Dan Bacher's blog

Privately funded fiasco has violated state, federal and international laws

by Dan Bacher

In 28 years of covering fish, water and environmental politics in the West, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative is the most corrupt public process I've ever reported on.

The Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA), a landmark law signed by Governor Gray Davis in 1999 to create a network of marine protected areas in state waters along the California coast, was designed to provide comprehensive protection to the marine ecosystem. However, the law was eviscerated under Schwarzenegger's privately-funded MLPA Initiative.

The initiative, overseen by oil industry, real estate, marina development and other corporate representatives, took water pollution, oil drilling and spills, wave energy development, corporate aquaculture, military testing, habitat destruction and all other human impacts on the ocean other than fishing and gathering off the table in its perverse concept of marine "protection."

There are six major lessons to be learned from the MLPA fiasco so that the inherent flaws of the initiative are never repeated in any process anywhere.

1. Never fund a public conservation process with private, unaccountable money, especially in a case where you are in effect removing stakeholders from public access. The roots of the MLPA's problems largely derive from the privatization of conservation through the Resources Legacy Fund Foundation, a private corporation.

Blue Ribbon Task Force Meetings Are Elaborated Staged Farces

by Dan Bacher

George Osborn, spokesman for the Partnership for Sustainable Oceans (PSO), presented a 25 page document documenting illegal private, non-public meetings of Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative officials to the California Fish and Game Commission during its meeting on February 2 in Sacramento.

The PSO, a coalition of national and regional fishing organization including the Coastside Fishing Club and United Anglers of Southern California, filed suit in San Diego Superior Court in late January, seeking to overturn South Coast and North Central Coast MLPA closures, alleging violations of the State Administrative Procedure Act.

During his brief public testimony, Osborn exposed the corruption and violations of law by the MLPA's Blue Ribbon Task Force (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I7_04BC1acA).

“After reviewing the documents turned over to us, which previously the BRTF had improperly withheld from the public, we now have evidence, indicating that the public meetings of the BRTF have been an elaborately staged Kabuki performance, choreographed and rehearsed down to the last detail, even to the crafting of motions, in scheduled private meetings held before the so-called public meetings of the BRTF," said Osborn. "Clearly, this has not been the most open and transparent process, as it has so often been described.”

http://blogs.alternet.org/danbacher/2011/01/20

by Dan Bacher

Following the revelations in the US diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks and published on the UK Guardian website, Mauritius is now suing the United Kingdom over the so-called "Marine Protected Area" created around the Chagos Islands to deny the native Chagossians the right to return to their homeland.

"Chagos was hived off from Mauritius to create an air base when the country won its independence in the 1960s, and it has always insisted that it should have sovereignty over the islands," according to Robert Bain of the UK Chagos Support Association (http://www.chagossupport.org.uk).

The Mauritian government has filed a case before the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea in Hamburg. "By creating the protected marine area, Great Britain did not take into account Mauritius' rights and those of the Chagossians it shamefully evicted from Chagos," Prime Minister Navin Ramgoolam stated.

The Wikileaks cables also revealed that the MPA was designed, with the approval of the Obama administration, to prevent the islanders from returning to their homeland while making sure that U.S. military interests were protected at their base on Diego Garcia.

Catherine Reheis-Boyd, the president of the Western States Petroleum Association, claimed the oil industry is "doing their share to promote renewable energy" in an op-ed in the Sacramento Bee on Sunday January 9. (http://www.sacbee.com/2011/01/09/3308270/opinion-petroleum-companies-doing.html)

"Villainizing the petroleum industry does nothing to promote sound energy policy," she contended. "Oil companies in the United States are the single biggest private sector investors in the development of alternative and renewable energy supplies."

However, Reheis-Boyd, as chair of the Marine Life Protection Task Force (MLPA) for the South Coast and a member of the task forces for the North Central Coast and North Coast, approved fake "marine protected areas" that "villainized" sustainable fishermen and gatherers while doing nothing to stop the real causes of fishery declines - water diversions from the Delta, water pollution and coastal development.

She and other task force members did everything they could to take oil spills and drilling, water pollution, development, military testing, corporate aquaculture and all other human uses of the ocean other than fishing and gathering off the table in their bizarre concept of marine "protection."

The Winnemem Journey to Justice benefit is set for Thursday, February 3, from 7 to 9:30 pm at the David Brower Center at 2150 Allston Way in Berkeley.

The evening of film, food and silent auction will assist the Winnemem Wintu (McCloud River) Tribe in their pursuit of justice, protection of sacred sites and the return of chinook salmon to the McCloud River.

by Dan Bacher

Outgoing Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and his supporters celebrated the decision by the California Fish and Game Commission on December 15 to create a network of so-called "marine protected areas" off the Southern California coast as a glorious, historic event.

“This vote will help restore southern California’s legacy of abundant sea life,” said Kaitilin Gaffney of The Ocean Conservancy. “After decades of treating the ocean as inexhaustible, by protecting ocean jewels like South La Jolla, Point Dume and Naples Reef, the Commission has turned the tide towards conservation.”

