Conservation Insider Bulletin, July 13

Conservation Insider Bulletin

Published weekly for the Conservation Council of North Carolina

Conservation News to Peruse & Use

Editor: Dan Besse, earthvote@ccnccpac.org

July 13, 2007


Legislative Watch: Clock Ticking on Landfill Moratorium

In one of last session's big environmental victories, the General Assembly slammed a permitting moratorium on large landfills, and kicked off a major study of policy action needs in the arena of solid waste management. An extensive "stakeholder" study process ensued, ultimately resulting in a broadly hailed comprehensive legislative proposal: SB 1492, "Responsible Waste Management". The sponsors of the bill are influential State Senators Daniel Clodfelter (D-Mecklenburg) and Charles Albertson (D-Duplin).

Unfortunately, although SB 1492 was on March 27 referred to the Senate Agriculture/Environment/Natural Resources Committee (chaired by Albertson), it has not yet emerged. Meanwhile, time is running out for the moratorium, which expires August 1.
A review of SB 1492 was the lead item in this week's legislative issues bulletin, Hot List, from CCNC lobbyist Mike Nelson. Regarding the need for immediate action on this issue, Mike said, "The moratorium stopped development for a year, but the issues with waste management in the state still exist. The waste industry has proposed six huge mega-dumps be constructed in North Carolina, all located in economically depressed areas in the eastern part of the state. Three of these proposed mega-dumps would build up trash higher than the Cape Hatteras lighthouse, creating huge mountains of waste over the state's famous coastal plain. Unregulated expansion of the waste management industry would clearly be an environmental disaster for the state's most depressed regions.

"However, the moratorium passed last session expires in just a few weeks, on August 1. If the moratorium is allowed to sunset, then it would signal a return to almost unrestricted landfill development in North Carolina. While waste management is essential to the state, North Carolina cannot become a dumping ground for the rest of the country's waste, as would inevitably happen if all the proposed landfills are built. The General Assembly needs to act in this session to ensure responsible waste management continues in this state."

As described by Mike, key provisions of SB 1492 include the following:

Promotes recycling in North Carolina by diverting a portion of tip fees to support local recycling programs. A seemingly small amount -- just a dollar per ton of garbage disposed of -- will generate millions of dollars in revenue for local recycling.
Creates a new environmental safety review process for private-sector landfills, and makes public landfills subject to state-level environmental review for the first time.
Provides funding to clean up over 600 non-compliant or abandoned landfills, a clear benefit to the environment around these pre-existing sites, many of which were built before liners were required.
Places size restrictions on new landfills, requiring them to be no higher than 200 feet and ensuring that needed development will not create "mountains of garbage" and hurt the landscape.

Washington Watch: Ex-Bush Surgeon General Details Political Interference; Administration Politics Endangers More Species

Ex-Bush Surgeon General Details Political Interference: George Bush's former Surgeon General, Richard H. Carmona, told a Congressional committee this week that Bush Administration officials persistently suppressed public health reports that ran counter to their political policies. Among a list of policy areas which he said were impacted, he included global warming, as well as health-related issues like secondhand smoke, emergency contraception, sex education, and health care in the prison system. Current Bush officials went scrambling, once again, to try to deny or diminish the revelations of another ex-colleague airing the dirty laundry of an Administration plainly dedicated to trumping science with politics.

Administration Politics Endangers More Species: In a thematically related story, the Los Angeles Times this week reported on strife and disarray within the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service's efforts to implement the laws protecting endangered species. According to the paper's research, the Bush Administration's political commitment to halt the expansion of endangered species protections has resulted in a waiting list of 279 candidate species for protection—species near extinction now, but lacking federal designation and protection as such. Further, about 200 of the 1,326 species currently on the endangered list are close to gone, in part because funding for their recovery has been cut. The Service has a 30 percent vacancy rate in the endangered species program's staff, and the agency's top position has been left unfilled for over a year. More program funding cuts are proposed. In sum, it's a portrait of a program in deep trouble. Perhaps the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service should be considered a candidate for endangered listing.

Campaign Watch: Lockie Bids for Local Office

The filing period for local government elections this year still has another week to run, but one of the interesting contests with potential environmental implications is shaping up in Durham. That's because an ex-leader (very recently ex-, as in last week) of one of the Art Pope organizations is running for mayor.

Thomas Stith, currently a Durham City Council Member, resigned last Friday as vice president of the John William Pope Civitas Institute in preparation for his campaign for Durham mayor. Stith will run against incumbent Durham Mayor Bill Bell.

The Civitas Institute is one of the Pope network of conservative advocacy groups, which also include the better-known John Locke Foundation. According to the Durham Herald-Sun, almost 98 percent of the Civitas funding of $1.8 million in fiscal year 2005-2006 came from a Pope family foundation. The paper also notes that a polling firm with ties to Civitas conducted a survey last year on the potential for a challenge to Bell.

As a matter of standard philosophy, the Lockies are aggressively hostile to nearly all meaningful environmental regulation, so we can probably look to this race as a testing ground for their attacks on local involvement in anti-sprawl efforts, stormwater management, renewable energy initiatives, and the like. CIB will plan to follow the details of the contest for environmentally relevant themes and developments.