Louisville Peace Web

Board Members---Karen Cassidy, Louis Hammond, Lee Howard and Barbara Sexton-Smith; board Chairman Joseph Vibbert. Next scheduled meeting; June 18 9am after public hearing (Barrett Avenue).

Ambient Air Monitoring & the Air Quality Index; Air Pollution links

EPA---Our area envirofacts; local regulated facilities; Louisville air releases

American Lung Association of Kentucky---Carolyn Embry, environmental specialist.

Environmental Defense's scorecard--find Louisville by zip code

Greater Louisville Sierra Club

Justice Resource Center---774-1116

Kentucky Pollution Prevention Center

Louisville Audubon Society---email

West Jefferson County Community Taskforce

Local Lobbyists

Greater Louisville Inc. (lobbied against higher air quality standards for industry)

NATIONAL ISSUES

The 2004 Budget and the Environment--National Resources Defense Council

The Bush administration's proposed budget for fiscal year 2004 continues the assault on environmental protection that started on day one of the administration. This two-pronged attack involves starving federal agencies of the resources needed to accomplish their missions and directing them to take actions that weaken environmental protections.

This year, however, there is an added twist: To disguise the magnitude of its proposed budget reductions, the administration is comparing its FY 2004 funding request to its request for FY 2003 -- even though Congress likely will reject the most serious cuts it proposed last year.

Here's a quick look inside the numbers:

Overall discretionary funding for the environment is slated for a $1.6 billion reduction (-5.5 percent) compared to FY 2002, falling from $29.6 billion to $28.0 billion.
When factoring in mandatory spending for FY 2004 from programs such as the Farm Bill, the gap narrows. But funding would still drop by more than $700 million from FY 2002.
What is worse, when comparing the discretionary budget proposal to the amount of money needed in FY 2004 to keep government activities at the same level as in FY 2002 (taking inflation and other changing expenses into account), then the shortfall balloons to $2.2 billion. (See Budget for FY 2004, "Analytical Perspectives," budget authority for Environment and Natural Resources, Function 300, pp. 337 and 485).

<full article>

Invoking War to Ease Rules---New York Times Editorial, March 22, 2003 (for News

that provoked editorial, link here)

The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee has begun a campaign it calls, portentously, "Operation End Extremism." The purpose is to expose "the increasing burden U.S. soldiers face on military training bases because of irrational enforcement of environmental laws." The whole thing might be dismissed as another ideological stunt from the committee's reactionary chairman, James Inhofe of Oklahoma, were it not for the fact that the Pentagon is trying to do the same thing. With White House backing, the Defense Department has asked Congress to approve a program it calls the "Readiness and Range Preservation Initiative," which would broadly exempt military bases and some operations from environmental regulation.

The Pentagon's basic complaint, echoed by Mr. Inhofe, is that the laws governing air pollution, toxic waste dumps, endangered species and even marine mammals — most of which have been on the books for decades — interfere with training and readiness exercises necessary for national security. The Pentagon thus seeks a host of exemptions. For instance, it would ease the hazardous waste laws to exclude explosives and other potentially toxic material on firing ranges. It seeks exemptions from the Endangered Species Act whenever its duty under that law to protect animals interferes with training operations. And, environmentalists say, the proposed law could transfer to state governments the enormous costs of cleaning up thousands of contaminated sites on military property.

Of particular interest is the Marine Mammals Protection Act, which is also the first target on Mr. Inhofe's hit list. The act is the nation's one legal instrument for protecting whales, dolphins, sea otters, manatees and the like. But the Navy claims that protecting these creatures restricts its ability to test sonar and other underwater detection devices. A recent court-ordered settlement makes about one million square miles of ocean available for such testing but that, apparently, is insufficient. (complete editorial)

To contact the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee and Senator Inhofe himself.

The Marine Mammal Protection Act

RESOURCES

CorpWatch---holding corporations accountable---Halliburton and the present Iraq War

Environmental Justice Resource Center Annotated Bibliography---People of Color; Environmental Resources Directory, the environment and minority communities.

Environmental Defense Fund

EPA---United States Environmental Protection Agency

Greenpeace

Harvard's Working Group on Environmental Justice

League of Conservation Voters---Newsroom--updates on timely conservation issues

Pew Center on Global Climate Change

Sierra Club