Promoting Pollution, Concrete and Cronyism
It’s easy to see why there is foam and scum on Florida’s rivers and why the EPA has to step in to head slap the Department of Environmental Protection. The DEP supervises the water management districts. Of the 49 members of the board of the five water management districts, only two (2) have degrees in anything related to water or the environment. Just four have had careers in either forestry or some sort of conservation/enviro position. Only one out of the 49 had an involved background in nature and conservation, Richard Hamann. The others? Real estate brokers, real estate appraisers, real estate consulting, building contractors, sugar cane, etc.
Maryam Ghyabi is a board member of the St. John’s Water Management District. She is CEO and President of Ghyabi & Associates, a planning and engineering firm. Her home page launches into a slideshow giving us views of concrete and steel, malls and acres of parking lots, interstate exchanges, strip centers and condo developments. I would have preferred to see that she was a biologist with a slideshow of some beautiful wetlands, wildlife, and children playing in clean water.
Todd Pressman is Chairman of the Board of the Southwest Florida Water Management District. He is also President of Pressman and Associates and represented “the successful public bidder for what is expected to become the largest Commercial development in Pinellas County.” His firm lobbies for “international engineering firms, to Motorola, to the billboard industry, bio-hazard industrial users, the fireworks industry”. Does this make you feel warm and fuzzy that the people in charge of “environmental protection” are truly protecting the environment? Perhaps they are protecting the real estate developers instead.
Yesterday, U.S. District Judge Alan Gold gave the EPA greater control in protecting the Everglades saying, “the South Florida Water Management District and Florida “have not been true stewards of protecting the Everglades in recent years.”
DEP is proposing to allow Georgia Pacific to discharge waste directly into the St. John’s River. An AP article noted a “100-mile toxic algae outbreak, the worst in Florida's history, in the St. Johns River last year. The green slime halted boat traffic, kept people from swimming and piled dead fish on the river's banks.” Florida filed a lawsuit in December against the EPA in an attempt to halt new water pollution standards. NPR noted in Nov. 2009, “Florida has allowed polluters to voluntarily control their messes, in a weak regulatory program called ‘Best Management Practices.’ The green slime covering the St. Johns River shows, starkly, that they don’t work.”
Governors in Florida appoint the Secretary of the DEP and the board members of the water management districts. Looking at the board member makeup of the Water Management Districts, cronyism, payback, uncontrollable sprawl and neglect of the environment seem to be the mission statement of the governor and the DEP, not “environmental protection”. We should indeed change the name to the “Department of Environmental Destruction” so the results can match the name.
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Friday, April 22, 2011
Strange Bedfellows in the Eco War
The Republican base was stunned when their conservative president turned liberal on fiscal matters. Today, Democrats are in shock as President Obama has turned anti-environment.
The Republican base made a grave error by not holding George Bush accountable for spending increases. By doing so, Bush just kept spending more. Democrats today are making the same grave error when it comes to environmental concerns.
Passionate party loyalty can work against the cause people fight for. An example is the budget cut to the EPA. The assumption that Democrats are pro-environment and Republicans are anti-environment has proven false under the Obama administration through anti-environment actions and has always been false when it comes to everyday Americans. The Democrat party base must not let party loyalty blind them to Democrat anti-environment actions. In doing so, the cause is hurt. On eco matters, party leaders are just two flavors of the same poison. One is just more toxic than the other.
Democrats can win the EPA and eco battles. The reason is there are many conservatives on the same side of the battlefront with liberals in eco matters. From sportsmen to hikers, fisherman to photographers, biologists and family vacationers, democrats have an army of republicans to fight with them.
In President Obama's State of the Union message this year, his only eco reference was negative: "to reduce barriers to growth and investment, I've ordered a review of government regulations. When we find rules that put an unnecessary burden on businesses, we will fix them. (Applause.)" This is anti-environment regulation busting. This is like saying "put up more condos and golf courses in the Everglades." He said nothing positive about eco protection, only this anti-eco quote.
A few days later, President Obama talked about cutting the $191 million from his own Great Lakes Restoration Initiative, yet another anti-environment Obama flip. This represents a microscopic .005% of the budget yet the EPA and the environment is one of the Dems top causes. What will happen to the environment when $6 trillion is cut?
