WolfeNotes.com

Jill Stein speaks at May Day celebration in NY City (May 1, 2015) (Bill Wolfe)

“Educate yourselves because we’ll need all your intelligence. Agitate because we’ll need all your enthusiasm. Organize yourselves because we’ll need all your strength.” (Antonio Gramsci – 1934?)

Happy Labor Day.

While President Obama is among the G20 elites in China promoting free trade and a corporate agenda sure to cook the planet – and Hillary Clinton fellates what even the NY Times called “the ultra-rich” of Gatsby’s Hamptons – let’s read these two excerpts and see if you can guess (or know) who wrote them and when they were written (I’ve edited to shorten and used different terms to avoid making it obvious – see answers below):

#1 – On the economy

… Society is more and mores splitting up into two great hostile camps; into two great classes directly facing each other. …

Modern industry has established the world market. … This market has given an immense development to commerce, to navigation, to communication. …

The executive of the modern state is but a committee for managing the common affairs of corporations.

The corporations have pitilessly torn asunder the ties between man and have left no other nexus than naked self interest, than callous “cash payments”. They have drowned the most heavenly ecstasies of religious fervor, of chivalrous enthusiasm, in the icy water of egotistical calculation. They have resolved personal worth into market exchange values and in place of the numberless indefeasible chartered freedoms, have set up that single, unconscionable freedom – free trade. In one word, veiled by religious and political affiliations, it has substituted naked, shameless, brutal exploitation. …

The need for a constantly expanding market for its products chases the corporations over the whole surface of the globe. They must nestle everywhere, settle everywhere, establish connections everywhere.

The corporations have through exploitation of the world market given a cosmopolitan character to production and consumption in every country.  To the chagrin of conservatives, they have drawn under the feet of industry the national ground on which it stood. All old-established national industries have been destroyed or are daily being destroyed. They are dislodged by new industries that no longer work up indigenous raw material, but raw material drawn from the remotest zones; industries whose products are consumed not only at home, but in every quarter of the globe. In place of the old wants, satisfied by the production of the home country, they find new wants, requiring for their satisfaction the products of distant lands.  In place of the old local and national self sufficiency we have intercourse in every direction, universal interdependence of nations….

The cheap prices of its commodities are the heavy artillery with which they batter down all Chinese walls, with which they force the barbarians’ intensely obstinate hatred of foreigners to capitulate. They compel all nations, on pain of extinction, to adopt the corporate mode of production; they compel them to introduce what it calls civilization into their midst; to become corporate themselves. In one word, it creates a world after its own image.

source: Federal Art Project

#2 – on why there is no large socialist or labor party in America

… American conditions involve very great difficulties for development of a workers party.

First, the Constitution, based on party government, causes every vote for any candidate not put up by one of the two governing parties to appear to be lost. The American wants to influence his government, he does not throw away his vote.

Second, immigration divides the workers into two groups: native born and immigrants, and the later in turn into many small ethnic/national subgroups, each of which understands only itself. And then there are African Americans. To form a single party out of all these requires quite unusually powerful incentives. Often there is a sudden violent élan, but the corporate elite need only wait passively and the dissimilar elements of the working class fall apart again.

May Day, NY City

Source: Federal Art Project

Full disclosure: my mother’s father was a Wobblie.

Answers:

#1 is from “The Communist Manifesto” by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels (1848) – I used the word “corporations” for Marx’s “bourgeoisie” to avoid giving it away.

#2 is from a letter by Friedrich Engels (1893) – slightly revised.

DEP and NJ Audubon Deal Would Keep All Documents Secret and Exempt From OPRA

Dark Money From Special Interests and Wall Street Billionaires Finance Public Lands Management 

This whole Sparta Mountain controversy continues to get dirtier by the day.

NJ Sierra Club just released what amounts to a secret Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) between the Christie DEP and NJ Audubon (NJA) regarding planning and management of Sparta Mountain Wildlife Management Area (SMWMA), including plans to commercially log the forest under the guise of “forest stewardship”.

