Dr. Keith Arnold is an old friend, once ornithologist at Texas A&M and now comfortably retired. For decades Keith functioned as the bird-sighting gestapo in Texas. He would pass judgement on every lame-brained bird sighting or CBC report that crossed his desk. He had a favorite term for the most outlandish of these; “unbelievable if true.”
Since the Gulf spill I have received countless solicitations from nonprofits wanting my money to help Gulf birds. Many of these spiels have been “unbelievable if true.” Today I received the latest from the National Wildlife Federation (NWF). I thought buying organic flowers to help Gulf birds could not be topped, but the NWF came through in the clutch.
The email says that I can help Gulf birds in two ways. First, send NWF money, period. Second, send NWF money to certify my backyard. According to NWF, “many of the bird species impacted by the BP Oil Spill are migratory. One way to help them is to create a Certified Wildlife Habitat™ site in your backyard, school or community.”
Unless your yard is a Gulf beach, name one. My Galveston yard is five blocks from the Gulf, and I cannot think of a bird threatened by the spill that needs my backyard habitat. Not gulls, terns, pelicans, cormorants, boobies, gannets, shorebirds, petrels, shearwaters, or any of the seabirds that are in harm’s way. I can’t think of any land bird that might need to set down on oiled waters during migration, except perhaps for chuck-will’s-widow. Of course beach and marsh shorebirds are at risk, and a few of the land birds that frequent the wetlands (Nelson’s sharp-tailed sparrow, seaside sparrow). Rails such as the clapper are certainly threatened, but I have never seen a rail other than a sora in my yard. There are certain ducks that winter in these waters (such as lesser scaup), and others make use of the nearshore during migration (blue-winged teal, gadwall, northern pintail). But none of these have ever been seen in my, or your, backyard.
The Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s (CLO) appeal follows the same general line of thinking, but is dramatically different in its approach. “Wildlife biologists are monitoring species such as pelicans and plovers in the immediate path of the oil, but we need bird watchers across the country to help us find out if birds that pass through or winter in the Gulf region carry contamination with them, possibly creating an “oil shadow” of declines in bird reproduction hundreds of miles from the coast.” The email is titled “Will the Gulf Oil Spill Affect Your Backyard Birds?,” and asks for no funds.
What do we make of this? First, the fuel for nonprofits is money, no different from any traditional business in this country. Second, within the nonprofit world the organizations differ in significant ways. For those of us who give and/or serve, it is important to know the character and practical intent (not just the canned mission) of the group. Finally, look for proof. Just who exactly is doing good work in the Gulf, and who is using this event as a fundraiser?
Let me mention two, other than eBird and CLO, that I believe are carrying the load – the American Bird Conservancy (ABC), and the American Birding Association (ABA). ABC focuses on bird conservation policy, and in recent months they have become increasingly outspoken about their concerns. ABA sent Drew Wheelan to the Gulf to report on impacts to birds, and he has proven to be an investigative journalist of the old school.
Why does false advertising matter? Simple. The credibility of conservationists everywhere is on the line. The dark side has been effective in obfuscating the impacts of this spill, and all we have in our favor is truth. I understand that money is the fuel that keeps these nonprofits running, but NWF and others need to be called to account for what is misleading advertising. Our challenge is too great, and our efforts too important, to let such obvious false statements go unchallenged, even when from our friends.
To announce that there must be no criticism of the president… is morally treasonable to the American public…Theodore Roosevelt
In the weeks since the eruption of the Gulf gusher, criticism of the administration and the president has been muted. There have been no marches on the Capitol, no insurrection in the Gulf. In fact, the only civil disobedience has come from BP.
For example,
The freedom of the press (an unambiguous 1st Amendment right), has been continuously abridged since 20 April 2010. Journalists have been detained and harassed, swaths of the Gulf have been cordoned off from the public, and BP has hired its own “reporters” to obscure the truth.
Independent scientists have been reduced to begging for a chance to collect critical baseline data from the gusher. BP and the administration continue to stall approval.
We have learned that there are over 27,000 abandoned oil and gas wells in the Gulf, many dating to the 1940s. More than 1,000 “temporary” wells have lingered in regulatory limbo for over a decade.
BP, the very company responsible for the oil spill that is already the worst in U.S. history, has purchased several phrases on search engines such as Google and Yahoo so that the first result that shows up directs information seekers to the company’s official website.
The US Fish and Wildlife Service has admitted that they approved the original Deepwater Horizon risk assessment since they estimated the chance of a catastrophe at less than 50%. Yet this same agency is working in close collaboration with BP and Entrix (BP’s environmental consultant) on the Natural Resource Damage Assessment (NRDA). “If they pay the bills, they’re welcome at the table,” said Peter Tuttle, an environmental contaminant specialist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
To be fair, the Republican opposition has countered every move the administration has proposed. Texan Joe Barton wins the prize with his “I do not want to live in a country where any time a citizen or a corporation does something that is legitimately wrong, is subject to some sort of political pressure that is, again, in my words, amounts to a shakedown. So I apologize” wackiness. But I expect the Republicans to be loony when it comes to the environment. My concern is for our guy, this president, and his administration. This is his watch, and to date his response (or lack of) has been deplorable.
Teddy believed that he could rally the public to his side, and he rarely failed. If he felt mounting opposition within Congress (often from his own Republican party) he would hit the rails to tell the people his side of the story. Teddy understood that he could never get too far ahead of the public. I cannot believe that the public in the early 1900s understood conservation any better than us today. But they believed in the president, and knew that his conservation campaign would benefit all Americans, including future generations. In the end no president left his mark on the American landscape more clearly than Theodore Roosevelt.
I see nothing clear about this president, and he has offered nothing riveting or inspirational related to the Gulf that our citizens can hold on to. The Gulf fiasco offers a revelatory moment, an epiphany, when the interests of the public are starkly defined. The Gulf is a war, and the administration is still hoping for appeasement.
