Newsbriefs

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(from February 2, 2006)

Rail Trail Talk
A public workshop on future uses for the old Ulster & Delaware railbed from Kingston to Highmount, now under the lease of the Catskill Mountain Railroad, based in Phoenicia, has been set to take place in Olive the evening of Thursday, February 9. Despite erroneous published reports, the session will not be a discussion of whether or not to wrest control of the railroad right-of-way from the CMRR, but to talk about elements in a new Ulster & Delaware Railroad Corridor Trail Feasibility Study, which includes a first look at new opportunities that could open up the rail line, much of it bordering the Ashokan Reservoir, to pedestrian and bicycle use as well as its current use for tourist rail trains in the Phoenicia, Kingston and Highmount area, oiperated by CMRR, the Kingston-based Trolley Museum of New York and the Delaware and Ulster Railride out of Arkville.
The purpose of the new federally-funded study, according to Ulster County planner Dennis Doyle, “is to analyze the feasibility and potential costs for a phased implementation of a trail system within the Ulster & Delaware Railroad Corridor right-of-way from Kingston Point Park on the Hudson River to the Belleayre Mountain Ski Resort at the Delaware County line.”
“The study was begun at the request of local citizens and legislators,” Doyle said, noting that the recent release of a federal Rail Trail Use study, which suggested multiple uses for railbeds, seemed to have sparked interest. “We want tro talk about opportunities and problems with those opportunities.”
In the latter area, he said, were such constraints as the old U&D right-of-way’s proximity to New York City Department of Environmnetal Protection lands, which carry their own strict regulations; as well as width and topographic constraints that could make the addition of second trail opportunities difficult.
Dave Reardon of DURR in Delaware County said that his organization currently operates 26 miles of rail trails for pedestrians and bicycles in addition to a19 miles of working rail tracks. Only a few miles have been usable for both functions, he said, due to federal regulations that make multi-use configurations difficult for single track rail right-of-ways.
Reardon said he would not be able to attend the upcoming meeting but would have representatives there.
Doyle said he was hoping the upcoming session would draw “at least 100 local people,” including active members of the CMRR, who have been involved in previous meetings about the feasibility study.
“We want a lot of input on this,” he said.
The CMRR has been methodically repairing the old U$D rail lines built in the early part of the 20th century since getting a 25-year lease on the county-owned right-of-way in 1991. They currently operate regular train rides on 7 miles of track between Phoenicia and the Mt. Tremper area.
The workshop is scheduled to take place on Thursday, February 9, from 7:00 pm to 9:00 pm at Olive Town Meeting Hall, 50 Bostock Road in Shokan, just off Route 28. It is being held there because of the facilitiy’s central location in the involved corridor, and because Olive councilwoman Linda Burkhardt was reportedly instrumental in calling for the new feasibility study.
For additional information contact UCTC at (845) 340-3340. To see the feasibility study materials, visit www.co.ulster.ny.us/planning/tran.html.

Complicated
This year's 137% spike in Phoenicia's water district taxes will be a one-time occurrence according to Supervisor Bob Cross Jr.who says that in 2007 he expects water taxes to "go down to the same level as 2005 or lower."
Cross, who said the town is now "undertaking a top-to-bottom review and revision of everything" in the hamlet's water district, explained that "a large part of the 2006 increase will be for the annual payment of the bond that's outstanding." Whether the total amount of money that individuals pay for water will go down significantly next year isn't clear yet, although changes in the structure of those payments does appear to be in the works.
According to Cross, the lion's share - about $146,000 of Phoenicia's $163,000 water budget - comes from money that will be raised by taxes, with only about $17,000 coming from user fees. Going forward, Cross believes the relationship between those two income streams should be basically reversed, with most of the costs covered directly by the system's users in the form of fees.The result, says Cross, is that the rates remain artificially low and don't actually reflect the system's operating costs, so that residential users have effectively ended up subsidizing the hamlet's commercial users. Those rates will have to rise, he says, but increases "will be well within manageable limits."
"In the future," says Cross, "we've also got to find ways to finance the remaining $160,000 in increased capital costs to cover the new infiltration gallery, generator, and automatic valving system. For this purpose we are well into the process of going after every grant in sight."

