A Note to the Press Corps from CEEI Executive Director Max Casebeau
Dear Editor or
Reporter,
I have included a summary of the history of CEEI and a background sketch.
Also included is a mission statement.
As to myself, I founded the Peninsula Electronics News and the Silicon
Valley Tech News in the 60's and 80's. CEEI was founded by myself and
concerned citizens in 1992 and is an Idaho non-profit corporation. If you
have questions about the articles please contact me.
CEEI will be developing more web site information as the data are
constantly changing. Key is an understanding of the environment and how it
works and doesn't work, as well as the record of successful restoration.
CEEI's new Endangered Species Early Warning web site should be a valuable
tool for you in the future <www.esew.org>.
CEEI has eleven more web sites on the drawing board. Two more will be
released in 2005 (in addition to America's Polluted Streams & Restoration
Strategies <www.wcei.org> which is
being upgraded, and reworked). This web site documents all the 30,000
polluted streams in the United States.
Best regards,
Max Casebeau
CEEI Exec Director
Center for Environmental Education and Information
P.O. Box 1778
Sun Valley, Idaho 83353
E-mail:
ceei@cox-internet.com
Web site:
www.wcei.org
Tel and Fax 208-578-1557
PS:
The newly formed CEEI Advisory Board has David R. Klein, Professor
Emeritus and Doctor of Environmental Science at the University of Alaska
as Chairman. Dr. Gary Alexander of the Environmental Education Department
at the University of Idaho and Dr. Scott S. Hughes, Professor and Chair of
the Department of Geosciences at Idaho State University have also joined.
Others will join later.
FOR
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
New Web Site Lists 29 New Species that may be in Trouble
+
The main reason for the new web site is to buy extra time for species that
"do not have a vote and require all the time they can get to stabilize and
recover". "We are depending on students, retired government employees,
bird watchers, scientists, farmers, ranchers, hunters, fisherman and
environmentally concerned citizens to voice their concerns and offer more
information" said Max Casebeau, CEEI Director.
"We had anticipated only a couple of hundred species would be listed worldwide. Then the ACIA's The Arctic Climate Assessment Report was announced November 8, 2004 and is already providing a paradigm shift in the thinking of the scientific community" Said Max Casebeau, CEEI director. A week later The World Conservation Union stated that up to 15,000 new species are at risk.
CEEI recently announced that it will add 11 more web sites over the next 4 years. "Our objective is to have the most comprehensive environmental educational website network in the United States" said Max Casebeau, CEEI Director.
The new Endangered Species Early Warning web site at <www.esew.org> integrates all the habitat data in the United States with the known species lists that are either threatened, endangered or extinct (USFW categories). In addition, eco-system maps are being generated by CEEI. The baseline maps are provided by Johns Hopkins University. Two additional web sites are scheduled to be completed and released by mid to late 2005.
The Bush Administration stated that they would think about the new ACIA report that stated that the earth is warming and the Arctic region is experiencing temperature increases up to 14 degrees. Sea ice and glaciers have been receding at an alarming rate for the past ten years. Species habitat is being affected already. "The caribou and reindeer are having a tough time", said Casebeau, "185 native villages are slated to be moved in Alaska soon according to a GAO Report".
"The only fix is to sign the Kyoto protocols and get on with it", said Casebeau, "even then it will take 1,000 years to clean up and restore our atmosphere."
Recently, Republican congressional voices have come up with attacks against the Endangered Species Act. As late as November 29, 2004 a major assault was mounted by Rush Limbaugh, a Republican spokesman, who characterized the new Arctic Assessment Report as "hysterical".
The Center for Environmental Education and Information - based in Sun Valley, Idaho - has established another web site that is tracking all the US 30,000 polluted streams for 14 years, <www.wcei.org>. This web site lists (line by line, page after page) by state, designated 303(d) streams that do not meet the criteria of the Clean Water Act (fish can't reproduce in them and humans can't swim in them).
Species that are on
the CEEI Early Warning List:
GLOBAL: Human (all countries), Leopard (Africa, Middle East, China, India,
Siberia, Southeast Asia).
AMERICA WEST: Mountain Quail, Mountain (Bighorn) Sheep, Redband Trout,
Pacific Fisher, Sage Grouse, Striped Bass, Arctic Grayling, Pygmy Rabbit,
Sand Dune Lizard, Slickspot Peppergrass, Southern Idaho Ground Squirrel,
Tahoe Yellow Cress.
PACIFIC REGION: (Need input from viewers.)
SOUTH AMERICA: (Need input from viewers.)
AFRICA: Black Rhino, Cheetah, Painted Dog, Pangolin, Wattled Crane.
ARCTIC REGION: Polar Bear, Caribou (Reindeer), Arctic Fox, Ringed Seal, Snowy Owl,
Arctic Shrimp, Arctic Crab.
ANTARCTIC: Adele Penguin.
AUSTRALIA: Koala Bear.
GREENLAND: (Need input from viewers.)
ASIA: Burmese Python
CEEI gets out to 12,000 high schools and 3,400 colleges and universities in the US. It has been nominated as "the most important environmental web site in the United States" three times by the UN and Sunset magazine. (CEEI reaches out to 12,000,000 new students from the 8th grade to lower division college and university levels.
+(For those who are young at heart - as an optional lead in for the Press Release title above, simply add "Humans")
Humans have been put on an Endangered species Early Warning List because of "possible chemical, cultural, disease and climate factors that may be beyond control". The "Human" listing went on to say: "lower sperm count coupled with infertility experienced by humans world wide, are indicators that may be linked to water, food, and air pollution caused by chemicals." advised Max Casebeau CEEI Director.
