Thursday, February 14, 2008

War on terror TalkLeft: "A new report by the Seton Hall Law Center for Policy and Research finds: More than 24,000 interrogations have been conducted at Guantánamo since 2002; All interrogations conducted at Guantánamo were videotaped. Thus, many videotapes documenting Guantánamo interrogations do or did exist; The Central Intelligence Agency is just one of many entities that interrogated detainees at Guantánamo." Andrew Sullivan: "McCain's betrayal: I fear he has hurt himself very badly among those who were more than prepared to give him a chance...Maybe McCain is waiting to take on the forces of Rove and the electoral advantages of appealing to crude, fascistic templates of "torture-them-or-we-all-die" variety. But McCain should know that when dealing with unscrupulous thugs, appeasement is not the best policy. He's the nominee. He needs to remind people that conservatism can be - must be - a decent political philosophy, that upholds, rather than trashes, the deepest moral traditions of the United States." "2008 pres" 6:12:16 PM

Iraq The Moderate Voice: "It was easy to overlook if you were thinking about baseball and mortgages and FISA yesterday, but Iraqi Parliament actually managed to get some good things done. They passed a budget, for one thing. They also defined the powers of the various states -- making Iraq a 'federal' government. They gave amnesty to thousands of prisoners. They declared that an upcoming election would be scheduled for October 1 (oh, if only the American election cycle were so short). Best of all, these bills were passed unanimously despite the fact that they are 'divisive'. Taken together, the new legislation should help even out the political power of the major ethnic, political, and religious groups in Iraq. And then the Parliament declared a 5 week holiday for themselves, insuring that no 'oil bill' would be passed anytime soon. Perhaps the best news of all is that 'representatives from Iraq's three main ethnic groups -- Shiite, Sunni and Kurd -- finally saw some benefit in compromise.'" "2008 pres" 6:05:15 PM

Colorado Polls Via Colorado Pols: "Two polls today released by Rasmussen shows two interesting pictures regarding Colorado. "The first is in regards to the Presidential race. "This shows McCain beating Clinton 49%-35%, but Obama beating McCain 46%-39%. This seems to show a couple things-Clinton and McCain, the overwhelmingly defeated candidates in our straw polls have shallow support in our state. But no one tops Hillary unpopularity. "The second poll is in regards to the Senate race, which again shows Schaffer ahead. 44%-43% for Schaffer. These numbers are unchanged since the last poll regarding our Senate race. This is good news for Schaffer-despite the less than amazing fund raising totals the race is still as close as all the commentators say it will be. Hopefully (as a Republican) this will help Schaffer's fund raising efforts-becaue Udall's money could make a huge difference in a close race. "In any case, these two polls show that Colorado is truely a battleground state." 5:59:53 PM

? for President? Political Wire: "The latest Rasmussen Reports tracking poll shows Sen. Barack Obama opening up a 12-point lead over Sen. Hillary Clinton, 49% to 37%. Over the past five days, Obama has gained 8 points while Clinton has dropped 12." Political Wire: "The latest Gallup tracking poll shows Sen. Barack Obama edging Sen. Hillary Clinton nationally, 46% to 45%. A new American Research Group poll shows Obama leading Clinton, 47% to 45%." Oliver Willis: "Obama Campaign On The Verge Of Stupid? Opting in to the public financing system? Are you whacked? Even if McCain gives a gentleman's agreement (for whatever that's worth with the GOP), to give up what is a newfound Democratic party strength is to hobble yourself." Solutions and speeches. Ezra Klein: "This demonstrates not only a gross ruthlessness on the part of Clinton's campaign, but an astonishingly cavalier attitude towards the preservation of the progressive coalition. To be willing to blithely rip it to shreds in order to wrest a nomination that's not been fairly earned is not only low, but a demonstration of deeply pernicious priorities -- namely, it's an explicit statement that the campaign puts its own political success above the health of the party and the pursuit of progressive goals, and one can't but help assume that's exactly the attitude they would take towards governance, too." Thanks to Andrew Sullivan for the link. Political Wire: "A new Quinnipiac poll in Ohio shows Sen. Hillary Clinton leading Sen. Barack Obama, 55% to 34%, among likely voters. In Pennsylvania, Clinton is ahead of Obama, 52% to 36%." "2008 pres" 5:55:28 PM

