Tag Archives: John S. Quarterman

Retreat, Lowndes County Commission @ LCC 2013-02-22

Clockwise: Stephanie Black (Finance), John Page (Dist. 5), Joyce Evans (Dist. 1), Demarcus Marshall (Dist. 4), Richard Raines (Dist. 2), Bill Slaughter (Chairman), Crawford Powell (Dist. 3), Paige Dukes (Clerk), Joe Pritchard (Manager) The Lowndes County Commission has retreated to Berrien County once again this year. So far they’ve talked about budgets and finance, LOST and SPLOST, departmental requests, and the local Land Bank Authority, with the occasional policy interjection. Commissioners and staff were clearly taking their tasks very seriously, although not without humor from John Page’s sneeze. And I congratulate them on going some place that couldn’t have cost much. I wish they’d talk more about policy and strategies for increasing the pie, rather than almost entirely about how to divvy up the existing pie. Video will follow; meanwhile here are a few notes.

On the one hand, it’s great that county staff have pulled together and managed with 30 fewer people, and while Commissioner Page was right that that’s efficiency, I think Chairman Slaughter was even more right in saying it’s beyond that, it’s beyond capacity. County Manager Joe Pritchard noted if there’s no SPLOST, the current Commission will have to decide between cutting some services and raising taxes. That’s no doubt true, and he indicated that Valdosta seemed to be waiting to hear what the County wants to do about SPLOST, while the county is waiting to hear what Valdosta wants to do. Several people remarked that the prior LOST negotiations (which are currently on judicial hold pending one participant returning from the current session of the state legislature) did affect SPLOST losing in the most recent election. I didn’t hear anybody suggest holding public hearings this time, but Commissioner Marshall did say it would be good to say what SPLOST funds would be for in some detail.

On the other hand, the Chairman asserted Continue reading →

Industrial Authority meeting tonight, about what, who can tell? @ VLCIA 2013-02-19

Same old agenda tonight at the Industrial Authority (only the dates change each month). It’s now buried three levels down on their website, but at least they’ve started archiving old agendas. Still no minutes, though, going on two years since the VDT publicly exposed VLCIA’s expensive price tag for old minutes.

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Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority
Agenda
Tuesday, February 19, 2013 5:30 p.m.
Industrial Authority Conference Room
2110 N. Patterson Street
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Acree Park at Hotchkiss Landing?

How about if Lowndes County buys the land next to Old State Road at Hotchkiss Crossing on the Alapaha River and turns it into Acree Park? That would be a much better solution to the trash, tresspassing, and hunting problems there than closing the road. And Lowndes County itsels claims it has plenty of money available for just such a purpose.

As we’ve seen, Lowndes County’s own Comprehensive Plan says the county has $500,000 in Acquisition Funds Available to “Adopt, implement, and update provisions of the Greenspace Initiative Plan to include land acquisition and resource enhancement/protection.” And that it plans to “Continue preparation and implementation of the Withlacoochee River Greenway Plan.”

What say the county acquires parkland at Hotchkiss Landing from Continue reading →

What does Lowndes Comprehensive Plan say about river corridor protection?

Future Development Map Lowndes County 2030 Comprehensive Plan Is the Lowndes County Commission a “Qualified Local Government”? Georgia state law says perennial river corridors shall be protected, all of the major rivers in Lowndes County (Alapaha, Withlacoochee, Little) qualify as perennial, and GA EPD rules say to be a “Qualified Local Government” a comprehensive plan including River Corridor Protection Plans with protection for a natural vegetative buffer area bordering each protected river is required.

GA DCA keeps a list of all the comprehensive plans in the state. Here’s Lowndes County’s 2030 Comprehensive Plan. The main document is the Community Agenda and here is the map. Hm, the map shows a light blue color for “Park/Recreation/Conservation” for parts of the Little, Withlacoochee, and Alapaha Rivers in Lowndes County, but not all. What about the rest of those rivers in the county?

What does the Community Agenda say? It doesn’t mention any River Corridor Protection Plans. However, it does say this:

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Return of water misinformation by Forrest H. Williams in the VDT

Seen today on the WACE facebook page is an image of an op-ed in the VDT, and alongside it I include here Michael Noll’s initial comments, plus a few links.

There is good reason why Stephen Hawkins once said “the greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge.” When entities like Fox News can claim that “solar won’t work in America because it’s not as sunny as Germany”, we shouldn’t be surprised by the results of such “educational” efforts. The fact is that we have a number of clean and renewable forms of energy (e.g. wind, solar, geothermal) that already work. Just go to Spain, Germany, Denmark, Iceland, or simply stay in the US and visit places like from New Jersey and New York to California and Arizona. Combine these pieces of a larger energy puzzle with meaningful initiatives of energy conservation and energy efficiency, and we find a way out of our current predicament (i.e. continuing dependence on finite and dirty sources of energy), while saving money (see solar vs. nuclear), preserving our natural resources (e.g. water, forests), and providing clean, healthy and safe environments to live in (e.g. wind and solar do not produce radioactive waste, pollute our air and groundwater).

The guest columnist appearing above is the same individual who thought

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Why did Lowndes County do nothing about a blocked public road?

