Georgia

General Assembly’s silence is deafening – Georgia Recorder

Published

11 months ago

February 14, 2024

Press Room

General Assembly’s silence is deafening – Georgia Recorder

Listen.

Can you hear it?

What?
Two things in Atlanta.

Clink, clink, clink and tick, tick, tick.

Cocktail glasses of Georgia Power, Twin Pines Minerals LLC and their lobbyists are clinking so loudly that you don’t have to be in Atlanta to hear the unmistakable sounds. The reasons for celebrating are different, but they are really the same. Hold that thought. I’ll explain.

Well, what about that ticking?

Feb. 29 (Leap Day) is Crossover Day in the General Assembly. That means proposed legislation in the House of Representatives must be approved and recommended to “cross over” to the Senate by Feb. 29.

Otherwise, the measure likely dies for 2024. Ditto for Senate-approved legislation that needs a vote in the House.

The Crossover Day clock is ticking—loudly—for two significant environmental issues that are likely to be lost this session in both chambers under the Gold Dome.

And Georgia Power appears to be escaping, again, without any interference from lawmakers who could force the behemoth utility to be more responsible with its storage of millions of tons of dangerous industrial waste—coal ash—that is leaching into ground water.

Twin Pines, the Alabama mining outfit that wants to dig for minerals on the “eastern hydrological boundary” of the Okefenokee Swamp, has—like Georgia Power—spent enough lobbying dollars to convince General Assembly powerbrokers that money is more important than factual science and environmental risks.

As you can see, the two issues are very different. But the silence on both issues is the same. The General Assembly found time to vote for cornbread as the “official bread” of Georgia, but it can’t seem to find room on the agenda to deal with the threat of Georgia Power’s coal ash poisoning our state’s drinking water.

Oh, I’m a fan of hot-buttered cornbread, too. Same goes for just-out-of-the-oven cathead biscuits. But I’d like to have clean water in my tea or coffee to wash down the official state bread. Wouldn’t you?

For years, I’ve been talking about Georgia Power’s bottom-line-driven strategy that prioritizes profits over common sense when it comes to safe handling/storage of coal ash. The heavy metals in coal ash are proven to make you sick and/or kill you. Yet legislative attempts to force Georgia Power to do what’s right are squashed, year after year.

Can you hear the cocktail glasses clinking?

My questions are:

Don’t the families of Democrats, Republicans and Independents all deserve clean, safe water to drink?

If so, what’s the problem?

The silence is deafening.

Now, about the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge—which is under threat from a seems-likely-to-happen mining operation of Twin Pines Minerals LLC.

The Alabama miners say, “Trust us. We know what we are doing.”

Others, who know more than I do, counter, “We can’t trust Twin Pines. Its plan will do irreparable harm to an irreplaceable ecosystem.”

This I do know. There’s only one Okefenokee Swamp in the world, and most of it is in Georgia. Why wouldn’t we want to safeguard this environmental treasure?

One clue is that a piece of protective legislation—with overwhelming bipartisan support—won’t even be brought up for discussion in the House’s committee on environment and natural resources. That nonaction appears to have given Twin Pines what it wanted: a draft permit for mining, courtesy of Georgia’s Environmental Protection Division (EPD).

Josh Marks, president of Georgians for the Okefenokee, believes, “The EPD may have signed the death warrant for the Okefenokee Swamp, our state’s greatest natural treasure.”

Can you hear the cocktail glasses clinking?

But wait.

The EPD has declared a 30-day public comment period, even though it earlier promised 60 days. If you have concerns about the proposed titanium dioxide mining, submit your statements to [email protected]. There’ll be a virtual public hearing on March 5 at 6 p.m. Don’t let your silence send the wrong signal.

The disturbing common denominator in both of these environmental issues—coal ash and the Okefenokee—is the deafening silence of Georgia’s General Assembly.

But it might not be too late.

Talk to your representative or senator.

Just remember that Crossover Day is Feb. 29.

Tick, tick, tick.

Source link

Click to comment

Georgia

Georgia transportation crews prepare for winter storm

Published

8 hours ago

January 9, 2025

Press Room

Georgia transportation crews prepare for winter storm

STORY: :: Georgia prepares for winter weather

with brine and road treatments

:: January 8, 2025

:: Forest Park, Georgia

:: Natalie Dale, Spokesperson, Georgia department of Transportation

“Brine is that mixture of water and salt. So the brine goes straight from these tanks into those tankers. And then you also have a system of pipes here where from the brine production unit outside — so where we’re churning up that granular salt and water, it feeds into the tanks.”

