Wednesday, 04 Sep 2002

Over and Out

"The Bush administration won this ballgame 44-0." That was how Brandon MacGillis, a spokesperson for the Washington, D.C.-based National Environmental Trust, summed up the World Summit on Sustainable Development, which wraps up today in Johannesburg, South Africa. Like MacGillis, many greens saw the 10-day conference as a step backward or, at best, a stalemate, with human rights and environmental organizations fighting to prevent governments from weakening existing international agreements. One triumph, however, did occur during the final hours of the summit: Russia confirmed that it would ratify the Kyoto Protocol on climate change in the near future, a step that would bring the treaty into effect for the 80-plus countries that have signed on. The U.S. does not number among those nations -- which is one reason why Secretary of State Colin Powell, who led the U.S. delegation in Johannesburg, was booed and heckled incessantly during a five-minute speech he gave at the summit today. Unfazed, Powell said he was confident that the hecklers did not represent the majority opinion, and he defended his country's much-maligned resistance to establishing target dates for meeting the summit's goals by saying that concrete actions were more important than paper agreements.

Rhode Island Lead

Rhode Island has taken eight paint manufacturers to court in a first-ever attempt by a state to hold companies accountable for decades of child lead poisoning. Rhode Island, which has one of the highest rates of such poisoning in the country, is claiming the manufacturers created a public nuisance by selling the paint. The paint companies counter that problems stem from improper maintenance, and that landlords, not manufacturers, should be held liable. Other states are following the dispute closely and are poised to initiate similar lawsuits if Rhode Island is successful. Lead paint was banned nationwide in 1978, when it was shown to cause health problems in children, such as learning disabilities, neurological damage, and even death. Last year, 8.1 percent of Rhode Island children under the age of six had elevated lead levels.

Fire Him

Allan Fitzsimmons, the man chosen by the Bush administration to head its wildfire prevention program, does not believe in ecosystems and says the extinction of threatened and endangered species would not be a crisis. Fitzsimmons was tasked last week with reducing fire danger on Interior Department lands through the newly formed Healthy Forests Initiative, but environmentalists say the appointment confirms their fears that the initiative is just a smokescreen for expanding logging on public lands. President Bush wants logging companies to thin forests, theoretically to reduce fire danger, in exchange for the right to harvest commercially valuable trees. Under the White House plan, forest protections would be suspended and it would be harder for environmentalists to sue to block thinning. Fitzsimmons, a free-market policy analyst aligned with libertarian and conservative think tanks, has written papers calling ecosystems human constructs and criticizing those who try to "accommodate nonexistent ecosystem needs."

Sin Diesel

Long-term exposure to diesel exhaust probably triggers a wide range of respiratory illnesses and causes lung cancer, according to a study released yesterday by the U.S. EPA. Based on decades of research, the study found "persuasive" evidence that the diesel engines operating on highways, farms, and construction sites around the country are hazardous to human health. The same conclusions have been reached before by various world health organizations and California agencies, but still, the new study lends urgency and credibility to efforts by the EPA and others to improve emissions standards for large trucks and buses under the Clean Air Act. In May, a federal appeals court upheld a Clinton-era regulation that would cut particulate matter from the diesel-powered vehicles by 90 percent and nitrogen oxides by 95 percent beginning in 2007. The Bush administration has largely stood by tougher emissions standards as well, despite heavy opposition from truck manufacturers and fuel refiners.

Hoopa It Up!

In a movement that could change the course of U.S. land management, Native Americans are pushing for laws that would give them veto power over development projects on historically sacred sites. Despite fierce opposition to granting Native Americans such power, especially on non-reservation land, the legal push has made some headway: A bill is nearing passage in California, support is growing for similar legislation in Congress, and the U.S. Supreme Court recently upheld a lower court ruling prohibiting logging on a sacred site of the Hoopa tribe in Northern California -- even though the land is privately owned by a non-native person. The trend has been spurred on by fears among Native Americans that the Bush administration's emphasis on maximizing domestic energy sources could lead to drilling and digging on sacred lands. Among the threatened lands they hope to protect: the Zuni Salt Lake in New Mexico and sacred trails on what was once Quechan tribal land in Indian Pass, Calif.