I have a cold. I’m in a bad mood. But it’s nothing a freshly backed loaf of banana bread (w/brown sugar, raisins and sunflower seeds) and enough orange liqueur can’t handle.

Luckily, I wrote the column below over the weekend.

And it’s not the Anniversary, but we’re close. It’s somewhere around here and so we shall celebrate today anyway!

It’s now more than a decade that News That Matters has been around in one incarnation or another.

Remember back in the olden days when we published at Yahoo and then made the move to Google and then to a comprehensive newsletter published three times a week and a website all our own?

Three websites. Four, actually.

You can find News That Matters at PlanPutnam and at Blogger and Posterous, both as “No Country For Sane Men“. And if you’re on Facebook you can find us there, too.

It’s a little crazy living in the USA right about now and with extremism coming at you from mostly right-angles like a warped isosceles triangle, and you need a source that can dissect the news and get it to you in ways you can genuinely understand. And that’s what we’re here for.

PlanPutnam/News That Matters is also this county’s premiere organizational tool and you know that to be true from the many issues and the many victories we have under our belts. I don’t need to list those successful battles for you know what they are and you know your lives are better for it – and that’s the point.

In case you have forgotten where we’ve been, here, in no particular order, are some reminders culled from the last few years:

The Thirty-Eight Billion Fee

This happens every day to thousands of people across the nation and while Bank of America is the most hideously evil of the lot, many banks play this game and billions of dollars are pulled from the economy and go to subsidize executive bonuses, stock dividends, the purchase of Congressmen and Senators, nifty automated teller machines that work so slowly you have to shave again by the time you’re done using them and which cause traffic tie-ups on Friday evenings that CBS radio reports along with, “…and it’s 40 minutes to The George.”

Chickens, Roads and Highways – A Special Report

As first proposed, the issue was one of safety but the project plans say that PHR is as safe as any other road. Then there was the idea that you’d be able to drive from Kent to Peekskill faster and yet, the accidents that have happened generally did so for people traveling way above the speed limit or tailgating. Then it was planned growth in the project area rated at 2% a year which would by 2029, create traffic and backups similar, I guess, to Route 22′s. But a quick look at a map shows that to be so wrong words cannot describe it.

The Tilly Foster Saga Continues…

What will it cost for taxpayers to cover the utility bills, heating, cooling, electricity, etc., and to maintain the walks and roads in all weather conditions vs. the amount of monies generated from sales taxes? I just don’t believe anyone could raise those kinds of funds through sales taxes alone from the Farm. So why not have a profit sharing arrangement? But that’s not in the contract. While Ann Fanizzi, the contract’s most ardent supporter, dreams that Mr. Whipple will build a bed & breakfast and turn the main lodge into full service restaurant, the county will need to foot the entirety of the utility bills and the maintenance of the roads and walkways leading to and surrounding them. I wish I had such a deal with my landlord!

What Being Sick Costs The Nation

When you are sick and on the job your productivity is down which results in a decline in efficiency. When you are sick and cannot work, especially in a job without paid sick days, the local economy is affected. And what happens when you wait until you simply cannot go on and your illness has advanced? How much money is pulled from the economy then? What of your home and family? Will Verizon or Comcast or NYSEG understand when they don’t get paid because of the cost of dealing with an illness that might have been easily treated at the beginning but that has now gotten out of control? They might. But you’ll be sending smoke signals and watching a blank TV screen by candlelight.Will your town’s tax collector say, “No problem Mrs. Smith, pay us when you can”?

Verizon’s Billing Mysteries

FCC Line Charge. This charge also is known as the Federal Subscriber Line Charge, the Federally-Ordered Subscriber Line Charge, Federal Line Cost Charge, and the FCC Subscriber Line Charge. In reality it’s the missing portion of your basic line charge mentioned above. That $8.79 fee should be, if Verizon were open and honest about their charges, $15.20. But they get to “cheat” to give you the impression your actual costs are lower and that the Fed is responsible for $6.41 of it. They’re misleading you and getting away with it.

Shooting Gazelles – Ball supports “Canned Hunting”

Yet, Assemblyman Greg Ball supports this type of hunting, claiming on the floor of the Assembly that if the New York bans the use of exotic, non-native animals from canned hunts held within the state that the next step is that the state will ban the shooting of white -tailed deer, then the state will take away everyone’s guns and finally we’ll all have chips in our backs. (see the video clip here). He also claims he represents ‘thousands of hunters in his district’ whom, one might assume, has given him their blessing to fight for this abominable practice in their name.

Contractors Ripped Off By Putnam County (NY)

In a previous issue I mentioned that a county Legislator suggested that if I had trouble paying the fee that maybe I shouldn’t be in business. Maybe he’s right. Maybe the economy sucks and those fees amount to a hardship. Or maybe no one should have to pay for the right to earn a living in Putnam County.

