Commercialization of our National Parks

---

From Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).

The National Park Service is getting ready to adopt new policies that would dramatically increase the commercialization of our National Parks. Under the new plan, the Park Service would aggressively seek corporate sponsorship of park projects and facilities. In return for financial sponsorships, the plan will give corporate donors naming rights to park facilities (but not the parks themselves) and allow use of National Park symbols and personnel in advertising.

Please take a moment to tell the Park Service not to pollute our national treasures with advertising and corporate sponsorships. Comments should be sent to partnerships@nps.gov. Please act today – the deadline for comments is December 5.

NATIONAL PARKS TO SEEK CORPORATE SPONSORSHIPS — Corporate Funds Will Alter Park Landscapes and Sway Policies

Washington, DC — In a quiet but far-reaching change, the National Park Service is poised to adopt a new policy of aggressively seeking corporate sponsorship of park projects and facilities. In return for financial sponsorships, the plan will give corporate donors naming rights, use of National Park symbols and personnel in advertising and much greater influence over park managers, according to public comments filed today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).

“This starts a slow motion commercialization of the national park system,” stated PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch. “What will be allowed stops just short of licensing ads for ‘The Official Beer of Yosemite’ or ‘ Old Faithful, Brought to You by Viagara.’”

The Park Service has put forward a draft directive encouraging active pursuit of potential financial donors and repealing the agency’s current passive posture of merely accepting donations. Public comment on the plan closes this week. Interior Secretary Gale Norton has hailed the plan as an “exciting” new approach for broadening the funding base for national parks.

Park managers would be encouraged to offer packages that attract big corporate donors, including –

Liberalized naming rights for trails, benches, rooms and other facilities (but not parks themselves), as well as display of logos and slogans on park literature, computer screens, and plaques; Exclusive media advertising rights to the official NPS Arrowhead symbol, the term “Proud Partner” of the National Park Service and the use of uniformed park employees in ads; and Flexibility to negotiate customized recognition deals that “meet the needs of individual donors.”
The plan jettisons bans against accepting or soliciting donations from vendors, concessionaires, permittees and others doing business with a park. Alcohol, tobacco and even gambling companies would also be eligible park sponsors. The only up-front review of major gifts would be a subjective “totality of circumstances” test applied by top officials to determine whether the donation is “appropriate.”

The plan is designed so that private donations develop into a much more significant factor in overall park budgets, as well as high-profile capital projects and improvements. Currently, the Park Service raises an estimated $17 million from outside sources each year.

“This is a thinly disguised scheme to subject the public commons to corporate branding campaigns,” added Ruch, pointing to related effort by both the Bush administration and House Republicans to sell naming rights of certain park facilities, as well as some parks in their entirety. “Will anyplace be off-limits to the Nike swoosh or the McDonald’s arches?”

Read the PEER comments on the proposed donation solicitation policy

Compare the proposal with current restrictions

A SLAUGHTERHOUSE AND CONFINEMENTS WITH AMMONIA AND HYDROGEN SULFIDE COMING TO A LOCATION NEAR YOU

---

Today a press conference was held in Moline, IL.  It was to notify the press that TWO PUBLIC MEETINGS WILL TAKE PLACE NEXT SATURDAY, DECEMBER 3RD.

 The meetings (ONE IN MOLINE AND ONE IN ELDRIDGE, IOWA) are to INFORM THE PUBLIC THAT A HOG SLAUGHTEHOUSE IS PROPOSED CLOSE TO BARSTOW, IL ON A FLOODPLAIN.  The site is on land that this year was annexed by the city of East Moline, IL.  

If the slaughterhouse is built, word is that 16,000 HOGS A DAY OR OVER 4,000,000 HOGS A YEAR…THAT'S RIGHT 4 MILLION… ARE EXPECTED TO BE KILLED.  THIS MEANS AN EXPLOSION OF HOG CONFINEMENTS IN EASTERN IOWA AND WESTERN ILLINOIS COUNTIES WILL FOLLOW.

THE PUTRID AIR THAT EMINATES FROM LARGE HOG CONFINEMENTS (ALSO KNOWN AS "FACTORY FARMS") CAUSES AN INCREASE IN ASTHMA RATES, DISORIENTATION, LOSS OF MEMORY, UNCONSCIOUSNESS, AND DEATH.  

THE IMPACTS DO NOT JUST AFFECT THE RURAL COMMUNITIES IN OUR COUNTIES, BUT MUST ALSO BE CONSIDERED BY MEDIUM AND LARGE URBAN AREAS SUCH AS THE METRO QUAD CITIES. Just last Wednesday while I was in Moline, the strong winds from the north (over 40 mph) brought the smell of manure from somewhere out there.

So, our ENVIRONMENTAL/SUSTAINABILITY/ENERGY group of the PROGRESSIVE ACTION FOR THE COMMON GOOD (PACG), thought it was time for more citizens to be informed.

The morning meeting on Saturday, December 3rd will be held in Moline, IL at Riverside United Methodist Life Center, 2420 41st St. from 10AM -12 Noon.

The afternoon meeting the same day will be held in Eldridge, IA in Scott County in the Eldridge Public Library/First Amendment Room from 2 - 4PM.  

Speakers will be KAREN HUDSON AND TERRY SPENCE of GRACE (GLOBAL RESOURCE CENTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT).  They are part of a national organization that helps others who may not have the funding to educate others on the hazards of CAFO's (CONFINED ANIMAL FEEDING OPERATIONS).

Come if you can and tell others about the meetings.  Get active in your county and keep track of what is going on.  As I said in an earlier article, once you step outside and are slapped in the face with the stench, it will be too late.

So check these web sites to gain further knowledge: www.farmweb.org
And www.thenation.com by searching for "Meatpacking" where you will find "The Shame of Meatpacking" by Karen Olsson and "Bad Meat" by Eric Schlosser.

