Where Do We Go From Here?

You Didn’t Need One Of These

One of These Days

On a warm spring day in April 2008 I checked in to the New Jersey State Police Disaster Response facility in West Trenton.  The weather was about as nice as it gets around here with temperatures in the low 70′s, beautiful blue skies and a slight breeze. Inside the building, which as far as I could tell was built to withstand a simultaneous nuclear blast and asteroid impact, it was quiet. The command center, with its banks of desks and computer monitors, was dark and empty. The walls were ringed with high-tech data displays and HD television screens that were blank, save for a single T.V. tuned to the Golf Network showing one of the early rounds of the Master’s.  This was not the kind of day this facility was built for.

I spent the afternoon meeting with the state’s disaster response coordinator as part of the background work for creating a new version of the New Jersey State Plan. A long-term assessment for the state, the State Plan was designed to steer decisions on land use, infrastructure investment, capital projects and resource conservation and protection.  A large portion of the research involved meeting with each of the state’s agencies and departments to obtain their input and to try to align each agency’s programs with the State Plan to the greatest extent possible.  This session focused on two aspects of disaster response: the vulnerability of infrastructure to potential disasters and the nature and direction of recovery efforts.  No responsible long-term plan could ignore these issues.

If you want to make enemies-try to change something- Woodrow Wilson

The updated State Plan was going to contain a new section on Climate Change and recommendations for a comprehensive response, from the way we contributed to continued greenhouse gas emissions to preparation and response for the inevitable effects that climatologists, including the Office of the New Jersey State Climatologist, warned we were facing. From hardening our infrastructure to handle the likely flooding, to protecting roads and bridges to, perhaps most importantly, planning to rebuild differently after any disaster, these issues were all explored and incorporated into the long-term outlook for the state. A plan that was eventually buried by the Corzine Administration and outright rejected by the Christie Administration because it contained some hard truths that may not have been politically expedient, it addressed getting ready for the inevitable. Four years later, on October 29, 2012 to be exact, the day the disaster response center was built for arrived. It really didn’t take a crystal ball to know this was coming.

Insanity?

Time for a Change

While the State Police were preparing for every sort of potential disaster from terrorist attacks to chemical spills to nuclear reactor accidents, we knew what the main threat to New Jersey was-the state’s vulnerability to coastal storms. Whether a nor’easter or a hurricane, a strong storm moving up the east coast or making landfall somewhere along the Jersey Shore was clearly the most likely danger facing the Garden State.  Rising sea levels made damage from flooding more likely, even from ordinary storms. Bridges and causeways were prone to inundation, cutting off escape routes for residents along the shore. Infrastructure, such as water and sewage facilities, electrical transmission equipment and other necessities of modern life were at risk. Homes, businesses and people in the path of such a storm were in danger.  Hurricane Sandy was the first of what will probably be many tests of the resiliency of our infrastructure and the communities it serves.

The effects of sea level rise have been studied. Mapping, like the interactive map that can be found here, clearly indicated where the largest risks existed and continue to exist. Yet we took little or no action.  This is as much an environmental issue as it is an economic and social issue and, not the least, an issue of public health and safety. As shore towns undertake rebuilding efforts, the question becomes are we taking the necessary steps during this process to avoid being right back in the same predicament when the next major event occurs. In a rush back to “normalcy” and trying to recover economically will we make the same mistakes again?  We never had the excuse that we didn’t know this would happen and we certainly can’t say it now. Sea level will continue to rise, storms will increase in intensity and frequency and the ocean will go where the ocean wants to go. Even though he didn’t really say it, we like to quote Einstein as saying insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Whether Einstein said it or not, its a good way to look at things.

The response to events like Hurricane Sandy will say a lot about us as a society. Our ability to make hard decisions. Our capacity to plan ahead. Our commitment to future generations. The nature and character of our political leadership. All of these things are subjects for consideration and evaluation. These are not abstract or theoretical issues. They have a real-world effect and we have a responsibility to demand that we cease senseless political debate and start to do things differently-and better. There is a lot on the table here.  We’ll continue to come back to this topic because of its importance and because it says so much about how we operate as a society. My mission for 2013 is to motivate visitors to this site to take action and hold our leaders accountable. Come back and check in often for discussion of ways to accomplish that. We can make a difference.  There are two ways to deal with hitting yourself on the thumb with a hammer. The first is to put some ice on it after you hit it. The other is not hitting yourself in the first place. This was one shot on the thumb. Let’s try not to hit it again. -Ben Spinelli

Time Has Come Today

The Dirty Work of Government

Its Later Than You Think

Now that the election is over, its time to get back to the business of governing. One of the prime functions of government is to provide the infrastructure that makes our society work. Roads, bridges, electrical distribution networks, and water and sewer facilities are all vital components of a healthy society. When it comes to the environment there are two essential elements of infrastructure that have a direct impact- water in and water out – our drinking water supply system and sewage treatment facilities. Infrastructure is probably one of the least interesting subjects to read about, but it may be one of the most important.

Talking about infrastructure may not have the cache’ of other environmental issues but it is the foundation of how our built environment interacts with the natural world. Where and how we obtain the drinking water that is essential to a functioning society is the hub for most environmental policies. What we do with that water and the impact of our methods of disposal of the by-products of our use of this resource is just as important an issue. When you start talking about water lines and sewage treatment plants, most people’s eyes start to glaze over. That’s unfortunate because the time has come (or has it really passed) for a serious discussion about infrastructure investment.

You may delay, but time will not-Benjamin Franklin

Time to Invest in Infrastructure

772 Communities Across The U.S. Still Utilize CSO’s

We get so lost in discussions of taxation and fiscal policy that we have forgotten basic principles of investment and re-investment in society. We are currently living off of the investments made by past generations and we are ignoring or refusing our obligation to pay those investments forward to the next generation. What’s the big deal? Well aside from kicking the can down the road and saddling our children and grand-children with an almost impossible task of renewing the nation’s infrastructure, we continue to inflict enormous damage on the environment. Over drawing aquifers, outstripping the capacity of water supplies, and disposing of improperly treated or untreated sewage effluent in the country’s waterways is taking a toll. In the current economic climate, nobody wants to discuss investing hundreds of billions of dollars into the unglamorous world that largely lies beneath the ground, out of sight and out of mind.

Narraganset Bay Commission’s CSO Project

The Narragansett Bay Commission recently undertook a massive project to solve the issue of CSO outflows that were seriously impacting the health of the bay. Their solution was to build a huge underground storage tunnel to store storm water until it could be safely released into Narragansett Bay. The cost for Phase I of this project was $350 million. The construction of this 3 mile tunnel underneath the City of Providence eliminated the discharge of 2.2 billion gallons of untreated sewage into the bay each year. An expensive endeavor, but was it worth the price? If you care about the health of the environment it certainly was. However, this isn’t the kind of investment where you get something that you can look at or score political points with. It’s just good sound government.

This is a political issue because this is a government responsibility. This is an environmental issue because every day we fail to address deficient infrastructure is one more day that we continue to foul our waterways or dangerously over-draw our water supplies.  Every time there is a heavy rainfall, Combined Sewage Outflows (CSO’s) pour millions of gallons of raw sewage into streams, rivers, coastal bays and the ocean. Inadequate and outdated sewage treatment plants dump under-treated or poorly treated effluent into our waterways every minute of every day. The problem is that there is no constituency for this issue. As long as water comes out of the tap and the toilet flushes, nobody pays much attention to why these things actually happen. Meanwhile, we are oblivious to the self-inflicted looming threat that the failure to modernize the lifelines of our society represents. Without advocates, without a well of campaign cash behind it, without a compelling narrative, and with an expensive solution, infrastructure investment is the most important issue that nobody cares about. Good luck trying to get political leaders to address this unwanted step-child of public policy.