The statement added: "There are other factors such as misapplication of government resources, commonplace educational breakdown, disease - Aids is still out of control in both Africa and Asia - and war." Environmental concerns are ignored and direct threats to the planet (such as Arctic Climate warming) seem to be of less importance than war or corporate tax returns. <www.esew.org>
CEEI's History and New
Mission Background
CEEI was founded 14 years ago when it was determined that most of the news media would not publish the official 303(d) polluted stream lists produced by the states themselves. These lists were produced in order to comply with the Clean Water Act (CWA). For example, Idaho maintained that only 34 streams qualified to be listed per the criteria of the CWA. (Criteria for streams to be listed include: inability of fish to reproduce, humans cannot swim in the waters because of chemicals or bacteria contamination). The media still is not comfortable with publishing this information because they fear advertising and subscriber retaliation.
CEEI conducted a poll in 1996 and found that, with a sample of 1,000 interviews, 99.9% did not know that Idaho had any polluted streams. (This poll was conducted in Ketchum, in the heart of the Idaho Rockies). CEEI notes that the actual Idaho list would take up to 19 pages of an average size tabloid. (The media cites all the 1 column, two inch stories they have run every two years about polluted streams as released by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)).
It turns out that Idaho had 962 streams that were polluted. Federal Judge Dwyer in Seattle then ordered Idaho to submit to the EPA the higher number because of evidence supplied by the Idaho Sporting Congress. In 1995 CEEI developed "a new way to look at the environment" by publishing the entire list of 23,000 303(d) streams in the United States and all associated information relating to the CWA, on the net at www.wcei.org.
The Clean Water Act report to Congress did not mention that only 19% of the streams in the country had been surveyed or the fact that most streams are incubators of Giardia (a bacteria that causes intestinal disease in humans and that is transmitted by livestock). It did not mention that most of the waterways in the East were also polluted by airborne mercury produced by coal fired generating plants. It was also determined that state committees usually vetted these stream lists to protect farmer, rancher and mining interests (state legislators realized that pesticides, fertilizers, and mining chemicals were bound to show up in these lists).
The CWA report, as provided to Congress in 1992, compiled by the EPA contained a total of 21,000 streams. Today the official lists report almost 30,000 polluted streams. CEEI believes, given all the factors cited above, that the actual number of 303(d) streams is more likely to be around 200,000 to 400,000. (CEEI simply doesn't know -- and neither does the EPA). EPA reports of the 2000 and 2002 surveys included only 12 and 14 states respectively, leaving out 81% of the states that had reported on time -- according to the National Resource Defense Council (NRDC), the EPA advised that they simply couldn't get the work done (approximately 5,000 streams were reported versus 40,000 streams cited by the states as polluted). The New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, San Francisco Chronicle, LA Times and other media outlets ignored this story. Far worse, both the relevant Republican and Democratic committees in the House and Senate also ignored EPA's inability to comply with the law.
The problem that CEEI has had with this list is that it presents a woefully short and distorted view of the true picture and status of the nation's waterways and water resources. We know that organizations like the Heinz Center in Washington DC surveyed many areas of concern about ecosystem health and found that the Clean Water Act simply was not producing surveys that could be used. They (150 leading scientists) made the statement that "it may be that all waterways may be polluted in the country right now with chemicals". see The State of the Nations Eco Systems (2002)
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. of the organization "Riverkeepers" believes that most streams, particularly on the Eastern Seaboard (east of most of the coal fired generating plants) are at risk and that the fish caught in them should be released and not consumed as most of them contain high levels of mercury. (This is well documented in the publication "Crimes against Nature"). In addition, streams being destroyed by mountain top mining in West Virginia are not listed.
It is CEEI's current mission to produce a new Endangered Species Early Warning (ESEW) web site to increase awareness of the magnitude of polluted streams in the United States. This information is a major indicator of environmental health, and represents the status of habitat data for hundreds of species -- including those that have not yet made the official lists but are at risk.
With the release of the ACIA's Arctic Climate Assessment Status Report on November 8, 2004 a paradigm shift is occurring. The country now faces climate and habitat problems for humans as well. The species that are at risk and have been identified by the WCU (World Conservation Union ) and the UN now number 15,000. In addition, 185 Arctic communities are going to be moved soon due to rising sea levels caused by global warming. CEEI's new web site <www.esew.org> will be focusing on those species that are now at risk (including humans) as determined by 8 nations that belong to the ACIA.
In it's report, the ACIA demonstrates a wealth of knowledge - the sheer magnitude of evidence indicates that even if we start to clean up the air now, it will take 1,000 years to restore the planet's equilibrium. Various computer models show that within 50 to 100 years most of the glacier ice and snow will be gone, that sea levels will rise (possibly 4 to 6 feet during this century) and that weather patterns will become increasingly unstable. America and the rest of the World, have been experiencing violent changes in weather patterns for the past ten years. (The 2004 hurricane season in Florida comes to mind and one can only speculate on whether the drought in the western United States for the last 7 years is indicative of what is to come.)
It is the mission of CEEI to stay abreast of this information using both it's ESEW and polluted stream (303(d)) web sites (and 11 additional sites now on the drawing board) to advance the awareness of current environmental knowledge and to provide factual, supporting data as well as other reports, photos, news articles, surveys, observations by native peoples, retired experts, students, scientists, bird watchers, ranchers and farmers. In short, by all people that concerned about their future on this the only planet we occupy.
CEEI provides outreach education to 12,000 high schools and 3,400 colleges and universities in the US, and has been nominated as the "most important environmental web site in the United States" three times by the United Nations and Sunset Magazine.
Center for Environmental Education and Information P.O.
Box 1778 Sun Valley, ID 83353 F/P 208-578-1557
Send E-Mail
A
JaxDesigns Development Company Website.
©2004,
Center for Environmental Education & Information.
Web Site Policies