Pending Jail
Even though work at the County Jail is almost done, according to contractors, no one should expect to start moving in for at least another two months because it will take that long to get the long-awaited and hugely overspent facility temporary certificates of occupancy. The jail was originally scheduled for completion in April, 2004.
Members of the county legislatures committee overseeing construction of the new Law Enforcement Center have also said in recent weeks that they can’t be sure when the new facility will be able to accept inmates.
“We are going to set up meeting with the commission of corrections to find out their process,” said legislator Richard Parete of District Three. According to past schedules of construction manager Bovis Lend Lease, he said, it was understood that “60 days after substantial completion, inmates would be moved in.”
Ulster County Legislature Chairman David Donaldson, D-Kingston, said the county has hired Ralph Johnson, a construction specialist and consultant from Chicago, to expedite the completion of the project and analyze change orders. Donaldson said Johnson will be paid $175 an hour and will probably be paid a total of $35,000 to $40,000.
In January, Donaldson proposed a full-fledged investigation into cost overruns at the Law Enforcement Center by county lawmakers. Donaldson said he expects the construction overruns to rise to $15 million. The project was initially projected to cost $71.8 million.
“The public wants to know what went wrong and why this happened,” Parete said. “It is something we are going to do.”
Yet Ulster County legislators, both Democrats and Republicans, have held back releasing a consultant’s report that is expected to focus on what led to nearly two years of delays and cost overruns in the construction of the Law Enforcement Center. According to the Ulster County Treasurer’s Office, taxpayers have already paid $953,454 to Hill International for its forensic accounting report.
Donaldson said he has not ruled out releasing the report, but said he would have to wait until he reads it and consults with attorneys to determine whether its disclosure would hamper the county’s chances of winning lawsuits filed in connection with delays in construction of the jail.
The Kingston Daily Freeman has meanwhile filed a Freedom of Information Law request to release the report as a matter of public information.
Stay tuned for eventual subpoenas…

ASPIE Split Away
The School for Autistic Strength, Purpose, and Independence in Education, better known by its acronym, ASPIE, is coming to a close at Onteora Central School. Valerie Paradiz, ASPIE executive director and founder of the program said, “ASPIE as a program developed as a partnership between our non-profit and Onteora, will cease to exist at the end of the school year.” The program is now in its third year for high school students diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome or High Functioning Autism. When asked why, Paradiz said, “As a model program, it’s a huge success and where we’re bringing it now is basically establishing an independent school so it’s continuing along the lines of growth.” She noted staffing and space as the biggest challenge, with the need to expand.
Superintendent of Onteora School district Justine Winters said she had concerns regarding staffing for Regents academics (in New York State all students must conform to and pass a program prescribed by a statewide board of Regents, including a final exam.) She said she has supported ASPIE, but its teachers lacked Regents experience and bringing in other teachers proved to be very expensive. Winters said that sometimes the student/teacher ratio was two to one and suggested moving the program to the High School. “ASPIE was successful in the beginning because the kids were not at Regents levels yet,” Winters said. “Val [Paradiz] feels strongly that it should be separate from the High School because the students become emotionally distraught.” Although Winters understands this is of concern based on their disabilities, she thought a separate area in the High School could be created.
The decision to end ASPIE was made by the administration in December and the Onteora School Board was made aware of this. School Board Vice President Rita Vanacore said the decision was, “logical and reasonable.”
Judy Upjohn is the director of Judy Upjohn Culture and Media Studies (JUCMS), a non-profit organization associated with both the ASPIE and Indie programs. She explained that the separation between ASPIE and Onteora reflected mutual needs - Indie will soon be expanding, needs the space it shares with ASPIE, and ASPIE no longer wanted to function as a program, but become its own school.
ASPIE is considered a pioneer in its field, with national and international recognition by autism organizations and the media. Just recently it was filmed for Japanese public television, and in 2004 it was featured on the front page of the New York Times.