Why? Why aren’t the president and his administration attacking the gusher with force and gusto? Why aren’t outraged Americans spilling into the streets? Do Americans have a clue as to the true impacts of this disaster?
No, they don’t. In fact, I am not certain that most Americans even know where the Gulf is located. According to a Roper/National Geographic poll after Hurricane Katrina (and the around-the-clock media coverage), “nearly one-third of young Americans (ages 18 to 24) polled couldn’t locate Louisiana on a map and nearly half were unable to identify Mississippi.” Six in 10 could not find Iraq on a map of the Middle East. Why should I believe that more could locate the Gulf of Mexico?
Americans are semantically (as well as geographically) challenged. We are asking our neighbors to apply terms and concepts such as biodiversity, ecology, and food chain to the Gulf of Mexico when they haven’t yet seen or touched it in their own backyards. Many of these words have also become adopted by marketers, transforming critical scientific language and concepts into cheap slogans and squishy labels.
Sustainable is one of those squishy words (like eco, green, and ethical) that is a manipulatable modifer. Slap one before a word or phrase and presto! your product or service is sanctified. Several years ago Wired Magazine wrote about Patrick Moore, one of the Greenpeace founders. Today he owns a consultancy and often works in direct opposition to environmental organizations. A recent opinion piece on his webpage is titled How Sick Is That? Environmental Movement Has Lost Its Way. He is considered by some to be an eco-traitor.
Or what about eco-friendly Spandex, or eco-sexy dating? A few years ago I accompanied Texas Governor Rick Perry on a quick trip to Dallas and Houston to announce a new project along the Trinity River. I had been hired by the state to compile an assessment of eco-tourism opportunities in the region. As he introduced me in Dallas, he concluded by calling me an expert in eco-terrorism. The crowd laughed, and I assumed a simple slip of the tongue. However, he went on to repeat the mistake in Houston. Toe-mah-toe or toe-may-toe, eco-tourism or eco-terrorism, what’s the big deal when you’re governor?
When words like sustainable and eco become popularized, I get nervous. Perfectly good words often become diluted or bastardized when they reach the street. Queer (as in odd) is an example. Most of the green modifiers (like green itself) have become meaningless or indistinct. Heading the list is sustainable, the word that no one can define.
The Brundtland Commission tried. They defined sustainable development as “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” Which (and whose) needs? Economic? Social? Ecological? Mine? Yours? The rich? The poor? One glance at America today should convince even the most blase observer that we have exceeded our economic capacity, our international policies have not proven to be sustainable, and we are going to hell in a hand basket in the Gulf. Does this mean that the U.S. is not sustainable? Of course not. In my mind, it means that the U.S., in its present configuration and on its present tack, isn’t sustainable. In sustainability, nothing is more important than knowing when to correct course.
Nothing, except for knowing what one is sustaining. Since my immediate interest is nature, let’s look at ecological sustainability. Exactly what are we sustaining? Do we try to sustain all of the parts, or only those that have value to us? Do we even know all of the parts?
Piping Plover, East Beach, Galveston, Texas, Ted Lee Eubanks
In the Gulf gusher, the focus has been on megafauna such as brown pelicans, sea turtles, and dolphins. Nothing sells papers better than a dead baby dolphin on the beach. The press and non-profits report bird deaths like the weekly Viet Nam casualty reports once given by Walter Cronkite on CBS Evening News. But do we really know all that is being lost, all that is being eradicated? Are we only concerned with the obvious, with the dramatic?
Today is 6 July, and in about a week piping plovers will begin to arrive on the upper Texas coast. Around 75% of the world’s population of piping plovers winters along the Gulf coast. The remainder winter, in general, along the southern Atlantic coast.
The most recent NOAA oil spill probability map shows a good chance of oil spoiling beaches throughout the plover’s winter range. There are fewer than 10,000 piping plovers left on the planet, and the bird is considered either endangered and threatened throughout its range. What makes a brown pelican intrinsically more valuable than a piping plover? Or what about a polychaete, part of the benthic infauna that shorebirds depend on for food? These are the segmented worms that live in the muck. Piping plovers spend much of their time foot-trembling in the soft sand, coaxing worms to the surface, then to the gullet. As worms go, so go shorebirds. As fish go, so go pelicans. Nothing about oil is good for worms or fish. Nothing about this oil is good for man or beast.
This brings me back to sustainability, my backyard, and John B.S. Haldane (hang with me, I know it’s a stretch). JBS Haldane is the biologist who said that “if one could conclude as to the nature of the Creator from a study of his creation it would appear that God has a special fondness for stars and beetles.” I would expand on Haldane and say that God must have an inordinate affection for life. Walk into your yard, any yard, and look. You will see only an infinitesimal fraction of what lives there, but even the obvious is overwhelming. The birds, mammals, and reptiles are apparent and exposed. But what about insects? What about all plants, not just the obvious (trees, shrubs, flowers)? What about nocturnal mammals and birds? And what about insects, including Haldane’s beetles?
What about damselflies? I photographed this damselfly in my yard this morning. On several occasions I have photographed ones infested with mites. You can imagine how small a damselfly mite must be. A couple of years ago I read a research paper about the parasites that live in the guts of mites that infest damselflies. That’s biodiversity, vividly illustrated in your own backyard.
Dusky dancer (Argia translata), Austin yard, 6 July 2010, Ted Lee Eubanks
Why does this matter? Because if you cannot see biodiversity in your backyard, that grasshopper in the cucumber blossom, how can you see it in the world? Within what context would you place biodiversity even if it’s under your own nose? Why should you care if you have never seen it, touched it, or known it? I know that this is a basic premise for Last Child in the Woods, but, no offense, the world cannot wait for 4th graders.
Aztec spur-throat (Aidemona azteca) on cucumber blossom, Austin yard, 6 July 2010, Ted Lee Eubanks
I have another yard, this one in Galveston. I live about 5 blocks from the Gulf of Mexico. Last week the first BP oil (tar balls) reached our beaches. The Gulf of Mexico is my extended yard, and I have seen, touched, and known its diversity for my entire life. Although I have spent countless hours in, on, and around the Gulf, I am still a neophyte, a dunce. I find peace knowing that what little I learn, what little I contribute, still becomes part of a grand encyclopedic saga.