Do The Math

And Up Through The Ground Came A Bubblin’….

The infrastructure issue is, at its root, a math problem. Capital investments, by their nature, are long-term propositions. Large expenditures that are paid for over a period of years. The theory underlying these undertakings is that projects with multi-generational  life spans and multi-generational benefits will be paid for over multiple generations. It makes a lot of sense. The scope of the necessary investment can be assessed and a rational financial plan for renewing and paying for a modern infrastructure system can be put in to place over a period of years. However, it takes someone to make the initial investment and set the wheels in motion. The problem is that nobody wants to take on the political risk of fulfilling this obligation. If it’s a 30 year undertaking and we waste a year, it’s just become a 31 year project. If we wait another year, it becomes 32 years.

I wish I had some pithy one-liner or a dramatic story to tell you to pique your interest. The problem is that this is just the real nuts and bolts of governing a modern society. Nothing exciting. Nothing glamorous. Unless you’re a water engineer or a long-term planner, you will never give a thought to these issues. Besides, our politicians are just so much more entertaining when they talk about things like taxes, abortion and guns that we forget to demand that they fulfill the real obligations of governing officials-make sure society works and make sure we plan for the future. Unfortunately, we can measure the costs of action fairly accurately. We have a very difficult time assessing the penalties for inaction in terms of dollars. So we obsess about the price of fulfilling our obligations, frightened by the financial investment needed, and in the end, do nothing.

Living on the Edge

NYC’s Water Tunnel #3 Under Construction

There are places where environmental infrastructure is being addressed. Aside from the Narragansett Bay Commission’s CSO project, New York City is in the home stretch of a construction project that started in 1970. The massive Water Tunnel Number 3 is scheduled for completion in 2020. A 50-year, $5 billion project that will insure the delivery of clean drinking water to our nation’s largest city. In all 50 states money from the Clean Water State Revolving Fund (SRF) is leveraged with state funds for local infrastructure projects that address both drinking water and waste water treatment. Unfortunately, its just a drop in the bucket compared to what needs to be done. In reality, even the Water Tunnel Number 3 project was only undertaken because planners and engineers realized that they couldn’t even perform routine maintenance on the existing water tunnels without turning off the tap to 8 million people. We’re just living on the edge when it comes to infrastructure, just one failure away from serious problems.

So, no, this is hardly the most compelling story to tell when it comes to environmental issues. However, its one that we need to drag from the shadows of policy wonkism and out into the daylight for discussion. The next time you hear some politician droning on about taxes and deficits, ask them what they plan on doing about our pending infrastructure nightmare. What will it take? A massive sewage spill? No, we’ve had those and they have hardly raised an eyebrow. The failure of a major city’s water system? That might get some response.  The notion that we need to see a major catastrophe before we act is a sad state of affairs, but also an apt commentary on the current state of our politics and our government.

What can we do? Start demanding answers to questions about infrastructure spending. At the very least you will force political leaders to do some research into an issue they would much rather ignore. This is a ticking bomb. Don’t wait until the tap is dry or the toilet doesn’t flush or you notice that a local waterway has taken on a distinctive new odor before asking for action. Politicians won’t react to this issue unless you compel them to. They need to drink clean water too. Give your state or federal representative’s office a call. Maybe we can start a movement.-  Ben Spinelli

Seeing Is Believing

Chasing Ice

Stunning Images of Decaying Glaciers

If you have a friend or acquaintance who is a climate change skeptic or denier, do them a favor and treat them to dinner and a movie. Find out where James Balog’s documentary Chasing Ice is screening near you and take them to see it.  At worst, you will  have a nice meal and spend an hour and fifteen minutes watching a real-life story of determination, effort and passion that is inspiring. At best, you may be able to cut through the political fog that surrounds the issue of climate change and open the eyes of someone to the transformation of our planet’s climate that is taking place right now.  Without a doubt you will see some of the most stunning and beautiful photography ever put on film.  It would be difficult for any thinking person to walk out of this movie without believing that climate change is real.

Balog set up automatic cameras in Greenland, Iceland, Alaska and Montana to take time-lapse photographs of retreating glaciers. His project, the Extreme Ice Survey (EIS) was an incredibly ambitious undertaking designed to document the melting ice. He and his team traveled to some of the harshest places on Earth to install and monitor photographic equipment that documented the break-up and melting of glaciers at a pace that is greater than has ever been experienced in modern history. One incredible sequence documents the collapse of a section of an Icelandic glacier that is the size of lower Manhattan. (This footage alone makes the movie worth seeing)  The physical and technical challenges that were overcome to to make EIS a reality are as much a part of the story as the evidence collected.

Blinding ignorance does mislead us. O! Wretched mortals, open your eyes!-Leonardo da Vinci

Icebergs Breaking Away From A Glacier in Iceland

There is no heavy-handed proselytizing in Chasing Ice and no real politics. There is very little hard-core science, save for a well done segment explaining the scientific significance of deep ice core samples and the correlation between the atmospheric concentration of greenhouse gases and temperature. What you will find in this movie is the compelling story of photographer James Balog’s efforts to create a diary of images taken over a period of several years.  His images chronicle the alarming changes taking place to glaciers in the Northern Hemisphere that are far beyond what he, or anyone, expected when he undertook this mission. Balog has collected a body of evidence that is incredibly convincing because it is simple, factual and authentic. The photographic record compiled by EIS speaks louder and more clearly than any advocate could ever hope to.

Who Are You Going To Believe-Me Or Your Lyin’ Eyes?

Balog opens his narration of the movie with an analogy comparing climate change denial to a patient with an abscessed tooth who shops from dentist to dentist until  he finds a doctor who tells him it’s O.K. to leave the infected tooth in place. I believe that climate change deniers are more akin to someone who, having exhausted their list of doctors, turns to their garbage man for a favorable opinion. Why trust science?  Balog makes it clear that there is overwhelming consensus among scientists that climate change is taking place and that it is, at least in part, attributable to the activities of man. His photographic record makes it clear that there are consequences that are occurring now.

Anyone with even a rudimentary idea of how to calculate volume should be frightened by the scope of the changes that are taking place. A few back-of-the-envelope calculations will give you an approximation of the amount of water being released by these glaciers into the world’s oceans. The rising sea-levels that will result should make anyone living near the coast, like say in New York City, take notice. But that’s science and climate change is all about politics, isn’t it? If I get an answer that I don’t like, I’ll turn to Rush Limbaugh or Sean Hannity for guidance. After all, my garbage man said it was O.K to walk around with a diseased tooth. I’m sure that nasty pain will go away soon.

Balog & Members of His Team At An EIS Camera Site

I saw the movie at the Acme Screening Room in Lambertville, NJ. It was a great place to see a movie but, aside from my wife and I, there were only about 20 other people in the theater. This is a movie that needs to be seen by as many people as possible. One of the things that you take away from this film is the sense that it is time for action. A modest start is to see this movie (and take someone with you). You can find a screening near you here.  I guarantee that you will be inspired to do something to make a difference after seeing it. If you have any sense of responsibility to your children or to future generations you will be moved to do what you can. Hopefully, its not too late. -Ben Spinelli

Dark, Cold & Lucky

Ironic That The Storm That Devastated The Jersey Shore Was Named Sandy

Hello, This Is Your Wake-Up Call

One week after Hurricane Sandy made landfall along the New Jersey coast, I’ve been exiled to the Center City Holiday Inn in Allentown, PA. Back in northwestern New Jersey my home is dark and cold. In rural areas no electricity means no heat, no lights, no water, no phone, no internet access and, since many cell towers in the region were knocked out of commission, there is spotty cell phone coverage at best.  Electric wires are lying across the front lawn and the lines from the road to my house are hanging from branches in the woods; pulled from the poles by several of the many large trees that fell or were snapped in half by the storm’s fierce winds. Gas stations are mostly closed and the few that are open have long lines and limited supplies. Getting anywhere is an adventure as roads are blocked by downed trees, fallen wires and broken telephone poles.