Immigration KJCT8News: "When the snow melts away and the sun comes out its back to work for thousands of laborers on the Western Slope. The migrant worker population fills much of the void, and business owners say they work hard to hire only 'legal' help. The question is could the Western Slope survive the planting and harvesting season without migrant workers, even if some of them are here illegally?" Thanks to Elevated Voices for the link. "2008 pres" 5:47:47 PM

Dry Gulch Reservoir: Update Here's an update on the proposed Dry Gulch Reservoir from The Pagosa Daily Post. From the article: At its regular meeting yesterday, the Pagosa Area Water and Sanitation District Board got a first look at the briefs filed by its legal council, Collins Cockrel & Cole, and by the attorney for Trout Unlimited, Andrew Peternell, in the continuing case of the Dry Gulch Reservoir project. The briefs were fresh off the presses, having been filed just that same morning, and the PAWSD staff had not yet had a chance to read the documents and comment on them. PAWSD is collaborating with another Archuleta County special district, San Juan Water Conservancy District, to jointly build a large reservoir on land about two miles north of downtown Pagosa Springs, recently purchased by the districts for about $9 million. The reservoir would provide recreational uses as well as secure water storage to help meet PAWSD new One-year Safety Supply Margin policy. It appears that the two districts have lowered their sights somewhat, and reduced the amount of water they are seeking in the case... In 2004, PAWSD and the San Juan Water Conservancy District filed a joint application for conditional water rights for a new project -- the Dry Gulch Reservoir. In their application, the water districts requested the right to pump 200 cubic feet per second (cfs) from the San Juan River. The district justified that amount of water based on 100-year population predictions developed by Steve Harris of Harris Engineering in Durango. PAWSD currently pumps less than 7 cfs from the San Juan. The presiding judge of the District 7 Water Court, Judge Greg Lyman, ruled in favor of the districts in May 2006, granting them conditional water rights -- rights that would become "absolute" once they were actually developed, at some point in the future. It appeared that Dry Gulch had cleared its first hurdle. There were, however, some fishermen unhappy with that decision. Trout Unlimited, a national organization with an active presence in Colorado, appealed the decision to the Colorado Supreme Court, arguing against the new conditional water rights. Peternell, who argued the Supreme Court case for TU, held that the districts' population figures were inflated -- Harris' projections were about twice as high as the figures available from the Colorado State Demography Office, or from a recent economic study produced for the Town of Pagosa Springs by Economic Planning Systems. Additionally, TU's appeal claimed that it was unreasonable for a municipality to make claims on water 100 years into the future. Also, TU claimed Harris' projections failed to take into account water conservation measures that will likely reduce per capita water use in the future. The Supreme Court did not reverse Lyman's decision, but did send the case back to him for "additional findings of fact." The two briefs submitted yesterday will supposedly provide Lyman with the facts he needs to reconsider the case... Changes to the proposed decree suggested in yesterday's brief by Evan Ela, the attorney for the two Districts, include: Reducing the diversion to storage from 200 cfs to 100 cfs; Reducing the initial fill from 29,000 acre-feet to 23,000 acre-feet; Reducing the annual total fill from 64,000 acre-feet to 29,000 acre-feet; Changing the priority date from March 2000 to December 2004; Adding a "reality check" stipulation, to include reassessment of need over time. TU's brief proposes that the longest appropriate planning period is 36 years, based on the length of time it would take to plan, permit and build the initial reservoir... Ela's brief for the Districts maintains that Harris' original population estimates are accurate, as are his estimates of water conservation improvements. The Districts' brief suggests over 90,000 people within the PAWSD service area by 2080. The TU brief basically states that the Dry Gulch Reservoir is not needed at all. TU holds that the population within the appropriate planning period -- 36 years -- will not exceed 35,000; that water conservation efforts will reduce daily per capita use from 215 gallons to 180 gallons; and that PAWSD already has sufficient water rights -- including over 8000 acre-feet of storage rights -- to serve a future 2040 population. More Coyote Gulch coverage here. "colorado water" 6:57:05 AM

Carter Lake, Boyd Lake and Horsetooth Reservoir to 303(d) list? The Colorado Water Quality Control Commission has started the process of adding Horsetooth Reservoir, Carter Lake and Boyd Lake to the 303(d) list of impaired waters, according to The Loveland Reporter-Herald. From the article: Mercury levels in fish spurred state officials to add Carter Lake, Boyd Lake and Horsetooth Reservoir to a list of water that does not meet federal standards. The Colorado Water Quality Control Commission preliminarily added the three lakes to the list Monday and is expected to do so formally March 11. The 303(d) list, named for a section of the Federal Clean Water Act, is updated every two years. "It doesn't indicate any significant concern with respect to drinking the water," said Paul Frohardt, administrator for the Colorado Water Quality Control Commission. "It's based solely on the elevated levels of mercury in the fish tissue." "colorado water" 6:30:49 AM

