Tag Archives: Norman Bennett

Industrial Authority board meets Tuesday @ VLCIA 2012 04 17

Industrial Authority board meets about something or other Tuesday; hard to tell what. Maybe this will reveal some sort of strategy:

  • Target Market Study Update

VLCIA’s website is restored enough to say:

The Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority will hold a Regular Board Meeting on Tuesday, April 17, 2012 at 5:30pm in the Industrial Authority Conference room.
They’ve also posted a notice on their facebook page.

The agenda doesn’t say much. I guess that one time they put a lot of information in it was a one-shot. And if you want to see any old agendas, you’ll need to wait until they finish fixing their website. Or look in the LAKE blog….

Now, let’s see, where are those minutes?

Here’s the agenda.

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Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority
Agenda
Tuesday, April 17, 2012 5:30 p.m.
Industrial Authority Conference Room
2110 N. Patterson Street
Continue reading →

Videos @ VLCIA 2012 02 23

Here are videos of the February 2012 Industrial Authority meeting. Apologies for the poor sound. The room turned out to have very echoey acoustics, and no placement of the camera seemed to alleviate that. Also it’s in three chunks, the first of them quite long. In the interests of moving along and catching up on posting videos of recent meetings, we’re going to leave it like that for now. Here’s the agenda.

Here’s a playlist:


Norman Bennett, Tom Call, Roy Copeland chairman, Mary Gooding, Jerry Jennett,
Andrea Schruijer Executive Director, J. Stephen Gupton attorney, Allan Ricketts Project Manager,
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 23 February 2012.
Video by John S. Quarterman for Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange (LAKE).

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VLCIA website sort of back: organizational questions

The continuing VLCIA website problems raise some organizational questions.

According to the VDT yesterday,

Website technical difficulties were a chief topic of concern at the Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority Tuesday evening.

Staff expects the website to go back online in less than 24 hours

Well, let’s see:

Well, sort of. The links in the flash thing at the top do work again, so you can get to detailed pages. Well, some of them: Staff & Board works, but Meeting Schedule does not. This description still applies:

It was also pointed out that meeting agendas and minutes were still available on the crashed website, but were intermixed with coding language.
The latest agenda is available. I thank VLCIA again for that, as I did both in Citizens to Be Heard and after the meeting Tuesday.

Doubtless VLCIA staff are doing what they can.

As an organizational issue, I wonder if the electricity was out for a week at the VLCIA office would the Industrial Authority do this: Continue reading →

Strategic Plan Update and Personnel Policy @ VLCIA 2012 03 20

The Industrial Authority meets this evening at 5:30 in their usual location. It seems to be mostly about business parks this time, plus these interesting items:

Director’s Report –Andrea Schruijer

  • Strategic Plan response

  • Update on Personal Policy and Procedure Manual

Maybe they’re serious about input from the community for their strategic plan process.

Their website still has sidebar error messages like this:

Deprecated: Function eregi() is deprecated in /home/industri/public_html/modules/jsCookMenu/JSCookMenu.class.php on line 277

But it’s fixed enough that I could retrieve the agenda. This time they do not list what any of the expansion projects or potential projects are. They also still don’t say what the various executive sessions were for; I think real estate or personnel are the usual two reasons allowed by state law.

Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority
Agenda
Tuesday, March 20, 2012 5:30 p.m.
Industrial Authority Conference Room
2110 N. Patterson Street

 

Continue reading →

Still time to contact VLCIA board before tomorrow’s private prison decision

We learned yesterday from Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority (VLCIA) Executive Director Andrea Schruijer that we can expect an opinion from the VLCIA board at tomorrow’s 2PM board meeting about Project Excel, the CCA private prison whose contract expires March 13th unless VLCIA gives it a third extension, which they haven’t so far.

Roy Copeland
Roy Copeland
Chairman 		Tom Call
Tom Call 		Mary B. Gooding
Mary Gooding 		Norman Bennett
Norman Bennett 		Jerry Jennett
Jerry Jennett,

It’s not too late to express your opinion to this tax-funded (1 mil of your property taxes + SPLOST funds, for around $3 million a year) appointed board. Follow this link for contact information for the VLCIA board. Or sign the petition online and your signature gets emailed directly to VLCIA Executive Director Andrea Schruijer.

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VLCIA and local counties

In which of these five, seven, eleven, or thirteen counties is Athens, Georgia?

According to Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority (VLCIA), Regional Hub,

Valdosta is a regional hub for eleven Georgia counties and two Florida counties. Valdosta-Lowndes County acts not only as the regional hub for retail, medical, transportation and entertainment. Our community is also the regional hub for employment for five contiguous, predominantly rural Georgia counties and two Florida counties (as indicated in the chart to the right) and supports a thirteen county region referenced from the 2000 Census (see chart attached below).
The five Georgia counties are (alphabetically) Brooks, Cook, Echols, Lanier, and Lowndes, and the two Florida counties are Hamilton and Madison. In which of those seven counties is Athens, Georgia?

