Announcement of a Tuberculosis (TB) History Project in Snohomish County
The TB Voices Project for Snohomish County is looking for persons to share their tuberculosis (TB) stories with the community. Whether you or a loved one had TB, your story is important. Share your story on our website or contact us for a recorded interview.
The purpose of the TB Voices Project is to allow individuals from all generations throughout the county to tell their TB story, and in turn, these stories can help persons around the globe currently impacted by TB.
For more information go to www.Tbphotovoice.org or contact Project Director, Teresa Rugg at 360.862.9034, twrugg@frontier.com.
The TB Voices Project for Snohomish and King County is a project of TB Photovoice, in partnership with the Firland Foundation. Since 2006, TB Photovoice (based in Snohomish) has worked around the world to amplify the voices of individuals directly impacted by TB so that they, as well as their communities, can improve their overall health.
U.S. President Barack Obama with the Navy’s F/A-18 Green Hornet. Photo: Official U.S. Navy Imagery/ CC by 2.0
By Lucy Wescott, Inter Press Service
The United States military, an organisation that consumes 90 percent of the country’s federal oil allowance, is trying to become a greener institution.
The U.S. Navy has said that by 2016 it will run one of its 11 carrier strike groups using biofuel. In a test run of the new approach in the Pacific Ocean, a novel mixture of jet fuel, algae and cooking grease powered FA-18 Super Hornets, a type of fighter aircraft.
Within a decade, half of the Air Force and Navy’s fuel needs will be met by alternative energy sources, according to Christopher Merrill, director of the International Writer’s Program at the University of Iowa.
Merrill, who penned an essay for Orion Magazine titled ‘The Future of War‘, suggested that with climate change posing an increasing threat to U.S. national security, another name for this pioneering strike group could be the Great Green Fleet.
The military also believes that the threat of climate change to U.S. security is not simply a temporary trend, Merrill said.
“I don’t view this as a one-off thing, I view this as somebody trying to look into the future, trying to figure out what (we) are going to have to do to defend the country,” Merrill said.
Climate change and security
In 2010, the Department of Defence recognised in its Quadrennial Defence Review (QDR) that climate change and energy will both play “significant roles in the future security environment”.
The report rendered the effect of climate disasters difficult to ignore: last year was the second most expensive year on record for the United States, with 11 weather-related natural disasters costing over 110 billion dollars in damages.
Marcus King, associate research professor of international affairs at the George Washington University, believes that threats from climate change would affect not only the United States through phenomena such as sea-level rise and droughts but the rest of the world as well.
The United States ought to be concerned that other nations, including U.S. allies, “could be constrained because they don’t have (the) adaptive capacity (to deal with climate change),” King told IPS.
“Once you look at global climate change as a threat, Africa has the least resistance…(and) it’s of strategic importance to the U.S.,” King said.
The Department of Defence recognised the potential increase in the Navy’s response to disasters abroad, reporting in the QDR that climate change is one factor “whose complex interplay may spark or exacerbate future conflicts”, along with cultural tensions and new strains of diseases.
Good PR?
But Leah Bolger, formerly with the U.S. Navy and now a peace activist, believes the green move to be more a publicity stunt than a progressive statement signalling changing times.
“I spent my (twenty) years in the military ambivalent about what the military policies were in foreign policy. It was a job…I didn’t really question my part in the military machine,” Bolger told IPS.
Now, however, Bolger called the Navy’s decision to make one carrier strike group green by 2016 “laughable”.
“(The green move is) like a page out of a PR book – something they can put out in their public affairs office to say, ‘We’re so mindful of the environment,’” Bolger said.
Still, one additional advantage of the green move is that the potential demand for alternative fuels could create a new market, Merrill told IPS. Already tax credits are being granted to wind farms, according to him.
“Once that market gets established, it’s likely that you’ll see the kind of innovations that came in the wake of the invention of the Internet,” he predicted.
Nevertheless, a change in the military’s energy consumption doesn’t necessarily mean a change in the behaviour of Americans, who consumed 19 percent of the world’s total energy resources in 2010, according to data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration, despite comprising around five percent of the global population.
Even if Americans knew about the Great Green Fleet, Bolger said, it wouldn’t do much to change their habits.
