BY FRED GRIMM
MiamiHerald.com/columnists Selling off our national parks to private developers…. well, you got to give it to Cliff Stearns. That’s just good modern Republican business sense. Sell ’em. Drill ’em. Frack ’em. Turn the Grand Tetons into a ski resort. Hang a zip line over the Grand Canyon. Convert Yosemite into a corporate retreat. Strip mine the Smokies. Erect drill rigs in the Everglades. But comparing a sell-off of so much scrubby parkland to getting rid of the family Caddy — that’s near about blaspheme where I’m from. Stearns, a ranking congressman from Ocala (better known, lately, as a Florida’s most prominent birther), uttered his slander on the most sacred of down-home family values last month at constituent meeting in Belleview. He was railing against a proposed new national trail commemorating the route Buffalo Soldiers rode through California back at the turn of the last century. The black Army outfit, essentially America’s first park rangers, patrolled the newly created Sequoia and Yosemite national parks, protecting the federal land from wildlife poachers, timber rustlers and illegal grazing. “Would you want to walk 200 miles?” Stearns asked his constituents. (That suggests that, if Stearns had been around in 1921, he’d have been even less enthused by the construction of the Appalachian National Scenic Trail. Would you want to walk 2,181 miles?) Stearns said that “we don’t need more national parks in this country. We need to actually sell off some of our national parks, and try and do what a normal family would do.” Normal families usually don’t have national parks in their domestic portfolio. But Stearns persisted. “They wouldn’t ask Uncle Joe for a loan, they would sell their Cadillac.” This was too much. Back where I’m from, in West Virginia, rednecks with Caddies would sooner sell their kids (a relatively plentiful commodity) than part with an Eldorado. If it happened to be the 1959 model with soaring fins and Marilyn Monroe bumpers, well, he’d consider tossing the wife and her momma into the negotiations. Previously, Rep. Stearns’ peculiar interest in the national parks system had focused on legislation to rescind the ban on firearms inside the parks. But other Republican members of Congress have lately proposed selling off chunks of parkland and national forests. Or opening up parks to oil and gas exploration. The new Smokey the Bear poster comes with either of two mottos: either “Don’t Shoot” or “Drill, baby bear, drill.” Under Gov. Rick Scott, Florida’s state parks have similarly been re-imagined as commodities. Last year, Gov. Scott’s administration, pushing a flurry of new proposals to reengineer state government as a business enterprise, decided that the state’s 160 parks should each be self-sufficient — or else. The state park service decided 53 “unprofitable” state parks would be shut down. Private operators would be able to build campgrounds, with RV hook-ups, inside another 56 parks. Another proposal would allow a single, well-connected company to construct and operate fancy golf courses in other parks. The public, which tends to regard a state park somewhat differently than, say, a strip shopping center in Kendall, was not amused. A great howl ensued. Scott suddenly decided he didn’t mind the unprofitable park system so much. This past session the Legislature did pass bills allowing commercial advertising along state scenic trails, giving “scenic” an odd new definition, but opponents managed to limit the damage to just seven trails. A bill to allow gas and oil drilling in state parks died a worthy death. No one, in the past session, proposed selling off the state’s oceanfront parks to condo developers. Maybe the Legislature’s big dogs are only waiting for the real estate market to recover. In the new Florida, you gotta think like a entrepreneur. Oddly enough, Cliff Stearns’ antipathy toward the creation of new historic parks was not so apparent in 2006, when the onetime operator of a small motel chain pushed through federal legislation (and funding) to designate Fort King, site of a major dust-up in the Second Seminole War, as a national historic landmark. On July 1, 2008, Stearns rightfully took full credit for the dedication of the 39-acre national historic site, which — I’m sure this is just a coincidence — happens to be located right there on 39th Avenue in his hometown of Ocala. “Our nation is rich in natural resources, scenic wonders and historic events and locations” he said. When Stearns said “rich,” who knew he was speaking as a real estate speculator? I bet Fort King would make a dandy location for a new motel. Do I hear bids? Anyone want to swap their old Caddy?