News That Matters: The Walkway Edition

Kudos need be sent to the organizers of this event. It’s massive scale and scope must have taken thousands of hours and untold patience. Everything ran so smoothly! Even with tens of thousands of people, thousands of cars, city buses, a dozen marching bands, scores of performers, several parades and assorted marauding clowns, trapeze artists and jugglers, (and yes, you can toss in a bevy of politicians,) there wasn’t a hitch to be seen. In fact, even the weather – which promised rain – cooperated beautifully.

Racists Rear Their Ugly Heads in Putnam Again

The misinformation contained in the copy on the website is astonishing in its one-sided shortsightedness and includes a link to an outside website where, if Mexicans were Jews, would read, “Die Juden sind ünser unglück”. No matter that the Comptroller of the State of Texas, among others of equal high position across the nation claim that undocumented workers contribute more to the system in taxes than they use, and that recent immigrants – legal and illegal – have *created* tens of thousands of new jobs, this linked website continues the same lies, mistruths and…. shit. It’s just pure White Supremacist shit.

Kent’s ‘panhandle’

Early maps show Philipstown being more recatngularish from when it was divvied up among the Philipse Family. The 1892 USGS map shows the current westernmost line of Kent, the line that runs along the Philisptown Pike (Route 301) AND the *old* town line as well. That line is missing from the 1941 map which has the current town lines in position.

Questions:

1) When did Kent acquire Hortowntown and,
2) Why?

[Ed note: this article was posted on October 3, 2006 and has still not been answered!]

Tales from the Trail

Why? Well, I added up all the possible promised blocks of votes and it turns out – at best – they represent about 15% of the voters. That’s right: the special interest groups and the armchair politicians and the folk who are in this only for the [insert turgid reference here] added together leave the remaining %85 of the voters unrepresented. But, for such a small group, they sure are organized! And Loud. And they have money.

A TEA Party on the Hill

For the past several weeks the region had been bombarded by an ever-increasing barrage of signs, snail mails, emails and robocalls announcing an event that was either a “RibFest!”, a People’s Convention, a Free BBQ or a rally for Greg Ball and Steve Katz… it all depended on which signs you saw or which advert you read or which phone call you got as they all had slightly different information and I reported on this confusion several days ago. But that didn’t seem to bother the 300 people who attended on Saturday.

Selecting an ESCO

Over half of NYSEG electricity supply customers who didn’t voice their choice last year don’t know their current supply pricing option. And while that may suck for them, it’s been great for us. We thank those customers for not having degrees in Advanced Rocket Science and praise their inability to figure out what their options are. NYSEG has always firmly believed that offering you the best choice is a simple matter of confusing the heck out of you. We are proud to continue that tradition because, face it, you have no choice!

Corporate Welfare, Putnam Style

If I were a better writer and could match the skills of even the most middling of authors, life in Putnam County would make quite excellent reading. But so few publishers would believe what I had written as genuine they’d have to place my book in the fiction section of bookstores and the fantasy section of libraries. But I can assure you that what we experience here as residents is real and genuine even though it reads – and too often feels – as if we’re living in a 1950′s Central American Banana Republic. In only a very few other places around the world, perhaps in one of those central Asian “stans” no one can pronounce, could we write about the depths of malfeasance that passes for government in our bucolic 240 square miles. If Voltaire or Shalom Aleichem were alive today even they could not have surpassed the fantastical mysteries and ironies that abound in our every day lives. Welcome to Putnam County, New York.

Controversy in Pawling? It Depends

At a meeting on July 2nd, 2008, Supervisor Coursen mentioned, after yet another round of public and pointed criticism from Mr. Carey, that the minutes from a recently held Comprehensive Plan meeting had not yet been posted to the town’s website due to a backlog on the Planning Board clerk’s desk. With the meeting continuing on, Supervisor Coursen rose from the dais to get a glass of water when Mr. Carey met her on the side and offered to come into town hall and post those minutes on his own. While that’s a nice thing to offer, what responsible entity would allow a political enemy, especially – and note this – the chair of a political party, access to a town’s website?

Pulte Homes, Adam Levy and Justice Putnam Style

Pulte Homes, Adam Levy and Justice Putnam Style: For what the Town of Carmel and Putnam County has done over the years to Lori Kemp you’d think agents from the human rights court in the Hague would descend from the heavens and arrest anyone who has ever sat on a board in that town. But that didn’t happen for too seldom do those who deserve justice get actually it.

The Great Tefillin Scare

On a short-haul flight the other day a 17 year old kid put on his tefflin to pray. A flight attendant asked what he was doing, “praying,” he replied. She notified the pilot. In the flight attendant’s description she said “…it had wires running from it and going up to his fingers,” What she didn’t know was that they go directly to God! but, I digress…

Breaking News: Putnam’s Most Out Person Accused of Autophobia

In a stunning revelation, Putnam County’s most ‘out’ political figure was accused by an alleged staffer from the Nan Hayworth campaign of making accusatory slurs against himself based on his sexual orientation.

