Lowndes County has transparency issues —John S. Quarterman @ LCC 28 June 2011

No unfinished drafts will be published while Ashley Paulk is chairman, or so he told us.

I asked him how he recommended citizens provide input to the budget process? He said at every meeting.

So I said I wondered why the county attorney seemed to be overbudget. No response.

Then I got to my main point, which was that the county seems to have a number of transparency issues, such as the missing ordinances he'd just heard about, or Vince Schneider's Foxborough McDonald's issues, or the animal shelter issues, or the T-SPLOST list that the Commission approved on the basis of a one page list of one-liner with no details that turns out to include things like $10 million to widen New Bethel Road to Lanier County.

I said I would like to compare the county's submissions for T-SPLOST funding to the county's Thoroughfare Plan and the Comprehensive Plan; if I could find those plans online. The Chairman said my five minutes were up. I said "Alrighty" and moseyed back to my seat. As you can see for yourself, it was actually 4 and a half minutes.

-jsq

Here's the video:

Lowndes County has transparency issues —John S. Quarterman @ LCC 28 June 2011
Regular Session, Lowndes County Commission (LCC),
Valdosta, Lowndes County, Georgia, 28 June 2011.
Videos by Gretchen Quarterman for LAKE, the Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange.

-jsq

Comments

[Barbara Stratton]

This is typical of all elected & appointed government bodies locally. The common opinion is citizens are only valuable for voting. After we vote we are to go home, never ask questions, never complain, & never comment until it is time to vote again. The common consensus is we are not capable of understanding what our elected/appointed officials are doing so we need to stay out of the process totally. This is nanny state government via local venues. We the people are reduced to you the unendowed & unimportant. John - Our political views are usually polar opposites, but we are always 100% agreed on shinning the light on government black-outs. Keep up the good work.

[Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange]

In the writeup I neglected to mention three things:
1) I started by apologizing for not sending my condolences fast enough during the recent rumor of the demise of my neighbor Ashley Paulk; I was so slow that the rumor was rebutted before I did so.
2) He said more than once that I should have been at the budget meeting at 5PM sharp. I asked several people afterwards whether he asked for questions at 5PM. He did not. Also there was no agenda for the budget meeting, so nobody knew when he might ask for questions.
3) The general response I got and the end with being cut off before my time was actually up seem bizarre considering I went out of my way to start in a neighborly manner. Or it would seem bizarre if we hadn't seen it so many times before, including a couple of other times that same day.
-jsq

[Susan Leavens]

It just appears to many issues with Lowndes are not only transparent but will continue to stay that way. I feel that Ashley Paulk shows his arrogant side of law enforcement when speaking to the public; almost in a manner of how I have witnessed them speaking to inmates... so I guess if that's the case then he gets it honestly. However...citizens and convicted criminals are two separate individuals; convicted criminals have no say, citizens of Lowndes County have the right to be heard and have the right to any and all open records and have the right to ask questions. However again only getting an arrogant answer only makes one wonder why we are not allowed to talk in a derogatory manner nor would we but it tolerated for them to talk to the public in such a manner. And he also said dont ask to speak at 5:01 you would be to late (I might add with a smerk on his face)...but he NEVER asked for questions he moved on with other buisness.

[An Outsider Looking In]

My question is why is this guy being allowed to "motion to the VDT" to let them know that "he" wants his comment published?

Is the VDT his PR firm?

That is so Mayberry-ish.