Date: Mon, 28 Feb 2000 17:08:23 -0500
From: Stephen Tvedten <steve@getipm.com>
Organization: Get Set Inc. (www.getipm.com)
To: Lyndon Hawkins <hawkins@empm.cdpr.ca.gov>
State of California,
Department of Pesticide Regulation
Integrated Pest
Management
Dear Lyndon, On 2/28/00, The Green Earth Journal recently had an article you might be interested in "someday" entitled: The Insiders.
If a government agency misbehaves, the ordinary citizen may feel helpless. His letters aren't answered, or the answers aren't helpful. Telephone calls are referred from office to office, and answers aren't responsive. In the past, government employees who spoke out about official misdeeds risked reprisals. Today if you're on the inside, part of the bureaucracy, you can speak out with able defenders. The movement began with the Association of Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics (AFSEEE). In 1992 Jeff DeBonis, founder of AFSEEE, began organizing Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility. PEER now has chapters in federal and state agencies from Texas to Alaska.
In Wisconsin, PEER members in the Department of Natural Resources wrote a questionnaire and sent it to all 3,000 DNR employees. More than half responded. The responses showed widespread concern that political concerns influence the agency's scientific decisions, that DNR administrators don't stand up against political pressures. Most favor removing the Governor's power to appoint the DNR Secretary and reestablishing the Public Intervenor's Office which the Governor abolished in 1996. The PEER report made headlines.
Bruce Eilerts, a civilian, was Natural & Cultural Resources director at Luke Air Force Base in Arizona. Last year the Air Force fired him for helping prepare a complaint about environmental problems to the Inspector General. He filed a protest under the Whistleblower Protection Act. That might have gone nowhere, but PEER, on his behalf and that of other employees, filed a formal complaint with the Inspector General alleging misconduct by Luke AFB officers.
"This is the most blatant case of retaliation I have ever seen," said PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch, "After Mr. Eilerts has been restored to his position we will seek disciplinary action against the officers involved."
Pamela Vining, the attorney representing Eilerts, said: "Certain officers will not let the civilian specialists do their job of managing the natural and cultural resources which by law they are supposed to protect, consistent with the military mission. There is a mind-set among certain officers at Luke that anything, even the dictates of law, that impedes this mission must be stamped out."
Another kind of case arose at the Wupatki National Monument in Arizona. The Hopi Tribe asked for a federal permit to take 40 golden eagles and an unlimited number of red-tailed hawks for ceremonial purposes. Hunting has been prohibited in National Parks and Monuments since Yellowstone became a National Park. Wupatki's Superintendent denied the Hopi request. So did the Park Service Regional Office and the Director of the National Park Service in Washington.
Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Fish and Wildlife Don Barry overruled the Park Service. Notes taken at a meeting recorded that Barry said Secretary of the Interior Babbitt wanted to keep the issue "ambiguous," adopting a "don't ask don't tell" policy while the Hopi killed birds, asking employees to be "good soldiers." Angered employees called PEER. PEER filed a Freedom of Information request for the meeting notes and other documents. The Hopis withdrew their request.
That hasn't ended the matter. Babbitt has instructed the Park Service to adopt new regulations allowing Native America "take" of animals and plants not protected by the Endangered Species Act for religious purposes from national parks. Learning of this PEER commented: "Native American hunting will end the special status of national parks as sanctuaries. It appears that this major shift in NPS policy has been initiated behind closed doors and without the analysis and study required under the National Environmental Policy Act."
In Rhode Island, Beverly Migliore, represented by PEER, won an $843,000 judgment against the Department of Environmental Management for harassing her after her disclosures of lack of environmental enforcement. DEM Director Jan Reitsma attacked the ruling, charging that the verdict was based on "fabrication and distortion of fact." After investigating Reitsm's attack, the U.S. Department of Labor found him guilty of personal harassment, fined him $10,000, and ordered him to post a copy of his retraction in the office.
Now PEER has filed new claims on behalf of two employees who were told, in writing, they could not be given upgrades because they had testified in favor of Magliore. Magliore has filed a civil defamation suit against Reitsma.
In Florida last summer PEER members in the Department of Environmental Protection documented serious mismanagement of the state's oil drilling program. A DEP internal investigation confirmed the major points of the report. Director David Struhs claimed he was vindicated because no criminal misconduct had been found. PEER has learned that DEP, still enying that there are problems, is proposing an array of administrative and legislative solutions.
In the Southwest, Dave Parsons had led the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service Mexican gray wolf recovery team for nine years. He was respected by ranchers as well as environmentalists. Last year the federal government offered an early retirement program, available until October 1. It looked good to Parsons, but he wanted to stay with the wolf restoration campaign for at least another 18 months. His supervisor offered a solution: Retire, and we'll hire you back as a retired annuitant. He retired. FWS advertised the retired annuitant position. Parsons was the only applicant. Regional Director Nancy Kaufman, who had been foot-dragging on wolf reintroduction, ordered the position abolished. A PEER member saw her e-mail note: "I do not anticipate interest in the mainstream press beyond tomorrow."
She misjudged. Articles and editorials kept coming. More than fifty environmental organizations wrote to Interior Secretary Babbitt demanding Parson's reinstatement. In a 1997 PEER survey, refuge managers had voted Kaufman by far the worst Regional Director in the country. PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch commented: "In another self-inflicted fiasco, Kaufman risks disrupting the agency's flagship project to salve her own ego. Director Jamie Clark should have intervened in this case months ago."
More such accounts are available at Peer's web site (www.peer.org) and in its quarterly magazine: PEEReview.
Well Lyndon, Now do you have anything to say?
Respectfully, Stephen L. Tvedten.
(Editorial Comment: To the many public employees who receive this information, please come forward and help us. There is protection in numbers and the numbers are growing daily. What could be more important than the lives of our children and your children and grandchildren. What's more important, your retirement, next big job with a chemical company or the citizens and environment you are responsible for overseeing on our behalf. You must know and do know about the growing horror we all face under the deluge of pesticides?)
Please!