So, after six days of finding inventive ways to cook everything that was left in the refrigerator on the barbecue grill, chainsawing my way to the road, sleeping in the cold and flushing the toilet with pots of water from the bathtub, it was time to get out-of-town. The closest available hotel rooms were in the Lehigh Valley in eastern Pennsylvania and a trip to a patch of high ground yielded the cell coverage necessary to make a reservation . We packed the car and headed west leaving our venture into the world of Little House on the Prairie behind. Arriving back in the 21st Century, with T.V., high-speed internet, heat, showers and actual modern plumbing, we were able to find that as difficult as our week had been, Sandy had been much harder on other parts of the region. The stunning video of the damage and the effects on the coastline of New Jersey and even in New York City were sobering.

A New Inlet Between Barnegat Bay & The Atlantic At Mantaloking, NJ

The havoc and destruction that the nearly 90 mph wind gusts wreaked on inland NJ were mild compared with the effects that were visited upon coastal areas of the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic U.S. by a record storm surge. My home is intact. My family and friends are well. The rainfall in our area was modest, so flooding was not a problem. Eventually, the electric lines will be rebuilt or repaired. I spent Saturday afternoon at a college football game watching Muhlenberg pull out an exciting 24-17 overtime victory over Ursinus. I then went to a nice warm hotel room where I could enjoy what, after a week in the cold and dark, were the modern marvels of a hot shower, television and, free wi-fi internet access. I’m writing from the relative comfort of a hotel room hanging out with utility workers from Ohio and Indiana who have come to help repair the storm’s damage to the power grid. My interaction with Sandy was annoying and distressing, but at its worst, an inconvenience. I was lucky.

I will skip over the technical analysis of the storm. That’s better left for meteorologists and climatologists, you know, the people who actually know what they’re talking about. We do know that record high tidal surges were recorded all along the east coast.  The pictures of the Hudson River pouring into the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel in Manhattan or of swaths of shore homes wiped from the barrier islands speak for themselves. The sight of the roller coaster at Seaside Heights, NJ sitting in the ocean will likely be an iconic image for generations. But the real lessons from this storm won’t be found in the damage. They won’t be found in the words of politicians reassuring victims. They won’t be found in the empty arguments of right-wing talk show hosts. The lessons won’t even come from the deaths of over 100 people in the storm’s path. No, the lessons will be in how we react as a society and whether or not we start to take planning for a changing climate, and a changing world, seriously, rationally and intelligently.

NYC’s Flooded Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel

History doesn’t repeat itself – at best it sometimes rhymes-Mark Twain

So, what does this have to do with politics and the environment? For starters, we better start paying more attention to reality with our policy-making and less to political considerations. Last week when the long-range forecasts first started showing Sandy making landfall along the New Jersey coast I started writing an  article about the last great storm to batter the mid-Atlantic in March 1962.  50 years ago, the Ash Wednesday storm lashed the east coast from North Carolina’s Outer Banks to Maine. Although there was serious damage all along the storm’s path, like Sandy, it reserved its biggest impacts for New Jersey’s barrier islands. However, the 1962 storm was much different in character. That storm was a more typical Nor’easter that sat off the coast and caused onshore winds to drive water landward for three days. This was the mid-Atlantic’s storm of record for over half a century. As it became more and more evident that Sandy, along with its storm surge, would indeed make landfall somewhere along the New Jersey coast I put the article aside to await the actual results. While there are many similarities between the 1962 storm and Sandy,  there are also significant differences. Those differences are where we need to direct our attention.

After more than 100 years without a land falling hurricane striking the New Jersey coast, there have now been two in two years. We can quibble that Irene, in 2010, fell to just below hurricane strength before coming ashore or that Sandy may or may have not become extra-tropical just before hitting the coast, but the distinctions are only important to the weathermen.  Sea level is at least a half-foot higher along the east coast today than it was in 1962 and it continues to rise at a rate of approximately 3 millimeters per year. Summertime ocean surface temperatures in the Atlantic off the northeast coast are rising and remain warmer into the Autumn months. Increased melting of Arctic sea ice has contributed to warmer Arctic air temperatures and the strengthening of high pressure systems in the far north Atlantic that act as blocks for northward traveling weather systems. Theses blocks force the storm track closer to, or actually back towards the East coast of the United States. The intensity and frequency of storms will continue to increase over historic norms and they will affect populated areas again and again. With the higher sea levels, even storms that in the past were ordinary, will begin to have increased effects on coastal areas. We can have all the political arguments we want about whether or not climate change is occurring  or if it is the result of man-made activities. Those disagreements will ultimately be resolved, with certainty, by Mother Nature.

Storm Damage Along The NJ Coast From the 1962 Ash Wednesday Storm

When I get back home and things get settled I will return to this subject for a more detailed analysis. Until then, consider the implications from this event for our policies at the national, state and local levels. Our land use practices, infrastructure investments, and the resiliency or redundancy of the structures we rely upon for our modern society all need to be re-assessed. There are an incredible number of cascading consequences from food supplies to adequate drinking water supplies that we must respond to. One storm drove the most densely populated portion of the nation, and our country’s biggest city, back to the 19th Century in a matter of hours. What will happen next time? (And there will be a next time) Before we even begin to address the root causes of climate change and our answers for them, we need to have a day of reckoning where we acknowledge that something is happening and we need to react. That is how rational and intelligent people respond to challenges. One thing that should be clear however is that both time and our luck have run out. Its time to demand that political leaders respond to the reality that we are facing serious and growing threats that we can no longer afford to ignore or treat as just another political issue. The power to make this change lies with us. It’s high time we used that power.- Ben Spinelli

On The Road To Nowhere

Climate Change & Politics

Is There A Difference Between Politics And Professional Wrestling?

Americans have an uncanny ability to politicize almost anything. You can be sure that once politics enters a discussion, no matter how important or complex the subject may be, it’s all downhill from there. There is no better example than the nation’s debate (or perhaps more accurately, lack of debate) over climate change. What began as a serious scientific inquiry into the state of our planet and it’s future has devolved into political theater. A question that cries out for sober and thoughtful inquiry has been reduced to the level of professional wrestling. I’m talking old school, WWF, good guys vs. bad guys wrestling. So, while the rest of the civilized world is engaged in an intelligent analysis of climate change and its potential implications, here in the U.S. we’ve turned the consideration of this issue into the equivalent of  a steel cage match between Bruno Sammartino and Superstar Billy Graham.

In politics, stupidity is not a handicap-Napoleon Bonaparte

A recent documentary in the PBS series Frontline entitled Climate of Doubt did a far better job of showing exactly how the issue of climate change became politicized and eventually neutralized as an issue than I could ever do here. You can watch the show online here and it is well worth the hour you will spend. We consider ourselves an educated and progressive society, yet our actions indicate just the opposite. You may find a lot of what you see in this documentary aggravating or disturbing but nothing should be more disquieting than the statement ” the politics have gotten to the point where people just don’t want to listen to science”. That alone should send a chill down your spine.

Politics Will Not Change the Answers

The course that the debate over climate change has taken is just another sorry episode in modern American politics. The notion that a scientific question has a political answer, or more precisely, a partisan political answer, is insulting and dangerous. Basically, the polarization of factions in our country has made it acceptable to reject logic and reason because your political opponents have embraced them. Combine this with a concerted public relations effort made by special interests, namely the powerful oil and gas industry, who stand to suffer some degree of financial harm if the U.S. takes suggested measures in response to the threat of climate change, and we have a situation where scientific inquiry has been reduced to just another opportunity to divide the electorate for the advantage of one side or the other. This is mass national derangement.