While the Great Green Fleet doesn’t necessarily improve the operational abilities of the Navy, the impetus is noble, King said. “If they have the ability to create demand (for alternative fuels)… I think that’s great, as long as it’s consistent with national security, which it is.”
Earthquakes equal to or bigger than magnitude 3.0 in the United States between 2009 and 2012. The background colors indicating earthquake risk are from the U.S. National Seismic Hazard Map. CREDIT: Science/AAAS
By Becky Oskin, Staff Writer
July 11, 2013
Two new studies of earthquakes near injection wells have seismologists using words rarely heard these days in earthquake science: prediction and warning.
The research has also renewed calls for better seismic monitoring and reporting in regions experiencing man-made earthquakes.
“Shale gas operations have completely changed our energy policy and people are injecting in places they’ve never injected before. If we’re going to do this safely, we need to address the environmental issues, including protecting water supplies and earthquake risk,” said Cliff Frohlich, a seismologist at the University of Texas Institute for Geophysics who was not involved in the new studies.
The two reports appear in today’s (July 11) issue of the journal Science.
Links between injection and earthquakes
In the Midwest, researchers discovered a warning signal that moderate-sized earthquakes may strike near injection wells, where mining companies dispose of waste fluids. At three sites in Oklahoma, Colorado and Texas, passing seismic waves from faraway earthquakes — the recent massive temblors in Japan, Sumatra and Chile — triggered swarms of small earthquakes. The seismic activity continued until magnitude-4 and magnitude-5 earthquakes struck, such as the large earthquakes near Prague, Okla., in November 2011. [7 Craziest Ways Japan’s Earthquake Affected Earth]
“We’ve been telling our operators for some time that this is one of the warning signs to look for,” said Austin Holland, a seismologist with the Oklahoma Geological Survey who was not involved in the study. “If you see remote triggering of your wells, it’s a clear indication that your faults are right at the failure point. It just took a little tickle, if you will, to trigger the earthquakes.”
In a separate study, researchers documented a clear link between earthquakes and production, or removing and injecting underground fluid, at Southern California’s Salton Sea Geothermal Field power plant. Every 500 million gallons of water pumped out of the ground caused one detectable earthquake per 11 days, according to the report.
“The thing that best predicted the earthquake rate was the net amount of water extracted from the ground,” said Emily Brodsky, lead study author and a seismologist at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
Scientists have long known that geothermal projects can trigger earthquakes, but some communities are wary of the seismic risk. Construction on a geothermal energy plant in Basel, Switzerland, was shut down in 2009 after fluid injection triggered earthquakes up to magnitude 3.4. Brodsky’s study offers a new statistical model for predicting how many earthquakes to expect at a geothermal plant, based on the amount of fluid going in and out of the ground.
“This paper has made a very direct and compelling correlation between the net of fluid out and fluid in and the rate at which these small earthquakes are happening,” said William Ellsworth, a seismologist at the U.S. Geological Survey’s Earthquake Science Center, who was not involved in the study. “This seems like a very promising way of applying this particular statistical model.”
Remotely triggered warnings
Many scientists also suspect a link between mining-related wastewater injection wells and a barrage of earthquakes in the central and eastern United States in the past decade. The surge outpaced natural background trends starting in 2001, according to a review by Ellsworth also published today in Science. But proving a cause-and-effect has been difficult for researchers, who lack the evidence for a slam-dunk case. Outside of California, there are few dense seismic networks to precisely locate small earthquakes, and injection well data is not immediately available.
Discovering earthquake warning signals in the Midwest, before the larger, more damaging temblors, was possible only through a temporary, massive seismic monitoring network called the USArray. The explosion in shale gas exploration also helped, because remote triggering is most common in places with high fluid pressure, such as geothermal fields, hot springs and the estimated 100,000 injection wells in the United States. [Top 10 Alternative Energy Bets]
A quick reminder: Fracking itself doesn’t cause felt earthquakes. Injecting fluids into the ground (as happens with the wastewater from fracking) spawns man-made earthquakes. The added fluids increase pore pressure on a fault’s surface, unclamping the fault and making it easier to slip.
“The fluids are weakening the fault,” said Nicholas van der Elst, a seismologist at Columbia University’s Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory in New York and lead author of the remote-triggering study. More than 50 years of controlled and unintentional experiments have proved the link.
