Newspaper Page Text
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The Braselton News
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
The Braselton News
braseltonnews.com
Mike Buffington Editor & Co-Publisher
General Phone: 706-367-5233
Opinion
“Difference of opinion leads
to enquiry, and enquiry to
truth. ” -Thomas Jefferson
B 1*0S611OOnS by .Jdin Sheppard
HAPPY BIRTHDAY MABEL
Eighty-seven is the new seventy-eight.
capitol report
State creates infrastructure ‘bank’
our views
What’s the goal
of ‘straw vote’
THE BARROW County Board of Commission
ers are considering asking for a non-binding “straw
vote” this July on whether or not to extend the run
way at Northeast Georgia Regional Airport. Yet air
port authority member Don Holliday told a crowd
of concerned citizens last week that there isn’t any
plan to extend the runway.
“We’ve not discussed runway extensions, we’ve
not started any runway extensions,” said Holliday.
So why, then, should there be a straw vote of citi
zens about a plan that Holliday claims doesn’t yet
exist? It doesn’t make sense.
Indeed, little about the ongoing debate over ex
panding the Barrow County airport adds up. That
includes the idea of holding a “straw vote” in July.
What is the goal of such a non-binding vote?
Usually, local government straw votes are little
more than political ploys, a way to divert attention
away from the main issue. If the Barrow County
Board of Commissioners really wants to see what
the public thinks of airport development plans, then
the BOC should put together an expansion propos
al, tally the costs and put the issue before citizens
in the form of a binding bond referendum. Let citi
zens have a real vote on whether or not to spend
tax dollars for a proposed airport expansion.
Despite Mr. Holliday’s assertion that there’s been
no discussion of a runway expansion at the air
port, that idea has indeed been discussed. In fact,
it shows up on the Georgia DOT’S Airport Capital
Improvement Program Report for the Northeast
Georgia Regional Airport as a $5 million project in
2010 to expand the runway from 5,500’ to 6,500’.
That report also outlines other wished-for improve
ments at the airport, including: $1 million in land
acquisition in 2009 paid from local funds; $1.5 mil
lion in land acquisition in 2010 of which $1 million
would come from local funds; $1 million in land ac
quisition in 2011 from local funds; another $1 mil
lion in land acquisition in 2012 from local funds, a
new terminal at $4 million in local funds and a new
airport fire station at $1 million from local funds.
Of course, none of that is set in stone and ap
parently a wish list of projects. Still, it’s apparent
there are plans to grow and expand the airport and
that a runway expansion is among the items being
discussed.
Exactly what these expansion plans entail, how
ever, is murky. Is the airport to be expanded simply
to better handle small corporate jets for economic
development, or is there something else behind
these efforts?
That isn’t clear because county leaders have
done a poor job of discussing the matter. That lack
of communication, among other things, has led to
an erosion of public confidence and suspicions that
airport expansion plans may be more grandiose, at
least in the minds of some officials.
Whatever those future growth plans entail, a non
binding straw vote isn’t the right way to clear the
air. If citizens take the time to vote on an issue, the
proposal should be clearly stated and the outcome
should be binding on both the taxpayers and the
government.
BY REP. TERRY ENGLAND
THE HOUSE convened this
week on Tuesday, February 26th,
for the 23rd day of our 40 day
legislative session. On the floor,
we adopted legislation address
ing our continued transportation
funding problems, education and
local school boards and an adop
tion tax credit.
Georgia is a large state with many transporta
tion needs in both our urban and rural areas. This
week, the House adopted House Bill 1019 autho
rizing the creation of the Georgia Transportation
Infrastructure Bank. The bank will provide low
interest loans to communities across Georgia for
transportation projects providing viable funding
options to move ahead with local projects.
Several education bills were considered this
week that will impact both local education and
the HOPE scholarship. Unfortunately sometimes,
educating our children means doing more than
providing schools. It can also mean ensuring
‘bad apples’ aren’t teaching in the classroom.
This week we adopted House Bill 250 enabling
the Professional Practices Commission to inves
tigate complaints against educators involving
illegal substances and sexual offenses. We also
adopted House Bill 1091 redefining residency
guidelines for students applying to our state uni
versities and for the HOPE scholarship.
With more children every year entering our
foster system, I believe it is important that we do
everything we can to support those families that
give them a permanent loving home.