The frightening part of this debate is that we have evidence that climate patterns are changing. What we don’t have is conclusive proof that these changes are either induced by human behavior or not part of the normal climate cycles that the Earth undergoes periodically. We just haven’t been able to accumulate enough scientific data over a long enough period of time to come up with answers to those questions with absolute certainty. We also have not had the capability to measure and analyze complex atmospheric dynamics for a long enough period of time. However, that doesn’t mean it’s not happening. Further, the evidence that we do have, including analysis of ancient deep ice core samples, sure does seem to point in the direction that something unusual is happening and that we have a hand in it.

Climate Change Opinions By Party

The ability to exploit this uncertainty has been a boon for the climate change deniers. Combine this with the fact that Democrats were quick to react to climate science and the stage was set for a partisan split. After all, in today’s political world, if Democrats are for it, then Republicans have to be against it. A recent poll by the Pew Research Center showed a wide gap between Democrats and Republicans on the issue. 85% of Democrats, compared with 48% of Republicans felt that there was substantial evidence of climate change. Its amazing. Political affiliation can account for a nearly 40% difference of opinion on a scientific matter. You can check out the full text of the Pew report here. Do you think we could get a similar split of opinion if Democrats came out supporting a study that found that gravity exists?

One of the principles that Jefferson, Madison, Adams and the rest of the men who founded this country wanted to guide our national affairs was the belief and reliance on science and reason. I guess they never accounted for the toxic effects of partisan politics. However, the cynical manipulation of public opinion, primarily for the benefit of a very few, is something quite different.  It speaks more to a national failure of critical thinking skills and a pervasive sentiment that the present is more important than the future. As bad as the effort to influence public opinion for political or monetary gain may be, our national susceptibility to that kind of control may be even worse. My, how little we have progressed. It’s hard to believe this is the same country that sent men to the moon and has successfully landed mobile probes on Mars.

This approach is the road to nowhere. We are faced with some real policy challenges and threats that may rise to the level of endangering modern civilization. Yet we are paralyzed by a partisan debate. It’s depressing. Whether or not you believe climate change has anthropogenic origins, you should understand that responding and adjusting to things like sea-level rise, changes in precipitation patterns and threats to the food supply are necessary and responsible. Whether or not you believe climate change is even occurring,  reduction in reliance on fossil fuels and atmospheric pollution still make sense. Instead we end up addressing none of these issues.   Lost in a nonsensical debate over the politics of the situation, we go around in circles while events progress. With a nod to the Talking Heads I suggest that you click here and allow this song to play while you read this article, it should at least put you in the right frame of mind to contemplate what a foolish course we are choosing as a nation. We have got to get past the politics that divide us.

We have got to demand better from our politicians. The good news in that Pew poll was that over 2/3 of Americans do believe that climate change is taking place. That means our national inaction on this issue is motivated by less than 1/3 of the population. That’s unacceptable. We need to stand up for science and reason. We need to require our representatives to get beyond partisanship and take action, or we need to get new representatives. If we are the educated and thoughtful country that we believe ourselves to be, we will do this. If science and reason really do guide our course of conduct we will take the necessary measures to respond to the threat of climate change. If not, then we haven’t really progressed much from the superstitious Dark Ages and we deserve that fate that awaits us. But I’m an optimist and I’m betting that this is not the future that we should expect.  However, it isn’t going to just happen. We need to take an active role in creating change and we need to start now.

Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride

Communism Is Just A Light Rail Ride Away!

What is the latest in crazy conspiracy theories? Well, believe it or not it’s the old conservative notion that planning ahead is a good thing. Planning, especially resource based planning, and anything with the word “sustainability” in it has been identified by right-wing factions of American politics as a part of a grand scheme to take over the United States. Yes, sustainable urban planning is all part of a vast plot to impose the U.N.’s  Agenda 21 on our nation, and if it hasn’t already arrived where you live, it’s coming soon.  Forget the “Black Helicopters”, the invaders will be using hybrid cars, bike paths, hiking trails and light rail lines to infiltrate our country. If you thought that we had a problem with an inability to appropriately plan development, conserve resources and formulate responsible infrastructure investments you were wrong. Planning apparently IS the problem.

Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I’m not sure about the former. -Albert Einstein

The conservative movement in America has managed to turn a legitimate policy debate over land use controls and property rights into fodder for the fringe and a cause celebre for the Tea Party crowd. Instead of having an intelligent discussion over the appropriate balance of societal needs and individual rights, you know, like the debates conducted in the Federalist Papers, they’ve decided to take the conversation somewhere else. There’s no need to conduct a rational assessment of our resource capacity compared to anticipated demand, the right-wing has decided that it would be much better to turn an important issue of public policy into an X-Files episode. They have a problem though, the truth most certainly is out there.

The U.N. Is Behind This! You Can Look It Up.

How far has the right-wing fringe pushed this lunacy? Well, farther than you might think. The Republican National Committee actually adopted a “Resolution Exposing United Nations Agenda 21” in January. The State of Alabama adopted a law in May 2012 prohibiting the state, or any of its subdivisions, from participating in any actions directly related to or traceable to the dreaded Agenda 21. Not to be outdone, a visit to the John Birch Society’s web site will provide you with the following analysis:

…UN’s Local Agenda 21 program may already be in your local community, through your home town or city’s membership in ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability. Agenda 21 seeks for the government to curtail your freedom to travel as you please, own a gas-powered car, live in suburbs or rural areas, and raise a family. Furthermore, it would eliminate your private property rights through eminent domain.

This is, after all, the organization that labeled President Dwight Eisenhower a “tool of the communists”, so their ability to spot infiltration by property stealing Bolsheviks is clearly beyond reproach. Tea Party activists have been on an anti-Agenda 21 binge; writing op-eds, letters-to-the-editor and protesting at planning and re-development meetings across the country.  There will be no planning for these guys.

The thing is, you would think that an effort that promotes living within our means, accurately forecasting financial needs and obligations and making intelligent and well thought-out land use decisions would find some favor with conservatives. That’s kind of the traditional definition of conservatism, isn’t it?  I guess not. Apparently, since the concept has met with the approval of the liberals among us, it must therefore also be evil. Private industry actually has a term for this approach to conducting your affairs. They call it a business plan. But bring this type of analysis to government and it becomes a U.N. plot. Go figure. If liberals are for it then conservatives have to be against it. Simple, isn’t it?  So logic and principals be damned, this is America and you can’t make us be smart if we don’t want to be.

Close Your Eyes & Hope For The Best

So, off we go on Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride. So much more thrilling than if we let those dour planners have their say. Do we have enough water for our future needs? Maybe. Maybe not. Clean air, working sewer systems, adequate roadways, sufficient energy sources? Who knows and who cares? Climate change? I’m not even sure it’s happening and we can’t do anything about it even if it is going on. An intact environment capable of supporting human life and meeting the needs of society?  Your guess is as good as mine!  I’m getting excited just writing this! Life is really an adventure if you don’t know where you’re headed. Why spoil it by trying to plan ahead. Who needs to go to Six Flags for an exhilarating ride? It’s all about the journey, isn’t it?

The problem is that we actually do know where we are going and that, in all likelihood, disaster awaits at the end of this trip. We live in a world of finite resources and an increasing demand on those resources. We’re not exactly careening off into the unknown. A crisis of public health threats, diminished  quality of life and economic ruin lurk down at the bottom of the hill by the town dump where this road is leading us. Rational thoughtful people who look at the circumstances that we are facing and conclude that we need to pay attention to the balance between man and nature, between capacity and demand, between where we’re headed and where we need to go, are not plotting the end of the “American Way of Life”. They’re responding in a manner that anyone with a decent survival instinct should understand.  Just because they share their conclusions with others, like scientists and planners from the U.N, doesn’t mean they are conspiring on an agenda. Maybe its just that intelligent sane people looking at similar facts and circumstances come up with similar answers. But I guess that’s just crazy talk.

