PNP comment: Gee wiz, the Greenies fear everything!!!! — Editor Liz Bowen

By Richard Halstead Marin Independent Journal

Posted:   05/15/2013 06:11:40 PM PDT

By SEAN SCULLY
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

Published: Wednesday, May 15, 2013 at 4:50 p.m.

Last Modified: Wednesday, May 15, 2013 at 4:50 p.m.

A Marin County judge has dismissed a pair of lawsuits by environmental groups demanding a more rigorous study of resuming freight rail service along the North Coast.

PNP comment: Interesting ruling. — Editor Liz Bowen

By SEAN SCULLY
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

Published: Tuesday, May 7, 2013 at 5:37 p.m.

Last Modified: Tuesday, May 7, 2013 at 5:37 p.m.

Environmental groups cannot use state law to block the resumption of freight rail service on the North Coast, a Marin County judge tentatively ruled Tuesday.

PNP comment: Thank you Heather Gass and Debbie Bacigalupi for this info.  Be sure to click on the link to US Fish and Wildlife Service office in Yreka, CA. — Editor Liz Bowen

Is this well-known:

Project Title: Middle Klamath River Fish Passage (FFS #R8TC)

State: California

Initial Project Description: The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service entered into Cooperative Agreements with theMid Klamath Watershed Council and the Karuk Tribe to restore fish passage on 10 miles of streams in the Mid Klamath Basin. The project is underwritten by funds granted through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

http://recovery.doi.gov/press/us-fish-and-wildlife-service/yreka-fish-and-wildlife-office/

PNP comment: There has been a BIG push by Greenies, Tribes and fed agencies to push the KBRA in large, well-known newspapers recently. They make it sound like it is a DONE DEAL. 

It is NOT.

Bottom line: There will be millions of dollars in “restoration” monies for these Greenie groups, several Tribes and government agencies to continue a welfare existence. Even though taking out the dams will kill the fish, wildlife, destroy water quality for years and dump huge amounts of toxic sediment into the Klamath River and allow the unfiltered spread of noxious weeds, whereever water recedes.

Also, the salmon have swam 191 miles up the Klamath River, when they reach the first dam — Irongate Dam. They typically have sores and are ready to spawn and die, which they do in the Irongate Fish Hatchery. If we need more fish, they can certainly increase the number to release from the hatchery. 

So our mantra remains:

 SAVE the dams and we will SAVE the fish, wildlife, streambeds and water quality. Simple. — Editor Liz Bowen

The Wall Street Journal

Landmark 2008 Pact to Aid Region Remains in Limbo as a New Drought Hits

By JIM CARLTON

KLAMATH FALLS, Ore.—One of the most bitter water wars in the West is erupting again.

This past week, the Klamath County Commission in southeastern Oregon and Gov. John Kitzhaber both declared a drought emergency to help make farmers eligible for federal subsidies to alleviate any losses. The agricultural county of 70,000 has been dealing with unusually dry conditions for the past four months, with farmers and ranchers saying they face potentially crippling water cutbacks by federal agencies.

If “they shut water off here, there could be some violence,” said Tom Mallams, a rancher and member of the Klamath County Commission. The drought declaration “will help defuse some of the tensions—I hope, anyway.”

The move is the latest attempt to quell water concerns in the 6,135-square-mile county of rugged sage and timber land, where one of the West’s most heated water wars broke out in 2001. At the time, federal officials shut off irrigation to thousands of acres of farmland in Oregon and California to protect endangered fish during another drought. In the aftermath, federal marshals had to be called in to stop angry farmers from reopening locked irrigation gates.

The squabbles resulted in a landmark 2008 agreement to end the fighting, including a provision by PacifiCorp, a Berkshire Hathaway  BRKB +2.21% Inc.-owned utility based in Portland, Ore., to remove four dams on the Klamath River by 2020. The agreement was unique because it brought many of the warring parties to the negotiating table, including PacifiCorp, the U.S. Interior Department and California and Oregon. At the time it was signed, many looked at the agreement as a model for resolving other water disputes in the West.

But in the five years since, the agreement has hit stumbling blocks, showing how difficult it remains to settle Western water disputes, even after the feuding sides have come together. And the recent dry conditions have renewed water tensions over who gets what. This past week’s drought declaration was partly an attempt to help protect mostly ranchers not covered by the 2008 agreement.