Supply news From The Sterling Journal Advocate, "The Sterling City Council on Tuesday postponed for two weeks the decision on when -- and if -- water rates will change for Sterling residents. Discussion on water and sewer rates were on last night's agenda for the Sterling City Council. The move is likely related to recent water quality violations. The water quality standards are set by the Environmental Protection Agency and administered by the Colorado Department of Health and Environment. Last fall, the city was notified of a water violation of trihalomethanes, a byproduct of water purification systems, and earlier this year it was put on notice for the concentration of uranium." Here's an update on Boulder's water budgets from The Boulder Daily Camera. From the article: Relief may be on the way for Boulder businesses that complain they've been getting soaked by the city's new "water budget" system. The Boulder City Council on Tuesday night agreed to move forward with several tweaks to the year-old system, but it's not yet clear which actually will be implemented -- or how the city will come up with the money to pay for them. The system gives customers monthly water budgets to try to encourage conservation. Customers pay $5 per 1,000 gallons of water they use above their budgeted amount -- twice the amount they pay for water within the budget. As customers go further outside their budgets, they can find themselves paying as much as five times their in-budget rate... Boulder's utility officials have come up with several proposals to fix the trouble spots -- but adopting all of them could cost as much as $1.2 million annually. Here's a look at some of the problems and proposed solutions: Seasonal business -- To come up with monthly budgets for commercial and industrial customers, water officials looked at businesses' historical yearly water use and divided it by 12. But that caused problems for businesses that see big seasonal swings in their water, such as beer breweries and hotels. Those businesses often stay well below their allotment during most months but then find themselves forced into far costlier brackets during their busy months. To fix that problem, utilities officials have proposed letting customers set their water budgets based on "historical monthly use." Under that optional system, January's budget would be set by averaging the January consumption levels of the past three Januaries. Businesses that use water more erratically could hire an expert to come in and give them an individualized budget... Multifamily crunch -- The city also heard complaints from people in larger apartments and condos unhappy about the city's policy of allotting the same amount of water to multifamily units regardless of the number of bedrooms they have. The city has proposed giving more water to those customers. Watering right -- Some customers who water public rights-of-way near sidewalks have found that their budgets don't take that into account. Utility officials have proposed expanding those budgets to allow the rights-of-way to be watered. From The Rocky Mountain News, "Denver Water overcharged thousands of suburban residential customers by $1.5 million for the past year because of a math error, but they'll get it all back in 2008. 'We hate this sort of situation,' David LaFrance, Denver Water's finance director, told the Denver Board of Water Commissioners on Wednesday. 'We take pride in doing accurate water calculations.' A mistake in the computer model that figures water rates caused 35,000 single-family homes -- all of them in water districts outside of Denver -- to be overcharged for the last seven bills. Most households paid an average overage of $44 for the entire year, but there were 15 accounts that paid $1,000 more than they should have. LaFrance said those homeowners might not have noticed the overcharge because of the relative size of their bills." "colorado water" 6:15:39 AM