I Don’t Know,
But I’m On My Way!

With the modest efforts we currently devote to planning a future that works, we barely make headway. Abandoning planning as a tool of competent and visionary government policy-making altogether is sheer folly. It reminds me of the The Little Rascals episode where the gang was careening down a hill  in a home-made fire truck.  As they raced out of control one of the kids asked Stymie, who was steering the contraption, “where are you going?” His response, “I don’t know, but I’m on my way!” is an apt metaphor for our current state of affairs. However, this is a dangerous and irresponsible way to conduct ourselves.

There has traditionally been a lot of tension between environmentalists and planners. In a lot of ways, the recent insanity of the anti-Agenda 21 attacks on planning efforts may prove to be a very positive development. Although the two groups may approach the puzzle of planning a sustainable future from different perspectives, they share a lot of common ground. The rejection of sustainable planning called for by the Tea Party is an attack on both environmental protection and planning. When the cry goes out that “green is the new red”, both groups are being categorized as un-American. The time is long past for planners and environmentalists to come to terms with their differences and concentrate on the values and goals that they share. They’re going to find that for all of the disagreements that they may have on how to accomplish them, their aspirations are largely the same.

Exactly Which Way Are We Going?

Maybe it’s just that going on a trip without asking for directions, no matter how lost you might be, isn’t only a “man” thing, its the American Way. The problem is that this isn’t a trip that we can afford to be lost on and there aren’t any secret short cuts. With a burgeoning world population putting unprecedented demands on the planet’s systems and resources, we need to come to terms with how we live on the Earth sooner rather than later. Future generations are relying on us having at least some idea of where we need to be and how to get there.  Instead of wasting time on an inane and ridiculous manufactured debate over the influence of Agenda 21, we need to get to work. In the words of the esteemed World’s Foremost Authority, Professor Irwin Corey, “if we don’t change direction soon, we’re going to end up where we’re going”. You can be certain that if we don’t pay attention, we’re not going to like the destination. -Ben Spinelli

Has Anyone Seen The Environment?

The Presidential Debates are over. The election is two weeks away.  Conspicuous, by its absence, has been any mention of environmental issues during this campaign.  Not a discussion of policy differences. Not a debate over environmental protection or regulations. Heaven forbid, not a word about climate change. Not a peep from the pundits.  Nothing! The discussion of environmental issues has not merely been marginalized in the current election cycle, it has been excluded.

Have You Seen Me?

Oh, the environment has been a bit player in the campaign. A mention of green jobs here.  Used as a scare tactic there. The environment has been exploited in the pejorative sense when candidates are talking about jobs in coal country or “energy independence” in terms of oil and gas drilling. In the fight for votes in the all-important swing states, protecting the environment has no role. You would almost think that we have solved the great environmental challenges facing our country. We can move on to other more pressing matters and leave the annoying and vexing questions about the environment in our rear-view mirror.

Sadly, this is an indicator of just how far environmental protection has slipped in the hierarchy of political issues.  Demonized by one major political party, abandoned by the other, the environment is an issue that has lost its patrons in the nation’s political leadership. In the cynical world of modern politics, attention to the environment produces neither the votes nor the money to warrant serious attention during the election cycle.  We are left trying to deduce where candidates stand and hope that we can make an educated guess regarding which candidate will best serve environmental issues if elected. That’s a heck of a predicament.

Tell Us-No Matter How Bad It Might Be

o paraphrase the old man in A Christmas Story, What has brought us to this lowly state? Unfortunately, there’s no easy answer. There are some prime suspects. The  difficult economy makes job creation a priority and environmental protection seem like a luxury. There is the obscene amount of money pumped into the electoral system, particularly from anti-environmental business interests,  following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United v. The Federal Election Commission. A false debate over climate change has, to a great extent, neutralized it as an effective political issue. No matter what the root cause might be, the more pressing issue is that we are here. And, accepting where we are, the most important question becomes “what are we going to do about it?”

Where do we start? The scope of the task can seem daunting and there certainly seems to be far more questions than answers when it comes to figuring this out. However, we can’t be paralyzed by the sheer difficulty of the challenge. It was never politically acceptable for a candidate to be an opponent of protecting the environment. There may have been substantial policy disagreements between candidates over the nature and extent that environmental protections should take, but it was never O.K. to ignore the environment. It’s a sad state of affairs when Richard Nixon looks like an environmental champion when compared to most current day politicians. So task number one is clearly holding elected officials accountable for their positions, or lack of them, on environmental issues.

Time To Revoke The Free Pass

The days of the free pass for politicians, regardless of political affiliation, need to be over. There needs to be a renewed respect, not only for the protection of the environment, but for the political power of environmental issues. At first glance this may seem an impossibility. How can a sector of the electorate that is primarily characterized by enthusiastic, but chronically disjointed and underfunded champions make an impact?  How can you fight the powerful monied interests that have captured the electoral process, particularly at the national level? How can you fight the financial power of the Koch Brothers and Super Pacs? The answer certainly lies in solidarity, organization, cooperation and pooling of resources and the power of the message and information. But it goes a little deeper than that. With a closely divided electorate, where one or two percentage points are everything, incremental shifts in support between candidates can have monumental consequences. If environmental issues are perceived to have the potential of changing a substantial enough block of votes, they will garner attention. Making candidates understand that the edge they seek may lie in adequately addressing environmental concerns is not a far-fetched goal. It can be achieved and, because of the importance of moving the needle of support just a little, can actually negate a good deal of the influence of the hundreds of millions of dollars poured into the election system by special interests. This can be accomplished on a very modest budget.

Making it clear that environmental protection is a bi-partisan issue is another important factor. Can you imagine a debate where the two candidates spend time going toe-to-toe trying to demonstrate which of them is a better choice for promoting protection of the environment? People who consider themselves environmentalists are well-aware of the importance of environmental issues and the long-term consequences of the continued failure to solve or prolonged neglect of the problems we are facing. Transferring that knowledge to political candidates, and translating it to political positions on issues, should not be a heavy lift. Raising awareness of environmental issues with the non-environmental voter is just as important. Making the environmental vote a sought after commodity is a big part of establishing the value of environmental issues. On a very basic level, protecting the environment is the right thing to do. Making it also the politically expedient thing to do is the key to success. No candidate, regardless of party, should be comfortable either neglecting the environment or taking positions that are detrimental to protecting the environment. This will not happen unless voters and candidates both value environmental issues and there are rewards, or consequences, for positions on those issues.

Time Is Running Out On This Election

We’re a little late in the game right now for environmental issues to play a meaningful part in the electoral outcome. That doesn’t mean that an effort shouldn’t be made during the last two weeks of the campaign to demand responses from the candidates to important questions like climate change, air and water quality, resource extraction and other problems that we face as a nation. Thoughtful and intelligent consideration of positions on these issues by candidates should be a minimum requirement, regardless of where they may ultimately stand. However, with the debates over and the points of contention having already been defined, the prospects of the environment becoming a meaningful part of the debate are slim. One thing that should be clear, however, is that this must be the last election where environmental interests are not a major part of the political discussion. Left to their own devices, the candidates will not gravitate to this area of policy on their own. The issues are too complex and the answers too difficult for them to venture into the difficult realm of environmental policies without encouragement or the prospect of political reward.