The local news coverage “Sierra Club says Sparta Mountain agreement keeps info from public” misses the implications, so let me explain.

DEP – Audubon Deal Is A Recipe For Privatization of the Control Over Public Lands That Must Be Stopped

The MOA was executed on July 6, 2016 and was not subject to any public participation or opportunity for public review and public comment.

Despite an ongoing enormous controversy and strong opposition by conservationists to the DEP and NJA proposed expansion of logging plans for SMWMA and significant press coverage of that debate, neither DEP or NJA publicly disclosed the existence of the agreement. There was no press release or public announcement regarding the MOA.

The MOA would abdicate DEP’s public duties and legal responsibilities to manage public lands in the public interest in accordance with transparent and accountable open public processes and in compliance with DEP regulations and standards, to a private entity bound by private Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) standards and planning procedures.

This gives NJA unaccountable control of the technical content of forest plans for public lands.

The kind of illegal delegation of DEP’s powers to a private entity is exactly why Governor Christie correctly vetoed a bill that would have done that.

The Governor’s CV stated the following:

“This bill requires the Department of Environmental Protection (“DEP”) to establish a forest stewardship program for State-owned lands. I commend the bill’s sponsors for their efforts to address this important environmental issue. I agree that it is in the public interest to establish a program for the responsible stewardship of forests on State-owned lands to promote the long-term health and vigor of New Jersey’s forests.

My sole concern with the bill is the requirement that DEP abdicate its responsibility to serve as the State’s environmental steward to a named third party. According to the Office of the Attorney General, this constitutes an improper delegation of Executive Branch authority in violation of the Constitution.” [emphases mine]

The MOA would delegate to NJA exactly the DEP powers the AG determined were “an improper delegation of Executive Branch authority in violation of the Constitution.”

Ironically, the bill the Gov. correctly vetoed as an illegal delegation of DEP powers required that forestry plans obtain DEP permits and regulatory approvals and be consistent with the Highlands Act, indirectly triggering public participation requirements (see section Section 4 of S1085 SCS)

4. a. The State Forester shall: [(1) – (3)]

(4) ensure that all required permits and approvals are obtained for any forest stewardship activities conducted pursuant to a forest stewardship plan adopted for State-owned lands;

(5) ensure that the implementation of forest stewardship plans on State-owned lands located in the Highlands Region is consistent with the provisions of the “Highlands Water Protection and Planning Act,” P.L.2004, c.120 (C.13:20-1 et al.);

Ironically, the DEP powers Governor Christie was so concerned about in his Veto are not only implicitly and explicitly delegated to NJA and FSC by the MOA, they are totally absent from the MOA.

The MOA is silent on any requirements to secure DEP permits and requirements to comply with the Highlands Act.

If logging on state lands were forced to comply with DEP water quality standards, stream buffers, wetlands and Highlands Act preservation area requirements, it could not be done. Period. Perhaps those are the real reasons Gov. Christie vetoed the forestry bill and the delegation issue was just a pretext.

The MOA would allow private “dark money” – including private contributions from a Wall Street billionaire – to finance the planning and management of public lands:

Under the MOA, DEP would deny public OPRA requests for all documents, including those necessary to determine who was paying for the preparation of forestry plans if that money were laundered through NJA.

We’ve already seen a billionaire owner of a hunting club – with special interests in a specific kind of forest management that maximizes game species – provide $140,000 to NJ Audubon to develop the Sparta Mountain plan.

Donald Trump entered into a partnership with NJ Audubon to manage his golf course – what would stop a secret contribution to manage public lands?

What’s to stop the forest products industry from funding NJA plans, without any public awareness?

On to top off all these abuses, the MOA attempts to keep all this secret! That is done in two ways, both of them an outrageous abuse of law and public policy.

First, the MOA would require the explicit consent of both DEP and NJA before any document could be released publicly – either of who could withhold consent to veto the public release of information, and for no reason at all:

Second, and even worse, the MOA would keep all documents and communications between NJ DEP and NJA secret by exploiting a loophole under OPRA known as the “deliberative privilege” exemption:

The Christie DEP is clearly abusing OPRA to keep secret all information, documents and public records regarding the planning and management of Sparta Mountain, including commercial logging there – conduccted by a private entity, funded by private interests, and subject to private standards.

