Gov. Jeb Bush urges end to U.S. oversight of Everglades cleanup

[seafan]

Gov. Bush urges end to U.S. oversight of Everglades cleanup

By Robert P. King

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Friday, February 03, 2006


Gov. Jeb Bush is lobbying to end federal court oversight of the state's Everglades cleanup, a move that would take the $1.1 billion project out of the hands of a judge who has accused Florida of violating its promises, according to a government official and others familiar with the case.
If the Justice Department and other federal agencies agree, Bush's intervention could lead to the end of the landmark 14-year-old court order that required Florida to begin cleansing the Everglades.

The state also would have to persuade the judge. And it is seeking the cooperation of the Miccosukee Indians, the state's most aggressive opponent in an array of Everglades pollution cases.
Bush's efforts, including a Jan. 27 meeting with federal leaders next door to the White House, have alarmed environmentalists, who don't trust the state to finish the project without supervision. Congressional budget leaders also have warned the governor's brother, President Bush, that "backsliding" on the cleanup would jeopardize federal spending on a larger $10.5 billion Everglades restoration.

snip

he governor went to Washington last week "to talk about the fact that we're getting no credit for all of the accomplishments we've made regarding the Everglades," said Colleen Castille, secretary of the state Department of Environmental Protection. "We believe the law is clear as to what standards we are supposed to meet.... We have been meeting that."

Castille said she could not discuss the lawsuit specifically and would not confirm whether the governor is seeking to end the 1992 court order. But a federal official familiar with the talks said the governor has pressed that request during months of meetings with representatives from the Justice and Interior departments, the Environmental Protection Agency and the White House, including the office of senior presidential adviser Karl Rove.

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/pbcwest/content/local_news/epaper/2006/02/03/m1a_GLADES_0203.html

[Skidmore]

1. So what's Jeb hiding in that swamp?

[htuttle]

2. Somebody get a backhoe!

[woodsprite]

5. Hmmmm. What bodies are missing? n/t

[wakeme2008]

4. the lack of money to clean it up

and that he wants for more tax cuts in his final year. :grr:

[Lorien]

10. He ran on a promise to clean up the Everglades, then quickly

drained State coffers by giving giant tax breaks to the wealthy (sounds familiar, eh?), thereby allowing him to say "we can't afford it".

He did the same with classroom size; promising during his campaign that shrinking classroom sizes for Florida school children was a top priority, then turning around and saying "either we fund nursing home care for the poor, or shrink classroom sizes, we can't do both" (and of course, he blamed 9/11 and a decrease in tourism, NOT his massive tax cuts for himself and other members of the uber rich).

Now he's illegally shredding state documents. Won't anyone reign these bastards in???

[William769]

6. The sugar industries waste.

[wordpix2]

15. got oil?

[izzie]

20. His brother is going to do it on his next endless vacation

We have better ways to waste tax payers money, like your weekly war.

[saltpoint]

3. Jeb Bush would re-institute slavery if he thought he could get away with

it.

What a smarmy, fiercely mediocre human being and governor.

Booo! in Jeb and anybody else in that particular political family.

[seafan]

7. Jeb Bush has no more use for the state of Florida. Here's more:

The Miccosukees also have been negotiating with Bush about their desire to expand gambling at their casino near Miami — prompting some environmentalists to fear that the two sides could reach a deal involving both slot machines and the Everglades.

snip

The federal agencies have made no decision on Bush's request, one government official said. But people familiar with the talks said the governor's intervention has heightened tensions for employees handling the issue.
"There's tremendous pressure," the official said. "You have a very demanding governor who asks for a lot of meetings in Washington and pounds the table."

Bush's efforts come at a crucial time. Under the consent decree, pollution limits for federally managed sections of the Everglades are due to tighten Dec. 31. U.S. District Judge Federico Moreno, who is overseeing the case, has warned he is "a jailing judge" when people violate orders in his courtroom.

snip

"The (state's) reaction wasn't 'Let's go out and fix it,' " said one person familiar with the lawsuit. "The reaction was 'Let's get rid of this thing and get rid of the judge.' "

Environmentalists say Florida's promises mean little without the judge's scrutiny. They point to a law Bush signed three years ago, championed by the sugar industry, that postponed enforcement of specific pollution limits in the Everglades until 2016.
"Given the power of the sugar plantations to march into Tallahassee and have the legislature do whatever they want, you do need a federal judge," said David Guest of the group Earthjustice.

snip

[Divernan]

13. Look for the judge to be promoted to the Federal Appellate Court

and some hack Bush appointed judge named to oversee the court order. That's basically what Bush did to cripple investigations of Jack Abramoff - it would work here too.

[seafan]

14. It's the BFEE way. n/t

[DoYouEverWonder]

18. Another reason why we need another Special Prosecutor

or for Fitzgerald to expand the scope of his investigation.