But even with a better seismic network, remotely triggered earthquakes are of limited use as warning signals. First, not all regions with possible man-made earthquakes also had remotely triggered earthquake swarms. Second, only one earthquake every year, on average, is big enough to send seismic waves rippling across Earth’s surface.
“The trouble with using this for forecasting is that the huge earthquakes that are triggering earthquakes are extremely rare,” Frohlich said. “We’ve had three in the last few years, but that’s an unusual rate. In the last 50 years, we’ve only had maybe a dozen earthquakes that big.”
The three sites with earthquake “sirens” were Prague, Okla., Synder, Tex., and Trinidad, Colo. Each saw a spike in seismic activity near injection wells within 24 hours of huge earthquakes in Chile in 2010, Japan in 2011 or Sumatra in 2012. The number of quakes increased until a magnitude-4 or magnitude-5 earthquake hit, includingOklahoma’s strongest recorded earthquake.
“I think this [study] shows that fluid pressure is really driving these earthquakes,” Van der Elst said. “Stress has been increased by the injection of all this fluid in these regions where people have suggested a connection between wells and earthquakes.
“The big implication in this is that remote triggering could act as a stress probe. You could look for remote triggering to anticipate large induced earthquakes,” Van der Elst said.
Better seismic monitoring needed
But well operators are already aware that upticks in seismicity near their injection sites are a warning sign that a larger quake could strike, Holland said. Some companies operate their own seismic networks to monitor wells, he added. “The idea of controlling your injection parameters based on the seismicity you’re observing has been around for 30 or 40 years,” he said.
In his Science review, Ellsworth recommends seismic monitoring of wells to improve understanding of man-made earthquakes and help regulators set seismic activity thresholds that limit injection if there are too many small quakes.
“We need better seismic monitoring so we can see the small earthquakes, and I would also like to have more information about the actual disposal process,” Ellsworth said. “Right now, all that’s required is monthly reporting, and that’s not adequate to build geophysical and geological models of the [earthquake] process.” Regulators developing new laws and reporting requirements also need much more timely and better information, Ellsworth said.
In response to Oklahoma’s recent uptick in earthquakes, the Oklahoma Geological Survey is doubling and modernizing its seismic monitoring network, Holland said.
Bolivian President Evo Morales thanked the Organization of American States (OAS) member countries this Wednesday for the severe criticisms they leveled at the governments of four European countries, PULSAR reported.
Last week, France, Portugal, Italy and Spain closed their airspaces to Morales’ presidential plane, giving rise to a serious diplomatic incident.
The Bolivian leader welcomed the OAS resolution and stressed that such a show of support entailed not only “defending Evo Morales, but the people of Latin America and the Caribbean as well.”
On Tuesday, the OAS condemned the mistreatment of Morales by the governments of several European countries. The international association called the actions of these countries a “clear violation of the basic norms and principles of international law, such as the inviolability of Heads of State.”
Referring to the mistreatment he experienced days ago when his plane was denied permission to cross the airspace of these countries and was forced to land in Vienna, Austria, Morales stated he could not “conceive that some European countries insist on causing us harm.”
“It seems some countries in Europe continue to think as they did 500 years ago,” Morales charged.
The indigenous Bolivian leader underscored that Latin American peoples are ready to confront “these types of impositions and decisions that do so much damage to human rights.”
Derek Nepinak tosses Indian status card in trash, promises new direction for First Nations
Source: CBC news
Manitoba’s grand chief is promising a new direction for Canada’s First Nations — one that would not include the Indian Act or the Assembly of First Nations — at a gathering of chiefs taking place this week.
Grand Chief Derek Nepinak of the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs is heading up the National Treaty Gathering on the Onion Lake Cree Nation in Saskatchewan, which could result in the creation of a breakaway group separate from the AFN.
Nepinak has been talking about forming the National Treaty Alliance, citing too much rhetoric and not enough action from the AFN on First Nations issues.
“As these institutions have become more politicized and more developed along bureaucratic lines, we’ve lost them,” Nepinak said at the meeting Monday.
In a bold symbolic gesture, Nepinak threw his government-issued Indian status card into the trash — a sign of what he said he wants to do for First Nations people.
“This Indian Act card is done with me and I’m done with it,” Nepinak said, before he stood up and tossed his card into a garbage can.
