Tittabawassee River... Wetlands... Mitigation Updates... and oh yes, Awards for Ignorance!

Tuesday I had the opportunity to comment on why I think the Legislative Subcommittee of the Saginaw County Commission should support Senate Bill 390, also known as the Homeowners' Fairness Act. I didn't actually count every person but there appeared to be as many of 'us' as there were of 'them' attending.

• Speaking for 'them' - one resident couple from the floodplain suing for the big money from Dow Chemical (wearing their death-head t-shirts) and two 'representatives' from Lone Tree Council - who do NOT live on the floodplain... Rhittic and Miller both! Ms. Rheddick actually fumed with anger, even with her laryngitis, and even went so far as to play her 'pregnant women, children and fetus' card. If Mrs. Rhetoric has a problem with fetuses and children she should remember the meaning of this simple word - genetics!
• Speaking for 'us' - actual residents of the Tittabawassee River floodplain - every single one! Our stakeholder residents included three residents from Greenpoint, business people, and several of us from along the River Road floodplain. Speaking for us included representatives of the people, elected and not, from the Saginaw County Board of Commissioners and Chamber of Commerce.
• The committee walked away undecided!!! Who says it's not all about politics, eh?

Rapanos awaits Supreme Court arguments
This article by Daily News staff and The Associated Press, published in the Midland Daily News on October 12. This case, based on federal Clean Water Act laws about unpermitted discharges to "navigable waters" goes a bit far. It is a classic example of government entering privately owned property in the guise of protecting the environment. If they can do it to Mr. Rapanos they can do it to you and me. Oh! That's right! They already have entered our backyards to 'help' us!

In case you haven't already seen this article in the Midland Daily News from October 5 - Rapanos wetland case could be heard by Supreme Court this session - Ralph Wirtz explained, in his simply elegant style, the lack of common sense used by the government in defining 'wetlands.' FYI, that is exactly the way wetlands AND floodplains are defined in our fair state. We are ALL potential victims of the MDEQ and all of their misguided legal mumbo-jumbo!

Here's a little item I collected last month - Wednesday September 21, 2005 as published in The Ann Arbor News: Dreams derailed when they built on a wetland. Owner not informed until foundation poured. Can you imagine!??? This fellow bought the land... got a building permit... began building... and then was told he was doing something illegal!!! Now it's really costing him - for nothing - except an overzealous bureaucratic agency!!! Yes, we NEED homeowners rights legislation in Michigan.

Did you see the 'ad' in Sunday's October 9 Midland Daily News? DEQ and Dow Announce Community Involvement Process - Dow and DEQ have decided, based on input from previous meetings, to hold open community meetings on a quarterly basis with possible other meetings in between. The purpose of these meetings is to 'inform the community, improve decisions, increase the number of people participating, and build trust among participants.'

Harvard's Award to Erin Brockovich and the Public Health (Credibility) Impact by Elizabeth M. Whelan, Sc.D., M.P.H. Ah yes, Ms. Brockovich got a 'busybody' award from a university we all think of as prestigious! What is this world coming to? Read what Elizabeth Whelan has to say about this. I quote here here:

Over the past two weeks, I (Elizabeth Whalen, ACSH) have been overwhelmed with e-mails and calls from members and supporters of the group I head, the American Council on Science and Health, expressing variations on this general sentiment: "I have long argued that public health is not a science, not a serious discipline. It is an ideologically-fueled movement, one which has disdain for science and facts. The so-called 'public health movement' has little if anything to do with protecting health, and it has everything to do with attacking the profit-making system, free enterprise, and traditional values -- and using the courts to manipulate a re-distribution of wealth."

Did I mention another comment received recently here at TRVoice? Anonymous said...

I live along the Tittabawassee River, though my property doesn't run back far enough to reach the rivers edge. We get about 4 to 6" of water in back yard every spring, and last year had about 18". I am a gardener, and have not had gardening problems, and the deer love my hosta. Other animals are also a bit of a problem. So, the dioxin doesn't seem to have affected the wild live in my area. Other residences have though with their skull and cross bone signs they post in their yards. I will be putting our home up for sale with in the next 6 mths because of relocation to northern Michigan. If my property values are affected, or if I can't sell my home, it will be because of the bad media publicity and dumb yard signs, not the dioxin. Let's start a class action against the Lone Tree Council for loss of property values. http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=6530233&postID=112731006281842335

I remain healthy and busy along the Tittabawassee River floodplain! Did I mention that my friends and I were the healthy pregnant women carrying those healthy fetuses that turned into healthy children many of whom then carried their own healthy fetuses that turned into healthy children that turned into healthy adults... all from back when we didn't even know there was dioxin in our backyards because Dow hadn't yet figured out how to measure it in such minute quantities. Definition (for the econutz) minute = tiny!