Keep up the good work you all do in helping to CPR…CONSERVE/PARTICIPATE/RECYCLE

Is Iowa Making Any Headway in Regaining Voters' Right To Vote?

---

by Tom Poe, Charles City, Iowa

As everyone knows by now, voters across the country and here in Iowa have literally lost their right to vote.  Today, with proprietary electronic voting systems ruling the way voters express their voices in elections, their voices are lost in the whir of computers that record those votes using a secret vote count.

There are some who think North Carolina has the strictest election laws in the country [1].  That's not really saying much, since their requirement that electronic voting systems vendors place their source code in escrow with the state is meaningless, if that step is supposed to provide reassurance that a secret vote count has not taken place. The full impact of just how fruitless such a requirement is will be felt the day the courts inevitably rule that proprietary vendors of electronic voting systems do not have to reveal their source code to satisfactory "public scrutiny."  That's assuming anyone, anywhere could get such an issue before the court in the first place.

The voters of Iowa (that includes me) need to become aware of the fact that we have lost our right to vote.  I sent an email to Iowa's Secretary of State/Registrar of Voters recently.  The Registrar asked the Deputy to respond, and I received a courteous reply, as well as a follow-up phone call.  I have included the email exchange below [2]. There is a solution, and that solution can be demonstrated by visiting the Australian web site that explains how they conduct their elections with electronic voting systems [3].

My original email:

Mr. Culver: 

  If you haven't already, please have your secretary request a copy of the Government Accounting Office report on electronic voting, and, after making the appropriate adjustments here in Iowa, publish a statement to reassure all voters in Iowa, that they will have their right to vote reinstated, immediately.
 
  I suspect it will be a trivial matter to sue the companies that you have chosen (unwisely) to do business with, in order to recompense the taxpayers of Iowa.
 
  I also recommend you arm yourself with knowledge about the electronic voting systems used in Australia.  The systems are available freely by downloading from the Internet, modifying to suit our needs, and guaranteeing us all the right to vote by securing public scrutiny. I will give you the benefit of the doubt, and assume you knew nothing about the Australian option prior to this email.  However, as of this date, you no longer will be accorded such discretion.
 
Among the recommendations/findings of the GAO:

  "Expeditiously establish documented policies, criteria, and procedures for certifying voting systems that will be in effect until the national laboratory accreditation program for voting systems becomes fully operational, and define tasks and time frames for achieving the full operational capability of the national voting system certification program." http://www.eastbaymedia.com/tgdc-march/
Technical Guidelines Development Committee Meeting of March, 2005.
 
  All Iowans will be looking forward to your published statement within the next thirty days.  Having suffered the loss of Iowan Voters' right to vote since at least the 2000 elections, thirty days is a very generous timeframe.  Please respect the office you hold, and mitigate the harm you've caused.
 
Respectfully,
Tom Poe
Charles City, Iowa 50616
 


[1] http://www.eff.org/news/archives/2005_11.php#004171

[2] John D. Hedgecoth
Deputy Secretary of State for Operations
Office of the Secretary of State
First Floor, Lucas Building
321 E. 12th St.
Des Moines, IA 50319
515-242-5071 (voice)
515-242-5953 (fax)
jhedgecoth@sos.state.ia.us

[3] http://www.elections.act.gov.au/Elecvote.html


The response:

  -----Original Message-----
  From: Hedgecoth, John [SOS]
  Sent: Thursday, November 10, 2005 3:19 PM
  To: 'tompoe@studioforrecording.com'
  Subject: Re: electronic voting machines
 
Tom:
 
  I wish to respond to your inquiry with our office of Nov. 7, which is set out below.
 
  As you doubtless are aware, our office is in the latter stages of implementation of the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), which requires upgrades in voting systems.  You also are aware that county auditors are in the process of selecting new voting equipment.  In some cases, auditors have selected touch-screen systems. Our office maintains compliance with HAVA when it comes to the certification process for new voting equipment and has produced guidelines similar to those referenced in the GAO report you reference.  We have consistently advocated for a voter verified paper trail in Iowa and do not intend to change that position.  The people of Iowa need to be certain their votes count.
 
  You raise an issue surrounding independent verification of votes, which apparently involves some type of open-source software.  We have made use of the vendors who have completed both the federal and state certification process.  We have no other legal option, now or in the future.  I would appreciate any further information you have to share on this issue.
 
  I find your deadline for some sort of public statement confusing. The office is in compliance with HAVA.
 
  John D. Hedgecoth
  Deputy Secretary of State for Operations
  Office of the Secretary of State
  First Floor, Lucas Building
  321 E. 12th St.
  Des Moines, IA 50319
  515-242-5071 (voice)
  515-242-5953 (fax)
  jhedgecoth@sos.state.ia.us

---

This article was written for Blog for Iowa by Tom Poe of Charles City.

FEC Investigates Diddy But Completely Ignores Scathing GAO Report on the State of U.S. Elections

---

Yes, my friends, it's true.  The Federal Elections Commission is turning its attention towards rapper and impresario Sean "Puff Daddy" "Puffy" "P Diddy" "Diddy" Combs.  His crime?  Some conservative "lack of ethics" attack dog group has targeted him for his "Vote or Die" campaign during the election of 2004.  Well, of course.  We wouldn't want non-conservatives to vote, now, would we?

In a related story, the FEC has completely ignored the recent (non-partisan) GAO report that cited factual evidence that electronic voting machines are error prone, ineffective and highly riggable.  Oh, and then there was that whole Ken Blackwell thing in Ohio.  Nope, gonna ignore that, too.

Well, I guess one must set one's priorities.  Poor Diddy.

(Click on "more" below for the complete details.)
   more »