The consequences of continued neglect of the environment are real and potentially grave. The environmental community needs to solve the puzzle of making environmental politics a factor in our electoral process and they need to come up with the answer sooner, rather than later. When it comes to policy, if you take care of the future, the present tends to take care of itself. Getting our focus on the future and adequately addressing environmental issues as part of that strategy can define our generation. We need to get the “missing” environment off the milk carton and into the mainstream of political discussion. Ultimately, it will be how our generation will be judged. -Ben Spinelli

Anything Goes….

But Now, God Knows,
Anything Goes

The World of Vulture Environmentalism

The issue of Vulture Capitalism will no doubt figure prominently in the upcoming Presidential election. Currently, the notion that the pursuit of profits by an individual, or by a small group of individuals, no matter what the consequences may be, is an acceptable or even admirable practice, holds political sway with a significant portion of the electorate in our country.  The idea that “anything goes” if there is the potential for profit has a large and powerful political constituency.   We have a candidate for President who managed to amass a sizable personal fortune on the backs of others and who takes great pride in his ability to exploit the system for his own gain. This slash and burn business model may very well be profitable for some, but at what cost? Anyone who questions this perverse brand of Social Darwinism is open to being labeled “un-American”.  Criticism is sneeringly dismissed by the “Born on Third Base” crowd as mere envy. However, the idea that this is the “American Way” may be more truthful and provide more insight into our national patterns of behavior than we would like to admit.

Vulture Environmentalism is Vulture Capitalism’s hungry and greedy cousin. Is it really surprising that a country that permits, or even lauds, the economic strip mining of our nation’s wealth for the benefit of a few would exhibit a similar mentality when it comes to our natural resources?  Just as the pillaging of our economy by the privileged and favored members of our society undermines the strength of our economy itself, and the economy’s ability to work for average people, so too, the mindless exploitation of our resources saps our national strength and spirit. The end game isn’t pretty. Playing Vulture Capitalism out to its eventual end looks like the last moves in a game of Monopoly; with most of the players mortgaging their pathetic homes on Baltic Avenue back to the bank so the winner can build a couple of more hotels on Boardwalk and Park Place. Vulture Environmentalism has a very similar outcome. It ends with a depleted and barren natural world that can no longer provide the elements to sustain life after a relatively small number of people have profited handsomely from draining the available resources.

Who Put This Guy In Charge?

What good are those Boardwalk hotels when the folks down on Baltic and Mediterranean can’t pay the rent? What good is there in having all the money in the world when that world can no longer provide a decent quality of life, no matter how much you might have to spend?  In the Vulture World, the answers to those questions don’t matter. For the rest of us who are forced to live with the consequences of their actions, and who will ultimately pay the majority of the price for them, the answers certainly do matter. The question that really matters for that majority of the population is, “why do we tolerate  this behavior?”  The answer lies in the failure to demand accountability. We neither assess the true expense from those who profit from exploitation of the economy or the environment, nor do we hold our political leaders who abide or facilitate these behaviors responsible for the results.

The vast majority of people who bear the costs for the enrichment of the few need to demand both an accounting from those who engage in this behavior and a policy response from those serving in government that is designed to preserve the social, economic and environmental health of our society.  However, this will not happen as long as exploitative behaviors are not appropriately evaluated. As long as we allow businesses or individuals who take advantage of our economic and our natural resources to be measured only by their profits we will continue to have an imbalanced system headed for ruin. If the cost of lost jobs, environmental degradation, public health, lost quality of life and other societal expenses are not added to the equation, we are falsely assessing the true impacts. Its like allowing those who profit from this scheme to balance their checkbooks based only on the deposits, while ignoring the checks written, the withdrawals and the fees. Don’t worry the rest of society will pick up those costs. Those who are “smarter” or who “worked harder” are merely getting what’s due to them. Right?

Hetch Hetchy Reservoir
Yosemite National Park

The valuation of our natural resources based upon the worth of their exploitation is nothing new. The great debate between John Muir and Gifford Pinchot over the Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park took place 100 years ago. Their dispute over the proper use of the valley’s resources, between preservation or “wise use”,  which was very divisive at the time, now seems like an argument between two ice cream enthusiasts over whether chocolate or vanilla is a better flavor. When compared to what we are dealing with today, their disagreement seems quaint. That fight was over whether the Hetch Hetchy valley should be left in its natural state or if the Tolumne River should be dammed for hydroelectric power and drinking water. Eventually a dam was built and the river valley flooded. This contributed substantially to a falling out between Muir and Pinchot, but looking back, they really weren’t that far apart in their views. They both had tremendous respect for the environment.

How has our discussion regarding our nation’s resources evolved?  We know where Muir would stand today. It would be hard to imagine Pinchot, who believed in conservation of  resources for use by humans, extending his philosophy to include mountaintop removal coal mining or extraction of oil shale in locations where it would significantly impact a treasured national park. It’s likely he would be equally appalled at how we are treating the environment today. We have gone someplace that is completely different, but but still shares some of the similar conditions  to those that spurred the birth of the American environmental movement. The more things change, the more they stay the same.  Only this time around there isn’t a debate over the best way to conserve our resources, just a march towards their consumption.  It’s hard to believe that we would once again deliver our nation’s resources into the hands of corporations without adequate safeguards in search of profit and power. Yet, that is exactly where we are headed with our national policies and, make no mistake, Republicans and Democrats alike have been complicit in enabling this return to exploitative consumption. There will be a steep price to pay and it is time for people to deliver the bill, and hold those who profit, or who are responsible for creating these conditions, accountable for the costs.

How Did We Get Here?

To paraphrase David Byrne, you may ask yourself, how did we get here? Unfortunately, the answer is we are right where we always have been. Theodore Roosevelt created the National Park System in response to rampant degradation of our nation’s natural treasures in the late 19th Century. The industrial boom of the mid-20th Century left us with a legacy of smog, fouled waterways and toxic waste that led to the creation of the EPA, the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act and the Superfund law. Today, whether its deep water oil drilling, fracking in water supply areas, mining oil shale next to Theodore Roosevelt’s Elkhorn Ranch or routing gas and oil pipelines through state and national parks, we’re engaging in the same behaviors with the same motivations and excuses that we always have. There’s always a reason. It’s jobs, it’s our need for energy, or  its the need to encourage economic growth; there’s always something driving us towards the cheap and easy solutions for our perceived problems . We continue to pursue short-sighted methods until enough people’s drinking water gets fouled, or air pollution causes enough new asthma cases or there is a massive oil spill. What will be our response to the latest round of environmental degradation and exploitation? More importantly, will there be one?

Tennessee Gas Pipeline
NJ Highlands

As long as politicians respond to the needs of business and economic power instead of the long-term needs of people, we will continue to enable and encourage, not only the exploitation of our resources, but the degradation of the environment because it is easier and more profitable. In the upcoming Presidential election the proposition that our problems can all be solved with tax cuts, less regulation and less government will be front and center in the political discussion .  Putting aside the fiscal implications, the consequences of abdicating the government’s responsibility to protect public health and the environment and turning over more of our nation’s resources to corporations will not yield better results when it comes to environmental protection. Also, if the current regulatory and tax policies are so onerous, why are corporations posting record profits?  These arguments just don’t hold up. Until there is accountability, there will never be a change in results. Waiting for a response to crisis conditions is not a sound strategy. People have to create the conditions where accountability, fairness and obligation to future generations are all mandatory elements of our nation’s environmental policies.

