Posted By: 86Winchester On: 8/20/2010

Title: Enviro-Litigants Fill Coffers While Wildlife Suffers

Center for Biological Diversity, Sierra Club, National Wildlife Federaton and Other Environmental Activist Groups Reap Millions of Tax Dollars from Law Suits!! What are they Doing for Conservation???
Part 1: Impact of Litigation Beneficial to Enviro-Litigants - not Wildlife

A March 4, 2010 article by Richard Pollack, editor for Pajamas Media and the Washington bureau Chief of PJTV, shed some light on legal activities of environmental activist groups including the Center for Biological Diversity, Sierra Club, National Wildlife Federation and others. (Click here for copy of entire article.)

According to the article," The activist groups have generated huge revenue streams via the obscure Equal Access to Justice Act. Congressional sources claim the groups are billing for "cookie cutter" lawsuits - they file the same petitions to multiple agencies on procedural grounds and under the Act, they file for attorney fees even if they do not win the case." These groups are not your normal not-for-profit organizations as we think of them. The Sierra Club alone reported its total worth as $56.6 million in 2007 according to Pollack. He further reported that 2007 IRS records showed the top ten environmental organization presidents receive as much as a half million dollars a year in annual compensation.

On January 15, 2010, Western Legacy Alliance (WLA) asked Attorney General Eric Holder and the President for a formal audit of the Equal Access to Justice Act (EAJA) based upon initial findings of a private audit conducted by Karen Budd-Falen Law Offices on behalf of WLA.

According to the WLA website, the Budd-Falen report revealed that 1,500 cases were filed by environmental groups over the past ten years, nearly $35 million in payouts were made to 13 environmental groups (click here for report), and more than $4.7 billion in taxpayer money was paid to environmental law firms between 2003 and 2007 representing an average of $940 million a year compared to $922 million the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service spent directly on the 986 endangered and threatened species in one year. Almost $1 Billion a year in tax payer dollars are being milked from the treasury, more than is actually spent on conserving endangered species.

The Richard Pollack article lists a sampling of Lawsuits filed between 2000 and 2009 identified by WLA and Budd-Falen as follows:

* Center for Biological Diversity (CDB) filed 409 lawsuits
* National Wildlife Federation filed 427 lawsuits
* Sierra Club filed 983 lawsuits
* Western Watersheds Project filed 91 lawsuits
* WildEarth Guardians (formerly known as Forest Guardians) filed 180 lawsuits
* Wilderness Society filed 149 lawsuits

Congress has finally taken notice of the misuse of taxpayer dollars and, thanks to Representative Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming, legislation (H.R.4717-Open EAJA Act of 2010) has been introduced to get to the bottom of the excessive payouts resulting from the Equal Access to Justice Act (EAJA). To date twenty-five members of Congress have signed on to co-sponsor the bill. Let's not fool ourselves into thinking the bill has a chance to pass with the current administration and a democrat-controlled congress. The Enviro-Litigants will use every tool they have to stop this bill from becoming law. If enacted the bill will require annual reports and transparency in lawsuits filed using the EAJA. The bill has been referred to the House Judiciary Committee and has since been further referred to the Subcommittee on Courts and Competition Policy. In other words it was buried as it is highly unlikely the subcommittee will even calendar the bill.

Do Environmental lawsuits benefit all wildlife or do they just benefit the Ideological beliefs of Enviro-Litigants??

Sportsmen have traditionally been recognized as the "First Conservationists" and have invested heavily for decades, both financially and through volunteer activities, to ensure that wildlife is conserved now and into the future. In Arizona, sportsmen fund approximately 72% of the Arizona Game & Fish Department budget and raise millions of dollars for the direct benefit of wildlife. Arizona sportsmen also contribute thousands of volunteer hours annually on work projects for the benefit of wildlife. The funds and volunteer hours contributed by the sportsmen's community not only benefits game species, it also benefits non-game species including those that are threatened or endangered. The contribution that sportsmen make is well documented.
Activist Environmental groups do make certain contributions. But are the contributions outweighed by the detractions and roadblocks created by the endless filing of lawsuits with little demonstrable benefit to wildlife, except for an occasional species that few know exists? Is their endless pursuit of more wilderness and other designations that place restrictions on the use of our public lands really about saving the land or is it about denying access to an ever-increasing population of individuals who want to enjoy its beauty. These are questions that demand an answer.

