ATLANTA – Opponents of a proposal to mine titanium near the Okefenokee Swamp have long concentrated their fire primarily on the environmental degradation it would wreak on the largest blackwater swamp in North America.
Now, they’re also building a case against the mine based on what they say are Alabama-based Twin Pines Minerals’ (TPM) alarming lack of qualifications to carry out the plan.
“The overwhelming scientific consensus that TPM’s project will damage the Okefenokee should be enough to convince [the Georgia Environmental Protection Division] to deny the permit application for this dangerous scheme,” said Josh Marks, an environmental lawyer who led a successful fight against a mine DuPont sought to open near the swamp during the 1990s and is spearheading opposition to the Twin Pines plan.
“But when you add the facts that TPM has no experience whatsoever in building titanium sand mines … it begs the question as to why Governor [Brian] Kemp and EPD continue to entertain this farce.”
“The company and its leadership have a long track record of noncompliance and environmental harm,” added Bill Sapp, a senior attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center and chairman of the Okefenokee Protection Alliance. “Twin Pines has consistently failed time and again over the past four years to prove that its proposed mining operations will not harm the Okefenokee Swamp, and we do not believe the company will ever be able to do so.”
Twin Pines Minerals is seeking state permits to mine titanium oxide along Trail Ridge near the swamp. The proposal generated more than 100,000 comments in opposition during a recent 60-day public comment period.
Opponents have introduced bipartisan bills during each of last two General Assembly sessions to ban surface mining along Trail Ridge, only to see both fall short of reaching the floor of either legislative chamber. This year’s legislation drew 94 of the 180 members of the state House of Representatives as cosponsors.
The mine’s critics say it would reduce the water level in the Okefenokee, which would have devastating consequences from polluting the swamp to exposing peat, making the area more susceptible to wildfires.
Beyond the environmental impact, the project’s opponents are now citing Twin Pines’ lack of experience in mining, which they say is limited to coal.
They also allege the joint ownership and management of Twin Pines with Georgia Renewable Power LLC, another Alabama company that drew the General Assembly’s attention several years ago for burning creosote-treated railroad ties at two biomass plants in Northeast Georgia. Creosote has been linked to respiratory problems and some forms of cancer.
The legislature passed a bill in 2020 banning the practice, and Georgia Renewable Power is facing a nuisance lawsuit filed by 30 families from Madison and Franklin counties.
Twin Pines President Steve Ingle declined to respond to the allegations surrounding his company’s affiliation with Georgia Renewable Power. But he defended his qualifications to mine titanium.
“I am a registered professional mining engineer with more than 40 years of experience in mining a very broad range of minerals, including titanium,” Ingle wrote in an email to Capitol Beat. “Our senior management team has more than 200 years of experience. We have been in the titanium market since 2015.”
While the mine’s legislative critics are expected to continue pushing their bill banning titanium mining next year, they face an opponent that wields a good deal of influence under the Gold Dome. Ingle contributed $18,750 to the campaigns of Republican state lawmakers and GOP Lt. Gov. Burt Jones last year, while Twin Pines donated $5,750, according to the campaign finance watchdog website OpenSecrets.
The company also has a large roster of experienced, well respected lobbyists in its employ.
Meanwhile, the EPD is continuing to review a draft Mining Land Use Plan Twin Pines submitted in January. If the state agency signs off on the plan, it would trigger a second public comment period before the project can proceed.
ATLANTA – Junior enlisted military personnel would receive a higher housing allowance under bipartisan legislation introduced in Congress this week by U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga.
Ossoff led an eight-month investigation last year that called attention to the poor condition of privatized housing at the Army’s Fort Gordon near Augusta. During that time, he said he heard from many military families about the challenges of finding affordable housing in their communities.
“Military families make immense sacrifices in our national defense,” Ossoff told reporters Friday during a news conference. “Junior uniformed personnel are not well paid. Their housing allowance is too low. This bipartisan legislation will modernize the formula the Department of Defense uses.”
Currently, the military is not permitted to take local housing costs into account in determining the housing allowance for junior enlisted personnel. The bill he and Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., are sponsoring would replace a “rigid and antiquated” formula with a more flexible housing allowance, Ossoff said.
Ossoff said he will push to get the bill included as part of the annual Defense Authorization Act Congress will take up later this year.
ATLANTA – The Georgia Department of Transportation is narrowing its search for a contracting team to overhaul the design of one of the nation’s worst traffic bottlenecks.