Consider our friend Haldane one more time. In a famous study in Panama, 19 trees were “fogged” with insecticide and the dead were collected as they fell through the canopy. In this study, nearly 1,200 species of beetles alone were collected. Of those, 80 percent were not known to science. Extrapolation is dangerous, but studies of this type suggest a high estimate of the number of species that could exist on earth. The current best guess is around 10 million, the low around 2 million, but the number could be as high as 100 million species.
In truth, we have no idea how many species exist on this planet. Between 1.4 and 1.8 million have been named, but most experts admit that the total ranges between 2 and 100 million. Even a conservative estimate, let’s say 10 million, means that we currently have identified only 14% to 18%.
How many are left to be named in the Gulf of Mexico? Hell, we are still finding new named species there, a few big like whales. Once thought to be rare in the Gulf, in recent years pods of as many as 200 orcas have been found in the northern Gulf. How do you overlook an orca?
Easy. The Gulf is immense, the lookers minuscule. Below the surface both mystery and water deepen. We do not, we cannot, know all that is there, all that is being damaged, all that is being killed. Accurate loss estimates will take years, and will rely (as usual) on the effect rather than the cause. We will assume that piping plovers were harmed if we see the population drop over the next decade or so. We will assume that orcas were harmed if they vacate the Gulf. We will assume that brown pelicans were harmed if we wake up to find them gone, like in my childhood, from our beaches. We will assume that shrimp were harmed if shrimpers can no longer net them along the Louisiana coast.
What about those organisms that we haven’t seen, touched, felt, measured, or named? Without a name does a species not exist? What about individuals within a species (named or not), each striving to survive and reproduce in a world turned upside down? What about life, all life?
Brown pelican, Galveston yard, 6 Jan 2006, Ted Lee Eubanks
In the evening, when the heat of day fades, I relax on my porch in Galveston and watch the birds pass. The gulls, terns, pelicans, herons, and egrets stream over, though I see them only for a moment as they fly between beach and bay. For 116 years birds have passed over this house, and there has never been a time when the day broke without them. There is a continuity and a permanence in their presence.
The people of the Gulf also know they can be taken away by our greed, cruelty, ignorance, and indifference. Feather hunters, egg collectors, pesticide sprayers, wetland drainers, resort developers, and deep-water drillers have all left their lesions. One lesson still rings true – people value what they know, and they protect what they value. Too many people simply do not know nature, do not know that their backyard is a living, breathing organism of incomprehensible complexity and dazzling beauty. Many do not know even when their yard is the Gulf of Mexico.
Teddy Roosevelt, faced with the ruination of the heron and egret rookeries by feather hunters, had no trouble capturing the right tone and words.
And to lose the chance to see frigatebirds soaring in circles above the storm, or a file of pelicans winging their way homeward across the crimson afterglow of the sunset, or a myriad terns flashing in the bright light of midday as they hover in a shifting maze above the beach — why, the loss is like the loss of a gallery of the masterpieces of the artists of old time.
The Gulf is not a sewer, or a dumping ground, or an oil field, or a fund raiser. The Gulf is one of the masterpieces that Roosevelt is referencing, and he did his part to see it protected. Nature is a time machine, allowing us to share experiences with the past. The same birds that Teddy reported from the White House lawn a century ago can be seen today.
The challenges to nature also transcend time, and we are sharing one of those moments of clarity and revelation with Roosevelt. How would Teddy have faced the Gulf gusher? How can we follow his lead and lessons?
Teddy Roosevelt sitting on the shore of Breton NWR in 1915
Here is one last Teddy story. Chapman and Boroughs came to meet with Teddy about the need to protect birds and wildlife in the Gulf, especially the rookeries. The discussion eventually shifted to the topic of federal lands and of sanctuaries. Roosevelt looked to an advisor, and asked about the legality of a president simply declaring these lands to be protected. A head nodded in the affirmative, and the president then made one of the most famous declarations in conservation history – I do so declare it. The AOU and Audubon then donated the funds to hire the first game wardens, men who served for little compensation and at great risk.
Roosevelt had brass. He understood that he had the public’s support to develop progressive conservation policy. In our time, we who know, we who believe, are responsible for garnering the public’s support (even beginning in our own yards). We cannot stay silent. We must wake from our sleep and challenge our neighbors, our fellow Americans, to rise to this occasion. Not all wars involve guns, bombs, and carnage. Wars can also be about beliefs, about sacred responsibilities. Our opponents have clearly defined their position, and drawn their line in the sand.
Have we?
Teddy said that “in a moment of decision the best thing you can do is the right thing. The worst thing you can do is nothing.” In our time, we must quit feeling sorry, sad, morose, horrified, and depressed and get back in the game. In your time, President Obama, it is your job to gut it up and follow Teddy’s example.
The well still gushes, the tropics are threatening, and BP and their apologists are still obfuscating. Not all apologists work for BP or the private sector. Many reside in Congress. The extent of the damage will unfold over years. Any NRDA (National Resource Damage Assessment) at this point will be preliminary. Tragically, this is a work in progress, and Congress appears to be willing to wait.
Here is the bad news (there is nothing new about Congress being bad). BP cannot return the Gulf to its former state. I can only hope that, with time, the Gulf will heal itself. Let’s also consider the condition of the Gulf before this blow out. Dead zones off the Mississippi delta, rapidly eroding wetlands along the Louisiana coast, and three hurricanes (Katrina, Rita, and Ike) left the Gulf on life support. We need to think beyond triage.
Let’s begin with demographics. Currently around 14 million Americans live in Gulf coast counties, a number less than 5% of the U.S. population. Even that number is misleading, though. This estimate includes Harris County, Texas, and Houston. The Florida Gulf counties include Hillsborough and the city of Tampa. Without those two metropolitan areas (and leaving New Orleans and Corpus Christi in the mix) the Gulf population is minuscule and easily dismissed by the rest of the country.