Remember when…

From the Patterson Crossing Scoping Session: January 2005

A Walk on the new Cornwall Hill DEC property: Summer 2004

Choices for Sustainable Living Conference: November 2005

Putnam Valley Dems Election Night Celebration: November 2005

FrOGS Announces NAWCA Grant: October 2002. Dave Tobias and Mike Griffin.

Croton Watershed Meeting: October 2004

Charlie Silver – Chief Watershed Scientist, Jim Tierney – Watershed Inspector General,
Peter Lehner, Chief Environmental Attorney. All work for the State Attorney General’s Office

And some Pictures of the Day shots: (Click on them – they get bigger!)

Ice Pond

Dean Road DEP property

Bear Mt. Bridge from Anthony’s Nose

Glynwood from Fahnestock State Park

Daniel Nimham Pow Wow

Thunderstorm over eastern Putnam from Shenandoah Mt.

Bull Hill (Mt. Taurus) from Round Hill in Fahnestock Park

The Kent “Cow”

Collaborative Concepts Out door Art Exhibit at Saunders’ Farm

There more. There’s nearly eighteen-thousand articles and posts since we began and that we’ve lasted as long as we have is a testament to my insanity – and your perseverance. Let’s keep that going.

Since July 18, 2000

10637 messages at the old Yahoo site
3508 messages at Google.
3738 messages posted to PlanPutnam/News That Matters

17,883 posts/messages/comments!

You’re going to need me for the next four years.

JmG

“Queen Elizabeth accepted the invitation of Conservative Party leader David Cameron to become Britain’s new prime minister Tuesday night after Gordon Brown resigned following his failure to form a coalition government with another liberal party after national elections last week”

The above quote came from a recent report from FOXNews, a close cousin of what used to be the Putnam County Courier. The problem with the quote is that no one asked the Queen about this and it came as quite a surprise to the other 100 million people who live in England, especially David Cameron who was, in fact, appointed Prime Minister. They Report. We Deride.

Mike Kaplowitz with 45% (down from 52%),
Jim Borkowski with 24% (down from 26%)
Greg Ball with 20% (up from 12%) and
Mary Beth Murphy with 11% (down from 10%)

The part-time assemblyman, who picked up four votes last evening, can count on a vote from inside the State Assembly offices and Mr. Borkowksi racked up two – within two minutes – from computers at Manhattan College. Mary Beth Murphy picked up several votes from the same IP addresses as were cast for Vinnie Leibell in our County Executive poll. The vote cast from the State Senate was expected as was the one from Washington, D.C., but there’s that one from Simon’s Rock… that one really confuses me. I know the voter is reading so please, drop me a note. I have to know who you are! (And I promise I won’t tell.)

Anyway, we’re considering the poll closed and a hearty congratulations to Mike Kaplowitz for handily staying in the lead.

Oh! Why do I analyze where the votes are coming from and at what rate they come in? Because with anything online it’s easy to skew the results by having all your friends vote or, as we saw with Senator Leibell’s tallies during the County Executive poll, use automated scripts. Most, if not all of Mr. Kaplowitz’ votes came from IP servers in the area and were casually spaced out over time telling me that support for him was genuine and not contrived. And, if the votes are coming in from Washington, DC or from inside government offices in Albany or from Lativa, well, can those people actually vote at the election?

The Ryder Farm on Starr Ridge Road will hold an Opening Day event this Sunday, May 16th complete with tours, refreshments and a Maypole dance. It really is a day you should come out and bring your kids to. Here’s a short video on being an intern at the farm which was filmed during the 2009 growing season.

The Journal News has done a bang-up job reporting the Barbara Dunn case. Imagine if they covered municipal meetings as closely as they do this populist pablum?

We can add Chase Bank to the list of Banks That Suck. The other day Richie received his bank statement which had a $25 charge for membership in some “points” club or other. He called the bank – twice – to ask a) to please remove the charge and b) how did it get there in the first place? Regardless of whom he spoke with they a) wouldn’t remove the charge and b) wouldn’t tell him how it got there. Remember when banks were there to help you manage your money? Now they’re just there to manage your money.

It’s a tie between Romania and Estonia for having the lowest debt to GDP ratio in Europe. Yes, Romania and Estonia.

Tomorrow night (Thursday) the County Legislature will discuss this very question and it would behoove any and all of you who care to be there. Rumor has it that the County Attorney will be there to answer these questions and as they’re the ones who wrote the original contract (see this article) the results could be interesting. If you’ve read the linked article(s) you’ll remember that it was quite a fight to get a decent contract and try as hard as I did it still sucked – for you, not for Preserve Putnam. If we had won that fight we wouldn’t have to be asking these questions as the county would have spelled them out – if they had a qualified attorney on staff and if the County Executive’s primary concern was our welfare and not that of a wealthy personal friend.

