Hey...a
Gilbreth BUMP!
Posted on 01/03/2002 7:00:05 AM PST by wcdukenfield
A free-market legal group filed suit against EPA and two other federal agencies last month to compel them to respond to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests for information on federal grant money being awarded to environmental groups such as World Wildlife Fund, Environmental Defense and The Nature Conservancy.
Sources with the Landmark Legal Foundation (LLF) say they suspect environmental groups are using millions of dollars in federal grant money to further their political agendas, a move that is illegal under federal tax rules and violates the intended purpose of the research or pilot project contracts under which the money was awarded.
LLF sources say their goal is to ensure that groups that are found to use the money for political purposes no longer receive federal funds. “Our ultimate goal is to make sure that no advocacy groups, right or left, are misusing the funds,” one Landmark source says.
Landmark sources also say they suspect federal agencies are not tracking how the money is used. The legal foundation says it was forced to file suit against EPA, the Interior Department's Bureau of Land Management and the Agriculture Department's Forest Service when the agencies did not respond to FOIA requests filed in October 2001. The legal foundation is expected to file a similar suit in the next few weeks against the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service.
The FOIA requests ask for information on the terms and conditions of contracts written for the federal grant money, how much the grants were for, and whether federal agencies are performing audits or management reviews on the groups receiving grant money. Landmark is seeking all information dating back to January 1993.
At press time, none of the three agencies had responded to the FOIA request, but one source at the LLF says EPA has been most willing to at least look at what information it could provide.
The FOIA requests were prompted by an October article in The Sacramento Bee that alleged that since 1998, $400 million in federal grants have gone to environmental groups to further their political agendas.
The group also has another lawsuit pending in the Federal District Court for the District of Columbia, where it accused former EPA Administrator Carol Browner and several high-ranking agency officials of intentionally destroying records regarding the interaction or contact EPA had with environmental groups during the crafting of new regulations.
Sources with environmental groups were unavailable for comment.
Issue: Vol. 23, No. 1
© Inside Washington Publishers
I recoil when I think of the horrors our tax money supports. How awful to think that our tax money is used to support agendas we find replusive and marxist. Thank you for caring, Mark! WE LOVE YA!
Yes, they're cheaper by the dozen!
I don't know if it is just me, but for the past week I have had boo-coo dificulty with posting articles, and replies. - Very slow, lots of error messages, etc. - Sometimes I think that it didn't post due to the "400" series errors so I re-do it :-)
"Efforts to tie a gag around groups, to cut them off from any access to government grants seeks to undermine essential parts of public involvement in the democratic process," Replogle said.
"This is a little uncomfortable," said Mark Rey, a Department of Agriculture undersecretary who oversees the Forest Service. "But getting people together and finding consensus (on wildfire issues) requires a certain amount of discomfort."
Doesn't it seem like these leftists make this stuff up as they go along? They must be giggling inside when they get away with it.
Mark Rey is the Clinton era bureaucrat who just approved the plan which will lead to massive infernos in the Sierra Nevada forest.
Makes the Federal money which may fund a gay and lesbian retirement home in Florida seem like chump change, doesn't it?
Yes indeed. These kinds of things are legion in our current nation.
I suppose if more people had questioned as I do today, only 150 years or so ago, maybe we'd be in a different boat. Just a daydream of mine, please disregard.
Only worse than the giving of our money to any of these groups is the ARROGANT REFUSAL TO PROVIDE ACCOUNTING!!
Question for you, e-s?
Could it be these departments are so infested with Leftist activists posing as bureaucrats that the Bush Administration actually is intimidated by the potential for political suicide if they were to intervene visa vi Ashcroft's Justice Department?
The entire matter has a peculiar smell about it which I cannot quite put my finger on, is why I ask.
This doesn't even begin to square.
...are the fed liviathon bureaucratic inmates running the Federal penitentiary, here; or, is this by design?
I read that one. Bush really let the country down, I'm afraid: Agriculture chief upholds management plan for 11.5 million acres of Sierra
Doesn't it seem like these leftists make this stuff up as they go along?
Yeah, they always come up with lame "dog ate my homework" excuses like the mental adolescents they are. But so far that tactic seems to work on the dumbed-down American public.
They seem to have difficulty understanding that if you "preserve" the forest by not allowing any logging, then you are really condemning it to a fiery [and early] death.
Payback is only appropriate. We should know down to the penny how much of our tax $'s go to the various enviral groups so they can then attack us!
Also, I want to know how much the Opecker Nations, like Saudi Arabia, contribute to these envirals, who in turn, contribute to people like Da$$hole, Boxer, ChiFi, Kennedy, and on down the line. Then, these and other senators work 24/7 since 1973 to make us more dependent on Opecker oil. Da$$hole alone has kept us from drilling in Anwar to lessen our dependence on Opecker oil!
The money probably went to some enviral think tank which came up with planting the linx hairs. Then they hosted seminars for the various envrial organizations that hate America 24/7. Ran the seminars which were packed with Forestry Service People, Interior Dept. people, Epa people, USDA people and other govermental wh$res for envirals! At these seminars, these governmental wh$res for envirals learned how to plant the lynx hairs and where to order them. Then if they got caught to use the old ACLU excuse for drug dealers when they get caught, "I was just working for the good guys and testing the system! I wasn't doing anything wrong!"
They know that even with changes of administrations, these Feds stay employed and can carry out their anti American envirals scams from Lynx hairs, Spotted Owls, Sucker Fish and the upcoming Red Legged Frog. They know that we can't shoot nor fire these federal employees regardless of what they do!
Go Landmark! Mark Levin for Supreme Court!
Can we pass some sort of law that says if a Government Agency fails to comply with a FOIA or Court ruling to release info, the Agency staff are FIRED (unless National Security is involved)?
That W seems intimidated seems obvious. - The question is why?
He is enjoying historically unparalleled public support, and I am convinced that the public is so radically anti-bureaucrat that failing to act is a far more likely source of public displeasure.
I have an excuse: I'm snowed in here in WNC. What's yours?
Bush is a terrific politician. He's positioning himself for his next Presidential run. He has to court the Western vote. Which way do you think the majority of urban voters think about preserving forests? It wouldn't be popular to take a strong stand against a popular environmental cause like "preserving the forest" in California--a state that is critical for him to win. This is pure speculation on my part, of course. And what do I know? I'm just a Westerner.
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