One big issue hindering the 2008 agreement is that the deal’s provisions have yet to be approved by Congress. The pact is languishing amid resistance in the Republican-held House to nearly $1 billion in projected federal costs to meet key goals, such as restoring wetlands.

In Klamath County, the agreement also has faced local opposition to dam removal among residents who believe it would reduce water further in the basin. In addition, locals who oppose the 2008 deal have risen in power. Last year, Mr. Mallams—a rancher who said the agreement favored farmers’ water rights over ranchers’ rights—was elected to the three-member Klamath County Commission. The commission, which had signed the 2008 agreement, voted last month to withdraw its support for the deal.

READ more:

http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424127887324763404578428962610094212-lMyQjAxMTAzMDIwMTEyNDEyWj.html?mod=wsj_share_email

PNP comment: My what a mis-use of words and truths. This “sucking machine” also cleans the sediment from gravel and salmon then love to lay their eggs is the clean gravel. But, of course, the Greenies claim the opposite. Suction dredge mining is quite beneficial and create NO toxic nightmare. What a FEAR tactic! It really comes down to mining law — and gold claims are legal private property, going back to the 1866 Mining Law. Oh, and remember the Greenies and Leftist government doesn’t want anyone to be able to find gold. — Editor Liz Bowen

FRESNO, Calif. –  A legal battle is brewing over whether California gold miners should be allowed to vacuum up the bottoms of rivers.

The controversy is about a process called suction dredge mining, a practice popularized on the Discovery Channel show “Bering Sea Gold” but banned for the last four years in California, as state courts continue to weigh new environmental regulations.

“Suction dredging is the best way to extract gold from the environment,” said Craig Lindsay, a former dredger and president of the Western Mining Alliance, an advocacy group working to protect mining rights in Western States.

Suction dredge mining is a process in which prospectors look for gold by diving underwater using a 4-inch wide hose to vacuum dirt and gravel to find gold.

“What we’ve done in our own way is take that ethic of hard work and individualism and trying to make a living by using our skills just like the ’49ers did,” Lindsay said.

But the current ban forces the more than 3,000 California dredge permit holders to use other methods to get the precious metal. And Lindsay believes this ban is unfair.

“It’s efficient, it allows people to earn a living, feed their families and does minimal amounts of damage to the environment in addition to removing all of the toxins from the environment, like lead and mercury,” Lindsay said.

But opponents view suction dredge mining as a harmful form of technology that will affect clean water to endangered species and mercury dispersal.

“Suction dredge machines suck up that mercury and blow it up into tiny pieces, and those pieces are much more toxic, much more available to be absorbed into the bodies of fish and insects. And when human beings eat fish contaminated with mercury, it’s absolutely toxic,” said Elizabeth Martin, CEO of the Sierra Fund, a community foundation for the Sierra.

Environmental organizations like the Sierra Fund say miners a hundred years ago used mercury in the form of quicksilver and left it behind in the water, and the dredge machines stir it back up in the water when they vacuum the river bottoms. The California State Water Board came out with a report detailing how suction dredging can affect water quality.

“There was really no question the science is settled. The suction dredge machines create a terrible toxic nightmare in our water,” Martin said.

The Department of Fish and Wildlife acknowledges that suction dredge mining affects the environment, and the agency has been asked to offer recommendations on how it can impose a more comprehensive regulatory scheme. But department Director Chuck Bonham says the agency has limitations.

“We don’t have the authority to regulate all the impacts to the environment that we’ve identified,” Bonham said. “We’re managing a pretty complex litigation caseload in San Bernadino County, which is the consolidation of lawsuits against us by the Karuk Tribe, environmental organizations, as well as an association of miners on the recreational and commercial side.”

The recommendations offered by the agency might affect the outcome of extending the ban or getting miners back in action.

Michelle Macaluso is part of the Junior Reporter program at Fox News. Get more information on the program here.

IN THE NEWS

 Liberty Scene

Liberty and Property Rights Coalition

EPA’s Secret Deals with Environmentalists

The EPA is under investigation for a practice called Sue and Settle. Environmentalists in government and private organizations have found ways to create new regulations by fashioning lawsuits tailored to have courts institute policy changes. Both parties involved in the lawsuits secretly decide in advance what the outcome will be and how much taxpayer money will be transferred to the environmental group in the settlement. In other words, they are exploiting the courts to change laws, and in the process, helping to fund radical environmental groups without legislative or taxpayer consent. Millions of taxpayer dollars have been given to these groups.