Even the recent FSC Audit of NJ Audubon and DEP’s prior Sparta Mountain forest management found significant con-compliance with minimal FSC “Stakeholder” consultation process requirements/

FSC Stakeholder consultation is FAR LESS involved than full DEP regulatory public participation requirements, which include public notice, opportunity for public review of the entire administrative record, minimum 30 day public comment period, public hearings, DEP response to public comment, and administrative and judicial appeal rights. FSC has NONE OF THAT. NONE.

Even worse, FSC allows NJ Audubon to select the friendly “stakeholders, just like DEP does in “by invitation only” Stakeholder meetings.

If DEP can get away with this abuse, it virtually privatizes and institutionalizes a secret planning process for public lands.

In part 2, we will talk about parallels with 2 recent high profile controversies:

1) Successful OPRA litigation by the NJ ACLU over the Zuckerberg $100 million contribution to Newark Schools, and

2) the recent debacle by the Christie DEP’s attempt to use private group NJ Future to secretly and privately plan for the commercialization and privatization of Liberty State Park.

Local Water Officials Failed to Disclose Results For 3 Years

(Update: 9/2/16 – wow – this is old news – reported by Bergen Record way back in March 20, 2016. Who knew?)

According to a local report, the people of Pompton Lakes NJ – home of a massive Dupont toxic mess – are exposed on a daily basis to a “likely carcinogen” in their drinking water and no one told them about that for over 3 years. Here’s the story.

The Bergen Record recently reported – in a series of high profile and detailed stories – about the discovery of the likely carcinogen 1,4,-dioxane in groundwater impacted by the Ford Superfund site, see:

• New danger found at Ringwood Superfund site
• More dioxane found at Ford site in Ringwood
• Two labs return wildly differing results for water in Ringwood

The Record blasted US EPA for failure to disclose this information to the public for several months after EPA discovered the contamination.

News reports also implied that the chemical could be migrating to the Wanaque Reservoir and impacting drinking water supplies.

I wrote about why both US EPA and NJ DEP failed to do the right thing in the Ringwood case, and explained the underlying flaw in regulations that led to this failure, see:

• Ford Ringwood Superfund Debate on Chemical 1,4, Dioxane Illustrates Flaws In Drinking Water Standards

But no one in Ringwood is drinking that contaminated groundwater, or exposed to it as far as I know.

So, I was more than surprised to learn – according to a March 21, 2016 letter to residents from the Pompton Lakes Municipal Utilities Authority (available upon request) – that the likely carcinogen 1,4,-dioxane was detected in drinking water in Pompton Lakes over 3 years ago and that this was not disclosed to the public for over 3 years.

There was actual exposure, a far more serious risk than Ringwood groundwater.

That PLMUA letter is highly misleading and flat out false in claiming that no standard exists and in failing to mention the NJ DEP groundwater standard of 0.4 parts per billion.

Not all residents of Pompton Lakes even received the PLMUA letter – and neither EPA nor DEP ever mentioned the issue despite numerous public meetings in Pompton Lakes about groundwater contamination over many years.

What explains the lack of public outrage and media coverage of the Pompton Lakes actual 1,4, dioxane drinking water problem?

Is that contamination linked to Dupont?

Why was it not disclosed for over 3 YEARS by local officials, EPA and NJ DEP?

There is no “safe” level of exposure to a human carcinogen and no threshold concentration under which there is no cancer risk. The only “safe” exposure is ZERO.

I fired off this letter today to US EPA Regional Adminsitrator Enck and NJ DEEP Commissioner Martin in an attempt to force them to respond:

Dear US EPA Regional Administrator Enck and NJ DEP Commissioner Martin:

The purpose of this letter is to request that your respective agencies take immediate steps to respond to the detection of unsafe levels of 1,4, dioxane – an EPA classified “likely carcinogen” – in NJ groundwater and drinking water supplies.