“California’s ocean habitats are every bit as dramatic as those on land. Just as we protected Yosemite and Kings Canyon on land, California is leading the way in preserving special places in the sea,” said Karen Garrison of the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC).

Likewise, the Department of Fish and Game gushed in a press release, "Informed by recommendations generated through a two-year public planning process, the regulations will create 36 new MPAs encompassing approximately 187 square miles (8 percent) of state waters in the study region. Approximately 116 square miles (4.9 percent) have been designated as no-take state marine reserves (82.5 square miles/3.5 percent) and no-take state marine conservation areas (33.5 square miles/1.4 percent), with the remainder designated as state marine conservation areas with different take allowances and varying levels of protection."

However, what MLPA advocates fail to mention is Schwarzenegger actually eviscerated the Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) in his implementation of the historic law. The MLPA Initiative, in a classic example of corporate greenwashing, took water pollution, oil drilling and spills, military testing, wave energy projects, corporate aquaculture and all other human uses of the ocean other than fishing and gathering off the table.

by Dan Bacher

Over 2,300 fall run Chinook salmon, the largest number of fish counted at the Van Arsdale Fisheries Station on the Eel River below Cape Horn Dam since the Department of Fish and Game (DFG) began keeping records, arrived just a few months after members of the Round Valley Indian Tribes of Covelo conducted dances and ceremonies to bring back the salmon.

In July of 2010, the Feather Dancers of the Tribes joined Friends of the Eel River (FOER) at a swimming hole in the Hearst area, a few miles downstream of the PG&E Potter Valley diversion (PVP) to the Russian River.

“Prayers and dances began just before dusk and continued well into the night,” said Nadananda, Executive Director of Friends of the Eel River. “Dances and ceremonies that had not happened in more than 100 years were done on the edge of the Eel River, prayers to bring back the salmon and for return of water natural to this river system.”

The Eel River Prayer Ceremony and Summit, a historic 2-day event held on the banks of the Eel River near Willits on July 17-18, 2010, drew Eel River advocates from San Francisco to the Oregon border, including biologists, hydrologists, fishermen and leading environmental groups. “We will not sit idly by,” was the central message of the event.

The Round Valley Tribes, with century-long fishing rights on the Eel, have experienced “devastating economic and health-related hardships from the loss of the salmon fisheries,” according to a joint news release from the Tribes and FOER.

Chagros Islanders denied right of return

by Dan Bacher

A U.S. State Department cable released through WikiLeaks reveals that that the British government cynically used the creation of a massive so-called marine “protected” area, the largest on the planet, as a tool to deny the native Chagros Islanders the right to return to their homeland in the Indian Ocean.

The U.K. Guardian published this US embassy cable on its website (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/us-embassy-cables-documents/207149) on December 2. “The cable, part of the massive stash acquired by WikiLeaks, quotes a British diplomat saying that creating the marine reserve would stymie the return of former islanders,” noted Science Magazine reporter Erik Stokstan on December 7.

In May 2009, Colin Roberts, the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office's (FCO) Director, Overseas Territories, told US embassy staff, “We do not regret the removal of the population,” since removal was necessary for the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT) to fulfill its “strategic purpose.”

He also said removal of the indigenous people was the reason why the uninhabited islands in the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT) and the surrounding waters are in “pristine” condition, adding that Diego Garcia’s “excellent condition” reflects the “responsible stewardship” of the U/S. and U.K. forces using it.

In addition, the leaked cable stated, “Establishing a marine reserve might, indeed, as the FCO’s Roberts stated, be the most effective long-term way to prevent any of the Chagos Islands’ former inhabitants or their descendents from resettling in the BIOT.”

The questions that MLPA advocates refuse to answer

by Dan Bacher

Officials from Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s fast-track Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative and their supporters have constantly repeated the false claims that the controversial process is "open, transparent and inclusive" and "protects” the ocean as part of a well-funded propaganda campaign to greenwash Schwarzenegger's abysmal environmental legacy before he leaves office.

In an editorial on December 20, the Sacramento Bee joined the campaign to greenwash the outgoing Republican Governor’s environmental record by praising Schwarzenegger’s MLPA initiative for taking “more bold steps on protecting state’s coast." (http://www.sacbee.com/2010/12/20/3269439/more-bold-steps-on-protecting.html)

“Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegg’ers environmental legacy certainly includes Assembly Bill 32, the law that aims to reduce carbon emissions to 1990 levels by 2020,” the editorial states. “Equally significant, and less well known, is his support for conserving Californrnia’s diverse coastal and marine wildlife habitats along the 1,100 mile coastline.”

The Bee and other proponents of the process refuse to address the many criticisms that advocates of true ocean protection have leveled against the MLPA Initiative. I have challenged MLPA proponents to answer a series of hard questions that cut to the core of the MLPA process.

None have responded yet to my specific questions, but only continue to repeat their unsubstantiated claims that the Initiative is “open, transparent and inclusive” and that anybody who criticizes the initiative is an opponent of “ocean protection.”