Currently, Canada’s First Nations people are governed by the federal Indian Act, which was created in 1876. Under the act, a status Indian has rights to health, education, and tax exemptions for which other Canadians don’t qualify.
But Nepinak said he no longer wants anything to do with the legislation.
“Do something with that Indian card but distance yourself from it as much as you can,” he said.
“We need to recreate treaty cards and put our faith back in one another again. I think that’s how we deconstruct the Indian Act.”
Atleo calls for unity
At the Assembly of First Nations’ meeting in Whitehorse, National Chief Shawn Atleo warned an audience of more than 200 chiefs on Tuesday that conditions for Canada’s First Nations won’t improve if they split into factions.
Atleo called for unity and told delegates that the AFN strives to respect the sovereignty of First Nations while “being careful not to overstep” its boundaries.
“Our agenda, the First Nations agenda, requires that everyone come together … just as Treaty 7 pulled First Nations together to deal with the rising water,” he said, referring to the recent floods in Alberta.
A call for unity should not be confused with a call for assimilation or cultural hegemony, said Atleo, adding that the AFN supports individual nations negotiating treaty issues with the federal government.
Potential impact on treaty process
Some have expressed concern that having some chiefs split off into a new group could potentially hurt the treaty negotiation process.
“To create something separate and distinct from the AFN on treaty issues may result in a weakening of positions because not everyone will participate,” said Aimee Craft, a lawyer in Winnipeg.
But Jamie Wilson, Manitoba’s treaty commissioner, said Nepinak is prompting a much-needed dialogue about the state of Canada’s treaties.
“We’re talking about issues that a lot of people don’t understand, and when there’s a lack of understanding, there’s a lot of prejudice,” he said.
Wilson said treaties were signed between First Nations and the Crown to mutually benefit both groups, but those agreements have not been implemented.
A decision on whether a new breakaway group should be created is expected to be made later this week.
A resolution in support of the Public Health and Safety Code of the San Carlos Apache Tribe (SCAT) has passed that will directly impact the lives of Natives living with HIV/AIDS. According to SCAT HIV/AIDS Coalition Chair and Public Health Emergency Preparedness Coordinator Anita L. Brock, this resolution should help curtail the spread of communicable infectious diseases such as HIV/AIDS. It offers tribal members “the system needed to continuously address the threat such diseases pose to the San Carlos Apache community,” Brock says. “The implementation of such a Code supports enforcement of public health responsibilities and the authority needed to identify the risk factors associated with the spread of infectious disease.”
According to HIV/AIDS activist Isadore Boni, a SCAT member and key supporter of the resolution, passage of this resolution does much more: “HIV/AIDS confidentiality is now in our health codes.”
Boni explains that this resolution “allows the protection and confidentiality of public health information and patient privacy, especially for those who have been infected by HIV/AIDS.” Another key component of this resolution, according to Boni, is that it renders HIV testing optional for SCAT members. “There was talk of doing mandatory testing,” he says, “but I advocated against it.”
According to Brock, who worked with the primary team in development of the code now in place, this new resolution benefits not just enrolled SCAT members, but Natives throughout Indian country. “The code adds to the infrastructure needed to make decisions that will benefit all tribal members,” she explains. “They will be the benefactors of a system which values their privacy and continuity of care. In addition, Indian country is quite vast with over 500 tribes, and each tribe may make this determination. From a purely public health perspective, the benefits are self-evident.”
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) reports that American Indians and Alaska Natives ranked fifth in rates of HIV infection in 2011, “with lower rates than blacks/African Americans, Hispanics/Latinos, Native Hawaiians/Other Pacific Islanders, and people reporting multiple races, but higher rates than Asians and whites.” However, American Indians and Alaska Natives have poorer survival rates than all other ethnicities and races.
Boni believes the official CDC numbers documenting the rates of HIV infection among Natives may be significantly lower than the actual rates of HIV/AIDS throughout Indian country.
“I personally know more people on my reservation that have HIV than what our Indian Health Service has in San Carlos,” Boni claims. “People like me get tested in the city, so our numbers do not get counted, and agencies and even tribes do not share information. So how many people actually have HIV/AIDS? No one really knows.”