The chemical has been detected in groundwater at federally and DEP regulated sites and facilities (e.g. Ford Ringwood Superfund site and it may be linked to the Dupont/Chemours Pompton Lakes RCRA site) and in public water supplies (e.g. Pompton Lakes) at unsafe levels that exceed applicable health based standards and policies.

The NJ Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) adopted an updated “Interim Specific Groundwater Quality Criterion” (ISGWQS) for 1,4-dioxane in October 2015.

Summary of Decision: In accordance with the New Jersey Ground Water Quality Standards rules at N.J.A.C. 7:9C-1.7, the Department of Environmental Protection (Department) has developed an interim specific ground water quality criterion of 0.4 μg/L and PQL of 0.1 μg/L for 1,4-dioxane. The basis for this criterion and PQL are discussed below. Pursuant to N.J.A.C. 7:9C-1.9(c),  the applicable constituent standard is 0.4 μ g/L. 

http://www.nj.gov/dep/wms/bears/docs/1,4%20dioxane%20final%20draft%20for%20posting2.pdf

The DEP’s scientific basis for the regulatory update was based on health effects and EPA’s update to the IRIS assessment:

The purpose of this memorandum is to recommend a revised interim specific ground water criterion of 0.35 ug/L for 1,4-dioxane, based on the recently updated IRIS assessment for this chemical.

The current interim specific ground water criterion for 1,4-dioxane is 3 ug/L, effective February 2008. It is based on the previous IRIS assessment, posted in 1988, that classified this chemical as Group B2 (Probable Human Carcinogen) with a slope factor of 0.011 (mg/kg/day)-1.

The IRIS assessment for 1,4-dioxane was updated on August 11, 2010 (USEPA, 2010a), and is supported by a Toxicological Review document (USEPA, 2010b). The updated IRIS assessment classifies 1,4-dioxane as likely to be carcinogenic to humans and provides an updated slope factor of 0.10 (mg/kg/day)-1. 

I have reviewed the updated IRIS assessment and Toxicological Review for 1,4-dioxane and recommend that the new slope factor be used as the basis for the interim ground water quality criterion.

1,4-Dioxane administered in drinking water caused liver tumors (hepatocellular adenomas and carcinomas) in several species and strains of rats, mice, and guinea pigs. It also caused nasal (squamous cell carcinomas), peritoneal mesotheliomas, and mammary tumors in rats. The mode of action for carcinogenicity by 1,4-dioxane is not known. Therefore, the IRIS risk assessment for carcinogenic effects was appropriately based on the default approach, linear low dose extrapolation, and a cancer slope factor was derived.

The previous IRIS slope factor, 0.011 (mg/kg/day)-1, was based on increased incidence of squamous cell carcinomas of the nasal turbinates in male rats in a 1978 chronic drinking water study (NCI, 1978). The current slope factor, 0.10 (mg/kg/day)-1, is based on liver tumors in female mice in a more recent study (Kano et al., 2009) which provides a more sensitive endpoint for carcinogenicity.

I have reviewed the IRIS Toxicological Review for 1,4-Dioxane (USEPA, 2010b) which presents the basis for the current IRIS assessment. I concur with USEPA’s conclusion which form the basis for the risk assessment for 1,4-dioxane, as well as the recommended slope factor. Based upon this review, I recommend that the interim ground water criterion for 1,4-dioxane be revised to 0.35 ug/L.

http://www.state.nj.us/dep/dsr/gw-criteria-pql-public-comment/1,4-dioxane.pdf

We request that EPA and DEP take the following immediate site specific and longer term statewide actions:

1. Require treatment for Pompton Lakes drinking water supplies

According to a March 21, 2016 letter to residents from the Pompton Lakes Borough Municipal Utilities Authority (PLBMUA):

“Pompton Lakes last tested for [1,4-] dioxane in 2013 and had results ranging from 0.38 ug/L to 0.53 ug/L”

The levels detected exceed NJ DEP’s ISGWQS health based standard of 0.4 ug/L.