An article in the December 21, 2009 issue of High Country News gives us insight into how these Enviro-Litigants think, their dislike for mixed use of public lands (including hunting, ranching, logging and other activities) and their use of litigation to shift the power to benefit their ideological beliefs. The article is an interview with Kierland Suckling, one of the founders of the Center for Biological Diversity.
While Enviro-Litigants profess to use science as the underpinning to further their ideological objectives, the article suggests otherwise. When asked if they (enviro-activists) were hindered by not having science degrees this was Mr. Suckling's response. "It was a key to our success. I think the professionalization of the environmental movement has injured it greatly. These kids get degrees in environmental conservation and wildlife management and come looking for jobs in the environmental movement. They've bought into resource management values and multiple use by the time they graduate. I'm more interested in hiring philosophers, linguists and poets. The core talent of a successful environmental activist is not science and law. Its campaigning instinct. That's not only not taught in the universities, it's discouraged." (To view the article in its entirety click here.)
They use the legal system to shift the pyridine from government agencies like the Arizona Game and Fish Department, who by all accounts has received accolades for their management of Arizona's wildlife resources. When asked what role lawsuits play in their strategy to list endangered species part of Mr. Suckling's response was "...by obtaining an injuction to shut down logging or prevent the filling of a dam, the power shifts to our hands. The forest Service needs our agreement to get back to work, and we are in the position of being able to powerfully negotiate the terms of releasing the injunction. "

What is the result of the mountains of lawsuits filed annually by activist environmental groups? We know from the Western Legacy Alliance and Budd-Falen research that there has been a huge dollar cost that is paid for by the taxpayer (that is you and me). What has been the hidden cost to agencies in responding to these lawsuits, whether it be the Arizona Game & Fish Department, U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the National Forest Service or the Bureau of Land Management? No doubt it is substantial. Does the benefit outweigh the cost? Only if you are one of the Enviro-Litigants!

Agencies, already operating with diminished or otherwise limited revenue streams, are required to divert precious resources that could be utilized to enhance our public lands and the wildlife therein only to deal with the flood of complaints, many of which never go to final judgment because the agencies capitulate regardless of the merits of the case. Another all- too-often-unnoticed detrimental side effect is the "fear" factor. These agencies, more often than not, roll over on demands not based on science or sound management decisions but fear. Mr. Suckling stated as much in the interview.

At a time when resources are scarce, what has been the cost to reintroduce one single species because it was known to previously inhabit an area a hundred years ago? What has been the cost to other species that are short changed by a re-introduction? The cost has been significant. Why should the conservation groups spend hundreds of millions of dollars to build healthy game herds only to have them used for food to feed the wolves, for example? If the wolves eat all of the elk and deer and they are on the verge of extinction, will groups like the Center for Biological Diversity file a lawsuit to save the endangered deer and elk and then claim the credit for restoring them? This is precisely what they did with the Sierra Nevada Bighorn Sheep. It is not about conservation, it is about money.

The Center for Biological Diversity website gives the impression that they were responsible for saving the Sierra Nevada Bighorn Sheep, bringing them back from the brink of extinction. What they don't tell you is that the near extinction of the Sierra Nevada Bighorn Sheep was primarily due to mountain lion predation, which went uncontrolled because Enviro-Litigants were able to get an initiative passed in California to ban mountain lion hunting. Prop 117 in California is another example of improperly trying to manage wildlife at the ballot box using emotion to sway the public.
What we have here is a vicious cycle of Enviro-Litigants suing or using the ballot box to accomplish their ideological agenda only to then get the opportunity to sue again to undue the damage caused by the first action. According to Arizona Game & Fish, the 2007 recovery plan to save the Sierra Nevada Bighorn Sheep population from extinction called for an expenditure of $21.7 million over 10 years and an additional $73.3 million to save the Peninsular Sheep in California

Sportsmen for Wildlife, an organization in Utah, recently reported the following information regarding the impact reintroduction of wolves has had on other species. The following is representative of the impact wolves have had in Idaho and Wyoming.

