Tag Archives: Save Our Suwannee

Video: Save Our Suwannee –Jay Jourden; deadline today for your song for Suwannee Riverkeeper Songwriting Contest 2020-08-22

Deadline today at midnight (11:59 PM, July 8, 2020) to send in your song. for the 2020 Suwannee Riverkeeper Songwriting Contest, on August 22, 2020.

Last year, Jay Jourden and band sang their Save Our Suwannee. Jay and his band from Ponte Vedra, Florida, swept the awards, winning a plaque for Best Newgrass Bluegrass, and $50 for Best Song from Outside the Suwannee River Basin, and the $300 First Prize, all for “Save Our Suwannee.”

You could win this year!

[Jay Jourden Winning]
Jay Jourden Winning

“Yes, Jay submitted the same song the year before,” said Suwannee Riverkeeper John S. Quarterman. “But last year he stopped in the middle, said he forgot some verses, and rattled off names of a whole bunch of rivers, all in perfect time. Naming rivers was one of the criteria, and it’s a great song: Save Our Suwannee!”

The three judges are ready to hear your songs, 7-9 PM, Saturday, August 22, 2020, at the Turner Center Art Park, 605 North Patterson Street, Valdosta, Georgia 31601. Headliners will play, finalists will play, silent auction and kayak raffle, judges will judge, prizes will be awarded, winners will play M.C.: Scott James of Talk 92.1 FM Radio.

Thanks to Dirty Bird and the Flu for handling sound.

Tickets to listen are on sale now, $10 online (children under 12 free), or $12 at the door. For VIP tables send email to song@suwanneeriverkeeper.org.

We’ll have a food truck, and a cash bar by The Pour House mobile bar.

Thanks to our top tier sponsor, Georgia Beer Company.

More sponsor opportunities are available. Sponsors get Continue reading →

Winners: Suwannee Riverkeeper Songwriting Contest

Valdosta, Georgia, August 25, 2019 — Everybody had a good time before plaques were awarded for Best in each Genre, from Folk to Funk, at the Suwannee Riverkeeper Songwriting Contest, before two finalists won the money prizes, at the Salty Snapper in Valdosta, Saturday afternoon.

Jay Jourden of Ponte Vedra, Florida, swept the awards, winning Best Newgrass Bluegrass, and $50 for Best Song from Outside the Suwannee River Basin, and the $300 First Prize, all for “Save Our Suwannee.” Jay promised to submit a new song next year, before he played it again for the very happy audience.

[Jay Jourden Winning]
Jay Jourden Winning

“Yes, Jay submitted the same song last year,” said Suwannee Riverkeeper John S. Quarterman. “But this time he stopped in the middle, said he forgot some verses, and rattled off names of a whole bunch of rivers, all in perfect time. Naming rivers was one of the criteria, and it’s a great song: Save Our Suwannee!”

Dick Grillo of Live Oak, Florida, won both Best Folk/Country, and $50 for Best Song from Inside the Suwannee River Basin, for “Dear ‘Ol Suwannee,” and his cheering section demonstrated it was the loudest. Continue reading →

Video: Jay Jourden singing Save Our Suwannee at SuwRK Songwriting Contest

Jay Jourden sang “Save Our Suwannee” and won a prize, at the First Annual Suwannee Riverkeeper Songwriting Contest, Saturday, June 23, 2018, at the Salty Snapper, Valdosta, GA.

Jay Jourden
Jay Jourden (photo by Bret Wagenhorst)

If there’s any song other than Stephen Foster’s that anybody knows about the Suwannee, it’s usually this one, which is a call to action:

The water table’s going down, cricks are running dry….
They say we need more power, there’s more rain in the sky….

But where’s that water going, and who says it’s so..??..
Somebody’s got the answers that we’d all like to know..!!..

Here’s the video: Continue reading →

For development, or not needed? US 84 widening from Homerville to Waycross

This paragraph sums it up:

300x388 Wetlands 29 and 31, in RE: SAS-2014-00862, Proposed U.S. Highway 84 Widening, by Gilbert B. Rogers, for WWALS.net, 28 May 2015 The project’s stated purpose in the EA is “economic development,” as part of the Governor’s Road Improvement Program created in the 1980s. See EA at 4. The NEPA regulations promulgated by the Council on Environmental Quality (“CEQ”) require agencies to examine the indirect impacts of projects — those growth-inducing impacts caused by a project, such as changes in land use and development patterns. 40 C.F.R. § 1508.8(b). Yet over and over, when purporting to examine the project’s potential for indirect impacts on various natural resources, the EA repeats, “The proposed project is not expected to precipitate substantial development along the corridor.”

Other questions include, why not use a narrower median? Why not leave trees on the median?

Below is the full text of the letter Continue reading →

Widening US 84 from Homerville to Waycross

300x232 Figure 4.1: State and Federal Waters Map, in US 84 four-laning from Homerville to Waycross, by John S. Quarterman, for WWALS.net, 28 April 2015 GDOT and the Army Corps want to widen U.S. 84 from Homerville to Waycross. Since it appears that US 84 is already four lane from Thomasville through Quitman and Valdosta to Homerville, and from Waycross onwards northeast, this would be the remaining gap. The public notice says little or nothing about why this road work might be needed.

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Public Notice, 28 April 2015, SAS-2014-00862 (SP-WMR), Widening and Reconstruction of U.S. Highway 84, with PDF. Since that notice says it expires in a month, there’s also a copy of the PDF on the WWALS website, including this location information: Continue reading →

Videos: Valdosta Wastewater meeting with slides 2015-03-17

Calls from Atlanta and from downstream in Florida about the three Valdosta wastewater overflows in February prompted WWALS as the local watershed organization to contact the City of Valdosta about organizing a presentation to the interested parties. Valdosta presented less than two weeks later, and brought their entire hierarchy related to this issue, from the mayor on down. Plus Lowndes County, which isn’t even responsible for Valdosta’s wastewater, was represented by their Chairman and a Commissioner. In Valdosta’s slides and the LAKE videos of that meeting of Tuesday 17 March 2015, you can see many questions were answered, but some are still open. Continue reading →