Walker County Schools is quietly eliminating at least forty teaching positions at the end of the school year. The majority appear to be from middle and high school classrooms. LU contacted the school system for comment late last week and hopefully their response will be out soon. Even without a response, expect a full post on this later today.

The old BlueBird school bus plant south of town has been purchased by Phillips Brothers Machine. Phillips Bros’ current Rossville machine shop will be relocated to LaFayette. That’s a gain for the Queen City, but not for Walker County as it just moves a business from one end of the county to the other. However, the business may expand its payroll in the new location.

The BlueBird property acquisition is touted in this poorly-researched news report from CNN Money, comparing unemployment in Walker County with the unemployment in Dalton.

This essentially claims Walker County is better off than “Dalton County” because there’s more diversity in jobs available. Having a diverse job market is good. But seems like one major industry with thousands of jobs would be better than five or six companies with a handful each.

It’s good that “Nissin Break” and some of the other local mills discussed are doing well, but the real unemployment rate is a lot higher than what official numbers show – and seems like the jobs being added are paying a lot less than jobs the area lost. New jobs are a positive thing, but they don’t replace what’s been lost in numbers or income. It’s not as positive as this report sounds.

A bologna sandwich is good to have if you’re starving to death, but don’t let somebody convince you it’s a steak just to get your vote.

Another CNN Money report written by (or credited to) someone else with some of the same language and the same video sounds like a Bebe Heiskell campaign slogan. Expect to hear this a lot from her as the campaign heats up:

“As the United States grapples with stubbornly high unemployment, there’s one part of the country where the jobless rate is plummeting. Walker County, Ga., population, 68,756.”

The best way to lower an area’s official unemployment rate? Start losing jobs earlier than everywhere else so unemployment benefits (which are what the government uses to track unemployment) expire before everyone else’s do.

Last week LaFayette’s DDA wrote and sent out an entire press release regarding something they seem to have no idea about. Stringing together a bunch of technical terms to make a minor thing seem like a big deal.

“A new look and a new approach to inform — and stay informed — about Walker County’s largest city is what LaFayette’s Downtown Development Authority hopes to achieve by becoming a beta site for WordPress.”

OO now they have WordPress, downtown will thrive.

Meanwhile the existing DDA Web site hasn’t been updated since 2008.

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Remember, Finster Fest will be this Saturday and Sunday in Summerville.

Chattanooga Times Free Press: “Changes are in the works this year. For one, the festival will be centered at Dowdy Park in downtown Summerville, with shuttles taking the anticipated 5,000 visitors to and from Paradise Garden, which is in a residential neighborhood that lacks parking. There will be live music both days with Patterson Hood of the Drive-By Truckers headlining at 6 p.m. Saturday. In another change, tours will start inside Finster’s studio, which hasn’t been open to the public since Finster died.”

Paul Chapman has formally withdrawn his request to move North Georgia Firearms & Ammunition to Chickamauga. He said he doesn’t want to cause trouble for nearby businesses that have protested his plan. He’s been a lot nicer to them than they were to him, hope he can find a more suitable place soon.

Chattanooga Times Free Press / CEOs like look of south: “For the eighth consecutive year, Texas ranked No. 1 in a survey of 650 CEOs by Chief Executive magazine. Tennessee maintained its No. 4 ranking among the 50 states for its favorable business climate, while Georgia slipped three places this year to No. 8.”

The way Mr. Chapman was treated by the people of Chickamauga probably won’t help the state rank any higher next year.

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Today is the National Day of Prayer. Fellowship of Christian Athletes will be having a prayer around the LHS flagpole at 7:40 AM with all students encouraged to join. Other schools around the county and nationally will have similar prayer events, and many are open to the public.

The LaFayette garbage can saga continues..

Some city residents are now being told new larger trash cans must be requested. But again the city hasn’t communicated this to anybody. They need to get their crap together.

To request a larger can, call LaFayette Public Works, 639 1509. Some say they called and were asked about the size of their family; several people called days ago and still haven’t gotten anything. Apparently we’re rationing trash bins now.

We don’t have a problem with the plan. We don’t have a problem with requiring people to call and request a bigger can. But we do have a problem with them not telling any of this to anybody. It shouldn’t be the Underground’s job to tell city trash customers about changes in their service and how to get larger cans to accommodate less frequent pickup.

The LU Facebook garbage can poll is holding steady at 10%; only 6 of 61 respondents say they’ve already gotten a bigger trash container.