Dam Issues
State representatives are rattling off all sorts of proposed legislation lately in reaction to the news of New York City’s poor handling of it reservoir dams.
Using the fear of floods, Senator John Bonacic (R-Mt. Hope) went on tour throughout his 42nd district delivering fire and brimstone speeches designed to get everyone with a stake in the New York City watershed to hold the City’s Department of Environmental Protection accountable for what he says are that departments contribution to floods and their aftermath. He even hinted that property owners below reservoirs should file a class action lawsuit against the City for damages last April when much of the area was devastated.
The Senator has five New York City owned reservoirs and dams in his sprawling 42nd Senate district, where at least one dam, on the Schoharie Reservoir, is now undergoing emergency repairs and two others, the Neversink and the Merriman dams, are under scrutiny after it was revealed that inspection reports had been routinely photocopied from week to week. Furthermore, the district suffers frequent flooding and the Senator believes that those reservoirs are part of the problem. He said he introduced bills in the Senate that would create greater State oversight of the way the City inspects and maintains its dams and reservoirs and give the state the control over releasing water from those reservoirs to reduce the risk of floods. His proposal also calls for all dam inspection information to be shared with local officials that have a reservoir in their community.
He also said he expects the bills to have problems gaining support in the State Assembly, where Kevin Cahill, who did not sponsor Bonacic’s legislation, has come up with his own. Assemblyman Kevin Cahill (D-Kingston) told the people in his 101st assembly district through a press release that he has introduced legislation that would require the State Disaster Preparedness Commission to work with local communities on reservoir, dam and waterway disaster prevention and response and recovery plans.
“Given the horrendous flooding that occurred this past April and the more recent revelations about the structural integrity of the Gilboa Dam I think there is now a heightened awareness over the necessity of having a comprehensive disaster preparedness plan in place,” said Mr. Cahill. “We are not going to let the DEP off the hook in terms of taking care of the watershed and the surrounding regions, but it is imperative that we have a safety net in place.”
Most recently, Bonacic also called upon Federal officials including senators Charles Schumer and Hilary Clinton to lean on DEP, urging them to threaten to meddle with the DEP’s Filtration Avoidance determination. The determination is up for review next year and Bonacic said the threat of losing the determination should be held over the City “like a hammer.”
Faced with building an $8 billion water filtration system to protect its water, the City worked with a variety of Governments and organizations in 1997 to prepare a plan to keep the water clean without building the filter. The Environmental Protection Agency agreed the plan would work, and issued the City a filtration avoidance determination that year. Every five years upstaters have a chance to push for enhancements to the funding and programs the City supplies in the watershed.
The Environmental Protection Agency will review how the City has done with water quality protection by July 2006. The review will include input from the Department of Environmental Protection and the Coalition of Watershed Towns. It is expected that the outcome of this review will be a commitment by the City, by December 14, 2006, to additional Long-Term Watershed Protection Program milestones through 2012.

UCDC Budget Cut
The Ulster County Legislature has agreed to provide $200,000 to the Ulster County Development Corp. for the current year, despite concern that the agency hasn’t said how it will use the money, and has been questioned for entering controversial development projects without question of county oversight. The 30-3 vote to release the funds require an update on all expenses and activities for 2005 before any actual monies are released. Voting against the funding were Democratic Legislators Susan Zimet of New Paltz, Brian Shapiro of Woodstock and Tracey Bartels of Gardiner.
The $200,000 grant represents a funding reduction of $60,000, or 23 percent, from the 2005 level.
Chester Straub, president of the development corporation, said information about the agency’s budget plans have been available and that the $200,000 would be split between “some very specific market activities associated with our electronic and print marketing, our trade shows, “ along with “a pilot effort with property owners to reposition properties for industrial and business park development.” The remaining funds would be utilized to support entrepreneurial activities… which this last year included considerable funding to Dean Gitter’s Emerson Inn rebuilding project in Shandaken.

Bigger Boss!
Ulster County Democrat Chairman John Parete, 64, has been nominated unanimously by his own party to serve as one of two county elections commissioner, replacing the rtetiring Harry Castiglione of Woodstock.
Ulster County Legislature Chairman David Donaldson said before the caucus that he, and others, felt a party chairman should not be an elections commissioner, a phenomenon Dems complained about when both positions which were held by Republican Peter Savago of New Paltz from 1984 to 1997.
Parete said he understood the concerns, but had no intention of retiring as party chairman at this time. The commissioner post pays $63,500 a year. The Legislature is expected to appoint Parete commissioner at its next regular meeting on Feb. 8.
Parete added that he will likely sell or hand over operations of his Boiceville Inn establishment, now over 30 years old.

