Tag Archives: Valdosta

Policies @ SGRC 2016-05-09

5PM today, a Comprehensive Plan Update Workshop for Lowndes County, GA.

Received by email this Reminder:

The next two workshops for the Joint 2016 Lowndes County and Cities
of Dasher, Hahira, Lake Park, Remerton, and Valdosta Comprehensive
Plan Update will be:

Monday, May 9, 2016

5:00 p.m. — 7:00 p.m.

SGRC office, 327 W. Savannah Avenue, Valdosta

At this workshop we will review the
Policies. We will not have time to review them in as much detail as
we have with the Issues and Opportunities, which is why I sent them
out for your review ahead of time.

Continue reading →

Videos: Hambrick Road paving and traffic and Bevel Creek bridge @ LCC 2016-04-26

Thanks to County Engineer Mike Fletcher for doing almost

what Gretchen asked

at the Lowndes County Commission Regular Session 26 April 2016.

They rattled through
the agenda
with almost no questions, unanimously approving everything, including
the $89,005 in emergency no-bid repairs.
You’d have little idea why they were doing anything if you weren’t at the
previous morning’s Work Session or you didn’t view the

LAKE videos of the Work Session,
in which we discovered for example
it’s not

Beatty Creek Bridge, rather Bevel Creek Bridge.
Nonetheless, the County Engineer still said the creek name wrong.

Here are links to each of the LAKE videos of the Regular Session of April 26th 2016, with a few notes, followed by a video playlist.
See also the

LAKE videos of the Work Session of April 25th 2016,
and the agenda.

They meet again this morning at 8:30 AM. Continue reading →

Appointment, big subdivision w of Hahira, Hwy 84 lift station pump @ LCC 2016-05-09

This morning, coyly considering appointing “an elected official” (I’d bet Joyce Evans) to the
South Georgia Community Service Board

and reappointing Mr. Shamb Purohit,
at the Lowndes County Commission, 9 May 2016.
A 7-acre subdivision
REZ-2016-10 Freedom Heights, 4301 Bemiss Rd
and a 173-acre subdivision
west of Hahira on Franks creek,
and a
pump fo the
Hwy. 84 Lift Station,
all also
on
the agenda
to be voted on tomorrow evening. Continue reading →

Solar farm or fracked methane pipeline with explosions?

Which do you want? A 31 megawatt solar farm such as is building next to Albany, Georgia,
built by Southern Company subsidiary Georgia Power
to power 5,000 homes, and that won’t leak or explode?
Or the Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline that could blow up like

Photo: US Army/Fort Benning.

KERRY JOBE VIA AP

another Spectra Energy 36″ pipeline this morning in Pennsylvania, badly burning a man and incinerating his house?
After which Spectra declared force majeure, which Bloomberg spells out as
“Force majeure is declared to remove a company from contractual obligation because of events beyond its control.”
So apparently any promises Spectra or Sabal Trail made to you, your city, county, or state, it can just declare force majeure and get off the hook.
Even for a 40-mile-long and 4,000-foot-high plume of smoke.

Russell Grantham, AJC, 29 April 2016,

Old power gives way to new power in south Georgia, Continue reading →

Videos: Emergency no-bid repairs, a bridge where, and unnecessary resurfacing @ LCC 2016-04-25

The

FY 2017 Juvenile Justice Incentive Grant was a popular topic yesterday morning, and
some Commissioners showed a little bit of scepticism about that
$89,005 in

emergency no-bid

repairs
on

the agenda for yesterday morning and for voting 5:30PM this evening.

Also

$634,800 for a bridge we can’t tell where, and

some unknown fraction of
$1,663,888.78 to resurface a road that shouldn’t be used as a highway in the first place.
Who’s in charge of budget planning for the county?

At the end, there was

more from the County Manager about private road Carter Way:
they discovered another property owner (“at least one”) after they

agreed to spend $67,822 to fix a private road.