* Idaho's Lolo Elk Herd declined from approximately 9,000 in 1995 to fewer than 2,000 in 2010
* The Jackson Wyoming Moose population declined from 1,200 in 1995 to a low of 117 in 2010

The damage to other wildlife species is not the only cost, U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service and state Agencies have literally spent millions of dollars toward the reintroduction of wolves, though the actual cost is ever elusive. According to a recent press release from "Big Game Forever" the federal government is currently spending $3.7 million dollars annually to remove problem wolves that kill domestic livestock in Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, Oregon, Washington, New Mexico, Arizona and Utah. This cost is in addition to $100 million in damage to the economies of states where wolves are found due to excessive predation on big game according to Ryan Benson, the National Director for Big Game Forever.

And though the mountain lion is not an endangered species, the same organizations that crusade to save the wolf are the ones that crusade to save the mountain lion or to stop a much-needed water catchment from being repaired or constructed. The Kofa National Wildlife Refuge is a good example. The Refuge, established in 1939, was intended for the conservation and development of natural wildlife resources and primarily for the protection and conservation of desert bighorn sheep. The enactment of the Arizona Desert Wilderness Act of 1990 resulted in 550,000 acres of the refuge being designated as wilderness.
* Kofa National Wildlife Refuge - Wilderness Watch , Arizona Wilderness Coalition, Sierra Club of Arizona, Western Watersheds Project and Grand Canyon Wildlands Council filed a suit against U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service In June 2007 to stop the construction of water catchments and to remove tanks needed for wildlife during drought periods because of Wilderness designation on portions of the Refuge.
* Kofa National Wildlife Refuge - threatened lawsuit against USFWS for failure to complete an environmental analysis (EA) before lethally removing two mountain lions. Just one mountain lion (KMO4) was eating a sheep every 10.5 days. From 2000 to 2006 the bighorn sheep on the Kofa declined from a high of 812 to a low of 390 sheep, coinciding with periods of drought and an increase in known predation by mountain lions, which are in no way endangered, nor have they historically ranged on the Kofa. The Arizona Game & Fish Department now has to operate under USFWS ruling which specifies that an offending mountain lion that kills two sheep within a six month period can be removed if the sheep population count is below 600, but if it is above 800 no action can be taken.
Enviro-Litigants are active in Arizona as well, we can no longer just hope they will go away.
Re-introduction of the Mexican Gray Wolf is a prime example. After being designated as an endangered species in 1978 for the conterminous United States, gray wolf populations currently exist in the northern Rocky Mountains, western Great Lakes and Southwest.
The Center for Biological Diversity claims credit for the initial re-introduction of the Mexican gray wolf starting with a lawsuit in 1990.
After nearly a decade of controversy and public discourse and a Federal mandate from the Endangered Species Act of 1973, a Federal decision was published in January 1998 to release the Mexican Gray Wolf into the Blue Range Wolf Recovery Area (BRWRA) which consists of the entire Apache and Gila National Forests in east-central Arizona and west-central New Mexico. The final rule adopted by U. S. Fish and Wildlife called for the BRWRA wolf population to be classified a non-essential experimental population under section (10-j) of the Endangered Species Act.
In March 1998 eleven captive-reared Mexican wolves were released. The Plan called for release of 14 family groups to be released over a period of 5 years with the goal of reaching a population of 100 wild wolves. Because captive wolves were not able to survive on their own, they relied on humans to feed them with road kill and other food sources. It was not until 2002, that the first wild-born litter occurred from a wild-born parent. After 12 years, at last count, there were only 42 wolves in the BRWRA. Program costs to date are estimated to be in excess of $20 Million and counting, $5.4 Million of which came from the Arizona Game & Fish Department. That's about $500,000 a wolf.
Today, most wildlife conservation groups and stakeholders involved in the wolf re-introduction experiment view the Arizona re-introduction effort as a failed program. At what point do you say, "The cost outweighs the benefit". In today's fragile economy, how can we continue to dump millions of dollars into a failed program for the sake of one species? Yet, the Enviro-Litigants continue to pursue their end goal of wolf reintroduction for the sake of wolves, while ignoring the impact the wolves are or will have on other wildlife species and domestic animals and the economic and social costs attributed thereto. The litigious nature of these groups is well documented on the wolf issue across the country and in Arizona. Following is a list, though likely not complete, of the trail of legal actions taken by the Center for Biological Diversity.
Mexican Gray Wolf:
* 1990 Court case led to the eventual reintroduction of the Mexican Gray Wolf
* 2009 Lawsuit for release of depredation information
* 2009 Petitioned to list Mexican Gray Wolf as endangered subspecies or distinct population segment - without final adjudication, U. S. Fish and Wildlife in August of this year agreed to evaluate the Mexican Gray Wolf's qualification as a separate listing and potential for listing as an endangered species separate from other wolves. (Simultaneously, a federal court reinstated wolf protections in Montana and Idaho, preventing them from being hunted; even though the Interior Department had delisted the wolves in Montana and Idaho discerning that a viable population existed and was in need of management)
* July 20, 2010 Petition filed with Interior Secretary and U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service requesting that wolf populations be established in areas which have suitable habitat in the Pacific Northwest, California, Great Basin, Southern Rocky Mountains, Great Plains and New England

