Couple of things

- The first installment of my new weekly column with the Athens Banner-Herald ran Sunday, and I opted to talk about the Oconee County Commission's budget negotiations.

- This is puzzling to me, and it's not because I don't agree with Athens-Clarke County officials in thinking that the legislation is ridiculous and continues the state's methodical march toward stamping out local control. Rather, I'd be curious to know the constitutional challenge Bill Berryman is pondering ... and, has the Athens-Clarke County Commission authorized the spending of taxpayer money to fight a law that, albeit poorly designed, is aimed to alleviate taxpayer burden. As we're seeing in Oconee County, you don't want to have a commission micromanage every element of local government, but it seems the opposite often happens in Athens-Clarke County where staff appears to barrel ahead minus the necessary direction and oversight from the community's elected representatives.

- If the budget negotiations wanted me to bang my head against a wall, the favoritism shown to Prince Avenue Baptist Church by the Oconee County Commission might result in me needing to repair some drywall. The logic is that the church, by its own accord, opted to use more expensive materials to build a ridiculously large facility and that should result in a massive break in building fees. Of course, in the absence of a fee structure that charges by the square feet (not an outrageous suggestion at all), the commission opted to simply arbitrarily lower the fee structure retroactive to last July, thus providing a $26,000-plus tax break to PABC and only PABC.

- Interesting take on Roy Barnes by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution's Jim Galloway.

- I should also point out that you really can't call yourself Prince Avenue Baptist Church if you're not, you know, actually on Prince Avenue anymore.