Holding those in power accountable is much easier said than done. It’s increasingly difficult as both the media and the electoral process are influenced by a tide of corporate money. The alternative can’t be to just give up. There are always going to be powerful interests that benefit from influencing politics and policy and they will always have money and access on their side. Understanding that this is just the way things are is only the beginning. Finding alternative means to counter that power is essential. Information and communication can be powerful tools when utilized effectively. A motivated and informed electorate can achieve a great deal. People who are concerned about the environment need to learn to use the assets at their disposal to get results in the political process. It will never be a fair fight, but it will become a battle where the outcome is not predetermined.   There is a strong moral element to the issues involved in this fight. There are elements of fairness and of sound management and stewardship of resources on the side of environmentalists.  The ability to turn intelligent policy choices into political power, or not, will be the determining factor over which way our country heads  on environmental issues from today forward.  The current trends may not be favorable, but that should only serve as motivation for action. Finding a way to require a balancing of the books on environmental costs will be a big step on the road to results and accountability.

Theodore Roosevelt’s Elkhorn Ranch
North Dakota

Let me finish with an apology to vultures. They may not be the prettiest birds, but they do serve an important and valuable function in our ecosystem. They do no harm and help keep nature in balance. Equating those who exploit our economy and our resources  for their own gain with these creatures is not quite fair to the vulture. It’s unfortunate that the term “vulture” has come to describe people who serve only their own interests without any greater benefit. The vulture should not, in any way, be tarred by association with humans who apparently can’t exhibit the common sense of a bird when it comes to dealing with our resources and with the future.

The Corporate Environment

WHY ENVIRONMENTAL POLITICS MATTER

Mountaintop Coal Mining
Cumberland Plateau, TN

Environmental issues are barely registering in our collective political consciousness this election cycle. The environment, as a cause, is passe’. Relegated to the realm of aging hippies and out-of-touch tree huggers, environmental issues are for people who are disconnected from modern politics. Nothing could be farther from the truth. The current environmental issues facing our society are a bellwether for the larger political trends that are the product of what amounts to a hostile corporate take-over of America. If you follow the state of the relationship between politics and the environment, it will prove to be an excellent indicator of where the majority of our national policies are headed.

Why do environmental issues provide a window for us to view the state of our national politics? The answer is fairly simple. A large sector of our economy is made up of corporations that profit from exploiting our nation’s resources. Primarily these companies come from the oil, gas and coal industries and related derivative businesses.  These same companies can increase their profitability greatly by limiting any restrictions on their profit-making activities. Environmental law is rooted in the concepts that our country’s natural resources are a shared public asset and that individual citizens have a right to be free from harm resulting from someone else’s actions. These concepts gave rise to laws designed to protect our air and waterways and to prevent pollution that was a threat to public health. Environmental regulations were created to promote these concepts and to provide societal protection through reasonable controls on industrial activities. However, to some powerful business interests they are seen as unwarranted restrictions on their operations. The struggle between the influence of powerful corporations and the rights of individual citizens is the political conflict of our generation.

Conservative organizations, and I use that term advisedly, like the Heritage Foundation, ALEC and the Federalist Society, were born in the early 1970′s as a corporate response to the progressive environmental regulations, like the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act and the creation of the EPA, that were enacted at that time. These measures were created in response to severe degradation of environmental conditions, primarily as the result of unconstrained industrial activity. Choking smog and fouled waterways along with growing awareness of the threats of toxic chemicals in our environment led to a public outcry for action. These tremendous environmental victories were achieved during the administration of Richard Nixon, a conservative Republican.

I use the descriptive term “conservative” advisedly because the only real principles these organizations share with traditional conservative thought is a disdain for government regulation. The true purpose of these corporate-backed political organizations is rooted in their founders and primary sources of funding; that is to promote the interests of corporations, or more precisely, corporations profiting from polluting the environment and exploiting our nation’s resources. These are not conservatives in the tradition of Theodore Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower or even Barry Goldwater and Ronald Regan.  Their agenda shares little else with traditional conservative principles than an aversion to big government, albeit for different reasons. Traditional conservatives had a respect for the environment. The condition of the environment is irrelevant to these corporatists. Their influence on our politics has been expanding. Therefore, following the status of environmental protection in our country is a good place to evaluate the level of influence these corporate interests are exerting on our government.

Hydraulic Fracturing Rig
Rural Pennsylvania

Corporations like Koch Industries and Coors Brewing that felt the pinch of modern efforts to protect the environment launched a political movement designed to establish corporate domination of American government. The battle for control of our nation has been underway since the early 1970′s. They have been engaged in a slow but steady march towards achieving their goals, mainly working at the state level. They have orchestrated a carefully planned strategy that has included placing like-minded people in positions of influence through electoral politics, judicial appointments and legislative action,   You just need to review ALEC’s agenda to see their concerted effort to influence state legislatures and their work to introduce and pass laws of their own design intended to benefit corporations.Environmental issues have been at the forefront of this struggle since it began.

Shale Oil Extraction
Colorado

One element of the strategy has been to portray environmental protection as both  radical and bad for the American economy. In fact neither is true. The economic benefits from a healthy environment have long been recognized. Whether seen as a function of public health, the actual value of resources like clean drinking water or the recreational benefits of  protecting the environment, there is an economic value to protecting the natural world. Add in the harder to measure inherent values of  improved quality of life and refuge from the pressures of modern society that can only result from environmental protection and the anti-economic argument is exposed as a false premise.

Regarding the “radical” nature of environmental protection, first consider the legal underpinnings for governmental actions. There are two main principles that provide the foundation for government’s role in protecting our resources.  The first is the Public Trust Doctrine. It traces its origins back to the Roman emperor Justinian and was a recognized part of English Common Law and eventually became established as part of American jurisprudence. Certain natural resources belong to the public and it is the government’s obligation to manage them for public use. The Public Trust Doctrine is why we can go to the beach, why we can swim in lake, go for a hike, go fishing or hunting. It is also why the government has the authority to step in and enact regulations when these resources are being threatened, depleted or degraded.

The second is the common law concept of nuisance. We all have the right to the use and enjoyment of our property, but that right ends when our activities impact someone else. When a factory releases smoke into the atmosphere or effluent into a waterway and it impacts others, nuisance is the legal concept that underlies measures enacted to stop or remediate the effects of that activity. Nuisance concepts underlie land use law and zoning.  People and corporations have a right to use their property but that right does not extend to making the rest of us breathe their smoke, drink their industrial by-products or endure other collateral results of their profit-making activities. Far from being radical leaps of legal reasoning, environmental protections have a sound basis in long-established legal principles. The only thing extraordinary about environmental regulations are that they have somehow been enacted in spite of the undue influence of powerful business interests.

ALEC and other corporate interests have been pursuing a strategy that they know will work. During America’s rapid industrial expansion of the late 19th Century, big corporations virtually owned the government process, especially at the state level. Standard Oil, U.S. Steel, the Sugar Trust, railroads and the coal industry all became powerful economic and political interests virtually running the country through their influence and their surrogates in government. Exploiting the nation’s resources and degrading the environment were just natural offshoots of their quest for more wealth and more power.  Presidents William McKinley, Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft all made their reputations as “trust-busters” taking back the American government for the people. They were able to make headway in breaking corporate domination of politics because people had become dissatisfied with conditions that came as a consequence of the protracted abusive conduct of big business. Welcome back to the good old days. Will we be able to find politicians in our time willing to stand-up to the powerful interests? Only if we are able to provide the support, motivation and incentive necessary to get the right people into positions of authority and inspire them to act.

There is a battle for the control of our nation going on right now. A more or less silent revolution. The modern-day trusts that engage in mountaintop removal coal mining, hydraulic fracturing to recover natural gas, oil shale extraction, deep-sea oil drilling and other very profitable, but environmentally destructive, endeavors are at the heart of the battle. Average people and the environment are in their way. The fight, with the rich and the powerful corporate interests on one side and the rest of us on the other, was never fair. However, there was always the odd chance that when people got aggravated enough, politicians would respond. In the post Citizens United world our political process has been opened up to an unfettered influx of corporate money. Combine this with a state-by state purchase of state legislatures by corporate interest groups and the pervasive presence of pro-corporate judges at every level of the judiciary and you will find that the playing field has been tilted even more.