Lake County declares local state of emergency around Leadville Mining District Officials representing Leadville are worried about a potential blowout from the Leadville Mining Tunnel according to 9News.com. From the article: Lake County Commissioners have declared a local state of emergency around an old mine drainage tunnel that is trapping an estimated 1 billion gallons of contaminated water inside a mountain. A state lawmaker plans to send a letter to President George Bush and Gov. Bill Ritter (D-Colorado) asking them to take action. Commissioners worry slowly rising water levels inside a mountain in north Leadville, combined with its increasing pressure, could cause water to blow out from a drainage tunnel. Commissioners say an uncontrolled blowout could kill more than 100 Leadville residents and contaminate the Arkansas River from Leadville to the Mississippi River... "This could be one of the biggest major environmental catastrophes that we've ever faced in the western part of the United States," said Sen. Tom Wiens (R-Castle Rock). Wiens' district covers Leadville. "We need immediate action by our state government and our federal government to make sure we dewater that mine pool to take the pressure off of it," said Wiens who planned to send his letter late Wednesday night to Ritter and President Bush. "The government is absolutely, positively failing to do (its) job...It needs immediate action and we need to treat it as an emergency," said Wiens. "The federal government owns this and the federal government is not protecting the people of Colorado and the Arkansas River."[...] The Bureau of Reclamation, a federal agency under the Department of the Interior, owns the Leadville Mine Drainage Tunnel. The area manager of the Bureau of Reclamation, Mike Collins, says safety of residents is his number one concern. He denies there is an immediate threat to residents living near the mine drainage tunnel. "I don't know if there has been any risk identified yet," Collins told 9Wants to Know in an interview on Feb. 11. "There is nothing that I would consider anything to be scared of." However, 9Wants to Know obtained a November 2007 letter from the EPA written to the Bureau of Reclamation. EPA Regional Administrator Robert Robert wrote: "Due to the unknown condition of the tunnel blockages and the large volume of water behind the blockages, we are concerned that an uncontrolled, potentially-catastrophic release of water to the Arkansas River from the LMDT (Leadville Mine Drainage Tunnel) is likely at some point. Not only endangering human life (people living at the East Fork Trailer Park and BOR employees,) the sudden release of water, rock, sediment, and heavy metals to the Arkansas River would be an environmental disaster."[...] County Commissioner Olsen worries the build up of water in the mountain could reverse a more than $70 million Superfund site cleanup project undertaken by the EPA. The California Gulch Superfund site cleanup project started in 1983. EPA community involvement coordinator Jennifer Lane said the cleanup is about 75 percent complete. Olsen worries that clean up could be reversed if the buildup of water begins to seep into contaminated soil. In an area three miles from the drainage tunnel, Olsen said he's witnessed new seepage that previously didn't exist on the mountain side. He believes the water is being forced upward and outward by the intense pressure of water inside the mountain. The seepage hasn't yet appeared in contaminated area, which the EPA is working to cleanup, but Olsen fears it could happen any time. More Coyote Gulch coverage here and here. "colorado water" 6:06:21 AM

Energy policy: Nuclear From The Denver Post, "A Larimer County study of uranium mining refuses to say whether a proposed uranium operation in neighboring Weld County is dangerous, citing a lack of information about the project. The report, prepared by the Larimer County Environmental Advisory Board, lays out the potential risks of uranium extraction, including soil, water and air pollution. But without specific facts about proposed mining activity in Nunn in eastern rural Weld, the board could not make a judgment call, said board chairman Dale Lockwood. 'We just can't at the moment,' Lockwood said. 'We don't have a good way to quantify the risk.'" More coverage from Fort Collins Now. They write: A proposed uranium mine near Nunn poses no threat to Greeley's drinking water, but city officials say water from the mine could eventually find its way into Greeley's No. 3 Ditch if the mining isn't done correctly. And that water, depending on whom you ask, could be subject to potential contamination if the proposed mine is approved. The ditch water -- which is undrinkable anyway -- is used to water city parks and also provides water for agriculture on farms near Greeley. Greeley owns about 40 percent of the water in the ditch along with local farmers. Powertech Uranium Corp. officials have previously said that they will be able to contain water at the mine site, preventing contamination, and that they will be able clean the groundwater after the uranium mining is completed. Jon Monson, Greeley's director of water and sewer, told the Greeley City Council at a work session Tuesday night that Greeley's drinking water supply originates upstream from the mine, is piped to the city and is in no danger of contamination. But, Monson said, if Powertech -- the Canadian company that wants to open the mine -- mines it correctly, there's no danger to the ditch water either... Wells around Greeley are typically dug to less than 100 feet, Monson said, and the uranium will be mined from deposits 120 to 620 feet below ground. Greeley bought farms south of the proposed mine site near Pierce and Ault to augment water rights for the city, so Monson said declining property values will be a concern for the city -- as it is for nearby residents -- if the mine goes in. Monson said for people to be satisfied that the mine will be safe, Powertech should be required to have bonds assuring cleanup at the site, a fact Powertech already has conceded. Meanwhile, councilmembers Tuesday night split on whether to entertain a resolution against the mine. Fort Collins City Council has already passed a resolution against the proposed mine. "If we show our concerns now, it may prevent them from even applying," Councilman Carrol Martin said. "It scares me to death to put a uranium mine in our aquifer." As part of the permitting process, Powertech would have to convince the EPA that the water it will mine in will never be used for drinking water. More Coyote Gulch coverage here and here. "2008 pres" 5:51:18 AM

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