Category Archives: Lowndes County Commission

Videos: Anti-Tethering, Budget, Surplus, Abandonment, Evidence, Workers Comp, Manhole @ LCC 2015-01-26

Mike Allen, former Utilities Director, no longer works for the county as of last Friday, according to County Manager Joe Pritchard. Dr. Amanda Hall proposed an anti-tethering ordinance. Both at yesterday morning’s Work Session of the Lowndes County Commission.

Lowndes County won an award for its budget as “a policy document, a financial plan, an operations guide and a communications device.” All good except: as a communications device? They’d probably have to publish drafts of it before they passed it for that to be true. Unless they mean as in a public telling, not a public hearing. They won last year, too, along with 45 other winners in Georgia, including Valdosta. Award, or passing grade? They’ll present it tonight at the Regular Session.

No rezonings, but surplus computing devices, abandonment of Deloach Road E (CR 95), more on the never-ending juvenile justice Evidence Based Associates topic, Workers Compensation Insurance Renewal, and sewer gasses corrode manhole covers. I wonder how much gases corrode pipelines?

See the agenda. Videos are linked below, followed by a video playlist.

Continue reading →

1 church, 2 small, 1 subdivision @ GLPC 2015-01-26

The Central Avenue Church of Christ wants to rezone 5.6 acres to Downtown Commercial, while the two small rezonings are on Old Pine Road and Skipper Bridge Road, plus Devine Subdivision on Tillman Crossing. This meeting already happened tonight.

Thanks to Lowndes County for starting to post Planning Commission agendas including this one. -jsq

Greater Lowndes Planning Commission
Lowndes County City of Valdosta City of Dasher City of Hahira City of Lake Park
REGULAR MONTHLY MEETING
AGENDA
Lowndes County South Health District Administrative Office
325 West Savannah Avenue
Monday, January 26, 2015 * 5:30 P.M. * Public Hearing

Continue reading →

Break the Chains: anti-tether ordinance @ LCC 2015-01-26

Their ordinance is the agenda for Monday morning’s Work Session, and a local organization called Break the Chains is sponsoring a facebook event to get people to show up for Tuesday evening’s Regular Session at 5:30 PM 26 January 2015 to recommend the Commission should pass it.

Joe Adgie, VDT, 24 January 2015, Anti-chain ordinance in future? Continue reading →

Videos: Packets, paving, safety, trash, education, appointment, jail, taxes, water @ LCC 2015-01-13

Teri Lupo reappointed to VLDA and almost all the Commissioners asked questions at some point during the at the Tuesday 5:30 PM 13 January 2015 Regular Session of the Lowndes County Commission, at which two new Commissioners got to vote. Several citizens spoke, on getting board packets on the web, on getting their road paved, on safety on Val Del Road and reopening some of the waste collection sites, and the National Council of Negro Women; the Chairman weighed in on a couple of topics.

They meet again Monday morning 26 January 2015 plus a Special Called Meeting on Waste Management that same morning.

The Alapaha River Water Trail resolution, according to the Chairman before the meeting, is waiting until they’re ready to dedicate the new boat ramp at US 84, which is waiting until the river water goes down enough to pour concrete. Maybe some time this spring.

See the agenda for details on what they were considering, and see the videos of the previous morning’s Work Session for background. Below are links to the LAKE videos of each agenda item, followed by a video playlist. See also the county’s own much more professional one big long video.

Continue reading →

Videos: VLDA appointment, jail, taxes, water @ LCC 2015-01-12

Teri Lupo was available for questions about being reappointed to VLDA at the Monday 8:30 AM 21 12 January 2015 Work Session of the Lowndes County Commission. There were no questions, but Commissioners Demarcus and one other (I think Mark Wisenbaker) had compliments. The Chairman asked for a motion to appoint, but was reminded this was a Work Session, so wait until the next evening for that.

The agenda item for the resolution in support of the Alapaha River Water Trail, according to the Chairman before the meeting, is waiting until they’re ready to dedicate the new boat ramp at US 84, which is waiting until the river water goes down enough to pour concrete. Maybe some time this spring.