Without population, the region has little political power. With much of its economy in the hands of non-Gulf companies (such as BP), the region has little economic clout. Populated by a dazzling (and eclectic) diversity of cultures and ethnicities, the region has no single voice (or single language) to speak to its concerns. The Gulf gives food, transportation, energy, and entertainment, and in return gets dead zones and oil spills.
What if BP’s oil now fouled the beaches of Long Island or the Hamptons? What if the Palos Verdes peninsula or the San Diego beaches were awash in this black goo? The nation has chosen to protect the Pacific and Atlantic coasts while laying waste to the Gulf.
On the afternoon of January 29, 1969, an environmental nightmare began in Santa Barbara, California. A Union Oil Co. platform stationed six miles off the coast of Summerland suffered a blowout. Oil workers had drilled a well down 3500 feet below the ocean floor. Riggers began to retrieve the pipe in order to replace a drill bit when the “mud” used to maintain pressure became dangerously low. A natural gas blowout occurred. An initial attempt to cap the hole was successful but led to a tremendous buildup of pressure. The expanding mass created five breaks in an east-west fault on the ocean floor, releasing oil and gas from deep beneath the earth.
For eleven days, oil workers struggled to cap the rupture. During that time, 200,000 gallons of crude oil bubbled to the surface and was spread into a 800 square mile slick by winds and swells. Incoming tides brought the thick tar to beaches from Rincon Point to Goleta, marring 35 miles of coastline. Beaches with off-shore kelp forests were spared the worst as kelp fronds kept most of the tar from coming ashore. The slick also moved south, tarring Anacapa Island’s Frenchy’s Cove and beaches on Santa Cruz, Santa Rosa and San Miguel Islands.
Only days after the spill began, Get Oil Out (GOO) was founded in Santa Barbara. Founder Bud Bottoms urged the public to cut down on driving, burn oil company credit cards and boycott gas stations associated with offshore drilling companies. Volunteers helped the organization gather 100,000 signatures on a petition banning offshore oil drilling. While drilling was only halted temporarily, laws were passed to strengthen offshore drilling regulations. Union Oil suffered millions in losses from the clean-up efforts, payments to fishermen and local businesses, and lawsuit settlements. But maybe worse, the reputation of the oil industry was forever tarnished.
U.S. President Richard Nixon said that “it is sad that it was necessary that Santa Barbara should be the example that had to bring it to the attention of the American people. What is involved is the use of our resources of the sea and of the land in a more effective way and with more concern for preserving the beauty and the natural resources that are so important to any kind of society that we want for the future. The Santa Barbara incident has frankly touched the conscience of the American people.”
A year later the nation celebrated the first Earth Day. The Nixon administration began to initiate the most sweeping environmental regulations in the nation’s history. One can argue that the Santa Barbara spill gave birth to the nation’s environmental movement. The Santa Barbara spill totaled 200,000 gallons, while the Gulf gusher already has spewed between 40 and 80 million gallons into the Gulf. But does anyone expect a cathartic uprising this time?
Louisiana isn’t California, is it? Isn’t it interesting that in all of the bitching about New Orleans after Katrina (the people don’t want to help themselves, the city shouldn’t be rebuilt below sea level, all Louisiana politicians are corrupt), no one took the time to consider the nation without the Gulf, without the Port of New Orleans, without the Mississippi River transportation corridor, without the oil and its products that fuel the rest of the nation.
Between the nation and its raw greed is the Gulf. Between the Gulf and the nation is a cultural “gulf,” a socio-economic chasm. Subject to the malevolence of greed is nature, forever the victim.
Corrupted by wealth and power, your government is like a restaurant with only one dish. They’ve got a set of Republican waiters on one side and a set of Democratic waiters on the other side. But no matter which set of waiters brings you the dish, the legislative grub is all prepared in the same Wall Street kitchen. – Huey Long
There are examples from the past to consider. In the early 1900s fashionable women in the northeast demanded plumes and feathers for their hats. Egrets, herons, spoonbills and their kin were slaughtered along the Gulf coast by the countless numbers so that the feather merchants could supply this demand. The conservation movement began in the swamps of Florida and Louisiana, where lone wardens funded by the National Audubon Society and the American Ornithological Union fought (and died) to protect Teddy Roosevelt’s first refuges from the pillagers.
Ironically, less than a century later the National Audubon Society began oil and gas development in its Paul J. Rainey Sanctuary in coastal Louisiana. According to PERC, “since the early 1950s, 37 wells have pumped natural gas (and a small amount of oil) at various times from Audubon’s Paul J. Rainey Sanctuary, a 26,000-acre preserve at the edge of the Intracoastal Waterway and Vermillion Bay in Louisiana. These wells have produced more than $25 million in revenues for the Society.” There is a lesson in that irony, one that the early Audubon movement would not have ignored.
Actions deferred are all too often opportunities lost, particularly in safeguarding our natural resources. I urge the enactment of this proposal at the earliest possible date so that a further significant step may be taken to assure the availability and accessibility of land and water-based recreation opportunities for all Americans — President John Kennedy, 1962 letter to Congress
Flash forward to the early 1960s. Acting on the wishes of the recently assassinated president, Congress established the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) in 1965. The Act designated that a portion of receipts from offshore oil and gas leases be placed into a fund annually for state and local conservation, as well as for the protection of our national treasures (parks, forest and wildlife areas).
Although authorized at $900 million from revenues generated from federal offshore oil royalties, the LWCF has only been fully funded once. More than $16 billion remains in the Fund on paper as an unspent balance, but has been diverted to the federal treasury. The demand for such funding has dramatically increased since the 1960s, yet this fund, established for this expressed purpose, remains gutted.