Casino News
The proposed Saugerties casino being put forth by the Oklahoma-based Seneca-Cayuga tribe and Rochester mall developer Thomas Wilmot at the Winston Farm in Saugerties recently hired long-time Ulster County clerk Al Spada, who retired in September after 39 years, to do public relations for the project. At the same time, Saugerties town and village officials, in tandem with the private No Casino movement, held a conference call with Washington, D.C.-based attorney Guy Martin, who they have retained to assess the casino project from a legal perspective and help develop a strategy to fight it. Martin, who also successfully fought a Wilmot casino plan in Bridgeport, CT, expects to present a report on possible casino-blocking actions to town and village officials within four to six weeks.
Spada, who is said to have ties to the Republican hierarchy in Albany vis considerable fundraising for Governor George Pataki, said he doesn’t know “what the role will be” but expects to learn more in the next few weeks when Wilmot and his representatives are scheduled to visit Ulster County.
Word has it, in Albany lobbying circles, that there currently appears to be little chance of a casino being sited in Ulster County because of the opposition here.
Regarding Saugerties’ legal strategy in fighting the casino, Martin said the community’s situation “is not yet entirely clear.” His report will present various routes the community can take, including how to best negotiate with the developer. Martin’s fee for this initial work is $10,000. He would not estimate the costs if the community chooses to undertake an extended legal battle other than to note they “could be substantial.” Said Martin, “These are difficult fights.”
Meanwhile, the local struggle is unfolding against a backdrop of potentially sweeping changes in the national’s capital that could dramatically restrict the approval of new Native American casinos, while at the same time giving tribes considerably more power. Senator John McCain (R-Arizona) has proposed a series of amendments to Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA) that would substantially overhaul the law, including barring tribes from moving across state lines to open a casino, something no tribe has been able to accomplish to date. McCain’s bill would further tighten the restrictions on future casino siting by requiring the Interior Department to ensure tribes have a “temporal, cultural and geographic nexus” to the land in question before it is taken into trust.
It is unclear how the McCain bill will fare.
New York is one of 12 states in which out-of-state tribes are seeking to open casinos. According various industry sources, some 225 tribes are currently operating casinos today and another 227 groups are seeking Congressional recognition as tribes in order to open casinos.
In addition to the Seneca-Cayuga project, the New York Oneidas are holding options on the former IBM property and numerous parcels around it in the town of Ulster in the hope of building a casino there.

County Finances
The Ulster County Legislature has been given a report showing that a cash-on-hand amount at the end of 2005 totally $11.27 million was a 44.99 percent reduction of $9.22 million from the previous year’s balance. County Deputy Treasurer Michael Hein announced the surprise ending to a difficult fiscal year by adding that $4.4 million of the balance should be considered encumbered because it is owed to county school districts due to the state’s late budget last year.
This represents the second year in a row that the county’s available year-end cash has been substantially lower, with 2004 seeing a 16.69 percent reduction of $4.4 million from the year before.

Local Movie Wins!
On Saturday, January 28, the Sundance Film Festival handed out it’s annual Waldo Salt screenwriting prize for dramatic feature to writer/director Hilary Brougher, born in Catskill and raised in New Paltz, for her teen baby-murder drama “Stephanie Daley,” produced in the summer of 2005 in ;ocations including Tannersville, Catskill, and Phoenicia. The film stars Tilda Swinton and Hudson Valley resident Melissa Leo. In the film, Swinton plays pregnant forensic psychologist Lydie Crane who is hired to learn the truth behind the case of 16-year-old Stephanie Daley, who is accused of concealing her pregnancy and murdering her infant.

Stream Talk!
The Esopus Creek Stream Management Plan, a project coordinated by Cornell Cooperative Extension of Ulster County, is hosting a series of community discussion and working groups in February. The community is invited and encouraged to attend.
On Thursday, Feb.2nd, a Streamside Landowners Community Discussion will be held from 6:30 to 8:00 pm for those owning property adjacent to the Esopus Creek or a tributary in the watershed wishing to tell Cornell Cooperative Extension of Ulster County how to provide the most useful educational resources for stream-side landowners.
On Wednesday, Feb. 8th, an Education Work Group Meeting, to be held from 11:00 am to 1:00 pm, will be held to help plan education and outreach activities for the Esopus Creek Stream Management Plan. Pre-registration required by calling Michael Courtney, 845-340-3990 or via email at: mcc55@cornell.edu.
On Tuesday, Feb. 28th, a Kayak/Whitewater Community Discussion will be held from 6:00pm to 7:30pm to share sports enthusiasts’ knowledge of the stream, and specific concerns and interests for stewardship of the Esopus Creek.
Unless otherwise stated, all meetings are at Cornell Cooperative Extension of Ulster County Phoenicia Office, 5578 Route 28 (Phoenicia Plaza), Phoenicia NY. For more information about community discussion and working groups, please contact Michael Courtney, Extension Educator, at 845-340-3990.