Jaguar
o Campaigned to have the jaguar listed as an endangered species (Jaguar was listed in 1997)
o 2008 Filed notice of intent to sue and later did so over recovery plan determination (obtained court ruling in favor of recovery plan and critical habitat from U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service in 2009)
o September 2009 Filed lawsuit to enjoin the Az Game & Fish Department from carrying out any activities that could potentially result in taking of a jaguar (case dismissed July 2010)
o August 2010 Filed a 60-day notice of intent to sue USFWS for issuing an amended permit to Az. Game & Fish Department
o Filed comments proposing 50 million acres of critical habitat for the Jaguar (no final determination made to date)
Sportsmen must awaken to what is happening around them. We can no longer afford to sit on the sidelines and ignore the impact on our wildlife and on the future of our hunting and fishing Heritage due to the radical Enviro-Litigants. This is much, much bigger than what one may think. We (all of us) better get organized!

This is the first part in a 4-part series. The next Sportsmen's Alert will focus on wilderness Designations and the role that they play in the Enviro-Litigants Plan.
Alan Hamberlin
President and Chairman of the Board for Arizona Sportsmen for Wildlife

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Posted By: 86Winchester On: 8/19/2010

Title: Removal of rural ranchers, farmers and families in the southwest

By Tom DeWeese
So how is this wrenching transformation being put into place? There are four very specific routes being used.
In the rural areas it’s called the Wildlands Project. In the cities it’s called smart growth. In business it’s called Public/Private Partnerships. And in government it’s called stakeholder councils and non-elected boards and regional government.
The Wildlands Project was the brainchild of Earth First’s Dave Foreman and it literally calls for the “re-wilding” of 50% of all the land in every state – back to the way it was before Christopher Columbus set foot on this land.
It is a diabolical plan to herd humans off the rural lands and into human settlements. Crazy you say! Yes. Impossible? Not so fast.
From the demented mind of Foreman, the plan became the blueprint for the UN’s Biodiversity Treaty. So now the scheme is international in scope.
But how do you remove people from the land? One step at a time. Let’s begin with a biosphere reserve. A national park will do. A huge place where there is no human activity. How about Yellowstone National Park? Then you establish a buffer zone around the reserve. Inside the buffer only limited human activity is allowed. Slowly, you squeeze until you squash that human activity.
Once accomplished, you extend the area of the biosphere to the limits of the former buffer area – and then you create a new buffer zone around the now larger biosphere and start the process over again. In that way, the Biosphere Reserve acts like a cancer cell, ever expanding, until all human activity is stopped.
And there are many tools in place to stop human activity and grow the reserve.
Push back livestock’s access to river banks on ranches. 300 feet ought to do it. When the cattle can’t reach the stream, the rancher can’t water them — he goes out of business. Lock away natural resources by creating national parks. It shuts down the mines — and they go out of business. Invent a Spotted Owl shortage and pretend it can’t live in a forest where timber is cut. Shut off the forest. Then, when no trees are cut, there’s nothing to feed the mills and then there are no jobs, and — they go out of business.
Locking away land cuts the tax base. Eventually the town dies. Keep it up and there is nothing to keep the people on the land – so they head to the cities. The wilderness grows – just like Dave Foreman planned.
It comes in many names and many programs. Heritage areas, land management, wolf and bear reintroduction, rails to trails, conservation easements, open space, and many more. Each of these programs is designed to make it just a little harder to live on the land – a little more expensive – a little more hopeless. Now tell me how they can deny that the process is herding people into human habitat areas?
In the West, where vast areas of open space make it easy to impose such polices there are several programs underway to remove humans from the land. Today, there are at least 31 Wildlands projects underway, locking away more than 40 percent of the nation’s land. The Alaska Wildlands Project seeks to lock away and control almost the entire state. In Washington State, Oregon, Idaho, Montana parts of North and South Dakota, parts of California, Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico, Wyoming, Texas, Utah, and more, there are at least 22 Wildlands Projects underway. For example, one project called Yukon to Yellowstone (Y2Y) – creates a 2000 mile no-man’s land corridor from the Arctic to Yellowstone.
