The following two articles are tiny examples of why I believe double dipping by environment groups should be stopped.
Senator Enzi (WY) and I have had discussions regards environmental groups and their double dipping. Being a CPA, he has an excellent understanding of how these numbers break out.
One solution? Stop federal funding of environmental groups.
Here's one possible way to achieve this:
As a part of the Economic Recovery Plan, President Bush could issue an Executive Order - placing a "Review Moratorium on Government Grants to Non-profits" which support and or engage in environmental activities defined as and including: climate change, global warming, wildlife, conservation easements, animal alliances, Endangered Species Act. [Marc - this is where your input could be invaluable.]
These groups would be required to submit their books for review, in order that; "monies received from the government are shown, and amounts used for lawsuits against federal or state governments are identified and stopped.
The purpose: To end federal gifts to any non-profit organization which uses said monies in litigatious actions against federal or state governments.
For examples, some groups that allegedly support litigation actions against federal and state governments include:
Friends of the Earth, AFL-CIO, Alliance for Justice, Earth Action, Earth Force, Environmental Alliance for Senior Involvement, Friends of the Earth, Gay Men's Health Crisis, Pesticide Action Network North America, Peace and Justice Center, Rural Coalition, Sierra Club, Southern Appalachian Labor School, Teamsters, United Auto Workers, American Federation of Teachers, American Library Association, Environmental Federation of America, Earth Share (EarthJustice Legal Defense Fund), The Nature Conservancy.
Through said grants, these groups possibly bleed off millions and millions of taxpayer dollars. The ancillary ripple affect of their actions unnecessarily - and additionally cost Americans untold billions.
These federally subsidized bail-outs that have enjoyed years of anonymity, deserve to be publically exposed and the money flows stopped.
They should be required to subsist on private donations equal to the number of individuals who want to surge forth imports and end American resource production.
I believe it would be economically prudent and beneficial to national security to keep American resource production alive and vital; therefore, I believe not one tax dollar should ever go towards its destruction.
Please urge President Bush to activate an Executive Order - placing a "Review Moratorium of Government Grants to Non-Profits."

Thank you,

Roni Bell Sylvester
www.GoodNeighborLaw.com
www.GetterDoneGals.Blogspot.com

Home > > Letters to the Editor - Tuesday, November 25, 2008 - Mailbox for Nov. 25

Maybe Allard can get funds back from The Nature Conservancy

It's terrific that Sen. Wayne Allard is showing interest in the position of chancellor of Colorado State University.

His eager submission of application and lining up with other qualified candidates for the interview, shows his agreeable willingness to follow the great American way of protocol.

Perhaps if accepted by the CSU Board of Governors, he'll be able to convince The Nature Conservancy to return some of the millions of dollars he secured for them (to partner with the U.S. Army in purchasing land in South East Colorado).

It is our understanding that because the Army indicated they'd exercise eminent domain, TNC withdrew their co-partner capacity, leaving them with several million of those dollars un-used.

Since the TNC was the recipient of tax-payer dollars anyway, it'd be totally acceptable if they returned it to us via educating our young at Colorado State University.

Or, while he's still our U.S. Senator, he could persuade TNC to do that, regardless.
Chuck and Roni Sylvester, La Salle

http://www.greeleytribune.com/article/20081125/READERS/811259988/1028&title=Mailbox%20for%20Nov.%2025
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Conservation groups challenge owl recovery plan

By Jeff Barnard
Associated Press Writer / November 25, 2008
GRANTS PASS, Ore.-Conservation groups are suing the Bush administration to undo the northern spotted owl recovery plan that is making it possible to ramp up old growth forest logging in Oregon.

A coalition of conservation groups filed motions Monday to intervene in a timber industry lawsuit over the owl in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C.

Seattle Audubon Society and the others argue the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service was politically influenced by the Bush administration and violated the Endangered Species Act by ignoring the best available science, both in the plan for saving the owl from extinction and in deciding to reduce protections for old growth forests where the owl lives by 1.6 million acres.

The spotted owl was declared a threatened species in 1990 primarily because of heavy logging in old growth forests. Lawsuits from conservation groups led to the creation of the Northwest Forest Plan, which cut logging on federal lands by more than 80 to protect habitat for the owl, salmon and other species.

The declining log production led to economic pain in the region, particularly in small logging towns, and the Bush administration has been trying since 2000 to relax environmental laws and regulations to boost logging levels, with little success.

The owl recovery plan twice flunked peer reviews by outside scientists who said it contained no scientific basis for allowing more logging of the old growth forests set aside under the Northwest Forest Plan as habitat for the owl. The plan also identified wildfire and the invasion of spotted owl territory by the barred owl as factors in the threatened bird's decline.

Dominick DellaSala of the National Center for Conservation Science & Policy, a plaintiff in the lawsuit, served on a team of scientists who worked on the owl recovery plan before it was taken over by the Fish and Wildlife Service.

He said they were prevented from doing their jobs by a group of Bush administration officials in Washington, who needed an owl recovery plan that would allow logging in old growth forests in order to push through the so-called Whopper, or Western Oregon Plan Revision, which dismantles the Northwest Forest Plan for saving owls and increases logging on federal lands in western Oregon.

Kristen Boyles, an attorney for Earthjustice, the public interest law firm representing the conservation groups, said the owl recovery plan, smaller critical habitat and the Whopper, "are the final pieces to the puzzle the Bush administration has been putting together the last eight years to undo the Northwest Forest Plan and deliver unsustainable amounts of timber to the timber industry."

Fish and Wildlife Service spokeswoman Joan Jewett said she could not comment on pending litigation.

Tom Partin, president of the American Forest Resource Council, said the recovery plan was a good one, but leaving so much forest in critical habitat will prevent the logging needed to prevent future wildfires that will destroy even more acres.

"We need the ability to manage the lands to be sure they stay in a more healthy state," Partin said. "We just feel we'll lose more acres of owl critical habitat to fire."

Research shows that spotted owl numbers continue to drop by 4 percent annually as a result of logging, wildfires and an invasion of its habitat by the barred owl, a more aggressive East Coast cousin that migrated across Canada and has been working its way south.

The Bush administration agreed to produce a new spotted owl recovery plan and review the critical habitat designation under terms of the settlement of a lawsuit brought by the timber industry.

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