Old State Road at the Alapaha River is a county-maintained public road. How could Lowndes County not have known that it was blocked by two huge blocks of concrete Seen by google earth 2012-01-24 at Hotchkiss Landing from late 2010 through at least early 2012? Why did Code Enforcement do nothing about it?

These blocks of concrete have to be quite heavy. This is not random litter, and no partier or hunter or 4-wheeler would have any motivation to block the road, much less with blocks this size. Who would? Why didn’t the county find out and do something about it?

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Videos: new website @ VLCIA 2013-01-15

Both Meghan Duke (PR and Marketing) and Andrea Schruijer (Executive Director) invited comments and additional information for the new website. They were speaking to their board at its meeting last night, but in the Industrial Authority’s new conversational spirit, maybe they’ll take suggestions from the rest of the community, as well. Both Allan Ricketts (Project Manager) and J. Stephen Gupton (Attorney) said the Hahira well site work was going well. They’ve got a new intern, and I reminded them about the need for fast Internet access. It was a long meeting by County Commission standards, yet short for Industrial Authority meeting: about half an hour.

Here’s the agenda, with links to the videos, and a few notes.

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Industrial Authority: new website, same old agenda tonight @ VLCIA 2013-01-15

The Industrial Authority has a spiffy new website under a new domain, buildlowndes.com, and with their new logo, formerly only on their facebook page. Their meeting agenda for tonight, however, is the same old recycled content-free placeholder.

I sure don’t miss the old hexagon menu, the new menu is up top and usable before they waste a bunch of space with stock photos. The Our Team page even links to the Linkedin profiles of Andrea Schruijer and Meghan Duke. While Allan Ricketts does have a Linkedin profile, it’s not very fleshed out and they don’t link to it.

The Recent Investments page is interesting, although it would be more so if Continue reading →

Industrial Authority working for solar in south Georgia @ VLCIA 2012-12-18

The Industrial Authority is working to find locations for some of the 210 MW Georgia Power got the PSC to shift from biomass to solar back in September. That’s a good next step.

Jason Schaefer wrote for the VDT 23 Dec 2012, Solar power push has Authority working to establish connections,

Since the Georgia Public Service Commission (PSC) approved Georgia Allan Ricketts, Projects and Existing Industry Manager, VLCIA, 2012-12-18 Power Company’s plan Nov. 20 to add 210 megawatts of solar power to its electrical grid, the Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority has been devising strategies to draw solar energy producers to South Georgia.

Georgia Power will issue a Request for Proposals (RFP) from solar energy collection and production companies in early 2013, according to the PSC, and the company will contract with the lowest bidders to purchase their energy and place it on the Georgia Power electrical grid for public consumption.

Georgia Power plans to add 90 megawatts to its grid from distributed generation (small companies producing between 100 kilowatts and 1 megawatt), and 120 megawatts of large utility-scale projects producing up to 20 megawatts each. The company plans to price the solar energy at $0.13 per kWh for distributed generation and up to $0.12 per kWh for utility-scale projects, according to the PSC.

This government-approved commercial push for solar energy could be a boon to sunny South Georgia as well as the greater Valdosta area specifically, and the Authority is prepared to accommodate the solar energy producers they expect.

Andrew Schruijer, Executive Director, VLCIA, 2012-12-18 “I think there’s a very good possibility of solar energy coming to South Georgia,” Executive Director Andrea Schruijer said. “Possibly in the near future.”

There’s more in the VDT story. It’s pretty much what Col. Ricketts also told me after the VLCIA meeting Tuesday a week ago. He asked me if I knew what “distributed” meant. I pointed out Georgia Power’s version of distributed was actually not very distributed, compared to Continue reading →

Education at Wiregrass Tech and startup funding, Chamber quarterly luncheon @ VLCoC 2012-12-18

Education at Wiregrass Tech, startup competition and awards by Guardian Bank, and more! Chamber president Tim Jones invited me to the quarterly luncheon of the Valdosta-Lowndes County Chamber of Commerce, held 18 December 2012 at the Rainwater Conference Center. I counted about 70 people there, and only maybe a dozen were Chamber board and staff, so that was a very well-attended meeting.

Keynote speaker Dr. Ray Perrin, president of Wiregrass Technical College said:

“Strong education systems are the heart of economic development.”

He congratulated VSU on the recent football win, as well as the various other local school systems, government bodies, and businesses, and proceeded to give an overview of what Wiregrass Tech is and what it does, which includes everything from automobile repair to computer science; from adult education for high school equivalency to advanced courses, in the eleven counties it serves, through the campuses in Valdosta, Fitzgerald, and Adel, as well as at Moody AFB and online overseas. He noted that changes in the HOPE scholarship and economic improvement had decreased enrollment, but Wiregrass Tech still has a large student body and is adding programs, such as in nursing and respiratory therapy. Plus a 97.5% placement rate.

Also in the plans is an Allied Health Education building 100,000 square foot facility that would cost about $20 million, for which Wiregrass Tech will be approaching the Georgia General Assembly in the next few years. Dr. Perrin invited feedback and requested assistance, both financially and in getting the word out about what Wiregrass Tech can do.

Tim Jones remarked that he was also on the board of the Wiregrass Tech Foundation which was in a fundraising drive, so anybody who wanted to donate could see him. (And it turns out you can also donate online.)

Here’s a video playlist of the entire meeting, followed by a few notes.

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