This week, I supported the adoption of House
Bill 1159 providing a state income tax credit for
families who adopt foster children. I hope that
this measure will encourage more of our Geor
gians to open their hearts and provide these
children with a permanent home.
This week the House Natural Resources Com
mittee favorably reported a bill I introduced.
House Bill 1281 was also favorably considered in
the committee requiring local governments wish
ing to enact water use restrictions beyond state
guidelines to go through the Environmental Pro
tection Department and it allows for a jurisdiction
that may have plenty of water resources during a
drought to relax their watering restrictions if they
can show their resources are adequate to EPD.
The EPD will be required to respond within three
business days with a ruling based on scientific
evidence and information gathered during the
resource identification phase of the Statewide
Comprehensive Water Plan. The bill will also
protect swimming pools from being closed and
possibly becoming health hazards during the
summer. The bill will still make sure that human
use and agricultural use are first and second
respectfully before other uses. This bill is critical
to local communities, the State and the Nation as
far as the implications to the Green Industry. The
Green Industry since mid - summer 2007 has lost
over $3 billion in sales and laid off over 35,000
employees in Georgia alone. This does not count
the impact to growers outside of the state. There
are currently over 800 different jurisdictions in the
State that can have different rules in regard to
outdoor watering. We are simply trying to make
these rules a little more uniform for property own
ers that are using water system water to sustain
their landscape and save an industry $8 billion
industry from going under. HB 1281 will be on
the Floor of the House Tuesday for a vote.
I will continue to keep you up to date on our
actions as the legislative session progresses.
Should you have any questions or concerns,
please do not hesitate to contact me at my Capi
tol office. As always, thank you for the chance
to represent you at our State Capitol. God Bless
to all.
Representative Terry England represents most
of Barrow County in the House of Representatives.
During the Session he may be contacted at:
501 Coverdell Legislative Office Building
Atlanta, GA 30334
Office: 404-656-0183
Email: terry.england@house.ga.gov
Water crisis may lead state to put growth limits in place
You don’t often see someone dressed up like Davy Crockett, complete with
frontier leggings and a coonskin cap, but that was the scene at the state capitol
last week.
This frontiersman was a self-styled “Tennessee Volunteer”
named Matt Lea who works for Ron Littlefield, the mayor of
Chattanooga, and drove a pickup truck loaded with hundreds
of bottles of water to Atlanta.
Littlefield was having a little fun with Georgia lawmakers who
want to push the boundary line with Tennessee about a mile
to the north so that our drought-parched state can tap into the
bounteously flowing Tennessee River and bring a little of that
water to North Georgia.
“It is feared that if today they come for our river, tomorrow
they might come for our Jack Daniels or George Dickel,”
Littlefield quipped in a special proclamation he had drawn up
for the occasion. Therefore, “in the interest of brotherly love,
peace, friendship, mutual prosperity, citywide self promotion,
political grandstanding and all that,” he was declaring Feb. 27
to be “Give Our Georgia Friends a Drink Day” and sending the truck full of water
down south.
The gesture was accepted with good humor, for the most part, by Georgia law
makers.
Sen. David Shafer, one of the sponsors of the border-grabbing legislation, went
before the Senate to acknowledge the gift and recite a Native American saying he
had looked up on Wikipedia.
“There is an ancient Indian proverb,” Shafer said. “Give a man a cup of water
and you quench his thirst for an afternoon. Share in the waters of a great river and
you quench his thirst for generations to come.”
“On behalf of the state Senate, I graciously accept this water as a down pay
ment on the billions of gallons of Georgia water that feed the Tennessee River from
the creeks and streams of Northwest Georgia,” Shafer said. “I remain confident
that the border dispute between our two great states can be resolved in a neigh
borly fashion.”
It was all in good clean fun, of course, and injected some badly needed humor
into the legislative process. Unfortunately, Georgia has some serious problems
ahead with its water resources that can’t be resolved through a few media stunts
like trying to move the border with Tennessee.
Our political leadership continues to operate under the illusion that Georgia
is entitled to keep all the water it wants so that metro Atlanta developers can
keep adding more subdivisions, strip malls and office parks to the region’s urban
sprawl.
That’s not going to happen because the governors of two adjoining states, Ala
bama and Florida, are demanding their rightful share of the water contained in
Lake Lanier. They’ve got a powerful ally on their side: the Southern Co. and its
subsidiaries which need to keep the water flowing along the Chattahoochee so
that their downstream power plants can continue to generate electricity.