The government consists of a gang of men exactly like you and me. They have, taking one with another, no special talent for the business of government; they have only a talent for getting and holding office. Their principal device to that end is to search out groups who pant and pine for something they can’t get and to promise to give it to them. Nine times out of ten that promise is worth nothing. The tenth time is made good by looting A to satisfy B. In other words, government is a broker in pillage, and every election is sort of an advance auction sale of stolen goods. — HL Mencken
Congress clearly indicated that the new Federal program should have a lasting effect on the supply of recreation sites and facilities by requiring that sites assisted be added permanently to the national recreation estate. As a result, Section 6(f)(3) of the Act states unequivocally that grant-assisted areas are to remain forever available for “public outdoor recreation use,” or be replaced by lands of equal market value and recreation usefulness.
Initially, three sources of revenue to the fund were designated: proceeds from sales of surplus Federal real property, motorboat fuel taxes and fees for recreation use of Federal lands. The level of funding from FY 1966 through FY 1968 reached about $100 million per year, which was far short of Congress’ expectations. To remedy this shortfall, it was proposed that Outer Continental shelf (OCS) mineral leasing receipts be tapped. In 1968, P.L. 90-401 raised the Fund’s level to $200 million a year for five years, beginning in FY 1969, making OCS revenues available to cover the difference between this minimum level and receipts from other sources.
By 1970, growing demands on the Fund led to enactment of P.L. 91- 485, which increased the LWCF again to a $300 million annual level from FY 1971 through FY 1989. This amendment reveals that Congress’ perception of needs for the Fund program had expanded in three ways: the State grant program should give more emphasis to urban parks and recreation areas; the grant program should help acquire and develop recreation facilities within urban areas, not just nearby; and the Federal side of the Fund program should also contribute to meeting close-to-home recreation needs.
The Fund’s increase in authorized funding to its current level came with enactment of P.L. 95-42 in June 1977, which increased the LWCF to $900 million for FY 1978 and subsequent years. Congress also enacted P.L. 95-625, which created, among other things, the Urban Park and Recreation Recovery Program (UPARR), as a complement to the LWCF program. This program encouraged local governments to rehabilitate existing recreation facilities, demonstrate innovative programs, and plan for overall revitalization of community recreation systems.
Since 1965, funding for the grants program has averaged approximately $100 million per year, with a peak of $369 million in 1979. In the last 20 years, annual appropriations have decreased to a low of zero funding in 1982 and 1996-1999. However, as a direct by-product of the effort to enact the Conservation and Reinvestment Act, the drought ended in FY 2000 with appropriations that ranged from $140 million in FY 2002 to $28.3 million in FY 2006.
The LWCF is intended to use offshore lease revenue to fund recreation and conservation projects throughout the nation. Since its inception Congress and the various administrations (Democrat and Republican alike) have viewed this fund as one of those sources of revenue to raid. The Obama administration, for example, budgeted less than half of the authorized $900 million for FY 2009. And while the funding appropriated is shared with the entire nation, the damage is generally limited to the Gulf.
The policy changes needed are simple. First, raise the LWCF appropriation to no less than $1 billion annually. Second, pass legislation to permanently fund the LWCF, insulating the fund from raids. Third, expand the LWCF by dedicating additional OCS revenues to conservation and recreation efforts in the Gulf states. Fourth, appropriate the LWCF funds that previously were authorized but not spent (around $13 billion) for a one-time “get right with God” appropriation. Give priority to the Gulf states, and remove the matching-fund requirement for stateside grants in this one-time appropriation. As now structured, the LWCF requires matching funds from local grantees, insuring that the poorest will continue to remain without.
The LWCF is not a true trust fund in the way “trust fund” is generally understood in the private sector. The fund is credited with revenues totaling to $900 million annually, but Congress must authorize appropriations; if appropriations are not made from the fund, the revenues remain in the U.S. Treasury and can be spent for other federal activities. If these funds are spent for other activities, no interest is accrued in the LWCF account. In addition, because the fund goes through the annual appropriations process, the funds are subject to earmarks and other more precise directions from Congress each year.
“Deposits” to the LWCF are thus, in effect, only an authorization of expenditures that accumulate if the funds are not appropriated. Through FY2001, the total amount that could have been appropriated over the years was $24.5 billion, but only $11.4 billion has been appropriated.
The OCS lands are the property of all citizens of this country. The damage being done is restricted to a few. A law is already in place to begin to make this right, the Land and Water Conservation Fund. Now is the time for this administration and Congress to atone for the sins of the past, and to begin the long, painful process of recovery. Now is the time to finally make good on the promise.
The first decade of the millennium is past. How will those ten years be remembered? WW II is the 1940s, the cultural revolution is the 1960s, a roaring economy is the 1920s. How will we label the 2010s?
For many 9/11 will be the moment that brands the decade. Perhaps the wars in the Middle East will give 9/11 a run for its money, although all of these events bleed together, literally. For many, though, I suspect that the decade is the period when we were all greened.
This nation (and world) has passed through conservation eras before. The late 1890s and early 1900s were Roosevelt years. In nine short years Theodore Roosevelt (with help from Pinchot, Garfield, and Lacy) set aside over 230 million acres and established the standard for the world (I should mention, though, that Grant preserved Yellowstone, creating the world’s first national park). The early 1970s brought the environmental years, with Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring spurring the movement to clean our air and water. We often forget that it was President Nixon who brought about the Clear Water Act, Clean Air Act, the Endangered Species Act, and NEPA.
How ironic that the two most momentous periods in Amiercan conservation and environmental history were guided by Republican presidents. Times do change.
In most cases these eras can be tied to a single or series of catalyzing events. The 1929 Wall Street collapse, Pearl Harbor, the Selma march, the Tet offensive, and 9/11 were prelude to immense social and political change. In the case of 9/11, we are still in the midst of that shift.
Conservationists and environmentalists have similar cataclysmic events to point to. The Cuyahoga River Fire in 1969, Love Canal, the first Earth Day, and Three Mile Island all led to significant changes in public perception and policy. I still remember W. Eugene Smith’s vivid images in Life Magazine showing the effects of mercury poisoning in Minamata, Japan. Humans often need a dramatic event to crystallize the issues that are otherwise amorphous and poorly defined. The current lack of public concern about global climate change is a perfect example. Perhaps when Manhattan or Miami goes under the public will finally take note.