However, if the Democrat base were to channel their energy into being activists for ecosystem protection and spend less time bashing Republicans, they would have far greater traction fighting for their cause because party leaders get stunned when their base rumbles.
The Tea Party could teach a valuable lesson to Democrat party loyalists, as distasteful as that may seem to them. The Tea Party was formed by conservatives who were outraged by liberal Republicans. Result? Democrats lost 63 House seats, lost seats in the Senate and suffered painful losses in state elections. Again, when the party base rumbles, party leaders take notice and change occurs. In the EPA example, if party faithful Democrats turn away and fail to show their outrage on their leaders' anti-environment actions, or they pretend that Democrat leaders are pro-environment when they are not, their leaders will feel vindicated and believe the base doesn't care about the destruction of the environment.
It is inconceivable that grassroots activists of both parties want to see more destruction of wetlands, less restrictions on the poisons killing the birds of prey and other species, national parks closed and less regulations that would accelerate the ongoing destruction of habitats and ecosystems. This is one cause both party faithful can rally around, especially since so very little of our budget is spent on the Department of Interior and the EPA.
By being party neutral and criticizing your own, you will see greater success for your eco agenda or any cause. Both parties deserve your wrath regarding eco protection and restoration. If you crawl in a hole and pretend the Dems are not equal blame, you are also the enemy of the very cause you fight for in environmental protection. If Democrats want to see their leaders stop their anti-environment actions, then that outrage needs to be heard by President Obama and the Democrats in Congress as well as by Republicans.
Stop party loyalty. Start eco activism.
Passionate party loyalty can work against the cause people fight for. An example is the budget cut to the EPA. The assumption that Democrats are pro-environment and Republicans are anti-environment has proven false under the Obama administration through anti-environment actions and has always been false when it comes to everyday Americans. The Democrat party base must not let party loyalty blind them to Democrat anti-environment actions. In doing so, the cause is hurt. On eco matters, party leaders are just two flavors of the same poison. One is just more toxic than the other.
Democrats can win the EPA and eco battles. The reason is there are many conservatives on the same side of the battlefront with liberals in eco matters. From sportsmen to hikers, fisherman to photographers, biologists and family vacationers, democrats have an army of republicans to fight with them.
In President Obama's State of the Union message this year, his only eco reference was negative: "to reduce barriers to growth and investment, I've ordered a review of government regulations. When we find rules that put an unnecessary burden on businesses, we will fix them. (Applause.)" This is anti-environment regulation busting. This is like saying "put up more condos and golf courses in the Everglades." He said nothing positive about eco protection, only this anti-eco quote.
A few days later, President Obama talked about cutting the $191 million from his own Great Lakes Restoration Initiative, yet another anti-environment Obama flip. This represents a microscopic .005% of the budget yet the EPA and the environment is one of the Dems top causes. What will happen to the environment when $6 trillion is cut?
However, if the Democrat base were to channel their energy into being activists for ecosystem protection and spend less time bashing Republicans, they would have far greater traction fighting for their cause because party leaders get stunned when their base rumbles.
The Tea Party could teach a valuable lesson to Democrat party loyalists, as distasteful as that may seem to them. The Tea Party was formed by conservatives who were outraged by liberal Republicans. Result? Democrats lost 63 House seats, lost seats in the Senate and suffered painful losses in state elections. Again, when the party base rumbles, party leaders take notice and change occurs. In the EPA example, if party faithful Democrats turn away and fail to show their outrage on their leaders' anti-environment actions, or they pretend that Democrat leaders are pro-environment when they are not, their leaders will feel vindicated and believe the base doesn't care about the destruction of the environment.
It is inconceivable that grassroots activists of both parties want to see more destruction of wetlands, less restrictions on the poisons killing the birds of prey and other species, national parks closed and less regulations that would accelerate the ongoing destruction of habitats and ecosystems. This is one cause both party faithful can rally around, especially since so very little of our budget is spent on the Department of Interior and the EPA.
By being party neutral and criticizing your own, you will see greater success for your eco agenda or any cause. Both parties deserve your wrath regarding eco protection and restoration. If you crawl in a hole and pretend the Dems are not equal blame, you are also the enemy of the very cause you fight for in environmental protection. If Democrats want to see their leaders stop their anti-environment actions, then that outrage needs to be heard by President Obama and the Democrats in Congress as well as by Republicans.
Stop party loyalty. Start eco activism.
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