(You Tube)

Pacific Legal Foundation asks Supreme Court to Protect Western Water Rights

Recently, PLF attorneys filed an amicus brief with the U.S. Supreme Court in support of the estates of Nevada ranchers, E. Wayne and Jane Hage. The Hages, and their children, have been fighting for over twenty years to preserve their water rights from federal agencies.

Water rights, like those owned by the Hages, are essential to ranching and other natural resource industries throughout the western United States. In their case, a federal agency interfered with the Hages’ rights to access and maintain the flow of water to their ranch. The U.S. Claims Court determined that the agency’s actions resulted in physical and regulatory takings of their water rights. The Federal Circuit Court of Appeals, however, reversed the trial court’s conclusion without addressing the merits of their claims. The court held that the Hages’ case—which arose nearly a quarter century ago—is premature!

(Pacific Legal Foundation)

Is Corporate Funding of Environmental Groups a Form of Hush Money and Necessary Cost of Business?

IDAHO FALLS, Idaho – The Sierra Club, a group with a documented history of shilling for cash accused via Twitter this morning the oil and gas lobby of buying support for the Keystone XL pipeline.

The Sierra Club took a shot at the American Petroleum Institute, a pro-oil and gas development group, with this tweet: (See article)

(Watchdog.org)

A New Spotted Owl?

The western sage grouse is just the latest in the long list of endangered species which have been successfully used by their environmental proponents as economic weapons of destruction in the West.  After the spotted owl was listed as an endangered species in the 1990’s the western timber industry was eradicated from our nation’s forests, leaving the timber to rot from disease and be consumed by catastrophic fires.

Thirty Clark County, Nevada ranchers went broke as a result of the ESA listing of the desert tortoise.  Tortoise eggs were determined to be in danger of cows stepping on them.  Despite the fact that cattle, sheep and tortoises had cohabitated in the southern Nevada desert for more than a century, ranchers were forced to abandon their vested water rights and forage rights for the tortoise.  Once the lands were cleared of ranchers then Nevada BLM Chief, Bob Abby pursued a public land selling spree to Las Vegas developers armed with excavators and paving equipment.  (Emails Link Former Chief of the BLM’s Ex BLM Chief Bob Abbey to Henderson, NV Land Scandal) Environmentalists and bureaucrats were suddenly mute on the subject of the desert tortoise.

History shows that endangered species listings have less to do with saving the lives of animals and more to do with taking property and water rights by circumventing that pesky provision in the Constitution—just compensation.  See this special report in Range Magazine about the new spotted owl, “The Sage Grouse”.

(Range Magazine)

Ron Arnold: A Journalism Nonprofit’s Nonagenda Agenda

Among the standout names of outfits recently whacking the Donors Trust is the nonprofit investigative journalism organization known as the Center for Public Integrity. To many, the group’s name seems presumptuous and agenda-laden, despite its insistence that it is “nonpartisan and does no advocacy work.”

(Washington Examiner)

The Liberty and Property Rights Coalition is committed to promoting and preserving Constitutional rights to liberty and property in public policy and the law.

For more information or to be removed from this list email rhmorrison@sbcglobal.net.

A service of Liberty and Property Rights Coalition 2013

PNP comment: Well, we knew this was coming. Continued hypocrisy and fraudulent science backs up these Greenies. Multiple studies prove cattle are beneficial to Sage Grouse! 

Also, I am taking this reporter to task. Talk about a biased article in favor of the Greenies. No ranchers or Public Lands Council folks were quoted. Guess the reporter doesn’t realize there is a whole other side to the story. This is truly disgusting to be printed in what is supposed to be an agricultural newspaper. Shame on Capital Press! — Editor Liz Bowen

Capital Press

Posted: Thursday, March 07, 2013 12:00 PM

ANNAPOLIS, Calif. (AP) — Conservation groups are hailing an agreement to buy and protect nearly 20,000 acres of timberland from expanding vineyards near the Sonoma County coast.

The Santa Rosa newspaper reports the $24.5 million purchase of Preservation Ranch would shield the land from a controversial vineyard project pushed by the California Public Employees’ Retirement System.

The land is being bought by The Conservation Fund, California Coastal Conservancy, Sonoma Land Trust and the county’s Agricultural Preservation and Open Space District. The purchase is scheduled to be completed by late May.

The property is near Annapolis in northwestern Sonoma County. It’s home to second- and third-growth redwood and Douglas fir, oak woodlands and salmon and steelhead streams.

The newspaper says the deal would be the county’s largest conservation purchase by acreage.