Police Blotter
Members of the Shandaken Police Department report the arrest of Ernest H. Fudge 44 years of age of Station Road, Phoenicia as a result of all Arson investigation. Police state that at 2:00 am Monday morning Fudge intentionally started a fire in an adjacent unoccupied trailer that was on his parent's property in tile Esopus Trailer Park. Police state that the trailer belonged to a former tenant who had not yet removed it from the property. The trailer was totally destroyed by the fire which had taken firefighters over 45 minutes hours to contain. Firefighters remained on the scene until 10 am Monday morning. Fudge was charged with Arson and Burglary both in the 3rd Degree, both Felonies. Fudge was remanded to the Ulster County Jail on $50,000. cash bail for $100,000 secured bond. Police were assisted by numerous Firefighters from the Phoenicia Fire District Company\s 1,2 and 3 and The Ulster County Fire Investigations Unit.

No Challenger
Ed Cox, the son-in-law of Richard Nixon who launched and then suspended a campaign to unseat Democratic U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, has decided to sit out the 2006 race. Last summer, Cox, a 58-year-old Manhattan lawyer, began seeking elective office for the first time, believing he had the backing of state Republican leaders. But when Westchester County District Attorney Jeanine Pirro, 54, entered the race in August and received a public endorsement from three-term Republican Gov. George Pataki, Cox withdrew. Cox had raised and spent $1.3 million barnstorming the state. His latest Federal Election Commission report showed him with $38,357 cash on hand. After Pirro’s campaign sputtered through a marred announcement speech and sluggish fund-raising, a majority of the state’s 62 Republican county chairs pushed her to run for state attorney general. Pirro quit the contest last December, and Cox had since been reconsidering the Senate race. He told reporters last week that an endorsement from Pataki was a condition of his return, but Pataki advisers indicated the governor would remain silent.
Clinton, 58, seeking re-election for the first time, had nearly $14 million cash on hand at the end of September and is due to file her end-of-year campaign report with the Federal Election Commission next week.
The leading Republican hopeful is now John Spencer, 59, a conservative two-term former mayor of Yonkers, New York’s fourth-most-populous city. Spencer, a Vietnam veteran who opposes abortion rights, gun control and affirmative action, has raised less than $1 million.

HEAP Help
U.S. Senator Charles Schumer recently visited Sickler Kingston to talk about his three-pronged plan of defense against rising heating costs, noting that he is pushing Congress to commit an additional $2 billion to the energy assistance program and expand the Weatherization Assistance Program by $500 million. He also is calling on the Bush administration to tap the Northeast Home Heating Oil Reserve, an emergency heating oil stockpile that Schumer’s office said could supply the region for 10 days. The threshold for its release was reached weeks ago, but the administration has declined to access the supply, the senator said.
One hundred percent of Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program funds go to fixed-income people who are 65 and older, disabled, or have five children or more, Schumer said, though the funds do not cover heating bills in their entirety.
THE U.S. Energy Information Administration estimates the average household will spend $420 more to heat their home this winter than last year, and shows that Ulster County residents will pay a combined $19 million more to heat their homes this winter. Schumer noted that natural gas prices are 40 percent higher than a year ago and home heating oil prices are up 26 percent.

