{ACT NOW!} Support Progressive Managers of our Lands and EPA! (Article Below)

[Judy Reed]

AnimalVoicesNews&Alert

ACT NOW:   
We can still impact the decision-making process for the remaining Cabinet appointments -- most importantly to many of us -- those who will manage our lands and environment!  Never before has the average citizen had the ability to give the president-elect feedback!  There are fax numbers and web sites for email!  Use them all!!!

Top of the list are Congressman Raúl Grijalva as Secretary of the Interior and Congresswoman Hilda Solis to head of the Environmental Protection Agency.

Also, at change.gov <http://change.gov/page/s/yourstory>, you can leave comments on any number of issues by clicking on the Agenda tab <http://change.gov/agenda/>, selecting an issue, and then clicking on  ³Submit Your Ideas.²  

The Center for Biological Diversity circulated a letter to animal-related and environmental organizations to acquire signatures to endorse Arizona Congressman Raúl Grijalva for Secretary of the Interior.  I have adapted the letter for your use to support the nomination of these two progressive leaders.  

Sign as an individual or a member of an organization.

Sources/References:  
<http://tba2007.confabb.com/users/profile/hsolis>
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hilda_Solis>
<http://www.pdamerica.org/>
<http://www.pdamerica.org/articles/news/2008-12-04-08-17-31-news.php>
<http://pdamerica.org/articles/news/2008-12-07-12-25-03-news.php>
"Tim Carpenter for PDA" <in...@pdamerica.org>
Letter Source: Brian Vincent <br...@bigwildlife.org>