We urge EPA and DEP to act to require treatment to remove this chemical to below NJ DEP’s ISGWQS. We believe that existing cost effective treatment by granular activated carbon (GAC) should be installed immediately.

The PLBMUA did not identify the known or suspected source of 1,4,-dioxane detected in groundwater, which serves as source water. We urge EPA and DEP to immediately develop a work plan to track down the source of this contamination to our drinking water and require that the responsible party pay for all treatment and remedial costs.

2. Amend the Dupont/Chemours RCRA Corrective Action permit to require sampling, monitoring, and remediation to attain the ISGWQS

3. Amend the 1988 Dupont/Chemours Administrative Consent Order (ACO) with DEP to require sampling and remediation to attain the ISGWQS

4. EPA must apply NJ DEP ISGWQS at federal Superfund and RCRA sites in NJ

5. NJ DEP must develop a strategy to enforce the ISGWQS at all contaminated groundwater sites across NJ

6. NJ DEP should require treatment of all public water supplies where sampling of source water detected exceedences of the ISGWQS

EPA and NJ DEP have legal and moral responsibilities to protect public health.

We urge you to act immediately to reduce the known risk of 1,4, dioxane at all sites where is has been detected in groundwater or public water supplies.

We appreciate your timely and favorable response to these requests.

Sincerely,

Move Comes After Sierra Club Accused DEP Of “Lying” To The Public About Forest Reclassification 

[Update – we shamed them into withdrawing this demand! Small Victory!]

The gloves surely are off now in the long simmering debate on the Christie DEP’s plans to expand commercial logging in Sparta Mountain Wildlife Management Area.

The Sierra Club just accused DEP and NJ Audubon of flat out “lying” to the public about the plan, an accusation the media ran with, see:

• Sierra Club: State, NJ Audubon lied so they could log Sparta Mt.

On top of that lie, Tittel forgot to mention an even bolder lie: NJ Audubon also lied to the public by stating – in writing – that Sierra Club supports their “stewardship” (logging) plan!

Here’s the latest round in this escalating battle.

DEP Provides “Customer Service” – Reaches Out and Demands “Special Use Permit”

DEP Commissioner Martin’s top priority is to provide “Customer Service”. It looks like DEP provided a unique style of customer service to opponents of DEP’s plan to log Sparta Mountain.

At the same time the press was making inquiries about that Sierra accusation, DEP appeared to retaliate by demanding that a local group, Friends of Sparta Mountain, obtain a $50 “Special Use Permit” – including a $1 million Liability Insurance Policy – before taking a hike on the mountain to show local residents the wonderful natural resources and damage from logging there. The hike is planned for September 24 and will be led by well renowned conservationist Dennis Miranda.

This is what DEP doesn’t want people to hike into the woods to see: Sparta Mountain: Take A Walk On The Wild Side – imagine that: Christie DEP now says it cost $50 to hike in public forests.

That DEP move irked members of the local group, particularly given how DEP – back on April 30, 2016 – joined a commercial logging group on a tour of Sparta Mountain.

The DEP demand was initiated by DEP via an email from a regional supervisor: (I’ve never heard of this before)

Friends of Sparta Mountain,

I just wanted to contact you regarding the upcoming hike you have planned at Sparta Mountain WMA.  NJ Division of Fish and Wildlife regulations require a Special Use Permit for organized groups of 10 or more on any state Wildlife Management Area. I attached a Special Use Permit application, if your group should exceed this limit. Please be sure to include a copy of your organizations Certificate of Liability Insurance with the application. The fee for a one-day Special Use Permit is $50.

Thank you for your anticipated cooperation.

Susan Predl

NJ Division of Fish and Wildlife

Whittingham WMA

150 Fredon-Springdale Rd.

Newton NJ 07860

office: 973-383-0918

cell: 609-422-6438

susan.predl@dep.nj.gov

After FoSM folks raised objections, I called Ms. Predl to ask about how DEP even learned of  what she decribed as “the upcoming hike you have planned at Sparta Mountain WMA“. Was DEP monitoring local groups?