New Orleans
Just when one thought no more bad news could emanate from New Orleans, what with Mardis Gras coming, things have gotten worse with a Congressional panel hearing testimony on the plight of homeless victims of hurricanes Katrina and Rita, with lawmakers scolding FEMA officials for not making temporary trailers available to over 20,000 people authorized to receive them; schools finally reopening in only a handful of public locations, even though many school buildings suffered minimal damage and most private schools have been given monies to re-open (the NOLA school district ended up firing all but 61 of about 7,000 school employees to make ends meet); unpopular proposals for a four-month moratorium on any rebuilding activities; more than 3,200 people still officially unaccounted for nearly five months after the hurricanes hit, with authorities now believing that some of those missing were washed into Lake Pontchartrain, or their bodies remain in the rubble that still blankets much of the city; floods of lawsuits that reflect the rising frustration and anger among thousands of residents and business owners who lost homes, jobs and relatives in the flooding, against everyone from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and local government boards that oversaw New Orleans’ failed levees, to oil companies, nursing homes and insurers refusing to pay for damages; a subsequent entanglement of the region’s entire court system, still struggling to recover from the disruptions caused by the flooding and evacuations that followed the Aug. 29 storm; and a heartrending decision by the Bush White House to withhold support from a major Congressional reconstruction plan because it would add to federal bureaucracy and set up what would be a government real estate agency. The government has also resisted calls to rebuild the city’s levees to withstand an equivalent future storm.
President Bush made his first visit in three months to the hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast to see progress there firsthand and personally restate his commitment to rebuilding. While In Louisiana, Bush met with New Orleans business executives, then gave a short speech on reconstruction in Waveland, Miss., and finally attended a Republican National Committee fundraiser at the sprawling oceanfront estate of Dwight Schar, CEO of NVR Homes, a major homebuilder and mortgage banking company, and co-owner of the Washington Redskins football team who raised more than $200,000 for Bush’s re-election campaign and is already making a bundle from Gulf area home rebuildings.
“People in far away places like Washington, D.C., still hear you and care about you,” Bush told survivors in Mississippi. “It may be hard for you to see, but from when I first came here to today, New Orleans is reminding me of the city I used to come to visit. It’s a heck of a place to bring your family. It’s a great place to find some of the greatest food in the world and some wonderful fun. And for folks around the country who are looking for a great place to have a convention, or a great place to visit, I’d suggest coming here to the great New Orleans.”
Meanwhile, it has been revealed that the White House was told in the hours before Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans that the city would probably soon be inundated with floodwater, forcing the long-term relocation of hundreds of thousands of people. The internal department documents, which were forwarded to the White House, contradict statements by President Bush and the homeland security secretary, Michael Chertoff, that no one expected the storm protection system in New Orleans to be breached. Other documents to be released Tuesday show that the weekend before Hurricane Katrina made landfall, Homeland Security Department officials predicted that its impact would be worse than a doomsday-like emergency planning exercise conducted in Louisiana in July 2004. A White House spokesman, asked about the seeming contradiction between Mr. Bush’s statement on Sept. 1 and the warning as the storm approached, said the president meant to say that once the storm passed and it initially looked as if New Orleans had gotten through the hurricane without catastrophic damage, no one anticipated at that point that the levees would be breached.
Separately, a Democrat on the House committee that is also investigating Hurricane Katrina urged Representative Thomas M. Davis III, Republican of Virginia, who is the chairman of the House inquiry, to enforce a subpoena presented to Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld for documents related to the storm.
The Democrat, Representative Charlie Melancon of Louisiana, said in a letter that recent interviews by House investigators had produced evidence that “the Defense Department frustrated FEMA’s attempts to get this aid delivered to the stricken region,” and that the documents from the Pentagon were necessary to address the accusations.
A Defense Department spokesman declined to comment on the letter.
Further charges are growing that the White House is crippling a Senate inquiry into the government’s sluggish response to Hurricane Katrina by barring administration officials from answering questions and failing to hand over documents.
Meanwhile, a group calling itself the Common Ground Collective (CGC) has announced that it will lease and occupy a building in New Orleans’ lower Ninth Ward in defiance of the city’s attempt to bulldoze that area, stating its belief that if the residents’ properties are confiscated through eminent domain laws, without due process allowed to its owners, it will render private property rights null and void in America. CGC has encouraged all good willed citizens to lobby the local, state and federal government to cease and desist the forceful taking of peoples’ lands. The organization believes that if this is allowed unchallenged, it will result in the erosion of social justice and private property rights. For further info contact: Common Ground Collective at 504.717.5633, 213.840.1972 or 917.440.9679.

