President Obama -- Don't Fund Deepening

Originally written by me, Maya van Rossum, the Delaware Riverkeeper, as guest blogger for Maria Rodale, CEO of Rodale, posted at http://www.mariasfarmcountrykitchen.com/

For over 20 years I and my organization, the Delaware Riverkeeper Network, have been challenging the Army Corps of Engineers’ proposal to deepen the Delaware River’s main channel by 5 feet for 102 miles from Philadelphia to the Ocean.  And in the next few days President Obama is going to decide whether or not to spend our tax dollars on this project by including it in his 2013 Presidential budget. But, deepening the Delaware River could devastate communities  that depend on this fragile ecosystem for jobs; it would destroy the habitat for countless populations of fish, shellfish, and migratory birds; and it will damage the wetlands that for years have provided safety from catastrophic storms. 

We, a non-profit organization, have found ourselves representing the citizens, fisherfolk, boaters, birders, and river communities and facing off against the mammoth agency that is the Army Corps of Engineers’ along with big corporations who favor the project.

For years the Delaware River deepening project has been kept alive with dribs and drabs of money by the congressional earmark process – with just a few Pennsylvania politicians keeping it on the taxpayer infusion line. Since last year’s ban on congressional earmarks should have cut off the corporate welfare fund for this project these very same politicians have lobbied for creation of a “slush” fund that can be used to fund congressional pet projects, like this one, and they are also trying to twist the arm of President Obama with direct lobbying and heavy handed messaging to force him to fund the project through his presidential budget.

Since President Obama has made jobs and community health a political priority, he should soundly reject the Delaware River deepening. Here are a few reasons why:

·      Deepening jeopardizes jobs. The jobs that depend upon a healthy and clean Delaware River would be threatened if the Army Corps has its way. Jobs in the oyster industry, for example, would be disrupted, and these jobs generate 80 million dollars of income and economic return every year. Income for every day Americans who use that hard-earned money to support their families and their communities.

·      Deepening damages the wetlands. Wetlands help protect communities from storm damage and deepening the Delaware will cause the River to erode away these amazing natural areas.

·      Deepening threatens wildlife. Horseshoe crabs from the Delaware River provide an essential national function: their blood (drawn non-lethally) contains a substance needed to test vaccines used across the country to make sure they are free of contamination.  Horseshoe crab spawning success is also critical for successful migration of many species of birds including 4 already on the path to extinction. The migratory bird and horseshoe crab phenomenon generates $34 million annually from ecotourism in the region.

·      Deepening destroys the health of the river. Dredging the bottom of the river and disposing of these contaminated “spoils” on land will cause the reintroduction of toxins and heavy metals long held captive in sediments on the river floor.

In these and other ways deepening the Delaware violates our obligation as good stewards of the earth, and threatens the health of our communities.  Congress’ independent investigative arm, the Government Accountability Office, has three times challenged claims that deepening will benefit business in the area and even the Army Corps has said it will not bring increased goods up the river. Army Corps documents confirm that the ports of the region can be equally served at the current 40-foot depth, and likely for less cost. Deepening, however, will cost taxpayers $277 million and according to a nationally recognized expert, will likely lose taxpayer money. 

For all of these reasons, President Obama should not provide any funding to deepen the Delaware River.  His decision on whether or not to do so is being made within the next few days as he prepares to release his proposed Presidential budget – it is critial he decide to keep the Delaware River deepening out of his proposed budget.  So please, take a moment to let the President know that deepening the Delaware is not how you want your tax dollars spent.

Sign our letter to the President today to say – No funding for the Delaware River Deepening – it hurts the environment, it hurts people, and it hurts jobs. http://www.delawareriverkeeper.org/act-now/urgent-details.aspx?Id=100 And share this with as many people as you can. Our voices, together, can make a difference.

 To learn more about the project go to www.delawareriverkeeper.org

The Dance of the Birds

I've been reading "Last Child in the Woods", a fabulous book about the healing, educational, nurturing, learning and soothing power of nature in the lives of children, families and really all people.  The level of scientific and real world documentation on the value of nature for helping people learn, grow and deal with health and learning disabilities (including ADHD) is phenomenal.