By “greened” I am referring to the popularization of environmental concerns. “Green” is a marketing term, a way of branding a product or act. A brand may well be a promise, but that promise is not always kept. In this past decade PR, marketing, and company flacks convinced the county (and the world) that a new age of sustainability had arrived. And, as with so much of marketing, no one actually took the time to look beyond these promises to see actual proof. Remember, in the green decade British Petroleum morphed into Beyond Petroleum. Now we see the proof that belies that claim in the Gulf of Mexico.
Let’s look past the hype and to the numbers. According to a recent article in New Scientist “the average fuel efficiency of the US vehicle fleet has risen by just 3 miles per gallon since the days of the Ford Model T, and has barely shifted at all since 1991.”
These are the conclusions reached by Michael Sivak and Omer Tsimhoni at the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute in Ann Arbor. They analysed the fuel efficiency of the entire US vehicle fleet of cars, motorcycles, trucks and buses from 1923 to 2006. Progress has stalled since then, though, despite growing environmental concerns. From 1991 to 2006 the average efficiency improved by only 1.8 per cent to 17.2 mpg (7.31 km/l).
The average size of a North American suburban home in 1950 was 800 sq ft, in 1970 it was 1500 sq ft, and in 2000 it was 2266 sq ft. According to the US Census Bureau, the average size of a US home as of 2006 is 2,469 square feet. In the same period, the average household size (number of people) dropped from 3.54 to around 2.5. Houses grow larger, and families grow smaller. Here is another scrap to remember – since at least 2005, there have been more TVs per household on average than people per household. I guess we need the TV’s to fill that extra space.
Surely public involvement in environmental issues is an area that showed an increase during the green decade? Here are the numbers. Gallup Poll 2010
The latest Gallup survey shows a decline in the percentage of people who are active in or sympathetic toward the environmental movement, and a doubling of those who are unsympathetic. Yes, environmental supporters still outnumber opponents by a wide margin, but wouldn’t we have expected growth in the age of green?
Even more dramatic is the decrease in the percentage of the American public that believes that the environmental movement is doing more harm than good.
Gallup survey, perceived impact
We rail about the oil industry, yet refuse to take the steps necessary to dramatically raise the average fleet mileage (and a CAFE standard of 34.1 by 2016 is hardly dramatic). We have smaller families to feed yet larger houses to heat, cool, and decorate. We buy green, yet act gray. What gives?
Let’s begin with awareness. Just how aware are Americans about the details of our environmental challenges? Young adults today are among the first to have taken environmental education classes (they were certainly absent when I attended school). We now have environmental learning centers, environmental educators, environmental tv channels, environmental cartoon shows, and environmental organizations constantly pushing environmental education. Shouldn’t we see a higher level of environmental knowledge and literacy than in the past?
But for most Americans, it [environmental literacy] falls far short. Most people accumulate a diverse and unconnected smattering of factoids, a few (sometimes incorrect) principles, numerous opinions, and very little real understanding. Research shows that most Americans believe they know more about the environment than they actually do. For example, 45 million Americans think the ocean is a source of fresh water; 120 million think spray cans still have CFCs in them even though CFCs were banned in 1978; another 120 million people think disposable diapers are the leading problem with landfills when they actually represent about 1% of the problem; and 130 million believe that hydropower is America’s top energy source, when it accounts for just 10% of the total. It is also why very few people understand the leading causes of air and water pollution or how they should be addressed…NEETF, Roper
If Americans struggle with the details, green marketers are more than willing to gloss over the facts for them. According to the American Marketing Association, green marketing is the marketing of products that are presumed to be environmentally safe. But what do they mean by presumed? What is safe? Who is sitting in judgment about what is or is not “green?” The auto industry gave Americans SUVs and Hummers splashing through wetlands on your television set while killing the electric car. The same industry has opposed meaningful CAFE standards since first considered. Exxon may donate to an environmental group, but then gives millions to global warming deniers. Check this for more information about greenwashing, and this older (but still germane) article about green marketing.
This is not to say that green marketing, PR, and communications can’t contribute. I will argue that given the American public’s penchant to buy what is being hawked, green marketing and communications could be a powerful voice and force for good. But to be such a force for good, marketers will need to be accurate, honest, and transparent. In other words, don’t use BP as the model for honest green PR.
Being greened, though, involves more than outside forces (the industries and their marketers). More importantly, we, the public, must be complicit for greenwashing to work. We have to suspend common sense and buy into the shtick.
Americans have been led to believe (and are willing to follow) that change can happen without sacrifice. To even mention sacrifice in American politics is certain death. We do not mention raising taxes (we fight our wars on credit), we do not talk about dramatic changes in transportation systems (we offer virtually meaningless mileage standards), and we want to keep our automobile culture without sacrificing clean beaches and safe seafood. We want all for nothing.
Here is an analogy. Drug consumption in the U.S. is well on its way to destroying a neighboring country – Mexico. Without our consumption, there is no drug war. Gas consumption in this U.S. works the same way, and its reach is global. The oil spilling onto our Gulf beaches is like cocaine washing ashore in Florida.
In this confusing, conflictive time, Americans are looking to their leaders for guidance. In the past, we have found answers from our clergy, elected officials, and the press. Now the clergy is either muted by scandal, or is itself politicized by social campaigners that link abortion, gay marriage, and the environment. The traditional press, the 4th Estate, is in economic meltdown, and environmental writers are an endangered species themselves. Want proof? After a 14-year run, Columbia has suspended its environmental journalism program. Congress has always been relatively easy to influence, but with increased campaign spending access is becoming even easier to buy. If you doubt this, just check campaign donations from the oil industry.
Who is left? What about advocacy groups, the nonprofits that campaign for social change? Remember that perfect storm? The green groups, I fear, have contributed to this blow up as well.