Also tomorrow night, the Legislature’s Rules committee will take up the issue of the $250 bi-annual contractor’s fee they charge anyone who touches your house. Landscapers, carpenters, painters, deck builders, pressure washers, everyone seems to be covered – with some notable exceptions (see below).

If you don’t pay the fee you can’t work and you face significant fines for working illegally in the county.

But it’s not just the administrative fee (see this article for more information) but a requirement that contractors carry $1,000,000 worth of insurance and post a $25,000 bond that names the county as the payee. The costs of both those combined, in addition to the “administrative fee”, can run as high as $1000 or more depending on the cost of insurance.

But there’s more! As part of the contractor’s application we are also forced to prove we don’t owe child support, that we will use Homeland Security’s e-Verify system if we should hire employees, that we’ve opted out of (or in to) the State’s workman’s comp program and more…. and all of the documents and forms need to be notarized, signed sealed and delivered.

Do we ask doctors and auto mechanics and cops and educators and store clerks to pay a “fee” to work in the county? Does the county require gas station attendants to carry personal business insurance? Does the county require your vet to use e-Verify? No, so why just blue-collar workers who are mostly self-employed and struggling through this economic recession? What is it about the people who form the backbone of our economy the County Legislature doesn’t like?

Or, the better question is this: if the county needs the money (and they grossed $171,000 on our “fees”) why not tax you directly rather than hide it and make the guy who cuts your lawn collect it from you?

And finally, what do contractors get for their $250? Nada. Zilch. Nothing. And, what if the economy sucks and you can’t afford the fee and yet you continue to work to house and feed yourself? If you get caught you’re facing fines and legal action. How is it possible that we charge county residents for the right to earn a living?
I thought only the mafia did that. Can you imagine? Well yes you can.

If this is important to you – and it should be – come to the Legislature’s Rules Committee meeting tomorrow [Thursday] evening in Room 318 (it could change but it’ll be one of two) at 6:30 PM. Both committees will meet one after the other and it could be quite a night. At least when it comes to forcing blue collar workers to act as a tax collector for the county it’s going to be v e r y interesting to hear those gals and guys squeak through the reasons why they won’t tax you directly but force your house painter to be the bad guy.

Unfolding like a real-life thriller, “Under Our Skin” exposes the hidden epidemic of Lyme disease and reveals how our health care system is failing to address one of the most serious and mysterious illnesses of our time. After the film join Dr. Steven Bock from The Rhinebeck Health Center and Jill Auerbach of the Dutchess County Lyme and Tick-Borne Disease Task Force for a Q&A. Joel Tyner, Dutchess County Legislator, will also be available to answer any questions.

Your government has decided to allow private corporations to reach into your home and disable parts of your set-top TV controller box at their will. Allegedly in an effort to reduce piracy of newly released movies, the FCC has told Hollywood, “Sure, no problem, mess with people’s personal equipment that’s sitting inside their homes and it’s okay to do it without their permission.” Really though, the problem is that the movie industry isn’t losing money from piracy but they are because you’re getting their films via Netflix or Amazon and the cut just isn’t enough for their greedy, money-grubbing  claws. But hey, if you want to live in a capitalist society then you need to accept that corporations will do what they want, when they want, and you and your privacy be damned and without the government in the way to stop them.

Sarah Palin hasn’t said anything truly stupid in the past 48 hours. Rumor has it she’s been kidnapped by the Liechtenstein Liberation Army and is being held in a cave just outside Vaduz. Seeing that Alaska does not have diplomatic relations with that small European nation, (though many can see it from their homes,) we’re not holding out much hope for her return.

We Built Sioux City: My eyes burned. It’s an awful, terrible video. And yet, I couldn’t stop watching and neither will you.

• Why You Should Eat Weeds
• The Wonders of Wheatgrass
• For Subway Signs, a Six-Figure Editing Job
• Froot Loops Not Made of Real Fruit: The Cereal Lawsuits
• Telcos’ secret plans to use fake “citizens groups” to kill Net Neutrality
• Fraud is as American as apple pie, here’s a primer on systemic fraudulence

Why You Should Eat Weeds

We are always looking for ways to save money, and our grocery bill is where we often try and find savings. Our drive to reduce our spending is understandable. Life is expensive. However, if you really want to save some money on your food bill, you may need to look no further than the backyard.

Now unless you are lawn fanatic, there is likely a plant or two that you can harvest and add to your dinner menu. We call these plants weeds.

What is a weed? Simply a plant we have not yet found a use for and so reject. True, not all weeds are edible and you do not want to just start grazing, but there are delicacies out there just waiting to be discovered.

The common blue violet is not only attractive to look at but tasty as both the flowers and the leaves are edible. They apparently have a high vitamin C content as well. Thicken soups with the leaves or add them to salads.

Read More

The Wonders of Wheatgrass

Monday, 10 May 2010 Gayle Eversole

What helps you naturally improve 70+ ailments and provides at least two dozen health benefits? Wonderful wheatgrass. Just one 3 ounce serving of this healing elixir provides you with about 36mg of chlorophyll and leads the way in detoxifying your body’s cells: cellular detoxification and nutrition are foundations of health.

