Couple of things

- While I think this is a very smart move on the part of the Oconee County Board of Education, I do wonder why they didn't recognize that stimulus funding would be available to assist with these expenditures? This thing has kinda been in the news a good bit, so one would think they'd have a ballpark idea of what money was flowing into the community.

- Very good to hear, and I have to say that one of the things I'm going to miss most about living in Athens-Clarke County was that I could watch the fireworks shows at Bishop Park and the Athens Country Club from my backyard. I'm sure that out here in The OC there's a good place to catch them, but it was nice to just sit in my backyard with a cooler and watch the show.

- Related to that - and at the risk of abandoning some of my progressive principles - why doesn't this become a permanently, privately funded affair? In fact, why don't lots of things like this become permanently, privately funded? Why not consider have leaf and limb pickup become privatized where existing landscape companies could expand their operations to handle this task? Particularly with the ongoing budget challenges the government is facing and the fact that the pickup is only going to come every nine weeks anyway?

- There's some much-needed - and much-appreciated - flexibility in the allocation of Rapid Re-Housing funding.

- Blake forgot to mention the part of the meeting where Ed Robinson said something to the effect of 'I will not be made a monkey of' ... which prompted confused stares from commissioners and staff alike.

- So one guy is a problem in Winder? Hey, here's another suggestion ... quit having your police officers drop them off at the Athens-Clarke County border and actually address the problem yourselves.

- Check out Hillary's 'Lil Hobby' installments for yesterday and today. Both were very good, particularly with regard to the Green Building non-debate and Sen. Bill Cowsert's love of telling others to slash basic public services