Predl expressed aggravation at my call – she apparently had already fielded several – and compounded my concerns about bureaucratic overkill by demanding that I provide her a list of people so her boss could call each one to explain the Special Use Permit requirement! Seriously, a DEP professional manager actually asked me to provide a list of DEP critics and their phone numbers.

Predl then revealed that she did not even know that a Special Use Permit required a $1 million Liability Insurance Policy – a significant and costly burden to an informal local friends group. The DEP “Special Use Permit” Application includes this:

Ms. Predl of DEP was oblivious to any public perception that such a move was bureaucratic overkill that would throw gasoline on an already adversarial situation.

Predl had no sensitivity to the fact that DEP’s move would be perceived as a bad faith attempt by DEP to restrict or unduly burden expression of constitutionally protected 1st Amendment rights of using a hike as a means to raise public awareness and protest DEP’s logging plan.

Predl told me that a DEP biologist saw a poster for the FoSM event and brought it to her attention. DEP biologists don’t have better things to work on than  monitoring local residents?

NJ Audubon De-Designation of Sparta Mountain as “High Conservation Value Forest”

One of the many lies Sierra Club accused NJ Audubon and DEP of was failure to disclose NJ Audubon’s de-designation of Sparta Mountain as “High Conservation Value Forest”.

Back in February, we broke the story and alerted the public and conservationists about NJ Audubon’s de-designation of Sparta Mountain as a “High Conservation Value Forest” under their Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) program:

According to FSC standards, mapping HCVF should be based on a “precautionary approach”, particularly under uncertainty or lack of data, including issues like suitable habitat and presence or absence of species:

2.6.2 | Using the precautionary approach

The Precautionary Approach means that when there is a threat of severe or irreversible damage to the environment or a threat to human welfare, responsible parties need to take explicit and effective measures to prevent the damage and risks, even when the scientific information is incomplete or inconclusive, and when the vulnerability and sensitivity of values are uncertain14. In the context of HCV identification, this means that when there are reasonable indications that an HCV is present, the assessor should assume that it is present.

But, in contradiction of any “precautionary approach”, shockingly, in an FSC audit (2013) of NJ Audubon’s compliance with FSC standards, on page 4 we learn that:

NJA modified its High Conservation Value Forest (HCVF) assessment by removing most of the Sparta Mountain Wildlife Management Area from HCVF status. The prior classification was based on landscape habitat suitability models and not on actual presence/absence data species and ecosystems that would contribute to HCVF classification.This decision was based on stakeholder input and field surveys by NJA confirming that the species predicted by the models did not occur or if present they were not likely to be there in sufficient numbers to indicate HCVF status. See Appendix I.

Got that? But why would NJ Audubon want to do that?

Because it looks really bad for a self described bird conservation group to support commercial logging of HCV forests with significant habitat and/or populations of rare, threatened or endangered species of plants, amphibians, reptiles and birds?

Because it might make the foresters uncomfortable and limit logging?

It is a form of private deregulation. The fox guarding and designing the hen house AND writing the standards for hen house construction!

And on On April 1, 2016 – April Fool’s Day –  we slamed NJ Audubon for that:

4. NJ Audubon has engaged in some really unprofessional and underhanded tactics – including the remarkable move to “de-designate” Sparta Mt. WMA as “High Conservation Value Forest” (even though NJA itself has designated SMWMA as “Important Bird and Birding Area”.

Even the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) has chastised NJA in audits of their program – with a more critical audit now in the works, now that FSC auditors have been made aware of NJA’s misleading tactics.

The more recent FSC Audit, released on August 11, 2016, contained several negative findings regarding NJ Audubon and DEP’s failure to comply with minimal FSC public participation requirements (for “Stakeholders”) and validated public criticism of the scientific basis for that move.

I encourage everyone to read that Audit and will provide it to anyone upon request (I have it as a PDF, not a link). I will do a future post that excerpts the relevant audit findings on flaws in the Stakeholder process and technical basis for the de-designation.

For now, simply put, Mr. Cecil of NJ Audubon is lying – again.