Gov. Sonny Perdue keeps stubbornly insisting that all the water be retained in
North Georgia for his developer friends, but Alabama Gov. Bob Riley and Florida
Gov. Charlie Crist keep pushing back on that idea. That’s why the tri-state water
talks have gotten nowhere - which finally prompted federal Interior Secretary Dirk
Kempthorne to disclose over the weekend that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
and related federal entities will craft a water-sharing plan and impose it on the
states.
That plan, whenever it is released, may be the element that finally forces
Georgia’s leadership to wake up and acknowledge that we’re going to have to
do things like put limits on development and implement strict water conservation
measures - even if the developers and real estate agents don’t like them.
In the midst of last week’s silliness, there was actually something done along
those lines. Shortly after Shafer made his speech accepting the water from Chat
tanooga, the state Senate voted 45-1 to pass a bill that will allow residents to use
“grey water” discharged from lavatories, bathtubs, and clothes washers for such
purposes as household gardening, lawn watering, and landscaping.
Although many homeowners have been using grey water during the current
drought to water bushes and shrubbery, the practice is technically illegal under
current state law. Making it legal, it is hoped, will inspire other people to do it.
If our political leaders would cut down on the posturing and start working on
other substantive ideas to conserve water, they would have a much better chance
of actually addressing Georgia’s problems.
Tom Crawford is the editor of Capitol Impact’s Georgia Report, an Internet news
site at www.gareport.com that covers government and politics in Georgia.
Fear of flu all
in the mind
NO OFFENSE, but don’t come
around me if you’re sick. Well, that’s
probably most of you.
This year’s flu season is proving to
be a nasty one. There are countless
people coughing, sneezing and feel
ing just plain icky regardless of where
you go.
I used to not be so freakishly con
science of germs.
That all changed
when I my daugh
ter spent the first
few months of her
life in a hospital.
Germs still remain
a constant threat
of causing her a
serious medical
ailment.
A bottle of in
stant hand sani
tizer is never far
from my body, and
it’s in practically
every room of my house. There’s even
a sign on our kitchen-entry door tell
ing people to wash their hands when
they enter — and wash their hands
often.
That’s what the experts say: Proper
ly washing your hands often can help
reduce the possibility of receiving a
nasty cold.
Remember that “Seinfeld” episode
where Jerry meets his chef in the
restroom, only to witness him not
washing his hands before going back
to the kitchen? You know there are
plenty of people like that in the world.
For that matter, I’ve never under
stood why people are so eager to
touch the faces of babies. Even
before I had my baby, I thought it was
rude for a stranger to coo at some
one else’s baby before rubbing their
(you-don’t-know-where-they’ve-been)
hands on their face.
And the face rubbing happens so
quickly — usually from the sweet
est little old lady. I’m usually able to
gently slide my child away from such
curious hands, but it doesn’t always
work.
But it’s not just the touching that I’ve
become overly paranoid about, it’s
also just being in a room with sick (or
potentially) sick people.
During a recent public meeting, I
realized that I couldn’t hear all of the
comments of the elected officials
because so many people in the audi
ence were coughing and blowing
their noses.
A bit of fear overcame me. Germs,
germs, germs. The room was
packed, but luckily, I was in the lone
seat away from most of those fighting
a cold.
While recently interviewing several
area hospitals for another story, I
found myself reaching for the instant
hand sanitizer on my desk between
taking notes.
And while I realize that you can’t
freak out about such news stories on
the growing flu outbreak, I still want
to keep that sanitizer nearby. It’s a
little bottle of security — at least in my
mind.
Kerri Testement is the news editor
of The Braselton News. Her e-mail
address is kerri@mainstreetnews.
com.
Kerri
Testement
kerri@mainstreet-
news.com
The Braselton News
A Publication of The Jackson Herald &
Mainstreet Newspapers, Inc.
Mike Buffington: Editor & Co-Publisher
mike @ mainstreetnews.com
706-367-5233
Scott Buffington: Co-Publisher & Adver
tising Manager
scott @mainstreenews. com
706-367-5233
Angela Gary: Managing Editor
angie @ mainstreetnews.com
706-367-2490
Kerri Testement: News Editor
kerri@mainstreetnews. com
706-367-5986
Jeremy Ginn: Advertising
jeremy@mainstreetnews. com
706-367-5990
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