“We sit in a very precarious place here in Metro Atlanta. And a lot of what we get is ice which is very different. It is hard, if not impossible, to plow sheets of ice. It is easier to plow that big, fluffy snow that you do get in the North. So we have to develop a winter weather plan that is specific to southern winters which are very different than northern winters.”

GDOT’s MAU manages the state’s largest brine operation, producing and storing hundreds of thousands of gallons of brine to treat roads before and during winter storms.

This operation is crucial for preventing ice buildup on major highways, such as Interstates 75, 85, I-20, and 285, which are prioritized for treatment during storms.

GDOT spokesperson Natalie Dale says Georgia’s primary challenge during winter weather is ice, not snow.

“We sit in a very precarious place here in Metro Atlanta. And a lot of what we get is ice,” Dale said. “It is hard, if not impossible, to plow sheets of ice. It’s easier to plow the big, fluffy snow you get up north.”

Starting at midnight, GDOT crews and vehicles will begin brining roads as snow and ice are expected to impact the region on Friday.

Source link

Georgia

School Closings in Northeast Georgia

Published

15 hours ago

January 8, 2025

Press Room

Due to the forecast of a winter storm with snow and ice, the following schools will be closed on Friday, January 10. Now Habersham will update the list as we receive the official notification from the school administration.

Schools

Tallulah Falls School as well as all extracurricular activities including the basketball games against Georgia Walton which have been postponed.

Colleges

Athens Technical College closed Friday.

If you would like to have your school or daycare added to our list, please email [email protected]

Source link

Georgia

Kirby Smart and the Bulldogs Have Entered a New Era of Georgia Football

Published

23 hours ago

January 8, 2025

Press Room

Kirby Smart and the Bulldogs Have Entered a New Era of Georgia Football

As the Bulldogs turn their attention to the 2025 college football season, the team will be entering a new era of Georgia football.

The Georgia Bulldogs 2024 college football season ended just over a week ago and the transfer portal entires, draft declarations, and coaching changes that subsequently follow the conclusion of a season have begun taking place. But as the post-mortem era of the Dawgs’ season brings changes throughout the building, Georgia football as a whole is undergoing a change as well.

This year’s senior class at the University of Georgia finished their careers as the winningest class in Bulldog history and were an integral part of the team’s two conference titles and back-to-back national championships that ushered in a new era of dominance that had never been seen by Georgia fans. But with the collegiate careers of the most successful Bulldog class ever now over, the Dawgs’ “renaissance era” of dominance has seemingly reached its conclusion as well.

A handful of the Bulldogs’ starters this season had playing experience in a national championship game. Names such as Malaki Starks, Carson Beck, Tate Ratledge, Mykel Williams, and others provided the team with real-game experience and a cultural understanding of what it took to win a national championship. But with the exception of a few returning seniors such as Oscar Delp and Dillon Bell, virtually none of Georgia’s starters in 2025 will have any experience in national championship games. Subsequently, the first-hand “championship experience” that is often required to win a national title within the roster has greatly been diminished.

As alarming as this news may be for Bulldog fans, it is certainly not the end of the world. After all, the Dawgs’ 2024 roster showcased numerous flashes of championship culture throughout the season. Flashes such as the team’s overtime win over Texas in the SEC Championship and an eight-overtime thriller against Georgia Tech at home prove that future rosters are more than capable of rebuilding the culture and habits that it takes to win the final game of the season.

The Georgia Bulldogs’ 2021 and 2022 rosters provided an incredible foundation for following teams to compete for national titles. But as members of those teams depart, conferences realign, and the College Football Playoff format changes, it is time to turn the page on Georgia’s “renaissance era” of dominance and usher in a new era of Georgia Football. An era that provides the team with a new championship culture and experiences that provide succeeding teams with the ability to continue the incredible legacy of the Georgia Bulldogs.

Other Georgia News:

Join the Community:

Subscribe to our YouTube Page HERE.

You can follow us for future coverage by clicking “Follow” on the top right-hand corner of the page. Also, be sure to like us on Facebook @BulldogMaven & follow us on Twitter at@DawgsDaily

Source link