Here are links to each of the LAKE videos, with a few notes, followed by a video playlist. Continue reading →

Halliburton says fossil fuels unsustainable, lays off a third worldwide, including management

You know things are bad for fossil fuels when the biggest profiteer of them all takes an axe to itself.
The fewer fossil fuel boondoggles
(including

more pipeline projects going belly-up),
the faster investment will keep moving to

renewable sun, wind, and water power,
for profits, and we get clean air and water and less global warming.

“Tyler Durden”, Zerohedge, 22 April 2016,

Halliburton Fires One Third Of Global Staff: “What We Are Experiencing Today Is Unsustainable”,

In a brutally frank and painfully honest first quarter operational update, Halliburton president Jeff Miller poured freezing cold water all over the “oil is stabilizing, and everything is going to be awesome” narrative. After explaining that the firm has laid off one-third of its global employees, and pointing to the collapse in sequential revenues across every business unit, Miller exclaimed: “What we are experiencing today is far beyond headwinds; it is
unsustainable.”

Due to the deadline of its merger agreement with Baker Hughes Halliburtion has delayed its earnings conference call until May 3rd and so gave an operational update. The healdlines were horrific:

*HAL SEES OVER 30% DROP IN YR GLOBAL DRILLING, COMPLETION SPEND

Continue reading →

Road paving and Alapaha BoatRamp in Naylor Town Hall @ LCC 2016-04-14 @ LCC 2016-04-14

Most people wanted to know which roads would be paved when,
in Bemiss, to Alapaha Subdivision, and next to the new Civic Center.

They did also talk about the
planned new civic center and the

Alapaha Boatramp they’re building.

I thank

the Chairman for clarifying his

remark about paving every road in the county.
He and other county officials also went on about safety being a big concern,
which is news to me, on my road the county insisted on paving that became
a drag race track.
And what’s this about Continue reading →

Emergency no-bid repairs, a bridge where, and unnecessary resurfacing @ LCC 2016-04-25

$89,005 in emergency no-bid repairs on the agenda for Monday morning and voting Tuesday evening.

Also $634,800 for a bridge we can’t tell where, and some unknown fraction of $1,663,888.78 to resurface a road that shouldn’t be used as a highway in the first place.
Who’s in charge of budget planning for the county?

Why is replacing the fiber optic data cable that connects the South Lowndes Data Center and the E911 Center an
emergency repair for $61,020,
when apparently the problem has been going on for years?
Meanwhile, it’s good that it’s not an emergency that the 911 Center
Core Network Equipment
needs replacing for $38,621.
Planning ahead is good.
Is one of these items in the budget and the other not?

Another emergency not marked as such in the agenda is Continue reading →

Carter Way Correction by Bill Slaughter @ LCC 2016-04-12

Thanks to Lowndes County Chairman Bill Slaughter, here’s a correction to

Fixing private road Carter Way next to proposed Sabal Trail fracked methane path @ LCC 2016-04-12.

From: Bill Slaughter

Subject: Carter Way

Date: Mon, 18 Apr 2016 21:04:14 +0000

John,

I got a call today regarding comments that have been made about
Agenda Item 7.h on your blog page, for clarification COWART & Sons
was not awarded a contract for this emergency repair the contractor
was Rountree Construction!

We requested a temporary easement from property owner Cowart & Sons
to allow Rountree Construction to perform the work on a private road Continue reading →

Project Max and many others 6PM this evening @ VLCIA 2016-04-19

Is the mysterious Project Max a glass container plant as everyone seems to think?

It’s on

the agenda that suddenly appeared on the Development Authority’s website
this afternoon after Gretchen called to ask where it was.
She will be there with the LAKE video camera.

Valdosta-Lowndes Development Authority

Tuesday, April 19, 2016 5:30 p.m.

Development Authority Conference Room/103 Roosevelt Drive

Monthly Meeting Agenda Continue reading →

On the LAKE front

Citizen dialog for transparent process by the Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange