Update 2016-04-28: The ordinance.
Rachel Walsh reports from the meeting that the fracking ordinance passed the Madison BOCC.
The
agenda item for tonight:
New Business 1. 6:00 p.m. Public Hearing For Possible Enactment of Ordinance Prohibiting Fracking in Madison County.
It’s been discussed in several previous meetings, with a hearing two weeks ago, reported by Morgan Norwood and Megan Vaughn, WTXL, 13 April 2016, Madison County Residents Voice Opinions in Fracking Debate, Continue reading
Julie Bowland reports:
Joy of joys! The humongous mud hole in the access road to the boat ramp off 133 across from the prison has finally been filled! And a sign calling it a park…could WWALS brochures be far behind?
This is the Little River Boat Ramp on the Withlacoochee and Little River Water Trail (WLRWT).
George Page, Executive Director of the Valdosta-Lowndes Parks & Rec Authority (VLPRA), told me it seems like a year or more ago that he had found funds to fix that access, and now I guess it’s happening.
It’s always been a park, listed under VLPRA as Continue reading
Update 2016-04-29: Canceled due to gators. Stay tuned for rescheduling.
The VSU Anthropology Club has asked WWALS to send volunteers to help clean up a private lake in Valdosta.
When: 9AM Saturday 30 April 2016
Where: End of Wedgewood Drive at Bancroft Road
In charge: VSU Anthropology Club aka Anthro-Geeks
Facebook: event, which says: Continue reading
Here’s a
map of all rivers in the U.S. by Nelson Minar.
It actually covers the lower 48 states and is pretty impressive at that scale.
Plus you can zoom in.
Here you can see rivers running to the Gulf start all the way up Continue reading
Mystery finally solved of where is the road over what creek does Lowndes County Georgia want to replace a bridge?
Item
6.b. Replacement of Beatty Creek Bridge on Williams Road,
for
yesterday morning’s Lowndes County Commission Work Session:
where is this for the $634,800 low bid from Southern Concrete Construction of Albany, GA?
There are two Williams Roads in Lowndes County and no Beaty Creek.
In the north end of the county Cat Creek has a tributary Beatty Mill Creek,
with a Williams Road running near it between
Upper New Bethel Road and Beatty Mill Creek Road.
But according to all the maps I can find, Williams Road does not cross
Beatty Mill Creek.
So what exactly is it that the county wants to pay the low bidder $634,800 for? In the 8:30 AM Tuesday 25 April 2016 Work Session, Commissioner Mark Wisenbaker asked, “Where exactly is this?” Continue reading
Sent yesterday to the Chairman, the other five elected Lowndes County Commissioners, and the County Clerk (PDF). They meet again 5:30PM Tuesday evening, April 25th 2016.
Dear Commissioners,
Thanks to Chairman Bill Slaughter for saying in the Valdosta Daily Times that the Commission signing an easement contract was not an endorsement of the Sabal Trail pipeline.[1] Therefore I ask you to:
- Invite the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to investigate on site and on paper the numerous omissions by Sabal Trail of springs and underground water transmissivity in what it told the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission; .please see the letter from WWALS to the Army Corps,[2] attached with the letter from WWALS to you of April 12th.
Ask our U.S. Congress member Austin Scott (GA-08) to join the four Georgia Congress members who have already asked FERC to fix its processes or deny a permit for Sabal Trail.[3]
- Join the hundreds of organizations and thousands of individuals who have already asked the U.S. Congress to call in the General Accounting Office (GAO) to review FERC’s permitting processes.[4]
Please find appended further information about the issues the Chairman raised in the VDT of eminent domain, in differences in regulation of oil and gas pipelines, and in environmental and safety issues of natural gas pipelines.
Since I wrote to you on April 12th, two more major natural gas pipelines have run into serious problems.
On April 20th, Kinder Morgan shelved Continue reading
Noon to 3PM today, WWALS will be on the VSU front lawn with
Students Against Violating the Environment (S.A.V.E.),
celebrating Earth Day, recommending along with Waterkeeper Alliance: Keep it in the Ground, especially fracking for pipelines including Sabal Trail, and congratulating Lowndes County on progress on the new Naylor Boatramp and Valdosta on finally almost just about pretty soon finishing its fixes to stop spilling sewage into our rivers.
Tomorrow at 8AM, come paddle with WWALS from Hotchkiss Road in Lanier County to Mayday in Echols County, past the new park and boat ramp Lowndes County is building just north of US 84. Next month at Reed Bingham State Park between Adel and Moultrie, GA, it’s the BIG Little River Paddle Race, registration 8-9AM Saturday May 21, 2016. And in June come paddle on the Withlacoochee River from Florida Campsites Ramp to Suwannee River State Park, Saturday June 4, 2016. Before then we hope to invite everybody downstream from Valdosta’s sewage spills to attend the end-of-May signing ceremony for the new Valdosta force main and uphill Withlacoochee Wastewater Treatment Plant!
If you fall in on one of these outings, you could win Continue reading
Since falling out of boats into our rivers is popular during outings, Phil Hubbard made these nifty plaques for Fallers.
Phil also made a small WWALS flag. Continue reading
So Lowndes County should have no problem asking the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to come investigate what Sabal Trail didn’t tell FERC.
And if the county is concerned about legal expenses, maybe it should pay attention
to the lawsuits happening right now in California about a natural gas leak
that went up into the air, closing schools, evacuating hundreds, and making many of them sick.
The VDT article today doesn’t mention writing a letter to the Corps was one of my requests to the county. It does quote the Chairman expresssing interest in details of eminent domain, in differences in regulation of oil and gas pipelines, and in environmental and safety issues of natural gas pipelines. Treating his statements as questions, I have provided some further information below on those points.
And he does say the county might have incurred legal expenses if it hadn’t accepted Sabal Trail’s money for the easement. He doesn’t mention how much money Lowndes County spent suing a local company on behalf of a trash collection company financed out of New York City, or how much money the county spent suing a local church about a minor tax matter. It seems when Lowndes County wants to do something, it doesn’t worry so much about legal expenses. And maybe the county should worry more about legal expenses if something does go wrong with that pipeline, especially considering what’s happening with the Porter Ranch leak in California.
Besides, writing a letter Continue reading
Valdosta seems serious about finally opening its new force main and uphill Withlacoochee Wastewater Treatment Plant: they’re scheduling a ribbon cutting for May, a year ahead of the original schedule. According to both City Council Tim Carroll and Engineering Assistant Director Emily Davenport, the EPA has already pressure-tested the relevant lines and the plant, and approved them.
People downstream are rightly concerned at the many years they’ve endured wastewater from Valdosta. And recent schedule slips haven’t helped their perceptions, which is why actually holding Continue reading