Commercialization of our National Parks

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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

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IBLTV.Org

Iowans for Better Local Television, Iowa's grassroots media reform group, is now leading an effort to ask the FCC to hold a hearing to review whether Iowans are being well-served by our Sinclair-owned station KGAN.  This year, all of Iowa's TV stations are up for license renewal which provides a rare opportunity for the public to have input.  We must act now, because the next license renewal is eight long years away.    
 
IBLTV has spent the past year getting organized and taking action.  After joining with the successful , nation-wide Sinclair advertiser boycott last fall, IBLTV co-sponsored the successful FCC Town Meeting on the Future of Media in October which drew over 500 Iowans.  IBLTV has also met with Congressman Leach, published columns in newspapers, made appearances on radio and TV, and has even drawn the attention of national media with a feature story in the broadcast industry publication, Broadcasting and Cable magazine.  
 
Here is what we are asking you to do:
 
(1) Sign our on-line signature petition asking the FCC for a meaningful license review.  Just click here:  "Sign the IBLTV Petition." If everyone takes this quick, simple action, it will help us enormously to demonstrate citizen support for this effort.
 
(2) Please let us know if you have a personal anecdote that illustrates an example of how you feel our Sinclair-owned station has not served the public interest.
 
P.S.  Like all organizations we need members and financial support.  It is not a condition of your participation in this project.  But if you are able and willing please consider  joining IBLTV.  Our group is focused on ACTION, not sitting around and complaining.  If you would like to get more  involved in media reform, there are many oopportunities available.  Bring your ideas!  You can sign up to be on IBLTV's online discussion group by contacting us at feedback@ibltv.org.    
 
Even small contributions help.  You can make checks payable to:  IBLTV, PO BOX 578, Iowa City, Iowa  52242. (Donate $25 and receive a bonus gift, the DVD Outfoxed while supplies last)!
 
IBLTV would like to thank you for your concern about media issues and we appreciate whatever you can do.  Please feel free to contact us at:  feedback@ibltv.org.

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

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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

 How Things Work in Washington

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Consortium News

It is sadly ironic that Bob Woodward, who in his early career was a role model for investigative journalists, appears now to have been corrupted by power and Washington politics. 

By Robert Parry 

In his book, Secrecy & Privilege, Robert Parry tracks how the Washington press corps changed from the Watergate/Vietnam era of the 1970s, when journalists took some pride in challenging the powerful, to the Iraq War, when many national news outlets cowered and fawned before a White House that equated skepticism with disloyalty.

This gradual but unmistakable shift in the ethos of Washington journalism marked a hard-fought victory for conservatives who invested billions of dollars over the past three decades in building a media/political machine for gaining as much control as possible of the information flowing through the nation’s capital to the American people.

Journalists who bucked the trend confronted ugly attacks from right-wing media “watchdogs,” almost inevitable betrayal by news executives, and dashed careers. Journalists who played along were rewarded with fame, money and access.

Today, no journalist personifies this transformation more than Washington Post assistant managing editor Bob Woodward, who made his name unraveling Richard Nixon’s Watergate cover-up but now has been caught misleading the public while protecting the Bush administration’s cover-up of a scheme to smear an Iraq War critic.

(click here to read the entire article)

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Sign our petition to the FCC

 Sign now...Time is running out!

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ALTA'S LEGISLATIVE WORKSHOP

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Saturday, November 19th saw about 30 folks assemble for informal, informative discussions with IOWA elected officials.  Our own DFQC's ALTA PRICE organized the event held at the Bettendorf Community Center.  It was a chance for concerned citizens in the area to speak in small groups to one elected official at a time.

Senator Frank Wood (D-Eldridge), Representatives Cindy Winckler (D-Davenport) and Ed Fallon (D-Des Moines/ gubernatorial candidate), as well as our own Ms. Elesha Gayman, former DEAN DELEGATE to Boston and candidate for House Representative were in attendance.  Representative Joe Hutter (R-Bettendorf) was also present. We divided into small groups and spent about ½ an hour at a time laying out our concerns on the need for adequate health care coverage, education matters, election reform, corporate reform, environmental hazards and other issues.

The first ½ hour saw Senator Wood listen to fair labor challenges while in another room, Rep. Winckler heard from attendees on their views to strengthen educational spending.

Later, Senator Wood listened as several of us in our group of about 10 voiced our dissatisfaction with the Master Matrix that is implemented by the Department Of Natural Resources.  It is a permit that has 44 questions that must be answered by anyone across the state wanting to build or expand a CAFO (Confined Animal Feeding Operation) above a certain number of animal units.

Many of us seated that day felt the Master Matrix is flawed and does really not give a county "local control".  It just gives each county's Board Of Supervisors the opportunity to be part of the permitting process if that Board has so agreed every January for the past 3 years to do so.  One of our messages to Senator Wood is that there needs to be discussion about this again.

Even though many legislatures are 'farmers', that term applies to numerous types of land/animal workers.  Many still are small to medium family farmers, while others are FACTORY RUN INDUSTRIAL ENTITIES that like to be under the wide umbrella of the term 'farmer'.  So, we would like to see consciousness raised regarding the impact on children's health from the excessive hydrogen sulfide and ammonia created by the CAFO's.  We would like to see that more is done to promote the use of methane produced by cattle lots, but not necessarily promoting large lots, though.  Jerry Neff, president of the Sierra Club suggested we envision a long-term plan for gradually segregating problem areas and searching for a better way to raise animals.  

We also talked about the bottle bill and that it needs to be revisited to include milk containers, water bottles, and other beverage holders. Some large grocery store chains and bottle distributors oppose a change unless it would be to do away with bottle deposit all together.

We will be following the progress of the Legislature after it convenes in early January.  This November get-together was well worth our time because it was OUR list of items directly given to the Senator and Representatives that we feel are imperative for consideration during the new year.

Don't forget:  CPR…CONSERVE/PARTICIPATE/RECYCLE

The Iowa-New Orleans Recording Connection

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by Iowa's Tom Poe, Studio for Recording

The New Orleans disaster wiped out most of the recording studios in the region.  This tragedy is not life-threatening.  However, it is compelling.  Our country is founded on the principle of stimulating creativity and innovation.  Silence music and the arts, which rely on recording studios, and our country suffers.  Of course, it doesn't take a hurricane to do that.  In Iowa, we have the telecom and cable monopolies doing exactly the same thing.

Imagine a child, sitting at a computer.  She plays a tune on her Kazoo.  She clicks and can instantly play back that tune.  She clicks again, and her tune is played back, with the sound of a piano.  She clicks, and she can see her tune as a musical score.  She can edit the notes, and change her tune.  She can add instruments, and create an entire orchestra.

If the computer is nothing more than a low-end PC, and the software is freely available from Stanford University's Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics, there is no good reason not to have a computer for every child in Iowa, the New Orleans region, or anywhere for that matter.

If every neighborhood had one, we could all be participating.  And the cost?  Free. 

Shane Pressley needs a computer donated, so they can start a community-based recording studio in the New Orleans region.  Can you help?  We need two computers, one for Shane, and one for Iowa.  Each time we work with a community outside Iowa, we also set up a community-based recording studio for Iowa.

You can learn more about this exciting project by visiting
http://www.studioforrecording.org/ or email us at tompoe@studioforrecording.org