Chlorophyll is akin to hemoglobin in the blood.  This iron-binding element in red blood cells carries oxygen to other body cells. In turn, this stimulates your red blood cells to carry more oxygen and key minerals like magnesium. Replete with high vitamin, mineral, protein and enzyme content, chlorophyll-laden wheatgrass is anti-cancer; it’s helpful in removing toxic heavy metals, protects you from DNA damage, and boosts immunity while serving as an anti-infective agent.

Wheatgrass supplies over 100 nutrients that are easily absorbed because they are in the whole food state. It takes energy to keep your body detoxified and in positive health and wheatgrass offers you superfood energy to support this important process. Wheatgrass has been commonly used since the 1900s as an adjunct to health and wellness programs. Its benefits are many – it cleans your lymph system, cleanses and builds blood, restores nutritional balance and vitality, nourishes the liver and kidneys.

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For Subway Signs, a Six-Figure Editing Job

Ed note: This article is about the cost of unintended consequences. You wanted the MTA to spend less money on moving wealth around the region and it’s going to cost you almost a million dollars to do it.

The signage of the New York City subway — stylish Helvetica, white-on-black type — is one of the most universally recognized design schemes in the world. By June 28, quite a bit of it will need to change.

On that Monday, disappearing trains (goodbye, W) and redrawn routes will render thousands of existing signs and maps throughout the system obsolete, a hidden cost of the drastic service cuts brought on by the subway’s budget problems.

To avoid chaos, New York City Transit must replace some 3,000 signs and 25,000 maps, all to be switched out within the span of about two weeks before the service changes take effect.

That task requires the biggest overhaul since service over the Manhattan Bridge was restored more than six years ago, juggling the Midtown subway routes.

John Montemarano, director of the station signage division for 15 years, said: “We make sure our customers can wake up on June 28 and figure out how the hell to get around.”

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Froot Loops Not Made of Real Fruit: The Cereal Lawsuits

There are days every now and then when my actual legal work directly intersects with my blog work.  This was one of those days.

On May 21, a judge of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California dismissed a complaint filed by a woman who said she had purchased “Cap’n Crunch with Crunch Berries” because she believed it contained real fruit. The plaintiff, Janine Sugawara, alleged that she had only recently learned to her dismay that said “berries” were in fact simply brightly-colored cereal balls, and that although the product did contain some strawberry fruit concentrate, it was not otherwise redeemed by fruit.  She sued, on behalf of herself and all similarly situated consumers, some of whom may believe that there are fields somewhere in our land thronged by crunchberry bushes.

According to the complaint, Sugawara and other consumers were misled not only by the use of the word “berries” in the name, but also by the front of the box, which features the product’s namesake, Cap’n Crunch, aggressively “thrusting a spoonful of ‘Crunchberries’ at the prospective buyer.” Plaintiff claimed that this message was reinforced by other marketing representing the product as a “combination of Crunch biscuits and colorful red, purple, teal and green berries.” Yet in actuality, the product contained “no berries of any kind.” Plaintiff brought claims for fraud, breach of warranty, and our notorious and ever-popular California Unfair Competition Law and Consumer Legal Remedies Act.

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Telcos’ secret plans to use fake “citizens groups” to kill Net Neutrality

Cory Doctorow at 7:45 PM May 11, 2010

ThinkProgress has a leaked copy of a telcoms industry PowerPoint presentation laying out their plans to use astroturf to kill Network Neutrality. The industry is hiring the same turfers who work with the Tea Party movement to carry their message to the people.

What the telcos want to do is reduce your access to websites and services unless those services have paid a bribe for “premium carriage” to you. So Google buys its bandwidth from its ISP. You buy your bandwidth from your ISP. Then your ISP goes to Google and says, “If you want to send your bits to our customers when they ask for them, you’ll have to pay us too.” If Google doesn’t pay, the ISP slows down its bits when you ask for them.

They call this “free and unregulated internet access for content flow and connectivity speed free and unregulated internet access for content flow and connectivity speed.”

Here’s how I see it: the telcos and cable operators got a huge public subsidy when we agreed to let them use our public sewers, tunnels and streets (not to mention our houses and basements) for their wires. We give them all this for free or far below the market costs. They put their wires in our dirt.

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Fraud is as American as apple pie, here’s a primer on systemic fraudulence

By Mark Ames

Ever since I got kicked out of Russia and forced back home, I’ve been collecting all kinds of news articles about fraud, in a document file titled “America Is Russia.” Here’s a sampling.

