NormasArk = www.normasark.blogspot.com/

Defenders of Wildlife Training Outreach


Hi from Ruby. Yesterday, Sunday November 4th, 2007 we attended a truly informative and wonderfully done teaching by The Defenders of Wildlife. It was held at the enormous, well-maintained Phoenix Zoo. Our dedicated teachers were Scotty Johnson, Senior Outreach Representative, Tucson, Arizona, and Marcia Lesky, Director of National Outreach, Washington, D.C. Photos are above. Each one of these excellent lecturers had quality humor, current on-target facts, and vital information to explain about the mass global animal extinctions we are facing now, and our rapidly melting polar icecaps. I did not know that polar bears were not only starving and drowning because they had to swim longer and longer distances between the ice flows, but that they began cannibalizing each other for food. For me this is an unbearable tragedy. We learned that as of right now, Arizona only has two Jaguars and so does New Mexico for a total of four Jaguars in the USA living in the wild. I met Shiloh, a former zoo keeper, who is now monitoring these few precious endangered Jaguars. On a TV documentary I recently learned that in the next ten years, we may see the end of all tigers in the wild. And shockingly, we are facing the current rapid mass extinction of honey bees that pollinate our global plant-life. This is only a brief article… but we were thoroughly saturated with meaningful information about wildlife, ecology, and politics.

We also learned the best ways to contact our elected official in order to “thank and spank” them into listening to their constituents, as well as other media formats such as letters to the editor. I was impressed enough to call and write two people who are running for election. We learned to address one issue per call and letter since they rarely have time to read long contacts. I was concise, clearly stated, gave my name and city to validate who I was, and asked for the names of those I spoke with. Doing that will give them the impression you intend to follow up. They really do hand your messaging to the representatives. Don’t be afraid to say your opinions, since it is very rewarding. Remember, without you, they are unemployed.

Below my article please read how Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff is handling the building of walls between the USA and Mexican borders. Please contact me privately, or on my Norma’s Ark Blog = www.normasark.blogspot.com/
comments option, about your feelings in reference to the wildlife and ecological issues this raises for an environmental impact?

Monday, October 22, 2007

Chertoff lifts environmental barriers to border fence construction
Howard Kline at 6:50 PM ET

[JURIST] US Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff [official profile] Monday utilized his power under the Real ID Act [PDF text; JURIST news archive] to circumvent a federal district court decision handed down last week that on environmental grounds ordered the delay of fence construction along part of the Arizona-Mexico border. Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle [official profile] of the US District Court for the District of Columbia held that the federal government did not take into account the environmental impact [AP report] of that portion of the fence. Title I sec. 102 of the Real ID Act, as included in a 2005 emergency supplemental appropriations bill, provides "Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the Secretary of Homeland Security shall have the authority to waive all legal requirements such Secretary, in such Secretary’s sole discretion, determines necessary to ensure expeditious construction of the barriers and roads under this section." This is the third time Chertoff has invoked the waiver provision; in September 2005 he used it to waive provisions of the Endangered Species Act, the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, the Coastal Zone Management Act, the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, and the National Historic Preservation Act applicable to construction of fencing through the Tijuana River National Estuarine Research Reserve near San Diego, and this January he used it to push fencing through the Barry M. Goldwater Air Force Range in Arizona [DW press release].

Huvelle had granted a temporary restraining order sought by two environmental advocacy groups to enjoin the Bureau of Land Management [official website] from building a 1.5 mile portion of the fence along the US-Mexico border over the San Pedro river until an appropriate environmental impact assessment had been completed, berating the government for beginning construction on the fence after taking only three weeks to assess its potential environmental impact. The San Pedro river, which flows across the Arizona-US border, is considered a National Conservation Area (NCA) [text] by the government. Huvelle noted in her ruling that the Homeland Security Department had legal authority to waive all environmental laws and build the fence despite the restraining order. AP has more.