Boni was diagnosed with HIV and Hepatitis C in 2002. He relocated to Phoenix, Arizona for treatment. “There was, and still are, no services for tribal members who are HIV positive on the reservation.” He says he was homeless in Phoenix for two years and lived on the streets, in halfway houses, and in shelters. He was beaten, and his medications were stolen. He worked as a laborer making minimum wage by day, to try to put together funds to pay for shelter and food at night. On World AIDS Day in 2004, Boni shared his story for the first time, and he has been a public advocate supporting the lives of HIV positive Natives ever since.
“Confidentiality has always been a problem on my reservation,” Boni says. “Many people have shared with me that their health information was disclosed without their consent.”
Boni, who has a bachelor’s degree in social work from Arizona State University, goes on to say that privacy rules and regulations had not been in practice in San Carlos. “It got to a boiling point for me. I assertively pushed the San Carlos Health Department to do something about this.”
Partly due to his efforts, the resolution passed in time for National HIV Testing Day, in June of this year. “HIV disclosure is painful, not only for the individual but their families,” Boni explains. This new code protects them.
“I know the decision-makers in our health department are still clueless as to the impact HIV/AIDS has on our reservation,” Boni continues. “To them it’s not a priority, but I remind them over and over that this health crisis is serious. No San Carlos Apache tribal member should have to die of AIDS complications in order to prove that this is a problem. Period.”
State officials and representatives of some corporate “environmental” NGOs have constantly touted the so-called “marine protected areas” created under the privately-funded Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative as a “science-based” method for bolstering fish and shellfish populations in California.
Yet a recent California Fish and Game Commission decision revealed that traditional fishery management, rather than the marine protected areas supported by the Western States Petroleum Association, Safeway Corporation and other corporate interests under the MLPA Initiative, may be much more effective in addressing fishery declines than the creation of questionable “marine protected areas.”
The Commission on June 26 voted to modify abalone fishery regulations along the northern California coast. By doing this, the Commission effectively admitted that fishing regulations, rather than alleged “marine reserves” that went into effect on the North Central Coast on May 1, 2010 and on the North Coast on December 19, 2012, are the “solution” to reducing pressure on a declining abalone population. The decline was spurred by a die-off that coincided with a local red tide bloom and calm ocean conditions in 2011.
The Commission voted to reduce the annual limit to 18 abalone (previously 24), with no more than nine taken from Sonoma and Marin counties. Other changes to abalone regulations included a coast-wide start time for the fishing day of 8 a.m. and a closure at Ft. Ross in Sonoma County.
The changes were proposed by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) and then adopted by the Commission.
“The new management measures we’ve adopted today will help ensure that the red abalone remains abundant on the North Coast and the popular recreational fishery there continues to thrive,” said Commission President Michael Sutton. “Our job is to keep wildlife populations in California healthy and not wait for a crisis to take action.”
Jim Martin, the West Coast Regional Director of the Recreational Fishing Alliance and representative of the Sonoma County Abalone Network (SCAN), responded, “Apparently Fish and Wildlife believes that traditional fishery management is more effective than marine protected areas in rebuilding fishery stocks – and that reductions in harvest are more effective than closing down areas.”
Martin noted that the abalone decline – caused by a die-off and not overharvesting – occurred in 2011. SCAN immediately supported a temporary closure at the Fort Ross index site to help the population to recover.
“They extended this temporary closure to a year round one,” said Martin. “We supported both that closure and an 8 am start time to help enforcement, as well as reduced bag limit south of Mendocino County.”
However, the abalone fishermen felt the reduction of the bag limit from 24 to 18 was “completely unnecessary.”
“What they really did was reduced the allowable recreational catch from 280,000 to 190,000 abalone, over a 30 percent reduction. And the Abalone Recovery and Management Plan only called for a 25 percent reduction,” said Martin.
In the course of discussing the regulations, Martin and other fishermen asked the Department to quantify the benefits of marine protected areas to the fishery.
The MPAs were touted by MLPA officials, including Ron LeValley, the Co-Chair of the MLPA Initiative Science Advisory team now being investigated by federal authorities for conspiracy with two others to embezzle nearly $1 million from the Yurok Tribe, because of the “benefits” they would provide by bolstering abalone and fish populations. (http://www.times-standard.com/… )
“The CDFW refused to quantify the benefits because they said it would take too long,” said Martin. “We believe there should be some benefit to quantify these benefits based on science.”