East of the Mississippi, there are at least nine Wildlands projects, covering Maine, Pennsylvania, New York, West Virginia, Ohio, Virginia, Tennessee, North and South Carolina, Georgia and Florida. Watch for names of Wildlands Projects like Chesapeake Bay Watershed, Appalachian Restoration Project and Piedmont Wildlands Project.
The second path is called Smart Growth. After they herd you into the city, they have more plans for you in regimented and dense urban communities.
They put a line around the city and tell you no growth can take place outside that line. Urban sprawl, they say disdainfully. They refuse to build more roads as a ploy to get you out of your car into public transportation, restricting mobility.
Because there is a restriction on space inside the controlled city limited there is a shortage of houses, so prices go up. That means populations will have to be controlled, because now there is a shortage of land.
Cities are now passing “green” regulations, forcing homeowners to meet strict guidelines for making their homes environmentally compliant, using specific building materials, forcing roof replacements, demanding replacement of appliances, and more. In Oakland, California, such restrictions, with compliance demanded in just a matter of a few years, will cost each homeowner an estimated $36,000. The Cap N Trade bill contains a whole section on such restrictions for the nation.
Third, inside the human habitat areas, government is controlled by an elite ruling class called stake holder councils.
These are mostly Non-governmental organizations, or NGOs, who, like thieves in the night, just show up to stake their claim to enforce their own private agendas. The function of legitimate government within the system will be simply to enforce the dictates of the councils.
The councils are unelected, but all powerful. They are controlled by a small minority in the community, but they are all powerful. They will make you ask permission (usually denied) for anything necessary to live in the community.
They destroy business. They dictate the number of outlets a business may have in a community, not matter what the population demands. For example, in San Francisco there can only be seven McDonalds. Period.
They can dictate the kind of building materials you can use in your home – or whether you can build on your property at all. Then, if they do grant a permit for building, they might not decide to let you acquire water and electricity for your new home – and they may or may not give you a reason for being turned down.
They can dictate that you get the proper exercise – as determined by the government. Again, San Francisco is building a new federal building – the greenest ever built. The elevators will only stop on every third floor so riders are forced to use stairs – for their own health, of course.
These councils fit almost perfectly the definition of a State Soviet: a system of councils that report to an apex council and then implement a predetermined outcome. Soviets are the operating mechanism of a government-controlled economy.
The fourth path is Public/Private Partnerships. Today, many freedom organizations are presenting PPPs as free enterprise and a private answer for keeping taxes down by using business to make a better society.
In truth, many PPPs are nothing more than government-sanctioned monopolies in which a few businesses are granted special favors like tax breaks, the power of eminent domain, non-compete clauses and specific guarantees for return on their investments.
That means they can charge what they want and they can use the power of government to put competition out of business. That is not free enterprise. And it is these global corporations that are pushing the green agenda.
For example, using government to ban its own product, General Electric is forcing the mercury-laden green light bulb on you, costing 5 times the price of incandescent bulbs. Such is the reality of green industry.
PPPs are building the Trans Texas Corridor, using eminent domain to take more than 580,000 acres of private land – sanctioned by the partnership with the Texas government. And PPPs are taking over highways and local water treatment plants in communities across the nation. PPPs controlling the water can control water consumption – a major part of the Sustainable Development blueprint.
The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is the root of the “Free Trade” process and the fuel for PPPs between international corporations and government, thereby creating an “elite” class of “connected” businesses – or what Ayn Rand called “the power of pull.” Success in the PPP world is not based on quality of product and service, but on who you know in high places. To play ball in the PPP game means accepting the mantra of Sustainable Development and helping to implement it, even if it means going against your own product. That’s why Home Depot uses its commercials to oppose cutting down trees and British Petroleum advocates reducing the use of oil.
It is not free enterprise, but a Mussolini-type fascism that will only lead to tyranny. And it’s all driven by the Agenda 21 blueprint of Sustainable Development.