* Accounting Fraud: Last year, America’s leading banks were insolvent. So Tim Geithner and Larry Summers forced an accounting rule change called “mark-to-model,” which let banks essentially scrape a pile of dogshit off the sidewalk, fling it into a vault, and mark it “worth 1 billion dollars.” Voila! The banks are making record profits.
* Big Pharm Fraud: Between May 2004 and March 2010, a handful of top drug companies like Pfizer, Eli Lilly and Bristol-Myers paid over $7 billion in criminal penalties for bribing doctors to prescribe drugs for unapproved uses, but it was a small price to pay for the tens of billions they earned poisoning Americans. Up to 100,000 Americans die every year from misprescribed drugs. Bummer for you guys.
* Greenspan Fraud: America’s central banker didn’t believe fraud is a crime that should be regulated, and he forced out a do-gooder regulator named Brooksley Born, who disagreed. Then Alan Greenspan pumped up the biggest housing bubble in human history, and once it was ready to burst, he quit the Fed and went on the payroll of three firms that made billions on the subprime crash: Paulson & Co., Deutsche Bank, and Pimco.

Read More

Good Wednesday Morning,

It’s clearly one of the most beautiful mornings – ever – out there today but the beauty of the day will be marred by the death of long-time Putnam Valley resident David Santo who passed away early yesterday. Funeral services will be held today at 1PM at the Clark David Funeral Home in Yorktown with burial at Rose Hills and King David cemetery in Putnam Valley afterward. Our thoughts and sympathies go out to David’s family and friends.

I’m still looking for a surplus washing machine. If you’re getting a new one don’t let Sears take it away!

I’d like to thank those who have supported News That Matters with your contributions and encourage others to do the same. Remember, if you’re not going to be active, at the very least you can reach into your pockets and help keep the information coming.

Action Update: For those who would like to see a little justice in our fair county there is still time to help us get the  charges leveled against Carmel resident Lori Kemp dropped and our letter writing campaign to District Attorney Adam Levy is in full swing. If you have not yet written (why is that?) there’s some good information and a sample letter here in a post called, “How You Can Help Lori Kemp” which has had more than 100 visits in the past few days!

News That Matters broke the story regarding the payment of property taxes at Tilly Foster Farm. Will the county be forced to pick up he bill or will Preserve Putnam, the organization that has a 40 year lease on the property and who promised to make it self-sufficient be doing so? See the article below or at the News That Matters website. It’s already one of the most read articles there.

Twenty-Eight of you have voted in our latest preference poll to see who should replace Senator Leibell in NY’s 40th State Senate district. So far Mike Kaplowitz is way out in front with 57% of the vote – and not a single vote came in from the Netherlands or Russia. The poll is here, in the right-hand column. If you haven’t voted, please do so.

In yet another attempt to get more money from you, the State of New York is proposing a $5 per vehicle parking fee for use of state owned parking lots at the Walkway Over the Hudson State Park. It’s probably not too late to stop this silliness but you’ll have to *do something about it* like write Senator Leibell or Assemblywoman Galef.

Putting things into perspective:
Since 2001 there have been 858 fires and explosions, 69 deaths and 1349 injuries on oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico – alone. Millions of gallons of oil have been spilled making the Gulf one of the most polluted seas on the planet and yet, Republicans are still pushing for more drilling and exploration along US coasts. Can you believe that? Why not spend that time and effort on conservation and alternative energy? Haven’t we done enough damage to our environment with oil and coal?

Between June of 2001 and August of 2008, 330 Americans have been killed in taser attacks by police. The American Medical Association says, “Concerns about the use of CEDs [Conducted Electrical devices]  fall into three general areas: (1) they are used too frequently and at lower levels on the use-of-force continuum than indicated; (2) appropriate training and supervision of CED use is lacking in some jurisdictions; and (3) CEDs may contribute to the death of suspects, either directly or indirectly.”

And though they also say the use of tasers can save lives in dramatic situations the AMA concludes that adequate training is lacking and that police use these devices too frequently… like on a guy in a university library (18 times) or a rambling mentally ill woman or a baseball fan running on the field. Police think they have a “safe gun” but more than 300 deaths say otherwise.

Between 2004 and 2007 California tasered 437 inmates leading to the death of two, and Orange County (CA) has just paid out $750,000 in the tasering of a guy who was already in police custody, in a cell, handcuffed and thrown to the ground – BEFORE he was shot – repeatedly – over a 13 minute period.

In 2009, Warren, Michigan police shot 16 year old Robert Mitchell with a taser. He’s now dead.

55 people have died in Florida from taser attacks. In Arizona, 30 have died. 12 in Illinois. In England, police are pushing for acceptance of the use of barbituates to subdue people. When and where will this stop?

If your town’s police force uses tasers ask your town board to volunteer to be tased. I can see it now: at the next town board meeting council members who voted for the use of tasers would line up in front of the audience and their local cops would shoot them – one by one – with a taser.

I mean, they’re safe right? So, why wouldn’t they want to prove this to the community?