The DOT has selected two finalists to redesign the interchange of interstates 285 and 20 west of Atlanta, Meg Pirkle, the agency’s chief engineer, told members of the State Transportation Board this week. The interchange has been ranked the fifth-worst bottleneck in the country by the American Transportation Research Institute.
Legacy Infrastructure Contractors and West Perimeter Contractors were short-listed for the project last month. The DOT will negotiate with both road building consortiums after issuing a request for proposals later this month, Pirkle said.
“We are very excited to have two qualified teams to move forward with this procurement,” she said.
The board approved a joint agreement with the State Road and Tollway Authority in April to move forward with the work.
The nearly $1 billion project will involve removing the left-hand entrance and exit ramps at the I-285/I-20 West interchange and building a westbound collector-distributor system from the interchange to Fulton Industrial Boulevard. Lanes will be added along I-20 from Factory Shoals Road to Hamilton E. Holmes Drive and along I-285 from Donald E. Hollowell Parkway to MLK Jr. Drive. Several bridges also will be replaced.
Bids will be due during the first quarter of next year, and the DOT will announce a “best value proposer” during the second quarter, Pirkle said.
The DOT also is in the midst of redesigning the other I-285/I-20 interchange east of Atlanta. Construction on the $685.5 million project is due to start later this year.
ATLANTA – A plan to add toll lanes along Georgia 400 in Fulton and Forsyth counties is being delayed by about four months after one of three contractor finalists dropped out of consideration.
Express 400 Partners, one of three roadbuilding consortiums the Georgia Department of Transportation had short-listed for the project, withdrew from the selection process last month, Meg Pirkle, the DOT’s chief engineer, told members of the State Transportation Board Wednesday.
That leaves two consortiums – Georgia Express Link Partners and SR 400 Peach Partners – still vying for the work, Pirkle said.
“We have two strong teams, and we have confidence that we will have a very competitive procurement,” she said..
The project calls for the addition of two toll lanes in each direction along Georgia 400 from the North Springs MARTA station north to McGinnis Ferry Road and one toll lane in each direction from there north to McFarland Parkway.
Also, MARTA plans to run a bus-rapid transit line using the insides of the toll lanes from the North Springs station north to a park-and-ride lot on Windward Parkway. Transit stations are planned for Holcomb Bridge Road and the North Point Mall.
The DOT budgeted $1.7 billion for the project, which prompted the agency to restart the procurement process last August after the only qualifying team of contractors at the time put in a bid for a significantly larger amount.
Pirkle said the DOT plans to announced an “apparent best value” bid in the second quarter of next year.
ATLANTA – Georgians eligible to treat their chronic illnesses with cannabis oil soon will have a lot more choices of places to get the medicine.
The state Board of Pharmacy has released a set of regulations that will allow Georgia’s independent pharmacies to dispense cannabis oil to eligible patients enrolled in a registry maintained by the state Department of Public Health.
The General Assembly passed legislation in 2019 legalizing the cultivation of marijuana in Georgia under close supervision and the conversion of the leafy crop into low -THC cannabis oil to treat patients suffering from a wide range of diseases.
The state agency that oversees the medical cannabis program has granted manufacturing licenses thus far to two companies. Trulieve Georgia and Botanical Sciences LLC have begun producing cannabis oil and have opened dispensaries in Marietta and Macon, with more to come.
Separate from those dispensaries, the 2019 law also authorizes independent pharmacies to sell cannabis oil to eligible patients.
Of more than 700 independent pharmacies across the state, more than 100 have expressed interest in the program, said Andrew Turnage, executive director of the Georgia Access to Medical Cannabis Commission.
“This gives an opportunity for virtually every community to have access,” Turnage said.
The pharmacy board held a brief public hearing Wednesday on the proposed rules governing the sale of cannabis oil by pharmacies. Turnage said he expects the board to adopt the rules soon.
“They set a pathway for independent pharmacies to apply and subject these pharmacies to inspection and regulation for this medicine,” he said.
Turnage said the board plans to roll out a draft application form next week that will include the proposed fee schedule. He expects the first pharmacies licensed to sell cannabis oil to begin selling the medicine in late August to early September.
The list of diseases that qualify patients for cannabis oil includes end stage cancer, seizure disorders, AIDS, post-traumatic stress disorder, Parkinson’s disease, multiple sclerosis, sickle-cell anemia, autism, and Alzheimer’s disease.