More Spying
The ACLU of Georgia has released copies of government files that illustrate the extent to which the FBI, the DeKalb County Division of Homeland Security and other government agencies have gone to compile information on citizens suspected of being threats simply for expressing controversial opinions. Two documents relating to anti-war and anti-government protests, and a vegan rally, prove the agencies have been “spying” on residents unconstitutionally, the ACLU said. The ACLU of Georgia accuses the Bush administration of labeling those who disagree with its policy as disloyal Americans.
“We believe that spying on American citizens for no good reason is fundamentally un-American, that it’s not the place of the government or the best use of resources to spy on its own citizens and we want it to stop. We want the spies in our government to pack their bags, close up their notebooks, take their cameras home and not engage in the spying anymore,” Gerald Weber of the ACLU of Georgia said during a news conference. “We have heard of not a single, government surveillance of a pro-war
group.”
Meanwhile, Google Inc. is rebuffing the Bush administration’s demand for a peek at what millions of people have been looking up on the Internet’s leading search engine — a request that underscores the potential for online databases to become tools for government surveillance.

Hibernation?
Researchers are investigating whether it’s possible to put living organs or whole patients into a state similar to that seen in mammals during hibernation. The reduced metabolism that those animals achieve, called torpor, could benefit transplant recipients, trauma survivors and surgical patients, biologists say. Sending parts of the body into torpor after an injury, heart attack or stroke might preserve them beyond the first crucial minutes or hour. Treatment in the first hour after an incident, called the “golden hour” in emergency medicine, offers the best chances for recovery, partly because tissues die from oxygen deprivation when blood flow falls suddenly.
The mystery for scientists is to understand how animals prime their organs to survive reduced flow during hibernation. Learning that “would extend the ‘golden hour’ to a golden day or even a golden week,” doctors say.
The Department of Defense has underwritten research in the area because of the need to treat wounded soldiers who may be far from decent emergency medicine. But no medical studies involving hibernation-like states have been reported so far.

Warming Weather
Six former heads of the Environmental Protection Agency - five Republicans and one Democrat - accused the Bush administration recently of neglecting global warming and other environmental problems.
“I don’t think there’s a commitment in this administration,” said Bill Ruckelshaus, who was EPA’s first administrator when the agency opened its doors in 1970 under President Nixon and headed it again under President Reagan in the 1980s.
Russell Train, who succeeded Ruckelshaus in the Nixon and Ford administrations, said slowing the growth of “greenhouse” gases isn’t enough.
“We need leadership, and I don’t think we’re getting it,” he said at an EPA-sponsored symposium centered around the agency’s 35th anniversary. “To sit back and just push it away and say we’ll deal with it sometime down the road is dishonest to the people and self-destructive.”
All the former administrators and the EPA’s current chief, Stephen Johnson, raised their hands when asked whether they believe global warming is a real problem - and again when asked if humans bear significant blame.
Defending his boss, Johnson said the current administration has spent $20 billion on research and technology to combat climate change after President Bush rejected mandatory controls on carbon dioxide, the chief gas blamed for trapping heat in the atmosphere like a greenhouse. Bush also kept the United States out of the Kyoto international treaty to reduce greenhouse gases globally, saying it would harm the U.S. economy, after many of the accord’s terms were negotiated by the Clinton administration.
Meanwhile, the top climate scientist at NASA says the Bush administration has tried to stop him from speaking out since he gave a lecture last month calling for prompt reductions in emissions of greenhouse gases linked to global warming. The scientist, James E. Hansen, longtime director of the agency’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, said in an interview that officials at NASA headquarters had ordered the public affairs staff to review his coming lectures, papers, postings on the Goddard Web site and requests for interviews from journalists.