In the 1970’s groups such as the Sierra Club were instrumental in forcing the environmental legislation that shifted both American policy and perception. Losing their tax exempt status in those early skirmishes, the Sierra Club continues today with a concerted political effort. However, most environmental and conservation groups now steer clear of advocacy. In part this is due to their 501 (c) 3 IRS status which restricts political activity. But even in areas where they are able to act most have chosen not to. Why?
Perhaps in part this failure to act is because the environmental movement has calcified, and become unable to march to the front. I suspect in part it is due to an honest desire to avoid confrontation, to be “good citizens.” I also believe that in part the green groups quickly embrace those initiatives that are conflict free, and avoid those that may entail blood on the carpets. Notice how many green groups have rushed to the Last Child in the Woods campaign, a feel-warm-all-over effort if ever there was one. Of course we want our kids and grandkids to grow up with an appreciation for nature and the outdoors. But, honestly, will issues such as the Deepwater Horizon gulf gusher wait for 4th graders to be able to vote? And, more importantly, is there any proof that this environmental education effort will be any more effective than those of the past?
In the U.S. there are over 1 million 501 (c) 3 charity organizations, one for every 300 American men, women, and children. Between 1998 and 2008 the number of these organizations grew by over 64%. Of course not all are conservation groups (many are churches and religious groups), but the growth is remarkable nevertheless. In the environmental world, nonadvocacy organizations such as land conservancies and land trusts have enjoyed spectacular growth as well. We now have more and more groups competing for what is generally a same-sized pie. To survive, many have chosen to focus on local land and planning initiatives, and avoid politics. Even international groups such as The Nature Conservancy prefer to stand back from political advocacy. As a result we have more green groups and fewer green acolytes.
Of course all of these groups are desperate for funding, and many of the extractive industries (oil and gas, timber, mining) have responded by filling some of the gap. BP has donated millions to The Nature Conservancy, and ConocoPhillips has supported Audubon and conservation efforts around the country. Perhaps they are simply being good corporate citizens. But in an essay published in the Wall Street Journal, the influential neoconservative Irving Kristol counseled that “corporate philanthropy should not be, and cannot be, disinterested,” but should serve as a means “to shape or reshape the climate of public opinion.”
Most of the groups will deny (testily, I might add) any link between the money they receive and the purity (as one recently put it) of the mission. Perhaps. But an exchange between a donor and a recipient involves at least an implied quid pro quo. The company donates money, and receives, in turn, at least the good will and good name of the recipient. And, of course, those “good names” have been more than helpful in greening the American public.
Edward Abbey said, “the idea of wilderness needs no defense, it only needs defenders.” At no time in my life has this been more true. The Gulf gusher shows that no matter how much land you conserve, you can never buy enough. If you could buy enough, you can never adequately protect it from the outside world. Isolationism does not work in international policy or conservation. The defenders of nature must be advocates, engaged in a political system that makes decisions daily (such as whether or not to exempt a proposed well from an EIS) that directly impact the resources we strive to protect.
As Zaradic, Pergams, and Kareiva recently noted, “Ultimately, the fate of biodiversity and intact ecosystems may depend less on rates of habitat loss or invasive species, than on public perception of whether conservation should be supported at all.” In order to stem this tide of change, the green groups will need to slip outside of their skins and embrace their neighbors rather than just their fellow members and donors.
Abraham Lincoln said that “public sentiment is everything. With public sentiment, nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed.” The environmental movement must reenlist the public, and invite both their involvement and their sentiment. Perhaps the existing structures should be altered. Shellenberger and Nordhaus, in The Death of Environmentalism, argued that “above all else, we need to take a hard look at the institutions the movement has built over the last 30 years. Are existing environmental institutions up to the task of imagining the post-global warming world? Or do we now need a set of new institutions founded around a more expansive vision and set of values?”
Whatever is needed, the change will be forced from the outside rather than come from inside the current structure. Can the Tea Party be the only current movement that understands the power of grassroots activism? Shellenberger and Nordhaus believe that “we need to take an urgent step backwards before we can take two steps forward.” If this step backwards is one returning the movement to the basic concepts of public engagement and grassroots organizing, then I agree. Absent strong political (particularly presidential) leadership, there is no other choice.
Ted Eubanks
Austin and Galveston, Texas
14 June 2010
The BP/Deepwater Horizon/Transocean/Halliburton farce continues. Farce is a poor choice of words, since a farce, in the theatrical sense, is humorous. The Gulf gusher is not farce, or funny. It’s despicable.
Birds have taken front stage in this disaster, at times overshadowing the loss of human lives. The images of birds floundering, drenched in a coppery gelatin ooze, are gut-wrenching. No, we shouldn’t forget the eleven men killed in the initial explosion. Yet I believe it human nature to reach out to those creatures that are helpless in their own right. I suspect that the media will continue to stream the grim images of the dead and dying birds
Good. The world needs to see.
As the gusher continues to blow its toxic mix into the deeps of the Gulf, the toll is mounting. We have all seen the glassy eyed brown pelicans, cormorants, gulls, and terns as they convulse on the beaches. But what does the average Joe really know about these birds, or the whales, dolphins, turtles, manatees, fish, crabs, oysters, and such that are equally vulnerable? The public knows only what it can see. If a bird is oiled, washes to a beach, and then is photographed by a press generally restricted from the area, it counts. The rest, the 99.9999% that never surfaces, is imaginary. A dead bird, fish, turtle, or whale out of sight is out of the public’s mind.
Here is what is at risk, what is dying as I write these words.
Waterbirds is an appropriate term for many of these coastal birds (I avoid the word species since it depersonalizes them). They breed, nest, feed, preen, loaf, forage, hide, display, and fly over and around these waters. The two, water and birds, are inextricable. Oil in water means oil on birds.
This is a tricolored heron, once called (much more appropriately) the Louisiana heron. Scientist tend to squeeze the life out of bird names. Least sandpiper. Lesser yellowlegs. Black tern. Red knot. Where is the magic? Where is the poetry in these names?