FGRIMM@MIAMIHERALD.COM
Chantell and Michael Sackett’s case against the Environmental Protection Agency before the Supreme Court on Monday might appear to be David versus Goliath. But those supporting the Sacketts with friend-of-the-court briefs are corporate Goliaths like General Electric and real estate developers eager to weaken the E.P.A.’s ability to protect wetlands and waterways under the federal Clean Water Act.
The Sacketts owned a small lot about 500 feet from Idaho’s pristine Priest Lake. They filled part of it with dirt and rock in preparing to build a house. The E.P.A. determined that the lot is federally protected wetland so the Sacketts needed a permit to do the work, which they did not seek. The agency ordered the couple to remove the fill because pollutants were being discharged.
The E.P.A. can issue compliance orders directing violators to get a permit and remedy any damage they caused. But to enforce an order, the agency has to sue in federal court; it does not have power to take action against a violator on its own. The Sacketts in their brief say they had no reason to believe their lot was covered by the Clean Water Act, though there is evidence to the contrary. They argue that lack of judicial review of the compliance order violated their due process rights, though they could have challenged the order through the agency’s administrative process — and could have gotten a permit after the E.P.A. told them they needed one.
Almost every federal court that has considered the issue found that the law does not allow “judicial review of compliance orders until the E.P.A. brings an enforcement action,” as the Ninth Circuit appeals court said in ruling against the Sacketts. The court explained that this process allows the agency “to act to address environmental problems quickly and without becoming immediately entangled in litigation.” Allowing challenges to E.P.A. orders before they are enforced would give landowners the ability to delay in correcting the harm they caused. Compliance orders are useful because they allow the agency to press landowners to negotiate about mitigating harms.
This case goes far beyond the Sacketts’ right to fill in their lot without a permit. If the Supreme Court allows them to seek pre-enforcement review, it will be handing a big victory to corporations and developers who want to evade the requirements of the Clean Water Act.
via nytimes.com
The Environmental Protection Agency has come under fire for its decision to allow the state of Florida to write its own water pollution rules (known as “numeric nutrient criteria”). EPA Regional Administrator Gwendolyn Keyes Fleming is now firing back, writing that the Agency commends the state Department of Environmental Protection for its draft of a proposed standard.
Full story: http://floridaindependent.com/57162/epa-numeric-nutrient-criteria#
The groups said that President Obama’s refusal to adopt the new standard was illegal and left in place an inadequate air quality rule from the Bush administration. Near the end of his presidency, George W. Bush overruled the Environmental Protection Agency’s scientific advisory panel and set the permissible ozone exposure at 75 parts per billion.
The current E.P.A. administrator, Lisa P. Jackson, wanted to set the standard at 70 parts per billion, near the maximum level recommended by the advisory panel. But President Obama rejected that proposal on Sept. 2, saying that compliance would be too costly and create too much regulatory uncertainty for industry. He ordered the E.P.A. to conduct further scientific studies and come up with a new proposal in 2013.
The decision infuriated environmental groups, who called it a betrayal, but cheered business leaders, who said that the ozone rule was one of the most onerous of the administration’s proposed environmental regulations.
The E.P.A. said last month that it would adopt the Bush-era standard and work toward tightening it in the future. The five groups that sued — Earthjustice, the American Lung Association, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Appalachian Mountain Club and the Environmental Defense Fund — said that was not adequate and asked a federal court in Washington to review the administration’s action.
“The rejection of stronger standards was illegal and irresponsible, in our view,” said David Baron, a lawyer for Earthjustice. “Instead of protecting people’s lungs as the law requires, this administration based its decision on politics, leaving tens of thousands of Americans at risk of sickness and suffering.”
The same groups had sued the Bush administration over its ozone policy, but agreed to suspend the suit when the Obama administration came to office and promised to reconsider the Bush standard. That reconsideration was delayed several times before finally being killed by the president last month.
Ground-level ozone is the main ingredient in smog, which is linked to premature deaths, heart attacks and lung ailments, including childhood asthma.
The standard rejected by Mr. Obama would have thrown hundreds of counties out of compliance with air quality regulations and imposed costs of $19 billion to $25 billion, according to E.P.A. estimates. But the resulting health benefits would have been $13 billion to $37 billion, the agency calculated.
via nytimes.com
Groups Sue After E.P.A. Fails to Shift Ozone Rules
Health and environmental groups challenged the Obama administration’s rejection of stricter air quality standards.