As much as I am out in nature for my work and in my personal life, enjoying this book is a powerful reminder that I need to be sure that I and my children are taking the time to learn from the earth, which of course reminds us why it is so powerful and important to protect it from harm.

The book is inspiring me to take extra effort to appreciate nature with my family.

It was on this past weekend while I was doing just that when i witnessed a spectacular bird display -- exceeding the beauty of any fireworks display in its moving majesty.  And I wanted to share -- so we can all be reminded that when we take the time to look, nature is always more than willing to inspire us to be better people with its beauty and power.

(Watch video below or click on "The Dance of the Birds" title to this blog post to see it on youtube and be able to make it full screen -- and be sure to watch as the show builds with more and more birds, so much that you can hear the swoosh of their wings.)

Army Corps Cooks Books Again on Delaware River Deepening

Economically, ecologically, for jobs and/or protection of the public Deepening the Delaware River is not a good idea.  And now there is a new report which, using the Army Corps’ own findings, demonstrates that this project is a big loser for the taxpayers – just as was found based on GAO findings years ago, every dollar invested in deepening brings less than a dollar back.  Environmentally the project is a major threat to our River and region, economically it is a worse than a wasted investment.

The Government Accountability Office has three times challenged the claims of economic benefit from deepening – with the most recent report issuing just this past year, April 2010.   In its most recent report, the GAO documented once again that the Army Corps failed to provide Congress or the public with accurate, up-to-date, complete information regarding the economic ramifications of deepening and in so doing failed to provide the objective assessment Congress needs to make an informed choice about continuing to fund the project.  This GAO report followed a 2002 Report and 2006 Congressional testimony provided by the GAO characterizing similar concerns.  Each report was followed by a quick “upgrade” by the Army Corps, and each “upgrade” was soundly refuted by experts and followed up by subsequent GAO actions mentioned. 

In apparent response to the GAO 2010 report the Army Corps conducted and released its 8^th economic analysis of deepening.  It is noteworthy that the Army Corps never made this document publicly available until the Delaware Riverkeeper Network learned of its existence and requested it via the Freedom of Information Act.  The Delaware Riverkeeper Network has had the nationally recognized expert, Dr. Robert Stearns, review the report and based on the information it contains it is clear that deepening the Delaware is unnecessary to serve the ports and a detriment to the taxpayers that would be expected to pay for it.

Dr. Stearns found basic, fundamental flaws in the analysis done by the Army Corps which prove their positive economic claims for the project are severely over-inflated.  In short, merely correcting for a fundamental and basic economic analysis claim identified by Dr. Stearns, the benefit cost ratio for the project falls to a mere 1.1 to 1, i.e. at best one can claim 10 cents of net taxpayer benefit for every dollar invested in the Delaware River deepening project.  When additional errors are taken into consideration, this figure will fall even further, supporting a conclusion that when accurately assessed the Delaware Deepening project yields less than $1 of benefit for taxpayers for every $1 spent on it – i.e. it is a net loss for the taxpayers and therefore cannot warrant the nearly $300 million it requires for construction.  And this is without even considering the wealth of environmental harm and damage to river-dependent jobs that will result if this project is allowed to move forward.

In addition to Dr. Stearns findings, there are additional findings documented in a supplemental report which further demonstrate the economic failings of the project and document why it must be soundly rejected by fiscally-minded elected officials seeking to ensure the proper use and investment of tax dollars during these hard economic times.

In the supplemental report we point out:

·      That the Army Corps continues to fail to acknowledge all of the oil facility closings in its calculations;

·      That the Corps claims benefits from the broadkill beach spoil disposal portion of the project and yet Delaware and the US Fish and Wildlife Service have documented the project is a harm;

·      That when the Army Corps dredged the 12 miles known as reach C they found they had underestimated the spoils to be disposed of by 38% -- apply that to the project as a whole and we have a lot more spoils which means more cost and harm, none of which the Corps includes in its analysis;

·      That the Army Corps’ analysis claims to update the benefits of the project but does not attempt to update the costs – thus giving a skewed picture using a mixture of time frames.

 When all of these are included, the case against this project gets even more rock solid.

Considering the lack of benefits, there can be no argument for accepting the level of environmental harm deepening brings.