Prescriptive Wha?
Most people, particularly senior citizens, say they are having a hard time understanding the new Medicare prescription drug program, an AP-Ipsos poll has found.
The drug benefit requires people to choose from among dozens of competing private insurance plans. Along with senior citizens, those most likely to acknowledge difficulties live in rural areas or are college graduates. More than half, 52 percent, of respondents say they think the program that began enrolling people on Jan. 1 is tough to understand. And two-thirds of older people surveyed and two-thirds of those who have signed up say they are confused by the program, which is intended to help many save more on their prescription drugs. A third said they had not decided what they think of the new program and 16 percent said they have little trouble figuring out the program.
Soon after enrollment opened, it became apparent there was widespread confusion, so the government increased from 150 to 4,000 the number of workers at a pharmacy help line. Questions also can go through the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services - 1-800-Medicare or http://www.cms.hhs.gov - or local aging agencies.
The public’s understanding of the program is one of several problems that have plagued the Bush administration’s initiative. Tens of thousands of elderly poor people have had trouble getting their medicine after they were canceled from Medicaid prescription drug coverage but not properly listed as eligible in the new program.
But Medicare spokesman Gary Karr said millions of people are getting their prescription drugs through the new program, despite the glitches.
About 3.6 million people have enrolled, in addition to the 6.4 million elderly poor shifted from Medicaid, the government health care program for the poor, that had provided their drug coverage. The government aims to have 28 million to 30 million - including the Medicaid transfers - enrolled in the Medicare drug program by the end of 2006, Karr said. He said people will like the program more as they realize it can save them money.

Money Marriages!
Marrying for money, it turns out, works. A study by an Ohio State University researcher shows that a person who marries - and stays married - accumulates nearly twice as much personal wealth as a person who is single or divorced. And for those who divorce, it’s a bit more expensive than giving up half of everything they own. They lose, on average, three-fourths of their personal net worth.
“Getting married for a few years and then getting divorced is clearly not the path to financial independence,” said Jay Zagorsky, whose study divided married couples’ assets so they could be compared with singles.
Zagorsky, a research scientist at OSU’s Center for Human Resource Research, tracked the wealth and marital status of 9,055 people from 1985 to 2000. Those people have been participating in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, which has repeatedly interviewed them about various aspects of their lives since 1979.
The participants are now 41 to 49 years old, making them the youngest of the baby boomers. Zagorsky cautioned that results could be different for older and younger Americans, who have faced different attitudes about marriage, divorce and living together without marriage.
Zagorsky’s study, which is published in the current issue of the Journal of Sociology, defines wealth as the total value of a person’s assets, such as real estate, stocks and bank accounts, minus liabilities, such as mortgages.
A big reason married people accumulate more wealth than others is simple economies of scale - one household is cheaper to maintain than two, Zagorsky said. Divorce reverses those benefits, he said.

Breaking Point
The U.S. Army, which many in its ranks are saying is near a breaking point, and would be unable to fight another war if needed, has forced about 50,000 soldiers to continue serving after their voluntary stints ended under a policy called “stop-loss,” but while some dispute its fairness, court challenges have fallen flat.
The policy applies to soldiers in units due to deploy for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. The Army said stop-loss is vital to maintain units that are cohesive and ready to fight. But some experts said it shows how badly the Army is stretched and could further complicate efforts to attract new recruits.
“As the war in Iraq drags on, the Army is accumulating a collection of problems that cumulatively could call into question the viability of an all-volunteer force,” said defense analyst Loren Thompson of the Lexington Institute think tank. “When a service has to repeatedly resort to compelling the retention of people who want to leave, you’re edging away from the whole notion of volunteerism.”
Meanwhile, a U.S. government audit has found American-led occupation authorities squandered tens of millions of dollars that were supposed to be used to rebuild Iraq through undocumented spending and outright fraud. In some cases, auditors recommend criminal charges be filed against the perpetrators. In others, it asks the U.S. ambassador to Iraq to recoup the money.
Dryly written audit reports describe the Coalition Provisional Authority’s offices in the south-central city of Hillah being awash in bricks of $100 bills taken from a central vault without documentation. It describes one agent who kept almost $700,000 in cash in an unlocked footlocker and mentions a U.S. soldier who gambled away as much as $60,000 in reconstruction funds in the Philippines.
“Tens of millions of dollars in cash had gone in and out of the South-Central Region vault without any tracking of who deposited or withdrew the money, and why it was taken out,” says a report by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, which is in the midst of a series of audits for the Pentagon and State Department.
The audits offer a window into the chaotic U.S.-led occupation of Iraq of 2003-04, when inexperienced American officials — including workers from President Bush’s election campaign — organized a cash-intensive “hearts and minds” mission to rebuild Iraq’s devastated economy. The failure of the rebuilding effort has been borne out most vividly by the rise of a virulent anti-American insurgency that has claimed most of the 2,237 U.S. military lives lost since the war began.