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Posted By: 86Winchester On: 8/18/2010

Title: Wolves at every doorstep is right

One thing that is not seen or understood by most; what is behind the whole scheme of wolf recovery in every state across America? All of the pro-wolf, pro-everything environmentalist organizations are against the use of natural renewable resources and they want to remove/eliminate every aspect of human use on federal lands to accomplish their dream of the "Wildlands Project". The ESA and lawsuits are the key to accomplish tying up 50% of the United States in Core areas, Buffers zones, and "Corridors"...and the wolf is the 'Gordian Knot' to accomplish their goal. This Wildlands plan is projected in stages 100 years ahead in time and each gain adds to completion. They know it will not be accomplished overnight, but a little at a time using the ESA, EPA, Global Warming, Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and every other source they can use. Oh, and they know the sportsman way outnumber the enviros, so they will not try to go directly at stopping hunting. The enviros will try to keep the focus off hunters to keep them from uniting and fighting against the enviro agenda. This is why few sportsman are yet concerned. All the time the enviros know their agenda, the 'Wildlands Project' will eliminate all hunting, trapping, fishing and Federal land use by humans when accomplished
The enviros are guiding and controlling all aspects of Federal Land Use by Lawsuits. It is easy for the enviros to succeed with their lawsuits when the controlling Federal agencies like the US Fish and Wildlife Service, Forest Service etc. are like minded. These Federal agencies want and have the same goals as the enviros. 99% of all enviro lawsuits are settled out of court, the Federal Agency stipulated to all their demands, the enviros get their attorney fees (millions) paid by taxpayers and the game continues on to the next grab that leaves the rural people in bewilderment.
Every Forest/Park in every state across America will become a target core area with wolves, all tied up with "critical habitat" including the areas surrounding the core areas which will be private property. Just imagine, you wake up one morning and you find out you cannot do anything on your 'own' private property. You can't build, plow, cut a tree or anything. What is your private property worth now?....you got it, nothing. So you wind up giving your land away for pennies on the dollar. Who wants your land?...well, the pro-wolf/environmental organizations and the Federal Government Agencies.... it will go into the wildlife land pool.
Then after the core areas are in place, these same pro-wolf/environmental organizations will sue the government to provide corridors tying all core areas together from Canada to Mexico under the guise of; there is no 'connectivity' for wolves to travel from each core area to other core areas so the wolves can breed, this will cause a bottleneck, which in turn produces inbreeding depression. Who owns these "corridor areas'...Private Property owners.
One thing I will say,
A few of the many sportsman across America are fighting to save our hunting heritage and customs of life of outdoor activities our fathers and their fathers have taught their sons and daughters for hundreds of years. I feel it will be to late by the time the majority of the sportsman of America finally see the damage done by these radical environmentalist organizations. To late, so sad, too bad. I tell every sportsman; Don't teach your kids what your father taught you about hunting, fishing, trapping if you are not willing to fight for their future right to hunt, fish and trap. Joint an organization that fights for your sportsman rights, donate, write letters, attend public meetings, scream, shout, get others to join, campaign for elected officials that are like minded. If you cannot, or will not get actively involved, then do not teach your children to be a hunter, fisherman or any other outdoor activity because by the time they will be your age.....there will be no game or anyplace they will be able to hunt.
'Its to late to hollar fire when the house is already burned down.....

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