See the agenda for details on what they were considering. Below are links to the LAKE videos of each agenda item, followed by a video playlist. See also the county’s own much more professional one big long video.

Continue reading →

Solid Waste Special Called Meeting @ LCC Waste 2015-01-26

Check it out the notification thingy from the county actually works. We got notified of a special called meeting.

From: listserv@civicplus.com
Date: 22 Jan 2015 13:52:48 -0600
Subject: New Event Special Called Meeting For cp-stcity2.civicplus.com

A new Event now appears on our site. Please click on the link below to go dir ectly to the new posting.

here.

A link under “News Flash” on the county’s front page leads to this slightly different version: Continue reading →

Budget, Surplus, Abandonment, Evidence, Workers Comp, Manhole @ LCC 2015-01-26

Update 25 January 2015: Additional item #5 Anti-Chaining Ordinance Request – Dr. Amanda Hall; see separate post.

Lowndes County won an award for its budget as “a policy document, a financial plan, an operations guide and a communications device.” All good except: as a communications device? They’d probably have to publish drafts of it before they passed it for that to be true. Unless they mean as in a public telling, not a public hearing. They won last year, too, along with 45 other winners in Georgia, including Valdosta. Award, or passing grade?

No rezonings, but surplus computing devices, abandonment of Deloach Road E (CR 95), more on the never-ending juvenile justice Evidence Based Associates topic, and sewer gasses corrode manhole covers. I wonder how much gases corrode pipelines?

The agenda (PDF) still doesn’t give the dates; just Monday and Tuesday, so I’ve inserted them in [brackets]. But congratulations on having the agenda online a week in advance!

LOWNDES COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
PROPOSED AGENDA
WORK SESSION, MONDAY, [January 26th] 8:30 a.m.
REGULAR SESSION, TUESDAY, [January 27th] 5:30 p.m.
327 N. Ashley Street – 2nd Floor

Continue reading →

Expanded agenda, VLDA appointment, jail, taxes, water @ LCC 2015-01-12

Whose terms are up and who’s being considered for appointment (Teri Lupo for VLDA again), who bid and how much (including showers and roofing for the jail), and some detail about two tax rates: these are all big improvements to the agenda! I do wonder where the agenda item for the Water Trail resolution is.

However, there’s room for improvement. Even though you get this same extended agenda when you select “packet” for download, it is not the complete board packet. For example, each agenda item has a one or more page agenda item form, and each proposed agreement or contract typically is include in the paper packets the Commissioners get. There are no rezoning cases on this agenda, but when there are, those always contain several maps in the board packet, and often other information. There’s an HTML version of the agenda, in addition to PDF: that’s another big improvement! The HTML code includes this at the end of each item:

<div class="documents"> </div>

So it looks like the website software the county is using is prepared to include such documents. Maybe the county will actually include them soon.

Here’s the agenda in HTML and in PDF on the county’s website, and I’ve also included it inline below. Continue reading →

Sunshine for local government

We’ve got a little list, a spreadsheet as a list,
please don’t take this as a diss, we think they have been missed….

Unlike Ko-Ko’s in the Mikado, this list is of things previously missed that are slowly being found (or created), so local governments can tell the citizens what fine things they’ve been up to, and so citizens can decide what they need to deal with and what topics they can provide input on. Here’s the LAKE sunshine list for local government.

The Lowndes County Commission just got some additions, with its new website, by posting videos of its own meetings, and by posting agendas and minutes for the Planning Commission.

The Valdosta City Council does pretty well, with its website, its agendas and minutes, and the agendas and summaries and minutes for ZBOA. Valdosta does not (yet) video and post its own meetings, but it does have what appears to be a complete list of its ordinances with links to their text. Dasher also has its ordinances online.

Meanwhile the Lowndes County Commission has only Continue reading →

Housing, paving, appointments, solar, packets, wells, pipeline, and trash! @ Town Hall Meeting 2014-12-15

Very respectable turnout and impressive interaction at the first-ever Town Hall by an individual Lowndes County Commissioner: Demarcus Marshall, Super District 4, 15 December 2014. See and read his State of District 4 address. You can read his summary of issues and concerns, and you can watch citizens express those concerns in the LAKE video playlist: Continue reading →