Always fun to be on the Steve Nichols radio show, 105.9 FM WVGA, especially when he just agreed to be the Master of Ceremonies for the 2021 Suwannee Riverkeeper Songwriting Contest.

You can ask Georgia Governor Brian Kemp to get GA-EPD to deny permits for a titanium strip mine far too close to the Okefenokee Swamp. While you’re at it, you can ask him to deny a permit for the Adel wood pellet plant. You’ll see our water trail signs popping up along the rivers and on the roadways, and we’re distributing the brochures. Don’t forget to come to the Solstice Light Parade at Banks Lake, Saturday, December 19, 2020, and the Suwannee Riverkeeper Songwriting Contest, Saturday, August 21, 2021 at the Turner Center Arts Park in Valdosta.

Here are WWALS videos.

• Introduction –Suwannee Riverkeeper on Steve Nichols radio 2020-12-08
  

  Video. I’m the Suwannee Riverkeeper, which is a staff position, working for fishable, drinkable, swimable water. Our umbrella organization is WWALS Watershed Coalition, Inc., incorporated in June 2012 as a 501(c)(3) educational nonprofit charity. We have board members scattered as far as Pine Mountain, Georgia, and Jacksonville, Florida, but mostly in the Suwannee River Basin watersheds.

• Water Trail signs and brochures –Suwannee Riverkeeper on Steve Nichols radio 2020-12-08
  

  Video. Using a generous grant from the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, we have printed 10,000 copies each of z-fold brochures for our two water trails: the Alapaha River Water Trail (ARWT) and the Withlacoochee and Little River Water Trail (WLRWT). Also thanks to Valdosta-Lowndes Tourism Authority for $500 towards brochure printing.

  Later that same day I picked up most of the at-water metal signs and this afternoon I’m picking up the metal signposts for them from the Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) in Tifton. Our Trails Committee Chair Dan Phillips is organizing planting ARWT at-water signs starting this weekend; let us know if you want to help.

  GDOT tells me the road signs we ordered have arrived up there, so I hope to photograph those before they put them on the roads. Thanks to the Cook County Commission and County Clerk Vicki Parrish for writing a letter to GDOT authorizing those WWALS purchases of road signs and signposts.

  
  All the ARWT signs and WLRWT top signs

• Ask GA Gov.: stop mine near Okefenokee Swamp –Suwannee Riverkeeper, Steve Nichols radio 2020-12-08
  

  Video. Since the Army Corps abdicated its oversight, only the state of Georgia stands between coal miners from Alabama and their plan to mine titanium for paint far too close to the Okefenokee Swamp, the headwaters of the St. Marys and Suwannee Rivers. We wrote to the Georgia Governor asking him to stop the mine, including most of the details I mentioned on the air. I have forwarded that letter to all the related statehouse members, as well as to the Director of the Georgia Environmental Protection Division (GA-EPD).

  You can also write to the governor and others:
  https://wwals.net/?p=54109#howtocomment

  Seems like this should be an issue in the current runoffs for U.S. Senate and Georgia Public Service Commission.

  
  Mine site, Okefenokee Swamp, TIAA land, TPM land

• Also ask to stop Adel wood pellet plant –Suwannee Riverkeeper on Steve Nichols radio 2020-12-08
  

  Video. The state of Georgia and one air quality permit is also all that stands between a company from Texas and its intended wood pellet plant in Adel, Georgia. Despite much local and other opposition, the Adel City Council already approved rezoning and annexation with only two dissenting votes. The plant would draw trees from a 75-mile radius, which includes the entire Suwannee River Basin in Georgia and much of Florida.

  You can ask the Georgia Governor and EPD to deny that permit.

  
  Adel, GA, pellet plant sourcing radius

• Suwannee Riverkeeper Songwriting Contest 2021-08-21 –SuwRK, Steve Nichols radio 2020-12-08
  

  Video. Steve Nichols has accepted the invitation from the organizing committee to be the Master of Ceremonies for the 2021 Suwannee Riverkeeper Songwriting Contest. That Fourth Annual contest will be Saturday evening, August 21, 2021, at the Turner Center Art Park, 605 North Patterson Street, Valdosta, GA 31601. Headliners and the judges will play, there will be food and drink, finalists will play, judges will judge, you can bid on the silent auction and kayak raffle, prizes will be awarded, and the winner will play.

  
  Flyer
  PDF

• Solstice Light Parade, Banks Lake 2020-12-29 –Suwannee Riverkeeper, Steve Nichols radio 2020-12-08
  

  Video. Bring your boat and lights to decorate it to Banks Lake, just west of Lakeland, GA, for the Second Annual WWALS Solstice Light Parade, Saturday afternoon, December 19, 2020. We’ll decorate boats in the afternoon, and paddle out in the dark of the new moon with excellent viewing from the new boardwalk and dock.

  Tickets are $10 for each person entering (yes, even for WWALS members; it’s a fundraiser). https://www.eventbrite.com/e/wwals-solstice-light-parade-tickets-124630460061

  
  Light Parade 2020
  PDF

Here’s a WWALS video playlist:

Water Trails, Okefenokee, Pellet Plant, Songwriting Contest, Light Parade –Suwannee Riverkeeper on Steve Nichols Radio 2020-12-08
Videos by John S. Quarterman for WWALS Watershed Coalition (WWALS),
8:30 AM Tuesday, December 8, 2020, on 105.9 FM WVGA, Valdosta, GA.

For more WWALS outings and events as they are posted, see the WWALS calendar or the WWALS outings and events web page. WWALS members also get an upcoming list in the Tannin Times newsletter.

 -jsq, John S. Quarterman, Suwannee RIVERKEEPER®

You can join this fun and work by becoming a WWALS member today!

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