Rather than address the many criticisms by grassroots environmentalists, Indian Tribes and fishing groups of the MLPA's implementation under Schwarzenegger, the Bee stated, “Critics should cool the rhetoric and give this conservation effort a chance to work.”

John and Barbara Stephens-Lewallen, two of Mendocino County's most dedicated and respected environmental leaders, are asking Governor-elect Jerry Brown to terminate Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's widely-contested Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative.

"We ask you to cancel the illegal and unconstitutional memorandum of understanding signed under the Schwarzenegger administration transferring powers of the State of California to the Resources Legacy Fund Foundation, a private foundation, to control the process of creating Marine Protected Areas in California State lands and ocean waters under the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative," the Philo-based couple stated in a letter to Brown.

"The corrupt, privatized Marine Life Protection Act Initiative process scorns state laws and sovereign tribal rights," they wrote. "Marine Protected Areas enacted under the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative threaten great environmental and economic harm to present and future generations of Californians."

"Please act to cancel the memorandum of understanding with Resources Legacy Fund Foundation, and to nullify the Marine Protected Areas already enacted by this corrupt private process. Californians need and deserve access to sustainable food from our public ocean waters and intertidal zone. We do not consent to being governed by private foundations," they concluded.

The Stephens-Lewallens have fought offshore oil drilling, the clear cutting of forests, military testing, wave energy projects and other threats to coastal ecosystems for decades. John was the co-founder of the Ocean Protection Coalition and Seaweed Rebellion, two prominent grassroots environmental organizations.

The Marine Life Protection Act, signed by Governor Gray Davis into law in 1999, was designed to create a comprehensive network of marine protected areas along the California coast. However, the Schwarzenegger administration, in a grotesque parody of marine "protection," has taken water pollution, oil drilling, oil spills, military testing, wave energy projects, habitat destruction and all other uses of the ocean other than fishing and gathering off the table.

U.S., British use marine reserves as tool of imperialist policy
by Dan Bacher

A U.S. State Department cable released through WikiLeaks reveals that that the British government cynically used the creation of a massive so-called marine “protected” area, the largest on the planet, as a tool to deny the native Chagros Islanders the right to return to their homeland in the Indian Ocean.

The U.K. Guardian published this US embassy cable on its website (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/us-embassy-cables-documents/207149) on December 2. “The cable, part of the massive stash acquired by WikiLeaks, quotes a British diplomat saying that creating the marine reserve would stymie the return of former islanders,” noted Science Magazine reporter Erik Stokstan on December 7.

In May 2009, Colin Roberts, the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office's (FCO) Director, Overseas Territories, told US embassy staff, “We do not regret the removal of the population,” since removal was necessary for the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT) to fulfill its “strategic purpose."

MLPA Attempts to Ban Traditional Tribal Gathering along North Coast

by Dan Bacher

A panel appointed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to implement his controversial Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative will consider amending a motion that will, in effect, ban traditional harvesting by Indian Tribes until the legal authority to regulate the Tribal uses is clarified by the State of California and California Tribes.

This amendment will be discussed at Schwarzenegger’s Blue Ribbon Task Force (BRTF) meeting this Thursday, December 9, 2010 at 10 am via teleconference. BTRF members will be distributed between locations in Crescent City, Eureka, and Fort Bragg, in a thinly-veiled attempt to prevent a unified protest by tribes, fishermen and environmental activists.

“The MLPA is trying to ban any and all gathering along our coastline, including NO TRADITIONAL gathering whatsoever, in marine protected areas,” said Georgiana Myers, organizer of the Klamath Justice Coalition and Yurok Tribal member. “I urge people to speak out against this insane idea of taking away what is not theirs to take!”

Yurok Tribal representatives and other North Coast Tribes expressed strong opposition to the original motion four, the “Enhanced Compliance Alternative,” by Gregory F. Schem, at the October 25-26, Blue Ribbon Task Force, (BRTF) meeting in Fortuna. They did so on the specific grounds that once the BRTF started changing the unified proposal, “it would be an invitation to make further changes,” according to a draft letter to BRTF Chair Cindy Gustafson by Thomas O’Rourke, chairman of the Yurok Tribal Council.

It has been an eventful couple of weeks for those concerned about the state of California's water politics and the fate of the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta. The Bay Delta Conservation Plan to build a peripheral canal/tunnel has been released, a contentious legislative oversight hearing was held on the BDCP and the Westlands Water District pulled out of the BDCP.

In addition, a coalition of fishing, tribal and environmental groups, including Salmon Water Now, sent a letter on November 23 to Congressman John Garamendi asking him to request the Securities Exchange Commission to investigate whether Westlands Water District engaged in "material misrepresentations and omissions" in connection with the offer and sale of certain municipal securities, including those issued by the Westlands and the San Luis & Delta Mendota Water Authority. "The specific securities in question involved a $50 million Revenue Notes, Series 2009A, CUSIP 798544AM4, issued in March 2009," according to the letter.

"The award for the biggest newsmaker once again goes to the Westlands Water District," said Bruce Tokars of SalmonWaterNow.org. "Salmon Water Now has a new video that we hope will contribute some background and perspective about what has been going on with our favorite irrigation district."