• Who is paying the taxes at Tilly Foster?
• Grants to Protect Endangered Species in Hudson Valley
• Water Quality Scorecard
• Jordan River to run dry by next year
• Under Arizona immigration law, overgrown lawns, barking dogs could trigger questioning, lawmaker says
• Toilet paper wipes out 27,000 trees a day
• Connections In Congress May Aid BP Lobby Effort
• The 7 Stupidest Statements Made About the BP Gulf Oil Spill

Who is paying the taxes at Tilly Foster?

Who is paying the $19,500 owed in property taxes at Tilly Foster Farm?

That’s a good question which Legislator Dan Birmingham would like an answer to.

In a three page memo dated today, Legislator Birmingham asks County Executive Bondi this very question and lays out the properties that are taxable and hopes that you and I will not be picking up the tab.

The three properties are:

56.-1-20.3 The Cottage – assessed at $375,000
56.-1-32.1 The rental house – assessed at $250,000
56.-1-20.4 The Country Store – assessed at $100,000

Each of these taxable parcels are being used by Preserve Putnam as income generating facilities and hold a combined property tax liability of somewhere around $19,500… or so.

Mr. Birmingham writes in part:

If I recall during these many public discussions [on the contract] , the County was assured by Preserve Putnam on numerous occasions that Tilly Foster Farm would be “self sufficient” and that the cost of the operations of Tilly Foster Farm would be borne exclusively by Preserve Putnam

I certainly hope that you would agree with me that this tax liability should not be paid for by the taxpayers of Putnam County. I would hope that when the tax bills are sent to the County (as legal owner of these parcels) that such bills would be hastily forwarded to Preserve Putnam for its prompt payment.

You can read the full memo here.

http://www.planputnam.org/ntm/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/birmingham_bondi_memo.pdf

Grants to Protect Endangered Species in Hudson Valley

Private landowners interested in enhancing and restoring critical bog turtle habitat could be eligible for a federally funded grant program totaling approximately $150,000. With bog turtle populations declining in New York State and throughout their range, the Department of Environmental Conservation’s (DEC) Landowner Incentive Program (LIP) for Bog Turtle Management and Protection directs funding to projects on private property that will help the survival of bog turtles and more than 30 other at-risk species through enhancement and protection of critical habitat.

The LIP is administered by DEC and funded through a grant from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. LIP participants must provide 25 percent in matching funds to implement their projects.

Bog Turtles

Bog turtles-New York’s smallest turtle-can live for 40 years or more but are slow to reproduce and are on the state’s endangered species list. In the Northeast, 95 percent of bog turtle habitat is on private land, so survival of the species in the wild is impossible without the collaboration of private landowners.

Eligibility

Grant recipients are eligible for awards ranging from $5,000 to $50,000, depending on the project. To maximize the program’s benefits, DEC will limit LIP eligibility to private landowners within the focus area, which includes portions of Columbia, Greene, Ulster, Dutchess, Putnam, Sullivan and Orange counties. Visit DEC’s website to see a map of the focus area.

Applications must include plans to restore and manage bog turtle habitat within the focus area. Activities related to this goal include management of vegetation, restoration of hydrology and connection of habitats. Applicants or landowners must also identify a source for the 25 percent in non-federal matching funds required as part of the program.

The deadline for pre-application submission is June 1, 2010.

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Water Quality Scorecard

Incorporating Green Infrastructure Practices at the Municipal, Neighborhood, and Site Scale

EPA’s Smart Growth Program, in conjunction with the Office of Water, has released Water Quality Scorecard: Incorporating Green Infrastructure Practices at the Municipal, Neighborhood, and Site Scale.This scorecard offers policy options for protecting and improving water quality across different scales of land use and across multiple municipal departments.

Many communities across the United States face the challenge of balancing water quality protection with accommodating new growth and development. Conventional development practices cover large areas with impervious surfaces such as roads, driveways, and buildings. Once such development occurs, rainwater cannot infiltrate into the ground. Instead, it runs off the land at much higher levels than would naturally occur. The collective force of this runoff scours streams, erodes stream banks, and carries large quantities of sediment and other pollutants into waterbodies each time it rains.

Communities are recognizing the importance of managing water quality impacts of development at a variety of scales, including the municipal, neighborhood, and site levels. Green infrastructure is a comprehensive approach to water quality protection defined by a range of natural and built systems that can occur at all three scales.

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Jordan River to run dry by next year

Unless urgent action is taken, large sections of the Lower Jordan River, which runs from Lake Kinneret to the Dead Sea, will dry out next year, according to a study released on Sunday by EcoPeace/Friends of the Earth Middle East (FoEME).

The NGO ran tests over a year to determine how much water would be needed to rehabilitate the river and damage had been caused by the lack of water in it. Israel, Jordan and Syria divert 98 percent of the flow for their respective country’s use.

In the 19th and early 20th century, 1.3 billion cubic meters of water cascaded each year down rapids and rolled over waterfalls on the way down to the lowest point on Earth – the Dead Sea.

