Liberty
Matters News Service
February 9, 2007
Property Rights Virginia Style
In 2001, Mary Meeks bid $110,000 to buy a dilapidated old school building that Cumberland County, VA, auctioned off as surplus government property. After spending two years getting a clear title to the property, she spent $250,000 fixing up the building and then renting space to four churches and an appliance store, while she tried to get the county to let her turn the place into apartments. Meanwhile, local school officials decided they needed the old school after all to accommodate several hundred kids while a new middle school was being built. Meeks offered to rent it to them, but the county wanted to own it. When they couldn't come to terms, the county filed a "quick take" and deposited $200,000 in an account for Meeks. Now "defendant" Meeks is going to court as though she were guilty of a crime. The judge will decide if the county was right to give her $200,000 instead of the $609,000 appraised value. But Virginia law forbids tax assessments to be used as evidence for property owners. The case could drag on for years. Meanwhile, Meeks must keep paying the mortgage, but she doesn't even get the rent from her tenants. That goes to the county.
'Just compensation' unjust by any name
Combat Global Warming and Save Species
Environmental groups have petitioned seven Bush administration cabinet secretaries to tailor their actions to reflect the dangers posed to plants and animal because of global warming. "Human destruction and fragmentation of habitats is causing species extinctions hundreds of times faster than normal," according Dr. Stuart Pimm, Professor of conservation Ecology at Duke University." One-quarter of the world's species could disappear forever this century if global warming trends continue," said Bill Snape of the Center for Biological Diversity. The petition asks the head of the Environmental Protection Agency, Secretaries of Interior, Agriculture, Energy, Commerce, Defense, and Transportation to adopt new rules that would require all federal agencies to assess global warming and its impacts on imperiled species when undertaking major federal action; demands the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service to conduct a study within three years identifying all threatened and endangered species likely affected by global warming; and, they want the government to provide incentives to states, counties, cities, corporations, and private landowners to restore habitats and protect endangered species. "We believe there are constructive solutions that can and must be initiated now so as not to destroy the legacy we leave to our children and grandchildren," Snape said.
Seven Cabinet Secretaries Petitioned To Combat Global Warming And Speed Endangered Species Recovery
Bush Pushes Billions for Cooperative Conservation
President Bush's 2007 Farm Bill contains billion$ in new spending to advance the noble cause of government control of the Nation's farm and ranch lands. The Bush plan adds $7.8 Billion to conserve and protect our natural resources by: Increasing by 50% the acreage to gain protection under the Wetlands Reserve Program from 2.3 to 3.5 million acres - a total of 250,000 acres will be made available for enrollment annually; creating a Regional Water Enhancement Program (RWEP) with an additional $1.75 Billion in funding over ten years; $175 million a year will go into large scale, coordinated water conservation projects to improve water quality and quantity on a watershed scale. Bush's 2008 budget includes tax incentives that promote voluntary land conservation and provide an economic benefit for family farmers and ranchers. Bush wants to make permanent a 2006 law that expanded federal tax incentives for conservation easements. The new law raises the deduction for conservation easement donations from 30 percent to 50 percent and to 100 percent for qualifying ranchers and farmers. The law also extended the carry-forward period for the donor to take the deductions from 5 to 16 years. The law will expire at the end of 2007, and Bush wants a permanent extension to allow time for the education and outreach to build awareness and acceptance of conservation easements.
A Cooperative Conservation Approach To Policy Development
Wildlands Project Dusted Off In Democrat House
East Coast legislators just love wilderness, but not in their backyards. Rep. Christopher Shays, R-CT and Carolyn Maloney, D-NY have dusted off the old Wildlands enabling legislation, now called the "Northern Rockies Ecosystem Protection Act of 2007" (NREPA). The measure has 186 co-sponsors, dating from 2005, the majority of whom hail from states east of the Mississippi. The bill would "protect most roadless lands in the northern Rockies (20,572,147 acres) by giving them the 'highest level of legal protection - designation under the 1964 Wilderness Act.'" It designates 1,810 miles of Wild, Scenic and Recreational Rivers. It safeguards against habitat fragmentation by establishing a system of Biological Linkage Corridors to connect the region's core wildlands into a "functioning ecological whole." Sound familiar? It establishes a pilot system of Wildland Restoration Areas (1,022,769 acres) and creates jobs restoring damage caused by unwise resource extraction practices. Mike Garrity, executive director of the Alliance for the Wild Rockies said NREPA will be among the highest priority wilderness bills in Congress. "It's in bill drafting now," Garrity said. "We expect it to go in soon, at least by March." There is no Senate sponsor for the bill yet.