Please copy: Brian Vincent at <brian @ bigwildlife.org> (close spaces)

~~~~~~ Suggested Letter ~~~~~~>rewrite/edit/Judy.

December 8, 2008

President-elect Barack Obama
Office of the President-elect
451 6th Street NW
Washington, DC  20004
Fax  transition team: 202-443-4724
Fax John Podesta:  202-682-1867
Web email:  <http://change.gov/page/s/energyenviro>

Re: I Support Congressman Raúl Grijalva for Secretary of the Interior
and Congresswoman Hilda Solis for the Environmental Protection Agency

Dear President-elect Obama:

As you make appointments to your Cabinet, I encourage you to consider Congressman Raúl Grijalva for Secretary of the Interior and Congresswoman Hilda Solis to the Environmental Protection Agency.  These are forward-thinking, progressive leaders who will bring strong, focused leadership to these positions in order to ameliorate the devastating effects of the Bush administration's eight years of failed environmental policy.  

Congresswoman Hilda Solis's background and record show her to be a leader who is more than prepared and ready for the challenge to head the EPA.  Please consider:

Congresswoman Solis is serving her fourth term in the U.S. House of Representatives. She represents California's 32nd Congressional District. Prior to her election to Congress, Solis served eight years in the California state legislature.

Solis obtained the support of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, Emily's List, Handgun Controls, the Sierra Club, and the California League of Conservation voters, all of whom motivated a significant amount of volunteers and donors to help Solis win.  She has served on:

*    Committee on Energy and Commerce
*    Subcommittee on the Environment and Hazardous Materials ­ Vice Chair
*    Subcommittee on Health
*    Subcommittee on Telecommunications & the Internet
*    House Committee on Natural Resources
*    Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources
*    Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming
*    Democratic Steering & Policy Committee ­ Vice Chair
*    Congressional Hispanic Caucus
*    Health Task Force ­ Chair

In August 2000, Congresswoman Solis distinguished herself by becoming the first woman to receive the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award for her pioneering work on environmental justice issues in California. In 2003, she became the first Latina appointed to the powerful Committee on Energy and Commerce. She is also a member of the House Committee on Natural Resources. In March 2007, Solis was named a member of the newly created House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming. Congresswoman Solis is also serving her third term as the Chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus' Task Force on Health and the Environment.    

Congressman Raúl Grijalva's background and record show him to be uniquely qualified to be Secretary of the Interior.  Please consider:

As Arizona's congressional representative, Congressman Grijalva has shown a broad range of passion and expertise for conservation and management of public lands.  He has highlighted the Bush administration's attempts to undercut science in favor of industry interests and sought ways to work with agencies and environmental groups to better protect public lands.  For this, Congressman Grijalva has gained respect in the environmental community for his clear and decisive positions on sometimes complicated issues.

As a member of the Pima County Board of Supervisors, Congressman Grijalva was responsible for leading one of the largest counties in the United States.  With large urban areas, vast expanses of federal land, rapid population growth, a high density of endangered species, a shared border with Mexico, and an ethnically and politically diverse populace, Pima County is microcosm of the issues a Secretary of the Interior must be capable of managing.  In this position, Congressman Grijalva demonstrated not only knowledge of the issues, but a natural ability to bring differing interests together to reach mutually acceptable agreement.  He was a leader in the development, approval and funding of the precedent-setting Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan.  Bringing federal, state and county governments together with conservationists, developers and scientists, Congressman Grijalva helped forge one of the most far-sighted endangered-species protection plans in the nation.

One of the immediate tasks for the Secretary of the Interior will be to deal with growing national water problems.   Management of drought and the ability of the Secretary to bring powerful, conflicting interests to the table will be essential, as evidenced by the recent crises in Georgia and Florida, the continuing controversy on the Klamath River, and the scientific consensus that the Colorado River is dangerously over-allocated.  Congressman Grijalva has long been involved in drought management on the San Pedro, Santa Cruz and Colorado Rivers and is well-prepared to tackle these issues on a national level.

Congressman Grijalva's record of anticipating and working to address growing environmental problems will also be an important asset in the Secretary of the Interior position.  Expanding forest fires, the melting of the Arctic, drought in the interior West and Southeast, loss of endangered species habitat, rangeland degradation, and permitting of coal mines, coal plants, and other traditional and alternative energy projects all point to global warming becoming the central issue for DOI lands and jurisdiction.  Congressman Grijalva has been a leader in pressing Interior and other federal agencies to integrate global warming issues into their planning and permitting.

Congressman Grijalva's experience in key environmental Congressional caucuses has prepared him to lead the full range of agencies within the Department of the Interior.  In addition to his chairmanship and work on public lands, he has worked closely with Native American communities ­ his district includes seven sovereign nations ­ and has served on the Subcommittee on Insular Affairs.  Also, as a Representative from the arid southwest he is intimately familiar with the responsibilities of the Bureau of Reclamation.

Further, Congressman Grijalva's leadership in the labor and Hispanic communities has allowed him to move beyond the long-held false dichotomies of environment vs. jobs and species vs. rural communities to promote better management and use of public lands.  This is especially important because Hispanics are the fastest growing users of public lands in the West.  Their interests have been largely ignored to date, even when those interests are harmed by federal land development and extraction and access policies.  The Interior will benefit from Grijalva’s ability to bring these interests to the table.

Congressman Grijalva has demonstrated a keen knowledge of procedural issues regarding public lands will also be an asset to the Secretary of the Interior position.  In 2008, he led efforts to stop damaging mining on BLM lands and other federal lands where the Secretary of the Interior, BLM and Minerals Management Services have permitting authorization. This was largely due to his innate ability to understand and compellingly explain how poorly planned mining threatens local communities and water supplies.

In the last decade, central management issues on public lands ­ including logging, ORVs, fire management, grazing, mining and water conservation ­ have changed from deeply rural issues to an urban interface. Congressman Grijalva's experience in the major urban center of Tucson has provided a hands-on understanding of the new urban-edge dynamic and an appreciation of the resulting political constituencies that are emerging.

The next Secretary of the Interior must have a nuanced understanding of the complex issues involved in protecting and stewarding our natural resources and lands.  With the recent economic downturn, there will be calls for increased energy production at the risk of significant environmental destruction.  We believe that Congressman Grijalva's demonstrated strength in navigating these sensitive issues and his commitment to science-based decision-making will serve the Interior well as it moves beyond the Bush administration's policies.

As a person who is dedicated to protecting imperiled animals, plants and our wild lands through sound science and enforcement of environmental laws, I regularly interact with federal agencies within the Department of the Interior.  It is with this perspective that I heartily endorse Congressman Raúl Grijalva to be appointed as its Secretary.  

Protecting and saving the environment will take Congressman Raúl Grijalva for Secretary of the Interior and Congresswoman Hilda Solis for the Environmental Protection Agency.  Both of these agencies need their unique background, experience, philosophy, guidance, and leadership to achieve a healthy future.  

Sincerely,

Your Full name, address and telephone number

~~~~~~~~Letter end~~~~~~~~~~~

Source/Letters: AlterNet <http://www.alternet.org/feedback/>
Link: <http://www.alternet.org/environment/110530/>

Obama May Tap a Strong Progressive
to Manage Our Wilderness

By Roberto Lovato, AlterNet. Posted December 6, 2008.