Tricolored heron
This heron is neck-deep in the waters of the Laguna Madre. The city of South Padre Island discharges fresh water from its waste water treatment plant near their convention center, and this spot has become popular for birds and birders. Birds such as this heron need fresh water to drink and bathe in, and in the hypersaline Laguna fresh water is hard to find.
Remember that point. All water is not equal. Some birds have enlarged salt glands that allow them to actually drink salt water. Some tolerate brackish water, and some demand only fresh water. All die when their preferred water is fouled with oil.
Look closely into this heron’s eyes. This is a living, breathing, pulsating creature, a unique individual, who, like tens of thousands of its kind, is now looking down the barrel of a gun. At the turn of the last century herons and egrets were decimated by hunters who shot them for their plumes. A feather or skinned bird atop a woman’s hat was in vogue then. Early conservationists such as Theodore Roosevelt, George Grinnell Bird, and Frank Chapman began the Audubon Movement to stop the slaughter. The guns have been silenced, but not the death.
Roosevelt conserved over 230 million acres in his nine years in office, including the first 51 bird reservations (now national wildlife refuges). Many of the earliest refuges are along the Gulf coast. How ironic that these same refuges are now threatened by a menace unknown in his time (although he did have the foresight to break Standard Oil into pieces).
Roseate spoonbills
Roseate spoonbills were not prime targets of the plume hunters since their feathers fade. The brilliant pink of a spoonbill is from the crustacea they filter out of the rich Gulf waters. But since spoonbills nested in the same rookeries as the other herons and egrets, their young were lost as well when the hunters came. Over the past century these waterbirds have begun to slowly recover from the millinery slaughter, yet they now face another threat. We have shot them, drained their marshes, and now pollute their waters.
Reddish egret
Here is another egret you should know – the reddish egret. The reddish is the egret of the immediate Gulf, rarely ranging any distance inland. Audubon estimates that this bird has a continental population of around 12,000 (no more than 70,000 globally). At this moment these birds are nesting along the coast, with the next generation not yet able to fly. During the winter these egrets aggregate in large feeding flocks in the Laguna Madre of south Texas. What if the oil has shifted there? What about the whooping cranes that return to the central Texas coast in October? What about the redheads that winter in the Laguna, estimated to be 90% of this duck’s entire world population?
The whooping crane is not the only endangered species that winters along the Gulf coast. The piping plovers that breed in the Great Plains winter here as well. In fact, virtually all of the world’s population winters between Florida and Texas.
Piping plover
These birds feed along the beaches and sand flats, spending as long as 8 months gorging on interstitial organisms like polychaetes (worms in the sand). What if this sand is oiled? What if their food supply has been destroyed? Shouldn’t we have thought about this before poking a hole 5000 feet deep in the Gulf? How could the federal government have exempted this well from assessing the potential environmental impacts?
In this gusher (please, this is not a spill) oil permeates the water column. Even the sheen on the surface matters.
This black skimmer at the top of the page does as the name implies. The bird skims the surface of the water with its lower mandible extended into the water. When it feels a small fish, it quickly slams the bill shut. But in oil? What if there are no small fish to skim?
Eventually, the damage will be assessed, and we will begin the inane discussion about the dollar value of what has been lost. Let me ask a simple question. How much is your pet worth? How much would I have to pay you for little Fluffy? I have three cats, and I would never place a value on their lives. The joy they bring to my life is beyond a price.
I value birds in the same way. No sentient human on this planet has lived a life apart from birds. They are with us every day of our lives. We see them soar while driving to work, and we hear their songs while we barbecue in the backyard. Birds are ever present, and the most direct path for humans to find nature.
No, I will not tell you what a bird is worth. But I can tell you the economic value of watching them. According to the US Fish and Wildlife Service, birders spend over $35 billion annually in this country. Yes, that’s billion with a “b.” Of that staggering amount, over $12 billion is trip related, with the remainder ($23 billion) going to equipment and supplies.
Here is how these expenditures break out for the Gulf states:
Wildlife Viewing Annual Expenditures
As you can see, wildlife viewers in Gulf coast states spend nearly $4 billion annually. Of course, not all of this is spent in coastal counties and communities. But Gulf birding is decidedly coastal, therefore it is safe to presume that the majority of the dollars are being at least generated by an interest in coastal birds. Most of the Gulf coast communities lack the retail facilities to adequately capture the sale of equipment and supplies, but certainly the expenditures for food and lodging stay along the coast. Even a conservative assessment would still credit birding with contributing hundreds of millions of dollars to the coastal Gulf.
But gross expenditures do not tell all of the story. The Gulf may be home to the American petroleum and petrochemical industries, particularly the segment of the Gulf between Corpus Christi and Baton Rouge, but one visit to this region will show you that most of that wealth goes somewhere else. Port Lavaca, Palacios, Bay City, Freeport, Clute, Texas City, Baytown, Sabine Pass, Port Arthur, Groves, New Iberia, Morgan City, Houma, and Thibodaux; wander through these coastal communities and follow the money. Where are the billions being earned annually by these immense companies? Why are these coastal communities so downtrodden and poor?
Simple. The dollars leave town. Yes, they do collect in places like Houston, but in general the coast itself is a plantation economy. The impact of the revenues that come from birding, fishing, hunting, and other types of recreation is therefore heightened in these otherwise depauperate communities. Now even this is threatened.
Caspian tern
President Theodore Roosevelt, our first and greatest conservation president, said that “the nation behaves well if it treats the natural resources as assets which it must turn over to the next generation increased; and not impaired in value.” In the Gulf of Mexico we have not come remotely close to following his lead. We have drained the swamps, filled the marshes, channelized the rivers, dredged the harbors, polluted the waters with agricultural runoff and urban waste, and now we are suffocating a coast already on life support.
The Gulf coast has value if the birds have value. The coast has worth if its people have worth. For far too long this part of America has been servile, its people content to gather up the scraps from the master’s table. Edward Abbey said “God bless America. Let’s save some of it.” I agree. Why not start with the Gulf?
