The Bulloch Action Coalition on Monday launched a double petition drive aimed at repealing the Bulloch County Board of Commissioners’ approval of two agreements with Bryan County related to the drilling and operation of at least four high-volume wells planned to supply water to Hyundai Motor Group Metaplant America.
One day and a few hours before Georgia’s state Environmental Protection Division, or EPD, holds a public information and input session on its latest drafts of the well permits, the Bulloch Action Coalition held a press conference turned public meeting Monday at the Honey Bowen Building in central Statesboro. About 70 people, including just a few reporters, attended. Next, the EPD’s info meeting will take place from 6 p.m. until 9 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 13, in the Southeast Bulloch High School auditorium south of Brooklet.
Bulloch Action Coalition co-founder Lawton Sack and other speakers noted that county officials told them a referendum could not be held on the Hyundai supply wells. But Sack asserts that actions in two other Georgia communities show that a referendum brought by petition could work to reverse Bulloch County’s official actions.
“We’ve been working with attorneys in designing the format and designing the language on these (petitions),” Sack said Monday. “I was asked last week, do you have the right to do this? Yes, we do. … Yes, Camden County did it for the spaceport. Their county commissioners decided, ‘We’re not going to listen to the people,’ so the people rose up, they got the petition, they passed the referendum.”
He didn’t go into further details. But almost 70% of Camden County voters in the March 2022 referendum rejected the extension of a county option agreement to buy land for the long-proposed spaceport. The commissioners challenged the results in court, but a Superior Court judge upheld the referendum result, and the Georgia Supreme Court agreed in a Feb. 7, 2023 ruling, finding that a referendum by petition can be called to reverse or amend such a “local act” of a county governing board.
“Our brothers and sisters now on Sapelo Island are doing the same thing, of protecting their culture,” Sack continued.
Residents of the Hog Hammock community, Gullah-Geechee descendants of West African people once enslaved on Sapelo, recently sought a referendum to reverse changes in zoning regulations approved by McIntosh County commissioners to favor development.
“Bless their hearts, they turned in their petitions. They’ve got an election day coming for their people to vote on a referendum,” Sack noted.
A passage in Article 9, Section 2 of Georgia’s State Constitution allows for referendums to appeal “local acts or ordinances, resolutions, or regulations” of a county governing board to be initiated by a petition from registered voters filed with the county probate judge. For a county, such as Bulloch, with more than 50,000 residents, signatures would be required from at least 10% of the county’s registered voters as of the last general election.
Bulloch County had 44,925 registered voters at the November 2022 general election. So about 4,500 signatures of registered voters would be needed for each of the two petitions, but the Bulloch Action Coalition is aiming for 6,000 signatures.
Possible timeline
Under the constitutional provision, upon receiving the petitions Bulloch County Probate Judge Lorna DeLoach would have up to 60 days to validate the signatures. If a sufficient number of Bulloch County registered voters had signed, she would then be expected to call an election at least 10 days but not more than 60 days after the petition was filed.
At least that is what would happen if the county or state governments or perhaps Hyundai Motor Group did not mount a successful legal challenge to halt the process. At the call of the election, the date for it would need to be set at least 60 but not more than 90 days later, according to the wording of Article 9.
But with the names yet to be collected, the petitions cannot result in a call of election in time for the Nov. 5 general election ballot, Sack acknowledged.
Targeted actions
By two separate 4-2 votes on June 27, Bulloch County commissioners approved both an intergovernmental agreement with Bryan County on water and sewer services and the two counties’ memo of understanding toward creating a mitigation fund for owners of other wells affected by the drawdown of water in the deep Floridan aquifer by the Hyundai supply wells.
One of the proposed referendums would pose the question: “Shall the motion passed by the Bulloch County, Georgia, Board of Commissioners approving a memorandum of understanding for a well mitigation program between Bulloch County and Bryan County be repealed?”
The other would ask: “Shall the motion passed by the Bulloch County, Georgia, Board of Commissioners approving an intergovernmental agreement between Bulloch County and Bryan County to provide water and sewer services be repealed?”
The Coalition
Founded in February 2023 by Sack and Cassandra Mikell, who are active in local Republican politics, the Bulloch Action Coalition became a 501c4 nonprofit organization in November. The coalition’s vocal opposition to local tax increases and campaigning against county incumbents coincided with several challengers winning in the May primary.
Two resulting county commissioners-elect, one Republican challenger who defeated a Republican incumbent but now faces a Democrat in the general election and a Republican still in the race against a Democratic incumbent all spoke during the petition announcement event. So did several other coalition members.
“Farmers without water for their crops face massive yield losses in the production of food and fiber,” said R. Ryan Brannen, farmer and District 1 Bulloch County commissioner candidate. “I’ve read and listened to the experts. None of them seem confident in their studies that these wells will or won’t have minimal effects.”
At a previous EPD meeting on the first draft of the permits, held at Southeast Bulloch High in February, EPD scientists predicted a drop of up to 19 feet in the water level in the deep Floridan aquifer at in the center of the cone of depression nearest the wells, tapering off to a drop of 10 feet or less five miles away. So the mitigation fund would cover the cost of changes in residential or farm wells, such as lowering submersible pumps or possibly deepening wells, after a Georgia-licensed well driller or pump installer investigates “alleged significant impacts to existing wells,” the proposed permits state.
But opponents of the well permits object that the state should be providing any compensation of this kind, instead of requiring the county governments to create the fund and seek other sources. Several of Monday’s speakers also argued that the amount reportedly committed to the fund so far, $750,000 total from the Bulloch and Bryan County development authorities and the Savannah Harbor-Interstate 16 Corridor Joint Development Authority, is much less than may be needed.
Bennett speaks
David Bennett, Bulloch County Board of Commissioners chairman-elect, noted that he asked the current commissioners during a March meeting if they would hold a referendum on the wells.
“Now, you’re going to hear people that are going to cry and they’re going to moan about how this is horrible timing and we’re holding up the road to Hyundai and everything else,” Bennett said. “You’re right, we are, but you know what? The people deserve to have a voice in this process. The JDA’s had a voice, (Gov.) Brian Kemp has had a voice, our local county commission has had a voice, Bryan County has had a voice, but the people that live here and pay taxes in this county have not had a voice.”
However, in a statement offered Monday, Development Authority of Bulloch County CEO Benjy Thompson said the DABC had worked since 2014 in cooperation with the Savannah JDA before landing “the big one,” Hyundai Motor Group in 2022.
“During that time, regional leaders, the State of Georgia, South Carolina and USGS (U.S. Geological Survey) have also completed detailed studies of our water supply,” Thompson wrote. “Those studies and all other scientific research show that the water required by Hyundai Motor Group Metaplant America will not have a significant impact on the water supply of anyone in Bulloch County. For those who may need to adjust their wells, we have established a mitigation fund in the hundreds of thousands of dollars to pay for those improvements.”
Before and during the 6-9 p.m. Tuesday EPD meeting at Southeast Bulloch High, the coalition plans to have people with clipboards collecting signatures beginning about 5 p.m. Then on Thursday, signatures will be collected from 4 p.m. until 6 p.m. at Nicky’s Pizzeria in Brooklet, which is not open for business yet but will serve as a petition location.