“The whole selling point of these MPAs is that they would make fish and shellfish populations more abundant,” said Martin. “The first test of that theory turned to be based on false promises.”
Martin emphasized, “We don’t think these marine protected areas benefit abalone at all. If they benefit abalone, give us some numbers. Instead they turned to traditional management to deal with a situation wasn’t harvest related.”
The CDFW press release announcing the regulations confirms Martin’s contention that the Department effectively admitted that the marine protected areas weren’t benefiting the abalone at all.
“Northern California red abalone are managed adaptively by the Commission, using traditional management measures coupled with fishery independent surveys to maintain the catch at sustainable levels, as prescribed by the Abalone Recovery and Management Plan (ARMP). Ongoing data surveys by the Department of Fish and Wildlife detected the effects of a recent abalone die-off along the Sonoma coast,” the Department stated.
“The declines in abalone density triggered the changes to management measures, because the densities dropped below levels that are prescribed in the ARMP for management action,” the release continued.
“The new regulations are intended to provide an opportunity for abalone populations in Sonoma and Marin to increase, and to help Mendocino County maintain a productive fishery. The set start time for the fishing day will also aid enforcement,” the DFW said.
Not mentioned anywhere in the news release are the “glorious” new marine protected areas, created under an allegedly “open, transparent and inclusive” process, that were supposed to bolster the populations of abalone and other species.
The release also didn’t mention the reasons for the abalone die-off and how to prevent a similar situation from taking place in the future.
Background: MLPA Initiative based on terminally flawed “science”
The “science” that the MLPA Initiative is based on is very questionable, leading tribal biologists, independent scientists, fishing groups and grassroots environmentalists to challenge its assumptions, methodology and conclusions.
The Northern California Tribal Chairman’s Association, including the Chairs of the Elk Valley Rancheria, Hoopa Valley Tribe, Karuk Tribe, Smith River Rancheria, Trinidad Rancheria, and Yurok Tribe, believes the science behind the MLPA Initiative developed by Schwarzenegger’s Science Advisory Team is “incomplete and terminally flawed.” (http://yubanet.com/…)
The Yurok Tribe said it has attempted on numerous occasions to address the scientific inadequacies with the MLPA science developed under the Schwarzenegger administration by adding “more robust protocols” into the equation, but was denied every time.
For example, the MLPA Science Advisory Team in August 2010 turned down a request by the Yurok Tribe to make a presentation to the panel. Among other data, the Tribe was going to present data of test results from other marine reserves regarding mussels.
“The data would have shown that there was not a statistical difference in the diversity of species from the harvested and un-harvested areas,” wrote John Corbett, Yurok Tribe Senior Attorney, in a letter to the Science Advisory Team on January 12, 2011. “The presentation would have encompassed the work of Smith, J.R. Gong and RF Ambrose, 2008, ‘The Impacts of Human Visitation on Mussel Bed Communities along the California Coast: Are Regulatory Marine Reserves Effective in Protecting these Communities.’” (http://yubanet.com/…)
No Tribal scientists were allowed to serve on the MLPA Science Advisory Team, in spite of the fact that the Yurok and other North Coast Indian Tribes have large natural resources and fisheries departments staffed with many fishery biologists and other scientists.
On the day of the historic direct action protest by a coalition of over 50 Tribes and their allies in Fort Bragg in July 2010, Frankie Joe Myers, Yurok Tribal member and Coastal Justice Coalition activist, exposed the refusal to incorporate Tribal science that underlies the fake “science” of the MLPA process.
“The whole process is inherently flawed by institutionalized racism,” said Myers. “It doesn’t recognize Tribes as political entities, or Tribal biologists as legitimate scientists.” (http://klamathjustice.blogspot.com/…)
To make matters even worse, the Del Norte County District Attorney arrested Ron LeValley, Co-Chair of the MLPA Science Advisory Team, in February 2012 for conspiracy with two others, Roland Raymond and Sean McAlllister, to embezzle nearly $1 million from the Yurok Tribe.