The thirteen counties, barely legible on VLCIA’s webpage, are: Berrien GA, Brooks GA, Clinch GA, Colquitt GA, Columbia FL, Cook GA, Dougherty GA, Duval FL, Echols GA, Fulton GA, Hamilton FL, Lanier GA, and Madison FL. Fulton County, Georgia? OK, that’s odd. Hm, the table is entitled

“Journeys To and From LOWNDES GA (Threshold = 50)”.
It’s about vehicles travelling in and out of Lowndes County. So Fulton makes some sense, due to people travelling between here and Atlanta. Local region, though? Not Fulton. Ditto Duval County, Florida. Jacksonville, local? I think not.

So maybe call it an eleven county region. In which of those eleven or thirteen counties is Athens, Georgia?

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Why doesn’t VLCIA buy locally?

Col. Ricketts reminded VLCIA board members at their most recent regular meeting (2012 01 17) that he had asked them for input about trees for Miller and Westside Business Parks.
We have identified trees from a nursery, Select Trees, in Athens, Georgia, with a special five year warranty on those trees, that meet our landscape plans for both Miller and Westside Business Park. As we discussed in our last board meeting, there is some cost savings available to us, and the ability for us to select trees now and hold them if we make a deposit.
OK, I commend VLCIA staff and board for trying to save we the taxpayers money.

But isn’t VLCIA supposed to be promoting local business and agriculture? Why is our Industrial Authority outsourcing to a company halfway across the state? Why doesn’t it buy locally, even if it costs a little more?

For that matter, aren’t there plenty of local trees, like sycamores, magnolias, and even longleaf pines that would cost very little to transplant to a local business park? Maybe those are the types of trees they’re buying. We don’t know, because only the board got the list of trees.

For that matter, why didn’t VLCIA put out a public request for bids for the trees?

Here’s the video:


Why doesn’t VLCIA buy locally?
Regular Meeting, Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority (VLCIA),
Norman Bennett, Tom Call, Roy Copeland chairman, Mary Gooding, Jerry Jennett,
Andrea Schruijer Executive Director, J. Stephen Gupton attorney, Allan Ricketts Project Manager,
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 17 January 2012.
Videos by John S. Quarterman for LAKE, the Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange.

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Videos of VLCIA Regular Meeting 2012 01 17

They sure did talk about Miller Business Park a lot.

Here’s the agenda.

Here’s a playlist:


Videos: Regular Session @ VLCIA 2012 01 17
Regular Meeting, Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority (VLCIA),
Norman Bennett, Tom Call, Roy Copeland chairman, Mary Gooding, Jerry Jennett,
Andrea Schruijer Executive Director, J. Stephen Gupton attorney, Allan Ricketts Project Manager,
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 17 January 2012.
Videos by John S. Quarterman for LAKE, the Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange.

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Video: Infrastructure, Westside Business Park @ VLCIA 2012 01 17

According to what Col. Ricketts said at their most recent regular meeting, apparently what VLCIA is accepting bids for today is Phase 2, not Phase 1, of Infrastructure for Westside Business Park. I still give them credit for at least posting an announcement of today’s meeting on their website.

The red rectangle indicates the area of clearing and grading for Phase 1 Infrastructure for Westside Business Park. Col. Ricketts said that had already been completed. This is all on Belleville Road near Lake Park.

They had already asked for bids for Phase 2, which is for an internal roadway, storm water and sewer, lighting, paving, etc.

They called for bids on the 24th, so the special called meeting of today (27th) is presumably to accept a final bid for Phase 2.

Here’s the video:


Video: Infrastructure, Westside Business Park @ VLCIA 2012 01 17
Regular Meeting, Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority (VLCIA),
Norman Bennett, Tom Call, Roy Copeland chairman, Mary Gooding, Jerry Jennett,
Andrea Schruijer Executive Director, J. Stephen Gupton attorney, Allan Ricketts Project Manager,
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 17 January 2012.
Videos by John S. Quarterman for LAKE, the Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange.

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Special Industrial Authority meeting today at noon

At least this time it’s on their website (under “RECENT NEWS”):
Notice of a Special Called Meeting of the Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority for the purpose of reviewing bids and awarding a contract for Westside Business Park Phase I Infrastructure Project on Friday, January 27, 2012, 12 Noon at the Authority offices, 2110 N. Patterson St. 229-259-9972.
That’s not a link in the middle; they underlined the date and time. Soon, maybe they will discover italics!

Here’s a picture from when they discussed this item at their most recent regular meeting:

Update 12:20 PM 2012 01 27: And here is video of Col. Ricketts at that 17th January 2012 Regular Session, saying Phase 1 had already been completed and they had asked for bids for Phase 2. So Phase 2 is presumably what they’re accepting bids for right now. I still give them credit for posting a notice of today’s special called meeting on their website. -jsq

Westside Business Park Phase 1 Infrastructure (Clear/Grading)
Regular Meeting, Valdosta-Lowndes County Industrial Authority (VLCIA),
Norman Bennett, Tom Call, Roy Copeland chairman, Mary Gooding, Jerry Jennett,
Andrea Schruijer Executive Director, J. Stephen Gupton attorney, Allan Ricketts Project Manager,
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 17 January 2012.
Picture by John S. Quarterman for LAKE, the Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange.

-jsq