[Mika]

23. Don't forget the sugar is the most heavily subsidized crop in the US

The sugar subsidization program was designed to kill the post '59 revolution Cuban sugar industry. Don't go thinking that the Fla Dems will fight big sugar..

Sugar:
Long-Term Contribution Trends
http://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus.asp?ind=A1200

[SillyGoose]

8. What a charmer...he and Bolton would get along great, I bet.

"There's tremendous pressure," the official said. "You have a very demanding governor who asks for a lot of meetings in Washington and pounds the table."

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I will never understand why my fellow Floridians voted for this guy. I never will.

***sigh****

[Jack Rabbit]

9. Jack Rabbit urges US begin oversight of Jeb Bush

Leavenworth Federal Prison from the website of Kent State University

[Lorien]

11. From Jack Rabbit's keyboard

to God's inbox-may we see the day, and soon.

[Judi Lynn]

12. Jeb's Cuban "exile" friends, the Fanjuls own a huge sugar cane operation

down there, and they've run afoul of the U.S. Government for pollution, and for desperately bad abuse of their workers.

S U G A R ' S
F I R S T F A M I L Y

~snip~
It is not a huge stretch to argue that the same federal price-support program that bolsters Florida sugar cane growers contributes to the degradation of the Everglades. And it should come as no great surprise that these same sugar magnates have used all the clout their political money brings, both at the national and local levels, first to resist a cleanup and second to avoid paying for it.

So far, they have, in large part, succeeded. Federal and state tax money is paying most of the price tag for what Florida environmentalists call a weak cleanup plan. From Tallahassee to Washington, sugar cane knows how to work its connections to get what it wants.


MEET THE FANJUL FAMILY

To understand the power of Florida sugar, it is illustrative to look at the very wealthy, very private members of the Fanjul family of Florida. With an enormous sugar empire that dwarfs even the U.S. Sugar Corporation, the Fanjul family's sugar holdings in Florida and the Dominican Republic total more than 400,000 acres, operated by a family of companies under the corporate umbrella of Flo-Sun, Inc.

Four brothers -- Alfonso "Alfie," José "Pepe," Alexander, and Andres -- are the principal owners and managers of Flo-Sun. The Fanjuls are Cuban-American descendants of the wealthy Gomez-Mena family of Cuba, which controlled much of the American-dominated sugar industry in Cuba until Fidel Castro seized power, and the New York-based Fanjul family. Matriarch Lillian de Fanjul and her four sons make their home in exclusive Palm Beach, Florida, an hour's drive and a world away from the gritty sugar plantations of western Palm Beach County.

Unlike U.S. Sugar Corporation, its Florida rival, whose offices are smack in the middle of Clewiston's sugar fields, Flo-Sun is headquartered in a posh complex in Palm Beach. The Fanjuls themselves live in multimillion-dollar mansions set among the palm-tree-lined streets of the town.

With their wealth conservatively estimated at several hundred million dollars (Forbes magazine puts the figure at $500 million), the Fanjuls can afford to spread around lots of political money. And they do. Family members, corporate executives, the corporations themselves, and the Florida Sugar Cane League PAC have contributed $2.6 million to political candidates and committees since 1979. (Until mid-1994, the Fanjuls and executives for Fanjul companies accounted for an increasing share of the Florida Sugar Cane League PAC's funds, from 20 percent in 1980 to 62 percent in 1992. While the PAC is still filing reports with the FEC, there has been little actual activity, with only $38 listed as receipts since October 1994.) Fanjul family members alone gave direct contributions of $359,505 to more than 172 congressional candidates of both parties.

That is just the "hard" money. The Fanjuls also give substantial "soft money" contributions to political parties. In fact, the Fanjul family and its companies account for 59 percent of all the soft money given by the sugar industry to the national party committees since 1991.
(snip/...)

http://www.opensecrets.org/pubs/cashingin_sugar/sugar08.html





Alfie and Pepe Fanjul



See photos of a party at their resort in the Dominican Republic. (George H. W. Bush went there to spend time with Venezuelan media owner Gustavo Cisneros, who was involved in the coup against Hugo Chavez)

http://newyorksocialdiary.com/socialdiary/2005/01_18_05/socialdiary01_18_05.php

[The Backlash Cometh]

16. I guess he has a few dead bodies he wants to unload.

[applegrove]

17. Maybe he needs somewhere to dump all the public documents?

[1monster]

19. DON'T DO IT, YOUR HONORS!!! Keep on his posterior like super glue.

If you don't, I'm sure we'll soon see the draining of the swamp for condos and golf courses... in the parts he doesn't sell to the sugar industry.

[DeepModem Mom]

21. Sorry, the Everglades belong to all of us, Jeb. nt

[Tigress DEM]

22. So that's where all the bodies from NoLa went.

:eyes:

WELL, he's hiding something... and shredding the rest.