The appointment of Arizona Rep. Raul Grijalva to the Department of the Interior would bring much-needed political balance to the Obama cabinet.

Anyone who has visited a national park or traversed the country's diverse wilderness comes home with gorgeous, yet distressing images of it; those returning from a visit to one of the more than 562 tribes the federal government recognizes and is supposed to assist also bring back sad stories about it; and those of us who enjoy camping or fishing or hunting inevitably return home talking about it. "It" is the scenery and life found on the millions of acres of federal land left blemished and vulnerable by the Bush administration's Department of the Interior.

As urbanization, economic restructuring and the insatiable lust for land and natural resources continue to threaten the still-astonishingly beautiful and rich land of this country, we should all care about whom President-elect Barack Obama chooses to lead the DOI. The urgency of these issues came home twice this week as the Bush administration delivered two parting gifts to big mining interests by rescinding two important regulations -- one requiring the DOI to prevent mining companies from dumping waste near public streams, and another protecting federal land near the Grand Canyon from mining and oil and gas development.

In order to deal with such challenges to the land and people under the purview of the department, which is charged with managing most federally owned land as well as with managing relationships with Native American peoples, the Obama administration must appoint someone with the experience, expertise and political sophistication to lead nothing less than a New Deal for the land and people our government deals with.

Of all the candidates being vetted by the Obama transition team for this complex and challenging responsibility, none can match the unique qualifications of Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Ariz. Grijalva, who was the leading voice denouncing this week's most recent giveaway to mining companies by the Bush administration, will bring urgently needed balance and poise to a federal land management bureaucracy that has pushed we the people into dangerous disequilibrium with the land we live on -- and love. Appointing Grijalva, who was elected co-chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, will also bring much-needed political balance to the Obama cabinet than some of the Republican-lite Democrats also being considered for the DOI post, like California Blue Dog Democrat Mike Thompson.

Like almost all of the previous secretaries of the interior, Grijalva hails from the West, more specifically Arizona, where his 7th Congressional District seat has provided him with the kind of experience and leadership we will need in a DOI secretary.

Grijalva's willingness to reverse the values and practices instituted by the Bush administration's Department of the Interior are well-illustrated by his leadership of the National Parks, Forests and Public Lands Subcommittee of the 110th Congress. Most recently, he spearheaded efforts to stop the planned re-mining of the Black Mesa, in northern Arizona.

In a recent letter to current DOI Secretary Dirk Kempthorne, Grijalva called on the Bush administration to restore some semblance of the natural balance between the diverse interests DOI must manage:  "Mining at Black Mesa has caused springs on Hopi lands to dry up and jeopardized the sole source of drinking water for many Hopis and Navajos.

This same will to balance informs the National Landscape Conservation System, and the Environment Congressional Task Force Co-Chairman Grijalva's efforts to craft urgently needed legislation to reform the very outdated General Mining Law of 1872. Environmentalists, scientists and other advocates believe this law must be changed if the wilderness of the West and of our national parks, forests and public lands systems are to return to sustainability. Such actions have secured very strong support for Grijalva's DOI bid from environmental, scientific and other groups, including the National Conservation Association, the Coalition of National Park Service Retirees and the U.S. Humane Society, to name a few. A letter to President-elect Obama in support of Grijalva was signed by more than 50 prominent scholars specializing in biology, conservation and other disciplines. In the letter, the scholars called him a "broad thinker" and praised the congressman's "Report on the Bush Administration Assault on Our National Parks, Forests and Public Lands" as the work of "someone who understands and values science."

No less effusive are the statements of support Grijalva is receiving from Native American leaders like Ned Norris, who as tribal chairman of the Tohono O'odham Nation -- one of seven tribes in Grijalva's district -- says he has "enjoyed an extensive and extremely positive relationship with the congressman for many years." Asked what appeals most to tribes like his about a possibility of a Grijalva-led DOI, Norris answered, "He has a deep understanding of and respect for relationship between tribes and U.S. government." Norris also pointed to Grijalva's sophistication and success in settling a 30-year-old water and resource dispute between the Tohono O'odham tribe and the federal government.

In his efforts to foster change and hope with regard to both the stewardship of federal land and the management of relations with Indian nations, Obama will bring urgency and much-needed balance to these important government functions by appointing Grijalva as secretary of the interior.

Roberto Lovat is a New York-based writer with New America Media.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~>

Judy Reed

This is distributed for nonprofit research and educational purposes only.
[Ref.http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html]