Posted on 12/30/2005 9:25:03 AM PST by NormsRevenge
In an unusual campaign to hedge their political bets, a coalition of 11 leading environmental groups has quietly drafted a ballot measure asking California voters next year to approve the largest parks and water bond in state history.
The proposed measure, now awaiting a title and summary from California Attorney General Bill Lockyer, would raise $5.4 billion to shore up aging levees in San Francisco Bay's delta, build new drinking water treatment plants, fund flood control, restore salmon runs and purchase new parklands from Monterey Bay to Lake Tahoe to inner-city Los Angeles.
--snip--
``We're hopeful the governor and the Legislature will respond, and they'll include funding in their bond proposals for those needs. But we are prepared to move forward with this proposal if the Legislature fails to meet the need.''
The environmental coalition is composed of deep-pocketed land trusts and other organizations that campaigned to win passage of the last parks and water bonds, Propositions 40 and 50 in 2002. It includes the Nature Conservancy, California Audubon Society, Save-the-Redwoods League, the Trust for Public Land, Peninsula Open Space Trust and Big Sur Land Trust.
The group will have to raise about $5 million to fund the campaign, and has hired a firm to begin collecting 600,000 signatures in about a month to meet a mid-April deadline, said Rachel Dinno, government affairs director for the Trust for Public Land, in Sacramento.
(Excerpt) Read more at mercurynews.com ...
Look out for this park crap. Just another government land grab at our expense. We lose when we pay off the bond, we lose when the land goes off the tax roll, and we lose through lost productivity.
Just seeing the groups involved should scare voters off.
I love that name though; Sherry Bebitch Jeffe?
The obvious question is: What did they do with the ~5 BILLION $ they got four years ago? Answer: They are using it as a way to fund the various agencies like Department of Fish & Game, Water Quality, even CalTrans and the public schools. It's not like they are spending the money on actually buying parks, they are using the bond mechanism to fund current operating expenses of a bloated State government. Stand by for a link....
The only thing missing is the person named Gerald Meral, founder of the CA Mountain Lion Foundation and some Rural/Urban Planning group whose name escapes me in my Senior Moment!!!
Scroll down at least 1/3 of the way and you will see where the money is going. DFG staff will tell small landowners," There is money available to help you." I only see one private individual on the whole list. The rest is being divided up between State agencies, cities, counties, RCD's and enviro groups.
In short, these people are junkies, looking for another fix from the taxpayers.
And the beat goes on...
Yep, get the taxpayers to buy their commandeered property at high market prices. Like fog says, the beat goes on...
Looks like they took a page from the social security adiministration's book on how to handle money.
"It's not like they are spending the money on actually buying parks"
There are too many parks now used mainly for living quarters for illegals, offices for drug dealers, city council ego trips, and the employment of maintainance people.
NO MORE BONDS!
Not even OO7?
Even the story line is becoming almost a repeat with a new face!
True. Nobody beats Connery.
You're too correct on that! And what do the enviro's and the bureaucrats with the forest service have to say? Zip! The drug cartels are destroying the parks and forests we have with their dope growing enterprises.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1524578/posts
National parks' pot farms blamed on cartels
I don't recall that one. Are you sure you aren't thinking of Prop 128 of 1990, the "Big Green Initiative?"
Thanks for the link. My personal favorite: $111,844 to study the ancestry of trout.
I believe the term is PORK.
Also, take a look at who gets the concessions to run these parks!
Here is one snip (hint):
http://wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=21395
Since the 1970s, [Bruce] Babbitt [D] has been criticized over his involvement with Emprise Corp. and later Delaware North Corp. As both attorney general of Arizona and as governor, Babbitt supported the company with links to organized crime, which, under his watch, became the concessionaire for Yosemite National Park. Oh, by the way, Babbitt took a $45,000 payoff from the company to ensure it retained its dog-racing licenses in the state.
Babbitt,, welll hardie har har har..
It's looking like another 'Business as usual' year in CaliPORKnia in 2006 ...
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