Liberty Matters News Service
March 27, 2001
Interior Secretary
Gale Norton told a gathering of National Parks Conservation Association
(NPCA) members that the president will keep his pledge to fund $5
billion over five years to correct the rundown conditions of the
national park system before there is any consideration given to creation
of new national parks. Ms.
Norton told the group “the National Park Service has the
responsibility to take care of the parks it already has.”
NPCA members expressed concern over whether the money would be
enough to preserve plants, animals and historic and cultural resources
in addition to maintaining the infrastructure.
Secretary Norton responded by assuring the group that the budget
contains an additional $20 million for the Natural Resource Challenge to
pay for park inventory and monitor natural resources, and said the
department will seek participation from private sources to provide
supplementary funding. NPCA President Tom Kiernan said that while $20 million is a
nice start, his group believes operations and natural resource
protection will require $600 million yearly.
“There is only so much funding that can come from sources
outside the federal government,” he said.
National
Parks: Norton Emphasizes Pledge to Fund Repair Backlog
California
Attorney General Bill Lockyear has joined environmental groups,
including the Sierra Club and Natural Resources Defense Council, to
defend Clinton’s designation of the 328,000 acre Giant Sequoia
National Monument. His
motion to intervene is in response to a suit filed by Tulare County,
logging interests and recreation groups, which seek to overturn the
designation or, at the very least, reduced to the 6% which actually
contains the giant trees. The
plaintiffs argue that a previous settlement agreement intended some of
the old Sequoia National Forest as multiple use and that the counties
and school districts would continue to receive a percentage of logging
operation fees from the U. S. Forest Service.
Although most of the new monument does not contain sequoias,
environmental groups have demanded that the surrounding forest and
watershed be included to protect the “health” of the giant trees.
The designation means that Tulare County and its school districts
will not receive millions of dollars from logging fees and will severely
curtail the county’s ability to thin the forest to prevent the kinds
of catastrophic fires that ravaged the West last year.
California
Attorney General Intervenes For Protection of Sequoia Monument
The U.S. Supreme
Court ruling Solid Waste Agency V. Army Corps of Engineers, which
decided that the Army Corps of Engineers cannot regulate wetlands that
are not connected to a river, stream or lake, has put a crimp in the
regulatory habits of the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.
The Corps informed Wisconsin regulators that it no longer has
authority to halt proposed development projects, which would include
filling some isolated wetland areas.
So far, only seven proposed fill projects have been identified,
but the WDNR worries that as much as a million acres could eventually be
filled because of the court’s ruling.
State lawmakers are being pressured to declare a moratorium on
filling wetlands until a permanent solution can be found.
Wetlands:
Court Decision Clears Way for Fill Projects in Wisconsin
The New England
Forestry Foundation granted a conservation easement the size of Rhode
Island to the Pingree family for land their family has owned since the
1840s. The easement covers
762,192 acres of Maine forest and cost $28 million.
The Pingree family agreed to the multimillion-dollar deal several
years ago, but the money had to be raised before the deal could be
completed. Million-dollar
donors include the Kresge Foundation, the Libra Foundation, the John
Merck Fund, the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, the North
American Wetlands Conservation Fund, the Elmina B. Sewall Foundation and
one anonymous donor. The
Nature Conservancy even got into the deal by donating money and 182,000
acres of their vast landholdings to complete the easement.
Conservation easements are being used more and more as a tool to
tie up vast areas of land to prevent any kind of development.
In all instances, easements last forever and no child or
subsequent owner can ever alter their restrictions.
Today, environmental groups and government entities are looking
for ways to tie up more land under the guise of conservation by offering
tax incentives through conservation easements.
Landowners are allowed to remain on the land, but are told how
much of the natural resources can be used and are required to create a
management plan for endangered species, wetlands and land use practices.
They are inspected on a regular basis by a managing partner and
still have the privilege of paying property taxes, albeit at a reduced
rate, just for the privilege of having the land remain in their
family’s name. Sounds
hauntingly similar to the old European feudal system of Indentured
Servitude.
Deal
Protects Maine Forest Lands
On April 5th,
the eco-terrorist group known as the Earth Liberation Front (ELF) plans
a “militant direct action” at FBI offices and other federal
buildings to coincide with a court hearing for accused front saboteur
Frank Ambrose in Indiana. Ambrose is charged with driving spikes into trees to stop
logging in a state forest near Bloomington, Indiana.
ELF is considered by the FBI to be a “domestic terrorist”
group that has claimed responsibility for 19 arsons and four other
significant crimes from Oregon to New York since 1996.
They target mainly logging, homebuilding and road construction
that they accuse of profiting from destruction of the natural world. Federal agents are concerned about possible bombings and
other terrorist’s acts outside the “guidelines” set up by the
parent ELF organization. Leslie
Pickering, one of the group’s press officers, said they hoped that
their call for action would prompt militant demonstrations against
federal authorities. “If
they’re angry, they ought to do more than just hold a sign,”
Pickering said. Why don’t
the other so-called non-violent environmental organizations denounce
such actions?
Eco-Terrorism:
ELF Calls for Day of Protests at Federal Buildings
The Roadless Policy
issued eight days before Former President Clinton left office has hit a
few more roadblocks. The
policy is considered one of the larges land grab efforts of the
Administration, locking up over 58 million acres in the west from
further road building and related projects.
But the Bush Administration took the position that the policy
should be reviewed by the new administration and on February 5th,
President Bush delayed the rules implementing the policy until May 12th.
In the interim, several lawsuits have been filed challenging
Clinton’s Roadless Policy in the courts.
The State of Idaho filed a suit claiming the U.S. Forest
Service’s analysis of the plan was inadequate under the National
Environmental Policy Act’s requirements for research and public
comment. The States of
Alaska and Montana also have their own cases against the policy.
The large timber corporation, Boise Cascade, recently filed a
motion for a temporary injunction against the implementation of the
regulations while they wage a larger legal battle against the plan in
court. The non-profit
organization, Mountain States Legal Foundation, is also challenging the
plan. Meanwhile,
environmental groups are attempting to intervene in these cases claiming
that the Justice Department is not vigorously defending these cases. They point to the Idaho case where the Justice Department has
asked the court to delay a hearing until early May.
Bush
Brief on Road Ban is Criticized
Bush
Moves To Delay Forest Plan
The Conservation
and Reinvestment Act, HR 701, reintroduced by Representative Don Young
on February 14th now has 60 co-sponsors signed onto the bill.
The bill would funnel billions of dollars into the Land and Water
Conservation Fund for land acquisition.
Unfortunately, President Bush has stated that he believes the
LWCF should be fully funded which indicates he might be willing to
compromise on property rights if CARA should pass both the House and
Senate. The CARA battle is far from over.
Contact the President and your Representative with your concerns.
List
of Co-sponsors