned by Gretchen, is on the LAKE website.

Second longest was Chairman Bill Slaughter’s comments, in which he listed four upcoming events: Continue reading

County and city setbacks @ ZBOA 2019-01-08

Setbacks are requested by in the county and in the city for ZBOA tomorrow afternoon.

[Conceptual Lot Layout Plan]
Conceptual Lot Layout Plan

The agenda packet is on the LAKE website, courtesy of ZBOA member Gretchen Quarterman.

Here is the agenda:

Valdosta – Lowndes County Zoning Board of Appeals

Matt Martin,
Valdosta Planning and Zoning Administrator
300 North Lee Street, Valdosta, Georgia
(229) 259-3563

Carmella Braswell,
Lowndes County Zoning Administrator
327 North Ashley Street, Valdosta, Georgia
(229) 671-2430

AGENDA
January 8, 2019
2:30 p.m.

Continue reading

Appointment to Development Authority, Abandon Reed Road, End Hay Lease, Forestry Speaks @ LCC 2019-01-07

It’s the end of an era at the Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority (VLCIA), excuse me, the Development Authority, now that Roy Copeland declined to be reappointed. To his joint-appointment position, Valdosta appointed Aneesha Johnson, and the Lowndes County Commission may confirm Tuesday.

Aneesha Johnson
DuPont Valdosta Plant Names Johnson New Plant Manager, Valdosta Today, 29 June 2015.

In Monday morning’s Work Session, they will also consider abandoning the end of Reed Road (presumably the part that runs down to the Withlacoochee River), and ending the hay lease (presumably on the county’s Land Application Site). Chief Ranger Stephen Spradley of Georgia Forestry will say a few words. They vote Tuesday at 5:30 PM.

Here’s the agenda.

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
PROPOSED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, JANUARY 7, 2018, 8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, JANUARY 8, 2018, 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor

Continue reading

Videos: slightly larger: The Settlement North on Val Del Road @ LCC 2018-12-11

In their one December 2018 Regular Session, they couldn’t bring themselves to reject a rezoning, but they did require still larger lot sizes, for the Val Del Road rezoning.

That was the most elaborate series of motions I’ve seen on anything in the dozen years I’ve been following the Lowndes County Commission. It even exceeds the time somebody tried to rezone next to my west field and they denied that one by not voting.

Nothing else took more than a few minutes. The County Manager asked for an emergency to Continue reading