In 2009, just 20 m.cu.m. to 30 m.cu.m of water pooled and sluggishly flowed through the river’s channels – all of it sewage. Sewage runs from Israel, the Palestinian Authority and Jordan into the river. However, two new sewage treatment plants, one in the Beit She’an area and the other in the Jordan Valley Regional Council area, are set to begin operating over the next year and a half.

While FoEME praised the construction of the two plants, it warned that unless fresh water replaced the amounts of sewage water that would be removed, the once mighty Lower Jordan River would become a cracked and dry riverbed through much of its 100-km. length.

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Under Arizona immigration law, overgrown lawns, barking dogs could trigger questioning, lawmaker says

The controversy over a hard-line immigration law signed by Republican Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer on April 23, 2010, shows no signs of ebbing — despite a last-minute change to the law’s language designed to placate some of the laws’ critics.
Generally speaking, the law, which would go into effect in 90 days, makes being an illegal immigrant a state crime and requires legal immigrants to carry papers that confirm their legal status.

One of the key questions to emerge during and after the law’s passage has been what standard law enforcement officers will need to use before questioning individuals about their immigration status. Critics have argued that trivial justifications could lead to immigration status checks that could get someone deported.

On April 30, Brewer signed a package of changes to the law that were intended to clarify what sorts of actions could trigger immigration-related questions. Here’s the new version of the language telling police the circumstances under which they will be expected to check on an individuals’ immigration status:

“For any lawful stop, detention or arrest made by a law enforcement official or a law enforcement agency of this state or a law enforcement official or a law enforcement agency of a county, city, town or other political subdivision of this state in the enforcement of any other law or ordinance of a county, city or town in this state where reasonable suspicion exists that the person is an alien and is unlawfully present in the United States, a reasonable attempt shall be made, when practicable, to determine the immigration status of the person, except if the determination may hinder or obstruct an investigation.”

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Toilet paper wipes out 27,000 trees a day

Worldwide, the equivalent of almost 270,000 trees is either flushed or dumped in landfills every day and roughly 10 percent of that total is attributable to toilet paper, according to the latest issue of World Watch magazine.

“Meanwhile, growing populations, adoption of Western lifestyles, and sanitation improvements in developing countries are driving the increased use of toilet paper,” the magazine added. “The result is that forests in both the global North and South are under assault by paper companies competing to fill consumer demand.”

Wikimedia Commons image by Tristanb

“Steadily increasing demand for toilet paper in developing countries is a critical factor in the impact that toilet paper manufacturer have on forests around the world,” says author Noelle Robbins in a Worldwatch Institute news release. “And with the increasing pressure to reduce and discontinue the use of old growth forests, the move is on to tree plantations.”

But according to Robbins, this cure could be worse than the disease, Worldwatch said.

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Connections In Congress May Aid BP Lobby Effort

The Deepwater Horizon oil spill is quickly becoming a serious ecological disaster. At the same time, the event has become a political hot potato as the various parties involved attempt to protect themselves from blame. British Petroleum (BP), the owners of the oil lease site where the sunken rig was drilling, is gearing up their lobbying team to present their case to congressional investigators. Thanks to their long-established connections, they may find some in Congress who are willing to listen.

The Center for Responsive Politics ranks BP as one of the top donors to political campaigns over the twenty years having given in excess of $6 million to congressional and presidential campaigns. The ten biggest recipients of BP contributions still in Congress are Rep. Don Young ($73,300), Sen. John McCain ($44,899), Sen. George Voinovich ($41,400), Rep. John Dingell ($31,000), Sen. Mary Landrieu ($28,200), Rep. Joe Barton ($27,350), Sen. Jim Inhofe ($22,300), Sen. Mitch McConnell ($22,000), Rep. John Culberson ($20,950) and Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison ($19,500).

BP has focused a good portion of their campaign contributions on the House Committee on Energy & Commerce. The committee is scheduled to begin hearings on the Deepwater Horizon oil spill on Wednesday. Since 1989, BP has contributed a total of $195,550 to the current 51 members of the committee. Rep. Barton is the ranking member of the committee. Rep. Dingell is chairman emeritus and was recently deposed as chairman by Rep. Henry Waxman. Other top recipients include Rep. Ralph Hall ($14,500), Rep. Fred Upton ($13,100) and Rep. Roy Blunt ($12,500).

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The 7 Stupidest Statements Made About the BP Gulf Oil Spill

The BP oil spill is on par to outpace the Exxon Valdez oil spill in terms of size, impact, and devastation, which is no small feat. The Valdez spill cost billions of dollars to clean up, killed hundreds of thousands of animals, and registered a debilitating effect to the coastal ecosystem. And yet, we see, once again, that there’s no shortage of people who seem to forget easily, or are downright ignorant of the catastrophe an oil spill of this magnitude presents. To illustrate, I bring you the 7 stupidest things said about the BP oil spill so far . . .

Some of these statements are made out of pure ignorance, while others are clearly intended to downplay the impact of the event, and any ramifications it might have on offshore drilling in general. Without further ado:

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