Yesterday the governor signed a bill banning abortion after 20 weeks of pregnancy. The new law, starting January 1st 2013, replaces current GA rules banning the procedure after 26 weeks.

A LaFayette native living in Dalton was arrested in April for stealing a prepaid phone from the LaFayette Walmart. He was also arrested back in March for stealing beer from Pit Stop, and has spent a considerable amount of his adult life in jail for the same kinds of minor crimes.

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More on the new LPD tasers. The first one went to Billy Mullis for use at LHS. Some students might think it’s nothing to be tased and put the SRO to test, but that’s fine.. Let them get tased and learn now before they grow up.

Good photo in here of officer Reyes, good to see him back on patrol after his unjustified termination.

LPD says the tasers have already been used: “A LaFayette officer has already drawn a taser as a deterrent in a situation. ..On April 10, a domestic situation on South Chattanooga Street occurred with a man allegedly choking his wife in the front yard, according to Clift. Witnesses called 911 and the man grabbed his child and ran in the house. Three officers from LaFayette broke down the door and cleared the rooms, with tasers in hand.”

The LU Facebook garbage can poll is now 5 “yes” votes to 45 “no” votes, or 10%. This isn’t exactly a scientific poll representative of the entire city, but it seems quite a few people still aren’t ready for the once-per-week garbage schedule.

The official City of LaFayette, GA Facebook finally announced the new schedule yesterday, a bit late for the Monday-Thursday people who didn’t get their refuse picked up Monday.

This video was posted Monday night as part of discussion about new school standards. It should be watched by anyone who is a parent, an educator, a taxpayer, or a student.

Ultimately there is no one, or two, or five, perfect educational systems or methods for every child. We need educational diversity, more schools, more systems – more opportunity to bring out what’s good in kids instead of cramming them all into the same mold.

But it seems like those who most support diversity in the population are the least supportive of diversity in the way that population is educated.

..Meanwhile the only announced candidate for Walker County School Board this year (so far) is running on a platform of opposing charter schools.

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As promised, today the LU begins daily updates. These links and comments are taken from yesterday’s LU Facebook activity.

During their April meeting, the LaFayette City Council voted to change garbage service to once a week pickup instead of twice a week during May. The move was meant to save money and should be OK because the city is gradually rolling out bigger trash bins (95 gal vs. 55 gal) to city residents. The new schedule gives former Monday-Thursday customers Thursday-only service, while Tuesday-Friday customers will get Tuesday pickup. The new schedule began yesterday, April 30th (the “first week of May” is the same as May apparently) with only two problems – many city residents don’t have the new bigger cans yet, and nobody was notified of the change.

At midnight an LU Facebook poll showed only 4 of the 39 people who voted (around 10%) have gotten larger cans, and many already rolled their old cans down to the curb expecting service on Monday because they weren’t told about the change. A decent plan but, as usual, the city executed it poorly. They should have let people know what was going on and waited for the new cans to be ready before starting.

If the changes don’t save money or too many people protest them, the city will return to the old schedule in June and raise garbage prices. An increase on city power bills will already begin this month.

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The City has earned “National Main Street Accreditation.”

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Walker County is spending $154,000 on a training tower for the fire department. Better trained fire fighters is worthy of the investment, and may result in a lower ISO rating to make insurance in the county cost less.

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Walker County Emergency Services is going to offer free community training on the first Thursday of each month. This week’s class will be Babysitter Safety for kids 12-18 years old who watch other children outside their own family. The classes will always be offered at Fire Station 1 in Rock Spring, from 6:30 to 8:30 PM, and taught by volunteers or salaried employees at no additional cost to the county.

Here’s the list of classes for the rest of 2012:
May – Babysitter Safety
June – Community CPR
July – Fire extinguisher training
August – Basic first aid
September – Safety in the woods Safety and Survival Techniques Part I
October – Safety in the woods Safety and Survival Techniques Part II
November – Community CPR
December – Preparing for a safe holiday season

“To register for a class, please call Headquarters at 706-539-1255 or email to Traci Reece at t.reece@walkerga.us”

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Majestic Manor Nursing Home in Rock Spring received a 93 score health inspection. Its previous score earlier in the month was a nasty nasty 49. Ivy Cottage in LaFayette got a 91, their last inspection was a similarly bad 63. Melinda’s Catering earned a B, and Twins Pizza got an A. (Originally from WQCH Radio.)

All Georgia restaurant inspections are now archived online.

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Here’s a look at the new state educational standards rolling out this fall. Georgia is now free of No Child Left Behind but these new guidelines come straight from the federal government.

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