The results can be seen in measures like the exemption of hydraulic fracturing from the Safe Drinking Water Act, and the Clean Air Act or the exemption of certain types of coal mining from the Clean Water Act. These exemptions were obtained through the intervention of powerful business interests into the political and policy process.  These exemptions have a very real impact on average people and on the environment. However getting regulation out of the way to facilitate bigger profits and satisfying large donors were more important policy goals than protecting public health and well-being and the integrity of the environment. The crossroads of this revolution, the place where the battle for the soul of our nation can be won or lost, will be the issues and the politics of environmental protection.

The rollback of environmental protections being pursued by ALEC and its membership should be a defining issue in politics. The environmental movement has been asleep at the switch while corporate interests have been busy executing their strategies over the past decade. Environmental issues matter to business, but they also matter to people. When maximizing corporate profits becomes the main driver for our politics and our policies, we are going to suffer as a country. The first place we will see the effects of the corporate take over of America will be in a reduction of environmental protections. It doesn’t need to be that way. Fouled waterways, polluted air, and the degradation of the natural world will be eventual consequences of this course. We shouldn’t have to see bad things happen before public opinion finally motivates political leaders to move. Environmental leaders need to recognize the trends and work to get our political system to respond before conditions deteriorate, or more importantly,  before the political road back becomes too difficult to negotiate.

Corporations should be able to make profits. A healthy economy is one of the key elements of a sustainable society. So is a healthy environment. While there are needs of modern society that need to be met, those goals can be achieved without degrading the environment, it just might stand in the way of optimum shareholder return. Maximizing profitability is not a guiding value of a healthy democracy.  Corporations exist to make money, period. If they can make money and protect the environment, they will do it. If they can make more money by degrading the environment, they will do that.

Understand, however, that there are powerful interests that believe that the path to the biggest profit involves controlling the government and clearing all obstacles to financial gain. That path runs straight through environmental protections. The next time you think environmental issues don’t matter, think again. Protecting the environment and the politics that go along with trying to enact appropriate environmental regulations are one in-the-same with the politics that will determine who owns  our country; the people or the corporations. Environmental issues matter because they can motivate people because a degraded environment strikes right at matters of public health and quality of life. Make the environment matter in politics. The future of our country just might depend on it.

-Ben Spinelli

When The Going Gets Tough…

Was It Over When The Germans Bombed Pearl Harbor?

During difficult economic times, protection of the environment drops as  a priority in most measures of public opinion as the energy and attention of the population becomes focused on more pressing issues like finding or keeping jobs and caring for families. Special interests and the politicians who serve them are quick to take advantage of these circumstances. Nationally, the Environmental Protection Agency has come under assault from Congress on many fronts. All environmental regulations now have a new prefix: job killing. Years of progress on things we now take for granted like clean air and clean water are set to be rolled back as powerful industry interests seek to eliminate air and water protections under the guise of economic development. The environmental movement is on the ropes in America’s current political landscape and its time to heed H.G. Wells’ admonition,“Adapt or perish, now as ever, is nature’s inexorable imperative.”

Support for individual environmental issues remains strong and public perception of environmental protection remains positive according to a recent Galllup Poll. However, overall support for the environment is declining. Why? Certainly economic circumstances play a significant role in the trend but it goes even deeper than just bad unemployment numbers. The dynamics of politics in the United States have changed. In a post Citizens United world the corrupting flood of special interest money is going to have an effect on both political debate and election results. Political and issue ads fueled by a supply of cash that is, for all intents and purposes, nearly unlimited are overwhelming the American political process. Anyone who doesn’t believe that environmental issues are squarely in the sights of the big money interests had better wake up. The growing cacophony of anti-environmental rhetoric fueled by corporate money is undoubtedly taking a toll on support for environmental protection.  So, what’s the plan?

The first step is to take stock of the situation. On the positive side, environmental protection, even with recent declines, still enjoys widespread public support. Threats to the environment still exist. What has changed are the methods of those who profit from reduced environmental protection and the amount of financial resources they can bring to the debate. Environmental advocates need to adjust to the changing world. The place to start is by tapping into the well of public support for environmental issues to demand accountability from elected representatives. Making elected political representatives responsive to the 60%-70% of the electorate who value protecting the environment rather than the small portion of the population who profit from either exploiting the nation’s resources or conducting commercial operations without even reasonable restrictions is a basic element of making environmentalists relevant in the political discussion. The environmental movement as a whole may be doing a credible job of educating the public about issues but they are failing when it comes to translating those issues to policy-making and electoral results. The majority of  politicians do not respect environmentalists as a political force. That must change.

Another approach is to go after the nation’s corporate community. In his dissent to the Citizens United decision, Justice John Paul Stevens argued that corporate spending on politics should be viewed as a business transaction designed by the officers or the board of directors for no purpose other than profit-making. He called corporate spending more transactional than ideological. Therein lies the opportunity. Corporations operate by their very nature to maximize profit and return on investment. The model of buying access to politicians who then ease regulations, lower taxes and enable corporate activity at the expense of the environment has been a profitable and effective course. Changing that methodology and providing an alternative where profit lies in responsibility and good citizenship through either positive or negative reinforcement needs to be a viable option. Environmentalists must devise a strategy that can co-opt some of corporate America’s vast resources and direct them towards environmental protection as well pressure corporations to engage in better behavior.

John Cronin, the nation’s first Riverkeeper and the current director of the Beacon Institute for Rivers and Estuaries was a pioneer in holding corporations responsible for environmental damage. He took on corporate giants like General Electric and Exxon and held them financially liable for polluting the Hudson River. He has since found ways to partner with corporations and  tap into their resources to achieve big gains in cleaning up the environment. This may not be “environmentally pure” in the eyes of many in the environmental sector, but it is effective. Results count and in an increasingly difficult political setting, every avenue should be explored.  No, corporations are not people too, my friend, but they are made up of people who presumably support protecting the environment in roughly the same percentage as the public at large. Couple this with the effort and expense that corporations put into burnishing their public image and the opportunity to harness their assets through cooperative efforts should not be passed up.

These are difficult times for environmental advocates. Right now they are out-gunned, out-manned, out-resourced and out-messaged by their opponents. In spite of the apparently dismal circumstances, there are opportunities and the fight is far from over. Whether seen as an inspirational quote from legendary football coach Vince Lombardi or a call to action from “Bluto” Blutarsky in the film Animal House, “when the going gets tough, the tough get going” provides a valuable motto to guide the environmental movement. It has never been considered acceptable to be an anti-environment politician, regardless of political party. It shouldn’t be now. Holding our elected representatives accountable for their actions in these difficult times is essential. Our elected officials need to know that protecting the environment is still a priority. It starts with insuring that there are political consequences for politicians who ignore or oppose reasonable environmental protections.

Likewise, there should be no profit in environmental destruction. A combination of bringing pressure on corporations that potentially affects their profitability and entering into partnerships with companies willing to engage in positive environmental action in a manner that enhances their returns needs to be part of the environmental arsenal. Adapting to the changing political landscape is imperative and right now that means fighting for what you believe in with every available method. Failure to make appropriate changes to the advocacy methods of the environmental community will surely result in continued free-fall into political irrelevance despite continued threats to our resources and in spite of the substantial public support that still exists. After 40 years of successes and failures, the modern environmental movement is in the fight of its life and there will be real consequences if , as a whole, those involved in protecting our quality of life by protecting the environment are not up to the battle. The exact methods to engage in this strategy can be left for another day. Right now its time to fight.

-Ben Spinelli