What is at risk? 

Oysters, horseshoe crabs, shorebirds and the hundreds of millions of dollars economic benefit dependent upon them.  Including in the biomedical industry that needs healthy and growing horseshoe crab populations for testing that protects us from poisonous vaccines.

Even with the Army Corp’s false analysis, at most for this nearly $300 million dollar expenditure, the Corps is talk about just over $13 million of benefit a year. 

The jobs and income associated with the River that are put on the line by this project are valued at far more, for example:

$80 million of economic benefit a year associated with oysters,

$34 million with birding,

$150 million with the biomedical industry

 Also at risk are:

Endangered species including the atlantic and shortnose sturgeon which need protection from extinction but also, who if allowed to rebound would themselves supports hundreds of millions in jobs and economic benefits as they did in our region’s not so distant past.

The marshlands that protect our coasts and coastal communities.

The quality of the river from both contaminants and increased salt water intrusion to unnatural levels that put at risk drinking water, fish and other important communities.

The Army Corps has misled congress and the public about this project time and time again.

When it comes to the fact that the Army Corps has tried to deceive us once again you don’t’ need to take our word for that – just take the word of the army corps – Bob stearns found it right in their own reports – again!

The project is a proven loser.

Assertions that deepening will inject millions of dollars into the region’s economies and create tens of thousands of jobs have not been the subject of any reports or reviews made available to the public or the experts for considered review.  Even the Army Corps estimates only $13.65 million of net annual economic benefit—a rather small sum when one considers the associated harms and that these benefits are the result of economic efficiencies, not increased goods or jobs.

The fact is that there is nothing on the record to demonstrate or document that deepening will lead to the immense economic benefits claimed by project supporters; even the Corps refutes their claims:

The Army Corps has stated that the “mix and volume of cargoes coming to the benefiting terminals will be equivalent for the current 40 foot or the proposed 45 foot channel depths. There is no induced tonnage as a result of the deepening project.  … The future volume of cargo passing through the Delaware River port system is determined by … factors that are not affected in any measurable way by the channel depth.”

Don't Deepen the Delaware -- Write your Congressman today!

Public Service or Public Sacrifice?

Photo by Amy Roe

I’ve often heard that being elected to public office is about sacrifice.  Naively, I thought that meant personal sacrifice on the part of the elected official to ensure they did the very best job they could for their constituents.  Unfortunately, it seems that the “sacrifice” that many public officials are willing to make these days is sacrificing the public, the environment and the health of future generations in order to serve their own personal and political agendas, including those of their political friends and donors.

I didn’t think the sacrifices of public service would include the 19 families in Dimock, PA who have lost their clean and healthy drinking water because it was contaminated by Marcellus shale gas drilling. The State is choosing not to ensure the long-term replacement or restoration of the water by the drillers – instead the State has allowed the drilling company responsible to stop their delivery and pursuit of a suitable and long-term water supply for these families.  I also didn’t think the sacrifices of public service would include the growing volume of families, environments and kids-yet-to-be-born, to the shale gas drillers who are wreaking such havoc wherever they seem to go.

I didn’t think the sacrifices of public service would include the oystermen, the fishermen, the bed and breakfasts, the entire population of Delaware River Atlantic Sturgeon, and much more that will be harmed by deepening the Delaware River – a project that Pennsylvania is going to use taxpayer dollars to pay for. The Government Accountability Office has three times challenged the Army Corps’ assertions of the economic benefits of the project and so the federal government isn’t putting forth the money – nor are the businesses who claim they support the project. 

I didn’t think the sacrifices of public service included the families who live downstream from major development and gas drilling projects and will suffer the resulting dangers and pollution because Pennsylvania legislators would rather make life easier for the developers and drillers rather than require basic safety measures like ensuring protection of the floodplains, buffers and woodlands that prevent growing and future flooding problems, water pollution and air pollution.

And now we have the Pennsylvania Legislators willing to strip communities of their legal authorities to protect themselves from damaging community and environmental projects like gas drilling, to learn more and get active on this one see: http://www.delawareriverkeeper.org/act-now/urgent-details.aspx?Id=97

I think it is about time that public service be about serving the public, protecting the health, safety, future and needs of the public.