Newspaper Page Text
Mayor, Commish Vote
for EDF Compromise
Backpedalling towards an apparent compro
mise with the Athens Economic Development
Foundation, ACC commissioners last week
agreed to continue the group's funding if it
will add one commission vote to its board.
Some commissioners, skeptical of the founda
tion's effectiveness, had earlier requested that
three commissioners be added, but instead
the EDF voted to add one non-voting commis
sioner: mayor pro-tern Andy Herod. The com
mission is now asking that Herod be allowed
to vote.
Mayor Nancy Denson, who also sits on the
EDF board (and does vote), opposed what she
saw as earlier efforts to "pack" the board, but
said she supports the current
request. "This compromise
had to happen to get funds
released," she told Flagpole.
"I believe jobs and tax base
are the more important
issue." The EDF's board will
meet Wednesday, Aug. 10;
approval would presumably
lay the conflict to rest, but requires compro
mise also from the EDF, which (lacking a spe
cific request from ACC commissioners) denied
Herod a vote when they seated him earlier.
Commissioners apparently expected approval;
"they are very anxious to put Commissioner
Herod to work," Commissioner Kathy Hoard
remarked. Denson also said she expected
approval.
Commissioners were at pains not to person
ally criticize EDF board members, calling them
"good people." They are also asking the EDF
to provide a plan for how it will market ACC to
business prospects, and for raising additional
operating funds from private businesses.
And hearing frequent complaints about
late leaf-and-limb pickups (Commissioner
George Maxwell said his own pickup was two
weeks late), commissioners assigned their
Government Operations Committee to look at
the problem. "I'm sure we'll have a very spir
ited discussion at that session," said Hoard.
As a money-saving measure, pickups have
gone from every eight weeks to every nine,
but sometimes they don't even meet that
schedule. "They are far behind," Commissioner
Alice Kinman said. "We've created that situ
ation ourselves, a good bit" with the slower
schedule.
"Sometimes we cut off our noses to spite
our faces," Maxwell added.
But ACC Solid Waste Director Jim Corley
told Flagpole that pickups are now meeting
schedules available in the newspaper, online,
and by phone (at 706-613-3501). For now,
even oversized piles will be picked up, he
said, as crews catch up on the debris left by
early summer storms and the unexpected loss
of several employees. Commissioners cut one
position to save money, but
otherwise crews are back to
their normal (but minimal)
staffing, Corley said: two
three-man crews with no
backup.
The Aug. 16 commit
tee meeting will be "more
a listening session than
an action session" chair Harry Sims said.
Commissioner Kelly Girtz offered one sugges
tion: don't charge people for taking their own
yard waste to the dump.
And despite protestations from ACC
Manager Alan Reddish that billing people 60
cents a month for recycling education might
cost the county more than it collects, the
commission directed him to figure out how to
do it. Reddish had proposed adding the fee
only to trash bills, but not everyone gets trash
pickup, commissioners said, and everyone
should pay equally—even people who haul
their own trash to the dump. It's not as simple
as adding the fee to stormwater or water bills
either, Reddish said earlier, because not all
citizens own land, and some have wells.
Commissioners may also balk (on envi
ronmental grounds) at the recommendation
Mayor Nancy Denson
opposed what she
saw as earlier efforts
to “pack” the board.
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of staff that a creek crossing by the new
Jennings Mill Road be made via a large culvert
rather than a more expensive bridge. "I'm
very much in favor of this road," which should
reduce traffic on the Atlanta Highway, Kinman
said, but "I'm also interested in the larger
ecosystem" of the pristine creek, and a bridge
would have less environmental impact, she
said. Reddish told commissioners that aquatic
life wouldn't be affected by a 185-foot con
crete box culvert.
Initially, the new road will be only two
lanes wide, but plans propose eventually wid
ening it to four lanes; and building a four-lane
bridge weuld cost $400,000 more than a con
crete culvert, Reddish said. But commissioners
questioned whether four-laning will ever be
needed, and asked Reddish to come back with
cost estimates for a two-lane bridge.
John Huie
Landfill Methane
Harvested for Sale
Rotting trash produces methane gas and
carbon dioxide—both "greenhouse gases" that
promote global warming—but at ACCs landfill,
that methane will soon be burned to produce
electricity. "They're actually installing wells
right now," Solid Waste Director Jim Corley
told Flagpole. Dozens of wells, drilled into
now-closed areas of the landfill, will harvest
methane for electricity that a private company
will then sell into the power grid. "They're
putting up all the money, then they will pay
us royalties," Corley said—perhaps $500,000 a
year on electricity and renewable energy cred
its that will also be sold.
John Huie
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AUGUST10.2011-FLAGPOLE.C0M 5