In January, District Attorney Jon Alexander said the state case was dismissed without prejudice against Raymond, LeValley and McAllister to “allow the case to move forward through the U.S. Attorney’s Office,” according to the Eureka Times-Standard. (http://www.times-standard.com/…)
Wouldn’t it have been prudent for the Natural Resources Agency and Department of Fish and Wildlife to have postponed the implementation of the alleged North Coast “marine protected areas” until this case had been resolved in the courts – and when the legitimacy of the “science” of the MLPA Initiative was already facing severe criticism from well-respected scientists?
The Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) is a landmark law, signed by Governor Gray Davis in 1999, designed to create a network of marine protected areas off the California Coast. However, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2004 created the privately-funded MLPA “Initiative” to “implement” the law, effectively eviscerating the MLPA.
The “marine protected areas” created under the MLPA Initiative fail to protect the ocean from oil spills and drilling, water pollution, military testing, wave and wind energy projects, corporate aquaculture and all other uses of the ocean other than fishing and gathering. These areas are not “marine protected areas” in any real sense, but are just “no fishing” zones.
The MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Forces that oversaw the implementation of “marine protected areas” included a big oil lobbyist, marina developer, real estate executive and other individuals with numerous conflicts of interest. Catherine Reheis-Boyd, the president of the Western States Petroleum Association, served on the MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Force for the North Coast and North Central Coast.
Reheis-Boyd, a relentless advocate for offshore oil drilling, hydraulic fracturing (fracking), the Keystone XL Pipeline and the weakening of environmental laws, also chaired the South Coast MLPA Blue Ribbon Task that developed the MPAs that went into effect in Southern California waters on January 1, 2012.
The MLPA Initiative operated through a controversial private/public partnership funded by the shadowy Resources Legacy Fund Foundation. The Schwarzenegger administration, under intense criticism by grassroots environmentalists, fishermen and Tribal members, authorized the implementation of marine protected areas under the initiative through a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the foundation and the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.
K. Neumeyer, Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission
A rainy April and a hotter-than-normal week in May created a challenge for the steelhead fry expected to emerge in Au- gust.
The rain, combined with heavy snow- melt after a string of 80-degree days in May, built up in the reservoir of Seattle City Light’s Skagit River Hydroelectric Project. To prevent an overflow that could scour out steelhead redds (nests), the utility released more water than usual, increasing the flow of the Skagit River. As a result, spawning steelhead dug redds in places at risk of being dewatered before the last fry emerge this summer, when flows are lower.
Water management in the Skagit Riv- er is guided in part by spawning surveys conducted by biologists Stan Walsh of the Skagit River System Cooperative and Dave Pflug of Seattle City Light. The Skagit River System Cooperative is the natural resources extension of the Swinomish and Sauk-Suiattle tribes.
Based on data gathered by Walsh and Pflug, Seattle City Light will release enough water in August to keep vulnerable steelhead eggs under water.
Walsh and Pflug have monitored salmon and steelhead redds between Rockport and Newhalem on the Upper Skagit River since 1995. They document new redds, note the condition of existing redds, and measure the depth of the shallowest redds to make sure the river’s flow stays high enough for those eggs to survive, but not so high that the eggs are washed away.
They also share data with state fisheries co-managers to help forecast run sizes.
“Seattle City Light has been a great part- ner to the tribes in water management,” Walsh said. “They’ve gone out of their way to protect fish beyond what’s required in their license agreement.”
The black-and-white photograph taken in Killisnoo, Alaska, at the turn of the 20th century depicts a group of fishermen reeling in a gigantic halibut. The image is lighthearted and almost comical: workers smile as the imposing creature writhes perilously close to them. What makes the photograph (Slide 5) unusual is not its subject matter but its subjects. The fishermen, working in apparent harmony, represent a cross section of the population of Killisnoo, an island off southeastern Alaska that was an important outpost for American businesses and tourism. Several of the men are white; at least two are Native American, members of the Tlingit community; and one is Asian. Taken at a time when racial integration was the exception and not the rule in the United States, the image by Vincent Soboleff, a Russian-American amateur photographer, is noteworthy. As the Dartmouth anthropologist Sergei A. Kan argues in his new book, “A Russian American Photographer in Tlingit Country: Vincent Soboleff in Alaska” (University of Oklahoma Press), Mr. Soboleff’s images of the United States territory, especially its Native population, are also significantly different from others of the period.
