Most attending ever seen at the Lowndes County, Georgia, Board of Elections! Potential closure of the Clyattville voting precinct was the issue. That won’t happen because of the strength of the Clyattville community in organizing and working with the union hall.
The union hall, at 5421 Madison Highway, is Continue reading
Way back in 2014 I calculated that half the right of way acreage of the Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline could produce just as much electricity, cheaper, faster, taking no land, using no cooling water, risking no leaks or explosions. Solar is even cheaper now, doubling deployed capacity every two years, and even Duke, FPL, and Georgia Power are building solar farms everywhere. So why do utilities persist in building more pipelines?
Net generation, United States, all sectors, monthly, U.S. EIA.
Every electric utility can read that chart from the U.S. Energy Information Agency, which shows wind (the middle orange line) and solar (the green line coming up from the bottom) adding up to almost all of “other renewables” (the top blue line), with nothing else growing like that. All the pipelines rammed through regulatorially captured agencies don’t come close Continue reading
PHMSA doesn’t have a public map of the Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline, but it does have a map of U.S. LNG Facilities, including many in Georgia and Florida. The source slides include many assertions about safety of LNG trucks and trains, but why should we take any risk for fossil fuel export profit to a few company executives and investors we solar power has no risk of leaks or explosions?
![[Detail: U.S. Southeast LNG Facilities]](http://www.l-a-k-e.org/govt/phmsa/2018-05-16--phmsa-lng-safety/se-lng-detail.jpg)
Detail: U.S. Southeast LNG Facilities
I’ve pulled out this detail of the U.S. Southeast, in which you can clearly see Pivotal LNG’s Alabama, Tennessee, and three Georgia plants marked with green circles as “Peakshavers with Liquefaction”, as well as Elba Island LNG at Savannah marked with a big red box. In Florida, Eagle (Maxville?) LNG at Jacksonville and Hialeah LNG at Miami are marked with stars as “Emerging LNG facilities”.
Here’s the bigger map: Continue reading
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
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
Be sure that if you are at all successful in opposing a pipeline you will get infiltrators, whether FBI or private security. Be prepared to deal with it, whether by checking backgrounds, or comparing lists, or by some other methods.
One of the most effective methods appears to be exposing what the pipeline company and their hired hands are up to, as The Intercept_ did about infiltrators at Standing Rock, using leaks from private security firm TigerSwan, which was hired by pipeline company Energy Transfer Partners (ETP) to “protect” its Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL). THE INFILTRATOR: How an Undercover Oil Industry Mercenary Tricked Pipeline Opponents Into Believing He Was One of Them, Alleen Brown, The Intercept_, 30 December 2018,
Joel McCollough, far right, at a climate march launch event in Chicago hosted by Food and Water Watch in April 2017. Photo: Courtesy of Gloria Araya, in
The Intercept_.
What he’s certain of is that the glimmer of opportunity he saw at the beginning of the pipeline fight was extinguished when The Intercept published more than 100 TigerSwan situation reports leaked by a former operative, revealing the security firm’s extensive surveillance efforts, coordination with law enforcement, and comparisons of water protectors to jihadi fighters. …
He remembers thinking at one time, “If they watch their p’s and q’s, they will be the standard. They’ll be the company that everybody’s gonna use.” The former contractor laughed. “That didn’t happen.”
DAPL is a petroleum products pipeline, but we heard some of the same Continue reading
Setbacks are requested by in the county and in the city for ZBOA tomorrow afternoon.
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) 259-3563Carmella Braswell,
Lowndes County Zoning Administrator
327 North Ashley Street, Valdosta, Georgia
(229) 671-2430AGENDA
Continue reading
January 8, 2019
2:30 p.m.
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.
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
Continue reading
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
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
Molly Stevenson, Engineering/Planning Technician, reminded Commissioners that the main reason for the Val Del Road rezoning is to be able to subdivide at a greater density. Then she recited the reasons to deny it.
Chairman Bill Slaughter reminded Commissioners they’d tabled it twice, and “I’d very much like to get this resolved at this meeting.” By which he meant the Regular Session this evening at 5:30 PM, not the Work Session yesterday morning at which he said that. At least one Commissioner had a question.
The second longest item was 6 m. Approval of the 2019 Commission Meeting Calendar, because of two questions by Commissioners.
Below are links to each LAKE video of each agenda item, followed by a LAKE video playlist. See also Continue reading
![[Conceptual Lot Layout Plan]](http://www.l-a-k-e.org/govt/zboa/2019-01-08--zboa-packet/VAR-2019-01XCoventryXVillasXandXXCoventryXSubdivisionXLotsX19-20XStaffXReport-0007.jpg)